Job 18 offers another round of Job’s friend Bildad belittling Job for not admitting his sin. The language is as flowery as ever, but the gist of the chapter is more of the same: Job if you weren’t sinning you wouldn’t be going through all of this.
As we can imagine, Job is getting more than tired of this constant barrage of accusations. He fires back once again in Job 19. This time Job asks why they have continued to attack him “these ten times.” He points out he is innocent, and even if he weren’t innocent, what right would these “friends” have to accuse him? The matter was between him and God. Job goes on to tell us he has no one who talks with him or listens to him. All his friends are gone. His family is either dead or against him. Even small children make fun of him when they see him rise. After all that, Job makes an amazing affirmation: I know my redeemer lives and at the last He shall stand upon the earth. Job says somehow, he is going to see that.
In Job 20, Zophar attacks Job even harder, talking about the punishment that comes to the evil. He talks about being brought to poverty, having one’s food turn to poison in the stomach, and with a number of other illustrations, he points out God will retaliate against the wicked. The assumption is once again that Job is being punished for his sins and is, therefore, being numbered among the wicked at that moment.
Job responds again in Job 21, but this time he points out a reality we must all acknowledge: The wicked do prosper. Sometimes it is only for a season, but sometimes the wicked prosper throughout their lives, and not only they but their offspring. Job rightly notes the wicked are often spared when the poor and humble are not. Job wasn’t making this case, because he was evil and was asking why he was being punished when so many weren’t. He simply wanted his accusers to understand the fallacy of their arguments. God does not always punish the wicked in this world. They sometimes live good and full lives and go to their graves happy. Job acknowledges at that point the worms eat them the same way they eat the poor, but he wants his attackers to consider their line of reasoning and realize it contains more than one fallacy.
As we return to Matthew 18, we read again of the disciples asking Jesus who is the greatest in the Kingdom of God? Jesus’ response is familiar to us by now, after our readings of Mark and Matthew: The greatest is the one who is like a little child. Childlikeness, not childishness, is the stuff of God’s Kingdom. Jesus went on to tell the disciples not to be one who lead one of the little ones astray, and God would go after even one lost one, because it was not His will that even one should perish. Jesus’ call to faithfulness continued with a reminder to “pluck out” or “cut off” an offending appendage and go to heaven maimed rather than to go fully intact to hell. Jesus was serious about our sanctification, that is our becoming more and more like Him. We see this once again as the chapter continues and Jesus talks about forgiving those who sin against us. He told the disciples of the importance of forgiveness. Then He gave a process for going to someone who has sinned against us to restore the person to the body of believers. He closed the chapter by telling a parable about a servant who was forgiven a great debt by his master but wouldn’t forgive a small debt owed to him by a fellow servant. The master punished that servant severely. Jesus summed up the parable by saying that is the same way the Heavenly Father will treat us if we don’t forgive our brothers and sisters from our hearts. Point taken!