Job has it bad, and he knows it. He has lost everything. His lands, his livestock, his children, his health, his riches are all gone. Everything he loved, everything he depended on is all gone. And he doesn’t know what to do here. He has no recourse, and nowhere to go. He curses his life, but he does not curse God.  He questions why God would let someone be born and live only to suffer so much. He wonders why God gave him so much only to take it away, but he still acknowledges that “the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.” He understands that nothing is inherently his, and whatever he had was at the will of God. He wishes for death because he knows that in death his suffering will be over. But throughout his suffering, and we only see one chapter of it in today’s readings, even as he acknowledges his suffering, he does not turn against God, and in Chapter 19 he says, “I know that my redeemer lives.” He looks forward to whatever time when his suffering will be done and he says, “I will see God… How my heart yearns within me.” Despite his hardships, he is still yearning to be with God after all.

As REM says, “Everybody hurts, sometimes.” And everybody does hurt sometimes, and everybody suffers at some point. It’s natural to want someone to blame. And it’s easy to want to give up. REM says, “well hang on, don’t let yourself go.” Job, who really has a very bad time, wishes he was never even born to live through such suffering, but he doesn’t blame, and he doesn’t give up, and he knows if it doesn’t get better here on earth, it will get better after. Job’s life does actually get better here on earth (although I don’t think he is made whole – his children die and even though he ends up with more children, they are not the ones who died. You can’t get that back) and he lives a long life seeing those children and their children grow up. But he knows throughout that this world is not his, these things are not his, and his real home is where he will see God.