JOY "JOB : When Bad Things Happen to Good People" January 28, 2015

January 28, 2015

Job…..When Bad Things Happen to Good People

I      Life Happens

II     The Advice of a Few Good Friends

III     The Lord’s Answer                                                                                                                           IV     God Comforts Job 

Gary Carr tells the story of Chippie the parakeet.  

"Chippie never saw it coming. One second he was peacefully perched in his cage, sending a song into the air; the next second he was sucked in, washed up, and blown over.

"His problem began when his owner decided to clean his cage with a vacuum. She had stuck the nozzle in to suck up the seeds and feathers at the bottom of the cage when the nearby telephone rang. Instinctively she turned to pick it up. She had barely said hello when-- Chippie got sucked in. She gasped, let the phone drop, and switched off the vacuum. With her heart in her mouth, she unzipped the bag.

"There was Chippie--alive but stunned--covered with heavy gray dust. She grabbed him and rushed to the bathtub, turned on the faucet full blast, and held Chippie under a torrent of ice-cold water, power washing him clean. Then it dawned on her that Chippie was soaking wet and shivering. So she did what any compassionate pet owner would do: she snatched up the hair dryer and blasted him with hot air.

"Did Chippie survive? Yes, but he doesn't sing much anymore. He just sits and stares a lot. It's not hard to see why. Sucked in, washed up, and blown over! It's enough to steal the song from any stout heart." Life is like that sometimes. You never see it coming, but life just sucks you in, washes you up and blows you over……

That’s exactly how Job must have felt, bless his heart,  sucked in, washed up and blown over .We are familiar with the things that Job had to endure. He suffered greatly for the glory of the Lord, and for thousands of years, his life has stood as a testimony to the faithfulness of the Lord and of His ability to bring His people through any trial. Job's story is one of vast encouragement, to us all. In this passage, we will see what the trials of life bring our way, and the most important thing we will learn is that God is always in control, no matter what it might look like…..so we have to trust HiS HEART WHEN WE CAN’T SEE His hand…

The gripping and challenging book of Job is perhaps one of the most fascinating books of the Old Testament, and it begins a new division in the scriptures….Scholars believe that it is the oldest book in the bible, we don’t know who penned it, but there is no doubt that it was authored by the Holy Spirit-----you can feel His presence hovering over the pages as you read it, can’t you? And most scholars agree that it answers the age-old question, “why do bad things happen to good people, more than any other book in scripture…

The books from Genesis to Esther are all narrative books, and are vitally meaningful to us, as living parables….. and because the characters actually lived and are a part of history….it enables us to see ourselves and how we are supposed to or not supposed to behave,…. what we are supposed to believe or not believe….who we’re supposed to obey and who we aren’t….

Job begins another section -- the poetry books of the Bible -- which also includes Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon and Lamentations. Job is a wonderful poem. Some have said that its the greatest poem in all of literature, spiritual and secular alike….. There’s nothing that even  Shakespeare has written, that exceeds the book of Job ,in beauty of expression. It is admired everywhere, as one of the most beautiful writings that man has ever known. 

But it is more than an expressive, dramatic writing; it has a message of truth and honesty as it is played out in man’s soul and of how the battle between good and evil is played out in the heavenly realms….

It is a drama, an epic drama much like The Iliad and The Odyssey, the poems by Homer from the Greek world. But the book of Job is also history. Job was an actual, living person and these events actually took place, but God recounts them for us in this beautiful style so that we might have an answer to the age-old, haunting question, "Why does apparently senseless tragedy strike godly people……..?" Any time we get into difficulties, or experience heartache or disappointment and loss,  we need to turn to the book of Job, especially  chapters 38-41 when the Lord speaks directly to Job….. Here is a man who experienced an agony of human despair and desolation of spirit, which accompanied the apparently meaningless, senseless tragedies that came into his life, as they always do…and he kept his focus on the Lord God…

The ultimate answer to the question of why do godly people suffer? is given right at the beginning of the book. At the opening, we are privey immediately to information that explains something about the drama, that even the actors themselves, are not permitted to know. And it’s the answer to the age-old question “why/”The answer is….. that senseless suffering comes because of the sin that buffets the people and the earth, since Adam and Eve’s fall in the garden and Satan's continual challenge of the Lord God’s sovereign right to rule the world….

