She could barely stand the sight of him. Angry, red, seeping sores covered every inch of visible skin. Pus oozed. Blood trickled. Scabs formed. Pain radiated from his eyes. Horror emanated from hers. Her stomach churned as she determinedly forced herself to look at him. Bile rose in the back of her throat as he scraped the pottery shard down his skin again, wiping the drainage on an overused rag at his side. Desperately she wanted to look away. Avert her eyes. Turn from the abominable scene before her. She couldn’t. This was absolutely the last straw. The final terror. She had to make him listen to reason. God had made His point. Stripped them of everything earthly they held dear. The only thing left to lose was their lives. It had to be enough. She couldn’t take it anymore. Job needed to relent, admit he was no match for the atrocities that overtook them. He needed to give in. Give up. Bow to the pressure. Curse the God he’d served so well. Renounce his faith. Rescind his integrity. Surrender himself to the illness ravaging his body. And die.
Death would surely be better than the abject humiliation they had suffered. It couldn’t possibly be worse. Her mortifying walk to Job’s new living quarters outside the city had proven the fact. One would expect folks to show more compassion for a woman who had lost everything in such a short period of time, yet no one seemed impressed by her enormous loss. Flocks and herds they’d worked so hard to raise. Servants they’d acquired. Wealth and social status upon which she’d relied. Children she’d carried, painfully birthed and carefully raised. All of it was gone. The shock was overwhelming. The grief literally stole her breath. It seemed her heart would break. Yet still it wasn’t over.
Before she’d had time to absorb the whole of her grief, her husband, the last precious thing she had, was stricken with boils and forced to take up residence outside the gates. In spite of her cleanliness, her obvious wholeness of health, people gave her a wide berth as she walked through town. Teenagers watched and whispered behind their hands. Men glued their backs to walls as she passed. Anxious mothers protectively swept unsuspecting toddlers behind their robes. Unsupervised children, curious by nature, followed at a distance to gawk through the gates at the gut-wrenching mess her husband had become. She knew they carried tales back into town. She’d overheard the exaltation of her enemies, the celebratory stories of how the mighty had well and truly fallen.
She wasn’t having it. It had to stop. All of it. The horrors. The grief. The gossip. Feeling much as the remaining servants had felt as they breathlessly ran up to bear their awful news, she marched through the gates to face her disgraced husband. She had some things to say. Stopping beside his piteous form, forcing herself to gaze directly into Job’s blotchy, oozing face, she spoke the words she’d been carefully rehearsing. Words that had been running over and over again in her brain. Words that came from a place of emotion and loss, frustration and anger, fear and hopelessness. Words she probably didn’t even mean, but couldn’t stop herself from saying. Enough was enough. God was clearly not impressed with Job or his faithfulness. He obviously wasn’t going to come racing to their rescue. The seething rage riding just below the surface finally bubbled to the top. Job needed to face the facts, be honest with himself. He needed to quit God, give way to the illness, and give himself up to death.
The man was too stubborn for his own good! Sitting there, aching and irritated by his physical issues, he still had the nerve to defy her, correct her, deny her. In fact, he had the audacity to compare her to the foolish women in town, ruled by their emotions, allowing anything and everything to roll from their lips. He’s clearly appalled by her suggestion. Curse God? Give up? Die? Not a chance! Job doesn’t even consider it. Doesn’t make a note. Doesn’t promise to think about it. No. He just strikes it down. Why? Because whether or not Job would eventually waver in his belief in God’s fairness and sovereignty, at that moment, covered in seeping, disgusting, agonizing boils, his belief in both remained firm. If God causes the rain to fall on both the good and the evil, should they not expect both pleasantness and adversity to affect everyone as well? (Job 1-2; Matthew 5:45)
This is obviously not an answer Job’s wife is prepared to accept. There must be a boil on the man’s brain! Foolish woman, indeed! Huffing in disgust and whirling around, she appears to walk away without a backward glance, leaving his care to the lamenting buddies that come to keep him company. Never again is she mentioned as visiting, bringing food, clean clothes, or soothing ointment. Perhaps her stomach couldn’t handle the sight or her anger remained kindled for the entirety of his illness. Either way, beyond a passive mention in one of Job’s responses, his wife gets no more ink in the remaining forty chapters of the book. Not even an honorable mention when Job acquires ten more children! So what’s the point of memorializing her tantrum in the first place? Is it about showcasing Job’s integrity? Is it about comparing her attitude with his? Or is it a looking glass for every soul who reads this account? (Job 31:9-10)
For the first time in my life, I tend to think it’s the latter. After all the times I’ve read the book of Job and pondered its words, after sitting through college discussions of the recorded events, after reading the thoughts of commentators and historians and people of far greater intellect than myself concerning the content of Job, I find I cannot stop hearing the voice of God and seeing His finger underline the few lines dedicated to Job’s wife. There’s a lesson for us in her words and actions. There’s a mirror in which to see ourselves. We have only to look.
