Job 23:10: “But He knows [the path] that I [Job] take; / When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold.”

December 18th, 2023 by Pastor Ed in devotional

Eliphaz mentioned God and gold in the last chapter: “Yes, the Almighty will be your gold / And your precious silver;” (Job 22:25). Job picked up on the idea and described how life is filled with tests that refine the believer like gold. Or you might say that in the furnace of trials and suffering, we become God’s gold. If gold is your god, then the furnace of affliction will weaken and embitter you. But if you are God’s gold, the furnace of affliction will purify and better you.

British author Malcolm Muggeridge said it well shortly before his death:

Contrary to what might be expected, I look back on experiences that at the time seemed especially desolating and painful, with particular satisfaction. Indeed, I can say with complete truthfulness that everything I have learned in my seventy-five years in this world, everything that has truly enhanced and enlightened my existence, has been through affliction and not through happiness,

Pastor A. Purnell Bailey (whose “Our Daily Bread” newspaper column inspired people around the world for 66 years) wrote of visiting an orange grove where a shared irrigation pump had broken down. The season was unusually dry and some of the trees were beginning to die from lack of water. The man giving the tour took Bailey to his own orchard where irrigation was used sparingly. “These trees could go without rain for another 2 weeks,” he said. “You see, when they were young, I frequently kept water from them. This hardship caused them to send their roots deeper into the soil in search of moisture. Now mine are the deepest-rooted trees in the area. While others are being scorched by the sun, these are finding moisture at a greater depth.” God wants us to not just survive the hard times but to grow stronger and purer through them.

“Thank You, LORD, for Your hand of care on us this day.”

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Job 23 KJV

¹ Then Job answered and said, ² Even to day is my complaint bitter: my stroke is heavier than my groaning.  ³ Oh that I knew where I might find him! that I might come even to his seat! ⁴ I would order my cause before him, and fill my mouth with arguments. ⁵ I would know the words which he would answer me, and understand what he would say unto me. ⁶ Will he plead against me with his great power? No; but he would put strength in me. ⁷ There the righteous might dispute with him; so should I be delivered for ever from my judge. ⁸ Behold, I go forward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him: ⁹ On the left hand, where he doth work, but I cannot behold him: he hideth himself on the right hand, that I cannot see him: ¹⁰ But he knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.  ¹¹ My foot hath held his steps, his way have I kept, and not declined. ¹² Neither have I gone back from the commandment of his lips; I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food.  ¹³ But he is in one mind , and who can turn him? and what his soul desireth, even that he doeth. ¹⁴ For he performeth the thing that is appointed for me: and many such things are with him. ¹⁵ Therefore am I troubled at his presence: when I consider, I am afraid of him. ¹⁶ For God maketh my heart soft, and the Almighty troubleth me: ¹⁷Because I was not cut off before the darkness, neither hath he covered the darkness from my face.