and
Part
3 – Afflicted Beyond What We Can Bear
When
people are going through terrible suffering, their friends might thoughtlessly quote
to them the cliché “The Bible says God
will not give you more than you can handle”. This is actually not a scriptural statement
whatsoever; it is based on misunderstood and misquoted verses. The verses of 1 Corinthians 10:12-14 speak on
the subject of temptation, not about trials of enduring suffering. Most contrary to the popular cliché, the apostle
Paul stated that we do face afflictions that may bring us to despair and feel
beyond our strength to endure, even to the point of making us feel like we may die.
“For we do not want you to be unaware, brethren, of our
affliction which came to us in Asia,
that we were burdened excessively, beyond our strength, so that we despaired
even of life; indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so
that we would not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead; who
delivered us from so great a peril of
death, and will deliver us, He
on whom we have set our hope. And He will yet deliver us…” (2 Corinthians
1:8-10)
There
are moments in this earthly life when we will face trials and sufferings which may
feel like they are more than we can possibly bear. The affliction may be so intense and
overwhelming to our body and soul that being dead might seem like a better
option to us. Why? Why does God bring such circumstances into
our lives? Why doesn’t He keep us from
enduring such suffering? Why doesn’t He
stop it? Paul stated, “…we had the sentence of death within
ourselves so that we would not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the
dead…” When things are running
smoothly and happily in our lives, we have a great tendency to become
complacent and sure of our own selves, plans, and abilities. We place a great trust in our own selves and
forget that we are God’s and that “…He Himself gives to all people
life and breath and all things; 26 and
He made from one man every
nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the
boundaries of their habitation, 27 that
they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though
He is not far from each one of us; 28 for
in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said,
‘For we also are His children.’…” (Acts 17:25-28).
All
comes from God. Everything we have comes out of God and through Christ—even our
faith to believe. In Him we live, move, and exist.
Job
endured such despairing affliction, and he wished he had never been born and
that he could simply die instead of enduring the suffering any longer. This is what happened:
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| The Art of William Blake |
JOB
2
1Again there was a day when the sons of God
came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them to present
himself before the Lord.
The spiritual beings check in with God on a regular
basis and must answer to Him for where they have been and what they have been
doing. God knows where they’ve been and
what they’ve been doing, but He still requires them to give an account for
themselves.
2The Lord said to Satan, “Where have you come from?”
Then Satan answered the Lord and said, “From roaming about on the earth
and walking around on it.” 3 The
Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered My servant Job? For there is no
one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man fearing God and turning
away from evil. And he still holds fast his integrity, although you incited Me
against him to ruin him without cause.” 4 Satan
answered the Lord and said, “Skin for skin! Yes, all that a man has he will give for
his life. 5 However, put forth Your
hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh; he will curse You to Your face.”
6 So the Lord said to
Satan, “Behold, he is in your power, only spare his life.”
Once
again, God speaks highly about Job’s integrity, and the Adversary taunts God and
proposes that Job will surely curse God if he is allowed to physically affect
him. “…all
that a man has he will give for his life.”
The Adversary recognizes how humans have a prevailing instinct and
desire to preserve themselves and their earthly lives, and that we will do just
about anything to do so. The earthly
life is tangible to us. It seems the
most real to us and so long lasting. In
God’s timing and plans, however, our earthly life is really a very short
lasting and temporary state of our being.
As
we are granted insight into the discussions between the Adversary and God, it
is not told to us that God gave the Adversary exact instructions on what evil
to bring Job. The Adversary is very good
at what he does best—chaos, destruction, ruin; he needs no suggestions. However, in both discussions, it is revealed
to us that the Adversary was given boundaries which were not to be crossed. God had not ordained for Job’s life to be
over yet, and He specifically told the Adversary to spare Job’s life. The
Adversary does not have any power over our lives where God prevents access.
Psalm
139 states that God knows our first day and our last. It says that God has ordained each and every
day of our earthly existence:
13 For You formed my inward parts; You wove me
in my mother’s womb. 14 I
will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are
Your works, and my soul knows it very well.
15 My frame was not hidden from You, when I was made in
secret, And skillfully wrought in the depths of the
earth; 16 Your eyes have seen my unformed substance; and in
Your book were all written the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them.
God
is our Creator and gives us life and breath each and every day, and our life cannot
come to an end until He has ordained for it to be so. Death may come in the form of evil from the
Adversary, human sickness, human accidents, or human tragedy. But death may not overtake any one of us unless
God has ordained for it to be our last day on this earth. And so it was with Job. “The Lord said to Satan, “Behold, he is in your
power, only spare his life.”