We rarely stop and feel the emotions behind the words of Job 2:9. We fail to feel her grief. We are deaf to her pain and fear, humiliation and hopelessness. We are indifferent to the aching, raging pain of losing every single one of her children at the exact same moment. We remain blind to the fact that she is a victim of the same set of circumstances that have us deeply pitying Job. We feel no sympathy, no empathy for the woman who is suffering alongside him. We have not one care about what her future looks like in a day when women had no rights without a man to stand for them. We ignore her obvious feelings of impotence, awarding her only passing attention as we celebrate the grand story of a great man. We read her rash words and judge her with a harshness we would never want used on ourselves. Yet if we look closely, answer honestly, we see a recognizable reflection staring back from the frustrated words she spoke to her husband outside the city gates. We see ourselves. Because we’ve all been there.
At some point in our lives, tragedies, trials and tribulations have bombarded our souls in relentless attacks. We find ourselves peeking around corners, surreptitiously glancing at the sky, jumping every time the phone rings, anxiously waiting for the other shoe to drop. As we sit there, draped in grief, surrounded by fear, steeped in anxiety and frustration, the claws of panic squeezing ever more tightly around our throats, the evil one has come in for the kill. He’s put thoughts in our minds and words in our mouth that sounded much like the ones Job’s wife uttered centuries ago. Temptations to quit serving God because we didn’t get our way, because tragedy struck, because our hopes and dreams aren’t happening as quickly as we hoped. He happily highlights how we can make our own wants and wishes happen in a timely manner while downplaying the pitfalls of our best-laid plans. He points to a pretty, rock-free path, easily trod that looks so lovely but takes us far away from God. So often, our grief-clouded minds follow. Our desperate hearts, grasping at the last strands of our dilapidated dreams, get distracted and we run down that pathway. We believe the lies. About God. About ourselves. About the future we could have if we just try a different, lesser, easier way.
It will never work. There is no pathway that will avoid pain and suffering, grief and woe. The Bible never promised or promoted that. The only one who ever said it is the evil one himself and we all know he’s a liar. But God is honest. Honest about the trials, temptations, and tribulations that would beset us. Honest about the tragedies and troubles. Honest about the discomforts and unpleasantness of this fallen world. And He was honest about where He’d be through them all. With us. He is not aloof or untouched by our infirmities, upsets, agonies. He is not ignorant of our fears and worries and cares. God is not standing far off waiting for our lives to even out and be pleasant again. He is right there in the trenches with us. He feels our grief. He hears our cries. He collects all our tears in a bottle, meticulously recording them in His book. Why? Because God never forgets His children. He never abandons us. He never leaves us alone. He is our Emmanuel. He is with us. Always. And you can trust Him. (John 8:44; Matthew 1:23; Hebrews 4:15; Psalm 139:13; Psalm 34:17-20; Psalm 56:8; Isaiah 53:4; Hebrews 13:5)
Wherever you are today, whatever you are facing, I hope you remember Job’s wife. Remember the woman steeped in horrifically tragic circumstances beyond her control. Remember that she was bereft of hope and help. Remember how the evil one took advantage of her vulnerable state. Remember that he’ll do it to you too. When things go epically wrong, when tragedy strikes, when your hopes and dreams lay in ashes at your feet, the evil one will start yammering in your head about haring off on your own, handling things better than God. Don’t fall for it. Don’t believe it. It’s all lies. You’ll end up down some dead-end road you never intended to follow, brokenhearted and lost, desperately in need of a rescue, missing out on the future blessings God has for you. So stay faithful. Don’t abandon the God who has proven Himself true over and over again. Don’t remove your faith from Him or take your hand from His no matter your circumstances or situation. Trust Him to be with you. Speak His name and know it is true. Emmanuel. God is with you. Always. (Deuteronomy 31:6,8; Matthew 28:20; Psalm 139:7; Psalm 145:18; Isaiah 41:10; Romans 8:35-39; I Peter 5:8; Psalm 37:3-5)
Amen.