Job CXXXVI

 Zophar was fully convinced that he would succeed where his two other friends had failed. He was, after all, the rationalist of the group, and while the other two may have fallen short of making their case, surely, his ironclad logic would prevail. You must have done something; now you just have to figure out what it was, and if you can’t, it’s because you don’t want to. God would not bring you so low for an oversight or something you’d readily forget doing. There’s no way you could have overlooked it, so you’re choosing not to confess it.

Job had no one but himself to stand in his defense. Throughout this protracted trial, God had been silent, and while two of the three could rest and gather their thoughts while one spoke, Job had no such help. It was akin to a one-sided tag team wrestling bout, three against one, with Satan putting his finger on the scale whenever he could.

Understanding both the context and the length of this drama is likely to make us more sympathetic toward Job and impressed with his resilience than we otherwise would be. We see moments of teeth-gnashing desperation pouring forth from his lips, and had we not been privy to the backstory of all he’d had to endure and how long he’d been enduring it, we would likely conclude, as Zophar did, that he was being a tad overly dramatic.

Unless you’ve been present in an individual’s life from the genesis of their trial, you cannot know everything they’ve gone through to bring them to their current state. It’s easier to judge a situation in situ than it is to take the time and hear the story, gather some context, and be balanced in your approach toward someone who is hurting. Understanding is the key to true compassion.

Nobody wakes up homeless, living on the street, with all their worldly possessions hanging in a plastic bag off a shopping cart. It’s a gradual descent, one thing leading to another, one bad decision having an exponential impact on the next, and if you take the time to hear their story, you’ll likely gain a greater understanding of their hardship and how much they had to endure to get to the place they’re in.

The unwritten rule of reciprocity of empathy, sympathy, and compassion is a real thing. No, I’m not talking about something as juvenile as karma; rather, if you fail to show compassion or sympathy for anyone, why would you live with the expectation of everyone showing you compassion when you’re in a position that requires it?

Matthew 7:12, “Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law of the Prophets.”

Be the kind of friend you’d like to have if you were the one going through a fiery trial. Be the kind of brother and sister in Christ you would desire to have holding up your weary hands when it seems like the hosts of hell are arrayed against you.

Some of the most heartbreaking stories I hear are from individuals who, after faithfully giving to their church for decades, fell on hard times, and now, with nowhere else to turn, ask for help for funeral expenses or some other tragedy and get denied outright. It’s usually by elder boards who oversee multi-million dollar budgets, with overflowing coffers, and pay packages for the leadership that would make a multi-national blush, but cutting a check for a couple of grand so someone could bury their loved one is one bridge too far in their book.

Whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them. It is a simple enough principle, and one that would have us living in a wholly different kind of world if those who claim to be believers would apply it consistently.

If Job’s friends had applied this principle, their words toward him would likely not have been as caustic or accusatory. They didn’t take the time to consider how they would react if what had happened to Job would happen to them, and from high atop their self-righteous perches, they heaped sorrow upon a man who was already heavy-laden with it.

It’s one thing to point to the gospel, and remind those who are hurting of what it promises, it’s quite another to superimpose personal opinion on their situation, and insist that they react to their trial in a manner we imagine we would have reacted to it ourselves, if in a similar circumstance. Oddly enough, we never see ourselves as giving in to despair or grief. We always seem to think that our reaction will be optimal, that we will weather the storm without fear of shipwreck, and that if, perchance, we were to walk in their shoes, and suffer the same hardships, we would show the world what it meant to remain steadfast in the face of adversity.

I hope it is so; I pray it is so, but you never really know until you’re going through it. More often than not, the theory of a thing seems simple on paper until you attempt to apply it practically. Cartwheels seem simple enough. I see my girls doing them all the time. You get a running start, raise your hands in the air, then flip your body forward, use your hands as a fulcrum, and land gracefully on your feet. Easy enough in theory, but if I tried to do a cartwheel, I’d likely end up in urgent care with a broken wrist or a fractured arm. There are plenty of YouTube videos attesting to the fact that cartwheels aren’t as straightforward as they seem, from people landing on their heads or face-planting into the dirt, but the theory itself is uncomplicated, to say the least.

You never know until you know. How I think I would react to a situation, and how I will react to it once it becomes a reality may be worlds apart, and this is the reason we must lean on His strength rather than our own, so that even when all seems lost, we trust that He will make a way.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.