Job 2:12 – And when they lifted up their eyes afar off, and knew him not, they lifted up their voice, and wept; and they rent every one his mantle, and sprinkled dust upon their heads toward heaven.

Hello readers, continuing in Job’s life and still at the start of the ordeal! They knew him not. Job’s friend’s had come to mourn with him and to comfort him. And so here they come… they’ve heard about what’s going on in his life. But they’ve only heard, they’ve not seen as yet. Then they arrive and they see this once great man… and he’s unrecognizable to them. What was prosperity, happiness, success… is now so different. Job’s life was a trainwreck. Job was sitting in the ashes scraping his boils, bankrupt, broken, befuddled. You can see how they came to the conclusion that it was something he had done, it was clear to them God was angry with him. Yet they hear Job complain, and it isn’t an acknowledgement of sin… it’s him bemoaning ever being conceived and born. So they’re like hey Job, it’s your fault, not God’s fault. These guys made many wrong assumptions about God, and they ended up being used by Satan to accuse Job, and they didn’t comfort him, they helped to dig a pit for him as Job said.

But today we see that your greatest testimony can be in the roughest part of your life. They knew him not. Don’t expect others to know what you’re going through. The fiery trial of our faith can not make sense to anyone else… and that’s ok. But we need to learn how to not be like Job’s friends. He was so different to them. What on earth had happened. You may never go through a Job like experience, and hopefully you don’t. But your light will shine brightest when it is darkest. If you have the light of Christ in you that is. If you have the light in an earthen vessel of your human life, well when broken, that light can shine forth. Job would later have the testimony of great is thy faithfulness… how God brought him through. Job’s faith was tested, and it came through the fire. If your faith isn’t test, how will you know what it’s worth? How do we handle adversity? How do we handle injustices of life? How we do is a testimony to others. Yet even as unrecognizable as he was from the past Job of his past life, he held his integrity and sinned not.

Job’s friends weren’t privvy to the discussion between God and Satan. They got it all wrong even with all their wisdom and life experience. Age does not always equate to wisdom. This was happening to Job because he was doing right! He was such an exemplary case of a faithful man that God used him to prove the infallibility of his grace in the face of Satan. It casts our minds to Jesus Christ, who came through life sinless and was victorious over sin, death, hell. Here was a man Satan couldn’t defeat, whom Satan could not find basis for accusation. Job’s friends became accusers. You see Eliphaz open his mouth, and he accuses Job. Be careful you don’t look on the exterior of someone’s life and get it all wrong. You’ll end up not being a help, but a hindrance. His situation made them afraid, yet they condemned him with their words. They came with the purpose of comforting, but they didn’t really comfort him did they? Miserable comforters are ye all.

Job’s friends didn’t know him. And they couldn’t offer him anything of value. Maybe when life hits you’ll find out you really didn’t know that person at all. When life gets real things change real quick, and God uses circumstances of life to sort people out, who and what people truly are. And so it was with Job’s life and God used it for Job’s good… his ending was beginning, and so it will be with all of us if we trust in the Lord Jesus Christ and cling to him through the storms that may come our way in our life… even when nobody else “gets us” or can offer us comfort or whatever, but all we need ultimately is who  Job had all along… the LORD God. We think of the one who ultimately we all did not know… the Lord Jesus. Even the Bible says John the Baptist knew him not. We need God to reveal Jesus Christ to each of us personally. In our blindness we cannot see him, we cannot acknowledge him, we cannot be saved. Pray for God to open your eyes to the Lord Jesus Christ, because that’s who we need, it’s who Job needed, and who we all need.

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