ResponsiveReiding

In modern terms, round one is over, and round two is about to begin. Each of Job’s 3 comforters has had their initial say, and Job has answered each as he can. Eliphaz the Temanite takes to the podium once again and the second siege begins much as the first.

Eliphaz sharpens his approach a bit, zeroing in on three basic arguments. But in the process he also slips into the error of those who know their reasoning isn’t strong enough on its own. He resorts to the simple assertion that to disagree with him, must be to disagree with God. It is this very tactic which often makes the Evangelical mindset the fodder of its critic’s volleys in our day. When Christians engage the World in dialog, and cannot seem to make our point, it is a sad truth that we often still run to the refuge of either the ad hominem attack, or the blustery assertion that if you disagree with me – you disagree with God. And since no one WANTS to disagree with God, this seems to be a magic bullet argument (at least in our own minds) to shut down the objections. But Job doesn’t fall for it any more than we ought to use it. How important it is in genuine discussions to keep the Spirit of Christ at the fore, and never run to hide behind false barricades and shallow bunkers that depend more on attempts to muscle an argument than to allow truth to stand and win the day on its own.

I feel Eliphaz’s frustration. He thinks if he can just get Job to understand his point of view, Job will concede, so he pounds the very same points home over and over as though Job just doesn’t get it. But he is never humble enough to wonder is he’s making his point poorly, or needing to understand Job’s points more precisely, or even consider that he might in fact – be wrong.

Lord help me – how very many times I’ve been Eliphaz!

Eliphaz’s discourse takes this very simple structure this time around:

1. 15:1-6 / Is this any way for a “wise” man to talk? It is useless babble. In fact it undermines sound doctrine about God (15:4 But you are doing away with the fear of God and hindering meditation before God.) Your sin is informing your theology more than the truth does, proving what we’ve been saying all along – you are a guilty sinner!

2. 15:7-16 / Do you really think you know better than the 3 of us put together with our age and experience? Your attitude shows contempt for God’s goodness, while trying to prove your own.

3. 15:17-35 / I’ll tell you the truth, it is the wicked who suffer – it has always been this way. Just because it is you suffering this time doesn’t change the fact. And no amount of self-deceit can clear you.

It strikes me how Paul’s words to Timothy would be particularly useful at this moment: 2 Timothy 2:24–26 “And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, 25 correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, 26 and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will.” But when in frustration we fall back on invective, insult and bluster, we can do no one any good spiritually. Least of all (in such a case as this) bring any comfort.

How much more learning to “weep with those who weep” (Rom. 12:15) would bring about both comfort and growth in all involved. Even when we have brought grief into our own lives through our sin and foolishness, does that mean our pain is any less, or needs any less to be relieved?

The words my own Mother spoke to me on several occasions come to mind at this moment. “Let your words always be sweet. Then it won’t be so bad when you have to eat them.”

Zophar’s words have cut crudely and deeply, and what remains amazing to me is how Job never seems to bite back. He keeps his heart and mind on the issue at hand, and not on their personalities. How unlike him I am. As we might expect, Job does his best to answer his friend’s accusations, but he refrains from ever falling into the trap of ad hominem attacks in return. He will disagree with them – vigorously, but never resorts to name calling or personal invective. And yes, he will even express his disappointment in them and tell them flatly they are not comforters at all. But all the while he listens. He considers. He dialogs. He remains open even when their words seem not only to do him no good, but actually inflict further injury. No wonder James will be led by the Spirit many centuries later to note: “As an example of suffering and patience, brothers, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. Behold, we consider those blessed who remained steadfast. You have heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful.” (James 5:10–11) Job remains an example to be marveled at.

Job’s third response stays on point: Can’t you see this is God’s hand? I’m not stupid. I’ve searched my heart, I’ve confessed, I’ve repented and sought forgiveness for – whatever. But the suffering remains. This is what I don’t understand. This is what I want God to explain to me.

His response, raw and authentic unfolds like this:

12:1-6 / Man! Do you all think you know everything or what? I’m not stupid you know.  I’m in all this pain and all you can do is mock me?

