This is a chapter from an upcoming book, Hope in the Loss of a Baby: A Deeper Dive Into What the Bible Says About Pregnancy and Infant Loss.
Job’s
Expectation
He who
took them was the one who gave them. He has not made a mistake. He does all
things well. ~ Hudson Taylor
Hudson Taylor, founder of the China Inland Mission, buried
four children and one wife. In his lament, he alluded to Job 1:21,
The Lord
gave and the Lord has taken away, blessed be
the name of the Lord.
Job comes early in this book because his experience speaks
volumes about the death of a baby, and it also speaks to parents who have lost
children. While whole books could be written on this topic from Job alone, I am
going to condense it into one chapter.
If you don’t know the story of Job, I would encourage you to
read Job 1 and 2 before continuing. The synopsis is that Job lost his entire
kingdom in a day because God offered him up as an example of faithfulness to
Satan. Within minutes Job learned that all of his livestock had been stolen,
almost all of his servants were murdered, and worst of all, that his ten
children had been killed in a natural disaster. Sometime later Job’s health was
also taken from him.
He was left only with a body covered in diseased sores, a
couple of servants, a lot of unanswered questions, and his wife.
Job’s Wife
Keep in mind that Job’s wife lost seven sons and three
daughters and her whole financial future, just like Job. We don’t see much of
her response–nor her grieving, pain, or despair–but we do see some, and we
understand in a very small way how hurt and distraught she was.
Many preachers and teachers have pointed out that what Job
really needed in his tribulation was a supportive and loving wife, and
what he got was “Curse God and die!” (Job 2:9). She very well may have been
captured by Satan to do his will (2 Timothy 2:26), helping to multiply the pain
of Job, or she may just have been speaking out of her broken heart. God had not
limited Satan’s interaction in her life like he had Job’s (Job 1:12). But even
though Job was the target, it wasn’t just his tribulation; it was their tribulation.
Hurt people hurt people, and Job’s wife was seriously hurt.
I’m trying to avoid a whole word study, but bear with me a
for a moment for an important point on word usage. To fully understand Job’s story,
we have to recognize that the Hebrew word “Barak” appears often in the
book of Job, but is used in radically different ways. God uses it as material
blessing, Satan uses it once to describe a material blessing, but then he turns
it to a curse, Job uses it to describe who God is, and his wife uses it as a
curse turned into an accusation.[1] Here’s
why the broadness of this term is important: the same event can have a vastly
different impact on different people. If you’re grieving, chances are someone
else experiencing the same even is going to grieve differently.
Pat Schwiebert and Chuck DeKlyen in their book Tear Soup:
A Recipe for Healing After Loss delivers the message that different people
grieve in drastically different ways. In the time of tragedy, it’s always
important to remember that the way you grieve is not the way everyone grieves.
Remember, love bears all things, believes all things, hopes
all things, endures all things (1 Corinthians 13:7). Someone that lashes out at
you, or someone who seems to have moved past the grief way too quickly, is almost
certainly grieving in their own way. Ask them what they’re feeling and what
they need, and if they want to talk. If you want to talk, and they don’t, then
make sure they know that when they’re ready, you need them to be a listening
ear. Until then, pray for them and seek a godly counselor who will listen, but
not replace, your spouse.
If they lash out, listen to their anger as an expression of
what is in their heart. The definition of worry is believing that God won’t do
what’s right. The definition of bitterness is believing that what God did
wasn’t right. Worry often expresses itself in silence, bitterness often
expresses itself in outburst. Both worry and bitterness are a sin, and we’ll
see that Job was not blameless later in the book, but right now we’re talking
about Job’s wife, who is mad at Job, but she’s more mad at God.
When Job responded to her, despite it being a rebuke, it
seems like he was being loving. Job 2:10 tells us there was no sin when he said,
“You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. Shall we receive good from
God, and shall we not receive evil?” Notice, Job doesn’t call her a foolish
woman, he says what she’s saying is foolish. He doesn’t accuse or label her, he
addresses what she said, and he points her to God’s provision, and he asks her
an introspective question. It truly is a marvelous exchange. His goal is to set
her hope on God, not to figure out who is to blame, or tear her down, and
especially not to hurt her.
