Finding Answers

We are curious creatures, we like to have answers. Answers to the reason for the way things are, the reason for our sufferings and this is such an intrinsic part of our nature. All my three children at a certain age where incessant with the “Why” question in trying to figure out the world around them. As adults, we too want to make sense of the world we live in and understand our place in it especially when we go through dark and difficult days. We ask “Why” often with regard to our suffering – Why me? What is the purpose of our suffering? Is there a purpose at all? Is there a good God who cares about my situation and the suffering in the world? Why doesn’t He do anything now? Why?

Job in the Bible had these questions. After all, his life was shaken upside down in a very violent way, hit by calamity after calamity. In a single day, he lost all his wealth as his possessions of oxen, donkeys, sheep and camel are stolen by raiders and when he thought things could not get any worse, the roof of his house collapses on his ten healthy children and they all perish. His wife instead of supporting and comforting Job asks him to curse God and die but incredibly Job holds onto his faith in God despite not knowing the answer to “Why?” He did not charge God with any wrongdoing. And as he tries to even comprehend the magnitude of the utter devastation, he suddenly suffers a dreaded painful disease as his body breaks out in sores and pus and gets infested with worms.
Job 1:20-22
²⁰ At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship ²¹ and said: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.” ²² In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.
Job 2:9-10
⁹ His wife said to him, “Are you still maintaining your integrity? Curse God and die!” ¹⁰ He replied, “You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?” In all this, Job did not sin in what he said.

Job is an upright, blameless, God fearing man who shuns evil. Surely, he didn’t deserve this. The principle that we expect to operate in this world is of experiencing God’s justice in the now, the righteous prospering and the wicked suffering. Often it does not play out that way in this side of eternity. We are even given a glimpse of God bragging about Job’s uprightness to Satan in heaven and even giving Satan permission to afflict Job. The great question that begs an answer is whether God is only worthy of our worship when He rewards us with good things? Is God worth worshipping even when things go wrong in our world and when we don’t know the reasons why we are afflicted?
Job 1:8-9
⁸ Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.” ⁹ “Does Job fear God for nothing?” Satan replied. ¹⁰ “Have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has? You have blessed the work of his hands, so that his flocks and herds are spread throughout the land. ¹¹ But now stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face.”

There is a lot of introspection and discussion on Job’s suffering with his three friends and then a fourth one called Elihu. Job’s friends implied that Job’s suffering was a sign that God was punishing him for some grievous sin or pride in his heart. Job refutes this and points out that there is no such correlation in this world and that the righteous often suffer more than the wicked and the wicked often prosper more than the righteous. 

Like Job and his friends, we would like an answer to make sense of the suffering we experience. We have questions about God’s character. Is God good and can He be trusted with what I am going through? We introspect our own character, going back into our lives and wondering if there was a particular event, pride or particular thing we said or did that caused the situation that we are in. We also question character in someone else when they go through a hard time and wonder whether they sinned and what they had done in the past that deserved this suffering. We need to suspend all such assumptions and trust God through our suffering. We need to know that God is just and He will ultimately reward the just and punish the wicked.

God finally speaks to Job through the storm and shifts some perspectives in Job’s life. God asks a series of questions on whether Job could run the cosmos and all the natural world? The answer is No. Job and we are so limited in our understanding of all the profound ways in which God orders the world and runs it even in it’s current fallen state. God asks us to trust Him for His wisdom and justice.

We simply cannot reduce God to our level and make Him accountable to us to give us answers that our minds don’t have the capacity to comprehend. His thoughts and ways are far higher than ours and God asks us to trust Him. Job did. He realised that God deserved all worship, both when he had all the rewards or blessings of this world and when they were taken away. God deserved worship even if he didn’t understand the purpose of his suffering and he didn’t have all the answers.
Job 38:1-4
¹Then the Lord spoke to Job out of the storm. He said: ² “Who is this that obscures my plans with words without knowledge?
³ Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me.
⁴ “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?
    Tell me, if you understand.
Job 42:1-3
¹Then Job replied to the Lord:
² “I know that you can do all things; no purpose of yours can be thwarted.
³ You asked, ‘Who is this that obscures my plans without knowledge?’
    Surely I spoke of things I did not understand,
    things too wonderful for me to know.

You might be going through a season of severe suffering right now. You might be searching for answers. You are going through the recesses of your mind to see if you did something wrong. You are asking God why He allows you to endure such excruciating agony. Like Job, you are looking for answers to make sense of your suffering. Often there isn’t any neat packaged answers in this side of eternity. There is always purpose in God. God never wastes His purpose in the suffering and redeems it for His glory. Job never got the answer to comprehend the loss and grief he experienced. Sometimes there are no satisfying answers to our pain and suffering but our suffering should draw us to deeper faith and worship of God like Job did. Is God worthy of worship even in my pain and suffering? Yes, He is worthy!
Revelation 4:11
¹¹ “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power,
for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being.”