Job 17-20

June 3

Job 17-20

Job is a man in despair. We cannot blame him. He has faced unimaginable wealth, then unimaginable destruction. He lost everything, and then his body began to rot away while he was still alive. He was removed from the community and left by himself to scrape his sores with broken pieces of pottery. The people who used to look up to Job, now ridiculed and made fun of him. His wife told him to curse God and die. Job would not curse God, but he wondered why God left him all alone and allowed him to face such suffering.  Job asked the question that would be on any of our minds in this situation; "where then is my hope? Who can see any hope for me?" (Job 17:15, NIV) Job was a man in despair.

But as Job processed what was happening to him, he realized that God had not totally abandoned him. His hope was not in what was happening right then, his hope was in his Redeemer. "I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see him with my own eyes—I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!" (Job 19:25-27, NIV)  Job’s longing was to stand before God and plead his case. Job’s dream was to see God face to face. Job longed to be with God.

The Psalmist wrote; "As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God?" (Psalm 42:1-2, NIV) That was the way Job thirsted for God. Even in the midst of his suffering, his hope, his desire, his dream was to meet with God.

When we are living in sin, living in disobedience to God, we do not thirst for Him. We tend to want to avoid God when we know we are not where we should be in our relationship. But God wants us to thirst for Him, to desire Him, to come to Him whether we are living in blessings or if we are living in the midst of turmoil. Outwardly Job had no hope, but he maintained his hope that he would see his Redeemer. He knew he would be set free from his suffering and pain. He knew God would vindicate him. He yearned to be with God.