The eyes of the LORD are in every place. His eyes are upon all men’s ways: they are not hid from His face, neither is their iniquity hid from His eyes.
God offers no account of anyone (apart from Jesus Christ) who ever suffered quite like Job. Job in many ways serves as an example for believers today.
Every believer will stand before the Lord Jesus Christ to give an account for his stewardship while living upon this earth. Perhaps no one understood this quite like the apostle Paul. He was the apostle of the Gentiles (Romans 11:13) and had a special calling as a steward “of the mysteries of God” (1 Corinthians 4:1). He spoke often about the fact that the gospel had been put in his trust (1 Thessalonians 2:4; 1 Timothy 1:11; Titus 1:3). The apostle Paul feared what would happen if he failed to fulfil his stewardship (1 Corinthians 9:16-17) because he knew a time of accounting faced all believers including himself. Though Paul’s calling was special, the fact that he would give an account was not unique to him only.
Many of those in the world perceive prayer as a crutch or a tool that shows weakness. Yet, the saint of God knows prayer to be one of the most powerful weapons during times of war. As the Lord Jesus prepared to face the mob that would soon arrest Him, He spent His remaining time in earnest prayer (Matthew 26:36-46). It was during this time that He taught the disciples saying, “Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak” (Matthew 26:41). Prayer does not distract the believer from the battle at hand; rather, it strengthens him and aids him during even the fiercest parts of the battle. Prayer reminds the believer of who he is, who his enemy is, and it reminds him of the power of his God.
Rebellion is a willing conscious decision to refuse the instruction of another. The Lord describes this in Zechariah 7:11 when He said, “they refused to hearken and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear.” This is a powerful illustration and picture! It almost seems like the Lord has a hand on the shoulder of the rebel but when faced with the Lord’s instruction, a rebel pulls away from the Lord’s gentle grasp. As he pulls away, the rebel turns his back and closes his ears to the Lord’s instruction. The Lord affirms this in Jeremiah 32:33 when He said, “they have turned unto me the back, and not the face: though I taught them, rising up early and teaching them, yet they have not hearkened to receive instruction.”
Few men, if any, have been afflicted like Job. His troubles involved the catastrophic loss of family members as well as physical ailments beyond most people's ability to endure. During the depths of these difficult trials, Job's three “friends” (Job 2:11) visited him. They showed up to comfort him but instead turned out to be additional sources of grief. Each word spoken by his friends seemed to compound his already miserable condition and circumstances. Job did not consider this to be the work of a friend and told them that, “To him that is afflicted pity should be shewed from his friend.” Later in the same chapter, Job said that his friends dug a pit for him (Job 6:27). Job’s friends should have shown him pity during his troublesome times instead of scorning (Job 16:20) and abhorring him (Job 19:19). True friends know how to comfort and console their friends as they experience trouble and pain in life. They certainly do not unrighteously judge and condemn.
