Job was "blameless and upright, one
who feared God and turned away from evil…the greatest of all the people of the
east." That is not only the
opinion of the writer, those same words come from the mouth of God. (How this conversation is known I have no
idea) Why does the Lord mention Job to satan? Certainly Job wasn't happy at being singled
out, but the Lord was especially proud of Job.
Satan believed that Job loved God because of all God had done for
Job. Today there are preachers who
encourage this exact belief, much to the detriment of their people. Job's reaction to losing his stuff and his
children was that the Lord had given him all these things and they were, then,
the Lord's to take away. He passed the
first test, he didn't charge God with wrong and he didn't sin.
Jesus, walking on water in the middle of a
storm, after dark, approaches the boat with the words, "It is I, do not be
afraid." How could they be anything
other than frightened at that sight? I doubt
I would have been comforted at all to see Him walking on the water. As soon as he gets into the boat, however, they
make land and John tells us nothing else of the conversation between Jesus and
the disciples. Next the people He has
just fed realize that Jesus has gone over the lake and so determine to follow
Him. He isn't exactly pastoral and
welcoming when they arrive, rebuking them for the reason they have come. He knows their hearts and we see that He was
right in His judgment.
Philip is available to the Lord for
whatever mission He may have for him. He
is told where to go and as he does, finds a eunuch of the court of Ethiopia
reading Scripture. He must have been in
Jerusalem and was going back to his country and his heart desired to know the
Word. He is reading from Isaiah, who,
interestingly, mentions eunuchs favorably in the coming kingdom (see chapter
56). Philip is able to tell him about
Jesus' fulfillment of the prophetic promise and then, although they were in a "desert
place", there was water enough for the man to be baptized. Philip was then whisked away to Azotus and
from there he preached the Gospel as he went.
The eunuch became the father of Christianity in Egypt, quite the irony.
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