12:7-25 / No one can deny this is God at work – NO ONE! And hear me, I don’t deny God’s greatness in any way in all of this. He is marvelous beyond words. But something is going on here outside of our ordinary way of understanding things.

13:1-3 /  Listen, Zophar, I know as much about how God moves and acts as you do. But there is something yet to be explored and understood in all of this we are not getting to yet.

13:4-6 / Won’t you allow for any mystery in this? No! And so all your counsel is worthless! Worse than useless, it adds to my suffering – listen to me!

13:7-19 / God doesn’t need a made up defense. I will own the conundrum here and yet I do not fear it somehow makes Him out to be bad. He can kill me in this, and I will still trust who and what He is. And with that, I will still argue I didn’t bring this on myself, no matter what you might say. You’ve got no proof for your case anyway.

13:20-28 / Prayer: Please God, help me understand. Why all of this? Why? It doesn’t make sense. You don’t make mankind to just to torture mankind. I know you better than that.

14:1-7 / You made us. And you know we are sinful no matter what. So why not just let us live without this kind of sorrow?

14:8- / Cut down a tree and it will grow again. But we are mortal. We can’t start over. Given our mortality – a situation like this is just meaningless pain without hope of a new day. It leaves us with nothing but mourning. Why?

And isn’t that the question we are plagued with in so many of our own sufferings? Indeed. But God has something higher for Job to grasp than why. Something higher for his friends to grasp than why. Something higher for US to grasp than why. He is slowly but surely reshaping their entire theological system, to move beyond a mere cause-and-effect universe, to one that is Christ centered. To one that has its plans and purposes hidden in the mystery of redemption, and outside the scope of just this incident or that circumstance or some other horizontal event. He is moving us to consider a Christ in whose deity, incarnation, death, resurrection and return is found the reasons behind everything. And that takes a much broader view than most of us ever truly conceive of.

Chapter 11 introduces us to Job’s 3^rd comforter – Zophar the Naamathite. One commentator notes that he was probably the youngest of the three, being the last to speak, and that he was “impetuous, tactless, direct, unsympathetic, but not altogether without some contribution to make to the friends’ case.^[1]” I won’t argue the assessment.

Zophar will only reply to Job one more time, and for me, that is plenty. While concurring with his two predecessors, he adds one more theological element to be discussed, and one that is commonly used (sad to say) by many modern day “comforters” as well.

As is often the case, those sincerely wanting to defend God from any false charges can at the same time err by overstating or at least over-applying certain truths in Scripture. This happens both by detractors from God’s Word, as well as its defenders. So here, Zophar is so zealous to be sure that God’s justice is not impugned, that he has no category for suffering like he sees in Job (and under God’s sovereignty) as anything else but justice being carried out. He is a man of the Law. And the Law rewards the righteous and punishes the guilty – period. As such, he has no category for grace either.

How easy it is for those who love God’s Word and the truth in it, still to distort it. Much like Zophar, we can take one attribute of God (in this case His justice) and magnify it in such a way that it leaves no room for His other attributes – like mercy, grace, forgiveness and compassion.

Many is the one who has magnified God’s love over and against His justice (producing universalism), only to be met by the opposite error of magnifying His justice at the expense of His love (producing harsh legalism). Both fail to realize that all of God’s attributes must be held in perfect tension and harmony with one another. All in perfect proportion and none eclipsing the others so as to produce a caricature instead of a true picture.

So Zophar picks up the truth that in reality, God indeed has not punished Job as much as he deserves. He just failed to realize it is true in his own case as well. And so Zophar’s “truth” become a twisted, jagged dagger in the heart of his friend. His argument runs like this:

11:1-11 / Well now, can we just stand by and listen to you prating endlessly and foolishly on? You defend yourself Job, when you KNOW it can’t be true – you MUST be guilty.

You say you want God to answer you? Well I do too. For then you would finally learn something above your foolishness.

And truth be told Job, you haven’t suffered nearly what your guilt deserves. You’re getting off light! Your pains should be infinitely more! You’re dumber than a donkey’s colt.

