Job 31:13 - 32:1 - Self-Righteousness Cannot Stand Before God (Session 33)

In this verse-by-verse Bible study of Job 31:13–40, Reasoning Through the Bible examines Job’s final defense as he lists the good things he has done for servants, the poor, widows, orphans, strangers, and the needy. This session explains why those works are commendable and necessary, but why they still cannot justify anyone before God. 

This study also highlights two important biblical truths from Job 31: human beings are known by God in the womb, and all people are equal before their Creator. The passage speaks clearly against class pride and shows that every human life bears dignity because God made each person. 

The second half of the episode addresses trusting in wealth, boasting in moral behavior, and Job’s bold desire to stand face to face with God and defend himself. The session shows why that instinct is dangerous, why self-righteousness always fails before God’s holiness, and why the only true righteousness a sinner can have is the righteousness of Jesus Christ credited by faith. 

Topics in this episode include:

•  Job 31 explained 
•  good works and justification 
•  helping the poor and orphans 
•  life in the womb 
•  equality before God 
•  trusting in wealth 
•  self-righteousness 
•  righteousness through Christ 
•  the judgment seat of Christ 

Reasoning Through the Bible is a verse-by-verse Bible teaching ministry committed to careful exposition, biblical context, and faithful application.

Transcript

Job’s Defense Meets God’s Greatness

SPEAKER_00 0:16

Today on Reasoning Through the Bible, we're going to see a man who is trying to justify his own actions before God. And then we're going to compare that to a magnificent, huge, tremendous God. And we're going to see how those things compare. Hi, my name's Glenn. I'm here with Steve. We are reasoning through the book of Job as we do with all the books of the Bible. If you're new to our ministry, you might check out our website, rtb.net or reasoningthible.com. There you'll see all of our books, and you'll be able to see our materials that we offer for free for people like you to teach what you hear us teach and be able to teach it in your small group or your church. But today, if you have your Bible, open it to the book of Job, chapter 31. We are in the midst of Job's last speech, his longest speech in the book, and he is now about to try to show his own justification before his friends and before God. So let's go ahead and dive in. Steve, can you

Job Lists His Care For Others

SPEAKER_00 1:19

start at Job 31, 13 and read down through verse 23?

SPEAKER_01 1:23

If I have rejected the claim of my male or female slaves when they filed a complaint against me, what then could I do when God arises? And when he calls me to account, how am I to answer him? Did he who made me in the womb not make him and the same one create us in the womb? If I have kept the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail, or have eaten my morsel alone, and the orphan has not shared it. But from my youth he grew up with me as with the father, and from my infancy I guided her. If I have seen anyone perish for lack of clothing, or that the needy had no covering, if his waist has not thanked me, and if he has not been warmed with the fleece of my sheep, if I have lifted up my hand against the orphan, because I saw I had support in the gate, may my shoulder fall from its socket, and my arm be broken off at the elbow, for disaster from God is a terror to me, and because of his majesty I can do nothing.

SPEAKER_00 2:40

So he goes through several things and he says, I was right by these needy people. Therefore, if I had done any of these sins, then I might have a failure before God. But I did do okay by all of this. And he lists off several things. He treated his servants fairly, he says. He helped the needy, he gave food to people that were hungry, he provided clothing for people in need, he took care of orphans. So this is commendable.

Justification Versus Sanctification

SPEAKER_00 3:10

Steve, when we look at that type of thing, those things are good, yes, we would all recognize that. But are those things the main thing of why Christianity exists? And can we be justified before God by doing social service work like feeding the poor, helping the needy, and doing work with orphans, that type of thing? Very needed. But does that justify us before God? And is that what the Bible is really all about?

