The Suffering of Job

The first time I read Job was in my high school English class. I understood only the basic story. My second reading was a year ago. I knew then that Job would be someone I would come to know personally.

Recently I have completed my third reading of the book of Job.

Through many trials and tribulations I have come to know for myself the following truth:

"The path of salvation has always led one way or another through Gethsemane."

--Elder Jeffery Holland, Lessons from Liberty Jail

The suffering of Job is to be a common experience among all true disciples of Jesus Christ.

Is there any other way to obtain salvation other than passing through Gethsemane? I now understand that truly, there is no other way.

I never understood why it would be necessary to experience an opposition in all things. I never understood why it would be requisite to know pain in order to know joy. For the first time in my existence, I have come to know for myself that this is true. Not because I have experienced the opposing joy and happiness on the other side of pain and suffering. On the contrary, I still remain almost entirely on the other side of the spectrum and I do not know for how much longer I will be there.

"3 So am I made to possess months of vanity, and wearisome nights are appointed to me.

4 When I lie down, I say, When shall I arise, and the night be gone? and I am full of tossings to and fro unto the dawning of the day."

--Job 7:3-4

Yet while I endure the hardships that have been my assignments to overcome, I have pondered upon many questions about my own salvation.

Is it possible that I could be saved from this death and dying--what I know to be death--pain, suffering, grief, sorrow, disappointment, discouragement, emptiness, loneliness, and despondency? Does anyone understand my hopelessness, helplessness, darkness, confusion, and disorientation? Can I be healed after I have been tortured, abused, neglected, abandoned, impoverished, humiliated, isolated? What happens after I am shamed, demeaned, ignored, spit upon, hated, stripped of dignity, mocked, discounted, and heartbroken? Can I be restored from my body decaying as I feel my heart beating slower, my spine disintegrating, my bowels losing effectiveness, and my brain delaying response? Is there forgiveness and relief from the infinite and never-ending guilt from and impotency over my weaknesses, shortcomings, short-sightedness, small-mindedness, ignorance, unkindness, impatience, intolerance, intemperance, rage, hatred, selfishness, and judgment of others?

Is there someone--anyone--anything--that can save me from all of this huge mess?

Many, many times I have been tempted to pin God as the culprit of all my misery, but I have come to the same conclusion as Job. Does it matter whose fault it is?

"15 Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him: but I will maintain mine own ways before him."

--Job 13:15

The irony is that in trusting in him completely, I have been left completely to my own strength. Yet in trusting in him, I have caught a vision of why this isolation is a necessary step on the road of discipleship.

If I always remained with God--in the comfort of his love, his presence, his strength, his power, his glory, his protection--I would never be able to savor the value of it all. And I would never gain what he has for myself because I would never need to; I would always have it. Like a young bird that never leaves the nest, I would never learn to fly.

Thus I am left alone in the wilderness of this broken world--this earthly sojourn--that I might come to know complete depravity so that I might know, understand, savor, and relish total abundance.

In conclusion, He has the power to raise me from death, all forms of death.

And as Job exclaims,

"25 I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth. 

 26 And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God:

 27 Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another..." 

--Job 19:25-27

I know that my Redeemer lives.