I've been spending some of my devotional time in the Book of Job these last few weeks. Like you, I've read this story many times before, but it seems to have taken on a new life this time. Maybe it's just because I'm older and wiser, but it has caused to to think about ideas and insights that I've never before associated with Job.
His three friends are extremely devoted. When they receive news of their neighbor's grave afflictions, they immediately converge on the scene where they spend seven days simply sitting in silence with the hurting man of God. That's a wonderful first step. Then they begin to talk, and in only a few hours, they unravel everything they've accomplished in their first week!
You know this part of the story: Job's friends all assume he is being punished by God. One by one, they insist he has done something terribly wrong. Otherwise, God would not be working against him! When Job insists he has not done anything to defy God, his friends insist even more vehemently that he needs to repent! Of course, everything they say makes a lot of sense.
The only problem is that they are wrong. God is not punishing Job. To the contrary, Satan is buffeting Job precisely because he has been such a towering figure of faith. In his profound despair, the man of God is not merely suffering the slings and arrows that fall on every human being who sins. Rather, he suffers precisely because his faith has been so exemplary. The problems being experienced by Job are not "business as usual."
I think it's easy for you and me to make this same mistake when life becomes painful and complex for our friends. We look at a few superficial facts and we draw some conventional conclusion: there is something you can do to fix this. We assume there is a sin, a flaw, a failure of judgment. We offer precriptions and platitudes. We reduce the situation to the lowest common denominator. We forget that life is full of mystery and that God is beyond our understanding. Sometimes it's hard to know exactly what's happening in another person's life even when we know all the facts- and we almost never know all the facts.
Sometimes the best thing a friend can do is sit there in silence and offer the gift of presence. I don't know the reason why this is happening to you. Maybe it's the consequence of a sinful choice. Maybe it's God building character in your life. Maybe it's actually Satan buffeting you because your faith is so strong. Or maybe this is a divine strategy so brilliant and so complex that I will never be able to discern until we look back from the future to see what God has done.
As your brother in Christ, it's not my job to offer you prescriptions and platitudes. It's just my job to be there for you and pray that God will give you strength and insight. Life is not a game. It's a story still being written by God. And sometimes the story is a mystery.
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