Job 36:10

God delights in blessing the righteous. But the righteous, like the unrighteous, will meet trials. That was true of Job. What does the trial do? It brings out what is actually in the heart. When God allows people to be bound in cords of affliction, His aim is to get their ear. He then tells them where they have transgressed and acted in defiance. That gives them the chance to listen and to turn from iniquity. Job's earlier life had not been a life of iniquity. But his bold criticism of God was certainly iniquity, though he barely realised it.

As I understand it, this is not a question of God bringing the unconverted into His favour. It is the discipline of the converted under His good hand. It is the ways of God, and the righteous government that He maintains with His own. But even such might slip aside. Alas! who does not know it? As God from the beginning dealt with souls to convert them, so He dealt with His own to lead them on and to correct them. The discipline of His saints, then, is the chief subject of this chapter.

These "righteous" people are the objects of God's care. Yet at times they are "bound in chains, caught in the cords of affliction." Does that contradict what Elihu had just said? To Job it did seem so. He failed to see the possibilities of evil in his own heart. His pride was as real a transgression as the terrible evils his friends falsely charged against him. God's object was to lay bare to man the hidden evil of his heart, to open his ear to His warnings, and to turn him from pride.

He allows them to be bound in chains and in the bonds of sorrow. He is the righteous God, and He does this to show them their deeds and to uncover their transgressions. Those transgressions spring from what God hates — pride. The afflictions of the righteous show His love and kindness, not His wrath and displeasure. He wants to instruct them through suffering. If they listen and learn the lesson, they will spend their days in prosperity. They will end their life on earth in peace and pleasantness.

In Job 36 another point is pressed on Job: if he looks at things from God's side, he must see His righteousness. Job ought to understand what God does. He does not withdraw His eyes from the righteous. He opens their ear to discipline. He delivers the poor in his affliction. Here Job had failed. He had been busy justifying himself instead of letting God open his ear to discipline.

We must be careful not to confuse two things. One is the believer's standing and salvation in Christ. The other is his walk, and the discipline he receives from his Father. As to his standing in Christ, as we have seen, it is established for ever. To make that depend, in the least, on his works would be to deny the grace of God. But how much does depend on his walk with God.