The Book of Job

[Machadaynu]

I mentioned my thoughts on The Book of Job in the 'Back to Church' thread, and it was suggested that I start a new thread about it. So here it is.

The story of the book of Job is (to quote myself from the other thread):

God is chatting to Satan and mentions how Job is his best follower and would never lose faith. Satan essentially has a bet with God that Job would turn on God if his life wasn't so great. God, for some reason, accepts this deal with the proviso that Satan doesn't kill Job. It's not explained why God is chewing the fat with Satan rather than, say, destroying him completely, what with God being omnipotent and Satan being pure evil.

Anyway, Satan sends all sorts of illness to Job, kills all his animals, destroys his farm and kills his entire family. God, being omniscient, knew this would happen when he took on the bet - he knew Job would suffer, and he knew Job would remain true to him. Quite why he needed to prove this to Satan (pure evil, remember) is something of a mystery.

In the end God gives Job twice as many animals as before, and 10 new children, including 3 daughters that were prettier than the ones God allowed Satan to kill.

Christians see this as a story of how faith is rewarded (even if you're only suffering because God is trying to prove a point to Satan) I see it as a story of how God will use us as he sees fit, is insecure and vain and is apparently either unable, or unwilling, to resist being influenced by Satan.

I contrast God's treatment of Job, his wife and children - all "God's children" used as pawns in a game, and suffering terribly for it - and wonder what we'd make of a human father treating his children in such a way. I expect the MN opinion would be rather damning to say the least. Yet when God does it, it becomes an inspiring story, and God is love, apparently.

Christians, I am told, see the book as a lesson in why the righteous suffer. The answer, it seems, is that their all-loving, all-powerful, all-knowing, benevolent holy father is sometimes prone to abandoning people to the worst excesses of Satan to try and prove some kind of point to God knows who.

Seems odd to me. God does not show love in that story. God shows himself to be deeply unpleasant. Or not God.

What are your views on Job?

Does the idea that God is more pleased by faith in him than any amount of good deeds carried out by someone with no faith not seem to impute God with one almighty Ego (no pun intended)?

That in effect he says to mortal beings "I don't care how much you loved your neighbours and tried to help them, or how much you have shown you are a good person, you didn't tell me that you loved me enough so we are not going to be friends and I am going to punish you".

TBH, someone like that does not sound like the sort of person I would want to be friends with in the first place.

That's interesting crescent moon, and a very apt comparison of mercy and grace, which are two similar concepts. Islam and Christianity have a lot in common :)

I think in answer to your points about grace and about it seeming unfair that people could get to heaven only by belief, I would re-iterate the seriousness of sin and the absolute contrast of God's saving grace. Basically, in Christian belief, no one can attain union with God by works, by good deeds, however good a life they have led, because God is too holy, and people go the wrong way all the time - for me, even if I think I'm doing a good work, there is often a double motive in it - a wanting to be praised, for example, or a desire to be at the front of something. I'm not saying we all go out and break the commandments every day, but all of us are pretty far from the perfection that is God. Many Christians would do well to remember this and not treat sin so lightly.

Grace is amazing, and can seem unfair, and injust. But look at it like this: If you had a child, who you loved with all your heart, as we all do our dc, and that child went off the rails - turned against you, hated you, went out and stole and did drugs and hurt others, even murdered someone - would you ever stop loving that child? Would you give that child another chance if you could, not dependent on their works but only on their repentance? Even if you felt you could not do that, God feels so fiercely loving about each one of us that he does this, extends this grace, and Christians believe that this is achieved through the death and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus made it possible for us to be reconciled with a God far too holy to even see us in our sin, by somehow taking all that sin. I find it profound and it rocks my world.

I don't think that anyone could say that they should not keep repenting, though, that they are forgiven once for all so it's ok to keep sinning (Paul talks about this) - far from it. There should be confession and repentance for sin, the thing is that it is possible for us to do this and be forgiven, again and again and again. It's so freeing.