11:12-19 / If you would just own your sin, and repent of it, everything will be OK. God will restore you. You have the power to change this.

11:20 / You know there is no other explanation or way out of this.

Zophar, like many of us, failed to understand that in the miracle of the Cross – righteous AND peace, can kiss one another. (Ps. 85:10)

Oh the glory of the Cross of Christ!

Bildad’s words to Job were brutal and cutting to the highest degree. Imagine suffering the loss of your 10 children in one horrendous and freak accident – only to be told that they must have deserved it, and in some way you do too. I can’t imagine it. Such grief is beyond my scope at present. And it pray it is beyond yours at well – not only at this point, but until life is through. But it is Job’s grief. And while his response to Bildad is understandably saturated with sorrow – it is also super-humanly tempered. He responds some to his friend’s careless “comfort” – but is still more troubled by his own inability to answer the “why?” question satisfactorily.

Job knows full well he isn’t sinless perfect. He isn’t trying to justify himself that way, even if his friends don’t understand what his real point is. It is as though he says: “Look, no one is completely innocent. I know that. That’s my point. If no one is completely righteous, then why me? Why this? I am completely confused. I do not understand what God is doing. And I just want to die.” I for one, get that. I understand that he just wants the misery to end at this moment. Yet how he endures. How he holds out. Because still, in the back of his mind, behind the haze that all his misery and confusion has shrouded his soul in, he knows God is to be honored, even when He cannot be understood. Undergirding all he says, that reality never completely leaves Him.

Chapters nine and ten then form his reply, and they read something like this:

9:1-12 / Bildad, seriously, I KNOW no one is without sin absolutely. I know how much higher God is than we are. That is not the question. I am not trying to say that.

9:13-24 / I’m not trying to say I’m perfect. I’m not saying God isn’t higher than I am. I’m not saying God isn’t just. I’m AM saying this doesn’t make sense. And if this is punishment – it doesn’t fit the crime. What could I have possibly done to warrant this?

And if God isn’t the one who did this in the face of my relative innocence, then tell me who did! I’m lost.

9:25-31 / No matter what I say, I know I can’t convince you that this is not some sort of tit-for-tat retribution for some hidden and unrepented of sin.

9:32-35 / And, at the same time, I KNOW God is just, but yet if I could only make my case to Him that this situation is somehow unjust, even though I know He isn’t.

10:1-15 / I hate my life – for I am stuck in this conundrum: Am I not the work of your hands Lord? So did you make me just to have me suffer without cause? No matter how innocent I am, I still look guilty in this condition. It is a lose-lose proposition for me.

10:16-22 / Better you just abandon whatever this is and give me at least a little peace and let me die.

Some might think a Christian should never sink so deep as to despair of life. From the comfort of my easy chair, I can say that too. Yet Christians of all stripes and in all ages have found themselves so severely tested, that death alone seemed to be a viable answer. What is remarkable here is that Job did nothing to end his own life. His knowing that God is still God, and that such a response is not the answer, even though it may seem like AN answer – at least to the suffering in the moment. He clings to the gift of life, no matter how mangled and excruciating it is at present. As he will state later, “I know that my Redeemer lives” – and that is enough for him. And if you perhaps find yourself today in the throes of the unbearable, may Job’s example, and the Spirit of Christ indwelling all who are His, turn your eyes to the Living Redeemer today as your very present Help in this time of desperate need. Your Redeemer, Christ the Redeemer lives. It isn’t over.

Chapter 8 of Job introduces us to the first words of Job’s friend Bildad, the Shuhite. Seeing that Eliphaz’s first attempt yielded no movement in Job at all toward Job seeing that his own sin must figure into all of this somehow – Bildad launches into what might be some of the most cruel words aimed at a suffering soul in all of Scripture.

