We will be spending the next three weeks in Job 2:11-37:24, which mainly record the speeches of Job and his
friends in order to demonstrate the
limits of human wisdom and to point readers to the only wise God (Job 28:23-27; Romans 16:27). These speeches are
poems that attempt to understand Job’ suffering, and the reason I say that they
demonstrate the limits of humans wisdom is because once the smoke clears 35
chapters later, they’ve still not reached a resolution as to why Job is
suffering! This portion of the book of
Job teaches us some very practical lessons when it comes to our own suffering
and also the suffering of others. In a
fallen world, we are going to suffer, and so are the people that we love are. As Christians, we are called to “comfort those who are in any affliction,
with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God” (2 Corinthians 1:3-4), and if we are
going to do so effectively, then we
must recognize the limits of human wisdom in both our suffering and our
counseling of others. Understanding
these limits should cause us to run to God in our suffering and in our ministry
to others who are suffering. My prayer
today is that this portion of God’s Word would move us to ask God for grace to humble ourselves when we
suffer and when we seek to help others through their suffering. We need the only wise God if we are going to
understand the mysteries of our suffering.
I.
WALKING THROUGH:
Let’s begin with an overview of the portion of Job
that we will consider today. A helpful
way to think about the book of Job as a whole is to see that Job 1:1-2:10 concerns Job and His Loss, that Job 2:11-37:24 concerns Job and His Friends, and that Job 38:1-42:17 concerns Job and His God. Today we are going to focus on the first
portion about Job and his friends (Job
2:11-27:23). It begins with the arrival of Job’s three friends (2:11-13). They are “Eliphaz
the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite.” The text says that whey they heard of all the “evil” that had
come upon Job, they came to show Job “sympathy”
and to “comfort him” (2:11). Upon arrival, they do not recognize Job (2:12)
and so they weep, mourn, and “sat with
him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him,
for they saw that his suffering was very great” (2:13). Now for all that these men are going to get
wrong in the book of Job, I think that their initial being there for Job is
something they got right. People who are
suffering greatly don’t always need you to “say something.” There is a time for talking, but what they need initially are simply
friends who know how to be there with them and for them.
After this moving scene of Job’s friends their
seeking to comfort Job in his suffering, the situation quickly
deteriorates. The speeches begin with Job’s opening lament (3:1-26), where he
curses the day of his birth asks “why”
he couldn’t have just died at birth (3:11-19) and “why…light” and “life” are
given to people who have to face such suffering. Job says that he basically wants to die so
that he can have “rest” from his
trials (3:13, 17, 26).
Job’s lament then sparks the great debate (4:1-26:14) that will take place between him and
his friends. I call it a debate because,
as we will see, Job and his friends are not on the same page when it comes to
why he is suffering. The debate centers
on this question of “why” Job is
suffering and takes place in three cycles
of each friend making a speech in turn with responses to each speech by
Job. Round One takes place in 4:1-14:22, Round Two in 15:1-21:34, and Round
Three in 22:1-26:14 (round three is much shorter than the first two and
Zophar doesn’t speak in it). The debate
proper with his friends ends with Job’s
closing lament (27:1-23), with Job still holding fast to his integrity and
his faith that the righteous (i.e. himself) will ultimately be vindicated.
Here are a few things you will want to watch for
in this debate. The first thing you will
want to notice is how the tension and frustration build as debate progresses. Neither side budges; they only dig their
heels further into the sand. The debate
itself essentially ends in a standoff,
with the friends having failed to comfort Job or to show him sympathy and Job
having failed to figure out what God is up to in His suffering. This frustration is intentional, meant to
show that “human wisdom on its own cannot
fathom the ways of God.”[1]
The second item that I want to point out is the
contrast between the theology of Job’s friends
and the dilemma of Job’s faith. The theology (or belief system) of Job’s friends is simple: people who are right with God do
not suffer; only the wicked do. Since
only the wicked suffer, Job must be wicked, because Job is suffering. Therefore, Job’s solution is that he needs to
repent and get right with God in order to be restored (4:7-8; 5:3-4, 17; 8:3-4;
8:13, 20; 15:5,16; 18:5, 19, 21; 20:23, 28; 22:1-20). Here are a few
samples: [7] “Remember: who that was
innocent ever perished? Or where were the upright cut off? [8] As I have seen, those who plow
iniquity and sow trouble reap the
same. (Job 4:7-8 ESV) [3] Does God pervert justice? Or does
the Almighty pervert the right? [4] If your children have sinned against
him, he has delivered them into the hand of their transgression. (Job 8:3-4 ESV) [2] “Should a multitude of words go unanswered, and a man full of
talk be judged right? [3] Should your babble silence men, and when you
mock, shall no one shame you? [4] For you say, ‘My doctrine is pure, and I
am clean in God's eyes.’ [5] But oh, that God would speak and open his
lips to you, [6] and that he would tell you the secrets of wisdom! For he
is manifold in understanding. Know then that God exacts of you less than your
guilt deserves. (Job 11:2-6 ESV) Eventually, they move from implying that
Job is guilty to outright, baseless accusation (22:2-11).