Grimma's post on monday quotes Matthew 25, showing that Jesus himself certainly doesn't expect his followers to get away with simply believing in him and sitting back happily for the remainder of their earthly lives. Christians should be out there doing this stuff, and if they are not, they are not following the spirit of what Jesus came to show and die for.

So yes Christianity does expect works as well as faith, but as James said 'faith without works is dead', and works without faith is also in vain, because faith enables grace. love it.

hth. Really interesting to read some more about Islam too. :)

If god will just look at our heart in the end why did we need a saviour. If we can be found to be acceptable without accepting Jesus as lord then you're using your own logic to make it acceptable to you.

It seems nonsensical to imagine a situation where god has two similar guys in front of him at the pearly gates, one just scrapes in by the skin of his teeth because he swore one time less than the other guy. And to your mind that would be fair?

Jesus didn't seem to think we didn't need a saviour. The great commission doesn't say 'go into all the world but not to worry if you don't because I'll judge them on a case by case basis'.

Thistledew - me neither, and I don't believe my God is like that. I think God is just and knows the heart and motives of each person and loves each person. But I also believe in salvation by grace. Contrary sod, aren't I

Nah, headinhands. A god that sent someone packing because of his swearing record wouldn't be a god I wanted to go near.

Thing is, I do believe we need a saviour, because I don't think all the good deeds in the world pass muster with a holy God. It comes down to that. But there is the tension and the mystery that God is just. Part of that is that God expects God's followers to do the great commission and not sit on their backsides enjoying 'grace'.

The God I know would not turn away anyone whose heart is towards God. And who are we to judge what that means, or who that entails?

You're right though, it could be easy to sit back and say 'well God is just, and will accept everyone, so there is no point in telling others or even bothering to follow God'. I think God takes it a lot more seriously than that, and somehow contains the tension...

Okay nightlurker, you tell me one way I am actually disadvantaged by you not teaching me something about your faith?

headinhands - no, it would not be fair to my mind that one person would get into heaven for saying one less swearword than another, but then to my mind there is no such thing as heaven, the pearly gates or even a god who makes judgments, so I don't have to tie myself up in knots trying to define how god is fair even though he doesn't appear to act so!

However, I am interested in how other people perform the mental logistics to reconcile the teachings of religion, and what lessons that teaches them about life.

Pressed post too soon -

But I don't feel disadvantaged by not hearing about people's faith, or by not understanding how they reconcile inconsistencies.

nightlurker, you need to actually be specific about it. What actual truth do you know that benefits you in life that I am denied in not believing? You don't need to quote scripture, I used to be a full on Christian.

night where does it say in the bible you can't drink? Are non-believers unable to learn from life as they get older? When you say commandments do you mean the 10 commandments?

Also Any non believer who chooses not to drink could say the same things, cite the same benefits so that's not something particular to your religion.

I find it hard to believe that Christians believe they are being guided by the most intelligent being in the universe. You go to the shop like I have to, get ill like I do, have happy times and sad times etc. I don't see a group of people that stand out as having any divine hot link to a super mind. All the benefits you say you get, I get secularly.

The New testament talks about drinking. The overuse of it is not ok.

headinhands,if you dont mind me asking,if you have been a full on Christian,what happened to cause you to change your mind? Have you now renounced it all,or just not doing too much about it at present.

night why would Jesus perform miracles using a substance he would later make a law about. Why not just ban it in the NT.? Lots of groups of people have statistically longer life spans. Sardinians have the longest life span in Europe. Does this mean god likes Sardinians, but not. say, Scots?

million it was a natural progression. Just a thought process over a number of years Nothing dreadful happened. Not angry with god or Christians. And my life is no less 'straight laced' than your average Christian from what I can fathom.

So god lacked the foresight to see how the bible would mislead millions of people, so had to pop down to correct it? But he only bothered to visit one branch of Christianity. He didn't think to give the update to the CofE etc? Hardly seems fair.

headinhands ok,but have you completely renounced it all ? Because that is a different state of affairs from staying in a certain place with it,iyswim.