JOB
2
7 Then Satan went out from the presence of
the Lord and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his
foot to the crown of his head. 8 And he took a potsherd to scrape himself while he
was sitting among the ashes. 9 Then his wife said to him, “Do you still
hold fast your integrity? Curse God and die!” 10 But he said to
her, “You speak as one of the foolish women speaks. Shall we indeed accept good
from God and not accept evil?” In all this, Job did not sin with his lips.
(Many
mainstream Bible translations erroneously substitute the word “evil” in Job 2:10
with “adversity” or “calamity”. However,
the original Hebrew word used there is “ra” which literally means evil.)
While
Job sat grieving among the ashes of his possessions and his children, the
Adversary brought further pain and evil upon Job by giving him awful sores all
over his body. As if the excruciating,
emotional pain of his losses was not enough, Job now also faced physically
debilitating pain. In that agony, and
while his wife taunted him, Job shares the depths of his heart and says to her: “Woman,
you are being foolish telling me I should curse God. How can I accept good things from God and not
also accept evil?” Job testifies he believes
in and accepts the complete and utter sovereignty of God. Job reveals to us that he knows evil cannot
touch his life unless God grants the access.
He knows good cannot come into his life unless God also grants it. With a simple statement, and by his actions
of not sinning or cursing God, Job essentially declares: “I know
that ultimately all is of God, and that no matter what happens to me in this
earthly life, He is God of all, He is good, and He knows best.”
Three
of Job’s friends hear about all the evil that has come upon Job, and they all
come to keep him company and offer their support, comfort, and words of
advice. The first seven days and nights
of their silent company turns out to be the greatest comfort Job’s friends
provide the whole time they are with him.
JOB
2
12 When they lifted up their eyes at a
distance and did not recognize him, they raised their voices and wept. And each
of them tore his robe and they threw dust over their heads toward the sky. 13 Then they sat down
on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights with no one speaking a
word to him, for they saw that his
pain was very great.
Job’s
appearance was so bad that his friends did not even recognize him! After seven days and nights, Job broke the
silence and spoke first.
JOB
3
1 Afterward Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of
his birth. 2 And Job said, 3 “Let
the day perish on which I was to be born, And the night which said, ‘A boy is conceived.’ 4 “May that
day be darkness; Let not God above care for it, Nor light shine on it. 5 “Let
darkness and black gloom claim it; Let a cloud settle on it; Let the blackness
of the day terrify it. 6 “As for that night, let darkness seize it; Let it not rejoice among
the days of the year; Let it not come into the number of the months. 7 “Behold,
let that night be barren; Let no joyful shout enter it. 8 “Let
those curse it who curse the day, Who are prepared to rouse Leviathan. 9 “Let
the stars of its twilight be darkened; Let it wait for light but have none, And
let it not see the breaking dawn; 10 Because it did not shut
the opening of my mother’s
womb, Or hide trouble from my eyes. 11 “Why did I not die at
birth, Come forth from the womb and expire? 12 “Why did the
knees receive me, And why the breasts, that I should suck? 13 “For
now I would have lain down and been quiet; I would have slept then, I would
have been at rest, 14 With kings and with counselors of the earth, Who rebuilt ruins for themselves; 15 Or
with princes who had gold, Who were filling their houses with silver. 16 “Or
like a miscarriage which is discarded, I would not be, As infants that never
saw light. 17 “There the wicked cease from raging, And there
the weary are at rest. 18 “The prisoners are at ease together;
They do not hear the voice of the taskmaster. 19 “The small and
the great are there, And the slave is free from his master. 20 “Why
is light given to him who suffers, And life to the bitter of soul, 21 Who
long for death, but there is none, And dig for it more than for hidden
treasures, 22 Who rejoice greatly, And exult when they find the grave? 23 “Why is light given to a man whose way
is hidden, And whom God has hedged in? 24 “For my groaning
comes at the sight of my food, And my cries pour out like water. 25 “For
what I fear comes upon me, And what I dread befalls me. 26 “I
am not at ease, nor am I quiet, And I am not at rest, but turmoil comes.”
I
share here all of Job’s initial words because he faced such despairing and
immense loss, he wished he had never been born and was dead. Job had his greatest fears, his utmost dread,
come to reality! When he spoke, after
that whole week of silence among his friends, he did not curse God. He cursed the day he was born and his very
life. He wished he had never been born
because his affliction felt like more than he could possibly bear. I do believe it was more than he could humanly
bear. By looking at Job, it is obvious
that contrary to the popular cliché, there are
times when God brings circumstances into our lives that are more than we can
bear (2 Corinthians 1: 8-10) and when we feel that we are going to die or we
want to die. People today face such intense suffering. Earthly
tragedies are extremely bitter to the soul. Our souls can ache so profoundly we begin
wishing we were dead in order to escape the pain and get relief from its overbearing
weight.
