Category Archives: Job

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Be a Disappointment to Satan

The Lord Gives and Takes Away - Blessed Be His Name

SYNOPSIS: Instead of cursing God to His face, as Satan had predicted — “take away everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face,” Job praised God in his grief — “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.” I hope that I will be equally disappointing to Satan! And I hope that my faith will prove equally confident in the sovereignty, wisdom, and goodness of God — no matter what.

Moments With God // Job 1:20-22

At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship and said: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.” In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.

The story of Job, and particularly, the first chapter where God seems willing to bargain with Satan over testing Job’s faith, is sobering and perhaps even confusing for us modern American believers. We are not used to suffering, or at least we don’t allow that God might give permission for our suffering. Our theology prefers a God who keeps us from all discomfort, so Job story rattles us.

Yet throughout Job, we learn of the unimpeachable sovereignty and goodness of God despite difficult circumstances that would test our confidence in that. And one of the things we learn about God is that in His foreknowledge, He is unshakably confident that Job’s faith is strong enough to handle even the most devastating loss a human being can imagine.

And not only at the end of the book do we see how Job’s faith has come through the furnace of affliction, but from the beginning, we see that he is pre-committed to God sovereignty, wisdom, and goodness as this unimaginable tragedy strikes, as demonstrated by these two juxtaposed verses:

Satan – “Strike everything Job has, and he will surely curse you to your face.”

Job – “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.” (Job 1:11, 21)

Instead of cursing God to his face — as Satan had predicted, “take away everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face!” — Job praised God in his grief.

I hope that I will be just as disappointing to Satan!

Likewise, since God knows in advance how Satan will attack my faith with hardship and has confidence in the strength of my faith to come through the fire of testing as pure gold, I hope that like Job, I will never disappoint God’s confidence in me.

The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.

Take A Moment: We never know what might befall us in life, and how our faith will stand up to the test of tragedy, but God knows that our faith is strong enough to handle the worst that Satan can through at us. He is that confident in us. So today, express your pre-commitment to God’s sovereignty, wisdom, and goodness.

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Be Careful What You Ask For

Reflect:
Job 38:1-4

Then the Lord answered Job from the whirlwind: “Who is this that questions my wisdom with such ignorant words? Brace yourself like a man, because I have some questions for you, and you must answer them. Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth…?”

God has been silent for thirty-five chapters as Job and his friends have presumed to speak for the Almighty (Job 3-37). During their conversation, Job, understandably, has posed some serious questions about his unspeakable pain and suffering, wanting to know why these tragedies have happened and where God has been during it all.

Finally, God breaks his silence (Job 38-40) and gives Job what he has requested: A personal hearing. Job has finally secured a session with the Almighty to defend his innocence and interrogate the One who should have kept him, such a worthy man, from this hardship and heartache. But, it doesn’t go quite the way Job has imagined, and all he can do is retreat into stunned silence.

Why? The reason becomes quickly apparent as God asks Job a series of questions about the creation of the universe that stunningly reveals not only God’s incomparable wisdom but also Job’s utter ignorance. By the time God gets through with Job, the only response this suddenly exposed man can offer is “I am nothing—how could I ever find the answers? I will cover my mouth with my hand.” (Job 40:4)

Barely into the conversation,  through God’s scalpel-like questions, Job, his friends, and each reader listening in on this story reaches the same conclusion: In light of God’s indescribable power, unfathomable wisdom and absolute sovereignty over the universe, what right does the created have to question the Creator?

In light of God’s indescribable power, unfathomable wisdom and absolute sovereignty over the universe, what right does the created have to question the Creator?

Job got what he wanted: an audience with God and a chance to get some answers. In Job’s mind, God had some “splainin” to do. But five minutes into it, Job turned from being a self-righteous victim into a self-effaced worshiper. He quickly understood his own smallness and sinfulness next to God’s vastness and holiness.

LogoimageSo what is the lesson from Job for you? I think it’s pretty obvious: Like all human beings, you will face Job-like pain and loss in your life at some point for which you will feel the Almighty owes you an explanation. But because of the vast and uncontainable nature of the Almighty and because of your own inability to grasp the ways and wisdom of God due to your sin-flawed DNA, for the most part, satisfactory answers will not come. Therefore, your best and most healing response is to simply and worshipfully hang on to your trust in the sovereignty and goodness of Father God.

