Sermon for March 5th, 2023

Job 13:20-28; 14:1-22

Today's scripture reading is Job 13:20-28 and 14:1-22. This is a long passage (one and a half chapters) and so I'm going to intersperse the reading into the sermon itself. You can follow along on page 463 of your pew bibles.

Job's Desperate Prayer

Last week, we got to see Job at his best--a man blessed by God with family, health, and prosperity; a man who prayed on a daily basis, for others and with others. Today we see him at his worst: Job has now lost everything, his family, his wealth, his well-being. But there is one thing Job has not lost, and that's his relationship with his creator, his inclination to pray.

In the chapters leading up to today's passage, Job has been talking with his three closest friends, who have come to comfort him in his despair. The friends have offered all sorts of explanations for why Job is suffering, why God seems to have abandoned him. None of those words have been as helpful as they were probably intended to be. That's often the case with well-intentioned friends. They mean well; they may be right in some respects, and we can be thankful for their presence, even when their words fall flat.

Finally, exasperated and in desperation, Job turns away from his friends and lifts his voice to his God in Chapter 13, verses 20-28 (OT p.463). Job says to God:

20“Only grant two things to me; then I will not hide myself from your face:
21 withdraw your hand far from me, and do not let dread of you terrify me.
22 Then call, and I will answer; or let me speak, and you reply to me.
23 How many are my iniquities and my sins? Make me know my transgression and my sin.
24 Why do you hide your face and count me as your enemy?
25 Will you frighten a windblown leaf and pursue dry chaff?
26 For you write bitter things against me and make me reap the iniquities of my youth.
27 You put my feet in the stocks and watch all my paths; you set a bound to the soles of my feet.
28 One wastes away like a rotten thing, like a garment that is moth-eaten.

Job does three things here that are instructive to us, in our own prayers of desperation. First, he calls for a time-out so that he and God can have it out with each other. And by "he and God" that mostly means him. There's an intentionality to this--saying "wait a minute, God. Stop everything. We need to talk." When something big happens in your life, something frightening, something painful, the intentionality and intensity of your prayers should match the scope of the crisis. Stop everything. Put everything aside. Spend the same time and effort on your prayers that you want God to spend on your situation.

Second, Job lets the questions fly: What did I do? Why are you doing this to me? WTF, God??? Notice that God does not answer any of Job's questions (at least not yet, if ever). But neither does God strike Job dead with a thunderbolt from heaven for his impunity. God can handle your questions. And underlying every question Job asks is not disrespect (okay, maybe just a little) but rather a willingness to understand, a steadfast belief that God exists, that God has the power to intervene, that God is in control of all things--even the unpleasant things.

Third, after the questions, Job lets fly a bunch of accusations: God, you're hurting me! God, you're not being fair! God, this sucks and it's all your fault! Again, these could be viewed as dangerous words to level at the creator of the universe. Job's friends have already criticized him for his careless words about God, for his borderline blasphemy, saying that he's only going to make his situation worse by attacking God. But I think that what God values most in our prayers is not bland, polite deference, but rather authenticity. Honesty. Putting everything out on the table for discussion.

To be sure, this is in fact a dangerous approach--for every one thing you put on the table, God who sees into the depths of your heart could probably put another ten... or ten thousand things on the table as well. And at the end of the book, that's exactly what God does. But if you're NOT willing to take that risk, to come at God with everything you've got, the good, the bad, and the really ugly--what can you realistically expect God to do? When the doctor pokes you in the place where it hurts, you're probably going to say a few bad words (possibly directed AT the doctor). That's how the healing process begins.

Job continues his prayer in chapter 14.

1 “A mortal, born of woman, few of days and full of trouble,
2 comes up like a flower and withers, flees like a shadow and does not last.
3 Do you fix your eyes on such a one? Do you bring me into judgment with you?
4 Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? No one can.
5 Since their days are determined, and the number of their months is known to you,
    and you have appointed the bounds that they cannot pass,
6 look away from them and desist, that they may enjoy, like laborers, their days.