So, as the book opens, we find God meeting with the angelic creation. Among them is Satan, who strides in sneering and swaggering, convinced that self-interest is the only real motive for human behavior. Satan's philosophy is that the question "What's in it for me?" is the only accurate explanation for why people do anything that they do, good and bad...

And there, in the presence of God, he maintains that anyone who claims that human beings act from any other motive are really religious phonys; and, he claimed that he could prove it. God patiently, agreed to test his theory." Then He selected Job to be the proving ground.

(A good analogy that we can compare it to, is that during In World War II, at the opening of the war between Japan and the United States, it looked as though this conflict would be staged in the Pacific Ocean -- most likely the islands of Hawaii, because the battle began at Pearl Harbor. But very early in the war, events took a sudden startling turn, and without a word of warning the whole theater of battle shifted abruptly to the South Pacific. For the first time, Americans began to hear of strange names of islands, like "Guadalcanal" and Oconawa…. There, in those quiet, obscure, out-of-the way corners of the earth, the greatest powers on earth were locked in mortal combat. The islands became the battleground for the great fight between empires.)

And something like this happened in the story of Job. Here is a man going about his private affairs, unaware that he has suddenly become the center of God's attention. For the time being all of God's activity is focused on him,because he has become the battleground for a conflict between God and Satan in which God is planning to pull the rug out from under Satan, and to reveal him as the phony that he is. Job is that battleground, and Satan immediately moves in with his shock troops.

I       Life Happens…..

In chapter 1 we read that, one by one, the props are pulled out of Job's life. It is a though some Western Union telegram boy delivers a series of messages to Job about terrible catastrophes. Hard on the heels of the first comes another one, and the messages just keep coming in. First, all Job's oxen have been taken by enemy raids, and then all his donkeys have been decimated. Next, word comes that his sheep have been killed by a terrible electric storm, and crowding in after that is the news that his great herd of camels, true wealth in the oriental world, has been wiped out in a natural catastrophe. Then comes the heartrending news that his seven sons and three daughters were together in one home enjoying a birthday celebration when a great tornado hit and the house was demolished. All of his children were killed in one fatal blow.

Job takes it all in stride. At the end of chapter 1 his response to this terrible series of tragic, senseless accidents  is :

"Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return; the LORD gives, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD." (Job 1:21 RSV)

I wonder if we would have responded that way? Satan is somewhat taken aback, and surprised by Job’s response, so he asks God to change the rules of the game. Satan has decided to attack Job more directly and petitions God for the right to strike Job's own body. And God lets him….. Without warning, Job is suddenly stricken with a series of terrible boils, or carbuncles.

(I don’t know if you’ve ever had a boil but when I was in high school, during a period of about 6 months,  I had, maybe 10 boils on my body, even though there there were no more than one or 2 at one time. I was very anemic and apparently, the boils were a side effect of the anemia….Since then I have had a deep sympathy for pooor, sweet Job. There is nothing more aggravating than a painful boil, which won’t relieved by any kind of medication. You can only grit your teeth and endure agony. until the boil comes to a head, and heals itself. And right as one boil is healing, the next one begins….And there ugly too, people are grossed out by them, so I tried to keep them covered up, but it was a constant struggle---they were on my legs and were too big and full of infection, and were in danger of bursting at any minute, so I couldn’t just wear a bandaid,,,,I had to have a wrapped-around-my-leg-bandage It drove me crazy, it was constantly sliding down----and people were always asking about  it….It was painful, mortifying and an aggravation all rolled into one…. ……

Consider how Job was stricken with them from the top of his head to the soles of his feet. He hardly knew what to do, but he was determined to wait it out. As the malady continued, his wife was the one whose faith crumbled. She turned on him and said, "Are you still holding fast to your integrity? Why don't you curse God and die?" 

