SIN AND SUFFERING

This morning in our journaling we were asked to revisit Job.  So, we shall, once again, see Job and his three friends, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zopher.  However, a fourth, new friend has arrived, a young man named Elihu.  Elihu had just been  standing near-by and could hardly wait, I think, to introduce his viewpoint to the four friends.


Study/ "While Job's three  friends said Job was suffering from past sins, which Job denied, Elihu said Job's suffering would not go away until he recognized his present sin. He maintained that Job wasn't suffering because of sin, he was sinning because of suffering.  Elihu pointed out that Job's attitude had become arrogant as he tried to defend his innocence.  Elihu also said that suffering is not meant to punish us as much as it is meant to correct and restore us, to keep us on the right path.  Elihu urged Job to look at his suffering from a different perspective and with a greater purpose in mind.


     Although Elihu spoke on a higher spiritual plateau than the others and was right about some things, he still  wrongly assumed a correct response to suffering. He claimed suffering always brings healing and restoration and that suffering is always in some way connected to sin. This is not so.  Our greatest test may be that we must trust God's goodness even though we don't understand as our lives are going in an adverse direction from our prospective.  We must learn to trust in God who is good, and not in the goodness of life." (end Study)


It seems to be that this is one of the most difficult lessons we Christians have to learn.  First of all, if our life is going hay-wire, we want to blame somebody! But God, continually calling us throughout our lives to come up higher and higher, allows us to sometimes stumble, sometimes fall, growing and becoming more and more like Him through every heartache, every catastrophe.  We would like life to be all sunshine and roses.  It is not.   Life on earth is preparation for life to come with God.  How wonderful when we learn to thank God for our difficulties. I hope and pray the words "if we learn to thank God for our difficulties" is no longer appropriate.


I do thank God for today, whatever it may bring, and I pray that tomorrow I will still thank God.


Will you?


Jo INMN