From out of the Whirlwind…

Sermon by Jamie Howison on Job 38:1-7, 34-41 and Mark 10:35-45

So back to the book of Job we go for another Sunday. Last week I made the observation that while the first two chapters of the book are written in prose and picture a steadfast and longsuffering Job, at the beginning of chapter 3 if shifts to poetry, where it remains until partway through the final chapter—chapter 42—when it shifts back to prose again. That’s over forty chapters of poetry compared to just over two and a half chapters of prose, and if you were to read just the prose—just the opening two chapters and the closing section of chapter 42—you have a picture of a patient, just, unflinchingly faithful Job, who is vindicated for his long-suffering faithfulness. But inserted between the opening and closing sections, we hear Job complain, agonize, rage, assert, and challenge God to show him what he has done to deserve this mess that he is in.

He’s suffering, and suffering badly, and so along come these three friends—the “comforters” they’re called—named Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar, who sit quietly with Job for seven full days, after which he opens his mouth and protests that he is innocent; that he has done nothing to deserve the mess he is in. Not so fast, Job, the three friends begin to protest, and one after another they set out their basic, air-tight theological framework, which can be summed up as follows: “God rewards the good and punishes the wicked; you are clearly suffering and being punished, therefore you must have acted wickedly; repent and be restored.” Full stop.

But that won’t do it for dear old Job, who the prose section has gone to great lengths to show as a just and righteous man. And so, for the better part of thirty chapters, Job stubbornly protests his innocence. How can I be in this mess if God is good? Show your face, God, and tell me where I have gone wrong. Show me why I have lost everything.

Well, the three comforters fall silent as chapter 32 begins, at which point another figure named Elihu appears, and he sets in with a slightly different tack, saying essentially, “God is greater than any mortal, so just surrender Job.” On Job’s part, there is no answer… but then chapter 38 arrives, with a rather powerful beginning: “Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind…”

We’re in that whirlwind tonight, as we heard words like, “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding,” and “Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, so that a flood of waters may cover you?” Right through chapters 38 and 39 that voice continues, saying essentially, “Who has made all things that are? Could you do this? Do you have the slightest idea of what makes the world what it is, Job?

There’s a moment as chapter 40 begins that Job tries to surrender, saying,

‘See, I am of small account; what shall I answer you?

I lay my hand on my mouth.

I have spoken once, and I will not answer;

twice, but will proceed no further.’

Yet that isn’t enough. There is a surrender, but it is only partial, and so the voice of God thunders for the better part of two more chapters, until Job truly surrenders.

I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear,

but now my eye sees you;

therefore I despise myself,

and repent in dust and ashes.

And—looking ahead to next week’s reading from the book—Job’s restoration begins. I’m just going to touch on that restoration, and leave things off until next week, when Helen Kennedy will be preaching, and she may well pick up on the story. What I do want to pick up on is the strange resolution of the interchange between Job and his God, as it is set out in this dense and unusual book.

In 1947 C.S. Lewis brought a book into print in memory of his late friend Charles Williams. Titled Essays Presented to Charles Williams, the book included essays by Lewis himself, J.R.R. Tolkien, Owen Barfield, and Dorothy Sayers, among others. In the preface, Lewis remembered an exchange he’d had with Williams, writing:

If [a human] wanted to carry its hot complaints to the very Throne [of heaven], even that, Williams felt, would be a permitted absurdity. For was not that very much what Job had done? It was true, Williams added, that the Divine answer had taken the surprising form of inviting Job to study the hippopotamus and the crocodile. But Job’s impatience had been approved. His apparent blasphemies had been accepted. The weight of the divine displeasure had been reserved for the “comforters,” the self-appointed advocates on God’s side, the people who tried to show that all was well—‘the sort of people,’ Williams said, immeasurably dropping his lower jaw and fixing me with his eyes—‘the sort of people who wrote books on the Problem of Pain.’ (xiii)

It is too easy, Williams was saying, to try to make sense out of everything, in a world that is often beyond that kind of “good sense.” Consider the hippopotamus—called the “behemoth” in Job 40—consider the crocodile—the “leviathan” of Job 41… can you even fathom these creatures, Job? Yet his impatience has been approved, his apparent blasphemies accepted, and the wrath of God is reserved for the three comforters, who had so blithely trotted out their theological views, and in the end are shown as shallow, hollow, and in need of Job’s prayers. Williams’ line about Lewis’s well-known book The Problem of Pain is not without its own power either, as Lewis himself would later have to face when his own life came to pieces in the death of his beloved wife. Sometimes we don’t know nearly so much as we think we know.

I’m put to mind here of Jesus’ struggle to have his poor disciples get his core message into their too often thick skulls. In today’s Gospel reading, James and John come forward asking him “to do for us whatever we ask of you,” which when you think about it is a heck of a thing to request. “And Jesus said to them, ‘What is it you want me to do for you?’ And they said to him, ‘Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.’” Hmmm…

You don’t know what you’re asking, he says to them. Are you ready to drink this cup and be baptized in the way that will happen to me? “Sure, sure we are!” Oh my brothers, you don’t have a clue.

Meanwhile, the other ten disciples are getting mad with James and John, though perhaps only because they had dared to ask for what the others had all wanted? And so Jesus sits them down, and once again tries to teach them what he is about.

You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.

Their heads nod up and down, but they’re still as clouded in their understanding as were Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. They’re working with these airtight sorts of religious systems, which frankly won’t do when it comes to Jesus, much less to this very real and so often complicated world. “Sure, sure, Jesus… we understand… but who gets those good seats beside you in glory?”

Steve Bell has often told the story of a dream he had many years ago, which I think slices straight to the heart of what is on the table tonight. It was at the time of the Ethiopian famine, probably around 1987 or thereabouts. In the dream Steve was in what seemed an eternal space, filled with countless people. He was sitting in the lap of God—not because he deserved it, but because it was his turn to be there—yet looking out he could sense no real distance between people. It was a warm, quiet, beautiful space, filled with millions of people, yet distance meant nothing. All he had to do was think about someone or speak to someone, and they were right there with him.

And then he heard someone weeping. It was a woman, and she stood up in that endless space and began to tell the story of her son, who was in terrible trouble with his addictions and on the verge of death. Steve sensed God nodding in acknowledgement, but no word was spoken. One after another people began to stand up and speak of the crying needs in the lives of people they loved, and each time there was just that same wordless acknowledgement. At some point an Ethiopian man stood up and begged for help for his people, his country. Again God simply nodded, and Steve found himself getting angrier and angrier at this lack of any real response. As he recalls the dream, he no longer cherished being there, but instead wanted to climb down and to the ground. And then a tear fell; he felt it fall. And everyone heard—wordlessly heard—“If you knew what I know, you’d sit still.” A strange consolation, but a consolation all the same. You can’t possibly understand; not this, not now. You can’t understand, but you might be able to feel God’s tear as it falls. And maybe, for now, that is enough.

So we hear these stories of Job, of James and John, and of Steve, and hopefully we can begin to cope with the fact that there is more going on than meets the eye. Sometimes that’s not easy, and so sometimes our own presuppositions will come lurching forward to try to take over and make life and the world and God and Christ Jesus a bit easier to swallow.

But sometimes we hear the stories, and we find in them a kind of consolation that says we—I—don’t need to have it all figured out, because in the long run I know I can trust this God to be faithful… even if that “long run” can feel very, very long indeed.