What We Didn't Deserve

10.28.11

Job 19.28-29 28 “If you say, ‘How we will hound him, since the root of the trouble lies in him,’ 29 you should fear the sword yourselves; for wrath will bring punishment by the sword, and then you will know that there is judgment.” NIV

I don’t think Job could embrace why what was happening to him was happening to him. To be sure, he had moments of terrific doubt; his confidence was shaken, and all that he had relied on up to this point seemed useless and small. Tragedy can do that to a person. Especially when it is out of the blue… as tragedy seems mostly to be.

When things go wrong, my guess is most of us tend to look inward and ask, “What did I do?” I know people looking at us think that. I believe that was Job’s case. Unfortunately for Job his friends asked the same question: what did you do!? They were convinced that Job was being punished for some huge, secret, unforsaken sin. In their thinking, it had to be – why else would anyone suffer at the level Job was suffering if they hadn’t done something wrong?

The Book of Job is not just a clever story with sound intellectual point and counterpoint. Job’s is the real story of a real guy who experienced real tragedy, who had real friends who were really convinced that Job had done something really wrong to get what he got: to them that is how life worked: a series of paybacks. And here is Job’s defense…

“Since you are convinced I did something wrong to deserve this; and you’re going to attack me until you get me to fess up to what you are sure is the truth; since we’re going to play that game, then beware: you should fear the sword yourselves; for wrath will bring punishment by the sword, and then you will know that there is judgment.” In other words, don’t think you’ll escape if this is your only understanding of what is happening to me. If you think I am being punished, watch out: you will be too! Job was right: we cannot assess one set of reasoning just to one person that we can’t or won’t to others – the reasoning applies to all of us!

How often I have danced the dance inside when someone I don’t care for gets what I think they deserve. No one gets what they deserve – at least according to God. And if there is a truth for me today it is this: No one gets what they deserve because God is working in everyone’s life to give them what they don’t deserve: life. We are all sinners and deserve death. Ultimately we will get what we choose, but because of His love, mercy, and grace we don’t get what we deserve. Yes, there is wrath, and yes, there is a death and after that to face the judgment; but getting what we deserve…? Job was trying to tell his friends not to think that way about God.

 And hell? Hell is the destination of our choosing. Sitting in hell for eternity will be the cost of denying the goodness and reality of God who went way out of His way to give us what we didn’t deserve…