Like Psalms of Lament, this piece has been adapted from an exegetical reflection paper submitted for a course, The Biblical Theology of Suffering and Hope, taught by Dr. Beth Stovell at Ambrose Seminary.

We were asked to use three books from our syllabus and course lectures as primary sources.

Due to footnote formatting limitations on this platform, citations are noted in brackets, and a bibliography is included at the end.

If you prefer more personal and reflective writing, scroll down to the second half of this blog post!

Living Hope in Suffering:
Questions, Answers, and Encounters in Job

The book of Job follows the story of a righteous man who endured suffering and experienced God afresh.

Job's barrage of loss and struggle would not entice anyone to enlist, but the fairy-tale-like ending brings perspective (Thompson, 151).

This book is a picture of hope to those walking through deep pain, affirming the possibilities for redemption are endless when the Creator is at work!

Still, life in this broken world ends in death for all, a reminder that full redemption waits for the grand finale of the Kingdom of God (Rev. 11:15).

With this in mind, two points stand out near the end of the book of Job: a confirmation of Job’s righteousness after endless suffering and accusations and God’s magnificent presence—an embodiment of hope.

After an overview of the structure, possible theodicies within the plot of Job, and the unconventional answer, I reflect on the hope this redemptive story offers personally, in ministry and for society.

First, it is essential to mention the origin of evil remains a mystery for theologians, as the Bible does not reveal its source (Wright, 71-74).

Beth Stovell aptly defines evil as “the absence of good” (Jan 30).

While offering a “series of theodicies” (Thompson, 109), responses to evil and suffering, Job is not meant to be a universal picture of God or Satan for the Old Testament; thus, many scholars conclude Job is not a universal theodicy (Stovell, Jan 30).

Still, questions dangle as Job's life unravels.

While the exact date of the book of Job is controversial, it may have been written late in Israelite history, in post-exilic times (Stovell, Jan 30).

Some argue this writing is not to be read as history and, like many parts of the Bible, could have been written at a different period from when it occurred (Stovell, Jan 30).

Nevertheless, it comprises a mix of conversational, narrative, and poetic language that gives it an “agelessness” (Thompson, 151).

• The book of Job begins with a prologue, introducing the reader to the main character, the conflict, and a conversation between God and Satan that led to Job’s test of intense suffering.

• Everything changed on a day when Job received news about his livestock being attacked and killed and his ten children destroyed in a storm (Job 1:13-19).

• These tragedies were followed by sores all over Job’s body (Job 2:7) and an expression of humility in response to his wife’s encouragement to “Curse God and die!” (Job 2:9b) when Job said:

• By the end of the second chapter, Job’s friends arrived, mirroring his emotions, weeping and sitting in silence (Job 2:11-13; Stovell, Jan 30), a practice affirmed later in the Bible: “Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn,” (Rom. 12:15).

• While Job did not take his wife’s encouragement to curse God, he went as far as cursing the day he was born (Job 3:3; Stovell, Jan 30).

• Chapter three showcases Job utterly undone:

• His friends, who appeared gracious and patient in his afflictions at the start, turned on him and made up for their days of silence (Thompson, 107).

• These well-meaning, misguided friends implied God set up his suffering for divine discipline (Thompson, 140).

• In chapters 4-5, Job’s loudest friend, Eliphaz, takes the microphone to exude a retributive perspective that all suffering is from sin (Stovell, Jan 30) and the righteous should prosper (Thompson, 110).

But Job’s suffering appeared suddenly and was disconnected from sin.

• Job’s hope in God remained through his friends' speeches. As Job argued his case in Job 13:15a, he said the famous line:

• Another beautiful passage proclaims his hope in an almost prophetic fashion:

“I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on 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).

The book goes on with three rounds of speeches, including Eliphaz, Zophar, Bildrad and Job, with a mentionable shift in Job 28.

Job 28, known for its wisdom, raises questions as it is written differently and “exudes a sense of calmness” (Thompson, 107).

The chapter makes space for mystery (Thompson, 135-37) and ends with an affirmation that wisdom is a gift from God, not obtained by one’s efforts (Job 28:28).

• The cycles of long speeches with debate, accusation and defence that make up the structure of most of the book beg for a shift from these redundant attempts at theodicy.

• Even Elihu, Job’s young friend, spoke for six chapters and called him to repent his supposed sins before everything changed!

• God entered the scene “out of the whirlwind” (Job 38: 1 KJV) to challenge Job’s limited knowledge and power with magnificent creation imagery (Job 38-41).

  Job’s brief reply is that he has said too much already (Job 40: 3-5).

• To add to the grandeur of this section, God pointed to two mammoth creatures, Behemoth, a huge land animal in Job 40:15-24, and Leviathan, a sea monster, in Job 41. These represent the forces of evil in the world, kept under control by God; a humbling, comforting and critical piece of theodicy, showing his ultimate power and control (Thompson, 146-47).

While many questions are left unanswered in the book of Job, there are two striking conclusions:

First, God vindicates Job, affirming sin is not what has caused this terrible test when he rebukes his friends (Job 42:7-8).

Second, Job encounters the living God (Job 38-41) and is satisfied, not because of an intellectual answer, but because of a revelation (Thompson, 146-47).

• Job repented of his unworthiness in ashes in Job 42:1-6, a reflection of the despair and grief seen near the start in Job 2:8.20.

