Job 29:2 Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me.
God is in Today
Would you rather live in the past or the future? Well, it doesn’t really matter what you wish, all you have is today. Old men tend to live in the past, and young men tend to live for the future. But in both cases a person can only live in the day that God has given. The more unfavorable the day may be, the more we tend to long for the past or hope the future will quickly come.
Job found himself in this situation because days were so dark for him in the present. In Job 29:2 he says, “O that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me.” In verse 4 he says, “As I was in the days of my youth.” Then the word that seems to be the watchword for the rest of the chapter is the word “when.” Verse 5 says, “When the Almighty was yet with me, when my children were about me.” Verse 6 says, “When.” Verse 7 says, “When.” Verse 11 says, “When.” Job said, “Boy, I wish it were yesterday. I wish I could go back to a more favorable time.” I don’t think he anticipated a good future, so the only way he knew to go was backward.
Unfortunately, though we don’t know how long we will live, we can’t go back to the past. Job 30:1 says, “But now they that are younger than I have me in derision.” Job goes on to say that there was a time when he was so great that he would not have hired their fathers to be one of the dogs to help him watch his flock. Verse 9 says, “And now am I their song, yea, I am their byword.” That’s the way things were, but now they mocked him. Verse 16 says, “And now my soul is poured out upon me.”
The lesson is to live in the day you inhabit. The reason for this is that God provides for today. God stands in the future, but you don’t. The only place you can be where God is right now is today. God is not the “I was” or the “I will be.” He is the eternal “I AM.” God is a very present help. That means He’s present in place and time. The Bible says, “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” God allows just so many problems, and He allows all the provision we need. He does that for today.
Also, remember that today leads to tomorrow. If you are going to be around in the future, the future has a path that leads smack dab through today. That makes this day mighty important.
At the end of the book in Job 42:12 it says, “So the LORD blessed the latter end of Job more than his beginning.” And verse 17 says, “So Job died, being old and full of days.”
We should learn from the past and we should have optimism about the future, but both of those are more likely when we live in the day we inhabit and trust God for this day.