Psalm 116:12-19 (17)
We had just been given a fairly late model car. Actually I bought it. I was told that if I wanted the car I should add a dollar a month to my missionary giving that year.
I was overwhelmed. After driving a junker the thought of driving something respectable was delectable. After driving a moving repair bill the thought of having a reliable vehicle was enough to make me delirious. I was grateful but as I listened to the man’s story I began to understand what real gratitude meant.
He was grateful for God’s mercy and protection. He had been shot down over Germany during World War II. He survived the plan crash and walked out of the country under the cover of night. He sobbed as he relived the terror, suspense and anxiety. He was a Lutheran by up-bringing. Years later he found our church and during an invitation came and knelt on top of the altar. Our evangelical ways were foreign to him and yet he knew that God had spoken and he owed God all. Now God had spoken again. God told him to give his pastor a car. In gratitude for what God had done for him he knew that giving many cars would never repay his debt of love.
The Psalmist said the he would live for God, pay his vows and even die for God. Giving all as a sacrifice of thanksgiving seems as nothing in comparison to His great gift.
Dr. Gayle Woods
Job 1:20-22; 2:1-10
In these verses the writer informs us that Job was a model man of God. God boasted of him to Satan saying that “there is none like him in the earth.” What were his distinctives? What set him apart? Four things are mentioned. A look at the Hebrew words might help us in knowing better what kind of behavior and demeanor impress God.
Job was a perfect man – The root of the Hebrew word Tam means to be complete. In many instances it speaks of that which is ethically sound. For example the Psalmist says that we are to be “wholly” Gods (Psa 101). David said, “I will walk within my house with a perfect heart.” Psa 101:2 Tam means to be undefiled or upright and nine of the thirteen times that the word is used speak of Job. “Some of these utterances are no more than asseverations that the speaker is innocent of particular crimes laid to his charge; others are general professions of purity of purpose….Those who make them do not profess to be absolutely sinless, but they do disclaim all fellowship with the wicked, from whom they expect to be distinguished in the course of Providence” (A. F. Kirkpatrick, Cambridge Bible, Psalms, I, p. 87).
Job was an upright man – yashar – to be level, straight, upright, just, lawful. One of the characteristics of the blameless is that they live upright lives. Being upright suggests that the life is not bent toward sinning but rather toward pleasing God completely. Uprightness is a word that characterizes God and the people who emulate Him. It is a quality of heart and mind which causes a person to remain steadfast in his determination to do Gods will even when others cringe and cower under the pressure of differing opinion.
Job feareth God – yare – fearing, afraid – (see last lesson)
Job escheweth evil – sur means to turn aside, depart – Sur is used both in a negative and in a positive sense. It often speaks of the apostasy of Israel. It means to make a distinctive and definite act of removing yourself from where you were before.
To sum up these observations we would have to say that Job was a holy man . . . a model of the holiness lifestyle.
(Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament)
Dr. Gayle Woods