Job had to stand alone, but he was determined to be faithful. But it was hard to continue to stand as he faced the final test, during a visit from three of his friends.

II                 The Advice of a Few Good Friends

At this point the whole book slightly shifts its focus because we aren’t just looking at Job anymore… but we’re also looking at his controversy with his three friends,…. and their discourse occupies the major part of the book.

 From their (very human) point of view, they attempted to answer that same haunting question, "Why do senseless tragedies afflict men?" The major part of the book, written in beautifully poetic language, records the attempts by these men to come to an answer. And the three friends' answers are all the same. They answer the question of Job's problems with smug, dogmatic assurances that only one explanation is possible: he has committed some awful sin. They try to break down Job's defenses with arguments.

And they aren’t necessarily wrong in their explanation. There are tragic events -- catastrophes, heartache, pain, and suffering -- which do occur because of sin. Any time that we disobey God’s, instructions for our good health and safety, we open ourselves up to the consequences of sin, sometimes there is an immediate and violent physical reaction with a whole lot of suffering that can come from it.... But the problem in his friends' arguments -- and their evil -- lay in their dogmatic assertion that this is the only explanation possible for all suffering.

They each took three rounds with Job. Each of them presented three nice, seemingly valid arguments, but each one played the exact same tune. They tried various approaches. First they tried sarcasm and irony. Then they appealed to Job's honesty. Then they accused him of specific crimes and misdeeds. Finally they acted hurt and went away, miffed and sulking, pridefully appealing to Job' s conscience, not to insult, them, any more. 

And the whole time, they attacked his integrity with the argument, that if God is indeed just, then the righteous will always blessed and the wicked will always suffer; which leads to the conclusion that, if an individual is suffering, it must be because there is something wrong in his life. This is their argument. To those men, the explanation was a simple matter of cause and effect and was very logical. It was neat and tidy and explaind everything, unless you happen to be the sufferer, and were blameless for your trouble.

At first Job is slightly irritated with his friends. But then he became angry and, finally, sarcastic. In the opening lines of his reply, he deliverd a cutting piece of irony: "I am sure you alone are the people and wisdom is going to die with you." (Job 12:2) basically meaning……. "You think you’ve got all the answers, you've solved all the problems, you know everything. So there's no use talking to you any longer!" and With bitter sarcasm he let them know that their explanation of his suffering was in error. And he expressed his own doubts and fears about what God was doing to help him….

He openly entreated them to understand that he couldn’t confess any sin, because he was genuinely unaware of anything he had done that had offended God. And then, with more than a little attirude, he confessed that he couldn’t   believe in justice any more, because the arguments that the wicked always suffer just weren’t true, because there were so many people, in the world, who were  notoriously wicked, and yet, they were flourishing amd prospering and living in ease, and nothing horrible was happening to them.

Then, he confessed that he didn't know what to do because God wasn't listening to him; so he didn't even have a chance to plead his case before Him, and he complains that God was hiding from him and couldn’t be found. 

Eventually Job actually shouted at his friends…. in the turmoil of his confusion, bewilderment, anger, hurt, and frustration. He confessed that he was afraid of this God, who was not the God he had known. He didn't know what has happened to his dear old friend whom he had always been able to rely upon, in the past. Job’s thoughts and attitude had taken a strange turn, since all the awful things were unrelentingly, happening to him… he didn’t know what to think or say…. 

The wonderful thing about this dear man is though, that throughout the whole book, he is utterly and completely honest. Confused and bewildered and puzzled by what was happening, he just blurts out his thoughts. He refused to admit things that he couldn’t accept: "All the pat answers don't help at all!" In his desolation he expressed, in various ways, the ultimate cry of the human spirit. 

Some wonderful verses emerge from this discourse by Job. Stripped to his very soul, he cried out again and again with some of the deepest expressions of the human heart, that we have everyone experienced at some time in our lives…. In chapter 9 he says about God,

“For he is not a man, as I am, that I might answer him,
that we should come to trial together.” (Job 9:32 RSV)

which is the cry of a heart that recognizes that God is higher and greater and richer and holier than man, and man can't reach him. It is the cry for a mediator to come between them.

