Job 42:7-17--God's Verdict

The Lord Rebukes Job's Friends
7 After the Lord had spoken these words to Job, the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite: “My anger burns against you and against your two friends, for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. 8 Now therefore take seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job and offer up a burnt offering for yourselves. And my servant Job shall pray for you, for I will accept his prayer not to deal with you according to your folly. For you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has.” 9 So Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went and did what the Lord had told them, and the Lord accepted Job's prayer.

The Lord Restores Job's Fortunes

10 And the Lord restored the fortunes of Job, when he had prayed for his friends. And the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. 11 Then came to him all his brothers and sisters and all who had known him before, and ate bread with him in his house. And they showed him sympathy and comforted him for all the evil that the Lord had brought upon him. And each of them gave him a piece of money and a ring of gold.

​12 And the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning. And he had 14,000 sheep, 6,000 camels, 1,000 yoke of oxen, and 1,000 female donkeys. 13 He had also seven sons and three daughters. 14 And he called the name of the first daughter Jemimah, and the name of the second Keziah, and the name of the third Keren-happuch. 15 And in all the land there were no women so beautiful as Job's daughters. And their father gave them an inheritance among their brothers. 16 And after this Job lived 140 years, and saw his sons, and his sons' sons, four generations. 17 And Job died, an old man, and full of days.

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Now that everyone is listening and God has established His position as Judge and Jury and Plaintiff, not Defendant, He is about to execute judgment that is both righteous and full of grace and mercy.  God has dealt with Job and he has repented, so that issue is taken care of and is off the table.  Job's sin is now under the blood of Christ and is as far as the east is from the west and God chooses to remember it no more and continues to see Job as holy and blameless in His sight, because when He sees Job, He sees the finished work of Christ.

Not so for Job's friends Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar.  They never repented, and therefore there is judgment brought against them for the slander that they spoke against Job without evidence or cause.  God speaks to Eliphaz as the oldest of the group and holds him accountable for his actions and the actions of the other friends.  God said that He burns with anger against all three of them because they had spoken incorrectly about God, unlike His servant Job.  So, what did they say that was wrong?  It wasn't that Job needed to repent or that he was proud and needed to be humbled, because that's exactly what Elihu and even God said.  No, it is the message of redemption that Job proclaimed and forgiveness that Job preached that his friends made a mockery of an they chose to believe instead in a God that was vindictive and full of wrath--not one that was full of grace and mercy and was quick to forgive the one who repents.  They preached a gospel of good works and told Job to stop doing bad things and start doing good things and maybe God would start loving him again.  This is the kind of god that most of the world serves--one where they can frame what is "good" and what is "bad" and declare themselves to be righteous in their own eyes and claim they have earned the blessings of their god including their eternal security.  That is not the gospel message of the Bible.

The friends were ordered to offer burnt offerings of seven bulls and seven rams (a huge sacrifice as one bull and one goat were usually killed once a year for the entire sin of the nation of Israel).  This should bring us back to the image of Job making sacrifices that seemed excessive for the possible sins of his children--even though he hadn't seen them, he knew they had been committed (and it's one of the most obvious cases we see of someone paying the price for someone else in the Old Testament--usually we see each man have to pay the penalty for his or her own sin, but Job paid for the sins of his children and took the cost upon himself, much like God would later).

They were told that Job would pray for them and God would hear the pray of Job and would forgive them on his behalf.  Again, see the intercessory work of Job here acting like a priest, this time not for his family, but for his "friends" who really turned out to be his enemies.  Let's pause for a minute to think about what God is doing here.  First, he doesn't tell the unsaved men--Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar--to pray to Him and He never promises to hear their prayers, as they are still unrepentant.  He instead tests Job to see if Job will forgive them in the same way that he himself has been forgiven.  Will he act in a way that is consistent with the Spirit of God or with his flesh?  We see Jesus teach His disciples about what happens to the man that claims to belong to God, but is unwilling to forgive his brother--but this is a different kind of love and forgiveness, for these men had shown themselves to be enemies of both God and Job, but God chooses to deal with them graciously for the sake of His servant.  That's amazing that sometimes God honors our requests for our unsaved "friends."  Do you have anyone in your life that you know that needs you to intercede on their behalf that God might hear you and grant them grace to not experience the full punishment they deserve? (See Psalm 103:10 and Proverbs 20:22)  Do you need to extend forgiveness to someone who has betrayed you and shown their true colors to you?  Show them what you are made of by showing them the new creation that God has made you to be.  "Do not repay evil for evil, but overcome evil with good." (I Peter 3:9)

Now for the part we've been waiting for.  What will God do with Job?  Will he leave him in his sorry estate, or will God raise him up to his previous status, or will he maybe even exalt him even more because of the trial he had endured?  Let's see.

Notice the blessing comes to Job after he offers the intercessory prayer for his friends and forgives them.  God would not bless him if he continued to live according the flesh and continued to be bitter, hold a grudge and be unforgiving in the face of the forgiveness that God had just shown.   The first thing that God restores to Job is his relationship with all of his friends and family who had deserted him.  Once again they come to him and have fellowship with him--something that I'm sure that Job missed greatly as family and community is everything in the Near East.  Finally people came near to him to comfort him and show him sympathy, and each of them brought a piece of gold and a gold ring as a gift for him--probably as their own offerings and the price they would pay for restoration to their relationship.

Next, God restores Job's physical blessings, but in nearly ever case, He gives Job twice as much as he had before.  It may look strange to us that Job ends up with the same number of children and not double, but Job never really "lost" those children if they too were saved--either way though, they are unlike the animals.  The souls of his children live on, and so, God did double the number of children that Job had.  God blessed Job's daughters with   This too is a great blessing from the Lord.

Last, but not least, God gave Job many more years of life.  Job was already older from the sound of things, but it sounds like God gave him another 140 years of life after this so that he could see his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren and that four generations (from Job to his great-grandchildren) could be together.  This again is a great blessing from the Lord and one of the key measures that the culture looked at to see if God was pleased with you--they assumed if you displeased God, He would kill you, but if you pleased Him, He'd give you long life.  The final words seem to indicate that Job died happy having lived a full life.

While no one would want to go through this experience if they had a choice, God knew that this was what it would take to purify His servant Job and teach him even more about who He is, and it was not purely done for Job's benefit, but for the friends of Job that they might learn who God really is and have a chance to see repentance and for all who lived at that time to see and hear Job's testimony, as well as for everyone who has come after and read Job's story.