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Hey, Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango, and I'm your host for the Bible department podcast, powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the Journey family. Welcome to day 320 here on the Bible Department podcast. I'm super, super excited. Today we've got job chapters 25, 26, 27, and 28. Four chapters of the Bible. And in my humble opinion. I know I'm letting the cat out of the bag early, okay. But in my humble opinion, Job chapter 28 may be some of the best reading on wisdom that I've read in all of the wisdom literature of the Bible. It may be my favorite chapter of the book of Job so far. I'll say so far. It may be my favorite chapter of Job so far, and it may be one of my favorite chapters of the bible. Job, chapter 28 is gold. So, hey, if you haven't done the reading today, stop this video, pause the audio, go get the reading done, because I. I promise you. Okay. Job, chapter 25, very, very short. 26 to 27, not long. But honestly, job, chapter 28 is incredible. And I don't want to shortchange chapters 25, 26, and 27 that it's all. It's all great reading, but, man, job chapter 28, gold. All right, if you have done the reading, let's dive into today's episode. Like always, I'm going to give you a context clue or two or three or whatever. Going to give you context, historical, cultural, linguistic context. And then we're going to dive into a couple of nerdy nuggets. I got five written down today. It's kind of been a rhythm I've been in as we have trekked through the book of Job together. And then, like always, I'll leave, leave us off, send us off, kind of, you know, commission us with a timeless truth for the day. Let's dive in. All right, I've already started talking about job chapter 28, so I may as well kind of talk through what's going on with Job chapter 28, because it is kind of odd. Okay? It's an odd chapter. Okay. So most people are going to assume that job, chapter 28 is spoken by Job. All right, and why? Well, you know, we've been in this rhythm where Eliphaz is going to talk. You know, Eliphaz is going to talk Bildad's going to talk, Zophar is going to talk, right? Like Eliphaz talks, Then Job responds, then Bildad, then Job responds, then Zophar, Then Job responds. All right, so because we're in that rhythm, you just kind of assume what's going to happen in chapter 25 is, Bill, Dad's going to talk. Now, this is the shortest speech that Bildad's going to give. It's only six verses. So you can look at chapter 25 right now. And you know, you can look at it in your Bible. It's short, man. It's like really, really short. And then Job's going to start responding, and he's going to respond in chapter 26. A lot of chaos language. We'll come back to that. And then chapter 27, I want to actually read these verses for you. So Job, chapter 26, verse 1. Just three words in the whole verse. Then Job replied, that's it. And then chapter 27, verse 1, says this. And Job continued his discourse. Okay, fantastic. Let's skip chapter 28. Let's go to chapter 29. Okay, it says this. Job continued his discourse. So we get, you know, Job is talking in chapter 26, verse 1, Job's talking in chapter 27, verse 1. Job's talking in chapter 29, verse 1. Fascinating. So who's talking in chapter 28? Now most people assume, since Job is talking before chapter 28 and he's talking after chapter 28, Job's talking in chapter 28. And you would be incorrect if you came to that conclusion. It is not Job. Okay? And multiple versions of the Bible are gonna actually, like, low key get this wrong. Okay? So in the same way that you know, chapter 26, verse 1, 27, verse 1, and 29, verse 1, all tell you, like, who's talking. A lot of versions of the Bible will insert a label here, okay? So the ESV does it. The ESV is going to put a little heading in the niv. The heading just says interlude. Okay? Where wisdom is found. That's what the NIV does. Just says interlude, where wisdom is found. But not every version of the Bible is gonna do that. The ESV labels this. Job continues, where is wisdom? So the ESV is making a claim that chapter 28 is written or is spoken by Job. However, the NIV is making it pretty clear this is not Job. So this is a debate. This may not even be a debate that you care about, but it is a debate. Now here's the next little clue is the entirety of The Book of Job is a chiasm. And good chiasms have something in the center. And the thing that's in the center is actually the whole point, the whole purpose. And guess what? The center of the entire Book of job is. Chapter 28. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. You're right. Chapter 28 is the center of the chiasm. So chapter 28, verse one has no beginning, doesn't tell us who's talking. You can assume it's Joe, but that would be an assumption. It's very, very different than everything else that we have in the entire book. And I, you know, just going to throw my hat in the ring here, I'm going to say, I think that this is the narrator. The same narrator who tells us in Chapter Chapter 1 in the prologue and in the epilogue, like, you know, narrates what's happening, the portions of Job that are narrative. I think the narrator is interjecting that human wisdom has gotten everybody to where as far as they can go. And then chapter 28. I actually think that the entirety of the Book of Job is built on chapter 28. All right, so that's our big context for the day. Okay, Bildad, part three is Job, chapter 25, Job's response to Bildad and all of his friends is Job, chapter 26 and 27. And then Job, chapter 28 is the center of our chiasm in the entire point of the Book of Job. And those are the four chapters that we have assigned for us today. Okay, so if you kind of want to wrap your head around, what are these four chapters doing here and what purpose do they serve at this point and juncture of the book? Chapters 25, 26, 27, 28 are Bildad's, you know, last. You know, he's a thorn in the flesh. It's his last twisting of the thorn in Job's side. Job responds in chapter 26, and then in chapter 27, he's responding to all of his friends. But then chapter 28, wisdom starts to talk. So with that context, let's dive into our nerdy nuggets. Okay, family, the wait is over. My brand new book, Crushing Chaos is out now and available everywhere. Books are, are sold. Literally. Today I walked into a Barnes and Noble and I signed a bunch of copies at a physical location. So you can grab this book at a physical Barnes and Noble or you can go to a Books a Million or Amazon or anywhere books are sold and grab a copy. If you enjoy reading the Bible from an ancient perspective, if you Understand that the beauty of scripture is actually knowing it in context. Then you'll love this book. And if there's any chaos in your personal life, I think that reading the Bible from an ancient perspective can actually help to crush the chaos in your life. I think this book is going to be a New York Times bestseller. I really do. I think we wrote a good one. I think you should get a copy today. All right, back to the episode. Job, chapter 25. This is Bildad, part three. And all I gotta say here is, dude, Bildad only gets six verses. And here's the irony. The irony is that Bildad isn't wrong when it comes to the nature of God. It's just that he's wrong about Job. So, Job, chapter 25, what does it say? It says, this dominion in all belong to God. Amen, Bildad. He establishes order in the heights of heaven. Amen, Bildad. Can his forces be numbered? On whom does his light not rise? How then can a mortal be righteous before God? Most of us would say, yeah, Paul. This is what Paul argues in Romans. No one's righteous. No, not one. For all have sin have fallen short of the glory of God. Okay, so in a real way, Bildad's right. Job, what's this? Righteous? No one's righteous before God. How can one born of woman be pure? Even if even the moon is not bright and the stars are not pure in his eyes? How much less a mortal who is but a maggot? God dang, that's fighting words. Bildad calls Job a maggot. You maggot. That's so mean. A human being who is only a worm. Dang. Job gets called a maggot and a worm. Now if here's the irony is that in a little bit, when Yahweh actually comes down to speak to Job, it's no different. The conclusion really is, who's this mortal that dares talk to me? Who is this mortal that thinks he even has the right to, like, approach me? So again, and this is just what's so trippy with all the content from the book of Job is that these guys are right. They just happen to be wrong in terms of the application. He's wrong about Job. Job is blameless. Okay, so right, but so wrong. Which that should be the theme. That should be the subtitle of the book of Job. Job, so right, but so wrong. Okay, it says this. Job, chapter 26, verse 1. Then Job replied, verse 2. How you have helped the powerless. How you have Saved the arm. That is feeble. What advice you have offered to one without wisdom and what great insight you have displayed. This is sarcasm. If you can't tell who has helped you utter these words and whose spirit spoke from your mouth, okay, this is just straight sarcasm. The dead are in deep anguish, those beneath the waters, and all that live in them. Okay? And so then Job is going to break into a creation poem. We got a lot of these in the book of Psalms, right? These what I would call mythological kind of retellings or versions of the creation account. In this creation account, I would say that job, chapter 26, verses 7 through 14, I would consider that a creation poem. He spreads out the northern skies over empty space. He suspends the earth over