“But he is unchangeable, and who can turn him back? What he desires, that he does. For he will complete what he appoints for me, and many such things are in his mind.” (Job 23:13-14)
What comes next?
“Therefore, I am joyously content…”?
“Therefore, I will trust Him…”?
“Therefore, I can relax…”?
Nope.
“Therefore, I am terrified at his presence; when I consider, I am in dread of him. God has made my heart faint; the Almighty has terrified me…”
Job 23:13-14 is only good news if “God is for us”. If you are convinced, like Job, that “the arrows of the Almighty” are in you, and if you have no knowledge that there is an “arbiter to lay his hand on us both”, then the immutability and power of God is something that evokes terror rather than peace.
This is why a good amount of our counseling of hurting people (including ourselves) is to buttress—or establish–a confidence in the goodness of God. Furthermore, our hearts and minds must be readjusted to believe that our greatest good is conformity to Jesus and drinking from the fountain of God’s sustaining grace.
Here comes a really weird transition statement…
I almost killed a guy once.
It was not intentional. Total accident. I was playing church league slow-pitch softball and hit a rocket to third base. The ball hit something, took a bad hop, and absolutely jacked the face of the third baseman. (Actually one of my former students, that I had poured a good amount of time into). He was hurt pretty bad but I left the ball park, feeling pretty bad but convinced that I had only broken his nose.
A few hours later the news turned grim. Apparently he had some sort of condition that made that part of his cranium softer than normal. He now had swelling on his brain and it was looking pretty serious. Needless to say, I was pretty shaken up.
During this time someone assured me “God is in control”. They pretty much told me Job 23:13-14. My response was similar to Job’s…terror. I knew that God was more dedicated to His glory than He was to my unblemished not-accidentally-killing-a-guy record. I knew that He could very well allow my friend to die and I would be (in part) the reason, though accidentally.
Again, the counsel that I needed was not “God is in control”. The counsel that I needed was that “God is good”. I needed to know that he would withhold no good thing from me. I needed to be reminded that all things work together for good (fundamentally conformity to Christ).
Thankfully the story is that I almost killed a guy once. But I learned a valuable lesson during that time—that often it is the goodness and not the sovereignty of God that suffering people must be graciously reminded of.
