Reading the Bible-Day 4

Job 1-5

Kretzmann

Job loved God. He was devout. He was raising his children to be God-fearing and prayed and made sacrifices for them daily. God kept him hedged in, which was something that annoyed Satan. Satan believed that the reason Job was so faithful to God was because God kept him hedged in and blessed him with many earthly blessings. But Satan had it wrong. Job loved God and was faithful...period. No matter what Satan did to him, he remained faithful. When his wife told him to just curse God and get it over with, he refused. He knew that his blessings came from God and He had the right to take them back at any time. No matter how great his loss, who would not lose faith in God. Instead of cursing God, he continues to praise and worship him.

Why does God allow this? He allows Satan to test Job, that's true. However He also uses this to test Satan...to prove something to us. Satan can't snatch you out of the Lord's hand! No matter how hard Satan tries, he can't snatch Job out of God's hands and he can't snatch us either.

His friends arrive, and like most good friends in the face of disaster, apparently had no words to say. So they did even better...they sat with him. Sometimes words aren't necessary. Just being there is what's required. Unfortunately, as we see later, they do eventually start talking.

When Job does finally decide to speak, he curses. But does he curse God, as his wife suggested? No! Instead he curses himself. Even though he did nothing to find fault with and still lost everything, he curses himself. He curses the day he was born. Today we would say he was depressed and that's true. If anyone had reason to be depressed it was most certainly Job! However, he feels that if he had never been born, or had died at birth, he would be at rest and ready for the day of resurrection. In the midst of this, he keeps his faith in God.

Then his friend Eliphaz speaks up. Good old Eliphaz, God bless him. He means well. Unfortunately his theological bent is as skewed as many people's today. He believes that if you're suffering that it's punishment for some sin. Either Job is hiding something or has some hidden sin that he's committed and that's why God is punishing him. Eliphaz uses the word "fool" to refer to those who deny God but he would fit in well with the fools who fall for the Word of Faith and other false doctrines today.

His so-called encouragement ends up discouraging poor Job. He offers empty platitudes and insists that all this is somehow Job's fault. When we are comforting those in our lives who are suffering or in grief, we have to be careful not to offer empty words that offer no comfort, but really listen to them and share their pain.

"God does use adversity to discipline His people, as Eliphaz pointed out (5:17-18; Heb 12:1-13). In the midst of trial, we might doubt God's love for us. But the cross shows us the measure of God's love. By the power of the Holy Spirit, we can see suffering as a tool to refine and strengthen our relationship with God in Jesus Christ. Luther: 'When faith begins, God does not forsake it; He lays the holy cross on our backs to strengthen us and to make faith powerful in us. ... Where suffering and the cross are found, there the Gospel can show and exercise its power. It is a Word of life. Therefore it must exercise all its power in death. In the absence of dying and death it can do nothing, and no one can become aware that it has such power and is stronger than sin and death' (AE 30:126). " (TLSB p. 789)