And we must admit that one of the most wretched proclivities which has attended humanity since the Fall in Eden is how like sharks, we circle the bleeding to make our attack. Once the idea of attack has been broached, we seem almost compelled to join the fray in a frenzied unleashing of our inward sinfulness. Our own generation has seen how once a mob is inflamed over some issue, unbridled violence ensues. One can’t help but think back to the violent results of the announcement of the verdict in the O. J. Simpson trial. Many who had never participated in such lawless acts before, caught up with the passion of the mob, joined in acts they would have ordinarily thought repulsive. Or just a generation ago, how many a family man in Germany became unspeakably cruel as the Holocaust ramped up. Neighbor turned upon neighbor with savage abandon. We must see how the seeds of this kind of sin are sown in the hearts of all the Sons and Daughters of Adam – and are still lurking even in the breasts of the most “moral” and religious among us.

Bildad is not a “bad” man in the sense of being a criminal or outwardly lawless. Nor is he some common cur. As one of Job’s friends, he is no doubt upright, respectable and considered a pillar in his community. He is a religious man, and not a pagan one either. Even here he sees his role as speaking for God on the side of righteousness. And in the process, he unspeakably wounds the heart of the friend he believes sincerely he is trying to help.

Bildad’s basic assumptions of how life works come out in this opening discourse. In essence, his thinking is built around the idea that we live in a cause and effect universe. Maybe it wasn’t Job’s sin directly that brought this on, but surely even Job should be able to recognize that his children must have sinned or they would still be alive. One can only imagine how his arguments must have stabbed Job’s heart excruciatingly.

Bildad makes 4 basic points:

1. 18:2-7 / Job, get off your self-righteous horse. Let’s just face the facts, if your children had been innocent, they wouldn’t be dead right now. You know you can only be receiving what is just. Own your sin, repent and God will restore you.

2. 8:8-10 / Don’t take our word for it. Isn’t this the way all generations have known it works? You know it as well as well do. Denying it is fruitless.

3. 8:11-19 / It is this simple Job, where there’s smoke, there’s fire. Where there’s suffering, there’s sin. End of discussion.

4. 8:20-22 / The good news is – God will take you back if you repent. He’ll restore you. Your enemies will be judged. Repent.

It never occurs to Bildad that it could be any different than this. His theology has no room for modification, correction or even nuance. This is how the universe works, and so if this is your case, then only one thing can possibly be true – sin is at the root.

May the Lord deliver us from the Bildad in ourselves. May we plead for hearts of genuine compassion like that of Christ – who when preaching in the villages of Judea in Matthew 9 “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” Oh for Spirit infused compassion on the harassed and helpless. This is the Spirit of Christ Jesus.

Job’s opening discourse was a simple lament. And an understandable one – “I wish I had never been born”. I’ve uttered those words in dark moments, and no doubt many if not all who are reading this have as well – at one time or another. Sometimes the pain, and especially the meaninglessness of pain coupled with no prospect of relief drives us to despair of life and simply to want the suffering to end more than anything else.

Suffering can eclipse all other reality. A telling event in the book of Exodus give us some insight into this truth. In Exodus 6, after Moses had approached Pharaoh for the first time asking to let God’s people go, Pharaoh wanted to teach the Jews a lesson. So Pharaoh made their labors all the worse by commanding the Jews to gather their own straw, while keeping up the same quota of making bricks. It was harsh and oppressive and the people felt it keenly on top of their existing slave conditions. So Moses went back to tell the people it would be OK, God WOULD deliver them if they trusted Him. There the text notes: Exodus 6:9 “Moses spoke thus to the people of Israel, but they did not listen to Moses, because of their broken spirit and harsh slavery.” Many a good man and woman grows deaf to genuinely good news when the suffering is severe. So with Job.

It is in response to Job’s initial lament that Eliphaz the Temanite makes his first attempt to address Job – and in substance he will say: “You wouldn’t be suffering like this if you weren’t guilty of SOME sin. He will open the door to what will be the main line of reasoning from all three of Job’s friends.

Eliphaz’s discourse is contained in chapters 5 and 6, and the run of his argument goes like this:

4:1-6 / Job, you’ve counseled others to be patient in hardship, now you be patient while I counsel you.

4:7-11 / Here’s the basic reality you need to grasp Job – no one suffers without cause; without a connection to sin.

