Thank goodness it is not up to me!

Job 23:1-8, 16-17
We continue our journey with Job this week.  Although the events and time may be different, reading the
Book of Job can bring that same sense of reality of Jobʼs suffering into many lives today. Jobʼs friends have arrived to give him moral support and comfort in his severe suffering.  However, their attempts have made his mental and spiritual agony worse.  For Job, the question remains, “Why should I be under the spotlight? I have done nothing wrong, yet I am suffering greatly. God, where are you?” Job has looked everywhere to find God, north, south, east and west, but canʼt find him. If he could, Job would take God to court over this matter and prove his innocence.  God, however, was very much aware of Job and of his wholehearted obedience.  In fact, it was God who called ʻThe Satanʼsʼ attention to Job initially. Christ reminded His disciples in Luke 12:6-7 that God, who even takes detailed note of the sparrows, is much more deeply interested in the affairs of His own children.  The Father is aware of everything about us, down to the smallest detail.  Even the hairs of our head are numbered.  When we think that “No one understands what Iʼm going through,” Jesus Christ does! We have a faithful High Priest (Jesus Christ) who was tested in all ways like us and is therefore able to empathise and give us the needed help (Heb. 4:15-16).
God saves the world by taking its suffering into the very heart of the divine life, bearing it there, and then wearing it on his own back in the form of a cross for us.

Pastor Darryl