Creation as an eye opener
Job experiences a tangible crisis. His whole life is shattered. Sitting suffering in the ashes, he experiences a real blind flight. This lasts until Elihu directs Job’s gaze to the wonders of creation. As the story continues, God himself asks Job question after question about nature, none of which he can answer. This glimpse into creation becomes an eye-opener for Job. Although he does not receive any answers to his suffering, it puts him in the right position with God. Full of reverence, he worships Him. In our smaller and larger crises, it is more important and more healing that we encounter God’s holiness than that we are immediately freed from our suffering.
Creation is both: an excellent medicine cabinet and an eye-opener for God. When I was fighting hip osteoarthritis at a young age, I read a book about nutrition. There I found out that grains contain an important cartilage-building vitamin. Unfortunately, it is lost in the processing that preserves the grain. Since that day, we always grind the rye for our breakfast muesli fresh the night before. My haul from reading the book was: The closer to nature, the healthier and richer. Another time I heard in a lecture that there was a tribe of people who had linseed in their daily diet. These people did not get cancer. So flax seeds became part of my breakfast cereal… God’s creation contains everything we need for a healthy life. Job experienced inner healing through contemplating creation and encountered God.
Blind
Job experienced a real blind flight. He is miserable. He has just lost all his possessions, his children and his health. Now he sits in the midst of the ashes and scratches himself with a shard of clay (Job 2:8). He has no insight into what is going on behind the scenes. It is a spiritual blind flight. It is so bad that his wife recommends that he renounce God and die. A typical human reaction in times of distress. To this Job replies: «You speak like a woman who is stupid and godless. Shall we take the good from God’s hand, but reject the bad?»(Job 2:10 NLB). Presumably, Job conditioned in good times the certainty that God is good. That keeps him now. For it is written in the text that Job did not sin in going through this terrible crisis.
Recently I visited a person who was also suffering. She expressed in no uncertain terms that she was not at all in agreement with God. That is why she was accusing Him. She is also flying blind and cannot make sense of what is happening spiritually. Her conviction is that Jesus, because He bore all sickness (Isaiah 53:4), should heal her.
When Job’s three friends learn of the evil, they visit him. They do the best that friends can do in the face of adversity: they cry, tear their clothes and endure just being with Job for seven days without saying anything. Great!
Afterwards they talk via God and search for explanations for the suffering. They apply the principle of causality and search for the cause of suffering. In doing so, they – like all their imitators – fail miserably. They are flying blind. Job differs from his three friends in that he addresses God personally 58 times. Although he cannot understand and categorise anything, he remains in conversation with God. In this, Job can become a model for us.
Viewing
Elihu had kept silent until then because he was younger than Job’s three friends. But now he puts forward his opinion. In the course of his speech he challenges Job: «Listen to this, Job! Stand still and contemplate what God is doing wonderfully!»(Job 37:14 NLB). He refers him to creation. And when Job turns his attention to creation, something decisive happens: «Then the Lord answered Job out of the storm: «Who is it that darkens God’s wise plan with words without understanding? Come before me like a man! I will ask you questions and you shall teach me. Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me, if you know!» » (Job 38:1–4 NLB).
Until now, God has felt far away for Job, but now it comes to an encounter. The Lord typically speaks out of the storm. The word for storm is ruach (Spirit of God). God reveals Himself in His creation, obviously especially in the wind. To David, God spoke through the rustling in the Baka trees (2 Samuel 5:24), Elijah heard God’s voice from the soft whispering (1 Kings 19:12) and at Pentecost «a roar sounded from the sky like the roar of a mighty storm» (Acts 2:2 NLB). Analogous to the air, God is present in creation through his spirit. That is why it is said: «The winds you have made your messengers and flames of fire your servants»(Psalm 104:4 NLB).
