The Impatient Friend

 

    We all have the friends that we really love and like to be around, but they are impatient.  They finish your sentences, have to be the leader, and get annoyed when you don't catch on as quickly as they think you should.  I know I have been that friend at times, but it reminds me that no one is perfect and I use it as a humbling moment.  For us, it is sometimes better to keep our mouths shut rather than insist that we are right for the sake of the friendship.

    Job's friend Bildad was his impatient friend.  I bet it was really hard for him to sit seven days in silence.  He let Eliphaz say his peace and listened to Job's response, but enough was enough.  He had to speak up now.  He really should have spent that time thinking about how to get his point across because he sounded harsh.  We also need to acknowledge that this was a cross-cultural group.  All of them came from different places, so their responses were influenced by the culture in which they came from.

    Bildad took offense to Job's reaction to God.  He believed that Job's children got what they deserved and that Job should beg God to forgive him.  It comes across that Bildad beleived that Job's children ended up so bad because he was a bad parent.  Being a bad parent must be his sin.  Bildad went so far as to call Job a hypocrite.  Even if all this was true, this was not the way to say it.  

    Everyone is guilty of believing that other people don't live the way they should.  Some people are more judgy than others, but we all have attitudes and opinions about life.  However, the wisdom comes from acknowledging our own shortcomings.  Seeing ourselves for who we are before noticing other people's shortcoming to make us feel better.  Wisdom is applied when you know when and how to speak to others people if a sin has to be confronted and using God's Word.

    Bildad assumed that Job, his friend, was evil and God will never reward evil.  He was begging Job to turn from his evil, so that God could restore his joy and laughter.  He was harsh, but he really did care.

    Bildad was so close to the truth about wisdom, but was missing it.  We do have to seek wisdom, but he was stuck in tradition.  When we follow tradition, we never fully grasp wisdom.  It is like never taking off the training wheels off the bike to be able to go full speed and experience the freedom of riding a bike on two wheels.  

Job 8