February 18th, 2012
Today’s reading from Encounter with God

Job's Darkest Hour

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Opening Prayer

Lord, today I want to speak the thanks I feel, and I ask You to forgive all my complaining.

Read Job 14:1-22

[1] “Man born of woman is of few days and full of trouble. [2] He springs up like a flower and withers away; like a fleeting shadow, he does not endure. [3] Do you fix your eye on such a one? Will you bring him before you for judgment? [4] Who can bring what is pure from the impure? No one! [5] Man’s days are determined; you have decreed the number of his months and have set limits he cannot exceed. [6] So look away from him and let him alone, till he has put in his time like a hired man. [7] “At least there is hope for a tree: If it is cut down, it will sprout again, and its new shoots will not fail. [8] Its roots may grow old in the ground and its stump die in the soil, [9] yet at the scent of water it will bud and put forth shoots like a plant. [10] But man dies and is laid low; he breathes his last and is no more. [11] As water disappears from the sea or a riverbed becomes parched and dry, [12] so man lies down and does not rise; till the heavens are no more, men will not awake or be roused from their sleep. [13] “If only you would hide me in the grave and conceal me till your anger has passed! If only you would set me a time and then remember me! [14] If a man dies, will he live again? All the days of my hard service I will wait for my renewal to come. [15] You will call and I will answer you; you will long for the creature your hands have made. [16] Surely then you will count my steps but not keep track of my sin. [17] My offenses will be sealed up in a bag; you will cover over my sin. [18] “But as a mountain erodes and crumbles and as a rock is moved from its place, [19] as water wears away stones and torrents wash away the soil, so you destroy man’s hope. [20] You overpower him once for all, and he is gone; you change his countenance and send him away. [21] If his sons are honored, he does not know it; if they are brought low, he does not see it. [22] He feels but the pain of his own body and mourns only for himself.”

Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. All rights reserved throughout the world. Used by permission of International Bible Society.

Meditate

If Job knew what you know now, how do you think he would have approached God? Suffering colors every part of our life.

Think Further

Suffering can bring a person to the point of utter reality. Platitudes are offensive. Any attempt on the part of friends to make the person feel better is decisively rejected. The only honest thing is to stare down the reality which confronts us. It is at this point that a profound encounter with God can occur. The sham with which we are accustomed to protect ourselves is stripped away and we are face to face with the blazing light of God. Here Job, living without any knowledge of the peace and restoration that Jesus Christ would bring, glimpses only life’s darkest possibility. He is sensitive to God’s invisible qualities, which Paul wrote of in Romans 1:20, seeing in the natural world God’s eternal power and divine nature.

In all of his suffering he still cries out to God. This chapter moves from hopelessness (1-12), through a cry of faith (13-17) back to hopelessness again. Sheol is normally described as the place where the dead go, only to eat dust and drink dirty water. Job knows, hopes against hope, that he will be vindicated (Job 13:18). “If someone dies, will they live again?” (14). Job can raise this only as a rhetorical question, but in the middle section he dares to hope that maybe God will remember him. He still knew himself to be the work of God’s hands (15). Perhaps at some future time God would long for his own creation. Perhaps God would even cover his sin. Perhaps.

In his darkest hour Job had foreseen a glimpse of the Gospel. Jesus’ resurrection points the way. We can look forward to the new heaven and new earth, and the time when God will wipe every tear from our eyes (Rev. 21:1,4).

Apply

Cry out in faith for all those you know who suffer, knowing that in all things God is at work for our good (Rom. 8:28).

Closing prayer

Eternal Father, because Jesus defeated death when he was raised from the dead, I will live in Your care forever. I thank You for that certain hope.

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