Job was not the rock of Gibraltar being beaten by crashing
waves and stoically withstanding it all as though nothing was amiss. He felt
the pain of loss for his ten children, he felt the physical pain of his boils,
and in the time it took for his friends to come to him, he had become
unrecognizable. The memory of what he’d been and what he looked like now was so
different that, to their eyes, it did not seem like the same man.
The same thing happens to each of us when we come to Jesus
but in the inverse. We start out sick and dirty, covered in tattered rags,
lifeless and hollow, and then we encounter Him. He takes a wretch like me and
patiently cleanses me with His blood, restores my soul, clothes me in white
garments, and breathes new life in me. How could I not sing His praises? How
could I not serve Him all the days of my life, knowing what would have been had
He not found me and called me His own?
Throughout the week, we take turns saying grace as we sit
down to dinner. We hold hands as a family, bow our heads, and one of us
proceeds to give thanks to God for His many blessings. When they were younger,
the girls would always start out thanking God for the food, the hands that
prepared it, and the grace of having something to eat when others in the world
might not. As they grew and began to understand who Jesus is and what He did on
the cross, I noticed that both of their prayers changed, and nowadays, more
often than not, they start out by thanking God for sending Jesus. They still
include the food, the heat, and the roof over our heads, but Jesus and His
salvific sacrifice come first.
Even at their tender age, without the benefit of attending seminary
and getting a degree in pastoral studies, they understand the immeasurable gift
we are freely given by the hand of God in that we were once lost, separated
from His love and grace, wandering in the dark and standoffish of the light. It
doesn’t take a genius-level IQ or endless hours of sitting in a classroom to
understand the simple truth of the gospel. Jesus came to set the captives free.
He came to give His life that we might have life, then rose again on the third
day, leaving all who would believe, repent, and follow after Him with the
promise that we would one day be with Him in the place He has prepared, where
every tear will be wiped from our eyes, and everlasting joy will abound.
Historical context is important in understanding both that
Job was now an outcast among his own people, given his painful boils and the perpetual
fear of the time of contracting some incurable disease, and the depth of love
his friends had for him in that they were not concerned or fearful for themselves.
It’s not as though Job had the benefit of modern medicine to determine whether
or not he was contagious. It’s not as though he’d gone out and done a blood panel
to determine what he was suffering from. It’s not as though his friends were
presented with a clean bill of health before they sat down with him for seven
days and seven nights, and for all they knew, they could have contracted the
same malady he suffered from if they breathed the same air or were around him
for a prolonged period of time.
Whether they took the possibility of getting sick themselves
into account, we will never know, but what is clearly written is that when his
three friends saw the state Job was in, they lifted their voices and wept, and
each one tore his robe and sprinkled dust on his head toward heaven. They cried
out for mercy on behalf of their friend, given that it was the only thing they
could do.
We know what man is capable of and the lengths to which he will
go if he feels as though his health or his life are in danger. To this day, I
still see people driving around by themselves with face diapers firmly secured
to their faces, although it's rarer now than it was two years ago. Imagine
living in a time before the ability to determine what someone was suffering from,
before electricity or WebMD, before Urgent Care, and the encyclopedia of diseases
and disorders.
Imagine seeing a friend you once knew as strong and vibrant,
now unrecognizable, sitting on an ash pile, covered in painful boils from head
to toe, not knowing if coming close to him will bring you to the same state. We
cannot dismiss the depth of love Job’s friends had for him. We can’t wave it
off and say it doesn’t count unless we try to put ourselves in their situation
and determine whether we would have done likewise. These three men likely had
families of their own, wives and children, servants and acquaintances, and the
thought that not only would they catch what Job had but spread it to their
loved ones, in turn, must have come to the fore at some point. Even so, they
sat down with him on the ground for seven days and seven nights.
When we look at this event through the prism of the
spiritual, we can’t help but notice some deeper truths. Jesus will sit with you
at your lowest when all others have abandoned you, when the world has shunned
you, and those you called friends will do everything they can to avoid you.
Even in your mess, your pain, in the disfigurement sin has wrought upon your
countenance, He will sit on the ground with you in the hope of lifting you up
out of the dust and ash and bringing you to a new understanding of life, most
notably that it doesn’t end when you go back to the dust, but that it continues
into eternity with only two possible destinations.
We choose to either take His outstretched hand and humble ourselves to the point of letting Him do on our behalf what we could have never done on our own or resign ourselves to the idea that all there is is ash and dust, and painful boils, and His promise of restoration and wholeness is nothing more than a fable. Call it a fable, call it a lie, call it a fanciful tale akin to spaghetti monsters, but I know what I know, I’ve felt what I’ve felt, I know Him as my Lord, my King, and my Savior, and nothing anyone says can sway me from what I know to be true.
With love in Christ,
Michael Boldea, Jr.
Posted on 26 November 2024 | 12:20 pm
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