Job 30:1-31
Crying Out to God
1 “But now they mock me,
men younger than I,
whose fathers I would have disdained
to put with my sheep dogs.
2 Of what use was the strength of their hands to me,
since their vigor had gone from them?
3 Haggard from want and hunger,
they roamed the parched land
in desolate wastelands at night.
4 In the brush they gathered salt herbs,
and their food was the root of the broom tree.
5 They were banished from their fellow men,
shouted at as if they were thieves.
6 They were forced to live in the dry stream beds,
among the rocks and in holes in the ground.
7 They brayed among the bushes
and huddled in the undergrowth.
8 A base and nameless brood,
they were driven out of the land.
9 “And now their sons mock me in song;
I have become a byword among them.
10 They detest me and keep their distance;
they do not hesitate to spit in my face.
11 Now that God has unstrung my bow and afflicted me,
they throw off restraint in my presence.
12 On my right the tribe attacks;
they lay snares for my feet,
they build their siege ramps against me.
13 They break up my road;
they succeed in destroying me—
without anyone’s helping them.
14 They advance as through a gaping breach;
amid the ruins they come rolling in.
15 Terrors overwhelm me;
my dignity is driven away as by the wind,
my safety vanishes like a cloud.
16 “And now my life ebbs away;
days of suffering grip me.
17 Night pierces my bones;
my gnawing pains never rest.
18 In his great power God becomes like clothing to me;
he binds me like the neck of my garment.
19 He throws me into the mud,
and I am reduced to dust and ashes.
20 “I cry out to you, O God, but you do not answer;
I stand up, but you merely look at me.
21 You turn on me ruthlessly;
with the might of your hand you attack me.
22 You snatch me up and drive me before the wind;
you toss me about in the storm.
23 I know you will bring me down to death,
to the place appointed for all the living.
24 “Surely no one lays a hand on a broken man
when he cries for help in his distress.
25 Have I not wept for those in trouble?
Has not my soul grieved for the poor?
26 Yet when I hoped for good, evil came;
when I looked for light, then came darkness.
27 The churning inside me never stops;
days of suffering confront me.
28 I go about blackened, but not by the sun;
I stand up in the assembly and cry for help.
29 I have become a brother of jackals,
a companion of owls.
30 My skin grows black and peels;
my body burns with fever.
31 My harp is tuned to mourning,
and my flute to the sound of wailing.
Job cries out to God, but He does not answer...I stand up, but God, You only look at me...You turn on me ruthlessly; with the might of Your hand You attack me...You snatch me up and drive me before the wind...You toss me about in the storm...I know You will bring me to death, to the place for all the living...
Job wanted a reason for his suffering...This seems like a reasonable request...
When I am anxious for several days I, like Job, wonder where He is at...I wonder why He allows my suffering to continue...But it does...At the peak moments of our suffering and troubles, He seems to hide from us...But God does not forget us...Our LORD does listen to those who suffer...Our Father does not ignore the cry of the afflicted (Psalm 9:12)...Sometimes, if not many times in our lives, we feel abandoned...When we feel that this abandonment and loneliness and we are without God, it seems worse...When we cry out in pain for His help, and He does not help our pain immediately, we question Him....Just like Job, many questions come out about the problem of pain in our lives...Job had many great questions for God...Job's questions never get answered...Much of our Pain and suffering can only be answered by God...God's plan is different than our plan...God works outside of time and only He knows the "right time, the right moment."...When the afflicted cry out, it is not that He is not there...Even though we suffer and do not like it, He is saying "not saying no, He is saying not yet."...Job found out in the very end, God's presence is more than the questions he had...God's presence is the answer...Job, like us, have to sometimes suffer and wait in time, with many questions for Him...