God is good! That’s true, and it will always be true. God is good in the storm, and he is good also when the clouds dissipate to let the sun shine through once more. God is good in birth and in death and during all the moments in between. “Whatsoever a man sows, that will he also reap!” (Galatians 6:7). This is a truism, and truisms are generally, but not always, true. For example, there is such a thing as forgiveness. Is God unrighteous, because he forgives and doesn’t’ treat us as we deserve? “God so loved the world that he gave…” (John 3:16). Did Jesus deserve the death he endured? Was the crucifixion his just due for what he sowed in his life? Truth will always be truth, but truisms are not always true!
We have recently begun the study of the Book of Job, and we are suddenly struck in the first two chapters with the idea that the Lord unleashed judgment upon a man the text identifies as Job, but was it deserved? Some might say that Job must have had some secret sin in his life that the Lord wanted to expose, but this isn’t so. Bad things do happen to good people, and undeservedly so. Moreover, we have God’s own testimony that Job was a righteous man, perfect in his ways, fearing the Lord and turning away from evil (Job 1:1). Is God a liar, or can we trust him? I speak foolishly, of course, for we all believe we can trust God. Only a fool would say otherwise. Yet, many believe Job was a self-righteous man, or had some other secret sin, which the Lord wished to expose. Nevertheless, one could read this book a hundred, or a thousand times, but he would never discover that Job was hiding his sin or that he was self-righteous and wasn’t aware of it.
No! Job’s pathetic condition, his loss of family and wealth, his humiliation, his pain, and all he suffered was unprovoked. The Lord says he destroyed Job without cause (Job 2:3). Do we actually believe what God says about himself or can’t we believe the literal truth, and make excuses for the Lord’s presumed lie? The Lord destroyed Job without cause, but not without reason, nevertheless, it was without cause. Job did not deserve to be treated like we find him being treated by God and satan in chapters one and two of this book. This should stand us up on our heels! I know it does me. I am astonished with this realization, that God, my God, would act in this manner, do something totally unjust. I know I mentioned forgiveness above, but we aren’t speaking of forgiveness here. We are speaking of actively hurting an innocent man, who doesn’t deserve to be hurt, and that is unjust—justice didn’t demand that the Lord do as he did. Why, then, did he do it? Well, interestingly enough, that’s what Job wants to know, too!
God is God, and he gets to do godly things, and he doesn’t have to answer to you or me for what he does. Our part is to walk with him in all that he does, and we’ll be satisfied in the end for doing so, because all that God does is good, because that is who he is—GOOD! We may not understand what he does, or his timing in it all, but if we are patient and walk with him, trusting that he is God, and that he has our best interests at heart, eventually, we’ll see the goodness in the things he does, like what he did to Job, even when Job didn’t deserve his lot. Yet, behind all of Job’s questions, he knew God is good. The really interesting thing I’ve discovered in these first two chapters is that Job, although he is in pain and has many questions about that, he is willing to give God the freedom to be God. The Lord gives and takes away. Blessed be the Name of the Lord!” (Job 1:21).
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