4:12-21 / And while we both know this Job, I want to tell you that the Lord has even spoken to me about this – I’ve received a vision. In the vision a spirit passed in front of me (and it was frightening) and said: ‘Can mortal man be in the right before God? Can a man be pure before his Maker?’ (vs. 17) from which I gather this Job – there’s no one without guilt, so this circumstance must fit into that category too.

5:1-7 / Look, you know I’m right. Affliction doesn’t just spring up out of the soil.

5:8-16 / My advice? Go to God Job. If you repent, all will be well.

5:17 / Make your confession, take your licks, and you’ll be restored.

5:27 / I and the others have thought this through Job. We’ve done the study – and this is the way it is. Take your medicine.

And so ends the first “comfort” Job is to receive from his friends. And I wonder how many of us have thought such things if not said them, when someone near us has suffered unusually and inexplicably? How quick we are to put it all in a neat box – and leave precious little room for the grace of God in Christ to our ailing brothers and sisters. Lord, preserve me from being such a “comforter”. THE Comforter knows infinitely better, by turning other’s eyes to Christ, rather than to their performance, or lack thereof.

Job chapter 1 set the stage for this amazing account. The righteous and prosperous Job has lost everything. His flocks, his 10 children, and upon further interaction between Satan and God (Ch. 2) – now his health is severely attacked. One cannot read those passages with feeling the enormity of his grief.

But the grief of his losses themselves, are nothing compared to what they generate internally. Without answers, Job (like us) is left with no “ease”. He remains uneasy if you will. He cannot rest. Nor can he be quiet. The heart and mind are in constant upheaval. He cannot give himself a moments rest but that all this trouble rushes in upon him over and over like unpredictable waves. Grief is a heavy load. That it is even recorded for us here in this way, is proof that our God knows what it is we suffer. He is so good.

And then Job’s three friends arrive. Make no mistake, these men really were his friends. They were not enemies in disguise. This is what makes the painful discussions which follow all the more difficult for Job. He knows these men. They fellowshipped together and served God together. They are not coming to hurt him, they love him and want to help him. But in their failure to understand the real situation, and in their very narrowly constructed theology – they end up pummeling him with their words like a thousand sledgehammers. It is unbearable to read in places. How much more it must have been unbearable to Job in the process.

One’s mind reflects back on the circumstances of Horatio Spafford – the author of “It Is Well With My Soul”. The fuller story in Spafford’s case carries much of Job’s sorrow with it.

Born Troy NY in October of 1828, Horatio became a very successful lawyer in Chicago. He married Anna, and their only son died at the age of 4 in 1870. Next, he lost most of his investments in the Chicago fire of 1871. Close friends of D. L. Moody and needing a break – he decides on a family vacation in Europe and to meet up with Moody while he was preaching there. Delayed by business, he sent his wife and 4 daughters on ahead of him:  eleven-year-old Anna “Annie”, nine-year-old Margaret Lee, five-year-old Elizabeth “Bessie”, and two-year-old Tanetta. As most of us know, the ship was struck by another and sunk in Nov. 1873. 226 died including Spafford’s 4 daughters. His wife Anna sent a simple, devastating wire: “Saved alone”. Later, sailing over the spot of their shipwreck Spafford pens the now famous lyrics to “It Is Well.”

But it didn’t end there. The Spaffords went on to have 3 more children. Of those 3, their 2^nd son dies at age four of scarlet fever. And it is then, as though this much grief is too much to be borne, their church, just like Job’s 3 friends, declares to them they must be suffering under some sort of divine judgment – and they are asked to leave lest this infect the whole church. They do leave, moving to Jerusalem to set up humanitarian works. And only a few years later, Horatio dies at 60 of malaria.

It is any wonder then that Job’s opening lament in chapter 3 can be summarized in very few words? Read the chapter, and you will no doubt come away with this brief, anguished cry:

“I wish I had never been born. Life is pain.”

Job was not the first to have been there, and certainly not the last. And if this where were the account ended, we would be at a total loss. But it is not. God will still be seen in His glory. And our dear friend Job will come to live life again – because of the faithful love of our Living God.