Job 23:3 – OH THAT I KNEW
Job 23:3 Oh that I knew where I might find him! that I might come even to his seat!
There will be times in your life where you feel like you are in the valley of the shadow of death. It is at these times where you may feel that God is not with you. Often when you are reading your Bible, the words that you are reading seem dry and you are simply reading the Bible as if you are going through the motions.
Not every moment of our spiritual life will be like Peter’s experience on the mount of transfiguration. During this mountain top experience, Peter felt very close to God. However, just because Peter was close to God, it did not mean that he had perfect understanding of the ways of God. Peter learned about the perfect will of God for his life after Jesus had ascended to heaven and he was patiently waiting with all the other followers for the Holy Spirit.
Just because you are in a period of your life that causes you to feel like nothing is going your way, that does not mean that God is not with you. In this passage, Job had been suffering so long that he desired to find God. Job knew that something was not right and even though he was going through so many trials, his desire was to return to a close relationship with God.
Job did not understand that God had never left him. God was there all along, God had just chosen not to make HIS presence known during certain portions of Job’s trials so that Job could prove his faith in God.
Have you ever seen a parent hide themselves from their toddler? The parent may be able to see the toddler the entire time, but the toddler does not know that. Some toddlers will play for a while before they realize that their parent is gone. Other toddlers will see that their parent is gone right away and start to cry in hopes that momma will come running.
We need to understand that just because we are not in the midst of a mountain top experience, that does not mean that God is not with us. Instead, we must learn to trust God when HE told us that HE will never leave us nor forsake us. These times in our life where it appears that God has forsaken us are times of testing to see how we will react. Will we realize that something has changed in our relationship with God and will we diligently seek to restore that communication?
When you are in a trial and it appears that God has forsaken you, that is the time that you need to seek HIS face diligently to learn the purpose of your trial. Too often, when the reading of the word of God seems dry unto us, that is the time that we put our Bible’s down and go do something else. That is the opposite reaction to what we should do. When it appears to us that God has forsaken us, that is when we should be most diligent in looking for HIM.
The next time you are reading your Bible and it seems dry, rather than shutting the Bible, stop and pray and ask God to open HIS word to you. God may not answer your prayer the first day, but if you are patient with God and daily request that HE speak to you, you will soon experience that wonderful feeling when God reveals HIMSELF to you in a new and exciting way.
You do not need to look at the map nearly as often when you are on the right road as you need to look at the map when you are not on the right road. When you are off the spiritual path or when you are in the midst of the storm, you may not find your life returning to normal right away, but if you remain patient with God and diligently seek HIS face, it will soon be over.