So as the Lord would have it, exactly at the time when Doug and I were having a very hard week, I was cruising through my Cover2Cover90 Bible reading plan and was at the point of reading Job. Smile. Couldn't be more timely. I've studied or at least read through this particular book probably no less than a half a dozen times or more and even read it aloud with Darius about a year ago. On each occasion, I always feel as if it's a tough book to understand at a really deep level.
In a nutshell, the story goes like this:
Job has much.....
loses it all in one fell swoop........
his friends accuse him of some hidden evil which has brought about God's punishment.......
he denies any wrong doing no matter how much they persist and he questions why God has brought this on.........
God, ever present, speaks up and condemns the group and asks Job why he thinks he's the expert on everything.........
Job, greatly humbled, stands corrected.....
Job ends up being doubly blessed by God in the end. Whew.
In the past, I would read Job and really wonder why God was so harsh on Job--not at the beginning of the book but rather at the end. Why did God step in and come down so hard on him?
Well, as I was reading in bed one night before going to sleep, I felt God ask me a question: "Kim, do you see yourself in this story?" As He posed it, I knew He didn't mean, "Have you had all things taken away like Job has?" That was not what He was talking about. Instead He was asking me, "Have you sinned like Job is sinning here in this story?" I immediately knew the answer.........yes. And I immediately knew how Job had sinned--why God stepped in and came down so hard on him.
You see, Job was adamant about his own innocence. He was absolutely certain, without a doubt, that he was innocent and that God was being capricious--treating him unfairly. He accused God of being overly harsh on him while letting the evil go free. I too was wanting so badly to stand on my innocence. I wanted to look outward to assess blame. I wanted to be mad at how I was being treated and felt more than justified in harboring anger, resentment, bitterness, and a whole host of emotions.
Sidebar: I discovered this week that I get the most bent out of shape when people don't give me the respect or the 'awe' that I feel that I'm due. When I'm not given full credit for my abilities, advanced degrees, age, experience, skills or you-name-it, then I'm pretty ornery. In my mind, it's not right to be treated as if I'm lacking in ___________. When I discovered that about myself, I realized that I still lack a ton of humility. That I have very little in common which Christ who set ALL of his glory aside to live a very humble, almost obscure existence among men. When I inwardly expect people to treat me a certain way, then I do not walk as Christ did. I more resemble those who worked against him. Yuck. Not where I want to be.
So, back to Job. Job was guilty because he questioned God's goodness. Now who does that sound like? Satan did the same thing with Eve in the garden of Eden. He, the great deceiver, led Eve to believe that God is not good and that we, the humans, are better determiners of right and wrong. That's exactly where Job was headed. Job had begun to see himself as completely innocent and God as completely guilty. Ouch!
So when God questioned, "Kim, do you see yourself in this story?" He let me know that I was beginning to see myself as innocent and Him as not taking care of things in the way I expected. As the One who knows me better than I know myself, I knew He was right. So, for a moment I was embarrased before my Lord at how I'd questioned Him and not trusted Him with the way things were coming out; the next moment I was so much more in love with Him because He'd revealed the ugliness inside me and loved me enough to not let me remain that way.
Oh man, our God is good. Terrible things may happen to us but that DOES NOT mean that He is a terrible God. He uses everything, and I mean everything, for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purposes.
May you know the same.
Blessings, kim
Just what I needed to hear. So true Kim.
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