One person who wrestled mightily with God was a man named Job. Job's story is one of the most ancient stories in all of Scripture. His story easily dates back to a time before the Patriarchs, were even born (i.e. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob). You might recall that before Abraham was called by God, he lived in a place called Ur, in Mesapotamia, in the Ancient East. Job also lived in the East.
The story begins in Job 1:1–3 (CSB). He has quite the spiritual resume! “There was a man in the country of Uz named Job. He was a man of complete integrity, who feared God and turned away from evil. 2 He had seven sons and three daughters. 3 His estate included seven thousand sheep and goats, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, five hundred female donkeys, and a very large number of servants. Job was the greatest man among all the people of the east.”
In Job 1:4 we also learn about Job's family. “4 His sons used to take turns having banquets at their homes. They would send an invitation to their three sisters to eat and drink with them.” His kids were party animals! When I read about Job's family, I think of those lifestyle blogs, where the children of the rich and famous parade their parent's luxurious wealth and their own excess. Few things ruin young people like inherited, fast, or easy wealth. The character it takes to build wealth is about the only thing strong enough to insulate one from its dangers. There isn't much compassion when one of these spoiled kids crashes dad’s Lamborghini.
Job 1:5 says, “Whenever a round of banqueting was over, Job would send for his children and purify them, rising early in the morning to offer burnt offerings for all of them. For Job thought, ‘Perhaps my children have sinned, having cursed God in their hearts.’ This was Job’s regular practice.” What an incredible father, right? He was doing everything in his power to advantage his children spiritually. His peace of mind was to entrust his children to God.
Suddenly the curtain of heaven is drawn back, and the reader becomes like a fly on the wall of heaven, a spectator to a privileged heavenly conversation. Job 1:6–7 says : “6 One day the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them. 7 The Lord asked Satan, “Where have you come from?” “From roaming through the earth,” Satan answered him, “and walking around on it.” We shouldn't be surprised, 1 Peter 5:8 tells us to be alert because Satan is like a Lion who roams around, looking for someone to devour.
But there is a surprising twist. In Job 1:8 the Lord says to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? No one else on earth is like him, a man of perfect integrity, who fears God and turns away from evil.” He’s like Enoch of old, who walked with God, and then was taken by God. Here, God is a reference on Job’s spiritual resume!
But Satan isn't just a preying Lion. Satan is also an accuser. In Job 1:9-11 Satan answers the Lord, “Does Job fear God for nothing? 10 Haven’t you placed a hedge around him, his household, and everything he owns? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. 11 But stretch out your hand and strike everything he owns, and he will surely curse you to your face.” This is the first of two accusations Satan makes against Job—and it’s a chilling accusation—the kind that would rattle any spiritual man to his core. Essentially Satan is accusing Job of having a hollow, superficial love for God. In affect, Job doesn't truly love God, for God Himself. Job merely loves God for his many benefits, blessings! Job loves God because he’s wealthy, successful, prosperous. He's got a big family and posterity, a big mansion, Ferrari camels, loyal servants, endless wealth. You can think of it another way… that Satan sees Job's relationship to God as nothing different in character than Job's son's relationship with Job. Is Job's love for God any more than that of a spoiled child's love for his rich dad?
If you are in the place of God—does anyone in all the earth, truly love you? Or is the world overrun by disloyal, godless spoiled children. God's knows Job's heart and is willing to allow Job's love be tested. Job 1:12 the Lord says to Satan, ‘Very well. . . everything he owns is in your power. However, do not lay a hand on Job himself.’ So Satan left the Lord’s presence.” Yeah, he leaves to do his work, kill and destroy!
One day while Job's kids are partying, the Sabeans swoop down, and kill all Job's servants, stealing his oxen, donkeys. Then it’s reported that fire fell from heaven consuming more servants, and Job's sheep! Then it’s reported the Chaldeans kill more servants and run off with Job's camels. And if that's not enough, while his kids were partying, it’s reported that a whirlwind consumed destroyed his mansion and left his sons, daughters, and families dead.
