As we have continued to work through the book of Job we have listened as even Job’s closest friends turn on him. We have considered what they have had to say- the three not-so-comforters, Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar. We have heard the advice they have tried to give Job- or I should say the abuse they have dumped on poor Job. We tried to summarise their worldview and we realised that it really is a very common way of understanding the world- especially for moral, religious types.

Their view is very neat: God is absolutely in control. God is absolutely just and fair. Therefore God always punishes wickedness and blesses righteousness. So it necessarily follows that if I suffer I must have sinned and am being punished justly for my sin, and if I am blessed I must have been good. It sounds so right and logical. But just doesn’t work in reality.

Look around this world and it just doesn’t work like that. This is the problem that caused the Psalmist all kinds of intellectual and spiritual stumbles (read Psalm 73:1-3 and following). And this is the problem that drives Job to tackle his friends head on.

Read Job 21

As we read these verses, we hear Job saying in effect: “You say that bad things happen to bad people. I agree that ultimately bad things will happen to bad people. But you only have to look around to see that in this life very good things often happen to bad people”. And he finishes the speech with this:

“So how can you console me with your nonsense? Nothing is left of your answers but falsehood!” (Job 21:34).

If we were to explore the trajectory of Job’s train of thought, we might ask that given the wicked do not necessarily get the judgment- in this life- that they deserve, then is it not possible that the righteous might experience- in this life- bad things that they do not deserve? If there is such a thing as apparently undeserved blessing for the unbeliever, might not there also be such a thing as undeserved suffering for the true believer? Might not the righteous suffer before they are ultimately vindicated and redeemed? And so Job asks his friends “is it not therefore possible that I, Job, am actually righteous, and your assessment of me is completely misplaced?”

Christopher Ash concludes:

Job’s argument is important for us in our pastoral engagement with others. We cannot deduce the spiritual state of a man or woman from their current happiness or prosperity or their present sufferings. The fact of this ignorance needs to be burned onto our consciousness, lest we slip into the errors of Job’s comforters… It is utterly stupid, and deeply hurtful, to suppose that we can presume from someone’s situation in this age the true state of his or her heart. An unrighteous person may enjoy a good life, and a righteous person may suffer the pain of a bad life. Only the end will reveal the heart.