As you read the first chapter of Job, you half expect John Quinones of ABC's "What Would YOU Do?" to jump out of the bushes and say, "Just kidding!" to Job. If this makes no sense to you, you must watch the show sometime...
Job is a faithful servant to God. He works hard, he prays, he worships, he offers...he does everything that God wants all of us to do. And he does it all without sin! So Satan has a chat with God about Job and says, "I bet I can get Job to turn against you." God replies, "He is strong, faithful, and true...you can tempt him, but he won't bite." So Satan asks God to tempt Job to curse God by having his oxen and asses slain, his sheep burned up, his camels stolen, his servants were killed, and a great wind blew in and killed all 10 of his children, to which Job replies (as he strips down and shaves his head), "Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." And he does it all without sin or wrongfully accusing God.
Pretend for a moment that you are like Job and have had all of this taken from you. What would YOU do? Oh, how many of us have wrongfully blamed another when something goes wrong! We can't seem to lose weight so we blame our thyroid. We are upset about not having enough money so we blame the opposing political party. We are late getting to work so we blame the traffic lights. We can't seem to get everything done during the day so we blame our children. In all of these situations, we're wrongfully blaming in order to take the heat off of ourselves. Instead of realizing that it's our own inability to control our portion sizes, our own bad budgeting, our own tardiness at home, or our own desire to sit around and be lazy causing these issues, we look elsewhere, perhaps because it's more socially acceptable to have a "problem" rather than look like the problem!
Job could have easily blamed God for these things that happened to him. "Hey, God, why did you have to go and send that tornado that killed my kids?" But instead he acknowledges that as our Creator, God has the power to take away all of the wonderful gifts that he gives us. Imagine if we all acknowledged the wonderful gifts that God gives to us (our will power, our children, our good health, etc.) instead of continually whining about how unfair life is and how hard things have gotten.
Remember, the Lord giveth, and the Lord CAN taketh away. Be thankful and praise God for what you DO have.
Great post! :) I think the thing most of us forget is that there is tremendous power and FREEDOM in taking responsibility of our own lives, and when things don't go our way, we tend to forget (as a society, I mean) that God doesn't do things that seem bad to us without good cause. When we simply change our attitude to look for the good in the bad, we find control, and freedom!
ReplyDeleteKeep it up you two!