This study is from an on going online Daily Bible Study at:
DailyBibleStudy.Org | Daily Bible Study Index Page | Daily Bible Study Online E-Book Library
Job 28:1
1 Surely [yesh] there is a vein [mowtsa'] for the silver [keceph], and a place [maqowm] for gold [zahab] where they fine [zaqaq] it. KJV-Interlinear
1 'Surely there is a mine for silver, And a place where they refine gold. NASB
Throughout ones life, a person searches for value and meaning and purpose. Man will go to great lengths to search out the hidden secrets of the earth around him. Man will go to great lengths to innovate, to design, to invent, to manufacture, to build a world of value around himself.
People will work long and hard hours. People will dedicate their entire lives pursuing goals they extract from out of this world. And of course there are those who work all of their lives trying to get out of work, and still expecting everything that everyone else has.
Look to Adam as an example. God created an entire garden, in which there was everything given and nothing expected in return. Yet Adam through his desire for Eve, and Eve through her indifference toward doctrine, were both fooled into losing everything thay had.
Man continues to pursue the things of this world, the elusive fountain of youth, the elusive tree of knowledge, the elusive search for happiness, meaning, purpose, wealth, fulfillment and so forth.
And so Job will now explain how man, even back in his early days of history, will go to great efforts to dig in the ground, search the land all over, bleed and sweat, steal and even die in pursuit of worldly wealth.
There is gold in the ground. There's silver in them thar' hills. But the gold and the silver though sometimes obvious, is mostly hidden in the ground and has to be found, dug for, and even when found is mixed up with dirt and dross and has to be refined before a pure form is possessed.
And even then, nuggets and chunks, though they might be pretty, aren't enough. Man hammers out jewelry and other objects in order to enhance its value.
And then again, mans goes to great lengths to create combinations of gold and silver objects in order to create even more value.
But one nugget is never enough. Man has to gather mountains of silver, as the dust, as Job said earlier, and vaults of gold, in order to satisfy his desires for wealth, security, and happiness. But it still, is never enough.
With great care and pain, men search out the caverns of the earth in order to discover its riches. Riches that are temporary, riches that are totally lost when one dies, and riches that will dissolve into nothing when God destroys this universe. They have done this since day one in human history following Adam's fall.
But when it comes to things of true value, such as the wisdom of God, something which comes from God as a gift, requiring no work whatsoever, only a positive attitude toward its learning, then man looks the other way, preferring the sweat or indifference, rather than the gift.
