Job

Job 36: Praise the God we cannot measure

Begin in prayer

Before Elihu continues, please ask God to teach us reverence without making us confident in explanations He has not given.

Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and marked off the sky with his span, and calculated the dust of the earth in a measuring basket, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance?

Isaiah 40:12

Father in heaven, please open our eyes as we read Your Word. Teach us to praise Your greatness and receive Your instruction. Help us know the Son through whom You reveal Yourself. Make us more like Jesus. And please bless our family as we worship You together. In Jesus' name, Amen.

See where we're going

Elihu continues, claiming to speak without falsehood on God’s behalf. He describes God as mighty in understanding and attentive to the afflicted. He says affliction exposes proud wrongdoing and promises prosperity for listening, but the sword and early death for refusal. He applies his account to Job and warns against wrath, a bribe, wealth and choosing iniquity. Then he calls Job to magnify God’s work and remember His unsearchable greatness. Rain and lightning show God’s power to judge people and give food.

As you read Job 36, look for the answers:

Reflect together

Key truth

God is great beyond our understanding, and His unsearchable life and mighty works call for praise.

Elihu claims to speak for God, but the LORD has not yet begun His own answer. God’s greatness means that even a confident speaker cannot measure His understanding. Saying we do not know Him admits incomplete knowledge, while God still makes Himself known through His works and words. Mortal lives can be counted, but God’s unsearchable years point beyond every human lifetime. The Teacher of all receives no instructions from His creatures. Elihu’s promises of prosperity for listening and early death for refusal remain his account of how God instructs through affliction. They cannot overturn God’s testimony that Job was ruined without cause. Rain and lightning display the power that judges people and gives food. Such works call for praise and humility about explanations God has not given.

How does Job 36 show us that God is great beyond our understanding, and His unsearchable life and mighty works call for praise?

God’s greatness exceeds the knowledge we can measure.

Elihu says God’s years cannot be searched out. This admits our inability to comprehend Him fully, not a claim that He can never be known. The Teacher of all does not receive instructions from His creatures.

Elihu’s promises do not explain every affliction.

He links listening with prosperity and refusing instruction with the sword. He also accuses Job of choosing wrongdoing instead of affliction. Those claims must remain distinct from God’s testimony that Job was ruined without cause.

God’s mighty works deserve praise.

Water rises, rain falls, and lightning strikes at His command. Elihu speaks of judgment and abundant food through these works. Human weakness should make us attentive to such power and provision.

Memorise

Behold, God is great, and we don’t know him. The number of his years is unsearchable.

Job 36:26

Looking to Jesus in my life

Ask yourself in your heart, where do I need Jesus to teach me humility before God’s greatness?

Elihu calls Job to praise a greatness that cannot be measured. Yet his confident explanation of Job’s trouble still needs testing. We know God through what He reveals, rather than by explaining every hidden purpose.

Hebrews 1 verses 1 to 3 directs us to the Son through whom God has spoken and made the worlds. The Son sustains all things and accomplished purification for sins. Jesus died for His people and bore their guilt at the cross. His completed sacrifice fully answers their need before God. He rose from the dead and reigns in glory.

Turn from your sin and trust the Son whom God has revealed. Jesus forgives those who seek Him. His people may praise the Father through Him while admitting how much they do not understand.

Parent's note

Tell your children that God’s greatness is certain, while Elihu’s prosperity promises do not explain Job’s suffering or guarantee our recovery. Please do not tell them they are saved just because they grew up in a Christian home. Call each child to turn from sin and trust Jesus, and pray that God would give them a new heart.

Pray together

Now please close your time together in prayer. Thank God for greatness we can praise without comprehending it fully, and bring the heart question to Him. Every child can pray, so let each one say a short prayer if they want to.

saying, “Amen! Blessing, glory, wisdom, thanksgiving, honor, power, and might, be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”

Revelation 7:12

Father, thank You for greatness beyond our understanding and for making Yourself known through Your Son. Forgive our proud explanations and our refusal to learn. Please bring us to repentance and faith in Jesus, whose sacrifice is complete. Help us praise You and listen humbly to Your Word this week. In Jesus' name, Amen.