Gold and Silver

Agree with God, and be at peace; thereby good will come to you. Receive instruction from his mouth, and lay up his words in your heart. If you return to the Almighty you will be built up; if you remove injustice far from your tents, if you lay gold in the dust, and gold of Ophir among the stones of the torrent-bed, then the Almighty will be your gold and your precious silver.
Job 22:21–25
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Gold and Silver
Job is pleaded with to simply confess his sins so that God would restore his fortunes.  Eliphaz is correct in his assertion that Job should repent.  All should repent, you, me, your neighbor, Job, Eliphaz, everyone.  “[F]or all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).  But the words are shallow, they hide the truth that even when we repent there is no guarantee that all of our woes will be over, as Eliphaz suggests.  There is no promise of gold and silver for the righteous, not in this life.  Yet we have something so much more precious that gold or silver, we have the blood of Christ.  Which has “redeemed me, a lost and condemned creature, purchased and won me from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil.” In purifying us in His blood God is showing that we are what is truly precious to Him, not riches of this world.  When troubles and trials come to us as they did to Job, we are to repent and turn to God, knowing that His grace is sufficient (2 Corinthians 12:9) to see us though.  The trials are not meant to overtake us or consume us but the bring us closer to God.  They purify us, burning away sin, death, and the devil, to leave us save in His arms. We are reminded of this fact when we sing:

When through fiery trials your pathway will lie,
My grace, all sufficient, will be you supply;
The flame will not hurt you; I only design
Your dross to consume, and your gold to refine. (LSB 728)