THE GOD OF MIRIAM, JOB AND JOEL…Three lessons about God.
MIRIAM’S GOD
A friend from church told about her acquaintance in another state. The older acquaintance is a strong follower of Christ and lives that way, being that she doesn’t hide or apologize for it.
A few years ago Miriam had a chance to buy a home. It was way too large for her alone, so she rents out bedrooms and shares the kitchen and laundry areas. Two grad student females from a nearby university ended up living in her home with her. One was from Asia, and had a different religion. That didn’t bother Miriam. In fact it changed nothing for her. She naturally talks about her relationship with Jesus, God the Father, and the Holy Spirit.
To be clear, she doesn’t go out of her way to evangelize. She respects others. However, like I mentioned, she also respects herself. So in several conversations she has mentioned how she talks with God. The woman from Asia had many questions. “Do you have to go to a specific place or face east?” “No,” Miriam replied. “I just talk to him.” The young woman asked another question, “Oh, so do you have a certain prayer you say?” Miriam said, “No. I just speak to Him as I am speaking to you, and He answers me.”
After a trip back to her home country to see her boyfriend, the Asian lady’s luggage was lost. Weeks went by and the luggage didn’t return. Finally, the lady asked Miriam, “Can I talk to your God, too?”
“Sure,” said Miriam, “Just talk to Him about the problem. He knows everything.”
Later that day the Asian lady went to her room, still upset that after many calls to the airline. They still couldn’t find her things. She decided it couldn’t hurt, so she began … “Miriam’s God, I live in her house and my luggage is lost. Please help them to find it for me.”
Ten minutes later her phone rang, the airline had found her luggage and it was being forwarded to her.
She immediately went to her landlady Miriam and reported, “I believe in your God. He found my luggage.”
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THE WICKED MAN’S PORTION
Read Job chapter 20.
That chirping man, speaking of things only an ungodly person thinks he knows, accused an honorable man of merely getting his just desserts.
Just how he became a “friend” is anyone’s guess, but he did “try” to comfort the man who had lost much and suffered more. Unfortunately he did not know the God Job served faithfully.
He did know his own vindictive god who demanded perfection but provided nothing in return.He chirped “The mirth of the wicked is brief,” as though he was saying the most clever words ever spoken. Did he know anything of Job’s God who provided reasons for mirth, or did he only imagine that mirth was man-made and earned?
In Zophar’s world socialists ruled. They absorbed the wealth that others created and returned little of value except to their closest friends. The path of socialist ideals was summarized in his words to Job, “Nothing is left for the wicked man to devour.” It is true that the socialist runs out of other people’s money fast if he produces nothing of lasting value with it. The socialist rarely produces anything valuable.
The wicked man’s portion is loss, loss, and more loss. Fortunately, Job’s belief in God shows a different result. In the end he is rewarded with more, more, and more. He receives the righteous man’s portion.
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JOEL’S GOD
Some ask “Why does God punish?” A better question was answered by Joel: “Will God take pity?”
The answer is given in Joel 2:12-27. It is also given by Jesus in Matthew 18 and illustrated by the Book of Jonah.
Joel 2:12-13 says, “’Yet even now,’ declares the LORD, ‘return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning…’ Return to the LORD your God for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster.” Joel says this AFTER he spent more than a chapter proclaimed that disaster was coming.
In Matthew 18 Jesus tells of a man who owed the king more than a man’s lifetime of earnings. The king took pity on him and forgave his debt. Then the man went and demanded payment of a small debt owed him by another. The king was told and the man was punished. The point is that God is that king. We owe more than we have the ability to pay. But we can be forgiven. God will take pity. But we must take to heart that God’s forgiveness has a price … we have to live as a new creation, more like God and less like man.
Then Jonah saw the same willingness of God to forgive. Jonah greatly disliked the Ninevites and wanted God to punish them. He also knew that God forgives freely when people repent (turn away from wickedness). Therefore, when God called him to preach doom to Ninevah he didn’t want to go. After he was swallowed and regurgitated by the fish he went, but after he proclaimed that God would bring doom on them because of their sins, he went to a nearby hill to watch God’s destruction of the city (there were rubberneckers even back then). Fortunately for the Ninevites, and unfortunately for Jonah, the people repented and God took pity. God spared the city. Jonah was disappointed.
Copyright 2026 Donald Whelpley
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