Pain derails lives, doesn’t it? The agonizing stab in my knee forced me to drop the heavy suitcase I was carrying to the airport shuttle. I had been managing mild arthritis well for eighteen months. My work and hiking had returned to normal. Suddenly, that pain shunted me back to my earlier fears of lost income and an end to my wilderness hikes. It wasn’t life-threatening, but, for me, it was potentially life-changing. I prefer to control my changes.

So began a mess of inner analysis and reasoning with God, all focused on getting my health span extended. Was there sin in my life (against my doctor’s advice or God)? Dealing with that would surely restore me. I also remembered the instruction about giving our anxieties to the Lord because He cares (Phil. 4:6–7; 1 Pet. 5:7). But I was tempted to obey that as a bargaining chip to win God’s healing and the return of my cherished and secure life, missing the reason we are able to give them up—faith in His care. Added to those two reactions, I demanded explanations—from within and from God. And that reminded me of Job’s suffering.

Job’s suffering was limited to loss of family, fortune, and a shameful skin condition. There is no indication that he was physically or mentally incapacitated, destitute, or fought against a terminal disease. His affliction was moderate compared to some people’s, but much worse than mine. Job responded rather like me, but his debate spilled into arguments with friends. His cynical wife was unsupportive of his pursuit of God’s justice (Job 2:9). Job’s friends thought his calamities were God’s judgment for a hidden sin. But Job argued his innocence relative to others (Job 10:7; 31:1–40). He wanted to eliminate his pain either by a quick death or a reversal of his birth (Job 3:2–26; 10:18–19). Most of all, he wanted to return to his former peace and prosperity, to being “bathed in butter” (Job 29:2–6). Don’t we all!

Explanations of suffering help cancel out our uncertainties about our faults or God’s lack of control or care. Those doubts underlie most opinions about suffering. Like all of us, Job asked God to name his sins, explain the pain, or let him die (Job 10:2–7). Job longed for a heavenly advocate or an opportunity to argue his case face to face (Job 13:3, 23-28; 23:1–7). And that wish could be a key to understanding a dilemma in the book, which we’ll get to in a minute.

However, no clarification came to Job because something more important was going on behind the scenes. Chapters one and two take readers backstage to a heavenly council meeting in which Satan mocks Job’s righteous behavior, insisting it would evaporate without God’s blessings. “Take them away and Job will curse You” (Job 1:6–12; 2:1–6). We find out that God wasn’t punishing Job for sin; He allowed his suffering because He was confident that Job’s righteousness would shine through trials. So God permitted Satan to test Job. To reveal the mocking challenger would spoil the test, like a cheat sheet. Job never glimpsed behind the curtain, so he was a mess of questions.

But here’s the dilemma: when God finally answers Job, it sounds like correction. Why? At the beginning, God commended Job to Satan (Job 1:8; 2:3). Through all his suffering, Job did not sin (Job 1:22; 2:10; 42:7-8). Yet God’s response to Job’s thirty-five-chapter spiel reminds me of a schoolteacher focusing distracted pupils. Slapping his hand on the desk, he urges them to pay attention. “Take lessons seriously. Your education is important. Stop talking in class.” God refocuses Job.

“Now gird up your loins like a man; I will ask you, and you instruct Me.” (Job 38:3; 40:7)

Job had made the mistake of arguing his innocence and demanding an audience with God. What a waste of breath! God rebuked him, “You have little knowledge and control of natural things, especially the awesome and powerful ones. Will you contend with Me?” (Job 40:2; 41:10). So much in Job’s speeches came from shallow opinion and traditional thinking about a causative link between sin and justice rather than from true knowledge of God. Confronted by God, Job finally grasped that God is beyond human comprehension. Instead of blabbering, he should have opened himself to revelation and silently waited for God to ring the bell on the test. Job’s suffering was both a classroom and an examination hall.

Perhaps some of our hard times are tests, too. In those cases, the Lord wants to prove that we are mature enough to endure with right attitudes. It’s hard, but if we invite God to do an inner work, it might speed the trials. Then He can dismiss Satan and restore us. In the end, we gain deeper knowledge of the Lord, as Job did. But we must try not to control the process or idolize certain outcomes; we should bow to the Master and let Him do His work.

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