SPEAKER_01 3:38

Those types of activities do not justify us before God. What they are, though, is a part of our sanctification process. Glenn, you and I did a session on justification, sanctification, and glorification. And we did it for just this reason that we're discussing here. People blur the lines between justification and sanctification. We are justified at one time. Whenever we place our faith and trust in Jesus Christ, we are then justified through that belief by him, not on our own works, but through what he has declared us to be. We're taught those things in Colossians and Galatians and other types of scripture. The deeds that we do then are becoming more like Christ. That's our sanctification process. That's us becoming separate to the world. That's us becoming more Christ-like, doing the things that we are supposed to do of loving our neighbor as ourselves. That's part of the royal law that we're under now. So we're not justified through those type of acts or deeds. But what we are doing is we're showing the world who God is, how merciful and just he is through our belief in Jesus Christ and what he has done for us. Those type of deeds don't justify us, but they sanctify us, they separate us from this world.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

The primary message of the scriptures is making us right before God through Jesus Christ. There are other things in here as well. Feeding the poor and working with orphans are an outgrowth of the first thing. Without the salvation in Christ, then the other things really don't matter so much. What he's saying here in the first part of this reading we just had was that I was right before all those around me. I was right by helping the poor. I was right by feeding those that were hungry and clothing those that had no clothes. So he is saying there, I was treating these servants and these slaves correctly. He then culminates that and makes an interesting comment in verse 15. Did he who make me in the womb not make him? He's talking about the servants, and the same one created us in the womb.

Made In The Womb And Equal

SPEAKER_00 5:56

So, Steve, I can count two things that we can get out of that verse that are quite important for us today. What can we learn about what he says there about making us in the womb?

SPEAKER_01 6:06

That he knows us whenever we are conceived and knows us as we're going through that process of gestation in our mother's womb. And the other thing is that he sees all of us as being equal in his sight, as far as equal as ones being created in his image. There's no distinction between rich or poor, Jew or Gentile. We are all the same in God's eyes as far as being imagers of him.

SPEAKER_00 6:37

Exactly. That's what he's saying. He's saying there that he knows us in the womb. God makes us in the womb. That tells us that we are individual people in the womb, that it's not just a blob of jelly. We are people in the womb that God has made. We have an identity in the womb. Therefore, abortion is not justified. Babies in the womb are people with identities, is what he's saying here. There's no way around that from this passage. The other thing is he's very clearly comparing himself to his servants. And many societies in the world have a class system. Traditional Hinduism had a caste system where in many of these cultures, people, if not directly, then implicitly, hold that, well, the upper class are just better human beings than the lower class. I remember hearing many stories of old Hinduism where the lower class people were considered so dirty that people wouldn't even be around them. There's also been racist peoples of all countries and all times. So what this does is it eliminates caste system, it eliminates racism, it eliminates class system by saying that we are all the same in the womb. God makes us all, he made me in the womb, made all of you as well. We have the same creator. We are individuals in the womb and we are born the same. So tremendous, tremendous things here in the Word of

Overwhelmed By God’s Majesty

SPEAKER_00 8:07

God. Verse 23, he gives a sense here of how overwhelming God is. Verse 23 says that he could not stand before God's magnificence. The book of Job has said several times, God's majesty is overwhelming. We're gonna find out some of that by the end of the book, are we not?

SPEAKER_01 8:27

Yes, we're gonna find out who God is because he shows up in the latter part of this book. And Job has been petitioning him in order to plead his case in front of God. So we're gonna see who God is and find out some characteristics of him whenever he shows up at the end of this book.

SPEAKER_00 8:44

Job says in verse 23, because of his majesty, I can do nothing. If we were to truly understand how immense and majestic and overwhelming God is, then if we were in his presence, we would have to agree with Job that in front of his majesty I can do nothing. I'm gonna go ahead and read, starting in verse 24, we find the next part here of Job's

Rejecting Wealth As A Savior

SPEAKER_00 9:10

speech. He says, If I have put my confidence in gold and called find gold my trust, if I have gloated because of my wealth was great, and because my hand had obtained so much, if I have looked at the sun when it shone, or the moon going in splendor, and my heart was secretly enticed, and my hand threw a kiss from my mouth, that too would have been a guilty deed calling for judgment. For I have denied God above. Now Job says that he hasn't put his trust in gold or wealth. He's not put his faith in perishable things here on earth, or not put his faith in what his hand could produce. If he had, he said he would be guilty before God. Steve, do we not see today many people that put their trust in their own intelligence or their own work ethic or their own abilities? How are they gonna fare when they actually meet God?

