This post is part of my ongoing series of writing down my thoughts on the Bible passages I read each day. Some days I hope to have great insight that the Lord gives me, and many days, I will likely struggle through the text and not know what to write down based on what I read. My hope and prayer is that as I make this a habit, just as I did daily writing for so long, that I will improve on my ability to read and understand the passages I’m reading. Please keep in mind that many of these posts may be published late at night or with little time studying and simply be my first thoughts after reading. This is in no way a commentary that one should use to discern the Bible, but my own personal thoughts.
I’m still one day behind on my reading plan, but tomorrow I’m hoping to catch the rest of the way up.
Really just one big thing (kind of two) stuck out to me today. Job 36:20-21. 20“Do not long for the night, when peoples vanish in their place. 21Take care; do not turn to iniquity, for this you have chosen rather than affliction.”
At first, I had something to say about verse 20, but after looking into it a bit more and understanding some of the words used, I realize that the thought I had and what I wrote down in my Bible were completely not what the text was saying, and it would have been completely incorrect to say what I said was pulled from verse 20. It made me realize once again the importance of going to the scripture and comparing to scripture when one is teaching. I caught myself in this instance, but as I continue through the course of this blog writing my thoughts, there are likely going to be other heretical things, and while it’s somewhat up to me to control that (and I obviously don’t try and write heretical things) ultimately, it’s up to you. To compare back to scripture to see if what I said aligns with scripture. If it doesn’t, under no circumstances should it take precedence over what is written there.
The second real takeaway from what I read was from verse 21. The parallel of iniquity to affliction is interesting to me. It seems that he’s saying that he was in affliction (which is pretty easy to see bu what God allowed Satan to do to Job’s life) and that in that, he should not turn to iniquity. Which is so interesting, because it does seem that when we’re in our most pain is when we make those game-day decisions. Do you drink a bottle of wine? Or do you turn to the Lord? Do you go and let your sexual temptation take over you, or do you pray and silence yourself to hear from God?
We must be prepared for the day of our affliction so that we can be ready to still stand up in truth and not crumble to the darts of the evil one.