Author: Erin Newton

Links for today’s readings:

Feb 4 Read: Job 37 Listen: (2:27) Read: Psalm 22 Listen: (3:49)

Scripture Focus: Job 37:14-16

14 “Listen to this, Job;
    stop and consider God’s wonders.
15 Do you know how God controls the clouds
    and makes his lightning flash?
16 Do you know how the clouds hang poised,
    those wonders of him who has perfect knowledge?

Reflection: Same Old Story

By Erin Newton

At no point in time has Job declared himself a scientific genius. When Elihu asks him if he knows how meteorology works, it is more of a statement than a question. Even if Job tried to answer his question, it’s not really the point.

The divine words in the next chapter sound nearly the same: “ Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain, and a path for the thunderstorm?” (Job 38:25–27).

Job doesn’t know how storms really work but I am fairly sure he knows who makes them.

Elihu and the other three friends all refer to the natural world. They speak of the rain, the seas, the heavens, etc. So nothing that God points out in his speech is foreign to Job. He saw clouds, watched lightning, felt rain, and maybe swam in the sea. All the things Job’s friends asked him to consider were familiar. But none of their arguments resonated with him.

The arguments and advice given to Job for all these chapters have been like proverbs—there are universal truths and solid advice, but not always applicable.

Scholars have argued about whether Job had reason to repent, if his repentance was genuine, and so on. But I pause here today to think about how the attempted counsel of his friends, while full of truth, effected no change from Job.

Let’s consider 1 Cor 3:6-7: “I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.”

Could God have answered Job right there in chapter 3 or 4? Absolutely. Why a week of silence and four friends with semi-helpful counsel? Perhaps because we’re all like them. Our call is to seek out friends, sit with them in their suffering, and hopefully speak wisdom. Does it affect change? Not always. (And we might get it wrong, just like them.)

And I think we’re a lot like Job. The truth might be found in a sermon, a friend’s encouragement, a line of a poem, a chorus in a song, a character from a book. We may need to hear truth from many mouths before we are changed.

And we need to keep speaking truth even if it’s been said before. We keep pointing to God and relying on him to affect change.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Request for Presence

Test me, O Lord, and try me; examine my heart and mind. — Psalm 26.2

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.

Read more: Prayers Before the Storm

Prayers Before the Storm — Guided Prayer

Read more: Hope In the Tree of the Cross

“He has done it,” Psalm 22’s last line proclaims. “It is finished,” Christ’s last breath from the cross echoes.

Hope In the Tree of the Cross

Links for today’s readings:

Jan 28  Read: Job 30 Listen: (3:14)  Read: Psalms 11-12 Listen: (1:59)

Scripture Focus: Job 30:24-26

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.”

Reflection: Human Decency

By Erin Newton

Human decency is a set of accepted moral standards. There is an expectation that people will act using human decency. We expect strangers to avoid violence, help the weak, and work for the betterment of society.

This is why Job says Surely. The word highlights, emphasizes, and intensifies the concept he’s about to state. Surely people don’t hurt hurting people. Job is relying on the universal concept of human decency.

Even in the ancient world, it was not the accepted standard for people to harm those who were already suffering. They did not assault those asking for help. Human decency isn’t a modern philosophy; Job’s view of the world is grounded in it.

By now, we’ve read through the stories of Job’s suffering and his friends’ poor assessment of his supposed guilt. Over and over Job has pleaded his innocence and questioned his suffering. If humans are expected to treat each other with kindness and respect, shouldn’t God also treat humans in such a way? This is Job’s mindset.

He feels beaten down by the divine hand because his suffering does not fit into their perspective of retribution. But something is not right for Job. He’s innocent and suffering.

This is one of those times that Job is expressing the fullness of his misery. He’s not holding back his words. He’s suffering and bringing it to God demanding that he answer. He brings human morality to the forefront. He knows that there are those who do hurt the helpless, but everyone can see how wrong that is. Is God acting wrong? Job is asking that sort of question.

As we wake up each morning, hesitant to turn on the news fearing another headline that brings heartache, grief, fury, and rage—we are hoping for human decency to prevail. We also are hoping for God to step in—fix our suffering, tell us why this is happening when we are trying so hard to do what is right. Like Job, we must keep asking and bringing into the argument that this is not how people are supposed to act.

We can rest assured that God can handle our doubts about his seeming inaction or his silence. In much the same way we keep calling our representatives, we plead with God. We keep coming to him: “Surely this is not ok. We are asking for light and all we see is darkness.”

Divine Hours Prayer: The Request for Presence

Show us the light of your countenance, O God, and come to us. — Psalm 67.1

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Autumn and Wintertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Read more: Prayer When None Are Faithful

We relate to the psalmist’s cries…The costs of lies are all around us. Violence. Confusion. Desperation. Loss of life.

Prayer When None are Faithful—Readers’ Choice

Read more: Help That Brings Hope—Guided Prayer

Let us…be the kind of help that Job hoped for in the lives of those around us.

Help That Brings Hope—Guided Prayer

Links for today’s readings:

Jan 21  Read: Job 22 Listen: (2:54) Read: John 21 Listen: (3:58)

Scripture Focus: Job 22:4–5

4 “Is it for your piety that he rebukes you
    and brings charges against you?
5 Is not your wickedness great?

