Walking With Christ

(Part 2 of 7)

Job 38:3  Dress for action like a man; I will question you, and you make it known to me.(ESV)

There are moments in Scripture when the entire direction of a conversation changes.  Job 38 is one of them.

For chapter after chapter, Job has been asking questions.

Why has this happened?

Why does God seem distant?

Why do the righteous suffer?

Why are the wicked allowed to prosper?

Job wants answers.  Considering what he has endured, it’s difficult not to understand why.

He’s lost his children.

He’s lost his wealth.

He’s lost his health.

His friends have accused him of sins they can’t prove because their theology doesn’t have room for innocent suffering.

Job wants an audience with God.  He wants to present his case.  He wants God to answer.

Then the whirlwind comes.  God speaks.  And suddenly Job is no longer asking the questions.

God is.

“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?”

“Who determined its measurements?”

“Have you commanded the morning since your days began?”

“Have you entered the storehouses of the snow?”

“Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades?”

Question after question follows.

Job wanted God on the witness stand.  Instead, Job discovers that he’s the one being examined.

That makes us pause.

It should.

There’s something overwhelming about watching a suffering man demand an explanation from God only to have the Creator of the universe answer by revealing just how much of reality Job can’t see.

God doesn’t tell Job that his pain is imaginary.

He doesn’t tell him that his questions were meaningless.

He doesn’t even give Job the explanation we, as readers, received at the beginning of the book.

He reminds Job who is God.  And who isn’t.

Most of us recognize the weight of that moment.

Then Paul writes one sentence:

Romans 14:12  So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.(ESV)

And we keep reading.

Pause.  Read it again.

Each of us.

Will give an account.

Of himself.

To God.

The scene is less dramatic than the whirlwind.  There’s no thunder.  No description of creation.  No barrage of questions about stars, oceans, animals, and the foundations of the earth.

Just one quiet sentence.

But the direction of the questioning is exactly the same.

We spend enormous amounts of time asking questions about other people.

Why did they do that?

How could they believe that?

Why did they say that?

Why are they behaving like this?

What were they thinking?

How could they possibly justify what they did?

Sometimes those are legitimate questions.  Discernment matters.  Truth matters.  Accountability matters.

But Romans 14:12 turns the chair around.

Each of us will give an account of himself.

Not of his neighbor.

Not of his spouse.

Not of his pastor.

Not of his children.

Not of the politician he cannot stand.

Not of the church that disappointed him.

Not of the person who hurt him.

Himself.

That should make us pause at least as long as Job does.  Because one day the questions stop being ours.

We won’t stand before God primarily as commentators on everyone else’s failures.  We will answer for our own lives.

Our words.

Our choices.

Our motives.

Our obedience.

Our neglect.

Our stewardship.

Our treatment of others.

What we did with what God entrusted to us.

What we knew.

What we ignored.

What we excused.

What we blamed on someone else.

That doesn’t mean other people’s sins cease to matter.

Job’s friends were still wrong.  People really can mistreat us.  People really can sin against us.  People really can abuse authority, lie, betray, neglect, manipulate, and destroy.

God sees all of that.  But their accountability doesn’t replace ours.

That may be one reason we read Romans 14:12 so quickly.

Looking outward is easier.  The sins of another person are often much easier to analyze than our own.

Their pride is obvious.  Our pride has context.

Their anger is sinful.  Our anger has reasons.

Their neglect is inexcusable.  Our neglect happened because we were busy.

Their words were cruel.  Ours were merely misunderstood.

Their disobedience reveals character.  Ours was complicated.

We are remarkably talented at becoming expert witnesses in everyone else’s trial.  Romans quietly dismisses us from that position.  “So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.”

Job wanted answers.  God eventually answered.

Just not with the questions Job expected.

Perhaps that’s worth remembering whenever we become consumed with asking what everyone else will answer for.

There will be a time for questions.  But there will also be a time when the questions turn around.

And when they do, the person standing before God won’t be everyone else.

It will be me.

It will be you.

Job heard the voice from the whirlwind and became very small before a very large God.

Romans 14:12 gives us the same opportunity without the storm.

We don’t have to wait for the whirlwind.

We can stop now.  We can ask now.

What will I have to answer for?

Where am I using another person’s failure to avoid examining my own?

Where am I explaining what I should be confessing?

Where am I demanding accountability from everyone except myself?

Where am I so busy watching someone else’s life that I’ve stopped faithfully stewarding mine?

Those questions are uncomfortable.

Good.

Some passages make us pause because the scene is enormous.

Others should make us pause because one quiet sentence suddenly places us in the scene.

Job stood before God and discovered that the questions had changed direction.

Romans tells us plainly that one day they will turn toward us too.

Don’t rush past that.

Each of us.

Will give an account.

Of himself.

To God.

Pause there.