Then in chapter 14 comes another expression out of this man's faithful heart:

If a man die, shall he live again?
All the days of my service I would wait,
till my release should come. (Job 14:14)

"If I knew that after I die I would live again, I would gladly wait until that time to argue my case before God!" "If a man die, shall he live again?"…..  is the question that is uttered by so many – which just wells up from the depths of Job’s desolation and suffering.

Then in chapter 16 Job cries out,

Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven,
and he that vouches for me is on high. (Job 16:19 RSV)

Earlier he had cried out for a mediator: "Oh, that I might have somebody step in between me and God." Now at last, born of his desperation, "I realize now that the only one who can adequately argue my case for me is God himself. If any cause of mine is going to be fairly presented before God, God himself has to do it."

Then, his attitude came full-circle, when, at last, a ray of light, was pin-pricking thedarkness:

"For I know that my Redeemer lives,
and at last he will stand upon the earth;
and after my skin has been thus destroyed,
then from my flesh["in my flesh," in the Hebrew] I shall see God." (Job 19:25, 26)

Out of the dark, deep distress of this man came cries, which ultimately found their fulfillment in the coming of the Lord Jesus. He came to be mediator. He came to give assurance that man shall live again. He came to stand between man and God. He came to stand in the flesh upon the earth that man might see him face-to-face. And its clear that Job understood the truth of this by the end of his conversation with the Lord God…

But before it was all over, came the final blow to Job…. after all his so-called friends had had their chance with him and had tried to beat him down, with their arguments pounding him again and again like a club… Poor Job -- bruised, defeated, puzzled, bewildered, and confused --  met with a young man who happened to be standing there all along, but who only, at the end, interjected himself into the picture, and lumped Job’s argument in with the arguments of Job’s negative friends….totally negating Job’s reasoning…. 

His name was Elihu and he was speaking for all youth, when he stood up to say, "You are all wrong. You friends of Job are wrong because you accuse him unjustly, and Job is wrong because he blames God for his difficulty. He is accusing God in order to exonerate himself." Elihu pointed out the weaknesses in both arguments but still offered nothing positive to answer the question of Job's misery.

III                       The Lord’s Answer

Then suddenly, the Lord himself answered Job. In a whirlwind's fury, he came to him and said, "Do you want to debate, Job? You have been saying that you want some answers to your questions and that I have been hiding and am not willing to debate with you. Do you want to debate your case? All right. First, let me see your qualifications. I have a list here of forty questions I would like to ask you, to see if you are competent to understand problems. These are very simple problems, very simple questions, and if you are able to handle these ABC's, then perhaps you are able to debate with me the questions you have in your heart."

Then, in chapters 38 through 40, we have one of the most remarkable passages in all of the Bible. God takes Job on a tour of nature and asks him question after question about Job's ability to deal with this kind of thing or that kind of thing in nature. Gradually these three chapters draw the picture of a vastly complicated, intricately intertwined universe for which is required a tremendous superhuman mind to direct all these activities, to keep life in balance and to answer all the questions that the Lord is asking Job to answer. And Job, along with the rest of us, is pulled up short, as we recognize, just who God is and just who we are in relation to Him…  

And At the end of this overwhelming display of the wisdom of God, Job fell down on his face and said:

"I had heard of thee by the hearing of the ear,
but now my eye sees thee;
therefore I despise myself,
and repent in dust and ashes." (Job 42:5- 6 RSV)

God's essential argument is that life is too complicated for simple answers. If you are demanding that God come up with simple answers to these deep and complicated problems, you are asking him to do more than you are able to understand. He is simply saying that only God can adequately deal with the answers to these kinds of questions. Therefore, man must take the position of trusting him -- not arguing with him. God has displayed in the most amazing way his ability to work out complicated situations while keeping human life and the life of the entire world -- with all their tremendously involved complexities -- in beautiful balance. Now if you really see that, then you must trust God to work out these complicated problems of life. ( Louis Giglio’s Indescrible……)

Job, overwhelmed by the vast might and wisdom and majesty of God, fell on his face, repented, and learned the lesson that God wanted him to learn. Only God has the right to use men for whatever purpose he desires. 