nothing. This stuff is beautiful. And like always, if we're going to have creation language or creation poems, we're going to get this mythological language. So what does Job say in Job, chapter 26, verses 12 and 13? He says this. By his power, he turned up the sea. By his wisdom, he cut Rahab to pieces. By his breath, the skies became fair. His hand pierced the gliding serpent. This is deeply mythological language. This is this chapter, chapter 26, with the creation myth and a focus on the deep and a particular sea monster named Rahab. Job is kind of foreshadowing chapters that we're going to get later on where God is going to respond. It's almost like God's responding to what Job says here in job, chapter 26. He's like, I'm so glad, you know, how about the creation and about these sea dragons and sea monsters. Let me tell you some stuff that you don't know, okay? Let me use this foundation of understanding that you've displayed here in chapter 26. And let's expand it, let's build upon it. It's crazy to me that in the middle of Job's chaos, he is commending a God who contained chaos. I love this, and I don't want to steal my thunder, but this is our timeless truth for the day. John the Baptist wasn't able to do this in the New Testament based on his own personal experiences. He made an assumption about Jesus based on personal experience. So since Jesus wasn't delivering him out of his suffering and his prison, he sent people to Jesus to ask, are you really the one, or should we be looking for somebody else, bruh? Am I the one? You are the one that said, I'm the lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world. What are you talking about? You're the One that baptized me. What are you talking about? So your personal offense with me is causing you to doubt who I am. There should be a massive firewall between your personal experiences with God and what you just know to be true about God. Right? I say this all the time. Whether or not God provides for you has nothing to do with whether or not he's a provider, period. Whether or not he heals you has nothing to do with whether or not he's a healer. And people's personal testimonies are amazing. And we don't want to discredit anybody's personal testimony. But personal testimony can't be the only reason that you believe all these amazing things about God. We don't believe in these amazing things about God just because another person can prove that they happen. No, we believe amazing things about God because the Bible tells us amazing things about God because this is the first cultural value at the Garden. The Bible is how we know God. My personal experience is not how I know God. The Bible is how I know God. Okay, so that's kind of my timeless truth of the day. I'm just so impressed that Job is dealing with chaos. And he can still say, by his power, he churned up the sea. By his wisdom, he cut Rahab into pieces. He can still acknowledge this is a God that crushes chaos. Low key, shameless plug for this book, crushing chaos. Job admits Yahweh alone tames chaos. And how do I know that Yahweh tames chaos? Because Job is using chaos language, the sea, the deep Rahab, to talk about God's dominance over the creation. Okay, next little nerdy nugget is, is Job, chapter 27. Okay, Job, chapter 27, verse two to four. We're going to have his oath of innocence. Job is going to give an oath of innocence. Listen, here says this as surely as God lives, who has denied me justice, the Almighty who has made my life bitter. As long as I have life within me, the breath of God in my nostrils, my lips will not say anything wicked and my tongue will not utter lies. So I'm not going to admit that I'm guilty when that's not the truth. Then it says this, verse 5, I will never admit you are in the right till I die. I will not deny my integrity. I will maintain my innocence and never let go of it. My conscience will not reproach me as long as I live. Job is like, I, I have to. I'm taking an oath of innocence. Now this oath of innocence is going to get blown up and like, expanded. And he's going to have to give an oath of innocence in order to talk to the Lord. Okay, so we're going to get more oath of innocence content from chapters 29 to 31. But this is a condensed version of that oath of innocence. All right. And then last. Okay, chapter Dang on 28. I love chapter 28. It starts this way. There is a mine for silver and a place for gold. Where gold is refined, Iron is taken from the earth and copper is smelted from ore. Okay, so these are all what, precious metals? Okay. And jewelry. Okay. Silver. Okay. Gold, iron. Okay. Copper, all this stuff. Like, there's a place where humans, like, take this stuff from the earth. Okay. Mortals put an end to the darkness. They search out the farthest recesses for ore in the blackest darkness. Okay, so ore is another ingredient. Silver, gold, iron, copper ore. Far from human dwellings, they cut a shaft. In places untouched by human feet. From far from other people, they dangle and sway the earth from which food comes. So now we're at food. Okay, Food comes from the earth as well. Lapis lazuli, okay. Comes from the rocks and does contain nuggets of gold. Okay. No bird of prey knows that hidden path. No falcon's eye has seen it. Proud beasts do not set foot on it. No lion prowls there. Okay. People assault the flinty rocks with their hands. