A Better Reason for Suffering - Learning from Elihu Job 32-33

From Job 32-33, we can learn 3 things from the young Elihu. They are how to present your idea, our loving God and the better reason for our suffering, and thirdly, the hope of salvation - wishing for the mediator between God and man.

Job's three friends insisted that Job must have sinned to incur the punishment from God but they could not point out the particular sin that Job had committed. Their reasoning and insistence only increased Job's suffering. A young man, Elihu, presented a different view on suffering and point towards the hope of having a mediator, an intercessor between God and man.

Here is the mind-map:

The 3 things that we can learn from Elihu:

1. On Debate:  How to Present Your Case

• 1 Respect Others - let them say first 32v7
• 2 Listen carefully first. 32v11-
• 3 Say what the other say. 33v9-11
• 4 Let the other confirm
• 5 Say why you want to say 32v12,v17,18
• 6 Say without prejudices and bias; not to praise nor condemn.
• 7 Speak truthfully and sincerely 33v3
• 8 Give other the opportunity to ask 33v5
• 9 Speak on equal standing, not higher or lower 32v9, 21-22; 33v6
• 10 not threatening and pressuring 33v7
• 11 Encourage people to listen, accept v31
• 12 Giving other the opportunity to challenge, expressing one's willingness to listen v32
• "Seek first to understand and then be understood." ----Stephen Covey's 5th Habit for Effective People

2.  Our Loving God Saving Man from their fatal sin

• God speaks twice, but men listen not 33v14
• God speaks thru dreams and visions 33v15
• through their ears and heart 33v16
• God 's purpose: 
• prevent man from following their evil plan out of pride 33v17
• to keep them from falling into the pits, or killed. 33v18
• But Man hears not 
• God speaks thru their sickness - in bed, pains in bones 33v19, no apetite v20 weigt loss v21, nearness to death v22.
• C.S. Lewis — 'Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains.

3 The Hope of Salvation Coming of Mediator 

• God sends an messenger from His presence to teach man the way v23
• With the intercessor, God will save man v24.
  • foretell of Jesus Christ
• the restoration of body and life v25
  • The Result of Salvation - A New Life & New Body
• the return to God's acceptance, presence, and righteousness v26
• Reconciliation of God and Man
• Sharing of Salvation and enligthenment v27-28
  • The Command to Spread the Gospels
• God saving man 2-3 times v29-30
• God tries many ways to save man.

Lim Liat (c) 11-1-15