Okay God. Strike Job's livelihood—his means of wealth, his loyal workforce, his mobility, his mansion, his very family. No way Job still loves God! But Satan is wrong, and God is proved true. Job 1:20–22 says: Then Job stood up, tore his robe, and shaved his head. He fell to the ground and worshiped, 21 saying: Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will leave this life., The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. 22 Throughout all this Job did not sin or blame God for anything.”
This shows you not just what exceptional love Job has for God! But I think also, what an exceptional love for God we ought all aspire toward! To love God for God, to love God with such a naked, non-materialistic love! Naked I came, Naked I depart. We take none of the trappings of life; We're left only with God as our reward.
Now this isn't good enough for Satan, so he “revises” his accusation. In Job 2:3 God is deeply pleased. There is no one like Job. Perfect integrity. Fears God. Turns from evil. Retains integrity even when everything he has is destroyed (and destroyed for “no good reason”) For those of us who are always looking for a reason to suffering—Satan is capricious, he has no good reason to destroy.
But in Job 2:4 Satan says, “Skin for skin!” Satan answered the Lord. “A man will give up everything he owns in exchange for his life. 5 But stretch out your hand and strike his flesh and bones, and he will surely curse you to your face.” Give Job a cross. Give Job a thorn in his flesh. And in Job 1:6 the Lord relents, “6 “Very well,” the Lord told Satan, “he is in your power; only spare his life.”
So again. Job 1:7-8, “So Satan left the Lord’s presence and infected Job with terrible boils from the soles of his feet to the top of his head. Then Job took a piece of broken pottery to scrape himself while he sat among the ashes.”
Comedian Tim Hawkins reflects on story of Job. He asks, “Do you know one person in Job's family Satan never touches? It was his wife!” In Job 1:9 Job's wife says to him, “Are you still holding on to your integrity? Curse God and die!” Satan knows exactly what he's doing! Boy if ever there was a story in Scripture given to teach young people to marry wisely, this is it. A spouse can be a Spiritual Multiplier or Spiritual Diminisher second to none! As if your hellish condition isn't enough, to have your spouse spews words from the pit of hell itself.
In Job 1:10 Job rebukes his wife, “You speak as a foolish woman speaks,” he told her. “Should we accept only good from God and not adversity?” Throughout all this Job did not sin in what he said.” Your spouse may be on a very different spiritual plan. For Job to have such spiritual sobriety to maintain integrity is the stuff of legend.
But it's not just Job's wife—her unspiritual words—that is problematic. Wouldn't you know it, but Job's three best friends come along. Every single one of us should take note of these three stooges, I mean “friends.” These “Friends" (in air quotes) come filled with good intentions. Job 2:11–13 says: Now when Job’s three friends—Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite—heard about all this adversity that had happened to him, each of them came from his home. They met together to go and sympathize with him and comfort him. 12 When they looked from a distance, they could barely recognize him. They wept aloud, and each man tore his robe and threw dust into the air and on his head. 13 Then they sat on the ground with him seven days and nights, but no one spoke a word to him because they saw that his suffering was very intense.”
The best thing these friends did for Job was to go, acknowledge, weep, mourn, sympathize, understand, fast, sit with him, and keep their mouths shut! So long as they sat there, they were a comfort, but the moment they began yapping, speculating, and presuming they become miserable comforters! Let me just say that the book of Job offers a master class on what’s helpful and not helpful for us to do when a friend faces a dark season of the soul. What should you do? Job 2:11-13 is a pretty good prescription. Silent presence can be golden.