SPEAKER_01 10:09

They're not gonna fare very well because everything that they have is something that is bound to this earth and to this world. They're not gonna have that in front of God whenever they meet their maker, so to speak, on that judgment portion. They're not gonna have any of the things that they've built here on earth. They're not gonna have their cars, they're not gonna have their houses, they're not gonna have their great corporations maybe that they have built. None of that stuff is gonna be with them. It's only gonna be them and God, and the standard is gonna be God's righteousness, what he has to say about it, and everything that they're doing is not gonna stand up to the righteousness that God demands for us to have.

SPEAKER_00 10:51

Where is the only place that we can put our full trust and confidence?

SPEAKER_01 10:56

As so many times that we've talked about through all of our studies of the book of the scripture, it's Jesus Christ, Jesus the Messiah, Jesus the anointed one. He is the one that we place our faith and trust in. It's Jesus' righteousness that God looks upon. We have that picture of the mercy seat on the Ark of the Covenant and the blood that was sprinkled there as God looked down from the heavens into that box that contained the law. He looked past that blood that was sprinkled there for the atonement of the Jewish people once a year. And that's the picture that we have in that God looks at Jesus' blood that was sacrificed for us on the cross. And it is through his blood that he sees the righteousness that we have. Not our own righteousness, it's the righteousness of Jesus Christ. And through Jesus' resurrection, we now have the hope and we have the testament that there is an afterlife and that we are going to have a glorified body and that Jesus is someday going to return. Jesus is alive today, he is not dead. He is seated at the right hand of God today. He is our high priest as we went through Hebrews, explained all of that. We encourage our listeners to go through the book of Hebrews with

Jesus’ Righteousness And The Mercy Seat

SPEAKER_01 12:21

us.

SPEAKER_00 12:21

In this next section, Job is going to do two things. He's first going to list the things that he thinks makes him righteous, and then he's going to spend some time being very aggressive in wanting to speak face to face with God. I'm reading, starting in verse 29. Have I rejoiced at the misfortune of my enemy or become excited when evil found him? No, I have not allowed my mouth to sin by asking for his life in a curse. Have the people of my tent not said, Who can find one who has not been satisfied with his meat? The stranger has not spent the night outside, for I have opened my doors to the traveler. Have I covered my wrongdoings like a man by hiding my guilt in my shirt pocket? Because I feared the great multitude and the contempt of families terrified me and kept silent and did not go out of doors? Oh, that I had one to hear me. Here is my signature. Let the Almighty answer me, and the indictment which my adversary has written. I would certainly carry it on my shoulder, I would tie it myself like a garland, I would declare to him the number of my steps, like a prince, I would approach him. If my land cries out against me and its furrows weep together, if I have eaten its fruit without money, or I have caused its owners to lose their lives, may the thorn bush grow instead of wheat, and stinkweed instead of barley. The words of Job are ended. So in here he listed again several things that he think makes him righteous. Steve, what did he say there in verses 29 through 31 that he thinks are reasons why he could stand before God and claim righteousness?

SPEAKER_01 14:04

In those specific verses, Glenn, he's talking about whether or not he has been boastful or rejoicing in the misfortune of the enemy that he has around him, or whether he has allowed his mouth to curse other people, his enemy, and whether or not the people of his tent has not praised him and said, Who can find one who has not been satisfied with his meat? In other words, he has fed his servants and he's fed his guests whenever they came. He has been a great host. And of course, hospitality is a large thing in the Middle Eastern culture. So he is bragging really on himself, on his behavior and the things that he has done. That's what we're seeing in these three verses here.

SPEAKER_00 14:53

And again, as we discussed, feeding the poor and being righteous towards those in need is something we should do. And Christians over the centuries have done very well at that. But that's not what makes us right before God. What makes us right before God is the Lord Jesus paying for our sin.

Job Demands A Hearing With God

SPEAKER_00 15:11

Job then moves into this section from starting in verse 35 and following, where he is almost begging to be face to face with God. He's begging God to respond to him. He thinks if I just get before God, I'm gonna set him straight. I'm gonna tell him a thing or two. Job plans to walk up to God like royalty and inform him of the things that God's been wrong about. He's going to inform God about all the things that Job has convinced himself that God should have been doing. Job is very confident in himself. So, Steve, what's going to happen later in the book when he actually gets this exact chance to do exactly this?

