Reflections on Job - 3 - How we talk to each other in the name of love

Job was in unimaginable pain. He tragically lost his sons and daughters and his livelihood in almost one swoop, and then he became very ill with some kind of pox that created boils over all his skin. How could he bear it? Even his wife becomes sick of him because of all the tragedy that has happened to him. "Curse God and die!" she said to him.

Three of Job's friends (presumably his very closest friends) came to mourn with him over these deeply personal tragedies. For seven days and nights they sat quietly and mourned with him.

Finally, Job cried: "Oh, why was I ever born?" And then the friendships take on a new character.

How often have I seen or experienced the Job scenario, either as Job or as one of Job's friends? Here's the way I see it:

We have four friends, one of whom is really in trouble.

At first, the non-troubled friends console the troubled friend. We sit together, quietly.

After sitting together so long, the troubled friend manages to speak. "Oh, I am so miserable, I wish I could die." Things begin to escalate from here.

We start with "You have helped so many..." and end with "You must have done something terribly wrong or God wouldn't be putting this trouble on you."

The focus begins with the troubled friend and ends with each non-troubled friend besting the advice of the others. The focus is no longer on Job. It's on how wise we we are and how we each understand God better than the others.

Oh, that we would learn to keep silent, except for prayer.

Oh, that we would not have this need to best each other.

Oh, that we would remember that we are all in the same boat, no matter how smart we are.

Oh, that we would remember that God is God, and that we are not.

But back to the main point: All these conversations started with a simple gesture of love. Three of us came to the fourth because the fourth was in trouble and we three cared about our friend. And then things escalated. It happens. It happens all the time.

Is it better that it happened than if it hadn't? Maybe so. Maybe this is the way it is. Maybe this is the way it has to be. Job did have the companionship of his friends. He wasn't humanly alone. Because of his friends, perhaps, Job came to a better understanding of how deep his faith was. Job was able to witness to his great faith in God, to speak the words in his heart that maybe he didn't even know were there. Job's values were certainly clarified during this time.

God bless us, and bless our friends. We don't know how to do it well. Only God can make sense of it. Only God knows what good will come of it. Only God can make good of it all - to our benefit, even. God have mercy on us. God has mercy on us.