Photo by Cristian Palmer on Unsplash
Whenever you read the title to a blog post and say, "Man, this is gonna be bleak," you know you're in for something fun.
That's a pretty daunting title, believe me, and I guess it should be. Hopelessness might just be the most futile feeling in the world. Hopelessness is that idea that nothing matters and nothing can change it.
Hopelessness is the root of depression, or the byproduct. I suppose that's sort of a chicken-and-egg situation, isn't it?
I've said before that one of the things I enjoy about H.P. Lovecraft's fiction is how well he encapsulates hopelessness with his cosmic horror. Okay, maybe enjoy is the wrong word. I can at least say I admire it, right, in that he does an excellent job of evoking that emotion with his fiction. You have to be impressed.
But hopelessness in fiction is one thing. Hopelessness in a person's life is entirely different.
When you're fighting hopelessness, you're fighting against the deepest, heaviest anchor you've ever dragged in your life. That hopelessness has a way of weighing you down and pulling you apart.
In our Sunday School class this past week, we talked about Job. If anyone ever had a reason for hopelessness, it was Job.
I think people frequently take the wrong lesson from Job. See, for the first few chapters of Job, after he's been overcome with affliction, he seems okay. He is praising God and talking about how he will submit to the Lord's judgment, and I think some people take from that this idea of stoicism in the eye of suffering.
Some people use Job as an excuse to bolster their throw-away phrase of "Someone always has it worse off than you." If you're ever tempted to use that noxious phrase when talking to someone who is hurting, just don't. Maybe take that same mentality and tell yourself, "There is always someone more capable of helping them than you are."
"Yep. Still here." (Photo by Fineas Anton on Unsplash)
But we can look at Job and say, "Oh, man. If this guy had to endure the loss of his 10 kids, his health, something like 10,000 goats, who am I to complain? I've never even lost one goat!"
That's not the lesson to take away from Job.
The lesson to take away from Job is that suffering doesn't mean you're evil, for starters. Sure, sometimes we experience troubles in life because we've brought them on ourselves. There are natural consequences and there are Heavenly consequences for our actions, but not all suffering is a direct result of these consequences.
Of course, if you get a speeding ticket because you're driving 30 miles over the limit, you can't blame anybody but yourself. You know you did wrong. If your carburetor explodes and turns your working vehicle into a modern art piece, that's not likely to be a punishment from the Lord. Do you see the difference?
Sometimes, things just happen.
And even though Job's affliction was indirectly from God, in that God allowed it to happen, it wasn't a punishment. It was an education and, ultimately a blessing.
Something I learned about Job when I was writing this Sunday School lesson last week has amazed me ever since. And not just the fact that Job complains about how tasteless and bland egg whites are. (That's not a joke.)
See, the old Hebrew idea of life and the afterlife was very different from what we know to be true now. They had a pretty futile outlook on death and humanity in that there were no post-death rewards benefits. There was just a place called Sheol, that was their cultural belief. That is evident when we look at what Job says to God in one of his tirades.
“How frail is humanity!
How short is life, how full of trouble!
2 We blossom like a flower and then wither.
Like a passing shadow, we quickly disappear.
3 Must you keep an eye on such a frail creature
and demand an accounting from me?
4 Who can bring purity out of an impure person?
No one!
5 You have decided the length of our lives.
You know how many months we will live,
and we are not given a minute longer.
6 So leave us alone and let us rest!
We are like hired hands, so let us finish our work in peace.
7 “Even a tree has more hope!
If it is cut down, it will sprout again
and grow new branches.
8 Though its roots have grown old in the earth
and its stump decays,
9 at the scent of water it will bud
and sprout again like a new seedling.
10 “But when people die, their strength is gone.
They breathe their last, and then where are they?
11 As water evaporates from a lake
and a river disappears in drought,
12 people are laid to rest and do not rise again.
Until the heavens are no more, they will not wake up
nor be roused from their sleep.
