Day 151: Job 31, 32 and 33

I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a girl. (Job 31:1)

In the 1983 film WarGames, Matthew Broderick plays a teenage computer whiz kid who accidentally hacks into the missile defense of the United States. Thinking he’s found his way into a computer game company, he’s eager to sample their newest product. He comes across such files as Tic-Tac-Toe, Chess,… and a very intriguing Global Thermonuclear War.

The computer asks: Do you want to play a game? And before he knows what’s happening, the computer locks him out and initiates a countdown to a preemptive nuclear strike.

While the countdown progresses, the kid challenges the computer to a game of Tic-Tac-Toe. Because two evenly matched players can play Tic-Tac-Toe indefinitely and neither of them ever win a game, the computer soon learns the concept of stalemate. It starts looking ahead through all the possible outcomes of a nuclear war and comes to a conclusion.

The only winning move is not to play.

The control room at NORAD breathes a collective sigh of relief, the world is saved, and the delinquent computer genius becomes the hero.

We may think we can play the game of lust and come out a winner but we cannot. There are always consequences for playing this game. Job had taken precautions to protect himself. When it comes to sexual fantasy and lust, the only winning move is not to play.

How are you protecting yourself? …your marriage?

Day 150: Job 28, 29 and 30

Man puts an end to the darkness; he searches the farthest recesses for ore in the blackest darkness. (Job 28:3)

Job describes an awesome, scary picture of ancient mining operations. He writes about cutting a shaft through the rock, dangling from ropes, and working in pitch blackness, illuminated only by the miners’ lamps. No bird or animal has ever seen what man discovers there in the cave’s loneliness.

But where can wisdom be found? Where does understanding dwell? (v. 12)

Job is telling us that wisdom is more valuable than even silver or rubies, and that we should be willing to go to greater lengths to find wisdom than we do to dig up sapphires and gold.

Our hero is also comparing the toils of his life to the search for riches. He has worked harder and suffered more than any treasure hunter. And he has discovered the hard truth that wisdom is more difficult to find than a vein of gold.

Do you treasure wisdom enough to keep going until you find it?

Day 149: Job 25, 26 and 27

I will never admit you are in the right; till I die, I will not deny my integrity. (Job 27:5)

One after another, first Eliphaz, then Bildad, and finally Zophar, Job’s three friends spout off the same age-old retribution wisdom. If you’re suffering, it must be because you sinned. Humble yourself and be restored.

But Job couldn’t humble himself. He had nothing to confess. To feign guilt just to gain relief wouldn’t have been right. Job was not about to let God off the hook just to ease his own discomfort.

Is there a lesson here for us? How often do we fall on our own sword, when we know we’re not in the wrong, just to make peace? If Job is a theodicy, a defense of God’s justice in the face of seemingly contradictory evidence, then it is also a study in the ethics of conflict.

How many times have I taken one for the team? While it sounds noble, it may be no better than a prizefighter taking a dive. Romans 12:18 reads: If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. But avoiding conflict isn’t always the ethical thing to do. Standing our ground may be more Christian than retreat. Winning a battle for my own glory certainly does not display a proper Christ-like attitude, but falling to the mat just to avoid the unpleasantness of conflict doesn’t either.

Have you ever kept the peace and lived to regret it?

Day 148: Job 22, 23 and 24

If only I knew where to find him. (Job 23:3)

St. John of the Cross, a 16^th century Spanish mystic, wrote The Dark Night of the Soul to describe the painful and lonely journey of an individual seeking spiritual maturity. John wrote his treatise while imprisoned by his own monastic brothers for his attempts to reform the order. It symbolizes a spiritual crisis in which God seems far off and unreachable.

Watchman Nee, the Chinese church planter who died in 1972 after twenty years in prison, wrote about the brokenness of the outer man in The Release of the Spirit. He talked about how God uses struggles and hardships in our lives to break the shell (the personality or the soul) that binds the inner man (the spirit). Nee and John could have been reading each other’s emails.

We talk about times when God seems to be hiding and our prayers bounce off the ceiling, times we cry out to God but get no answer. That’s what Job was experiencing. He was seeking, but God was nowhere to be found.

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, and am not silent (Psalm 22:1,2).

It seems that Christ also experienced the dark night of the soul.

Have your cries for God ever been answered only with silence?

Day 147: Job 19, 20 and 21

Why do the wicked live on? (Job 21:7)

There’s the crux of the matter. I know bad things happen to good people, but if it at least seemed like the scales were balanced and that the wicked suffered as much as the righteous, then I could say, Well, trouble comes to us all in equal measure.

But that’s not how it seems. While I’m struggling to pay my bills; while I’m suffering through illness and injury; while my kids are making bad choices causing me to lose sleep, my neighbor just bought another boat. Why does he need two boats? How is that fair, God?

It’s not so much that good people suffer, but that bad people so often seem to get a pass. Why do they have the advantage?

Near the end of the 1989 movie Field of Dreams, Kevin Costner’s character Ray Kinsella confronts baseball right fielder Shoeless Joe Jackson. Kinsella complains how he did all the work and went to all the expense to build a baseball field in the middle of his struggling farm, and he’s about to go under.

Kinsella: Never once have I asked, “What’s in it for me?”

Jackson: What are you saying, Ray?

Kinsella: I’m saying, What’s in it for me?

Looking at the seeming disparity between the lifestyles of the rich and famous and the lifestyle of the average believer, can you understand why Job thought life seemed unfair?

Have you ever asked, “What’s in it for me?”

Day 146: Job 16, 17 and 18

What ails you that you keep on arguing? (Job 16:3)

Job referring to his friends as miserable comforters (v. 2) reminds me of the SNL character Debbie Downer played by actress/comedienne Rachel Dratch. Debbie was that socially awkward acquaintance (we all know one) who shares depressing anecdotal information guaranteed to cast a pall over any gathering.

In one episode while the whole gang is enjoying breakfast in a Magic Kingdom novelty restaurant, one cast member says how great steak and eggs sound. Debbie’s reply: Ever since they found mad cow disease in the U.S. I’m not taking any chances. It can live in your body for years before it ravages your brain. We know she’s a lot of fun at parties.

Job goes on to say, If you were in my place, I could speak just like you. But my mouth would encourage you; my words of comfort would bring you relief (vv. 4,5 my paraphrase).

Let’s face it: some people seem to have the spiritual gift of discouragement… they’re pathological downers. Moms-to-be heading for the delivery room don’t need to hear horror stories about the pain of childbirth. People scheduled for a tax audit don’t need to be regaled with accounts of someone else’s IRS nightmares.

If you’re an encourager, keep it up. You are sure to be welcome in any gathering. If you’re a Debbie (or Donny) Downer, maybe you should just not talk.

Do you light up a room by entering it? Or by leaving it?

Day 145: Job 13, 14 and 15

Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him. (Job 13:15)

Job exhibits great confidence in his own righteousness, and even greater confidence in God.

Job’s statement highlights an important ingredient in faith. Job is saying that no matter how bad things get, no matter how dark, no matter how hopeless, he still knows where he will put his trust.

When everything’s going our way, when the sun is shining and the flowers are blooming, when we’ve just receive an A on our report card or a nice attaboy at work, who needs faith then? Faith was made for the dark times. Faith is being sure of what we hope for, and certain of what we do not see. Faith is about certainty in uncertain times.

When we can’t see what’s around the bend, that’s when we wrap ourselves in the faith that God is walking with us and will not let us down.

Can you trust in God even through the hard times?