Job 8 Devotional

Justice Is Not a Formula

Job's words, Bildad says, are nothing but wind (8:2). Then he asks the question at the center of his argument: does God twist justice (8:3)? The answer is no. But Bildad draws a cruel conclusion from it. Job's children must have sinned, so God handed them over to the consequences (8:4). The reader remembers Job rising early to offer sacrifices for those same children (1:5).

Bildad leans on the wisdom of earlier generations (8:8-10) and pictures the godless as papyrus without water and as a man trusting a spider's web (8:11-15). If Job is pure, he promises, God will restore him and fill his mouth with laughter (8:6, 8:21). The logic is simple: blessing proves righteousness, and ruin proves sin. Jesus rejected exactly that reasoning when he asked whether people who died in a disaster were worse sinners than others, and answered no (Luke 13:2-3). God is just, but his justice is not a formula for reading other people's pain. That leaves room to grieve with someone without explaining them.

To think about: Where are you tempted to read God's verdict from someone's circumstances, including your own?