It has been most encouraging to see the generous response from New Zealanders to October’s Pacific tsunami. I was honoured to represent the Presbyterian Church at a memorial service for tsunami victims at the Waitakere stadium in West Auckland. Numerous community and church fundraising events have been held around the country. Many people and congregations have supported Christian World Service and other emergency appeals. Our prayers continue for the families and comm-unities affected by the tsunami.
Interestingly, around the time of the tsunami, the book of Job featured in the weekly lectionary readings.
Probably more than any other book in the Bible, this remarkable story focuses the mind on the question of how we might interpret the suffering of the innocent.
Job’s friends present him with a variety of interpretations, including the possibility that suffering is the means by which Job is being punished, corrected and humbled by God. Job not only refutes these arguments; he calls God to account, protesting as he does so that there is no end to injustice in a world where evil people seem to prosper and good people suffer without cause.
As far as Job’s friends are concerned, Job’s protest is blasphemous. How dare Job question God’s wisdom and justice? If he truly was a person of faith, he would look within himself for the cause of his plight.
After the friends’ arguments have run their course, God finally speaks. As God’s sovereignty is asserted, Job is simultaneously chastised, humbled and vindicated; his so-called friends are humiliated and punished. By the end of God’s speech, it is notable that many of Job’s questions have not been answered, but that does not matter, for he has been addressed personally by the living God. His protest has been heard; his trust in God has been renewed, and he repents.
When we place the book of Job alongside the New Testament witness to Christ, we find the notion of God’s sovereignty being extended. It is now located not in the inscrutable will of God but in the resolve of a God who comes alongside us, enters our suffering, plumbs the depths of our alienation and draws us into the resurrection life. It is located in God’s love.
This is the remarkable Good News by which we live, and which we celebrate afresh each Advent and Christmas season. It enables us to joyfully and defiantly celebrate life in the midst of death, to give voice to hope in the midst of despair and to detect signs of goodness in the midst of chaos. How does St John put it in Revelation 21? “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.”
May the One whose birth we celebrate this Christmas draw each of us more fully into His grace and truth.