While the theology of Job’s friends is simple, the dilemma of Job’s faith, however, is
very complex. Job is struggling, and his struggle is
complicated. Though he is not sinless,
he is, according to God Himself, innocent (1:1, 8; 2:3; 9:15,20; 10:7; 12:4) in
the sense that what he is suffering is undeserved. His view of God is that God is sovereign,
all-powerful, just, and at the same time all wise and all good. Yet here he is, experiencing unimaginable
suffering that is clearly supernatural.
These things are not adding up for Job.
He feels like God is after him and he doesn’t understand why (6:4; 7:19-21;
10:2; 16:7-9). He says in Job 13:24, “Why do you hide your face and count me as your
enemy?” For Job, the God whom he loves and serves
seems to have it out for him.
Therefore, Job wants to bring his “case” before God, which causes another
dilemma because Job fears God too much to be so bold, and knows that even if he
could bring a case before God, there is no way he would win it because Job,
along with his friends, recognizes that a mortal man cannot be right before God
(4:17; 9:2; 15:14-16; 25:4). Therefore,
he begins to ask for an “arbiter” (9:33),
who is someone who has the power and authority to settle an
argument between people, someone who will uphold BOTH God’s character and Job’s
integrity (16:18-22; 23:2-7). Job sincerely believes that
if he could talk to God, that it would be clear that he were “in the right” (13:18).
Another dilemma of Job’s faith is seen in Job’s recognition that the wicked do prosper at times and the
righteous do suffer at times (9:22-24; 21:1-26; 24:1-25), and that God governs
all of this (12:9-10). The relationship
between sin and suffering is obviously not as simple as Job’s friends make it
out to be. All of these realities
stretch Job’s faith to the breaking point.
Job’s faith, however, does not crumble. However close he seems to toe the line at
times in his statements, we need to let the Bible interpret Job’s struggle for
us. God will say twice in the end that
Job has spoken of Him “what is right” (Job 42:7-8). Ezekiel
14:14 mentions Job in the same breath as Noah and Daniel and calls him a “righteous” man. James tells believers to consider “the steadfastness of Job” as an example
of how to patiently persevere in suffering (James
5:11). This means that however close
Job may have came to crossing the line in his questioning of what God was
doing, his faith did not crumble. I’d
like to show you a few examples of “the
steadfastness of Job,” and I pray that you will memorize some of as anchors
for your own suffering. He praises God
in a grand description of God’s wisdom and might in Job 12:13-25. He says of God
in Job 13:15, “though he slay me, I will hope in him.” Consider two more: [23] “Oh that my words were written! Oh that they were inscribed
in a book! [24] Oh that with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in
the rock forever! [25] For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last
he will stand upon the earth. [26] And after my skin has been thus
destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, [27] whom I shall see for
myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me!
(Job 19:23-27 ESV)
[8] “Behold,
I go forward, but he is not there, and backward, but I do not perceive him; [9] on
the left hand when he is working, I do not behold him; he turns to the right
hand, but I do not see him. [10] But he knows the way that I take; when he
has tried me, I shall come out as gold. [11] My foot has held fast to his
steps; I have kept his way and have not turned aside. [12] I have not
departed from the commandment of his lips; I have treasured the words of his
mouth more than my portion of food. [13] But he is unchangeable, and who
can turn him back? What he desires, that he does. [14] For he will
complete what he appoints for me, and many such things are in his mind. [15] Therefore
I am terrified at his presence; when I consider, I am in dread of him. [16] God
has made my heart faint; the Almighty has terrified me; [17] yet I am not
silenced because of the darkness, nor because thick darkness covers my face. (Job
23:8-17 ESV)
II.
STEPPING BACK
As we seek to apply this portion of Job, I want to
remind you that the point of this debate was to demonstrate the limits of human wisdom. We said up front that these limitations
should cause us to humble ourselves and cling to God when we suffer or when we
are trying to help someone who is suffering.
I want to show you three ways in which they do so.
