This year has been quite, well… unexpected. The year 2020 will definitely go down in the history books as one of the hardest and strangest years in the 21st century. Who would have thought that something so small, so tiny that you need a super powered microscope to see, would dramatically affect the whole world in such a short time. For me personally, COVID-19/SARS-COV-2, has been a stark reminder that I have very little control over what happens in my life. The only thing I truly have any say in is how I choose to respond to what happens to me, my husband, my children, and the world around me. The same is true for how I choose to respond to my spouse and/or my children when they make choices that do not line up with my wishes on behavior or attitudes. Just as I can not make my children obey me or control what my husband does, I can not make politicians, neighbors, my boss, coworkers, the other driver on the road, etc… bend to my every whim and desire. However, what I can do is control how I choose to respond to: the neighbor who’s marijuana smoke blows into my back yard while my kids are playing there, the driver who cut me off on the interstate, the coworker who always seems to have it out for me, or my husband whom I think totally just ignored what I said and inadvertently hurt my feelings. Ultimately our response is our responsibility and at the end of the day we choose the way we react. We can not blame anyone else for our actions but ourselves. I’m not saying that this is easy. Absolutely not! It is so hard sometimes, especially when emotions are bubbling. So what do we do when all of a sudden things go from pretty good or even awesome to the pits? Let’s take a quick look at what Job’s Wife has to teach us about when things take a turn for the worst. Maybe Job and his wife had a 2020 kind of year…. or maybe it was worse.
Who was Job’s Wife? We are never given the name of Job’s wife. Actually, in the whole book of Job, his wife is only mentioned 3 times and she only speaks once in the whole 42 chapters of Job. Don’t think for a minute that Job’s wife doesn’t have something to teach us because she totally does! We know that Job and his family were very rich, owning over 1,000 livestock of various types, had numerous servants, and is noted as being “the greatest man among all the people of the east” (Job 1:3). Maybe Job was like the Warren Buffet of his day? Job’s wife gave birth to 7 sons and 3 daughters (Job 1:2). It is believed she is his only wife because every time the word “wife” is used in the book it is always in the singular form, never plural. Job is also noted to be “a man of perfect integrity, who feared God and turned away from evil” (Job 1:1).
The story of Job goes something like this: Satan presents himself before God and God points out how awesome Job is (Job 1:6-8). Satan claims Job is only so great because God is protecting him and will not allow Satan to do him any harm (Job 1:9-10). So God basically says “okay Satan, you can do whatever you want to him but you can’t touch Job (Job 1:11-12).” Satan leaves and then in one day Job discovers that he has had all his livestock either stolen or burned in a wild fire, all his children have died due to a house collapsing in a storm, and only 4 servants have escaped so that they could tell him of each of these disasters. If all this happened to me in one day I think I’d curl up in a ball and cry until I had no tears left to cry and pass out from exhaustion but Job acts just as God expected him too (Job 1:13-19). He falls to the ground and worships God and did not sin or blame God for anything that had happened to him (Job 1:20-22). Sometime later, Satan presents himself before God and God mentions Job’s greatness again and that even though Satan wanted him destroyed without just cause, Job still remains perfect in integrity (Job 2:1-3). Satan again accuses Job of only being great because God is protecting his body and that any person would curse God if their health was taken away (Job 2:4-5). So again, God allows Satan to mess with Job but commands that Job’s life must not be taken from him (Job 2:6). The important thing to absorb here is that though Satan is powerful, he has his own set of boundaries that he is required to work within. Satan can not do whatever he pleases. If God says “no” Satan must obey.
So, here is Job’s wife. She has also just watched everything she and Job have worked for disappear in a day; literally everything is gone in one (1) day! She also lost all 10 of her children die in a moment. Sometimes I wonder if they had buried all their children in one grave or if each of them received their own tomb. Did they even have money left to properly bury their children? The text never says. I’m sure the grief was overwhelming for Job’s wife. I have never lost a child, let alone all of my children at once; it must have seemed unbearable. Now to make matters worse, her husband was suffering physically as well; sitting in the ash heap, scraping his skin with pot shards because of the boils on his skin (Job 2:8). She comes to Job and this is what she says: “Do you still retain your integrity? Curse God and die! (Job 2:9).” She just told Job to do the very thing that Satan told God Job would do if he lost his physical health; curse God.
I can’t be mad at Job’s wife for her comment. If I was in her shoes I can picture myself doing something similar. At this point in the story I can just imagine her looking at the physical state her husband is in, his physical suffering, coupled with their emotional suffering, and thinking life is not worth living! Death is a relief! She recognized that his additional suffering was related to his integrity because she specifically mentions it, however, she probably believes one of two things: 1) he has not been as integral as he had seemed and reckoned that all the disaster that had come to them was do to a lack of integrity (which is what everyone else in the story believes) or 2) she knows her husband’s character well, sees it as worthless in preventing this disaster and blames God for their current situation (which is how scholars interpret the text). She could even be blaming Job for their current suffering and thinking that if he died things would be better since the suffering came because of him. So not only does it appear she has grown resentful towards God for their current situation but also towards her husband. According to one commentary I read, Job seems surprised by his wife’s response to their suffering and tells her “should we only accept good from God and not adversity? (Job 2:10).” Wow Job, wow! What a statement in such circumstances!
