Pray:
O Lord, I yearn for the day that I will see You face to face, when I will know even as I am known.
Read:
Job 19:1-29
Reflect:
Do you know Jesus to be a friend in suffering?
In this chapter, we read Job's response to Bildad's ultimately futile theories about why suffering exists. Here, his supposed words of comfort are exposed as directly opposite. Job's feelings of isolation, hinted at in chapter 9, return with fuller force. Everyone shuns him, he says (13-22). Job's friends had started off so well. They sat with their suffering friend in silence (2:11-13). It's a pity they didn't continue their vigil in the same way!
When friends let you down, remember there is another friend who won't. Job calls him "Redeemer" (25). In Hebrew law, this was your closest male relative, whose job it was to buy back your property if you had to sell it to survive, avenge your death and father children with your wife if you died childless, so that your family line continued. Jesus, our Redeemer, defeats death and gives us a future and a lasting inheritance.
In the midst of suffering, when we feel alone and friendless, it's comforting to know we have "a friend who sticks closer than a brother" (Prov. 18:24).
Apply:
Picture Jesus whispering, "I'm with you." What is the effect as you hear those words and sense his presence?
Pray:
Faithful Lord, who gave all to redeem me, I love You, and I trust You forever.
