Let’s not be idealistic about Job. He wasn’t so exalted in his spiritual state that he was immune from the pain and confusion of his suffering. He found light in his darkness, but he struggled to keep it and, in the end, he was enlightened despite himself. In his pain Job did what we must all do with profusion when we suffer. He mourned. Jesus said: “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted” (Matthew 5:4). But Job did more than that: he complained. Complaint is nothing to avoid. Many psalmists complained and for them it was the expression of the confidence of faith. They knew that they were children of God, and they expressed how they felt, even their anger and frustration. So too do we see Job, a child of God, punching, as it were, at his father’s thighs in sheer pain. And God does not push us away when we come to him in grief. He holds us close and he mourns with us. The problem for Job was the seeming senselessness of what was happening to him. He had been faithful to God, so why would this happen? The question “why” dominates the expression of Job’s grief. But would it lessen his grief to know why? Does a ‘reason’ make things better? What Job needed was not an answer from God; he needed God himself. And that is what he got in the end. He met God. This is yet another biblical example of how the darkest experiences in life become places of profound divine encounter.
What is upsetting you most at the moment? Express your grief to God and pray that you would find him in this situation.
Read Job 3