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Okay? They tunnel. This is verse 10. They tunnel through the rock. Their eyes see all its treasures. They search the sources of the rivers to bring hidden things to light. And then it's all going to shift. Here we go. But where can wisdom be found? Where does understanding dwell? Drop the mic like that is such a freaking dope setup to say, but wisdom can't be found on the earth. You can find silver on the earth, you can find gold on the earth, you can find iron on the earth, you can find copper on the earth, you can find ore. You can find precious metals. You can find lapis lazuli. You can find treasures. You can find hidden things. You can do all that humans can get all that. They can search the sea, they can search the earth. They can find all this stuff, but they can't get wisdom. Verse 13. No mortal comprehends its worth. It cannot be found in the land of the living. The deep says it's not in me. The sea says it is not with me. It cannot be bought with the finest gold, nor can its price be weighed out in silver. It cannot be bought with the gold of Osphere Ophir. Ophir with precious onyx or lapis lazuli. Neither gold nor crystal can compare with it, nor can it be had for jewels of gold. Okay, just on and on and on and on and on. And what is the point? Verse 20, chapter 28. Where then does wisdom come from? Since it doesn't come from the earth, you can't. You can't dig for it, you can't mine it. Where does understanding dwell? It is hidden from the eyes of every living thing, concealed even from the birds in the sky. And then it all culminates in the last verse. And he said to the human race, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom. And to shun evil is understanding what a good chapter of the Bible. Hey, there is no wisdom found on earth. God is the only one who can make you wise. God is the only one who can give wisdom. You can get gold out of the earth. You can get silver out of the earth. You can get copper out of the earth. You can get ore out of the earth. You can get a lot of things out of the earth. Can't get wisdom out of the earth. Can't dig for it, can't tunnel for it, can't mine for it. The only thing you can do is pray for it and fear the Lord. And God will begin to make you wise. And if he makes you wise, oh, man, Then guess what? Everything becomes at your disposal. I don't know. If you ever talk to somebody and you just think to yourself, yep, I would have never thought to ask that question. Or I would have never thought to ask myself that question. Or look at it that way. That person is wise. They're wise. And it is the pursuit of wisdom that actually begins to make you wise. And whether or not you even know where to go looking for wisdom is already a proof that you're either wise or not wise. Wisdom, you can hear proverbs being echoed. Hey, wisdom is more valuable than gold. It's more costly than crystals and Jasper and all these other things. So the price of wisdom, but also the person who ultimately holds the key for wisdom, is the whole point of chapter 28. And now that we're at the chiasm, okay, now we're at the halfway point, and everything starts to shift from this point out. And everything is gonna start to mirror what's come buff for it. But that is chapter 28. And we already tackled our timeless truth for the the day. We kind of did a little out of order. I gave you our context clue, and I was giving you nerdy nuggets. And then I kind of slipped our timeless truth in there. And then I gave you my last nerdy nugget for the day. What a good day on the podcast. Tomorrow we've got day 321. Day 321. We're going to be looking at job chapters 29 to 31. I cannot wait. Same time, same place. I'll be here. I'll only question is, will you be here? If you're on a streak, I'm proud of you. If you're not on a streak, I love you. There is now no condemnation for those of you who are in Christ Jesus. Anyway, just playing. Love you, love you, love you. I'll see you tomorrow. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the show@thebibledepartment.com and on Instagram at the Bible department. If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into the Bible, you can get free access to our library of courses@thebibledepartment.com we'll see you back here tomorrow.