Our Jōb moment of why me is more common to man than we think. We are our Sovereign God’s possession to do with us as He pleases, but like David, we had rather fall into God’s hands than the hands of the enemy. “And David said unto Gad, I am in a great strait: let us fall now into the hand of the LORD; for His mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man” (2Samuel 24:14 KJV). In the end, Job quit defending his own righteousness and began acknowledging God can do what He thinks best. “I know that You can do all things; no purpose of Yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2 NET). At the beginning, Jehovah had acknowledged Job as “none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth [turns away from] evil” (1:8). God has a higher opinion of you than you think. He is willing to preserve us from day to day temptations. “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer [allow] you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it” (1Corinthians 10:13 KJV). He taught us to pray, “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil” (Matthew 6:13 KJV). We are His children, and our Father knows best. Let us remember He is the High King of Heaven, acting in the best interests of His Kingdom, but He remembers our frame as dust. O LORD, be merciful to Your children, “Nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt” (26:39). Amen and amen.
Job
Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men
“The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry,” wrote poet Robert Burns. Things don’t always work out as we planned. “It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man” (Psalm 118:8 KJV). Life is our opportunity to cast our vote for the LORD by trusting Him. Even after checking our heart, things may work out like God is angry with us; still, we should say like Job, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him” (Job 13:15 KJV). We want the world to have that same confidence in the LORD. “And the LORD passed by before him [Moses], and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation” (Exodus 34:6-7 KJV). O LORD, in the same manner You treat the guilty, may Your treatment of us, who have confidence in You, be manifested in goodness upon us, our children, and our children’s children, to the third and fourth generation. In Jesus’ name, we ask it. Amen and amen.
Embracing Suffering Doesn’t Mean Rejecting Overcoming
Just because we embrace suffering as God’s way of refining us, teaching us, and magnifying Himself, doesn’t mean we reject overcoming. On the one hand, Christ said, “In the world ye shall have tribulation” (John 16:33 KJV). On the other hand, He said, “Be of good cheer; I have overcome the world” (16:33). On one hand Paul said, “Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me” (2Corinthians 12:9 KJV). On the other hand Paul said, “Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us” (Romans 8:37 KJV). Initially, Job defended his righteousness about his suffering. In the end, He confessed the Almighty’s rightness to choose, if and when he should suffer. “Who is he that hideth counsel without knowledge? therefore have I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not” (Job 42:3 KJV). Is the Holy Spirit impressing you to suffer or overcome? He can do either. What has He given you to embrace for your circumstance? “Hast thou faith? have it to thyself before God. Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth” (Romans 14:22 KJV).
Why Me?
Why me? Why am I suffering? Why did God choose Job to be the Poster Child for Suffering? Job may not have said it that way, but felt it. Yahweh already answered that question, even before Job asked it, in a conversation with the Enemy. “And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth [hates] evil” (Job 1:8 KJV). The LORD is not afraid to refine us, even at the Adversary’s suggestion. “None like him” (1:8) indicates Job was the best the Almighty had “in the earth” (1:8). Job was “perfect” (1:8) in heart, which is the only perfection possible for any created being. He was “upright” (1:8) because he did right. He feared God more than the Adversary, where well trained troops are more afraid of disappointing their drill sergeant than they fear the enemy. He hated evil. Job’s testing proved: (1) “All that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution” (2Timothy 3:12 KJV), (2) Suffering makes the greatest impression on us in a teachable moment, for even Jesus in His humanity “learned He obedience by the things which He suffered” (Hebrews 5:8 KJV), (3) In suffering’s refinement, “He knoweth the way that I take: when He hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold” (Job 23:10 KJV), (4) Yahweh’s conversation with the satan demonstrates there really is an Unseen Realm of Spiritual Warfare, where “we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Ephesians 6:12 KJV). May Yahweh be magnified as He helps us, and we help each other, in our suffering to come forth as gold. Amen and amen.
What About Job?
When it comes to suffering, what about Job? Didn’t it prove that even good people have to suffer, and suffering was not necessarily a sign of God’s anger because we have done something wrong? Was Job wrong for expecting deliverance from his suffering? Weren’t Job’s friends condemned by God for attacking Job? Wasn’t Elihu not condemned by God because he attempted more to justify God than just condemn Job? Didn’t Job finally confess, “Who is he that hideth counsel without knowledge? therefore have I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not” (Job 42:3 KJV) and repented? God is sovereign. We are earthly soldiers in a Cosmic War between the Almighty and the forces of Lucifer. If my suffering or death is needed for the Lord God Almighty to achieve His Final Triumph over the Wicked One, Thy Kingdom come, and Thy Will be done. And, if my deliverance will frustrate the wicked and encourage the godly, do unto me Lord, as You will. Amen and amen.
We Need A Miracle 