Readings for today: Psalms 35, 54, 63, 18
So I’ve been thinking a lot about Job this week. If you remember Job’s story from the Bible, it begins with this incredible strange scene in the heavenly throne room where Satan comes to challenge God. For those who don’t know, the Hebrew word “satan” means accuser and that’s exactly what takes place. Satan accuses humanity before God. The Bible gives the sense that Satan has come from “walking to and fro on the earth” and hasn’t found anyone on it who is seeking God. In response, God offers up his servant Job. Satan immediately challenges God. “Does Job fear God for no reason?” After all, has not God blessed Job with tremendous wealth and success and a large family and health and a long life? Satan goes on to suggest that if God were take those things away, Job’s faith would fail. So God allows Satan to put Job to the test. Job loses his wealth. His children are tragically killed. All his property is taken away. His health fails. Everything he has is stripped away, leaving him a broken man sitting in dust and ashes. Despite all this, Job remains faithful. He never loses hope. Yes, he gets angry. Yes, he gets bitter. Yes, he struggles to understand why it is all happening. But at the end of the book, when God finally shows up on the scene, Job humbles himself. He falls on his face before God. He surrenders to His perfect will.
I think about everything we are going through right now. A pandemic sweeping the earth, stealing our health. Economies crashing, stealing our wealth. Jobs lost, stealing our livelihoods. Quarantines in place, robbing us of community. Fear and anxiety rising to overwhelming levels all over the globe as people struggle to cope with it all. Satan, the accuser of the human race, is clearly on the move. God has allowed him to roam free for a season, wreaking havoc where he may. And I wonder how we will respond? Will we respond like Job’s friends? Demanding answers that simply are not there. Shaming the victims of this crisis rather than seeking to help. Casting blame on others for a situation beyond our control. Will we allow outrage and bitterness and frustration to get the best of us? Will we allow the pain and anxiety and fear we are feeling drive how we respond in the days and weeks and months ahead? Will we let hopelessness and helplessness sink in, leading to despair and a loss of faith? Or will we follow Job’s example? Humble ourselves under God’s mighty hand. Trust in God’s sovereign purposes even for our pain. Hold fast to the truth that God uses all things for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose? When we get to the end of ourselves and the end of our resources and the end of our hopes and the end of our addictions and idolatry and sinful dependence on everything except God…will we find faith?
This is where the reading from the Psalms comes in. As we read these words, we find our voice in the midst of all we are going through. When we don’t know how to pray in the midst of this pandemic or what to pray for, the Psalms provide direction. The Spirit praying with us and for us. Listen again to what the Psalmist declares…
“My soul will rejoice in the Lord, exulting in his salvation. All my bones shall say, "O Lord, who is like you, delivering the poor from him who is too strong for him, the poor and needy from him who robs him?" (Psalm 35:9-10)
“But I, when they were sick— I wore sackcloth; I afflicted myself with fasting; I prayed with head bowed on my chest. I went about as though I grieved for my friend or my brother; as one who laments his mother, I bowed down in mourning. But at my stumbling they rejoiced and gathered; they gathered together against me; wretches whom I did not know tore at me without ceasing; like profane mockers at a feast, they gnash at me with their teeth. How long, O Lord, will you look on? Rescue me from their destruction, my precious life from the lions! I will thank you in the great congregation; in the mighty throng I will praise you.” (Psalm 35:13-18)
“Behold, God is my helper; the Lord is the upholder of my life. He will return the evil to my enemies; in your faithfulness put an end to them. With a freewill offering I will sacrifice to you; I will give thanks to your name, O Lord, for it is good. For he has delivered me from every trouble, and my eye has looked in triumph on my enemies.” (Psalm 54:4-7)
“O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands. My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips, when I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night; for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy.” (Psalm 63:1-7)
God’s promise throughout the Bible is simply this…He will redeem our suffering. He will set all things right. He will make all things new. He will never abandon His people. Does that mean every desire of ours will be fulfilled? Of course not. We have to grapple with the fact that our lifestyles are not guaranteed by God. We have to acknowledge the American Dream is not something God ever promised. We have to humble ourselves and confess the lives we were pursuing pre-COVID were actually sinful on some level as we put other loves before God. Does God promise we will never experience pain? Not at all. God tells us straight up that in this world we will suffer. In this world we will face trials. In this world we will go through tribulation. Anyone who tells you different is clearly not speaking for God. Pain is real because sin is real. Our world is broken at a fundamental level which is why natural evils like viruses exist in the first place. Is following Jesus always positive and encouraging? Sadly, no. Jesus clearly calls us to pick up our cross. To take up a life of redemptive suffering for the sake of others. To sacrifice for the sake of the world around us. To deny ourselves daily so that others around us may flourish. Just as He did.
Friends, I am certainly praying for an end to this plague. I am certainly praying for an end to the suffering and pain we are all experiencing on various levels. I am certainly praying for the least-resourced and those communities most impacted. I am certainly praying for our political and business and medical leaders. But more than anything else, I am praying for the Holy Spirit to drive us to our knees before the Father in repentance and humility. I am praying we fall on our faces before Him in acknowledgement of our personal, corporate, and systemic sin. I am praying for revival to come as the human race all over the globe comes to grip with the fact that we are small and weak and the systems/societies we’ve built and placed our trust in are, at best, castles made of sand. I am praying the challenges of this cultural moment bring us to the end of ourselves so we can come face to face with God and find the grace we all so desperately need. Maranatha!
Readings for tomorrow: 1 Samuel 28-31, 1 Chronicles 10