Pain Insane – Job 14

I used to play basketball and one day landed on a players foot and rolled my foot over, stretching and stressing that ligament across the top of my foot. It hurt but I didn’t think anything of it until about an hour later when it started hurting so bad I decided to go the doctor. By the time the doctor saw me and decided I just needed a pain relieving shot and to rest that foot, I was so “crazy” with pain I refused the shot and asked instead for a pain pill, which took even more time to give me relief. I just couldn’t stand the idea of that one more bit of pain from that needle prick. Nutty? Yep!

I think that is where Job is in his suffering. He’s lost his kids, his dignity, his wife’s support, his health and his confidence in God.

“Man who is born of a woman is few of days and full of trouble. He comes out like a flower and withers; he flees like a shadow and continues not. And do you open your eyes on such a one and bring me into judgment with you? Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? There is not one. Since his days are determined, and the number of his months is with you, and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass, look away from him and leave him alone, that he may enjoy, like a hired hand, his day.

“For there is hope for a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that its shoots will not cease. Though its root grow old in the earth, and its stump die in the soil, yet at the scent of water it will bud and put out branches like a young plant. But a man dies and is laid low; man breathes his last, and where is he? As waters fail from a lake and a river wastes away and dries up, so a man lies down and rises not again; till the heavens are no more he will not awake or be roused out of his sleep. Oh that you would hide me in Sheol, that you would conceal me until your wrath be past, that you would appoint me a set time, and remember me! If a man dies, shall he live again? All the days of my service I would wait, till my renewal should come. You would call, and I would answer you; you would long for the work of your hands. For then you would number my steps; you would not keep watch over my sin; my transgression would be sealed up in a bag, and you would cover over my iniquity.

“But the mountain falls and crumbles away, and the rock is removed from its place; the waters wear away the stones; the torrents wash away the soil of the earth; so you destroy the hope of man. You prevail forever against him, and he passes; you change his countenance, and send him away. His sons come to honor, and he does not know it; they are brought low, and he perceives it not. He feels only the pain of his own body, and he mourns only for himself.” (Job 14, ESV)

Job begins his defense to God with a questioning of why God should spend so much energy focusing on humans, since humans are such a frail and troubled being.  No one can bring a clean thing out of an unclean so God should look away from humans and leave them alone so they can enjoy some sort of life.

Because, unlike a tree stump that has hope of budding again after being cut down, humans die never to rise again.  Job longs for death to conceal him from God’s wrath until a time in the future when he can be correctly judged.  God would call for him and seal up his transgressions never to bother him again with them. That’s what Job would like to happen.

However, Job’s expectation is that just as everything erodes so God erodes man’s hope by staying against him throughout his short life.  His sons may come to honor or dishonor but he will be dead and not know it.  He only experiences pain and mourning.

Discussion Questions

1. What is the worst suffering you have ever experienced?
2. Did you think, do, or say anything crazy during your suffering?
3. Why do you think people think, do, or say things out of the ordinary when they are hurting?
4. What, if anything, is wrong with what Job is asserting about humans never rising again?
5. How do we know that God does indeed desire to set an appointed time to remember us, seal up our sins in a bag, and cover over our iniquity?
6. Do you know that God has sealed up and covered over your iniquity?