We don’t know the rest of her story, but I’m sure she had a
lot of wrestling to do with God. I want to believe that she worked through this
season with Job and was restored. She is mentioned a few times throughout Job’s
defense of himself, but never in a way we can discern her end. When Job is
restored, she’s not mentioned, but there is also no evidence that Job had to
find a new wife.
She’s also not included in God’s rebuke against Job and his
counselors, making it seem that God had already forgiven her outburst and
bitterness. In one sense it would be nice to know if she was restored, but I
believe what the Holy Spirit is doing by not answering that questions is encouraging
us to look inward at our own bitterness and consider how we have responded and
how we should live in the future. But there are enough hints to know what she
was thinking and feeling, so that we can have compassion on her and learn from
her suffering.
When she lashed out at Job, it shows she had been
considering the potential cause and effect of their misfortune. She asked Job,
“Do you still hold fast to your integrity!?” (Job 2:9, emphasis mine,
compare Job 2:3 for Job’s intact integrity).
Let’s try to discern her thought process. She likely believed
like Job and his friends that if you do good, good things will happen to you
(Job 4:7, 8:20, etc., compare Deuteronomy 28:1-14), and if bad things have happened to you, it’s
because you’ve done bad things (Job 4:8, 11:20, 18:5-21, etc., compare
Deuteronomy 27:9-26, 28:15-68). In one sense the world might call it Karmic,
but in a more realistic sense, it was the language of the Old Covenant, that what
a person sows, they will reap (Hosea 8:7, 10:13, Proverbs 22:8, Galatians 6:7).
We would call it the “Old Covenant” which was between men and God and required
constant and perfect obedience and is meant to lead us to the “New Covenant” which
is between Jesus and the Father (Consider Hebrews 8:6-13, especially verse 12).
The Bible tells us to look into the law like it’s a mirror (James 1:23), so
that it will show us that we are accountable to God (Romans 3:19), so that we
can be redeemed by Christ who redeemed us from the curse of the law (Galatians
3:13).
Job’s wife was still living in that place, likely before
even Moses, where God’s blessing seemed to depend on her obedience, and if
there were cursing, it seemed sure that someone must have sinned.
Job’s wife could look inward and know that she had not
sinned, that the calamity facing them was not her fault, so there was only one
other option in her mind: Job must have sinned. She didn’t have access to the behind
the scenes commentary where the Holy Spirit confirms that Job was blameless,
upright, feared God, and turned away from evil (Job 1:1). She didn’t know that Job’s
righteousness was reiterated when, “Job did not sin or charge God with wrong” (Job
1:22). She couldn’t know that God affirmed to Satan that Job was still walking
in his integrity (Job 2:3). And finally she couldn’t tell that Job did not sin
with his lips (Job 2:10). But she couldn’t know that, because the book of Job
hadn’t been written yet, so I don’t fault her for considering that Job must
have sinned.
Whatever she accused him of is not recorded, but he must
have denied having any culpability, holding fast to his integrity.
Unfortunately, she didn’t respond gently.
In every tragedy we are going to respond in love or in
bitterness, there are not many other options. If I were counseling Job and his
wife, I would point them towards Grieving: Your Path Back to Peace by
James White which would encourage them towards peace and away from acrimony.
As we searched for God’s will, I would say there are four
options: 1) Job sinned, 2) Job’s wife sinned, 3) they both sinned, or 4) nobody
sinned and God is doing a work that they don’t currently understand. I might
take each of them aside individually and ask candidly, “Did you sin?” There is
no benefit it pretending a sin didn’t occur if it clearly did, but if they were
both adamant that they had kept a short list of sins and confession with God,
then I would move on towards what the future holds.
It's tempting to draw a straight line from sin to calamity,
but it’s rarely that clear. Especially in Job’s situation, since we know the
behind the scenes events, if we assign blame to him we would be clearly in the
wrong, just as his three friends were erroneous in their accusations and
counsel. We do well to remember the saying,
Presence
of calamity is not proof of sin. Presence of comfort is not proof of virtue.
In Job’s case, while his calamity was not predicated by sin,
we’ll see later that his future did hold bitterness and accusations against God.
Because of his suffering and his interaction with God, Job was moved to a place
of humility and the blessing of a deeper relationship with God.
