"" Writer's Wanderings: My COVID Book Corner--Be Patient

Thursday, October 08, 2020

My COVID Book Corner--Be Patient


 There have been some very good things that I have found in the midst of this pandemic. One of them was the opportunity to begin reading through the chronological Bible--a Bible organized a little closer to the timeline of historical events. I got to Job and read through the book and then wondered what I had read. I've been through Job before but I don't think I ever took the time to try to understand it. I needed help.

Help came through a book by Warren Wiersbe called Be Patient.  Wiersbe takes all the flowery poetic phrases and makes them a little easier to understand. In a short period of time, Job lost his wealth and his children and his position in the community. We find him sitting on an ash pile and scraping boils with broken pottery.

Ah, but three friends spin a lot of rhetoric telling Job what is wrong with him and his relationship with God. Job continues to trust God through it all even though at times he questions why he has come to such ruin. Once Wiersbe puts it in language a little easier to understand, I realized how these know-it-all friends really didn't help Job much nor did they know it all.

While Job is a righteous man and trusts in God, he still questions why he has been put through all of this. He challenges God to show him where he has gone wrong. How often we question God when things go wrong.

In the end God triumphs over Satan in that Job remains faithful and He chastises Job's friends. Job intercedes for them and forgives them. In the end, Job's faithfulness is rewarded with a blessing of double what he had before he lost it all. 

While I've always heard the phrase "the patience of Job," in the end I think it was more the patience of God that prevailed. Oh, and I have to smile when Job's wife lost her patience and just told him to curse God and die. Hmmm. There must be a lesson there somewhere as well. Lots more to learn. Wiersbe's book is a good start.

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