The platitudes of wisdom are like a hot knife of hate in an ill-timed moment. “Timing is everything.” Certainly, that is part of what Solomon means in the second line of his couplet in Ecclesiastes 3:7: “A time to be silent and a time to speak.” Job’s friends are stunned into silence by the magnitude of Job’s sorrows for seven days. It should have been 7 years. Minimum.
This past two weeks, I have been reading the book of Job over and over, trying to drink deeply of its wisdom so that I might better care for men and women experiencing the harrowing withering of suffering and loss. Like staring into a flame, some beauties are only found in the long draw and the uninterrupted gaze of meditation. As a father, I am appalled at the insensitivity of Job’s friends words, wise as they might be in most moments, thrust into the ears of Job in his most painful moment of loss and pain. They are both hollow and foul because they assume a knowledge of cause that they do not have.
The man has lost 10 children. Seven sons and three daughters no longer breath the air he breathes. Sons and daughters raised in love, celebrated in life, are gone. Gone. And days, at the most, weeks afterward three “friends” arrive to “comfort” Job, and when they see the devastation of the man, now compounded by a wasting skin disease (2:7ff) that has disfigured him beyond recognition (2:12), their mouths are closed in horror and wailing at his pain for seven days. But no more. These three had made an appointment to meet up and travel together and “comfort” Job (2:11). They don’t know what we know. They don’t know that the Almighty Himself has already rendered judgment on the character of Job. Three times we are told that God’s perspective is that Job is blameless, upright, a fearer of God, and a man who turns away from evil. There are other issues in play.
Job’s pain is NOT the result of his sin.
He is NOT being judged for some misstep in his life.
He is NOT suffering because of some lack of integrity. (2:3)
He is NOT the victim of some indiscretion or secret sin.
He has DONE NOTHING TO DESERVE what has occurred in his life.
There is a great cosmic battle being played out in his life and it has nothing to do with sin.
Will a man cling to faith in the Living God when every self-interested reason
for doing so is yanked away?
In the different speeches by the three “friends” filled with bad theology and worse assumptions each imply or state outright, multiple times, that the reason his children are dead is either because of Job’s sin or the sins of his children!
When, in the remainder of whatever might be left to his days would such a statement EVER be appropriate to a mother and father who have lost seven sons and three daughters!
All of us know people who are going through harrowing pain. I certainly do, in my ministry to pastors who have been broken by ministry. But all of us know or will know, men and women, family and friends, who will have a marriage disintegrate, a cancer diagnoses, a tragic accident, a debilitating illness, a devastating job loss, a crushing financial reversal, a bone-chilling loss of a child. These things happen in a sin-infested world. As I read the story of Job and the missteps of his friends, I think of a couple of questions and conclusions related to how we might be of real substantive hope to our friends in the midst of their pain.
Questions:
- How can we help our friends in their sorrows? and
- What should we pray for our friends in their sorrows?
Conclusions:
- Keep your mouth shut. Harrowing pain and sorrow is a time that requires silence. (Eccl. 3:7)
- Pray that they would not forsake the fear of God. (Job 6:14)
- Check your assumptions. Make no judgments about cause and effects. The friends of Job didn’t know the back drop of chapters 1 and 2 and we don’t know the whole story on the source of our friends pain.
- Assume that the Spirit of God can use your presence to bring a good effect. After they sat for seven days, Job himself finally began his own lament. That was progress. It was not an invitation for his companions to judge Job with their assumptions.
We can all serve the world, the Kingdom of God and Jesus, better, if we would follow these simple conclusions. Let’s do it. Let’s do our part in not adding to the world’s pain.
ChosenRebel's Blog 