Job and his wife give us completely opposite responses regarding the attitude that we can have when bad things happen to us in life. In our grief we can either raise our fists to heaven and blame God and others for our situations and become resentful and angry towards God or we can choose to worship God and believe that in God’s sovereignty that He is still right, just, and good even when we have no answers for why the current circumstances are what they are.
Just in Job’s day, there is still the idea in the Church today that if anything bad happens in life; if you’re not blessed financially, or if you don’t appear to “prosper” materially than it is a direct consequence of something you have done. Although there is a Biblical principle of sowing and reaping (that means that what you “plant” is what you “grow” in life), not everything in life is a result of something that you have done. The life of Job attests to this; he was a man of “perfect integrity” who did absolutely nothing wrong in the eyes of God yet he went through an incredible amount of suffering. Jesus, himself, also addresses this issue. In John 9:1-3, the disciples ask Jesus if a man who was born blind was blind because of his sin or his parent’s sin. Jesus replies that he was not born blind because of sin but so that God’s power could be put on display! Jesus then heals the man of his blindness and many people are amazed at what had happened. Jesus also warns us that life will have suffering but encourages us to have courage because He has conquered the world and that we can have peace in Him (John 16:33). James 1:2-18 encourages believers to rejoice in our hard times because they can help increase our faith, help us gain endurance, and helps us grow into maturity as believers. These hard times/ trials also will lead us to God’s blessing if we do not give up. Hard situations reveal our hearts. These circumstances reveal the hidden properties within us that many times can not come to light if we hadn’t been pressed. No one likes difficult situations, no one. Job was not enjoying his time in the ash heap but Scripture promises that God works all things for the good of those who love him (Romans 8:28), even those things that seem unbearable and we never get an answer for “why Lord?” For Job and his wife, their suffering revealed each of their internal attitudes towards God; one pleased the Lord and the other did not.
When my eldest son was around one and a half years old he was diagnosed with a severe peanut allergy as well as some other food allergies he has since grown to tolerate (excluding the peanut). It was scary. To be honest fear sometimes still creeps up at times. Satan swept in like an approaching army and he was ready to pounce on my fears when ever the opportunity arose. My son is now five and a half and his allergy number is still close to 100 for peanut, though his last test did go down instead of jump up, for that I am thankful. At one point I remember having a conversation with my husband that if our son died because of a peanut that I would be mad a God for “a while” because He has the power to heal my son and I am under the strong conviction that if as a believer we can “drink deadly poison (Mark 16:18)” than surely food should not kill us! I remember my husband looking at me and telling me that if our son died from a peanut, it would not be God’s fault, it is just a consequence of being in a world with sin. This prospective smack me right between the eyes. It has taken some time for me to processes my feelings about this hypothetical but very real possibility. As a mom loosing a child can be devastating. I personally know a few mom’s who have had to bury their children, one at 3 months from SIDS and one at 16 years due to heart failure. The pain was horrendous but the joy these ladies have now and what they did in the midst of their grief has been so inspiring. Another woman who comes to mind is one who has now gone on to be with the Lord. I meet her over 10 years ago. She was the most joyous and inspirational woman I had ever meet. If you met her you would have never known she was dying of cancer. She was so full of life and had excitement for every day. You would often hear her say that she would live every day the Lord had assigned for her and that her days would not be cut short. She was in excruciating pain, especially at the end. I remember visiting her in the hospital in her last month of life popping narcotics for the pain which she said never went away and never got any less but even at the end she was so full of love and joy. Of all the people I had known over the years who had died and passed on, her death was the only one I sobbed over. She had fought the good fight, she had overcome and now she was with Jesus and truly free from her suffering.
So, how do we respond when it feels like our world is crashing down around us? Do we curse God and place the blame on Him? Or do we worship God for who He is and rest in His sovereignty, knowing that even this He will work for our good? The story of Job and his wife did not end in the ash heap and yours doesn’t have to end there either. The Bible tells us in Job 42:10-17 that in the end Job’s health was completely restored to him and he and his wife had 7 more sons and 3 more daughters and Job lived many more years. Plus they were blessed twice as much as before their suffering began! Those who believed Job’s suffering was due to wrong doing on his part were ultimately proven wrong and their misunderstanding of God’s character was addressed (Job 42:7-9).
If you are reading this than your story is not yet over. Whatever trial, hard time, or suffering you are going through right now, God is able to redeem it. He can take your situation and turn it around for your good and for the good of those around you. You may never have a “why” for your suffering just as Job didn’t. I’m not here to tell you why this particular situation happened to you but I know that God was/is there, He saw/sees it, He felt/feels your pain and He was/is also grieved by the situation. God loves you, even when you don’t feel like He does. Thank God His character does not change based on our feelings or our situations. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hew 13:8); His word never changes (1 Peter 1:25), and He cannot lie (Num 23:19).
“For as heaven is higher than the earth, so My ways are higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:9
The Ruby Blossom 