Job 36 - What's Blocking Your Blessings

Daily Bible Study for Monday June 20, 2016

By: Hanny Lynn Stearns

Fish – N – Loaves Ministries

Multiplying God’s Word around the Globe!

Chapter Reading for Today: Please read in your Bible before proceeding. Note that most translations are considered paraphrases. The Young’s Literal Translation provides a more accurate translation since he is the one who authored a concordance. Others are helpful for seeing a different perspective, but we cannot always depend on their wording. I hope this is helpful to you. If you are studying in another version, that is fine. I am studying from the KJV, but for the purpose of this study, I will keep it with the New King James Version. One final note: I will put the scripture in italics to differentiate from my own writing. I am adding red to the letters when it is Jesus talking – just like the Bible. Thank you.

Bible Gateway Verse of the Day

Mark 8:36

For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?

Psalm 100:4

Enter into His gates with thanksgiving,

and into His courts with praise.

Be thankful to Him, and bless His name.

                                            Song:  Magnify The Lord With Me 

What’s Blocking Your Blessings?

It is amazing how wonderful God is even when we blow it big time, isn’t it saints? Here’s Job. He has been in this terrible pit for far too long by now. His heart has flip flopped all over the place like a fish jumping out of the water. His vacillation has kept him far from relief though it was never God’s will or plan for him. Let’s see what the Lord wants to tell us through the words of Elihu today…Let’s pray…

Heavenly Father,

You are so great and powerful and awesome! Who among men can understand Your ways? Yet, in all Your glory and majesty, You love people. You are always trying to help us when we get in trouble. Thank You for what You gave us in Your word to study today. Father, help us to glean every rich nugget of what You want us to apply to our lives today. I ask You to use my mind and speak through my hands and heart to give birth to Your word in all our hearts to bring fresh revelation and equip us to do the work You are calling each one of us to do. May Your desired message go forth through me unhindered and unchecked by any outside force or my flesh. I ask You in faith and thank You for what You have for every person reading this lesson in Jesus name. Amen!

The Bible says in everything to give thanks to the Lord!

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

In our human intellect it doesn’t seem to make sense to give thanks in each and every situation, does it? But that is exactly what the Lord wants us to do – the Bible says it and we must believe it. Today Elihu was asking Job to bear with him a little longer because there was more God wanted to say to Job through this prophet sent by God.

Job had gone on and on in his complaints and accusations, but now he was sitting still, quietly listening. After all, what else could he do at this point? He had run out of complaints and his misery remained.  

We can assume that he knew Almighty God was coming through Elihu to give him a fresh and accurate view of things – amen?! Elihu established first things first – God is powerful, He is wise and that is the best place to begin. If we understand that we know we can trust that what He does is right all the time. No person is as just or wise or powerful as God – no one! No devil in hell including satan himself can stand up to the great and awesome power of God. Yet in all His greatness and power, He cares for people. How many on the planet today really understand that about Him? After all, He is the one who created us, every single human that ever did or would live. Why would someone so loving create a bunch of people who couldn’t even take a breath without His help and then just leave them hanging? Well the fact is, He wouldn’t.

In his communication to Job, the Lord is making it clear that He will not let the wicked people off the hook nor neglect those who are poor and afflicted. He is the God of justice as we have looked at already in our study of Job. He judges everything correctly from the ground up so to speak. It is God who puts people in high places of authority. And He will make sure He gets their attention if they are messing up so He can give them a chance to straighten up. How is that for fair? Even when we blow it, He tries to come in and show us our errors so we can repent and get back on the straight path. And the even more amazing thing than that is that if the person repents, God promises to make them successful so they can go on to live a happy life – how’s that for grace? He judges rightly – He is a just Judge.

While some folks have turned so bitter that even their suffering for their sins will not cause them to repent, He works to save those who suffer by using that suffering to cause them to repent. Some will respond to it and others would rather stay in their pot of misery then to bow to anyone over them. That is extremely SADD-U-CEE! They would just as soon be miserable as to let anyone, including God Himself tell them what to do. And He won’t force them to straighten up – remember; we all get to make a choice for ourselves. They find out quick enough that it does not pay to go against God when they live in sickness and struggles of one sort or another and their lives get cut short – many even in their youths. What a waste of a good life that God had planned so many good things for. Can we even begin to imagine how that breaks His heart? I am sure we can’t!