Reflection: Assumptions

By Erin Newton

When headlines break with news of some new atrocity, the details are often vague and incomplete. With the lack of information, assumptions rush to fill the void. Whatever the incident, whoever the person, assumptions are a common exacerbator of suffering.

When Job’s friends arrive on the scene, they give him a week’s silence. Then the verbal (and emotional) onslaught begins. As Francis Andersen notes in the Tyndale commentary on Job, “The idea of a good man suffering never enters their thoughts. It would demolish their theology, or, as Eliphaz has already said, undermine religion.” Eliphaz, just a few chapters earlier is dismayed by Job’s repeated insistence of innocence. “But you even undermine piety and hinder devotion to God” (15:4). The thinking, at that time, was that bad things happen to bad people. He deserved it. And then they probe to find it.

But we keep returning to the fact that we already know the reason for Job’s suffering; his friends, however, do not. Three rounds of debates between Job and his friends ensue. Eight different conversations grow in their intensity. First, they all generally suggest that suffering is caused by a person’s sin. By Job 22, Eliphaz is not mincing his words anymore: “Are not your sins endless?” (v. 5) and “That is why snares are all around you” (v. 10). Job’s friends cast the cause of his misery onto his own head.

When our first instinct is to heap responsibility back onto the person who suffers, we are often acting like Eliphaz himself. We cannot see a world outside of our own assumptions—even more so, our assumptions rooted in preconceived biases.

Andersen reminds us: “The reader … understands that Job is neither stubborn nor arrogant. He is honest and tenacious. From the depths of a sick body and broken mind, his spirit is still thrusting its faith into God, even though his blind cries sound wild to his friends.”

For those who suffer from chronic or life-threatening illness, are we quick to assume they’ve done something wrong? For those who lose a loved one to violence, are we blaming the victim for “being in the wrong place at the wrong time”? For those who have been abused by someone, are we analyzing their outfits, their demeanor, or their gullibility?

To avoid being like Job’s friends, we must be quick to listen, slow to speak—and I’d like to add—slow to assume.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Request for Presence

Let my cry come before you, O Lord; give me understanding, according to your word.

Let my supplication come before you; deliver me, according to your promise. — Psalm 119.169-170

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Autumn and Wintertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Read more: Return from Financial Sins

One rarely hears sermons on financial sins that approach the passion and zeal of sermons about sex or drugs or pornography…unless one reads the Bible.

Return From Financial Sins

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Links for today’s readings:

Jan 14  Read: Job 14 Listen: (2:23) Read: John 14 Listen: (4:13)

Scripture Focus: Job 14:5-10

5 A person’s days are determined;
    you have decreed the number of his months
    and have set limits he cannot exceed.
6 So look away from him and let him alone,
    till he has put in his time like a hired laborer.

7 “At least there is hope for a tree:
    If it is cut down, it will sprout again,
    and its new shoots will not fail.
8 Its roots may grow old in the ground
    and its stump die in the soil,
9 yet at the scent of water it will bud
    and put forth shoots like a plant.
10 But a man dies and is laid low;
    he breathes his last and is no more

Reflection: Can We Live Again?

By Erin Newton

In case no one has told you, it’s ok to disagree with the Bible. Of course, that comes with the caveat that you need to understand context. Verses in a silo can be misunderstood. Scripture without context is dangerous.

Job’s complaints and his friend’s advice are good examples of a “yes, but” interpretation. Here, Job continues his emotional lament about the status of his life. His perspective is bleak and hopeless.

Even if we, today, can read the Scriptures and see the promises of eternal life from the very beginning of Genesis, Job wasn’t there yet. Life in that time was measured by one’s earthly accomplishments, one’s legacy. This is why Job is so distraught. His legacy cannot continue through his children for they have all died. His legacy cannot continue through his social status for he is now a sore-covered outcast. His legacy cannot continue through his wealth for his livestock all perished.

So we come to Job 14 with a measure of sympathy and contextual understanding. This life, here, is utterly important to him. His life, at this point, is also utterly dreadful. He understands the limits of one’s life. He knows that it is God who ordains a person’s days. We can find hope in that.

I remember when my child was sick and doctors were unable to assure me of his recovery. This truth, from Job’s own mouth, resonated in my soul. God determines the limits of life. We cannot die without God knowing.

Although this is something that we can hold as true, it doesn’t (and didn’t years ago) stop me from pleading with God to keep watch, to intervene, or to extend one’s days.

The book of Job is all about tension. We know that God watches over us (“Have you considered my servant Job?”) and that he holds the boundaries of life (“A person’s days are determined”), but that doesn’t always grant us answers.

Job envies the trees that can sprout back to life. When Job finds resolution in his suffering at the end of the book, he reenters the land of living. 

We look to the future of eternal life. But in the midst of suffering now, I think God asks us to consider the rejuvenation of trees. We can return to the land of the living—but that means accepting the uncertainty of life and choosing to be present.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Call to Prayer

But I will call upon God, and the Lord will deliver me.
In the evening, in the morning, and at noonday, I will complain and lament,
He will bring me safely back…God, who is enthroned of old, will hear me… — Psalm 55.17

– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Autumn and Wintertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Read more: Hope In the Tree of the Cross

The idea that God will raise humans to eternal life is a seed in Job…and blooms in the gospels.

Hope In the Tree of the Cross

Read more: The Arm of Flesh versus the Prince of Peace

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The Arm of Flesh versus the Prince of Peace