In other words, God does not exist for man but man exists for God. God is not a glorified bell-boy at whom we can snap our fingers and have him run up asking, "May I take your order?" We exist for him. We are God's instruments for the working out of his purposes, some of which are so vastly complicated they are far beyond our ability to understand. There are many questions which simply cannot be answered because our calculating machinery is so inadequate.

IV                          God Comforts Job

The last of the book is a beautiful picture of what James calls the tender mercies of God toward Job (James 5:11). God says to Job, "Now I want you to pray for your friends -- these three dear men, so stubborn, so sure that they had all the answers, so well meaning, so sincere, so dedicated, but such utter blunderers. Pray for them. Job."

Then God said to Job, "How many sheep did you have?" Job said, "Seven thousand." God said, "All right, I will give you fourteen thousand. How many oxen did you have?" And he said, "Five hundred." God replied, "I'll give you a thousand. How many camels?" "Three thousand." "All right, Job, you will have six thousand camels. How many asses did you have?" "Five hundred." "I'll give you a thousand. How many sons and daughters?" "Seven sons and three daughters." "All right, you will have seven sons and three daughters more, doubled. Twice as many. Seven sons and three daughters in glory and seven sons and three daughters on earth." God restored twice as much to Job and he lived the rest of his life in blessedness and happiness. The account closes with the words,

And Job died, and old man, and full of days. (Job 42:17 RSV)

Now the remarkable thing about this book is the answer we are given: the fact that the backdrop to human suffering is the age-long conflict of Satan's challenge to God's righteous government of the universe. This answer is never given to Job, at least while he lives. At the beginning of the book you find God, Satan, and Job. 

At the end of the book, Satan has faded out of the picture totally, and God stands before Job with his arms crossed, saying, "All right, I am responsible. Any questions?" 

The great lesson of the book is that there are times when we cannot be told the whole picture. There are times when God doesn’t adequately explain life to us. There are times when we must trust that not all suffering occurs because we are bad, but because it can also be the source of some final good. The deepest note in the book may be struck. when, out of the desolation of his heart and yet with the Spirit of God within him urging him on to faith in the middle of his bewilde-rment and confusion, Job says,

In 19:25-26 “For I know that my redeemer lives, and that he shall stand at the latter day on the earth, and after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God, I myself will see Him, I and no other,,,,how my heart yearns within me…

 “But he knows the way that I take; when he has tried me, I shall come forth as gold.” (Job 23:10 RSV)

That is the lesson of this book. Life is too complicated for us to handle alone. It gets so involved that we can't even be given some of the answers at times, because we can’t understand them, or the burden would be too much for us to bear…. but God is saying, "If you just take a look at all the problems that I keep solving on the very simplest levels of life, and which even then are far beyond your ability to cope with, can't you trust me to work this one out as well?

And God is saying, “If you trust me with your eternal future, why can’t you trust me with your day to day?” 

In Romans, Paul rejoices, "We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose." (Romans 8:28)

The greatest truth we need to take away from this study is to do as it says in Proverbs 3:4-5 “trust in the Lord with all your heart, lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways, acknowledge Him and He will direct your path.”

Prayer: Father God, thank you for this look into Job's heart. Thank you for recording for us the struggles of this precious man as he frankly, openly, and honestly voices his doubts, airs his grievances, addresses you with his complaints. Lord, we hear ourselves, in our immaturity crying out to you, blaming you for our circumstances, unwilling to believe that you have a purpose behind them and are able to work them out. Lord, teach us to rest in you, through the great and wonderful revelation, that in every circumstance we are privileged to be instruments in the hand of Almighty, sovereign God, working out His victory over satan, to demonstrate once and for all that the only life worth living is a life lived by faith. We pray in your name. Amen.