When I was in my crisis that started back in 2003, I went into some extreme suffering such as I had never known in all my life. I had had some real ‘tough to handle’ times, but nothing compared to the blackness of that trial that lasted 4 long years. If you haven’t read some of the earlier chapters you can go back on my Blog site to get caught up and hear all the no so pretty details in order to gain understanding. (www.fishnloavesministires.blogspot.com)

And the thing about all that suffering is that even though the difficulties began right away, I did not have the good sense to walk away from it right then. I stayed in that mess and it just kept getting worse. Did God allow that? Yes He did. But was He responsible for any of it? Not at all.

Today in our chapter we can hone in on what God wanted to tell Job about his situation. In verse 15 we are told that God delivers the poor in their oppression and opens their ear. I was poor emotionally at that time. I had never been taught the many right things about how to live life the right way. There was something in me that deeply desired it. God knew that about me more than I knew it about myself. He knew that there was a whole lot that I didn’t understand. Sure, I knew I had done wrong in the way I left my husband and children. I knew I was making a terrible mistake. Yet even knowing all that, I couldn’t seem to pull myself together. Later, after moving to Florida I would look back at all that and wonder how I ever could have done all the things I did. I was shocked at my own self for the way I had hurt the people that I cared about the most in my life.

You see, God knows everything – the deepest parts of our hearts. He knows the things that we don’t even realize are there. He knew Job had some ‘stuff’ that had to be brought up and out if he was going to go on living life as a man of God. And although God didn’t choose this pain and heavy trial for his man of God, He allowed him to suffer through it because Job was not yet ready to really give up on his own way of thinking and just humble himself before God. He had all his junk coming up and out and the Lord had to wait until he was through. It’s sort of like Job was vomiting up the viruses in his soul, and God would wait and be there to wipe him off when he was finished – oh what a loving Father (Daddy) in heaven we have.

God did the same to me. When all that ugly stuff came out and I got good and ready to reach up for help, He was right there waiting. When we get to verse 16 in today’s chapter we get to see a wonderful ray of light in all the darkness that had surrounded Job since this all began. Elihu told Job that God wanted to help him and take away the burdens that were crushing him. Then he told him that God wanted to load him up with more than enough blessings – but he couldn’t. Why? Because Job had been so busy with arrogance, pride, and judgement about those who are wicked, and he was not ready to look at himself. He had been too busy being critical of others and not judging himself. Here is what the Bible says about that…

1 Corinthians 11:31

For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged.

What Job didn’t realize at the time was that up the road just a piece there was a load of blessings awaiting him, but he was completely blocked from getting them. Elihu made it clear as he spoke what the Lord wanted Job to hear that nothing (short of repentance that is) Job did would help him in the day of his judgment. Job’s anger and bitterness kept the road to blessings completely blocked for him.

Elihu told him not to let the cost of forgiveness (admitting you are wrong) keep him from God. Many can’t swallow their pride and end up dying in it. Though God had a lot of blessings stored up for them, they ended up storing up for themselves His wrath instead because of their hardness of heart…

Romans 2:5

But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God,

Job was warned not to be like evil people who try to find darkness to hide in. And just because we are suffering is no excuse to do the wrong thing. It took me quite a while to wake up to this. Little did I know in my crisis the enormous blessings God had waiting for me if I would just come to Him and repent. He was waiting for me though – every miserable step of the way – He was waiting. How many people in the world at large today would do a complete U-Turn immediately if they knew the blessings that awaited them at the end of their stubborn pride? But it doesn’t work that way. It would be like opening a Christmas gift before Christmas Day or getting dessert before dinner. God wants people to love and respect Him of their own will. And if they do that, He will bless them with more abundance than the human mind can comprehend!

Look back at verses 11 & 12 in our chapter today…

Job 36:11-12

If they obey and serve Him, they shall spend their days in prosperity, and their years in pleasures.
But if they do not obey, they shall perish by the sword, and they shall die without knowledge.

The following is one of many chapters and verses in the Old Testament that promise God’s blessings for obedience…

Deuteronomy 7:12-26

“Then it shall come to pass, because you listen to these judgments, and keep and do them, that the Lord your God will keep with you the covenant and the mercy which He swore to your fathers. ¹³ And He will love you and bless you and multiply you; He will also bless the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your land, your grain and your new wine and your oil, the increase of your cattle and the offspring of your flock, in the land of which He swore to your fathers to give you. ¹⁴ You shall be blessed above all peoples; there shall not be a male or female barren among you or among your livestock. 

¹⁵ And the Lord will take away from you all sickness, and will afflict you with none of the terrible diseases of Egypt which you have known, but will lay them on all those who hate you. 

¹⁶ Also you shall destroy all the peoples whom the Lord your God delivers over to you; your eye shall have no pity on them; nor shall you serve their gods, for that will be a snare to you.

