A few thoughts on the first of the nine:
Job 9:33 vs. 1 Tim 2:5
Probably the most obvious pairing of Job with Jesus is this one. This verse in Job comes in the middle of Job's response to Bildad's first rant (chapter 8). Notice especially verse 4 in chapter 8. Here, Bildad gets on Job's good side right off the bat by outright damning his dead kids. Job, earlier, has stated that what happened to him was what he feared most. I believe that he was referring to his practice of making sacrifices after each of his kid's parties in case they had sinned during them. Obviously, Job believed it was highly probable that they were in fact sinning, and obviously they were killed before he could perform his priestly duty. Bildad piles on.
Amazingly, (although we know already that Job was a fine upstanding man!) Job pretty much ignores Bildad and gets on with chapter nine, which mostly features a man stripped of his vain imaginations about God and who is left with the fact of God's transcendence. To wit: 1) he doesn't answer your questions 2) he works all the marvels of nature but is completely indiscernable by humans in any direct way (Job knows God is both immanent and transcendent at the same time!) 3) in a courtroom scenario things go poorly for man even to the point that Job seems to be accusing God of being unjust.
In 9:22 Job nails the negative side of Mt 5:45. Whereas Jesus points out common grace in the sermon on the mount, Job is accutely tuned into the common curse.
In 9:27-28 Job lays waste to the notion that death ain't so bad; I'll just choose to be joyful and lay aside my grief.
In 9:30-31 Job assures us that our attempts at works righteousness (which surely has to include climbing the spiritual ladder) not only fail but leave us in a worse condition than if we hadn't even bothered. Note the reference to the repeated theme in scripture of being clothed as a symbol of imputed righteousness here, and here, and here and here.
All this leads up to Job's plea for that which would solve many of the forgoing problems.
Rather than go any further, I leave you to ponder the great unity in scripture which is so strongly hinted at in just one chapter of one book in the Bible.
2 comments:
Don't be discouraged by lack of comments -- I think you have said enough, well enough, that I don't need to say anymore. Press on!
I was saving this quote from Calvin regarding Jacob's ladder:
It is Christ alone, therefore, who connects heaven and earth: he is the only Mediator who reaches from heaven down to earth: he is the medium through which the fullness of all celestial blessings flows down to us, and through which we, in turn, ascend to God…We also, who were not only fixed to the earth, but plunged into the depths of the curse, and into hell itself, ascend even unto God. John Calvin, Commentary on Genesis
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