The Book of Job, along with the Book of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes (and several non-biblical writings from the time), belongs to a genre called "Wisdom Literature." It was the precursor to the scientific method in the ancient world. The ancient wisdom teachers believed that if you looked to the natural world around you, and tried to understand the processes that governed the plants, the animals, the mountains and the forests, you could apply that knowledge to human beings. So Job, in these verses, looks to the flower as an example of human life: It sprouts, it blossoms, it withers and it dies. Is the withering of the flower (akin to Job's suffering) a judgement from God, any more than its sprouting and blossoming were? If God looks away from the flower, does it enjoy its life more? Does it suffer less? Does it still die? Do some flowers bloom sooner, and some wither later?

Job continues the nature analogy in verse 7:

7 “For there is hope for a tree, if it is cut down, that it will sprout again and that its shoots will not cease.
8 Though its root grows old in the earth and its stump dies in the ground,
9 yet at the scent of water it will bud and put forth branches like a young plant.
10 But mortals die and are laid low; humans expire, and where are they?
11 As waters fail from a lake and a river wastes away and dries up,
12 so mortals lie down and do not rise again; until the heavens are no more, they will not awake
    or be roused out of their sleep.

For Job, the analogy breaks down here: At least trees have some hope of renewal, regrowth if they are cut down. But human beings, he argues, are more like a dried up river or lake--once it's gone, it's gone forever. When human life is over, that's it. There's nothing more. The end. Roll the credits.

John Calvin, one of the founding fathers of the Presbyterian Church, believed that Job spoke these words from his grief and despair, and because of this he exaggerated his examples. We know that rivers change course, and lakes dry up for a season, but like the trees, they too have the hope of renewal. All it takes is one good rain. Calvin taught that if God cares for the trees and the lakes in this way, how much more does he care for the ones he made in his own image?

Job's hope, however, is not for renewal at this point. His prayer is for an end to his suffering, for death--or in Hebrew, Sheol, to come quickly. Verse 13:

13 O that you would hide me in Sheol, that you would conceal me until your wrath is past,
    that you would appoint me a set time and remember me!
14 If mortals die, will they live again? All the days of my service I would wait until my release should come.
15 You would call, and I would answer you; you would long for the work of your hands.
16 For then you would not number my steps; you would not keep watch over my sin;
17 my transgression would be sealed up in a bag, and you would cover over my iniquity.

I love verse 15--Job is basically saying to God, "You're going to miss me when I'm gone!" For Job, death not only means an end to suffering, but also an end to sinfulness. God will no longer be watching him like a hawk, and all his faults will be sealed up in a bag, all his imperfections would be six feet under, covered in dirt.

This is heavy stuff, depressing stuff, even. I know that a lot of you come to church on Sunday mornings to be inspired, energized and uplifted for the week ahead. So why are we talking about depression and death? The answer is, because those things are a part of every life, and any religion or faith that doesn't wrestle with these things--any prayers that avoid or gloss over these things--are shallow, deceptive, and not real. God cannot be the Lord of your happiness if he is not also the Lord of your sorrow. Let me say that again: God cannot be the Lord of your happiness if he is not also the Lord of your sorrow. Will you, like Job, let him into that deep and dark part of your life? Will you pray to him, will you engage with him, and will you listen to him, even when it hurts to do so?

Job concludes his prayer, not in hope, but in desperation. Verse 18:

18 “But the mountain falls and crumbles away, and the rock is removed from its place;
19 the waters wear away the stones; the torrents wash away the soil of the earth;
    so you destroy the hope of mortals.
20 You prevail forever against them, and they pass away; you change their countenance and send them away.
21 Their children come to honor, and they do not know it; they are brought low, and it goes unnoticed.
22 They feel only the pain of their own bodies and mourn only for themselves.”

In verse 19, Job calls God a destroyer. He's not entirely wrong. Every creator is also a destroyer. Every artist, musician, builder, programmer, entrepreneur, writer, or designer knows this to be true. The creative process by its very nature is also destructive. To build muscle, you have to tear muscle. To make an omlette, you have to break the eggs. To carve a sculpture, you must chisel away the rock.

The mighty mountain crumbles into rocks. The rocks in turn become stones, and the stones become dust, and the dust is washed away by the waters.

The strongest athlete will succumb to age and weakness. The sharpest mind in time will grow dull and forgetful. The most famous will someday be forgotten, and the most powerful will someday lie powerless in the grave.

God does all of this, not as punishment or out of spite, but precisely because of that intimate, divine connection between destruction and creation.

Our finite existence is what points us to the infinite.

The proximity of death is what teaches us to live.

Suffering is what teaches us to love.

And sometimes desperation... is what teaches us to pray.