Proverbs 3:5-7
Trust in the Lord
5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;
6 in all your ways acknowledge him,
and he will make your paths straight.
7 Do not be wise in your own eyes;
fear the LORD and shun evil.
Isaiah 40:28-31
Hope in the LORD
28 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The LORD is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.
29 He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
30 Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
31 but those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.
Job 1:20-21
Naked Job Came to Earth and Naked He Will Leave Earth
21 At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship 22 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."
Job 23:8-12
Job is Looking for God in His Sufferings
8 “But if I go to the east, he is not there;
if I go to the west, I do not find him.
9 When he is at work in the north, I do not see him;
when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him.
10 But he knows the way that I take;
when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold.
11 My feet have closely followed his steps;
I have kept to his way without turning aside.
12 I have not departed from the commands of his lips;
I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread.
1 Then Bildad the Shuhite replied:
2 “Dominion and awe belong to God;
he establishes order in the heights of heaven.
3 Can his forces be numbered?
On whom does his light not rise?
4 How then can a mortal be righteous before God?
How can one born of woman be pure?
5 If even the moon is not bright
and the stars are not pure in his eyes,
6 how much less a mortal, who is but a maggot—
a human being, who is only a worm!”
1 Then Job replied:
2 “How you have helped the powerless!
How you have saved the arm that is feeble!
3 What advice you have offered to one without wisdom!
And what great insight you have displayed!
4 Who has helped you utter these words?
And whose spirit spoke from your mouth?
5 “The dead are in deep anguish,
those beneath the waters and all that live in them.
6 The realm of the dead is naked before God;
Destruction lies uncovered.
7 He spreads out the northern skies over empty space;
he suspends the earth over nothing.
8 He wraps up the waters in his clouds,
yet the clouds do not burst under their weight.
9 He covers the face of the full moon,
spreading his clouds over it.
10 He marks out the horizon on the face of the waters
for a boundary between light and darkness.
11 The pillars of the heavens quake,
aghast at his rebuke.
12 By his power he churned up the sea;
by his wisdom he cut Rahab to pieces.
13 By his breath the skies became fair;
his hand pierced the gliding serpent.
14 And these are but the outer fringe of his works;
how faint the whisper we hear of him!
Who then can understand the thunder of his power?”
Hebrews 13:8
Jesus Always the Same
8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
The Bible throughout teaches us to trust in the LORD, and to hope in the LORD...This seems easier to do when things are going well for us...It is difficult to do when we are in trouble or are having troubles, or are suffering...It seems we are given a choice when things are good and we cling to material things, and the things we want...These things may not necessarily be a part of God's Plan and He may want us to learn...When we are troubled and challenged, we still have this choice (and it is a tough choice) to trust God or to go back to what we thought we needed to cling to...
In the Book of Job, God has allowed the evil one to play havoc in Job's life and cause him many troubles...Job looks to the east, west, north and south and cannot find God...Dominion and awe do belong to God as He covers the face of the moon with clouds and seems to hide from us...It seemed that Job, who had been so close to God now has lost a little trust in Him and is looking for Him and has many questions for Him...It seems God is hiding from Job and Job's problems...Maybe God does leave us sometimes to test our faith or discipline our faith and He want us to learn from His disappearance...Maybe He wants us to change how we think about Him or change our view of Him?...Or maybe these things happen (how we think about Him) as a result of the experience or experiences, we are having...
As God leaves Job and his suffering, Job begins to ask God questions...Does Job change or God change?...God is unchanging, but Job will after this is over, look at God differently after this incident...Job remains persistence in his tough questions to God...He remains steadfast to God and knows He is All Powerful...But His questions keep coming as he tells us the power of God throughout the Book of Job...His questions really do not get answered (as he asks them), but somehow I think Job has changed for the better, because of what he has been through...And how He thinks about His LORD maybe has changed...
Job thought about God in a certain way...Now, I believe his perspective on God has changed...In the deep and dark moments of our lives, when we need God the most, He sometimes seems to leave us...The narrow road gets even narrower...During our tough and troubled periods God is watching and helping us through the Holy Spirit -to grow us a little bit more spiritually and to exercise our spiritual and faith muscles...He seems to push us out all alone and sometimes into this troubled and aloneness state -wanting us to get to the kind of person we can be...He wants us to reach our potential...And our potential is a stronger faith and being stronger spiritually...But sometimes sitting alone in our thoughts, struggling to figure out what has and is happening, we can lose perspective...Sometimes only when we look back in our lives and see what we have went through, can we see the Light that He has provided and was providing at that time...Maybe at that darkest moment, we see no Light, but somehow He is there...
When we are challenged in life, it seems very much our faith gets challenged...God has not changed, our faith and thoughts about Him have...Our hope and our trust in the LORD seem sometimes to have lessened in many of our struggles...God does not always let our lives go as we plan and want...God's Plan and our plan maybe different...God never said trusting and hoping in Him is easy...Often He wants us to change and the path He gives us is a struggle, and if we trust and hope in Him, we may learn this...And sitting back and reflecting on what has happened to us, after the fact, sometimes is a part of our learning process...