With Friends Like These . . . Job’s Friends and Religious Foolishness (The Prologue: Chs. 1-3, Part 8)

Job now speaks. Perhaps he sees that his friends’ silence is coming to an end. Or perhaps he doesn’t even notice them in his pain. But he now gives voice to his agony. We want to notice what Job is feeling . . . and thinking.

VIII. Job’s Lament (ch. 3)

Job opens his mouth and curses — not the Lord — but his own birth! He can no longer focus on the birthdays of his ten children. They are dead. And he wishes he were. He despises the fact that he was ever born!

He asks that God Himself not care about his birth (v. 4). He wishes that he had been stillborn, that there had been no shout of joy at his coming into the world (v. 7).

If he had been stillborn, or died in delivery, he says he would now be asleep and at rest with the kings and rulers of the earth (v. 13). Such a fate would have brought him rest, ease, freedom. He asks, “Why is light given to those in misery, and life to the bitter of soul, to those who long for death that does not come, who search for it more than for hidden treasure, who are filled with gladness and rejoice when they reach the grave?” (vv. 20-22). At a later stage of his struggle, Job tells us that he treasured not death, but “the words of God’s mouth more than [his] daily food” (Job 23:12).

Job describes himself as one whom God has “hedged in” (v. 23). One is reminded of Satan’s words to God in chapter one when he says, “Have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has?” (v. 10). Satan’s reference to God’s hedge is to make the point that Job serves God because God pays him well. Job’s reference to God’s hedging him in has to do with Job’s ignorance of God’s ways and his lack of relief from his awful pains.

In some ways Job may have anticipated life crashing in on him, for he says in verse 25, “What I feared has come upon me; what I dreaded has happened to me.”

As he takes an inventory of his present state of existence, Job says, “I have no peace, no quietness; I have no rest, but only turmoil.” (v. 26). Little does he suspect that his three friends, sitting silently with him on his ash-heap of agony, will further his troubles and bring profound additional turmoil to his circumstances.

 

 

With Friends Like These . . . Job’s Friends and Religious Foolishness (The Prologue: Chs. 1-3, Part 7)

And now, the friends. When one takes a bird’s-eye view of the entire book of Job, most of the chapters record the lectures of Job’s friends and his responses to their accusations. We will examine each of their challenges, but first we need to notice what they did right.

VII. What Job’s Friends Did Right (2:11-13)

We are introduced to Job’s three friends in this second chapter after Satan’s successful assault on Job’s body and after his wife’s words of death. He is not at home. He is sitting on a soft ash-heap scraping his boils. Perhaps his wife is there with him, pleading with him to curse God and die. Can one imagine a more desperate and pathetic scene?

Acts of Friendship: News travels fast when calamity invades a well-respected leader of a community. And Job’s three friends “heard about all the troubles that had come upon him” (v. 11). They decide to physically travel from their homes to Job’s ash-heap to be with him. We don’t know how far away their homes were, but the purpose of their journey was clear: they agree together “to go and sympathize with him and comfort him” (v. 11).

The first step of comforting another who is suffering involves deciding to get involved. For Job’s friends this began with physically traveling to him. But before they got to Job’s side, they saw him from a distance and we read that “they could hardly recognize him.” Being covered with boils tends to alter one’s appearance! One can only imagine his appearance: sores oozing, bits of pottery being scraped over his body, perhaps his only clothing a loin cloth for privacy. No one wants to have cloth — even expensive cloth — rubbing against open sores.

A second act of friendship is sympathy. As the friends approach Job they could be heard from far away, for they are weeping aloud for the devastated condition of their friend. To show their sharing of his grief, they tear their robes and even sprinkle dust on their heads (v. 12). They are identifying with Job and his suffering. There is a kind of closeness in calamity. But such second-hand suffering can be quite temporary, for the friends will soon give voice to their theological understanding of the ways of God.

The third act of friendship is the ministry of presence. They sit on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights. That’s true friendship, the being with the one who is suffering. In our world of mass communication, in our time of instant texts and emails and facetime, we can easily think that electronic communication is sufficient. No. Physical presence occurs in space and time with real bodies and concerned souls.

The fourth act of friendship shown by these three friends is that of silence. They do not lecture Job. They do not pepper him with questions. They do not theorize as to the why of his situation. They are just there. Silent. We read, “No one said a word to him, because they saw how great his suffering was.” (v. 13). Our noise-addicted world misses the value of simple silence.

But the friends’ ministry of silence does not last beyond the 168 hours of sitting quietly with their sore-covered friend. And what they hear their friend Job say in his brokenness is more than they can bear.

 

The Theology of Calvin . . . and Hobbes (Friendship)

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With Friends Like These . . . Job’s Friends and Religious Foolishness (Introduction)

Friends: I want to begin a series on the book of Job. In looking over my posts, I just realized that I dealt with this subject back in 2014! But I’m hoping that this series of posts will eventually become my next book. So, please read my posts and provide any comments or questions that you have.

