Scripture Daily

Context No. 1667 of 4322 · Job

Context · Reflection

Job 31:33-40: in context

33if like Adam I have covered my transgressions, by hiding my iniquity in my heart, 34because I feared the great multitude, and the contempt of families terrified me, so that I kept silence, and didn’t go out of the door— 35oh that I had one to hear me! Behold, here is my signature! Let the Almighty answer me! Let the accuser write my indictment! 36Surely I would carry it on my shoulder, and I would bind it to me as a crown. 37I would declare to him the number of my steps. I would go near to him like a prince. 38If my land cries out against me, and its furrows weep together; 39if I have eaten its fruits without money, or have caused its owners to lose their life, 40let briers grow instead of wheat, and stinkweed instead of barley.” The words of Job are ended.

Job comes to the end of his long defense. Have I, like Adam, covered my transgressions, he asks, hiding my iniquity in my heart because I feared the crowd and dreaded the contempt of families, so that I kept silent? He longs for someone to hear his case; he would sign his name to it, carry his indictment on his shoulder, and approach God like a prince, with nothing to hide. He calls even his land to testify against him if he has wronged it. And with that, the text says, the words of Job are ended.

One line stands out: have I, like Adam, covered my transgressions, hiding my iniquity in my heart? Job is protesting that he has not done this, that he has not hidden his sin out of fear of what people would think. But the image he reaches for is telling: like Adam. For that is what Adam did in the garden, and what we his children instinctively do, when we have done wrong, we hide it, cover it, bury it in the heart, out of fear and shame. The first instinct after sin is concealment: to keep it out of sight, unconfessed, hidden from God and others, hoping it will not be seen. Job holds up the opposite as his integrity, that he did not bury his sin but was willing to have it all brought into the open, to sign his name and face God with nothing concealed. There is a searching question in this about our own instinct toward hidden sin. The temptation, ancient as Adam, is to cover what we have done, to keep it in the dark of the heart where no one sees, rather than bring it into the light of honest confession. But sin hidden is not sin dealt with; it festers in the dark, and the God from whom we hide it sees it anyway. The way of honesty, of the open case and the signed name, is the way of health: to stop covering our iniquity like Adam and bring it instead into the light, where it can be confessed and forgiven. What we hide, we keep; what we bring into the open before God, he is faithful to forgive.

Do I, like Adam, cover my transgressions, hiding my sin in my heart out of fear and shame, keeping it in the dark where I hope it will not be seen, or can I bring it into the light of honest confession before God, who sees it anyway and is faithful to forgive what we stop hiding?

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