Job 14:1-12 (NLT)
Job is talking about the end of his life as the end of everything. In his mind, he's about to die from these sores and boils. He's about to die from everything he's dealing with, and it's God's fault.
On the one hand, that does imply a certain understanding of God's power. Yes, God is omnipotent. Nothing happens in this world that God couldn't prevent. By our thought, God is culpable.
Think about all of the people who know about child abuse or spousal abuse and say nothing. We hold them accountable for that inaction, don't we?
So shouldn't we still hold God accountable for everything that happens, whether he directly caused it or not?
Yeah, actually. We should. But the way we handle that isn't right, and let me explain.
See, Job's tirade doesn't end with his hopelessness. He goes on to add a corollary, and this corollary is quite interesting when juxtaposed with what God reveals through Jesus in the New Testament. See if you catch my meaning here.
“I wish you would hide me in the grave
and forget me there until your anger has passed.
But mark your calendar to think of me again!
14 Can the dead live again?
If so, this would give me hope through all my years of struggle,
and I would eagerly await the release of death.
15 You would call and I would answer,
and you would yearn for me, your handiwork.
16 For then you would guard my steps,
instead of watching for my sins.
17 My sins would be sealed in a pouch,
and you would cover my guilt.
Job 14:13-17
Do you see what he said that's so intriguing here?
Job says that if he knew of another life, then he would be satisfied and he would live with hope. He says that if he knew there was something more, then God would treat him differently.
But look closely. What Job describes is exactly what God does. And what God did in sending Jesus.
Considering that Job is the oldest book in the Bible, that's pretty incredible.
I said earlier that we should hold God accountable for everything that happens to us, and I stand by that. Because you know what happened to Job in the end? He saw God. God spoke to him in a whirlwind, and God spoke pretty harshly, but God taught Job.
Then Job replied to the Lord:
2 “I know that you can do anything,
and no one can stop you.
3 You asked, ‘Who is this that questions my wisdom with such ignorance?’
It is I—and I was talking about things I knew nothing about,
things far too wonderful for me.
4 You said, ‘Listen and I will speak!
I have some questions for you,
and you must answer them.’
5 I had only heard about you before,
but now I have seen you with my own eyes.
6 I take back everything I said,
and I sit in dust and ashes to show my repentance.”
Job 42:1-6
If Job hadn't gone through the suffering he went through, he would have never "known" God in the way that he did. He would have never come to know the God he worshiped. Sure, Job was a God-fearing man. He was a good and righteous man. But Job was still living in that old covenant that had a degree of separation between God and man that ran counter to what the Lord wanted for his relationship with people.
But through Job's suffering, he got to truly experience God. Now the gift of Jesus means we don't have to experience suffering to get to know God. God has already made a way for us to know Him and to be close to Him, but Job didn't have that yet.
God allowed Job to suffer, but then God made himself known to Job. And you know what? Job didn't die immediately after his affliction. He lived another 140 years. That's 140 years of life with a deep, knowing relationship with the God he worshipped.
I'm not telling you to never be sad. I'm not telling you to shout and sing and be exuberant about suffering. And God's not saying that, either. Remember when "Jesus wept?" Yeah, He knew what He was going to do. He knew that Lazarus wouldn't be dead much longer, but He was moved by the sadness around Him.
I'm just telling you that hopelessness can be defeated. We can have hope because this life isn't the end. And our suffering isn't forever if we know Jesus Christ. God made a way to be sure that our suffering wouldn't last forever.
When you're fighting through that hopelessness, I know it doesn't feel like you will ever get out of it. It feels like your new reality that you've just got to struggle through. But there is always an end to suffering, probably sooner rather than later.
But if you don't know God the way that Job learned to, and if you don't know Jesus the way that He wants to know you, then you'll never be able to fully escape that suffering.
Let me encourage you in this, that Jesus does love you and, even though you're suffering today, He wants to be your escape from that suffering.