Bill McKibben's "The Comforting Whilwind".

A great commentary on the Old Testament story of Job.

Here is a piece, more to come.

(humility is the first response of Job as God reveals himself in the whirlwind...)

"The voice also calls us, overwhelmingly to joy. To immersion in the fantastic beauty and drama all around us. It does not call us to think, to categorize, to analyze, to evaluate. It calls us to be. The reason Job matters so much to me is because of the language - the biologically accurate, earthy, juicy, crusty, WILD, untamed poetry of God's great speech. Now, commentators - mostly urban commentators, I would wager - have insisted over the centuries that God's answer is obscure; I read recently an interview with a leading rock hard fundamentalist who believed every word in the Bible, but said that he thought the language in Job was probably "poetic." Many others have said that simply the presence of God alone is answer enough for Job. But that is absurd, if only because of the incredible strength that the artist lavishes on his words. We are to listen to God with that part of us that is most open to the POWER OF ART. Not just our ears - more than anything, the images are visual, sensual, a total contrast to the gnat-straining and wool-gathering and other academic exercises that have occupied the previous thirty chapters. Gd doesn't even deign to dismiss all that talk as vain. No - he simply embarks on a defiantly proud tour of the physical world, a world filled with untamed glory tat reflects his own...""

JOB'S CREATION CHAPTERS ARE WHERE THIS POETIC GOD SPEECH LIES - CHECK IT OUT: STARTS IN CHAPTER 38 OF JOB - especially great in Eugene Peterson's translation "The Message".

He goes on quoting some of the text and says,

"Not only are all these things mighty and inexplicable and painful, but they are unbearably beautiful to God. They are right. They should brew in us a fierce and intoxicating joy."

"WILDERNESS IS OUR TRUE HOME" - someone said that... Henry Bugbee? Eckhart? DJDuncan?...

Bill M. also says,
"This kind of untamed joy, of rapture, is not confined to our dealings with the natural world, of course. Friendship, love, sex - all are openings into this irrational and deeply moving world. None move solely according to the calculations we are taught by the economists and advertisers; all produce joy far deeper than any material acquisition."

I LOVE THIS.
JOB, REMEMBER IS BEING INTRODUCED TO THIS AWE-FILLED EXPLORATION OF THE WONDER-WILDERNESS OF CREATION FROM A PLACE OF DESTITUTE SUFFERING AND LOSS - JOB AND HIS PAIN ARE SIMPLY A PART OF THIS WILDERNESS OF LIFE...AND OF DEATH.
*AND SOMEHOW THIS MAKES GOD'S "LOVE" THAT WE HEAR ABOUT ALL THE TIME ALL THE MORE MAGNIFICENT...

EVERYONE CONVINCED?...