First of all, this debate clearly shows us that the reasons for our suffering are
not always clear. As we said, this
debate ends in frustration and confusion, not
resolution. Now Job’s friends aren’t
wrong about everything that they say, but they are wrong in how they apply it to Job. Scripture does teach that there are blessing
for obedience and severe consequences for disobedience and wickedness (Leviticus 26; Deuteronomy 27-30; Psalm
34:11-22; Galatians 6:7-8; 1 Peter 3:10).
We could even go a step further and say that all suffering is the result
of sin in the sense that we all live under the curse of Genesis 3:14-19, but those truths do not merit a 1:1 correlation
between all sin and suffering. Not all
suffering in someone’s life can be directly tied to his or her sin. Sometimes a person suffering is for their
good (to make them more like Christ) and meant to display God’s glory (to
display His worth, to fill up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions). Rather than being the evidence of God’s
displeasure, sometimes suffering is actually the evidence of God’s
pleasure.
The point is that unless it is very clear, we should
use caution when connecting our own or another person’s suffering with
sin. Our wisdom is limited. As Job points out in Job 26:5-14, God is simply
too great for us to understand all of His ways.
God’s dealings with us are both majestic and mysterious. Sometimes there are no easy answers to
suffering. This reality should drive us
into God as it does Job.
A second way that this debate helps us is by
showing us that the experience of
our suffering is always messy. If
you’ve read the book of Job, have you noticed what a mixed bag Job seems to
be? He is shining example of robust faith
at times and then he seems to be strongly questioning God at other times. Let me just say that if you had suffered what
Job had, you would probably be a mixed bag too!
The reason our suffering is such a mess is because our wisdom is limited. This is the nature of being tested.
A test doesn’t “test” anything if someone has a cheat sheet handy with
all the answers. It is a humbling, messy
thing to have our faith tested sometimes.
What is encouraging about Job is that as much of a
mixed bag as he is, he takes his mess to God.
Job encourages us to be brutally honest with God. Job tells God exactly how he feels and just
what he thinks, and because God is a “big boy,” He welcomes such honesty on the
part of His struggling servants. As Francis
Andersen says, Job’s “friends talk about God. Job
talks to God. And this makes him the
only authentic theologian in the book.”[2]
The final way that this passage helps us is by
pointing us to the gospel of our Savior
as our only hope in a broken world.
Where am I getting this point? I
want to make this point by showing you how issues that Job and his friends
raise ultimately point us to Jesus Christ.
First of all, Job and his friend raise the most important issue in all
of life for people who are sinners and that his this question: “How can a mortal man be right before God?”
The answer is from the rest of the Bible is that we cannot be, not without a
Mediator (Romans 3:19-26). What did Job ask for again? Job’s requested an “arbiter” and a “Redeemer”
to reconcile him with God.
Now, granted, Job was probably not thinking about
Jesus when he made this request, but I believe this language points to Jesus
Christ, whether Job was thinking that specifically or not. Because God wrote the whole Bible, sometimes
issues are raised in the Old Testament as a shadow and find their ultimate
fulfillment in the New Testament in Jesus Christ. The New Testament tells us that Jesus Christ
has become an “arbiter” for His
people in an even greater dilemma (1
Timothy 2:5). He has arbitrated our
reconciliation with God while we were guilty, not while we were innocent. Our dilemma was not that we were innocent
sufferers who needed someone to go to bat for us before God. Our dilemma was that we were dead in our
trespasses and sins and were justly under
the wrath of God. To arbitrate our
reconciliation, Jesus humbled Himself as one of us, sympathized with our
weaknesses (Hebrews 4:15), bore the
weight of our sin in His body on the cross, and rose again from the grave to prove
that we do indeed have a Redeemer who lives!
Jesus is not just the Mediator that Job needed; He is the Mediator that
we all need.
Jesus Christ is God’s remedy for suffering in this
broken world. As we said earlier, all
suffering finds its roots in Genesis
3:14-19. Jesus is the promised
offspring (Genesis 3:15) who has
suffered for us so that suffering can be done away with forever in the world to
come. Again, our wisdom is limited here. We would never have planned the cross, and
yet the cross of Christ is the wisdom and power of God (1 Corinthians 1:20-25). In
a fallen world where we are part of the problem, the gospel of Jesus Christ is
our only hope.
The suffering of our Redeemer is also our
guarantee that what we suffer in this broken world is ultimately for our
good. That is the logic of Romans 8:32. In your suffering, don’t look to you own
wisdom; it is limited. Instead look to
the cross, where the just suffered for the unjust so that those whom He
justified would always know that He was for them in everything they would ever
face.
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