Читать книгу What Everyone Needs to Know Before They Grow Up! - Eddie Boone's Phillips - Страница 5

Once upon a time, in a place called Uz, there lived a guy named Job. The Bible says that he was a good man, well respected by his friends and neighbors, and someone who loved the Lord with all his heart. In other words, he was definitely a cut above everyone else, a man who stood out among the crowd.

Because Job was such a righteous person, God blessed him greatly. He had ten children, a large estate, and many possessions. When I say “many”, I’m talking 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 head of cattle, 500 donkeys, and a bunch of servants to take care of them all. Face it, the guy was filthy rich! But as we’ll see, one’s circumstances in life can change in an instant.

OK, we pick up our story with God admiring His creation. All of a sudden He sees Satan snooping around. The Lord suspects that Mr. Evil is up to no good, so He decides to stop and have a little chat with him. The conversation goes something like this:

“Hey Satan, what have you been up to?”

“Oh, just roaming the earth looking for souls to devour.”

“Why does that not surprise me?”

“By the way, God, I thought those people were made in Your own image.”

“They are.”

“Well, I must say I’m not impressed.” “Really?”

“Really.”

“Well, what about my main man Job over there?”

“Him? What’s so special about Job?” “He’s a righteous man, well respected by others, and he loves Me with all his heart.”

“Is that so?”

“Yep.”

“Hmm, seems to me that Job only loves You because You have blessed him so richly.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah, and I bet if You took all his possessions away he would curse You to Your face.”

“No he wouldn’t.” “You wanna bet?”

“OK, you’re on, but whatever you do, don’t lay a hand on him. Deal?”

“Deal,” said Satan as he leaves to do his dirty work.

Well, up until this point Job has led a wonderful life. However, that’s about to quickly change. In the course of one day all his cattle and donkeys are stolen, his sheep are destroyed by fire, rustlers make off with his camels and most of his servants are killed. But worst of all, Job’s children die in a terrible wind storm. Of course, the Devil is behind all of this, and he’s sure the Lord’s favorite will now curse His name.

Yet things don’t turn out like Satan thought they would. Job mourns for his losses, but never once does he sin or blame God for his misfortunes. As a matter of fact, what Job says makes the Devil furious: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I shall return there. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21, NASB).

But Satan isn’t about to give up that easily. No way! Sometime later he runs into God again, and this time he tells the Lord that Job would curse His name if he were to experience bodily pain and suffering. Well, the bet is on again. God gives him one more crack at Job. However, the Devil has to promise not to kill him.

As you can imagine, things are already bad enough for Job. He’s lost his family and he’s flat broke. But now Satan causes big, painful, pus-filled sores to pop up all over his body. They extend all the way from the top of his head to the soles of his feet. He looks so hideous that not even the flies buzzing around his head will dare touch his skin (pretty disgusting, huh?).

Needless to say, Job is miserable. He’s hurting so much that he wishes he had never been born. And to make matters worse, his wife tells him that he might as well go ahead and curse God before he dies.

Still, Job won’t do it. He tells her that if you are going to accept the good things in life from the Lord, then you must also be prepared to accept the bad. That’s something most of us don’t think about when adversity strikes.

Poor Job. By now, you’re probably wondering what else could possibly go wrong for him. Well, three of his friends hear what has happened and they come by to cheer him up. But instead of making him feel better, they tell him that he must have done something really bad to deserve such punishment. Yet Job knows he hasn’t done anything wrong. There is no way he deserves the hardships he is experiencing, and for his friends to think that just makes everything worse.

Finally, after days of torment, Job cries out to God and demands to know why all of this is happening. The Lord appears to him in the midst of a storm cloud and the two of them have a heart to heart talk. Although God is not happy with Job questioning His authority to do whatever He wants, the Lord nevertheless restores his health and wealth. However, God never does tell Job why he had to endure such tribulation.

And so it is with us today. There’s a reason for everything, but as mere mortals there are some things we will never know in this life. But for the faithful all wrongs will be righted in heaven, and whatever trials we experience here will only last a moment in comparison to the eternity that awaits us.