• In this posture, he responded with a famous line:

He even reconciled with and desired the best for his terrible friends (Job 42:7-9).

The remarkable conclusion to the book of Job is not that he receives abundant blessings after so much tragedy but that he experiences God in a new way (Thompson, 132).

Thompson says, “Job here has come to an affirmation of hope, thus, at last, able to draw some conclusions for his ongoing sufferings” (Thompson, 132).

But J. Christian Bekker suggests this “provides no solution to Job’s quest” but “highlights the hidden character of God’s wisdom” (52).

Even if there are no answers or revelations while on earth, a much bigger picture is at play that we will understand one day.

The God of the universe is with us in our struggles, providing a picture of hope personally to share in our ministries and communities.

What does the story of Job mean to you?

I interacted with this Bible story throughout my life as a faithful Sunday school student and church attendee; however, my first encounter with death and grief twelve years ago, when I had an early miscarriage, made it more personal.

The Sunday after my miscarriage, tears fell in the hiddenness of this loss as I tried to sing along with words that echoed Job’s:

But walking through cancer journeys with both of my parents in the same season trumped any heartache I have experienced.

One evening, early on my dad’s cancer journey, he did not intend to express a homily from his hospitable bed.

Still, when a family video call was not connecting, my sister recorded his thoughts on her phone.

For five minutes, he shared his perspective on his suffering. This audio clip was played the following Sunday for the congregation he had faithfully led for many years.

In the recording, my dad humbly referenced Job’s story. He shared how he had prayed with my mom to discern if there was any sin or areas they needed to repent for and concluded this was a test.

Not all stories end like Job’s on earth, but that does not mean we abandon our hope in God.

I will never forget the tragically beautiful way it all ended; leading worship at our church with my husband on Good Friday night; singing about Jesus and hope; knowing my dad could probably hear the service through my mom’s phone in the hospital room where he was receiving palliative care; making it up the driveway after the service only to get a message in our family group from my mom:

“Come now; he's struggling to breathe.”

Moments later, we gathered around his hospital bed, strangely in the same room where his brutal journey had started four and a half months before.

Six broken adult children and their spouses weeping and worshipping; our dad passed before we arrived.

I imagine my dad saying Job’s words, which were on the back of his funeral program a week later:

"My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you" (Job 42:5).

Two weeks later, I was driving home through a blur of tears after dropping my mom off for hip surgery.

It should have been my dad bringing her to this long-awaited surgery. He had taken her to every breast cancer appointment until his sudden cancer diagnosis.

I poured out my sadness and questions to God that morning because that is what an inkling of hope looks like in devastation!

A while back, when I was out for coffee with my niece, she turned the focus to me and prayed that Jesus would speak to the storms of my grief as he did to the winds and waves (Matt. 8:23-27, Mark 4:35-41, Luke 8:22-25).

I saw my grief in a new light.

For the first time, I realized that when the next wave comes, Jesus is with me, speaking peace over the entire situation. It was a theophany for my heart, even if only in my mind’s eye.

I love how this imagery is a reflection of the way God spoke through creation to Job.

Part of being in a community and sharing struggles and losses with others is we can speak into each other's lives.

I share my experience with the beauty and struggles of life on my blog, on a worship team, and in groups to encourage and connect with others looking for hope.

Over the last year, I have shared my grief journey, knowing firsthand that people do not want platitudes in distress.

We want empathy, presence and vulnerability!

I have found what Rick Warren says to be true,

“Your greatest ministry will most likely come out of your greatest pain. God often uses our deepest pain as the launching pad of our greatest calling” (Warren, 34).

In an online group I lead, I put out a poll about loss, and as responses came in, I wept over the brokenness of grief and the beauty of holding space for each other.

May we not be like Job’s friends who start well but make a mess of things.

Instead, may we be like Jesus, who wept with his friends for their dear friend Lazarus (John 11).

Many in today’s culture have a hollowness in their loss stories because, without Christ, there is no hope beyond the grave.

Sadly, while part of a twelve-week community group on grief, I encountered a lack of eternal hope.

On numerous occasions in this group, as well as with my neighbours and while overseas on a ministry trip, I have shared about the hope my family is clinging to after a great loss.

This hope is now the epitaph on my dad’s gravestone, “Jesus Christ, our living hope.”

While scripture offers several relatable characters and passages for those suffering, the book of Job resonates because there is an experience of God that also acknowledges mystery.

Our human understanding can not comprehend the fullness of divine justice within human suffering because:

In suffering, we may not receive answers to all of our questions, but, like Job, we have an invitation to a deeper relationship with the Creator of the universe, the one speaking peace to the next wave and offering His presence as our living hope!

Bibliography

• Beker, J. Christiaan. Suffering and Hope: The Biblical Vision and the Human Predicament. 2nd edition. Grand Rapids, Mich: Wm. B. Eerdmans-Lightning Source, 1994.

• Stovell, Beth. “Job: Explorations in Theodicy,” BT 633: The Biblical Theology of Suffering and Hope. Class lecture at Ambrose Seminary, Calgary, AB, January 30, 2023.

• Thompson, Michael E. W. Where Is the God of Justice?: The Old Testament and Suffering. Eugene, Or: Wipf & Stock, 2011.

• Warren, Rick. Purpose Driven Life. Later Printing edition. Grand Rapids, Mich: Zondervan Trade Books, 2002.

• Wright, N. T. Evil and the Justice of God. Downers Grove, Ill: IVP Books, 2006.