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| The Art of William Blake |
When
someone is going through hardship, never assume it has to do with their
character, lack of faith, sin in their life, or anything else. Make no assumptions about the trials and miseries
of others. We cannot truly know why they
are going through those circumstances. Only God knows all the reasons. He is the designer and orchestrator of each
person’s life. He is the molder of each
human vessel. We should also never
make any assumptions about circumstances appearing perfect and rosy in someone’s
life. Likelihood is that we are not
seeing the entire picture.
“…your Father Who is
in the heavens, for He causes His sun to rise on the wicked and the good, and
makes it rain on the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45). God brings sun and rain upon the just and
unjust. Depending on the extremity of sunshine
or rain, it can be a good thing or a bad thing for the human race. People who do good things and people who do bad things face and
endure sun and rain and the trials and joys of this earthly life.
Job
eventually ends up telling his friends (in Job 16) that they are a sorry lot of
comforters because the things they are repeatedly suggesting are only causing
him additional anguish and frustration.
Yet, even these so called friends of Job are the friends that God gave
him in his life and to accompany him during this terrible suffering.
When
I am in turmoil, I initially want to run and tell those whom I trust and love
what is wrong and seek comfort from them.
I long for the people who care about me to sympathize with me and offer
their support. However, over the years, it
has frequently happened that when I have shared my heartaches with others, I
have not felt as consoled as I hoped for.
It does not necessarily have anything to do with the person(s) offering
their help; I believe they do try to offer the best comfort they can at the
time. However, I’ve discovered in my
deepest pain, human sympathies and words sometimes come across as shallow. They are shallow in the sense that human
words of comfort only scratch the surface of a sorrow that may be so deep, only
God can possibly reach it, touch it, and make us feel wholly comforted. The best human reassurance I have ever felt
has come from people who have gone through a similar circumstance and seem to
be able to genuinely empathize with the pain I am experiencing. Ultimately, in my most agonizing of pains, it
has been through reaching and crying out to God and waiting on His touch that
the greatest comfort and healing has taken place.
The
worst things we can do for someone afflicted beyond what they can bear is to become
their judge and jury pronouncing judgments over them, offer only a conditional
love, or outright abandon them.
The
greatest comfort we can offer to another person afflicted beyond what they can
bear is love, compassion, and empathy—a graceful perspective, a listening ear,
arms to hug and hold them, a shoulder to cry on, reassurance of friendship, love,
and help, and to simply be near without judgment or condemnation.
The
worst thing we can do for ourselves when we are afflicted beyond what we can
bear is to give up all hope and resign ourselves to never ending misery.
God
will bring an ultimate comfort and healing in His perfect timing. He may accomplish that in any multitude of
ways through Christ, through people, and some other ways we can’t possibly
imagine. I am aware that many times we cannot see past
our current affliction. The pain is
blinding and inescapable. However, this
human life is in constant motion and so is God. Life is not static and neither is God. We can resign and surrender ourselves to remain in life long misery, or we can reach out to God for the strength to go on and be victorious over each of our trials.
In
2004, I faced an emotional affliction that was more than I could bear. The pain from it lasted for a very long time,
and there were moments I felt as if God was so far away and so silent I was
tempted to give up all hope for my shattered heart to be healed and put back
together again. I was tempted to give up
all hope and tempted to turn my back on God and walk away from Him. Faithfully and lovingly, God reassured me
that giving up Hope (Him) was most definitely not going to be my answer in
finding any comfort, relief, or healing. 
“The same
God who brings the hurricanes in your life is the only one who can bring out
the rainbows and the sun afterwards! After the hurricane has come and
gone, He’s the only one who can put together what the storm has scattered; the
only one who can truly make the wrongs all right again. He is the only one
who can mend what is broken, heal what is hurting, and bring joy to sorrow’s
door. He is the only ONE! There is
no other. To whom will you compare Him? If you were to try, He would
not be the God who He really is. Our finite human minds cannot contain the
fullness, the greatness, or the power of God. He is the only ONE! There is
no other. Jump! I dare us to jump, right into the arms of God, our
complete Hope for today, tomorrow, and for eternity.”
“Trust in
Hope, He never fails.”
To be continued in an upcoming post: Where Is God When Bad Things Happen? Finding Understanding through Job - Part 4
To be continued in an upcoming post: Where Is God When Bad Things Happen? Finding Understanding through Job - Part 4
Related
posts:
God is Hope
Stand on Your Knees! The Sun Will Rise After the Night
Trail Lessons - The Season Will Come and Go
Stand on Your Knees! The Sun Will Rise After the Night
Trail Lessons - The Season Will Come and Go
Helpful
books:
Being Okay With Not
Being Okay
by Clyde Pilkington, Jr.
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