Given the vast and uncontainable nature of Almighty God and because of our own inability to grasp the ways and wisdom of God due to our sin-flawed DNA, for the most part, satisfactory answers will not come. Therefore, our best and most healing response to hardship of any kind is to simply and worshipfully hang on to our trust in the sovereignty and goodness of Father God.

You and I would do well to decide in advance that God is always good and righteous in all his ways, although he is too powerful, holy and deep to always explain himself. A predetermined commitment to this truth will enable us to journey through those times of pain and disappointment with our trust intact and our hand in the hand of the One who has promised to see us through and at the end of the day, bring us into a safe harbor of indescribable restoration.

Prayer… Father, like a short-sighted child, I often question your goodness and wisdom when I don’t get what I want; I throw a tantrum when my comfort gets disrupted. Forgive me!  At those moments in life when you don’t offer an explanation for my disappointment, help me to offer my full trust in your immutable goodness, infinite wisdom and unassailable sovereignty.

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A Limited Perspective

Reflect:
Job 4:4-5

Then Eliphaz the Temanite responded to Job: “…Your words have supported those who stumbled; you have strengthened faltering knees. But now trouble comes to you, and you are discouraged; it strikes you, and you are dismayed.”

The book of Job can be simply outlined as follows:

I.    Introduction To Job’s Suffering—The Historical Setting
II.   Interaction Between Job and His Friends—The Human Perspective
III.  Interruption of God—The Heavenly Perspective
IV.  Epilogue—The Restoration of Job

The Interaction between Job and his friends is the longest section of the book. This is the back-and-forth conversation that takes place between the devastated Job and his so called “comforters.”  As you read these interactions, keep in mind that you are listening to their analysis of life from a human point of view.  Their perspective is not necessarily right, nor is it necessarily wrong; it’s just human.

Eliphaz, the first of Job’s friends to speak, immediately points out to this suffering man that it is much easier to talk about suffering than to go through it. Point well taken. For the most part, that is an accurate perspective on suffering.  Eliphaz acknowledges that Job has in the past been a comfort and an encouragement to so many others who have gone through challenges in life, but now that the shoe is on the other foot, now that suffering has touched him, it is a whole different matter.

How true that is. We should have a theological framework for pain and suffering, and that enables us to compassionately discharge our calling as God’s children to comfort and encourage others who are going through suffering. But how rare it is to find the person who ministers to the pain of others who himself doesn’t become discouraged, who doesn’t question God’s goodness and who doesn’t feel like giving up when immense suffering touches his own life.

Another common human perspective from Job, again, perhaps true, but maybe false, is that it is the sufferer’s sin that has opened the door to the pain and devastation he is now forced to endure. Eliphaz says to Job, “As I have observed, those who plow evil and those who sow trouble reap it.” (Job 4:8)

Of course, sin is at the heart of suffering.  But to assume that it is the result of the sufferer’s sin is to tread on dangerous ground.  It could be true, but it also could be true that suffering has touched him simply because he, like you and I, are living in a world broken by human sin, and as a result, there is sickness, loss and death.

Then yet another human perspective is that our suffering is meaningless and hopeless. Of course, we don’t think that theoretically about suffering. But in practice, in the blast furnace of affliction, we steer into that mindset. Job thought that:  “What strength do I have, that I should still hope? What prospects, that I should be patient?”  (Job 6:11)

see.thru.glass.darklySo what is the lesson here?  Simply keep in mind that when either we, or the people we love, are suffering, our perspectives on that suffering are human. We see our trials as through a glass darkly. Therefore don’t be quick to assign that misfortune to specific sin or a lack of faith—it is very likely that the suffering is just part and parcel of a world system that is still waiting to be redeemed.

Likewise, in the midst of doubt, discouragement and the temptation to give up on God, don’t! Offer him your trust.

In the midst of doubt, discouragement and the temptation to give up on God, don’t! Offer him your trust. In the end, God’s ways are always wise and loving—always!

