Then Job replied: “Even today my complaint is bitter; His hand is heavy in spite of my groaning. If only I knew where to find Him; if only I could go to His dwelling! I would state my case before Him and fill my mouth with arguments. I would find out what He would answer me, and consider what He would say. Would He oppose me with great power? No, He would not press charges against me. There an upright man could present his case before Him, and I would be delivered forever from my judge. But if I go to the east, He is not there; if I go to the west, I do not find Him. When He is at work in the north, I do not see Him; when He turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of Him. ... God has made my heart faint; the Almighty has terrified me. Yet I am not silenced by the darkness, by the thick darkness that covers my face. (Job 23:1-9,16-17)

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

     There is a certain irony to hearing a story about Job on Thanksgiving weekend. After all, Job had little obvious reason to be thankful, which alone is perhaps reason enough to consider Job’s story today. Thanksgiving is a little bit like Christmas. We’re told by the calendar to be thankful, and yet, any of us might be facing circumstances that make being thankful difficult. Perhaps a deeper look at Job’s story helps us to understand why we should be thankful even when thankfulness may not be our natural response to our circumstances. Leading up to today’s passage, Job had faced three calamities: he had lost his wealth, his family and his health, and in this passage Job is doing what we all want to do from time to time: something has filled us with desperation or grief or fear and we ask God, “Why?” And we wait for an answer. Sometimes, it seems as though God isn’t listening and we start to wonder if God has deserted us in a moment of great need. Some people see so much hardship that they reject the very existence of God. “Would a loving God allow this?” they wonder. That’s not an easy question to answer, but we have to struggle with it. Leith Andersen, in a book uncomfortably entitled When God Says No, writes that “… for every story of answered prayer, there are a thousand stories of unanswered prayers – many of them asked by godly saints on their knees pleading with God. God needs no defence. But [we] need an explanation.”

     It’s not a sin to want an explanation. Even Job wanted an explanation. Job was an upright, blameless and genuinely good man who loved God – and yet he lost everything, and Job demanded an explanation: “”Why me God? I didn’t deserve this!” Job was right! He didn’t deserve any of the terrible things that had happened to him – and isn’t that so often the case? Bad things happen to good people, and there doesn’t seem to be any justice in it. We say that God is good, but then we’re confronted by the reality that life isn’t fair. When we face that contradiction – when we feel that we’ve been treated unfairly by God, Whose goodness we so passionately believe in – what can we do? Job had been talking to three of his friends. They advised him to repent. They assumed that Job was being punished for some sin he had committed, but Job knew better. He didn’t deserve what had happened. It was unfair; there was no justice in it and so instead of repenting, Job argued with God. He was mad, and he let God know it! That’s an important lesson – it’s OK to be angry with God, and when we’re angry with God we don’t have to just swallow it and mouth pious words that we don’t really believe – we can express our anger to God. That’s good, because all of us feel unfairly treated by God sometimes, and if we deny that, our anger and resentment against God builds to the point at which it destroys our relationship with God. More than that, feeling anger at God helps us to at least retain the chance of rebuilding our relationship with God, because at least if we’re angry with God, we’re conceding that there’s a God to be angry with.

The frustration is that God doesn’t very often argue back! It’s somehow a lot easier to argue when the person you shout at shouts back at you. God doesn’t do that, and that in part is why Job confesses that he’s terrified. He’s terrified not because of the awful things that have been happening to him, but because of the sudden distance he feels from God. Suddenly, he discovers that he can’t find God anywhere, no matter where he looks; no matter which way he turns. He’s angry and frustrated and frightened – and those feelings grow because he can’t find God, even though he knows that God is everywhere. That can make us angry in our times of trouble too. God knows everything; God is aware of our troubles. Should we be angry with God for not taking them away? As I suggested last week, if belief in God took away all our problems then our relationship with God would be a sham, based on what we get out of it rather than on love. The mark of a true relationship based on love isn’t selfish gain, but selfless commitment, and the love of God is shown not by God taking away our troubles but by God sharing in our troubles.

     God became incarnate in Jesus Christ to bridge the gap between the human and the divine. Faith in Jesus assures us that God is with us. God is not so removed from us as to be unable to understand our troubles. This is where we begin to understand why we should give thanks even in tough times – because thanks to Jesus, God is with us; in Jesus, God became one of us; through Jesus God understands what we feel and why we feel it, because through Jesus God has felt it. Jesus lived and died; Jesus suffered pain; Jesus knew the heartache of being betrayed by a friend; Jesus laughed and cried and ate and drank; Jesus loved and suffered the grief of losing those He loved. Jesus even knew what it was like to feel abandoned by God: on the cross He cried out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” There’s that question – right from the lips of Jesus: “Why me, God?” Jesus understands that question. Of course, Jesus hadn’t been abandoned by God – but the reality of sin touching Him so personally on the cross created a barrier between Jesus and God that made Him feel separate from His Father for the first time. We’re never abandoned by God, either, but there are many barriers that can cause us to feel separated from God as well. When we have problems, it can be irritating to hear someone say “I know what you’re going through,” because we know very well that they don’t. Usually, it’s an empty platitude, but it can be truly comforting to encounter someone who has faced the very same experience. Well – look at Jesus. Whatever you’re going through at any given moment, He’s been there. When God says “I know what you’re going through,” He really means it.

     Sometimes, we may feel as if God doesn’t answer us, but that isn’t true. There’s always an answer – it’s just that the answer is sometimes the one we don’t want to hear. Many people fall into the trap of believing that when they ask God for something they should get it; that “yes” should be the only possible answer, when really we know that “no” is just as valid an answer to any question. When people complain that God hasn’t answered their prayers, what they really mean is that God hasn’t answered them in the way they wanted them answered. That’s a big difference. God’s not a genie who pops out of a bottle and promises to grant our every wish. That’s a fairy tale – but God is real! We need to understand that the answer we want isn’t always going to be the answer that we get, and that when God says “no” there’s a reason. Most children don’t get chocolate cake for breakfast – even though many would like it! Still, their parents say “no” because it wouldn’t be good for them, and eventually the children grow up and learn why they can’t have chocolate cake for breakfast. Faith is similar. Maybe the important thing is that, with God’s help, we learn from the troubles we face rather than simply having God make it all better. After all, it’s “no” that teaches us about relationships – they’re not about getting; they’re about giving. They hold together in good times and in bad. There would be no relationship between us and God if God simply gave and we simply took.

     As Christians, we give thanks to God because whatever our circumstances and whatever out lot in life, God is good. We give thanks to God because through Jesus God is always with us, even if we sometimes create barriers. We give thank to God because God is ours and we are God’s – even if we sometimes get a bit frustrated with each other. We give thanks to God even if, sometimes, God responds to our prayers with the answer we don’t want to hear. So, whatever your circumstances this weekend, I wish you all a very happy Thanksgiving. Give thanks, indeed, because God is with us. We are not alone. Thanks be to God!