There is something frightening about invisibility. In fictional stories, when people can make themselves invisible, it gives them great power. You can't see where they are, where they are going, or what they are doing. Here, in this true story, God is invisible and Job is terrified.

And yet, even in his fear, Job longs to stand before the great invisible God. In today's reading and the next, we consider Job's reply to Eliphaz.

There are two sides to this reply. On the one hand (Job 23), Job longs for the day when he, and all others who are righteous by faith, will stand vindicated before God. On the other hand (Job 24), he yearns for the final judgment on the wicked. In a way, he prays, as we do in the Lord's Prayer, ″Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven″ (see Matthew 6:9-13).

In Job 23:1-7, Job says he longs to ″find″ the invisible God and state his case before Him. He believes that the day will come when he, along with all who are ″upright″ (that is, real believers; see 1:1, 8; 2:3), will be able to ″establish their innocence before him″ and ″be delivered for ever″ by God the judge (23:7). And yet, God is invisible (vv. 8-9): wherever Job looks, he cannot find Him!

Still, Job is sure that although he does not know the way God takes (as we saw in chapters 1 and 2, Job does not hear the heavenly scenes), God ″knows the way that I take″ (23:10).

God knows that Job walks with a clear conscience, that his ″feet″ (that is, his behaviour) closely follow God's ways, and that he has not departed from God's commands (vv. 11-12). So, Job is confident that ″when he has tested me, I shall come forth as gold″ (v. 10). Job knows that in this life, all manner of terrible things will happen to righteous and upright believers. But he trusts that the day will come when God's will shall be done on earth as it is in heaven, and all true believers will be vindicated for ever.

In verses 13-17, Job says how frightened he is of the great, all-powerful, invisible God. Yet he is confident, and his confidence is not a shallow thing. He is ″not silenced″ (v. 17), though there is awe and even terror in his heart as he contemplates final judgment.