Job

The beginning of Job describes the man Job with the following four descriptors: blameless, upright, fears God, and shuns evil. Nowhere else in Scripture is a person given such an unqualified glowing description of righteousness.

Ironically, it’s this very righteousness that qualifies Job for suffering.

When Job is in the middle of his suffering, his friends challenge him to look deep into his own heart and life to find the hidden sin that led to the catastrophe. Sounds like good advice, except that we already know Job is blameless. But Job’s friends assume he sinned. They assumed that since Job is suffering he must have done something wrong.

Scripture tells us that generally speaking God blesses the righteous and makes life tough for the wicked. The problem arises when we look at blessing and assume it’s the result of righteousness or, like Job’s friends, look at suffering and assume it’s the result of wickedness or sin. In Job’s case, just the opposite was true: Job’s suffering was a result of his righteousness.

When we look at a tragedy, say a hurricane or a terrorist attack, and claim we know God is judging sin we defy the message of Job. We cannot look at suffering in the world or in our own lives and automatically declare it to be the result of sin. It’s true that our suffering and challenges, heartaches and disappointments can be the result of sin in our lives, but in those cases God is usually clear and the conviction is concrete.
The suffering may very well be the result of righteousness.

Think about when Jesus’ disciples looked at the blind man and asked Jesus, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” The disciples made the same mistake that Job’s friends made. Jesus responded, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned. This happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.”