Even when you can’t see the end from the beginning, you’ve read stories like Job, and what you know is that in the end, God’s ways are always wise and loving—always.  And that would be true of your suffering, too.

Prayer… Father, you created it all, you own it all and you have the right to rule it all—including my life. Therefore, in good times and in bad, I will honor you, offer my life as living proof of your love and lift my response to life as an offering of praise to your righteous Name. You are a ruthlessly faithful God and I will be your ruthlessly faithful child.

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Ruthlessly Faithful

Reflect:
Job 1:21

“The Lord gave me everything I had, and they were his to take away.  Blessed be the name of the Lord.”

When you read the Bible as it happened chronologically, you quickly run into Job, a man who lived at the time of the Patriarchs—Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And when you run into Job, you run into a bunch of theological questions that have perplexed mankind ever since. Questions like, “why do the righteous suffer?” Or, “how could a good God allow such evil?” Or, “what in the world is God doing playing a chess match with Satan using Job as a pawn?”

Unfortunately, in a sense, Job wasn’t the only human being who bore the brunt of such inexplicable and devastating hardship. Rather, he has become the emotional father of a long line of human beings whose lives have been brutally interrupted by pain, loss and inconsolable grief.  But fortunately, in a sense, since we all suffer, Job has also become the spiritual father for righteously and obediently trudging the path of grief to find at its end a God who is, through it all, loving and good, and who unfailingly works out his purposes for his own glory and for our good.

imagesThe book of Job starts off in the first verse of chapter 2 by telling us, “There lived in the land of Uz a man named Job—a good man who feared God and stayed away from evil.” (Job 1:1) He was a very wealthy man with a big family and a sterling reputation—but he lost it all.  Yet in all this, as the last verse of chapter 1 says, “Job did not sin or revile God.” (Job 1:22)

By the time you get to the end of this book—a tough journey with lots of perplexing questions, in my opinion—rather than getting your “why”, “how” and “what” questions answered, the only answer you will find is “Who!” The book of Job starts with the suffering of a righteous man, but it ends with the glory of a righteous God, a God who created it all, owns it all and has a right to rule over it all just as he pleases. In fact, at the end of this book, in one of the most powerful statements in all of Scripture, God himself says to Job and his friends—and to you and me by extension,

“I owe no one anything. Everything under the heaven is mine.” (Job 41:11)

You will need to keep that in mind as you read Job and are confronted with these harsh and inexplicable episodes of suffering. Keep also in mind that as Job, in his need to find meaning in his pain—and his “comforters”, in their “need” to explain the reason for his pain—are speaking out of brutal honesty from a limited human perspective rather than theological accuracy.  For that reason, we must be very careful in trying to construct specific theologies from their words.

Yet at the end of the day, there are some immutable truths we can hang onto as we journey the inevitable path of loss, pain and grief from which no human being gets a pass:

God created it all, owns it all, and has a right to rule over it in anyway he sees fit.  And since God is immutably good, wise and powerful, he will see to it, in this life or the next, that his faithful ones will experience the never-ending satisfaction of his glory and grace.

Since that is true, we would do well then, as Job did, to steadfastly submit to the will of God, come what may, stubbornly trust in the goodness of God, even when there seems little reason for trust, unceasingly practice patience with the sovereignty of God, who has promised to work out all things for his glory and our good and therefore joyfully—yes joyfully—offer our grateful worship before the eternal God. This is a hard truth, but I agree: “We ought to give thanks for all fortune: if it is good, because it is good; if bad, because it works in us patience, humility, contempt of this world and the hope of our eternal country.” (C.S. Lewis)

Obviously, that requires ruthless faithfulness to the Creator. But what is the alternative? And what better, more pleasing offering of worship can you give to the God who created it all, owns it all and rules it all than your submission, trust and patient endurance? There is no greater worship!

Prayer… Father, you created it all, you own it all and you have the right to rule it all—including my life. Therefore, in good times and in bad, I will honor you, offer my life as living proof of your love and lift my response to life as an offering of praise to your righteous Name. You are a ruthlessly faithful God and I will be your ruthlessly faithful child.