We can’t say for sure what happened to Job’s wife or her
relationship with God, but I hope you’ve seen that her response and her
interaction with her husband were realistic responses to the trouble they were
facing. May she bring you comfort as you consider your response when God gives
and takes away.
I do want to emphasize that accusations are never right. So,
if you’re hurt, don’t respond in a hurtful way; seek to bless the Lord
in your heart and bless those around you with your words and deeds. Especially
those who are hurting with you.
Job’s Lament
After his interaction with his wife, Job sat for at least
seven days in his despair, potentially several months (Job 29:2). He was not
rash to speak, but that didn’t temper his anger by much.
Job’s friends came and sat with him, both day and night. These
were wonderful friends; their desire was pure to love their friend as they sought
to commiserate with and comfort him. In chaplaincy we call this a ministry of
presence, just being there. It’s tempting to speak quickly, but in a time of
tragedy like this, often it’s beneficial just to be present. This is especially
important, like in Job’s case, when the suffering is “very great.” I teach
young ministers that in the hospital they only need to do three things: 1) Be
there, 2) Pray for comfort 3) Keep your words brief. I’ve heard from many
families that “I don’t remember what the chaplain said, but them being there
was a comfort.”
God speaks to every topic and pain, so when the time is
right, we speak. But in the midst of such tragedy, we must take James’ wisdom
seriously, “Beloved brother, let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak,
slow to anger, for the anger of men does not produce the righteousness of God”
(James 1:19-20). The time for counseling and conversation will come, but it’s
often not immediately.
Job’s processing took time. You will not quickly be ready to
talk, much less ready to move past your grief. There is a real and healthy
expectation that you will carry your grief with you for the rest of your life.
In counseling those who have lost children, I’ve heard everything from, “It’s
his one-month birthday today,” to “He would have been twenty-nine (years old)
today.” And everything in the middle. My grandmother lost an infant son to
Meningitis in about 1962 and she spoke often of him until she died in 2012.
Others process the death quickly; usually this is predicated
by a desire to care for people who are grieving and need someone to be stronger
than them. King David can be used as an example, having moved past his mourning
relatively quickly (2 Samuel 12:19-23), partly because he need to comfort his
wife, the baby’s mother (2 Samuel 12:24). Job on the other hand took at least
seven days just to be ready to talk. Others may not be ready to talk for years,
but I recommend finding a godly friend, family member, or counselor who you can
share your grief with within the first few weeks. I’m generally ready to talk
immediately after tragedy, but I’m not you and you’re not me, so move at your
own pace in the wisdom of God.
Most of Job’s lament is based around the fact that he wished
he’d never been born…he is not alone in this, we’ll see that Jeremiah and Judas
Iscariot were in similar positions. Where Job is unique is that he doesn’t wish
he’d never existed, he points a still-birth at rest and hope.
I would have lain down and been
quiet; I would have slept; then I would have been at rest, with kings and
counselors of the earth who rebuilt ruins for themselves, or with princes who
had gold, who filled their houses with silver…there the wary are at rest, there
the prisoners are at ease together; they hear not the voice of the task masker.
The small and the great are there, and the slave is free from his master. ~ Job
3:13-19
He goes on to say that death is a release, “[they] are glad
when they find the grave…” (Job 3:22). Later Job would consider that he would
have hope even if God took his life, “Though he slay me, I will hope in him…”
(Job 13:15) and he looked forward to the renewal after his death (Job 14:13,
14, the New Testament calls this renewal a resurrection, see John 11:24).
Matthew Henry says of the rest that is death, “it is a bed out of which they
shall rise refreshed in the morning of the resurrection.”
The phrase “Rest in Peace” on tombstones has only become
popular in the last seventeen-hundred or so years, but the idea of a person who
knew God resting in peace until the resurrection has been around much longer. Lazarus
is referenced as being in comfort after his death (Luke 16:25), the author of
Hebrews references death as “For we who believed entered that rest” (Hebrews
4:3), and Stephen isn’t said to have died when he was murdered, rather, he fell
asleep (Acts 7:60).
