Job 8--Bildad Speaks: Job Should Repent

Bildad Speaks: Job Should Repent​
8 Then Bildad the Shuhite answered and said:

2 “How long will you say these things,
    and the words of your mouth be a great wind?
3 Does God pervert justice?
    Or does the Almighty pervert the right?
4 If your children have sinned against him,
    he has delivered them into the hand of their transgression.
5 If you will seek God
    and plead with the Almighty for mercy,
6 if you are pure and upright,
    surely then he will rouse himself for you
    and restore your rightful habitation.
7 And though your beginning was small,
    your latter days will be very great.

8 “For inquire, please, of bygone ages,
    and consider what the fathers have searched out.
9 For we are but of yesterday and know nothing,
    for our days on earth are a shadow.
10 Will they not teach you and tell you
    and utter words out of their understanding?

11 “Can papyrus grow where there is no marsh?
    Can reeds flourish where there is no water?
12 While yet in flower and not cut down,
    they wither before any other plant.
13 Such are the paths of all who forget God;
    the hope of the godless shall perish.
14 His confidence is severed,
    and his trust is a spider's web.
15 He leans against his house, but it does not stand;
    he lays hold of it, but it does not endure.
16 He is a lush plant before the sun,
    and his shoots spread over his garden.
17 His roots entwine the stone heap;
    he looks upon a house of stones.
18 If he is destroyed from his place,
    then it will deny him, saying, ‘I have never seen you.’
19 Behold, this is the joy of his way,
    and out of the soil others will spring.

20 “Behold, God will not reject a blameless man,
    nor take the hand of evildoers.
21 He will yet fill your mouth with laughter,
    and your lips with shouting.
22 Those who hate you will be clothed with shame,
    and the tent of the wicked will be no more.”

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Enter the next character of this saga--Bildad the Shuhite.  Bildad doesn't have a lot of words to say, but he thinks he has an important message for Job that can be summed up in one word--"Repent!"  Now we know that's not such a terrible message, in fact it's the beginning of the gospel as we see in the Gospel of Mark.  We see both John the Baptist and Jesus starting their ministry with the same message--"Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near" or "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."  (Depending on your version).  Is this the same message that Bildad speaks?  Let's examine the text and see.

Other than Bildad starting off by calling Job's cries for deliverance "a great wind," Bildad seems to be hitting a grand slam at first with as much as we can assume that he understood about God and man at the time.  He does say that each man is judged for his or her individual sin, though it appears he lacks the understanding of Original Sin.  He says that all that God does is right and just, including His judgments and that Job's children must have sinned in order to have earned the wages of that sin, death---check, that's Romans 6:23.  He says that God is rich in grace and mercy and will respond to all those who are righteous and call out to Him in faith.

We see Bildad use language that sounds familiar to us--similar to that of Psalm 1 and possibly even the Parable of the Two Foundations, and maybe even portions of the Sermon on the Mount.  So, where is the error?  The problem is this, Bildad is preaching a message that somehow Job and work his way back into God's favor, and that's just not true.  The answer to sin is not good works, it is a blood sacrifice, and that blood sacrifice cannot be mixed with our works.  Bildad is so close and yet so far here.  Job seems to be far off, but is much closer in his understanding of God's desire for redemption, grace, mercy, and forgiveness.  We still have people today that preach this wisdom of Bildad--maybe you are one of them or belong to such a congregation.  Repentance is about a change in identity first that leads to a change in behavior.  It is not about simply changing our behavior to manipulate God into doing "good" things for us and blessing us.  That is a salvation where we are at the center of it instead of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, and God will share His glory with no one and nothing else--for He is a jealous God.

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Ephesians 2
English Standard Version

By Grace Through Faith​
2 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience-- 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. 4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved-- 6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

One in Christ
11 Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands-- 12 remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14 For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15 by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances [or sacraments], that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, 16 and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. 17 And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22 In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.