But the story of Job painfully illustrates the human compulsion to want to break the silence. One of the hardest disciplines to exercise is to maintain a silent, prayerful, support presence with a person who is suffering. But beware! The deafening violence of WHAT has happened to Job, his family, and his estate compels his friends to speak beyond their knowledge. Their mysterious questions of WHY compel them to speak beyond knowledge. Their impatience that there be a quick resolution to Job's suffering compels them to speak beyond knowledge, and spew senseless advice and speculate wildly and wrongly about his condition. Their personal discomfort with Job's profound loss, and personal pain, compels them to speak beyond knowledge. Their personal fear of Job's pain and suffering ever befalling them compels them to speak without knowledge. Their personal angst, their sense of guilt, and shame, even their fear of a Great, and Holy, and Just God compels them to speak without knowledge. If God is contending with Job in this manner, then how much more vulnerable and susceptible might we be?
The main body of the book of Job consists of his three friends lecturing him. I'd love to walk through their speeches with you but there isn't time. His friends are stooges. Eliphaz criticizes Job for being exhausted, and exhausting. They accuse him of making his own piety, integrity, purity, and righteousness his hope. They tell him that he is surely reaping evil from the evil he's sown. They tell him no way could a man be pure, righteous before God--he's getting punishment he deserves. He should just repent and accept the Lord's corrective discipline.
Bildad tells Job his kids all died because they sinned. He tells Job that if he was as righteous as he thinks he is God would have alleviated his suffering by now. He has a clever way of accusing Job for trusting other things more than God. He says, in Job 8:13–15, “Such is the destiny of all who forget God; the hope of the godless will perish. 14 His source of confidence is fragile; what he trusts in is a spider’s web. 15 He leans on his web, but it doesn’t stand firm. He grabs it, but it does not hold up.”
Job's buddy Zophar accuses Job of being a babbler, lacking humility. He feels it’s his spiritual duty to put Job in his place. In Job 11:2–3 he says, “Should this abundance of words go unanswered and such a talker be acquitted? 3 Should your babbling put others to silence, so that you can keep on ridiculing with no one to humiliate you?” Zophar then goes on to lecture Job about the mystery of God.
Round and round they go. Not everything his friends say about God is false. In fact, parts of their speeches are profoundly insightful! The problem is each of his friends lacks spiritual understanding, and spiritual context, for what and for why things are happening to their friend. They presume to be flies on the wall of heaven, knowing the counsel of God, but they know nothing. They are speaking beyond their knowledge. Job utterly silences their folly, just like he silenced that of his wife. It’s ironic, but while Job's three friends are doing their speeches some young man named “Elihu" is listening. When Job's friends fail to convict him, “Eli-who-do-you-think-you-are” takes his own shot at Job.
Throughout the book of Job, Job curses himself, he curses the day he was born, he’s depressed and even contemplates suicide… but he never curses God. He maintains perfect integrity, fears Gods, and turns away from evil. He refuses to believe God has it out for him, that his suffering was because of his own wickedness. Job yearns to have his day, and stand before God, in heavenly court, to defend himself against accusation. Job 10:1–2: “I am disgusted with my life. I will give vent to my complaint and speak in the bitterness of my soul. 2 I will say to God, “Do not declare me guilty! Let me know why you prosecute me.” At one point he tells God to stop the pain, and stop the terror!
Job ponders hope. In Job 14:10 he asks “when a person dies and fades away; he breathes his last—where is he?” But in Job 19:25–27 affirms, “But I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the end he will stand on the dust. 26 Even after my skin has been destroyed, yet I will see God in my flesh. 27 I will see him myself; my eyes will look at him, and not as a stranger. My heart longs within me.” No matter what comes of my flesh, my skin, my family, possessions... I will still see the God I love! I will stand on the dust, I will see God in my flesh. Resurrection Hope is as old, and ancient a promise as any in all the Bible. It was not an innovation of Jesus nor Christians.
In the end, God speaks to Job from the whirlwind—Jobs comfort was not found in what, or why, but WHO sovereign over all things. He upholds Job's cause, and makes Job's friends apologize and eat crow. Job 40:3–5 (CSB): Job answers the Lord: “4 I am so insignificant. How can I answer you? I place my hand over my mouth. 5 I have spoken once, and I will not reply; twice, but now I can add nothing.”