Faith, Doubt and God's Mysterious TimingSample

More is happening than you can see

You’ve probably read (or heard of) Job- he is the man who suffered unjustly. You can see in Job chapter 1 that he suffered not because he did something wrong, but because he was good. Job himself never knows why suffering befalls him. But in the last chapter, he moves from crying out about his injustice to repenting for his cries. When Job says, “Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know ", Job reveals that his new perspective has healed his faith.

God doesn’t tell Job why he suffered, instead He takes him on a tour and shows him all that is happening in the world around him. Job’s faith is restored- not by finding all the answers, but by what he is now able to see. Job saw beyond the limited view of his circumstances to all God was doing around him. He could see that his life was part of a story so big and complex and detailed, that his circumstances might carry more (or different) meaning than he could now see. Time has proved Job right.

It was Job’s losses, not his blessings, that became the story that defined him. It was Job’s response to his suffering that God ended up using most. The book of Job is of primary importance to people’s faith because it reveals that God is not the author of suffering, but our companion in it. We see this through the life of Jesus, but Job gives us a glimmer of that truth first. This important theology marks the book of Job with such significance that we can see a far-reaching purpose in Job’s suffering. Job couldn’t see what his story would mean to others, but his encounter with God at the end of the book moved him to trust. Job could see that the meaning of his story was beyond his scope.

What Job saw moved him to repentance for judging God on the limited view he had about his circumstances. What Job never saw was the spiritual restoration that millions of suffering people have gotten from his gut-wrenching cries recorded in his book. That’s the mystery- and far-reaching effect of the way God works.

Seeing the impact of Job’s story on this longer timeline, we can look at our own struggles differently. We know that God will not only use our story to impact others during our life, but after our life is through.

Takeaway: Spend time thinking about the storms of your life and how God has used them. Contemplate how God uses the hard times most powerfully in the lives of others- and how God may have a bigger picture of what you are going through.