Bible Devotion Week 11

One of my favorite Scripture references in a movie, always a dangerous thing, is in “The Davinci Code.” The verse is, “Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further” (Job 38:11). The verse is quoted by a nun to one of the bad guys when he followed a false lead. It is my favorite because it so wonderfully captures how the vast majority of people, not necessarily believers, read the Bible. They read it however they want fitting individual verses to suit the occasion. In actual context, this verse is God’s sarcastic rebuke against Job. He hammers Job with accusing question after question, “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?” (Job 38:4) God asks Job where he was when God created all things. He goes on to talk about creating the sea and its parameters and this is what he says to them, “Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further.” 

After God ends his speech in chapter 41, Job responds to one of God’s accusations, “‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’ Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.” (Job 42:3). One commentator said of this passage, “The world is beautiful and terrifying, and in it all God is everywhere, seen to be powerful and wise, and more mysterious when He is known than when He is but dimly discerned.” We know God even more than Job did because we live in the time after the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus. We may still look out at the world and ask “Why are things this way?” But God is known in his Son so that whatever we face in this life, we may face it knowing the God who said to the waters, “Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further.” Not only said it at creation but on a boat in the middle of a lake causing his friends to ask, “What sort of man is this, that even winds and sea obey him?” (Matthew 8:27).