Day 8 and Connections...

Text:

Job 10-11—(http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=JOb%2010-11;&version=31;)

Summary of Job 10-11—In Ch. 10 Job is very depressed and speaks out of the despair and hopelessness of his soul. He said, in many different ways, that God created him…will He now curse the work of His hands? Then, giving up, Job just says that he’s going to die, so what’s the use? He can’t prove himself to God, so what’s the point in arguing it… and he falls silent.

Then Zophar the Nammathite answers back. He points out that God is beyond all our finite minds, and that we cannot understand him…and that He is just and will act just and that if we only reach out to him, devote ourselves and our lives to Him that pretty much everything will go well…

This really reminds me a lot of a friend of mine, who I’m going to call Patrick. Patrick is going through a very rough time right now. He is depressed, unmotivated, and has seemingly had his relationship with God severed almost. He doesn’t feel like God answers him when he prays and isn’t there when he reads his Bible. He feels like a little child waiting at the window for his Father to come home…but has been waiting so long that he is becoming very lonely and wonders if he’ll ever come home.

All of the authority figures and many friends tell Patrick that he’s doing everything wrong and that he needs to spend more time with God and do this or do that… but nothing is working. Patrick still feels like he’s been virtually abandoned by God. His relationship with God is the most important thing in his life…and now it feels like that has been ripped away. He wants to die, and be with God… to get angry because God left him, and to just run to God’s arms and be held close…and know that everything is going to be okay.

The interesting thing about all of this is that Patrick and I had a talk a couple nights ago…right after I had read this passage, and I showed him the comparison. I told him I didn’t know how similar it was, or if this was just something that I was coming up with…and he disagreed, saying that he also could see the connection quite clearly…and it encouraged him. I just hope that our modern day Job gets his interview with God soon…and that God will not allow this test to go on much longer. The spiritual war is really hurting Patrick…and he just wants to be with God…. If you think about him… please pray…