Job 1v1, 2v1-10.  John 11: 17-27

So what are we to do with a reading like the one from Job? Avoid it?  Embrace it? Struggle with it? Job is part of the Wisdom Writings in the Hebrew Scriptures which include Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. It tells the story of the wise person, celebrated so much in the book of Proverbs. The important question raised by the story is why do good people suffer? Job has been described as one of the greatest works of world literature but, for us, it is also one of the most difficult, partly because it comes from a culture so different from ours.

Job is a poetic piece written more like a play. It is a piece to be grappled with but, as we grapple, let us remember that Jesus did not always make things clear for His hearers. He told them truths in parables and frequently left them confused. He called His hearers to ponder on what He was saying and to seek out the meaning.    Job raises questions for us. Questions about good and evil. Questions about what God may allow to happen even when it seems harsh to us. Questions about some of the ultimate issues we face – illness, pain. suffering, life and death. Questions about where God may be in the difficult things that we all face from time to time. For these reasons it is surely worth our attention.

Job is a faithful servant of God and God knows that. Faced with the possibility of evil affecting Job’s life God says –“Yes, okay but his life is to be spared”. The boundaries of what may happen to Job are laid down by God, not by Satan. During the story Job’s life, wealth and family are stripped away from Him apparently with God’s consent. As he grieves for all that is lost his friends come and sit with him.  They don’t listen to him very well and instead they pose questions too hard for Job to answer. They have a legalistic view of how God works and they drag Job down, challenging his faith even further things have changed so much for Job, life is so much worse – surely Job must be responsible?

So what are we to learn from this passage and the rest of this book? The presence of evil in the world is clear, as is God’s power to save.  We may struggle with the idea that God in some way “gave permission” for what happened to Job. We see the effects of evil all around us every day. The environment is damaged, people are hungry, frightened and homeless. However, we know also that we have a God who loved us enough to send His son to save us and all who turn to Him. As with Job, God is always there. He will set the limits. In His letter to the Corinthians Paul says this. “God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.”    This is a difficult subject and may lead to many questions about life and God. Questions are important and should be asked.  God does not mind. They are often a way of working out our faith. This month we will start running an Alpha Course.  If you have questions about your faith, whether you are new to it or whether you have been coming to Church for years, do think of attending. It is a course designed for you to ask questions. God allows us to question Him, so long as we are honestly seeking His answers.

As Job’s life gets worse and everything is stripped from him, his friends come and sit with him. They got that right. Just being with people when times are hard for them is important. But unfortunately the friends weren’t satisfied with just listening to Job, they wanted to solve his problems and that made things worse.

“What have you done for this to happen to you?”  they ask.  But of course Job had done nothing and their questions only made things worse. For us we need to learn to listen and to listen well to others. Learn that listening is in itself healing and the best thing you can offer. We are there to hold to faith when others cannot. To pray for those who cannot pray for themselves.

Finally, however, in chapter 19 something remarkable happens. Almost in fury and indignation Job rises above all that has happened and all that has been said by his friends. “This, he declares is what I know.”

He wants his words written on paper, but realising that that is not enough, he calls for them to be written in a book and finally, to make sure that they are never obliterated, he calls for them to be carved in stone.

This, this is what I know he says “I know that my redeemer lives”.  “I know that at the end of time He will stand on the earth” and “Even though I am dead and my body destroyed I will see Him in my resurrected body”.  What an amazing statement of faith and like so many of such statements it comes out of a hard and difficult place.  Leaping forward several hundred years we find Mary and Martha mourning the death of their brother Lazarus. He was dearly loved by them and in that culture, he was their only support. Jesus was not there when wanted. They also had lost almost everything but when Jesus finally comes Martha again makes a profound statement of faith.  “Yes, Lord I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.” This was before Lazarus was raised from the dead.

For both Job and Martha, when the cards are down and all else is stripped away a deeply embedded faith in the God who loves them is all that is left. This is their bedrock, and they will not be shifted.  Their words have rung down the centuries and particularly of course, in the case of Job, were picked up by Handel and used for one of the greatest arias in the Messiah. Who hearing these words would guess they came from the mouth of a man battered by circumstance and bereft of all else?   So today what are our questions and where is our faith? Do we believe in the God who has promised to always be with us through good and ill? Is He the bedrock of our being too?                                                                  

 Every blessing.   Rev. Mary Staunton