Today’s Bible Reading:
Job 3-4
Psalm 8
Matthew 6
**Click to read Christine Miller’s Bible study for today.
The word hand (Strong’s #3027) appears 51 times in the book of Job, and 1615 times in the Old Testament alone. The Greek version of hand (Greek #5495) appears another 179 times in the New Testament.
It shouldn’t surprise me, because I remember that Hebrews 6:1-2 says that teaching about the “laying on of hands” is a foundational thing.
Hebrew is an action language, and the roots of words are usually verbs, not nouns. For instance, the word hand is yod (יָד) and comes from a root that means “to throw.” Throwing is an action, and in Hebrew thought, objects (nouns) that do the action are named that because they can do that action.
A hand can throw because it can move. The ability to move back and forth enables a man to do work, and it’s honestly the whole arm that can move back and forth. I love that the word yod (יָד) is so similar to the English word yard, because an English yardstick is about the length of an arm.
By Lbeaumont – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=47267662
Yesterday, we read that Satan and God had a discussion about hands.
“So Satan answered YHVH and said, ‘Does Job fear God for nothing? Have You not made a hedge around him, around his household, and around all that he has on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But now, stretch out Your hand and touch all that he has, and he will surely curse You to Your face!’
“And YHVH said to Satan, ‘Behold, all that he has is in your hand; only do not lay a hand on his person'” (Job 1:9-12).
In some translations, the word yod in Job 1:12 is translated, “all that he has is in your power.” That’s because the ability to do work with our hands is a form of power. It is our ability. And sometimes, people put their power on others to oppress them or hurt them.
CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2692107
Basically, YHVH gave Satan the power or authority or permission to act. Satan could not have harmed Job without YHVH’s permission or authority.
In fact, in the next chapter, we read that YHVH Himself was actually the one to bring harm to Job:
“Then YHVH said to Satan, ‘Have you considered My servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil? And still he holds fast to his integrity, although you incited Me against him, to destroy him without cause'” (Job 2:3).
So every action Satan did was done with the full authority of YHVH behind him.
Even though his friend Eliphaz came and accused Job of having done something secretly wicked to have caused his suffering, that wasn’t the case at all! Job didn’t know that, and he mourned that he had ever been born, but it wasn’t true. The unseen truth that was happening in the spiritual realm was that YHVH had given Job into Satan’s hand.
Nothing happens without YHVH’s permission. Nothing.
Even if Job had actually done something wicked and had been deserving of YHVH’s wrath, even that happens only with YHVH’s permission.
The exact day of his birth had been of YHVH’s permission, too.
And maybe knowing this doesn’t actually provide relief, but it helps us trust, doesn’t it?
YHVH’s hands are always working, and they have been working since the beginning.
“When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers,
The moon and the stars, which You have ordained,
What is man that You are mindful of him,
And the son of man that You visit him?
For You have made him a little lower than the angels,
And You have crowned him with glory and honor.You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands;
You have put all things under his feet,
All sheep and oxen—
Even the beasts of the field,
The birds of the air,
And the fish of the sea
That pass through the paths of the seas” (Psalm 8:3-8)
When I’m tempted to stop trusting His hand, all I need to do is look out the window.
You’ve probably heard me say this before, but when I was young, my dad would sometimes wake us up in the middle of the night and take us outside to see the stars. Maybe it was Haley’s Comet, or maybe a meteor shower or the northern lights. But inevitably, while my brother and I were staring up at the black sky and shivering, Dad would start to recite Psalm 8. (This is why it’s one of my favorite Psalms and why I want my children to memorize it, too.)
And did you catch that just like He gave authority to Satan’s hands, He has also given authority to us?
He has made us to have dominion over the works of His hands!
This is not authority over people. We cannot act like Satan, oppressing others on a whim. We absolutely do not have permission to do this.
We do have permission over “all sheep and oxen — even the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea.” Of course, that doesn’t mean we can oppress them.
A righteous man regards the life of his animal,
But the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel (Proverbs 12:10).
My personal opinion is that you can see the character of a person by watching how he treats his animals. Is he cruel? Impatient? Kicking them? Not feeding them? Neglecting to teach and train them?
To have dominion (Strong’s #4910) is to be a king over a realm, but the Hebrew sense of it is to establish order and a rule of measurement. Isn’t that so cool? This reminds me of our yardstick again.
We establish order and help them measure up to the King’s standard. We aren’t the king. We are just the ones helping bring the earth up to our King’s standard. This means that we ourselves must be walking in order and according to the rule of measurement ourselves. We aren’t kings on thrones, eating bon-bons, bossing our subjects around. We’re walking with, helping, and making order possible through the works of our own hands.
Everything we do, every action we take with our hands, is for His Kingdom. We are all functioning for Him, even when we don’t understand why the King is doing what He does. We trust Him — and we get on with living in the meantime.
“But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you” (Matthew 6:33).
Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture in this blog post taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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To Study Further:
- Did you see the reference to hands in Matthew 7:33? What does this mean?
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