So that everyone he has made may know his work, he stops all people from their labor. – Job 37:7

Today’s Scripture Reading (May 22, 2015): Job 37

I have to admit that I love “snow days.” You know, those days when the weather (where I live it is usually the snow) is so bad that you just can’t get into work. The schools close down and everyone just stays home. These are days to throw some extra wood into the fire place and just enjoy the pause because the weather isn’t going to let you do anything else. I need days of pause. I just don’t experience snow days very often (in fact, I really can’t remember when the last time was when I had one.) Part of the problem is that the city in which I live is just too prepared for snow. A good friend of mine spends his winter as part of the army of drivers manning the snow plows to make sure that I can get to work. A few years ago a blizzard hit on Saturday night. As I watched the snow fall (and accumulate on the ground) I was sure that no one was going to be in church the next morning. But the next morning came and we dug ourselves out and a few people were missing from the church service, but not many. Secretly, I am a little jealous of people whose city’s are a little less prepared for snow –and who just decide to shut down when the snow falls.

This is exactly the phenomenon that Elihu is talking about. As he speaks these words to Job, it is snow days that he has in mind. In his world, when the snow comes in winter, it meant that the farmer had to stop his work. He enjoyed a snow day (really a season of snow days.) And the snow day, the inconvenience of not being able to work, was a gift from God, It was also a reminder that even the things that we do with our hands, our ability to work, comes from God.

Too often we seem to believe that we are self-made people. That the things that we possess, we possess because of the sweat of our brow and the talent that we possess. But Elihu points out that every capability that we have to create with our hands, we have only because God has given it to us. And every capability that God gives to us, God can also take away – and sometimes by something as simple as a snow day.

But it is also quite possible that Elihu was pointing right at Job and the situation that had developed in his life. Job had once been able to create, but God had stopped him. And not only that, Job’s situation had influenced Elihu and Job’s other three friends ability to work. All five of them had stopped from their labors because of the action that God had taken. Elihu and Job’s friends would eventually decide to leave Job and go back to work, but Elihu makes sure that Job understand that if he  ever hoped to be able to work again, it could only happen because God had decided to end Job’s snow day.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Job 38