Focus

As you quiet yourself for this brief time, be willing to be open to God in whatever way that may take place.

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Read

Job 16:1-21 (NRSV)

Then Job answered:

“I have heard many such things;
miserable comforters are you all.
Have windy words no limit?
Or what provokes you that you keep on talking?
I also could talk as you do,
if you were in my place;
I could join words together against you,
and shake my head at you.
I could encourage you with my mouth,
and the solace of my lips would assuage your pain.

“If I speak, my pain is not assuaged,
and if I forbear, how much of it leaves me?
Surely now God has worn me out;
he has made desolate all my company.
And he has shriveled me up,
which is a witness against me;
my leanness has risen up against me,
and it testifies to my face.
He has torn me in his wrath, and hated me;
he has gnashed his teeth at me;
my adversary sharpens his eyes against me.
They have gaped at me with their mouths;
they have struck me insolently on the cheek;
they mass themselves together against me.
God gives me up to the ungodly,
and casts me into the hands of the wicked.
I was at ease, and he broke me in two;
he seized me by the neck and dashed me to pieces;
he set me up as his target;
his archers surround me.
He slashes open my kidneys, and shows no mercy;
he pours out my gall on the ground.
He bursts upon me again and again;
he rushes at me like a warrior.
I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin,
and have laid my strength in the dust.
My face is red with weeping,
and deep darkness is on my eyelids,
though there is no violence in my hands,
and my prayer is pure.

“O earth, do not cover my blood;
let my outcry find no resting place.
Even now, in fact, my witness is in heaven,
and he that vouches for me is on high.
My friends scorn me;
my eye pours out tears to God,
that he would maintain the right of a mortal with God,
as one does for a neighbor.

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Reflect

Job was miserable. And his friends, miserable comforters that they were, made Job feel even worse. They talked too much. Yes, Job had been talking too much, too. He had been pouring out his anguish to his friends, trying to make sense of the misery that he was having to bear. His friends obviously felt as if they must answer him.

When was the last time you had a friend in the midst of tragedy? I asked some youth at camp, “If you are really sad, what can a friend do to help you?” One young girl answered without missing a beat, “They can be with you.” I knew immediately that she had experienced a personal loss. Indeed, she had lost her father only weeks earlier. Her grief was still fresh, and she remembered how a friend helped her by being with her.

There is something called the ministry of presence. We are often afraid to be with somebody who has experienced loss because we don’t know what to say to them. The truth is that we don’t need to say anything. The presence of a loving friend can say more than words.

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Pray

Loving God, We are grateful for your love. When we are miserable, we so often need to talk to somebody. When that happens, it can be so comforting to have friends around us. Help us to be the kind of friend who can be with others without always having to talk. May our physical presence serve as a sort of spiritual conduit for your presence. Fill us with you, O God! Amen.

Go with God.