¹⁷ “If you should say in your heart, ‘These nations are greater than I; how can I dispossess them?’— ¹⁸ you shall not be afraid of them, but you shall remember well what the Lord your God did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt: ¹⁹ the great trials which your eyes saw, the signs and the wonders, the mighty hand and the outstretched arm, by which the Lord your God brought you out. So shall the Lord your God do to all the peoples of whom you are afraid.²⁰ Moreover the Lord your God will send the hornet among them until those who are left, who hide themselves from you, are destroyed. ²¹ You shall not be terrified of them; for the Lord your God, the great and awesome God, is among you. ²² And the Lord your God will drive out those nations before you little by little; you will be unable to destroy them at once, lest the beasts of the field become too numerous for you. ²³ But the Lord your God will deliver them over to you, and will inflict defeat upon them until they are destroyed. ²⁴ And He will deliver their kings into your hand, and you will destroy their name from under heaven; no one shall be able to stand against you until you have destroyed them. ²⁵ You shall burn the carved images of their gods with fire; you shall not covet the silver or gold that is on them, nor take it for yourselves, lest you be snared by it; for it is an abomination to the Lord your God. ²⁶ Nor shall you bring an abomination into your house, lest you be doomed to destruction like it. You shall utterly detest it and utterly abhor it, for it is an accursed thing.

The fact is that God wants to bless His creation. Here is what it says in Proverbs…

Proverbs 10:22

The blessing of the Lord makes one rich, and He adds no sorrow with it.

The Lord has never changed His mind about loving people and wanting to bless them. Adam and Eve had everything in the garden before the fall. They lacked nothing. There was no sin, sickness, poverty – nothing but blessings and perfection surrounded them. The God who created and blessed them is the same God we serve today. We might say, “Well, if I had known God was going to do all this before I made those bad choices I never would have done all that.” The fact is, if we won’t love God when we have nothing, we won’t love Him when we have wealth and plenty. It is as true as the law of gravity. God wants to have our love and affection first. After that He will load us with benefits daily…

Psalm 68:19

Blessed be the Lord, Who daily loads us with benefits, the God of our salvation! Selah

If I had known what I know now about the goodness of God I would like to think I would have given Him my full affection way back then. But the fact of the matter is that I was a very damaged soul, and no matter how we turn the coin, I would not have been able to love God for who He is if all I got was what was in His hand.

He is a person of love. That is what He is and what He stands for. We have feelings that can be hurt – so can His. Who among us would want someone to be around us just because we give them good gifts, but after the gift was distributed they took off and chose to spend their time with someone else? Can anyone relate?

Maybe like me you have family members or friends whom you have helped and they turned around and stomped on your heart and acted like you meant nothing to them. It happens all the time. People get in a bind and they go to someone – usually a family member to try and tug on their heart strings to get them to give them what they need, and then they are gone - nowhere in sight. They would rather spend their time someplace else or with someone else. I have experienced this in my own family and it is a painful reality – I know.

The thing is, we have to understand that God has to have the first place in our hearts. He is a jealous God and will not share that spot with another. And when others hurt us, we just have to forgive them. If we don’t, we will be blocking our blessings from God.

Some of the things that block our blessings are listed below…

Fear

Doubt

Worry

Unbelief – lack of faith

Anger

Bitterness

Unforgiveness

Pride

Selfishness

Need I say more? All of these things get us nowhere with God and He cannot bless those types of behavior in anybody. We may think we are doing lots of things right and wondering why we are not getting blessed. But God knows the hidden man of the heart…

Proverbs 21:2

Every way of a man is right in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the hearts.

What I didn’t realize back in my crisis days was that I was full of anger and bitterness. I was critical and judgmental toward others, and I was prideful - thinking only I could do the things that needed to be done right. Yes, even perfectionism is pride and it is evil. The list goes on. I was full of fear, doubt and worry. I was afraid of people. I was afraid of lack. I was full of fear. God cannot bless that kind of behavior. We have to walk in complete faith in Him and trust Him by casting all our cares of Him…

1 Peter 5:7

casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.

I think the thing I like in this chapter the most is that God is coming to Job after he has put himself literally through the ringer and says in essence, “Hey, Job – I love you so much. I don’t want to see you struggle like this. I want to continue to bless you – even more than I did before. But Job, you have got to change your heart, son. If you will acknowledge your sins of pride and self-righteousness, I will forgive you and load you up with all kinds of blessings and prosper you more than you can imagine.”

