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Teleios occurs again in James 1: 17 where we read:
"Every good and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father
of lights, with Whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning."
In his next usage of anothen "from above" James speaks of "wisdom" (James 3: 15,
17); contrasting the wisdom that is from beneath with that which is from above. Now
Job is most certainly one of the "wisdom" books of the Bible, and without the Divine
comment found in Job 42: 7 who of us would feel capable of pronouncing judgment
upon the logic and philosophy of Eliphaz and his friends? The word teleios is used twice
more "the perfect law of liberty" (James 1: 25); and of the man who offends not in word
and consequently is able also to bridle the whole body (James 3: 2). While there is no
evident reference in this passage to the work of Job, it is interesting to see that "unbridled
disrespect" was a figure well-known to Job by painful experience (Job 30: 11).
Teleioo "to perfect", occurs but once in James in the passage already quoted:
"seest thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect?"
(James 2: 22). James is not traversing the doctrines of Romans or Galatians, which insist
upon the doctrine of justification by faith only, but speaks of the "perfecting" of that faith
by works that follow.
Teleo occurs but once in James, "if ye fulfil the royal law", where the word means as
elsewhere to "finish" as a course, as well as to fulfil, as a law.
In these eight references we can see that James means by "the end" of the Lord, the
end the Lord had in view when He permitted Job to be subjected to such severe
discipline. Job knew what it was to be visited "every morning" and tried "every
moment" (Job 7: 18). He could also say "when He hath tried me, I shall come forth as
gold" (Job 23: 10), then "patience" had its perfecting work and the end of the Lord was
achieved.
The problem of pain and of apparent unequal distribution of suffering; the total
disregard, in natural events, of relating the life and character of the sufferer with the
heaviness of the stroke endured, these and similar subjects have tormented the minds of
sensitive men and women since the dawn of time; yet here, at the threshold of
Revelation, is a book that epitomizes the problem of the ages and deals with this very
thing. In the opening chapters of Job is made known that which was hidden from Job and
his friends--the enmity that must exist between the two seeds and which underlies the
problem of the ages. The overruling grace of God, bending all these things to the
accomplishing of His "end", shines as a light in a dark place. Argument can never
resolve the problem of evil. Philosophic research is vain. Tradition can offer no solution,
and religion no solace; all that Job could do, and all that we can do, is to "trust", to lean
hard upon the fact that God is both righteous and good; both wise and kind; and at last
He will be justified in all His ways, and the sufferer "come forth as gold".
Job uses the word massah "temptation" in chapter 9: 23 where he faces the problems
of the apparent inequality in the distribution of affliction; of man's inability to justify