Job 16:1-22 vs. 1
"Then Job answered, ‘I have heard many such things; miserable comforters are you all.’"

ave you ever been in need of comfort?

Every one who has ever lived has, at some time or another, needed to be comforted.

Whether you were grieving the loss of a loved one or friend, or involved in an accident, or fallen off your bicycle, or were awaken by a nightmare, the one thing you needed in each situation was comforting.

Providing comfort, has been the theme of this weeks reading from Job.

When, three of Job’s friends, learned the terrible news of Job’s tragic losses, scripture tells us,

"They met together to go and console and comfort him. When they saw him from a distance, they did not recognize him.

Now that should be no surprise. My guess is that we would all be unrecognizable if we had experienced in one 24 hour period the kind of losses Job experienced.

Take note of what his friends did,

"they raised their voices and wept aloud; they tore their robes and threw dust in the air upon their heads. They sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his suffering was very great."

Their immediate actions were to become one with Job, in his suffering.

Does this surprise you? It shouldn’t. You’ probably do the same thing every time you go to the funeral parlor, or when you run a cake over to your grieving neighbors house, or when you send a get well card to a friend. These actions and thousands like them are our attempts at comforting or consoling our friends. Its our way of being one with them in their pain.

Isn’t this exactly what God does? Jesus promises to be with us in our pain,

"I will not leave you desolate." "I will come to you." "I will send you another comforter, the Holy Spirit ..."

Job’s three friends reveal and remind us of the very nature of God, which is that in the midst of our trials, our suffering, God comforts us.

What is it that causes Job to say to his three friends,

"I have heard many such things; miserable comforters are you all."

After a week of sitting quietly, Job broke the silence by cursing the day he was born. Struggling emotionally, physically and even spiritually Job wondered out loud, why has God forsaken me.

Instead of letting Job ponder out, Job’s friends felt an obligation to Job, to try to answer his WHYs. I suppose they thought this would make Job feel better. The problem, is that they hadn’t the foggiest idea why Job was suffering. Since suffering was associated with disobeying God, they concluded the obvious, Job sinned and God is punishing him.

Chapters 3 through 15 reveal the dialogue between Job and his three friends. Job is crying out to God to let him die. His three friends are trying to persuade Job to repent of his sin. Job argues that he does not deserve such suffering. His friends respond with harsh accusations. Job responds,

"I have heard many such things; miserable comforters are you all."

There are times in everyone’s life, when we lift our thunderous WHYS toward the heavens, desperately wanting an answer, yet knowing full well no voice from heaven is going to shout back an answer.

However, there is always someone, who like Job’s friends will try and answer for God. I have heard some God awful things said by well meaning people who try to answer the WHY question.

There is the person who thinks they are consoling a couple of a miscarriage by saying, "Better now than after the child is born." "You can always try again." Diane and I know firsthand how empty those words are.

Or how about saying to a smoker who has been diagnosed with lung cancer, "I told you to give up smoking years ago." "It’s your own fault."

There are other statements like, "It’s God’s will." "I warned you." "If you play with fire, your going to get burned."

When a child falls off his or her bicycle and is lying on the sidewalk crying, does he or she want to hear the how and why he or she fell or does he or she want to be cradled in the arms of his/her parents?

You tell me which is more comforting.

Scripture is very clear when it comes to comforting. God will comfort us AND we are to comfort others.

Paul said to the church of Corinthian,

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation, who comforts us in all our afflictions, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For just as the sufferings of Christ are abundant for us, so also our comforting is abundant through Christ." (2Cor.1:3-5)

To comfort means to support and to encourage, to become one with another’s suffering. It does not mean to remove hardship by attempting to explain WHY it happened.

Throughout the Bible we find the promise of God’s comfort, but NOT from conflict, rather IN the midst of conflict. God does not comfort us by removing our hardships. If that were always so, people would turn to God only to be relieved of pain. God would then be like a Tylenol which we take when we want to get rid of a headache, or a Rolaids which we take when we want relief from acid indigestion.

Instead God comforts us with His Spirit, His Word, giving us the strength, the tears, the courage, the reassurance of His presence. We are to turn to God NOT as an escape hatch, rather we are to turn to God out of love. When we turn to God in love, we will be comforted. And as we are comforted we are to comfort others.

In the footnotes of the Life Application Bible are listed 5 things we can learn from the mistakes of Job’s friends so that we can become better comforters.

1. Don’t talk just for the sake of talking.

2. Don’t sermonize by giving pat answers.

3. Don’t accuse or criticize.

4. Put yourself in the other person’s place.

5. Offer help and encouragement.

In other words when seeking to comfort someone, Don’t try and be the mind of God, instead try and be the heart and presence of God.

If you or I do that, then what was said by Job of his friends will never be said of you,

"I have heard many such things; miserable comforters are you all."

AMEN

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