The important thing to see in Job’s life is that the quiet
of still-birth was anticipated by him to be better than a life “born to trouble
as the sparks fly upward” (Job 5:7), since “man who is born of a woman is few
of days and full of trouble” (Job 14:1, compare James 4:14). The Holy Spirit
would not have recorded this in the book of Job if it weren’t true, and we’re
able to compare it to other accounts to verify it wasn’t just Job’s wishful
thinking, which we’ll do later in the book.
Based on Job’s lamentation, we are able to see that babies
who die are instantly at rest. Some might say that “rest” just means that the
ends of all mankind are the same (Ecclesiastes 2:19-21), which could reasonably
be argued if we just stayed in Job 3, but the conclusion to the book of Job
shows something interesting about his deceased children.
Job’s Restoration
At the end of Job’s ordeal, he received double the sheep
(14,000 instead of the 7,000 that he lost), double the camels (12,000 instead
of the 6,000 he had lost), double the oxen (1,000 yoke instead of the 500 he
had lost), and double the donkeys (1,000 instead of the 500 he had lost). But,
and pay attention carefully, he did not receive double the number of children
on earth. He lost ten children and he received ten children. He didn’t have
twenty new children, only ten more.
This is an important fact not to be missed. Animals don’t
have a soul, so while they can be incredibly useful, loving, and loved, they
cease to exist when they die.
Human beings, on the other hand, have a soul, and to be
absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
When it came to his restoration, Job did receive double the children, the only
difference in this restoration was that ten were in eternity and ten were on
earth.
While the animals are double the number
of Job 1:3, why are not the children? It is obvious that Job still had seven
sons and three daughters waiting for him in the presence of God. ~ John
MacArthur
If you’ve lost a child, I believe Augustine said it best, “we
have not lost our dear ones who have departed from this life but have merely
sent them ahead of us…” and Spurgeon agreed, “They are not lost, but gone
before. They are gone to the great Father’s house, where the many mansions are.
They are in the upper room of the house, in the nursery of the Great King.”
Truly, we haven’t lost something if we know where it is. In the case of a loved
one who trusted God for salvation, we may have lost their fellowship
temporarily, but we know just where they are and how to be reunited with them.
Job’s restoration is difficult to understand at first,
because it seems to be implied that his future blessing made up for his past
suffering. But I would say that his material blessing is just a symptom of the
true blessing.
The true blessing was that Job gained a deeper relationship
with God, was able to repent of his bitterness that had fomented in his heart,
and that he learned what it was to be an intercessor for his friends.
It’s easy to gloss over the fact that Eliphaz, Bildad, and
Zophar are likely in heaven today because Job’s suffering revealed what was in
their heart so that blood could be shed for their sins and Job could act as
mediator for their souls (Job 42:8-10). Without Job’s suffering they very well
could be in anguish right now, but because of his suffering they gained a
mediator between God and men. Mediators like Job point forward to a time when
God’s own Son would mediate for his saints (1 Timothy 2:5) after shedding his
own blood for their redemption (Hebrews 9:12).
Was their salvation worth all the pain and suffering that
Job endured? Was it worth the death of Job’s sons and daughters? I can’t say
that for sure, but God definitely used that tragedy for their good.
But, I can say this confidently, the death of God’s own Son
was definitely used for my salvation, theirs, and yours, if you’ll trust him.
Job’s Backward Looking
We have one more lesson to learn from Job. Not long before
God rebukes him, he has a nice reminiscent vision of his life before the
tragedy. I say it’s nice, because there is not initially anything wrong with it,
Oh, that I were as in the months
of old, as in the days when God watched over me… ~ Job 29:2 (see also verses
3-25)
It doesn’t feel bad to look backwards. In fact there might
be a lot of comfort in remembering how much God did in your life before the
tragedy. But we have to remember that God rebukes Job sternly starting in
chapter 38. Living in the past can definitely be a sin.
Philippians 3:13-14 tells us that Paul didn’t live in the past,
but pressed towards the future with this statement,
One thing I do: forgetting what
lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the
goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
No matter how great your past was, one thing is certain:
things can never go back to the way they were. You’ll either grow in grace or
grow in bitterness, but you can’t stay the same and you can never go back to
the way you were. Neither could Job.
