God's Word-filled Wednesday - Job 1:21 and 33:28

If you are at all familiar with the story of Job in the Bible, then you know that God allowed Satan to send trials and sufferings to Job to test his faith.  So you've got Satan on the one side saying, "This guy only likes you because he's got a great life with a nice wife, good kids, and a lovely home and estate , good health, and friends."  To which God answers, "No way.  Job is filled with love and trust for me.  And to prove it to you, I'll let you take all that stuff away from him and we'll see how he reacts."

Alright, so I'm paraphrasing, but basically what happens is that Job is that he loses everything.  His kids die, his wife starts nagging him, he develops boils on his body, he loses all his stuff, and his friends assume that he's actually not such a great guy and insinuate that God is punishing him for his sinfulness. 

Throughout all these tests, Job trusts in the Lord.  One of his first responses is one the one that sticks out to me (probably because a song I love, "Blessed Be Your Name" is taken from it):

"The Lord gives and the Lord takes away.  Blessed be the name of the Lord!" (Job 1:21)

What faith!  What love!  Eventually after he gave this kind of response to everything Satan threw at him, God speaks and essentially humbles them all, saying that who are they to question the God who created all things; they don't know what he is doing.  And he blesses Job again for his faithfulness and restores his riches and health and family.  

I have to think that after having everything stripped of you, one would be pretty near despair.  Yet, Job trusted God and the following verse is simple incredible.  

 Job had done nothing to deserve scorn and hate, but yet he received it.  It's a wonderful reminder that no matter how close to the Lord you are and no matter how far away you are, you still need to be redeemed by the Savior because the holiest of men is still unable to do anything apart from God's grace and mercy.  It is he who redeems us so that we can live in the light!  

I love that Job blessed the Lord through both his trials and through his joys.  Generally when I am going through a hard time, I ask for God to help me deal with it and I ask him to fix it, but rarely do I praise him for it.  When my daughter is throwing up, I don't think to praise him.  When I run out of sugar baking brownies, I don't think to praise him.  When our car breaks down, I don't think to praise him.  When people I love hurt me, I don't think to praise him.  When I developed a thyroid problem, I didn't think to praise him.  

But God never tells us we need to understand everything.  We just need to praise him. Plain and simple.