The Lord also challenges Job to turn his gaze to creation by asking him many questionsWhere were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Who closed the sea with gates? Have you ever in your life called for the morning? Have you reached the springs from which the seas spring? Where is the way to the abode of light? Who has dug a channel for the downpour? Canst thou send forth the lightnings? Who gives food to the ravens?
After two chapters of such questions, Job answers: «I am nothing – how could I say anything back to you? I put my hand over my mouth. I spoke once and I won’t start again, a second time and I don’t want to do it again» (Job 40:4–5 NLB). Job recognises God’s greatness and majesty through a deeper engagement with creation. The appropriate response to the holiness of God is amazement and speechlessness, silence in awe. Job does not worship creation, but God.
Obviously, Job is so impressed by the encounter with the Holy God that his previous view of God or the world is completely shaken up and reordered: Who am I to accuse and question God?! This is the decisive breakthrough in Job’s biography. God can rise from Job’s dock.
Seeing
After this realisation, Job’s therapy with questions from nature continues for two chapters. The new thoughts are to become deeply anchored in Job’s heart. Then, when Job answers a second time, he utters the meaningful words: «Until now I knew you only by hearsay, but now I have seen you with my own eyes. Therefore I recant what I have said and repent in dust and ashes»(Job 42:5f NLB).
After suffering blindly for a long time, Job now becomes sighted. His relationship with God is raised to an unprecedented level. From hearing to seeing – and only through confrontation with the wonders of creation. His image of the world and of God changes elementarily. How great must this God be who does such great things! Job finds himself in the fear of God and humility. God does not belong in the dock, but must be worshipped. That is the meaning of life. God is God, we are human beings. He is the Creator, we are his creatures. David also found the reason for worship in creation: «Yours, O LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the honour and the majesty. For everything in heaven and on earth is yours» (1 Chronicles 29:11 NLB).
The «new» image of God given to Job has deep healing power. Job’s situation has not changed for the time being. Nor is he given an explanation for his suffering. In our smaller and larger crises, it is more important and more healing that we encounter God’s holiness than that we are immediately freed from our suffering. The contemplation and study of creation can help to achieve this breakthrough and turn blind people into seeing worshippers of God.. We can learn an enormous amount from Job. One lesson is that we turn to creation in the face of difficulties in life. God reveals himself in his creation. Paul writes: «Since the creation of the world, people have seen the earth and the heavens and everything that God has created, and can clearly recognise Him, the invisible God, in His eternal power and divine essence. Therefore, they have no excuse for not having known about God.»(Romans 1:20 NLB). Are you suffering? Go out into creation, contemplate it and find the holy God. He makes you see and heals with pleasure!
The tension of suffering and yet trusting and worshipping God is also found in Asaf: «Though my body and soul languish, yet, O God, thou art always the comfort and portion of my heart.»(Psalm 73:26 LUT). When I suffer, it is more important that I meet God than that I am healed immediately! Let us align ourselves with it in our needs!
Yes, by observing creation we are confronted with the majesty of God. We can draw conclusions about the Creator from what has been created. But this does not mean that we are in a personal relationship with God. God reveals himself not only in creation, but also in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15). And this approach to God is the key to giving us the right to call this holy God by the familiar title «our Father. «But to all those who received him and believed in his name, he gave the right to become God’s children.»(John 1:12 NLB). Holiness and intimacy, majesty and intimacy come together. Creation is an eye-opener to God. But personal access to the heavenly Father is only found in Jesus Christ.
Questions for the small groups
Read Bible text: Job 38:1ff; 42:5
- Are there situations in your life where you have lost perspective?
- What potential lies in exploring and contemplating creation?
- Have you also encountered the holy God in creation, so that you have been silent in awe?
- What do you say to the statement that in our crises it is more important and more healing that we encounter God’s holiness than that we are immediately freed from our sufferings?
- Do you know God only by hearsay or has your eye seen him? What do you base your answer on?
- Go out and look a little closer at some of the wonders of God’s creation!
