From God’s Perspective
by Fr. David M. Knight
Friday, October 4, 2024
Twenty-Sixth Week of the Year
Feast of St. Francis
Lectionary 459
Jb 38:1, 12-21; 40:3-5/Lk 10:13-16
Job 38:1-21; 40:3-5: We must sympathize with the editor who selected these verses out of chapters 38 and 39, which are too beautiful and too powerful to be abridged by a single line. Finally, God rises in his own defense. It takes the form of attack on the presumptuousness of any creature who, not knowing the ultimate answers to anything, dares out of the depths of ignorance and powerlessness to question God who knows All and can do All.
Then the LORD addressed Job out of the storm and said: Who is this that obscures divine plans with words of ignorance? Gird up your loins now, like a man; I will question you, and you tell me the answers!
Where were you when I founded the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its size; do you know? Who stretched out the measuring line for it? Into what were its pedestals sunk, and who laid the cornerstone while the morning stars sang in chorus and all the sons of God shouted for joy?
God doesn’t need to answer argument for argument. If we enter into any dialogue with him—or with ourselves, questioning his ways—we must be clear from the outset that whatever God says is true; we simply need to try to understand it. And whatever God does is good, because he is Goodness Itself and can only act out of love. His creatures may do evil, and he may permit it. But it is not because he is weak or uncaring. Whether we understand what he does or not, we have to begin and end every inquiry with Job’s admission: “Behold, I am of little account; what can I answer you? I put my hand over my mouth.”
This is the Fear of the Lord that is the beginning of Wisdom. If we don’t keep ourselves, God and everything else in perspective, all of our judgments will be distorted. (Psalms 111:10; Proverbs 1:7; 9:10)
But we have to begin early; before tragedy strikes us and renders all reason irrelevant. The loss of health; of loved ones; failure when we have prayed our hearts out for success; falling into sin when we have been trying to do better; betrayal by those we trusted; a situation of apparently inescapable abuse; the corruption of those in high places—any of these can tempt us to doubt God and blame him. When blinded by pain, it is hard to see God clearly. That is why we need to look long and hard at him ahead of time. And decide that, no matter what happens, we will “love the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our mind, and strength.” Unwaveringly.
Luke 10:13-16: The hardest to convert are those who think they are already converted. They have enough religion to think it is enough. So they ignore the call to “more.” They lack perspective. “Fear of the Lord” is awareness there is never “enough” with God.
Initiative: Take your stance toward God. Work out of non-negotiable adoration.
Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry
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