Job's Wife
The woman in Job's life has always gotten a bad rap. She only has one line, is unnamed and isn't mentioned again. When things like that come up in the Bible I like to go back and take a good look again. Read between the lines, put myself in the place of the person, try to feel what they feel. In the instance of Job's wife I understand her a lot right now. Married to a man, watching him do everything he can to live right, honor God, raise a godly family, only to watch it taken away piece by piece and the man still sits there chin raised to heaven praising God. Everything Job lost, she lost as well. It was not her body afflicted by boils and she wasn't sitting in the ash heap, but her man was. It does something to a wife to have to sit back and watch her husband suffer. She was living in the same nightmare world that he was in, waking up every morning hoping it was all just a very bad dream.
When hardships come we have this very human tendency to shrink back into ourselves and deal with it. In our house right now, each of us have our own pains, all associated with the same losses but depending on personality and perspective we are dealing with different hurts. Our daughter lost her husband, Josh and I lost a son in law and now have to watch our daughter suffer. Its unique to each person, this grief. Like Job we may have a spouse who doesn't understand how we can still maintain relationship with a God who would allow all of this. We may have friends who come from far distances with the intention to comfort us but end up bringing on more condemnation and pain.
What I love about the story of Job is that God comes and addresses everybody and sets it all straight. Job is restored and in turn his wife is restored, and his friends are put in their place. The hardships only proved to allow him to become stronger but only through his steadfastness and God's goodness.
When hardships come we have this very human tendency to shrink back into ourselves and deal with it. In our house right now, each of us have our own pains, all associated with the same losses but depending on personality and perspective we are dealing with different hurts. Our daughter lost her husband, Josh and I lost a son in law and now have to watch our daughter suffer. Its unique to each person, this grief. Like Job we may have a spouse who doesn't understand how we can still maintain relationship with a God who would allow all of this. We may have friends who come from far distances with the intention to comfort us but end up bringing on more condemnation and pain.
What I love about the story of Job is that God comes and addresses everybody and sets it all straight. Job is restored and in turn his wife is restored, and his friends are put in their place. The hardships only proved to allow him to become stronger but only through his steadfastness and God's goodness.
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