Can a man be of benefit to God? Can even a wise person benefit him? – Job 22:2

Today’s Scripture Reading (April 2, 2012): Job 22

Sometimes it is just easier to imagine this world working without God. Not that the evidence that we see around us doesn’t require God. I am honestly blown away with all that I see around me every day. The question that bothers me is why would he want to stick around for us? Is there anything that we can offer to him? What is it that God can get out of us – of what benefit are we to him?

So our reaction is to build up a belief system that says that after God finished with creating the world, he walked away. It is an old belief. It was the way that the people of the ancient world thought about their gods. In the story of Elijah on Mount Carmel, the prophets of Baal have to yell louder because Ba’al was thought to possibly be a long way off. The main job of the ancient believer was either to appease the gods or to try to not be noticed by them. The thought was that really all man could do was anger the gods. There was nothing that man could do to please them.

Except that the story of Job tells us a different story. In Job, God is pleased by the life of Job. He is proud of him. God treats Job like a proud Father treats his child. What he wants from Job is simply that Job would make the most of his life. And Job was doing precisely that.

It doesn’t make sense that God would benefit from us. But then it also doesn’t make sense that we would be react to our kids with pride – and yet we do. Maybe the highest honor we can give to God is with the way that we live our lives. And our friends may not understand, just as Job’s didn’t, but they aren’t our audience anyway. God is – and he is the only one that really matters.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Job 23