2024 10 06
Proper 22 Pentecost 20B
Why, oh why,
oh why???? My granddaughter has reached
that age, where she asks why and I’m not really sure why she even asks why, but
it sure is a challenge sometimes. The
book of Job, which we read from today is a book that asks the same question –
why? We also find that Jesus, after
being tested by the authorities about marriage, has his disciples asking him
why also. In verse 10; “Then in the
house the disciples asked him again about this matter.” Why did they have to
ask him again? Did he say something that
was new to them? For us who have often
read this passage, it all seems very matter of fact. So, why did the disciples need to question
him again? It seems to imply that there
was a common belief here that Jesus was challenging. Moses made an allowance for people’s failings,
but Jesus reminds them that there is a more perfect way.
Job was a
man who walked a perfect path. He was known
as a man of Integrity. Integrity is a
virtue that we really need to cultivate… in ourselves and in our children. When has someone encouraged you to give up
your integrity? Possibly the last time
you recall, might have been when you were at school being peer pressured into
joining in with the forbidden antics, but as adults, the peer pressure still
exists. We are peer pressured into
thinking the same, into believing the same….
And this may or may not be a threat to our integrity, but sometimes it
is and we don’t always as readily realize it.
A simple example; everyone exceeds the speed limit at this particular
part of the road, and if you do the speed, the person behind sits so close that
you feel the pressure to conform.
Integrity is
doing the right thing even when no one is looking and even everyone else is
doing the wrong thing. It is something
I often talk about with the school children because even very good children
will tend to follow the crowd when no authority figure is looking. Therefore, we strive to teach them about
this thing called “Integrity”, and I usually explain that it is something that we
need to practise, in order to be strong in integrity.
Job was told
by his wife to give up his integrity and curse God and die. Why did she say this? Well, there is a little back story to Job
that you need to know; Satan had accused God that Job only feared God because
God had blessed Job. Therefore, God gave
Satan permission to test Job and so, in one day, all Job’s possessions came to
ruin and his children were killed. Job
was grief stricken but continued to worship God. Then came Satan again and afflicted Job with
sores, and his wife sees his suffering and encourages him to curse God and
die. But Job refuses.
The book of
Job is very important. It deals with the
subject that all people struggle with; why do bad things happen to good,
God-fearing people? The traditional and
narrow answer is one that we see echoed in many of the encounters of healing
people had with Jesus; that sickness and tragedy is because of sin. Although it is obvious that when we do
something foolish the consequence may lead to destruction, there are many good
people that through no fault of their own, experience terrible tragedy.
We do live
in a fallen world where we are subject to the consequence of both our sin and
the sin of others, but sometimes there seems to be such an injustice in the
Russian roulette of who bears the consequence.
This “Why do bad things happen to good people?” question, is one of
life’s big questions. And one that
people will often give as a reason to not follow God. The book of Job gives us another reason,
other than the sin that is in the world.
It opens our minds to understand that there is a spiritual realm that
we know very little about. This
spiritual realm has rules and ways of operating that effect us, and how we
respond has an effect in that spiritual realm also. The book of Job deals with the reality of who
we are in that spiritual realm and it deals with our attitude, and challenges
us to ponder, “Do we respond with faith, when bad things happen?”
I recently
saw a theological lecture where the lecturer explained that our image of God
matters. It is important that the God we
proclaim is not just a megaphone for ourselves and our own ideas, but that we
allow God to be bigger than what we can comprehend. This is what the book of Job does. It reminds us that God is bigger and that
there are reasons that we just can’t know. While remembering that God is… El Shaddai
… the Almighty and beyond us, God does
desire for us to know him and love him, which is why Christ came to our
world.
Christ is the exact representation of God,
which is what we note in our letter to the Hebrews today. “He is the reflection of God's glory and
the exact imprint of God's very being, and he sustains all things by his
powerful word. When he had made purification for sins, he sat down at the right
hand of the Majesty on high,..”
God made
purification for sins! What does this
tell us about God? You know the idea of
Karma is that we get what we deserve. We
do the wrong thing and we eventually get pay back… and the same for if we do
the right thing. Does this always work
in our world though? It is an obvious
NO… and the book of Job draws our attention to this fact.
If Jesus is the exact representation of God,
and he made purification for our sins, then it stands to reason, that God is sacrificially
and unconditionally loving. This is totally different from Karma, where if
we did wrong, we’d be reincarnated as a bug.
And just between me and you…. Much better news! God’s love is such that He himself willingly
made purification for our sins. How it
all works, and what is going on in the spiritual realm is beyond our knowledge
and comprehension, which is the main point in the book of Job – God’s way and
wisdom is beyond our understanding.
But who are
we in the spiritual realm? We are lower
than Angels… for a little while. As
Hebrews tells us; "What are human that you are mindful of them or mortals
that you care for them? You have made
them for a little while lower than the angels; you have crowned them with glory
and honor,..” We are central to God’s
purpose and we are part of his plan and we are his beloved children, but there
are hints that God has a leadership place for us as his royal children. As yet, we don’t know more than a hint of
God’s plan, but it is just enough to show us that there is something more that
we can not yet fathom… we simply need to JUST TRUST.
Trust in God!
Jesus said,
“Let the little children come to me; do not stop them, for it is to such as
these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly
I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will
never enter it."
My husband
tells me that “Why” is a faithless question.
Because the question, “Why” implies that we don’t trust God. God is
sovereign and things will be one way or the other, but our role is to have
faith in God and grow in the knowledge of God’s love and grace.
Children do ask “Why”, and we will answer them the best we can, but more often than not, they can’t comprehend what the answer is, and they need to simply trust us. It is the same with God and us. We haven’t the ability… yet… to comprehend the goings on in the spiritual realm, and scripture tells us that No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined the things that God has prepared for those who love him.” and we are not meant to worry about it, but trust and rest in the knowledge that God loves us and know that he does all things for our ultimate good…. It is for a good that is bigger than this finite existence. How exciting to know that God has something planned for us. Let us rejoice in this truly Good News, and may this truth give us strength and comfort when the tough times come. So that we can remain people of Integrity.
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