Job 36:1-4, “Elihu also proceeded and said: ‘Bear with me a little, and I will show you that there are yet words to speak on God’s behalf. I will fetch my knowledge from afar; I will ascribe righteousness to my Maker. For truly my words are not false; One who is perfect in knowledge is with you.”’
If you know what
to look for, there is no shortage of red flags when it comes to Elihu’s speech.
Once again, the way he frames it does not suggest that God sent him with a
message or that God had spoken to him, but that he had taken it upon himself to
speak on God’s behalf.
I’m not done, not
by a long shot, and you’re going to hear everything I have to say on God’s
behalf. On whose authority? By what authority? What permits you to speak on
behalf of the Almighty? Could He not speak on His own behalf if He so chose?
Surely, He could!
Men going without
being sent and speaking on behalf of God, even though God never spoke to them,
have become an epidemic in the contemporary church. It was such a common thing
that the more astute among us concluded they needed to up the ante if they had
any hope of standing out, because when everyone from Uncle Bob to Aunt Lucy
takes it upon themselves to speak on behalf of God, it’s just not that special
anymore.
And so we have
the new breed of interdimensional travelers who teleport to heaven and back on
the weekly, hanging out with God and watching old reruns of Little House on the
Prairie, being used as a confidant and sounding board as to how God should rule
the universe He spoke into being, because, you know, He second-guesses Himself
so often, he needs some input from some spiky haired train wreck who discovered
that a portapoti is the Star Trek equivalent of a transporter.
Perhaps people are
so hungry for some type of supernatural experience that they’re willing to
swallow anything. Perhaps it’s the utter lack of Biblical literacy, but
whatever the reason behind the rise of individuals who make greater, grander,
and more bombastic claims regarding their own supposed experiences, it will not
end well, not for them, and not for those who follow them.
In his second
letter to the Corinthians, Paul spoke of knowing a man who fourteen years hence
had been caught up to the third heaven. There is a high probability that Paul
was speaking of himself, but because he did not want to be seen as special or
unique, he claimed it was some other individual. If it’s all about Jesus as
some claim, then they’ll make it all about Jesus. If it’s all about themselves
while claiming it’s about Jesus, they will be the ones standing in the spotlight,
passing themselves off as superior in spirituality as well as experience,
because they are the hero of their story, the star of their show, and there’s
only room on the stage for one individual.
That Elihu would
have the temerity to speak on God’s behalf was the first red flag, shortly
followed by the second, which was elevating himself to the point that he deemed
himself perfect in knowledge. One who is perfect in knowledge is with you! By
whose qualification? By whose standard? By whose plumbline? My own, of course,
silly. Who else can ascertain whether I am perfect in knowledge if not I? If anything,
you should be grateful that one such as myself is taking the time to speak to
you, rather than asking pesky questions like whether or not I have any evidence
to back up my claims.
Trust me; I’m not
lying; my words are not false. I am perfect in knowledge, and if you don’t see
it, that’s on you. Anyone making audacious claims about interacting with the Almighty
Himself and braiding His beard follows up their fanciful tale with trust me, I’m
not lying; that’s a tell, and you should be aware of it.
What they are
doing when they throw out the trust me line is attempting to short-circuit your
rational thinking ability and guilt-trip you into thinking you’re too
judgmental and unwilling to give the benefit of the doubt. It’s the same mind
game confidence men like to play, where they pretend to be hurt and aggrieved when
you call them out on their inconsistency.
You’re telling me
that if I give you a hundred dollars today, you’ll give me five hundred in a
week? But how can that be? What? Don’t you trust me? I’m not lying; my words
are not false. And that’s when they have you on the back foot, no longer
wondering why, if this individual could turn a hundred dollars into five
hundred in a week, they need your hundred dollars, why they’re still driving a
rusty Pinto, or why they smell like a cross between boiled head cheese and an
outhouse.
Here they are,
just trying to help me out, and I’m questioning their integrity. Shame on me.
Then the greed
comes into play, and the question is no longer whether this person is lying or
how this could possibly be real, but whether he can turn a thousand into five
thousand rather than a measly hundred into five. Those playing the long con
will even insist that you start out small, just to see that it works, and
return in a week with five crisp hundreds, knowing that the next time it won’t
be just a hundred bucks, but a thousand, or even ten.
If you don’t
believe these are some of the same shenanigans being done in some churches, you’ve
been sheltered, and I envy you for it. From the gold dust that never turns out
to be real gold to people mysteriously finding fifty dollars in their Bibles
after they threw five bucks in the offering plate, these are tricks intended to
elicit a specific response.
Elihu was not
motivated by justice, charity, love, or compassion. Elihu was motivated by
Elihu and how others perceived him. His baseline was that he be seen as one who
is perfect in knowledge and would accept nothing less. If that meant dragging Job
through the mud and making him out to be a wicked man, so be it. You can’t have
an omelet without breaking some eggs, after all, and it wasn’t like Job was long
for this world regardless. Funny thing how, even to this day, people justify
the most reprobate, vile, and evil things if they have a mind to.
With love in Christ,
Michael Boldea, Jr.
Posted on 1 July 2026 | 11:36 am
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