Bless the Lord’s heart! He is so sweet and loving and kind. He is always trying to give us another chance. He never gives up on us like we give up on ourselves. I had given up on myself completely. That’s why I tried to commit suicide. I did not think there was one shred of hope left for me. I was certain that I had blown it so badly that there was just no turning back. The damage had been done and the only way out was death – just like Job had thought. Little did he or I know how great and merciful God really is. Not yet at least.

Ephesians 2:4-10

 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.

How can we not love God who would love us like this even in the midst of all our muck? Hallelujah! If this verse does not convince someone of God’s amazing grace and mercy, nothing will. If we who are human would love our kids even when they are doing the worst possible things to us or around us, how much more does God, the one true God love us… 

Romans 8:37

 Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come,  nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

That is love saints – it doesn’t get any better than this – hallelujah! Thank You Jesus! Elihu finished the chapter by discussing the greatness of God which no one can understand. He does such mighty things – who can comprehend it? But the verse we need to grab a hold of the most in the last verses for our lives is in verse 24. We need to praise Him at all times and in every situation no matter what. When I was trying to come up out of my pit, I learned one thing that I believe is a key to God’s heart – praising Him in the middle of the storm. Yes, no matter what it looks like or feels like, the only response from us should be a heart of true praise. He is always worthy of our praise, regardless of our circumstances. And the thing is, praise moves His hand in ways we could never imagine. It shows Him true love by trusting Him in the heat of the battle.

Paul and Silas praised him in jail and the prison doors flew open. The Israelites praised Him at the walls of Jericho and they fell down. What is standing in your way right now that God won’t bring tumbling down in response to your heartfelt praise of Him? I saw the Lord blow open doors for me and the windows of heaven were opened to me in ways I never imagined. And when I messed up, those same windows and doors would close. But confession and repentance opened them up wide once again. What a great God we serve. He is worthy to be praised at all times. When the Lord calls us to do His work, there will be much opposition by satan and his helpers. But it is nothing God can’t see us through…

1 Corinthians 16:9

For a great and effective door has opened to me, and there are many adversaries.

Job was used by God to bless many and he prospered greatly and had a wonderful life as he had walked with God. When this happens we can’t think for a moment that satan won’t be looking for ways to hinder our work. But God is able to keep us and protect us as we place our full trust in Him – glory to His name forever.

Questions:

What were some of the characteristics about God that Elihu pointed out in this chapter?

Which part of God’s character stood out to you the most? Why?

What does God try to do for His children who have gotten themselves into trouble?

What is the best attitude to have toward the Lord in any and every situation?

Explain in your own words the wonderful promise contained in verse 11. Are you living this kind of life? If not, why not?

Habakkuk 3:19

 The Lord God is my strength;
He will make my feet like deer’s feet,
and He will make me walk on my high hills.

There are three main points to consider from today’s study… 

As big and powerful as God is – He still loves people

No matter how bad we have blown it the Lord is ready to give us another chance

God wants us to be loaded with blessings

Let’s pray…

Heavenly Father,

Thank You for bringing me out of darkness and helping me to live right before You so You can bless me. Father, I ask You to forgive me for any attitude or action that I have done that has been prideful or wrong in any way. Show me the error of my ways and I will be quick to repent. Lord, I want to live a life that pleases You. I want to be blessed so I can be a blessing to many other people. Thank You for being so good and so loving all the time – even in my darkest hours. In Jesus name – amen! 

Will you let God show you what’s in your heart so He can bless you?

And God Said… You fill in the blanks.

Isaiah 30:18-26

Therefore the Lord will wait, that He may be gracious to you; and therefore He will be exalted, that He may have mercy on you.
For the Lord is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for Him.

For the people shall dwell in Zion at Jerusalem; you shall weep no more.
He will be very gracious to you at the sound of your cry; when He hears it, He will answer you.

And though the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your teachers will not be moved into a corner anymore, but your eyes shall see your teachers.

Your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” whenever you turn to the right hand or whenever you turn to the left.

You will also defile the covering of your images of silver, and the ornament of your molded images of gold.
You will throw them away as an unclean thing; you will say to them, “Get away!”

Then He will give the rain for your seed with which you sow the ground, and bread of the increase of the earth; it will be fat and plentiful. In that day your cattle will feed in large pastures. Likewise the oxen and the young donkeys that work the ground will eat cured fodder, which has been winnowed with the shovel and fan.

There will be on every high mountain and on every high hill rivers and streams of waters, in the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall.

Moreover the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day that the Lord binds up the bruise of His people and heals the stroke of their wound.