A number of movies have romanticized the idea of heroes
being rewarded by getting to relive life without tragedy, such as Jumanji
(1995) where the parents died in a car accident, or Masters of the Universe
(1987) where the parents died in a plane crash. In both of those movies, the
end of the saga shows the parents alive and the heroes begging them not to take
their trips. In Live Die Repeat (2014) the main character gets to try
again every time he is killed in his mission to win a battle. And in Groundhog
Day (1993), the main character relives every day, sometimes making the
world nicer and sometimes making it worse, but with no lasting consequences for
any of his actions. Getting a second chance, or multiple redoes, is a nice
thought, but it misses the providence of God; he is working in all
circumstances to bring about his purposes. I would love a second chance to avoid
serious pitfalls and pain, but then I would negate the grace of God that has
been shown through those trials.
Forgetting all things in the past doesn’t mean that we don’t
remember and rejoice, but that we look forward for to see what God would have
us to do. This includes not reminiscing too long even on the good things. Imagine
a couple who have been happily married for forty-nine years; on their wedding
anniversary they both announce that they have loved each other enough and have
agreed to take a one-year hiatus from further love, and that they will survive
and thrive on the past forty-nine years of love. This arrangement will free up
time to do things that don’t involve loving each other! Doesn’t that sound
ridiculous?
Past love does not carry us through the future. This is why
we’re called to persevere, continue loving, and finish the race. This is why
God not only loved (past tense) the world and sent his Son (John 3:16, Revelation
1:5), but why he continues to love (present tense) the Christian (John 14:23,
16:27, Hebrews 12:6, Revelation 1:5). We look back at the love that Christ
showed on the cross and consider that he is actively loving us today. Both his
past and present love encourage us to continue loving towards the future,
knowing that he will never leave us nor forsake us.
Refusing to live in the past sounds harsh until you realize
what you’re pressing towards. In Job’s case it was, “And the Lord
restored the fortunes of Job…the Lord gave Job twice as much as he
had before…and the Lord blessed the latter days of
Job more than his beginning…and Job died, an old man, and full of days” (Job
42:10, 12, 17).
What are you pressing towards? Romans 8:28-29 says that God
is using all things to transform you into the image of Christ. I hope God
blesses you on earth, but much more I hope he blesses you in eternity. The call
is to look forward to the future glory of Christ, which is nothing in
comparison to the present suffering, nor the things you’ve lost. That includes
even the exceeding precious people that will forever hold a place in our
hearts.
Conclusion to Job
We like to think that God wants us to be safe, comfortable,
and building a strong family with a long progeny. Job’s story turns all of that
upside down, especially when we realize it was not Satan’s idea, but God’s idea
and will to put Job through such a trial.
God cares about his glory, our holiness, and our eternal life
much more than our temporary happiness or comfort. Death, tragedy, and
suffering are God’s extreme tools to shake up our lives to seek him. Please note
that neither Job, his wife, his children, nor his servants did anything to
cause what they went through. Nor did they have any idea of what God was doing
behind the scenes.
Rather, notice that suffering led to us seeing what was in
the hearts of Job, his wife, and his friends, so that it could be purged from
them and their relationship with God increased. What they gained in knowing God
was infinitely better than what they lost.
The next time you hear of someone suffering, spend some time
first just sitting with them, and consider that there may not be an easy answer
to why they are suffering. Remember that they don’t need accusations or immediate
answers, and the person they need to hear from much more than you is God.
Last, remember that Jesus, though a son, learned obedience
through what he suffered (Hebrews 5:8). If you’re suffering now, or suffered in
the past, consider whether your suffering moved you closer to God or farther
from him. If you moved away from God, it’s not too late to redeem your
suffering by running back to the God who loves you and is seeking your highest
and best usefulness. He is ready and willing to give you all things that
pertain to life and godliness through his Son. He will continue to work in your
life until Christ returns or calls you home.
Through many dangers,
toils, and snares,
I have already come.
‘Twas grace that brought me safe thus far,
and grace will lead me home. ~
John Newton
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| Job's Restoration by Laurent de La Hyre, 1648 |
[1]Barak
(blessing/cursing) is similar in sound to the word Baraq (lightning) but there does not seem to be an etymological link between the two;
the author of Job seems to seek to avoid this confusion by using Owr for
lightning rather than Barak.