SPEAKER_01 15:51

He's going to shrink from God. He's going to see the awesomeness and the glory of God, the Shekinah glory of God and who he is. And so much like we see other characters, when they are confronted by God or have a glimpse of God, they're in fear of their life. They are shrink, they bow down, they worship because of the power that God has whenever his presence is just there. That's what we're going to see Job in his reaction. So here, when he's being very boastful and prideful as to how he's going to approach God, we see really the exact opposite whenever God actually shows up.

SPEAKER_00 16:35

Here, Job demonstrates that he has a very high view of his own righteousness. He is being very foolish to want to have this conversation with God. The correct position to take before God is one to admit that we have failed and beg his forgiveness. At the beginning of the book, we remember Job was sacrificing just in case his children might have sinned. Well, by this point, he has convinced himself that he has no sin and he is not contrite. He is rather puffed up and bold, and he thinks he's going to go correct God, and he's going to be sadly mistaken. Job is coming across very prideful, which is a dangerous thing to do, especially when

The Danger Of Self-Righteousness

SPEAKER_00 17:20

we appear before God. Now, the end of this chapter that we just read, this has ended Job's speeches. The three friends are not going to speak anymore, but we see here, if we sum up what we've seen so far in the book of Job, at no time was Job ever in repentance. At no time did Job beg God for forgiveness. Throughout the book, he claims he can stand on his own behavior before God. The Christian today must realize that yes, we are saved, our sins have been washed by Christ, but we commit sin daily, and we must always be humble and repentant before God. We must always bow at his feet. We should never think we're going to stand before God and demand answers. If we try to stand before God, we do so in our own righteousness. We're going to suffer the same fate that Job's going to suffer when God shows up. Now, again, that is at the end there of chapter 31. That's the end of Job's speeches and the three friends'

Elihu Arrives Next And Closing

SPEAKER_00 18:27

speeches. Starting in chapter 32, we meet another gentleman. We see a man named Elihu. And the next several chapters here is one speech from this man, Elihu. He has not spoken yet in the book. We have him as the final friend. He's going to be quite interesting and give a slightly different take, and we'll see him. But before we jump into Elihu, I want to read the first verse of Job chapter 32. It says there, these three men stopped answering Job because he was righteous in his own eyes. And we just mentioned that, Steve. Job was righteous in his own eyes. What happens to people when we're self-righteous?

SPEAKER_01 19:12

Well, the first distinction that we should make is that these are his three friends that are saying that Job was righteous in his own eyes. We know from chapters one and two that Job is righteous in God's eyes, that he has been declared righteous by God. So he has a correct standing with God. This is a declaration by his friends that he is self-righteous. But the principle of being righteous in your own eyes is one that we think that we can live up to God's standards, that we think that based on the things that we do, that we can have salvation, that we can have a relationship with God. And the most famous place that we see this depicted is in the book of Judges, where it says there, everyone was doing what was right in their own eyes. And we see that cycle of sin that the nation of Israel kept going through. They weren't looking to God, they were looking to themselves for the various activities, and they were paying a price for that, and they had to plead for God to come rescue them over and over again. So our self-righteousness is something that we think that we can do to live up to God's standards, but we cannot do that. We have to depend on God declaring us righteous. And as we've noted before in this session and others, that's only done through our belief, trust in Jesus Christ.

SPEAKER_00 20:38

We can only think we are righteous by comparing ourselves to other people. And we can always compare ourselves to somebody across town that we think is less righteous than us. Therefore, I think I'm righteous. But when we compare ourselves to God's holy standard, that's when we get true righteousness. His standard is true holiness. Everybody around me is just another lost sinner. So we need to compare ourselves to true righteousness. And when we do, we find that we have all fallen short. And we our only hope is to fall at the feet of God and accept Jesus Christ and His righteousness. When we do that, then we don't have to be righteous in our own eyes. This is a good section in the book to stop because next time we're going to go into detail about Elihu. He has his own speech. It's quite interesting. It's very different from Job and his three friends. So we trust that you'll be back here next time to continue reasoning through the book of Job. Thank you so much for watching and listening.

SPEAKER_01 21:45

May God bless you.