Homily for Sunday, October 25th Graves Chapel
The Old Testament story of Job reads like
a play, but may also be seen as a parable. The wisdom it reveals is both difficult and profound as it
asks the question, “How can we understand why people suffer in the many ways
they do?”
Today’s lesson from the Book of Job comes
from the very last chapter in Job’s story—Chapter 42. In Chapter 1, we learn that Job is a
faithful and righteous man, a man beloved and mightily blessed by God. In fact, Job becomes a topic of
conversation between God and Satan.
Satan makes a wager with God concerning Job, and the essence of what
Satan says is this: What does it
take for a faithful man to lose his faith? Yes, Job is a righteous and faithful man—and that’s easy
for him since he is blessed with great wealth, a loving family, and good health.
But if you take away all of his blessings and reduce him to a state of extreme
poverty and ill-health, would Job continue to be faithful to you, God? God has so much confidence in Job’s
faith that he agrees to have him tested in this way.
In a matter of moments, it seems, all is
taken away from Job: All of his possessions; even all of his children. Finally, deprived of everything that had
made his life worth living and covered with painful boils, Job sits on an
ash-heap, moaning in pain. Three of his old, righteous friends come to visit
Job. They question him, attempting to help him understand why these awful
things have happened to him. In other words, they ask him to search his
conscience and determine what he had done, what sin he had committed to deserve
such punishment. But Job is stubborn. He knows in his heart that he did NOT
sin, nor did he deserve to be punished. In fact, in Chapters 26 to 31, Job
proclaims to his old friends all of the ways he was blessed and the reasons why
he deserved to be blessed. Job asserts his righteousness.
Blind Bartimaeus, the beggar we meet
briefly in today’s gospel lesson from Mark, provides an interesting contrast to
Job. We don’t know anything about Bartimaeus except that he calls out to Jesus
as he passes by—and he cries out persistently until Jesus hears and responds.
We are told, “Then Jesus said to him, ‘What do you want me to do for
you?’” Without hesitation, Bartimaeus
answers Jesus, “My teacher, let me see again.” And the answer Jesus gives him is a familiar one: “Go; your
faith has made you well.” Since Bartimaeus
is willing to believe that the rabbi Jesus can heal him, he is healed. Bartimaeus
does not waste time asking Jesus WHY he is blind.
As Job contends with his so-called
friends, he struggles to understand—to see—why the God he has served and
worshiped faithfully has seemingly turned his back on him. Has Job truly found himself in a
position opposite that of Bartimaeus?
Or is there something the formerly wealthy Job could learn from the
blind beggar? Instead of trying to
figure out why his life has been turned upside down and defending his record as
a good man, what if Job simply asked what Bartimaeus asked of Jesus? “Teacher, let me see again.”
After his three old friends argue with Job, a young man named
Elihu speaks up. Elihu has listened to the three older men
chastising Job, saying only egregious sins could have earned him such harsh
punishment. He has heard Job defend himself, justifying his own righteousness
and saying he did NOT deserve to be punished. Although Elihu is a young man,
and he showed respect for his elders by waiting for them to finish speaking, what
he has to say demonstrates his wisdom. First, he politely rebukes the main
thesis of the elder friends of Job. Their basic argument was that Job must
have sinned because they believed that God punishes only sinners. Elihu points
out that ALL people suffer from time to time, the good as well as the bad. His
assertion is that God does not cause bad things to happen to good people; rather,
in Elihu’s words, “God delivers the afflicted by their affliction, and opens
their ear by adversity.”
Isn’t there great truth in those
words? When our lives are moving
along swimmingly and all seems well, how often do we take the time to think of
God, to express gratitude for our many blessings? Isn’t it more likely, as Elihu suggests, that we turn our
attention to God and pray most fervently when we find ourselves in pain—either
physical or emotional? God doesn’t cause the pain—pain happens to everyone
sooner or later. But God uses the pain to draw our attention in God’s
direction, where help and comfort can be found.
When Job spoke to the three older
friends, asserting his righteousness and his lack of sin, he has fallen into a very
common human trap. It reminds me
of my favorite line from a T-Bone Burnette song: “As soon as you say you’re
being humble, you are no longer humble.” Elihu points out the conceit Job
expresses when he argues, at length, “I have NO sin.”
Would Job measure the worth of someone like
Bartimaeus, for example, by his outward appearance as a blind beggar, and find Bartimaeus
less worthy than he? By expressing his righteousness as a reason why he does not
deserve to suffer, Job shows disdain—a lack of empathy—for others like Bartimaeus
who suffer. For this, Elihu takes Job to task, saying, “But you are obsessed
with the case of the wicked; judgment and justice seize you. Beware that wrath
does not entice you into scoffing.”
In other words, Elihu suggests to Job, who are you to imply that other
sufferers deserve their suffering any more than you do? Do the poor deserve to
be poor? Who are you to judge or to scoff? Do you really believe you understand
the judgment and the ways of God?
Elihu concludes by saying, “God thunders
wondrously with his voice. He does great things that we cannot
comprehend.” In the face of such
greatness, the best thing we humans can do is surrender our own willfulness and
worship God—because, as Elihu continues, “ God does not regard any who are wise
in their own conceit.”
What happens next in this dramatic story?
God answers Job “out of the whirlwind.” Some of the most spectacular passages
about God’s creation follow, in Chapters 38 to 41. God asks Job (and all of
us), “Were you there when I laid the foundation of the earth?... Have you
commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its
place so that it might take hold of the skirts of the earth?...Have you entered
into the springs of the sea or walked in the recesses of the deep?...Have you
entered the storehouses of the snow?...Declare if you know all this.”
Finally, Job begins to comprehend and he
speaks the words of today’s lesson: “I know that you can do all things and that
no purpose of yours can be thwarted… Therefore I have uttered what I did not
understand, things too wonderful for me that I did not know…I had heard you by
the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you.”
With only “the hearing of the ear,” we
humans fail to see God at work in our lives. We like to use reason as we argue
and discuss and figure things out (as Job and his friends had attempted to do).
Our God is a God who uses even our suffering to bless us in unexpected and
seemingly unreasonable ways. I know that sounds a little crazy, but I will
share with you my personal example. If I had not gotten married at a very young
age to a man who turned out to be an alcoholic, I would never have found or
followed my current spiritual path.
I would simply not be the person I am today. As difficult as my life
seemed during those years, I can honestly say I’m very grateful for all of
it.
As with Job, it may take us some time to
comprehend God’s ways! Should we, like
Bartimaeus, simply ask the Lord, “Teacher, let me see again”?
Amen.
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