Certainly, one of the hardest lessons for anyone to learn is that life is not always fair. As we have just seen, Job found this out the hard way. He got caught up in a tug-of-war between good and evil, and as a result he endured tremendous heartache and suffering through no fault of his own.

However, Job is not the only one who has ever suffered injustice. Sometimes kids get blamed for stuff their brothers or sisters do. There are times when the most talented don’t get picked for the school play or the cheerleading squad. Often the most qualified applicant gets turned down for the job. In addition, really bad things like floods, earthquakes and fatal illnesses afflict innocent victims for no apparent reason. It’s just a fact of life.

Unfortunately, when tragedies like these occur we tend to blame God. We think to ourselves “Why me?” or “What did I do to deserve this?” But as we have seen in the case of Job, sometimes Satan is the culprit behind all of our troubles. They don’t call him the “Great Deceiver” for nothing. He uses every trick in the book to try to get us to lose our faith in the Lord. Injustice is only one of the many weapons at his disposal.

But no matter if the Devil did it or God allowed it to happen, or we were just unlucky enough to suffer for someone else’s poor judgment (such as accidents caused by drunk drivers), we need to accept the fact that some hardship and disappointment is inevitable. We all experience both good and bad times in life.

Yet, what’s really important is how we react to the misfortunes that come our way. Usually, our natural reaction is to cry foul, to pout about it, and then tell everyone how badly we have been treated. But what then? Well, either we can give up and let our problems defeat us, or we can use the occasion to become better and stronger people. Believe it or not, the thing that seems so devastating today may very well end up being good for us in the long run.

Let me tell you about someone who discovered this for herself. Not too many years ago there was a young lady named Sarah. This girl was quite a volleyball player. She was good, really good.

When Sarah was in the eighth grade she went out for her junior varsity team at school. During tryouts it was quite evident to everyone that she was one of the better players out on the court. But when the team roster was posted, her name was not on it.

Sarah was crushed. She couldn’t understand why she didn’t make the squad. She was clearly better than several of the girls who were selected. It just didn’t make any sense.

That afternoon Sarah came home from school in tears. It was all so unfair, and she thought she would never play volleyball again. But after a couple of days the crying turned into anger, and later that turned into determination. She decided to show everyone that the coach was wrong.

After the season was over Sarah signed up for a club volleyball team. Her coach was a former college star who really knew her stuff. She heard what had happened to Sarah, and she spent a lot of time giving her one-on-one instruction. This, plus the excellent competition the team faced that year, made her a much better player.

The next season Sarah went out for her school team again. This time she made it, but she didn’t stay there very long. She was playing so well, the varsity coach pulled her up to his squad. Sarah went on to have an outstanding career, eventually being named team captain and getting a scholarship to play college ball. It was quite a turnaround from her initial disappointment.

When anyone asks Sarah what was the highlight of her playing days, she always says it was when she was cut from her JV volleyball team. For you see, it was that injustice that gave her the motivation she needed to become the elite athlete she eventually became. In reality, that coach did her a favor. If she had made the school team that first year, she probably would have been an average player at best. It’s amazing how things work out sometimes.

So what can we learn from all of this? Well, life is not always fair. Unpleasant things will happen to all of us that we don’t deserve. However, it does us no good to obsess over why it happened, nor does it help to sit around and feel sorry for ourselves. What’s important is how we react to the unfortunate circumstances that befall us. Neither Sarah nor Job ever gave up. They refused to let the injustices of life defeat them. They used adversity to become better, stronger people. Will others be able to say the same thing about you?

THINGS TO REMEMBER

EVERYONE HAS PROBLEMS - SOME ARE JUST BETTER AT HIDING THEM THAN OTHERS.

NOTHING CAN STEAL YOUR FAITH IN GOD. YOU’LL HAVE TO LOSE THAT ON YOUR OWN.

ADVERSITY IS LIKE FERTILIZER FOR THE SOUL. SURE IT STINKS NOW, BUT IT WILL GROW CHARACTER FOR THE FUTURE.