Chapter 31 concludes Job’s final speech. It viewed as his final assertion of integrity and within it he covers some important topics. He wonders what God has in store for him, how he will one day be judged before the throne of God for his actions. Job also speaks of how he let the opinion of others define his actions at times. It’s in this chapter that we’re reminded of our story, our own questions. It’s not that the rest of Job’s story doesn’t apply to us, but I almost feel like this chapter reflects the worries of our life in a certain way. Whatever the question though, the answer still comes back to our relationship with God.
God is Our Portion
For what portion would I have from God above, or what inheritance from the Almighty on high?
Job 31:2 CSB
Job asks an important question: What is our inheritance from the Almighty?
He then proceeds to speak of the destruction of that will befall evildoers, but he leaves out another inheritance––the inheritance of Grace.
As he says, “God sees everything we do and every step that we take.” (Job 31:4) He knows our rising and our lying down. He knows our heart and the secret desires that we harbor. In every instance, God places a choice before us and one of those choices leads to the path of coming to Him.
Job asks, “What is our portion from God?”
Our portion is God Himself. Our inheritance is grace and mercy from His throne, a continual life as part of His family, a life in reconciliation with Him. Out of anything and everything we could dream of, hope for, and even ask for, we could have God, the Creator of everything––of every hope and dream. He could be ours and we could be His.
We only have to choose.
Accurate Scales
Oh, let Him weigh me with accurate scales, and let God know my integrity.
Job 31:6 AMP
God won’t judge anyone with a bias. He loves us, every one of us, whether we accept Him or not. Because of that love, He cannot and will not look on us with rose colored lenses. He sees us as we truly are, not as we attempt to appear.
Perhaps that is why God first told the Accuser that he would not find a man as righteous as Job. In a time when the Mosaic Law ruled and the people were kept from God’s intimate presence, when the people followed symbolism and foreshadowing without knowing it, Job had a heart that yearned to be intimate with God.
Job wasn’t a perfect human being by any means. He messed up. He went through hardships and he had let his success put distance between him and God. But the deepest desire of Job’s heart remained the same: to know God.
God sees us at our deepest levels. He is able to judge us accurately because nothing is hidden from Him. He knows our intentions and He knows the state of our inner-being. He knows and sees how the scale will balance when we’re placed on the purest scale. One in which there is no bias or additions but simple and pure truth.
How could the scale tip in our favor when our very lifeblood is tainted with selfishness and self-centeredness? When our very makeup is tainted? The only way we could be placed on the scale and it tip in our favor is if we are washed clean. If we give up that tainted inheritance for a pure one, a new one.
The only way we could make it out of this world untainted is if we live by another, a higher one. The only way is if our allegiance isn’t to the earth we walk on, though we abide in it and continue on in the first commandment God issued to His creation (Gen. 1:27-30), but to a Kingdom of eternal righteousness and truth––God’s Kingdom and His Son.
What then could I do when God arises [to judge me]? When He calls me to account, what will I answer Him?
Job 31:14 AMP
When God sits on the seat of judgement and we stand before Him, will we have a defense? Or rather, will we have a Defender?
How will we answer when we give an account for the life we lived and the choices we made? When we’re called to step on that pure scale, what will we have on our tongue as defense if it doesn’t tip in our favor? Or will we have a Defender who steps on it and balances that scale for us?
Be assured that on our own, we have no defense. We cannot be our own defender in the face of pure truth. On our own, the scale will not tip in our favor and none of our good deeds will be enough to balance it out. There is only one way the scale will be balanced and weigh in our favor and that is with Jesus as our Defender.
The Hypocrite Label
Have I covered my transgressions as others do by hiding my iniquity in my heart because I greatly feared the crowds and because the contempt of the clans terrified me, so I grew silent and would not go outside?
Job 31:33-34 CSB
We are not perfect. We will not be perfect until we depart from this life and come into the fullness of God. Every single one of us will mess up in some way. Sin is like a weed in the garden of our hearts. It is something that must be tended to, pulled again and again so that it will not overtake and choke out the fruit of God’s spirit within us.
Yet in his words, Job speaks of something that plagues every Christian: the label and belief of being hypocrites.
Honestly, we live in fear of that label, even if we know it not to be true of ourselves. Are there hypocrites out there? Yes. Is every Christian a hypocrite? No.
However, we’ve become so afraid of someone labeling us as one that we often try to bury our transgressions deep down so that no one sees them. We try to be perfect. But in doing so, we remove our own testimony.
They conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; for they did not love their lives to the point of death.
Rev. 12:11 CSB
We take out a key part in our work when we don’t share our testimony, when we don’t share our own transgressions and failings. When that happens, we also suppress the knowledge and sharing of what the blood of the Lamb, and the Lamb Himself, has done for us. We then present a picture that is hypocritical and impossible to follow and it creates a stumbling stone for other believers.
We cannot be afraid of what the crowds and assemblies will say about us, we cannot be afraid of labels or opinions that others may place on us, because it could be our testimony, our life with all of it’s failings and shortcomings, that changes someone else’s life and leads them to the Lamb.
If we remain silent and fail to go outside to spread our testimony and the Word of God, then we fail not only ourselves, not only God, but also all the people whose lives could have been changed by our words and life.
We cannot live in the fear of the hypocrite label. When we stand before God, how would we explain we did not fulfill His call on our lives because we feared a temporary label?
Would we deny someone an eternal inheritance of goodness and love, of grace and kindness, of God Himself, all because someone calls us a name?
Jesus’ name is above every other name. (Philip. 2:9) That includes the name of hypocrite. If we have entered the covenant with Him then we have vowed to put Him first above all else. People will call us names, the enemy will come against us, and yet we must press on in the power and calling of the Name of Jesus.
The label of hypocrite will not last forever. The label of being God’s child will. The choice of which we live by is ours.
Do not let a temporary label keep you from living by your eternal one.
Have you shared your testimony lately?
Ask God to guide you and provide you with an opportunity to share His work in your life.
Above My Waves 
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