Job 28 could just as easily have been penned by Solomon and placed in Proverbs. It is exceptional. Amid severe and prolonged suffering, Job looks for hidden wisdom. When suffering, we want to know a purpose for it, and we want to sense God. Yet suffering often dulls our ability to grasp wisdom and to sense God’s presence and His thoughts. Job says the earth is full of precious resources, yet wisdom eludes us while we suffer. Job sums up his experience and simply says when we suffer the best wisdom is to fear the Lord and to shun evil.
Adrian Timmons 
Just read and studied this chapter yesterday. It is an interesting study.
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Oh, Adrian, I started a note to you (a reply!) but somehow lost it… HERE IS A SECOND
ATTEMPT TO REFLECT TO YOU HOW YOUR THOUGHTS STIMULATED ME TO
GO TO THE SOURCE…
I noticed in this HIDDEN WISDOM response you didn’t use the usual pattern
of expressing your response to a biblical reference in a wise and summarizing
statement (although that thought pattern IS there –but rather the emphasis
seemed to be on making us curious enough to go to the source and DISCOVER FOR
OURSELVES THE MESSAGE AND CONCLUSION. And that is exactly what I did!)
I read all the way to the end of Job! (Which, I sadly admit I had not done in years!)
So I, of course, found new thoughts which might not have come to me in earlier,
less experienced years…
Thank you for the inspiration you have provided! I had been prodding myself with the
thoughts … that my housework…and gardening…and yardwork…and filing…take so much longer
now (at nearly ninety) that Bible reading has fallen by the wayside and that I NEED to return to it!
But I have been slow to do so in the middle of the mess. Pray with me for strength to do what is most important.
(Thought) Someone has come up with the thought that the letters in BIBLE stand for BASIC INSTRUCTIONS BEORE LEAVING EARTH…(but if you go to Safari browser, you will find several other interesting suggestions…by typing in the words–
acronym for BIBLE…try it. If it doesn’t work for you: CALL DON!)
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Thank you, Melba! It is always so good to hear from you. It’s always interesting to see how God uses what I do. This morning I preached on Genesis 49 with the blessing of the 12 tribes of Judah. I was kinda of dreading it–it seemed boring and not very good sermon material. But God gave me the right ending to the sermon as I was preaching and I had quite a lot of feedback about how helpful it was. I have looked at acronyms for Bible. After months of talking we just approved a Core Values statement for our church using an acronym for Christ: Compassion, Honor, Responsibility, Inspiration, Scripture, Truth. I’m thinking my next sermon series will be topical around those values. May God bless! Tell Don hi! I had such a great time visiting with him on the phone–need to do that again! Love, Adrian & Priscilla.
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