I don’t know about you, but for me the book of Job has always been an incredibly hard book in the Bible to get through. I often find myself speed reading through it, only glazing over the salient points just so I can finish it as quickly as possible and move on to something less uncomfortable. But lately I have begun to view that book very differently. There are several incredibly important lessons in the book of Job, beyond the obvious that we are to trust God and be faithful in all things. Hidden in plain sight are lessons about life and hardship. The unknown and the unpredictable. But there are also lessons about supporting those who are experiencing hardships, how to be a friend, and how not to be.
Some of the most painful comments made to me have come from other believers within the church. Shortly after our second child was diagnosed with a life-threatening lifelong illness (in less than a year from the first), a parishioner approached my family and asked how we were doing. After some small back and forth in which I was unable to “fake it”, this fellow believer blurted out “You must really have some things for God to address for your family to be going through so much pruning”. The conversation ended there, I had no more to say. This person was essentially a stranger to me and knew very little about me, my family or our spiritual walk. Basically, I had just been told that my children’s illness was a result of my sin and that we were being punished, albeit the delivery was intended to be cloaked behind spiritual words. How often have we experienced this. Often the delivery is much more tactful, but the meaning behind the platitudes remains the same. You did this, it’s your fault, and therefore I could never be in your shoes or be forced to endure such pain.
I am finding that the way that I approached the book of Job has said a lot more about the nature of me, rather than the nature of God. My avoidance of Job points out that I have been no different than those that have made callous comments. I avoid Job because I don’t want to be Job. I don’t want to be forced to put myself in his shoes and contemplate the unthinkable. I don’t want to be reminded that sometimes in this life, horrible and unthinkable things happen. I don’t want to be reminded that I am not always in control, and that we live in a fallen and broken world where sometimes bad things happen to good people. But all of us are currently in a society that tells us to avoid pain and discomfort at all costs. We are told to cut off anything that is toxic or uncomfortable, chase our joy and live our truth. We are encouraged to seek personal gratification no matter what.
This brings me to my main point. While we have all heard sermons about the faithfulness of Job, I instead want to focus on his friends. His friends at first do what we all should do when faced with a believer or loved one who is grieving or in pain (Job 2:12-13). They sit in the ash heap with Job in silence, for seven days and nights. They sit. They grieve. They say nothing. By doing this they simply show their support and understanding of the depth of Jobs pain. They even listen for a while as Job laments (Job 3). Unfortunately, their human nature gets the better of them and they open their mouths. We see in chapters 4-26 that his friends can’t help but blame Job. To offer platitudes, unsolicited advice and essentially wage an argument for why Job is responsible, should admit it, and move on. They want to believe that this could never happen to them and begin beseeching him to leave his grief behind. They got uncomfortable with the pain, they wanted it to end. Not for Job, but for themselves.
My prayer is that we can all take a lesson away from this on what it actually means to offer support to each other when in pain. We need to learn to just “be” in the grief and pain. We need to remember that Christ is also there with us. We need to learn to not heap more hurt on top just because we are uncomfortable and want it to end. We need to learn to not run from the uncomfortable and just sit in the ash heap.