The first step for me in doing this study is to unit-read the book of Job. Unit-reading is reading straight through a book of the Bible in one sitting. Will you join me in doing this? Here’s a check box to remind you to unit-read the whole book! Would you drop me an email when you’ve unit-read the book of Job for our ongoing study? (theoprof@bellsouth.net)

My next post will give a few reflections on what I’ve seen in trying to take in the book as a whole.

 

“It Was Great to Meet You!” (an evangelistic booklet)- Introduction

Friends: I have wanted for quite a while to write a short, evangelistic booklet that I could give someone that I had just met. Maybe you feel the same. There are plenty of gospel tracts out there, but I’m thinking of something personal, something that might lead to a growing relationship with that person.  So here are a couple of ideas that I’ve had as to the content of this booklet:

1. The Purpose of the Booklet

2. Some personal details

3. A clear gospel presentation

4. Contact information

What information would you want to suggest that I add? Is this something that you would find useful? Would you consider inserting your own personal details if the framework of the booklet looked good?

Sure would appreciate any comments you want to give me!  Thanks!

 

 

 

“Why Don’t You Mind Your Own Business?” – A great commercial!

Great commercial! But I wonder if we followers of Jesus are being told by our culture “Why don’t you mind your own business?” The problem. Our business is sharing the gospel with them! And we answer to a Higher Authority!

Your comments?

 

Please Consider an “Unlike Jesus” Seminar – Session #3 Video! Conclusion!

Friends: As you know, my most recent book is Unlike Jesus! Let’s Stop Unfriending the World.  I’m convinced many of us believers meet only with other Christians, watch only Christian movies, and eat only Christian casseroles. We make lousy friends because we’re not sure we’re supposed to be a friend of sinners!

In the next few posts, I’m going to hammer pretty hard on this idea of being a friend of sinners — like Jesus was! I have one goal in mind — to get you (and me) much more serious about the unbelievers we know and to challenge us to develop deep, committed friendships with them.

Just so you know, I’ve developed three videos which cover the basics of my book and can be used in a Zoom kind of church study. I would gladly lead the discussion (live) after your church group watches each video. All we have to do is schedule the meetings.

We’ve looked at the first two videos and a bunch of short pitches for the book. Let’s finally look at the third video in this series — our conclusion!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Please Consider an “Unlike Jesus” Seminar – Part 14

Friends: As you know, my most recent book is Unlike Jesus! Let’s Stop Unfriending the World.  I’m convinced many of us believers meet only with other Christians, watch only Christian movies, and eat only Christian casseroles. We make lousy friends because we’re not sure we’re supposed to be a friend of sinners!

In the next few posts, I’m going to hammer pretty hard on this idea of being a friend of sinners — like Jesus was! I have one goal in mind — to get you (and me) much more serious about the unbelievers we know and to challenge us to develop deep, committed friendships with them.

Just so you know, I’ve developed three videos which cover the basics of my book and can be used in a Zoom kind of church study. I would gladly lead the discussion (live) after your church group watches each video. All we have to do is schedule the meetings.

We’ve looked at the first two videos and a couple of short pitches for the book. Let’s look at a twelfth pitch, about the central question — Was Jesus a friend of sinners?!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Theology of Calvin . . . and Hobbes (Happiness)

 

Ruminating on ROMANS! (Some Thoughts on Paul’s Great Epistle) #46 “Critical Imperatives for the Christ-Follower” (A Study of Romans 12) Part 18

Many of you know that my New Jersey friend Frank and I are reading through God’s Word together (described here). We’re now in the book of Romans and are reading chapter 12 each day this week.I count 24 injunctions or commands or imperatives for the believer here in Romans 12. I’m aware that the expression “critical imperative” is redundant, but I think it’s useful for what we see here in this great chapter.

We’ve seen that the believer is to offer his body as a living sacrifice, not to conform to the pattern of this world, to be transformed by the renewing of his mind, to think of himself with sober judgment, to use his gifts to build up the body of Christ, to hate as God hates, to be devoted to the body in love, to honor one another beyond yourselves, to keep one’s spiritual fervor, to be joyful in hope, to be patient in affliction, to be faithful in prayer, to share with the Lord’s people who are in need, to practice hospitality, to bless those who persecute them, to use our emotions for the Lord and for each other, and to live in harmony with one another!

Let’s continue our multipart study by looking again at verse 16.The eighteenth critical imperative is —

18. Believers are to REACH OUT TO OTHERS REGARDLESS OF THEIR STATUS (v. 16)!

How we relate to other believers is really important! And the Apostle Paul gets at our heart attitude which underlies the way we associate or don’t associate with others.

Pride often keeps us from connecting with those who would value our friendship and encouragement. If we are trapped in what one writer calls “the terrible squirrel cage of self,” we will miss opportunities to show Christ’s love, especially to those of a different economic or educational or racial background.

Conceit frequently lies at the heart of the problem. If I find my deepest significance in myself and my talents and my background, I am forgetting my new life in Christ! My pride is to be in the Lord and in what He is doing in my life. Sinful, self-serving, self-focused conceit ruins relationships. And that’s not what the Lord wants from us!

Today’s Challenge: Think of a specific person as you meditate on verse 16. How does your pride or conceit inhibit you from reaching out to them?