|
|
|
Mystic
Congregational Church, UCC Mystic,
Connecticut Sermon
from October 15, 2006 “A Path Like
Job’s” Rev.
Patricia L. Liberty
Scriptures: Hebrews 4:12-16 Job 23:1-9,
16-17 Job
writes from a place of unfettered devastation.
In the blink of an eye, he loses everything:
home, possessions, livelihood, family and health.
At least, that much of his story is known to most.
Job suffered great loss. He
is the poster child for human pain. Beyond
the obvious losses was the deeper, eviscerating wreckage that comes from severed
relationships, broken dreams, shattered hope, and any sense of a bearable
future. Job’s
path is not unfamiliar to us. The
capricious path of illness and disease can change our lives in heartbeat.
A random act of violence or carelessness can shred our fragile hold on
security in a flash. Death invades
our relationships and we are powerless in our loss. Relationships change. So
many things intrude into the fragile worlds we construct for ourselves and those
we love. And so much of it is
beyond our control. And then, there
is, of course, all that we manage to do to each other. Ah, yes, ours path sometimes intersects with Job’s. Though
Job’s life is a life laid bare, his path through the wilderness is marked with
clear signposts and, in moments when our paths are similar to Job’s, those
markers are there for our comfort. Job’s
story unfolds as a play in several acts. The
first act introduces us to Job and serves as an off-stage character development
narrative. Job is a good guy.
The second act takes place independently of Job, and is essentially a
conversation between God and an under-schlep angel known as the Satan.
Contrary to our popular images of the little guy with the pitchfork and
long tail dressed in red, which is a construct of Dante and not Scripture, the
Satan was an important part of God’s cadre of under-schleps. It was the Satan’s job to spot unrighteousness and bring it
to God’s attention. The first act
ends with God and the Satan agreeing to send a host of misfortunes Job’s way
to see how he acts when all his blessings evaporate into thin air. The
image of a God who has to play games with Job and his family, as a means of
proving that Job will remain faithful, doesn’t sit easily with our image of
God. It was, however, the God-image
of the postexilic period, when Job was most likely written. Going along with that was a cosmology that tied suffering to
retribution. In other words, awful
stuff was believed to be the consequence of sin. It was a tit-for-tat world.
And
that sets the stage for Act III, which unfolds in numerous scenes, each
involving the friends who visit Job in his affliction.
The Reader’s Digest version of their visit:
“With friends like that, who
needs enemies?” The highlight
of their time with Job is the three days they spent in silence.
When they open their mouths, it’s pretty much downhill. To say they are misguided but well-intentioned is generous.
These friends meet Job in his misery and try to talk him through it, talk
him out of it. At some points, it
seems they are trying to finish him off by talking him to death. They
assault Job in his misery with their particular variation on the theme: “If stuff is
happening in your life, it’s your own fault”.
And for good measure, they each add their own version of “Buck up, shut up, and get on with it.” We have all been on the receiving end of such
well-intentioned but unhelpful advice. There’s
the Eliphaz type who basically sings a chorus of
“Gray skies are gonna clear up;
put on a happy face.” And the
second verse is worse than the first, “God
never gives us more than we can handle.” Then
there is the Bildad type whose message is, “It’s
God’s will, don’t question, just accept.”
I heard that with alarming frequency during the years I worked in a
pediatric hospice, particularly from attendees at a group I facilitated for
bereaved parents. Over and over,
parents would come into the group devastated by the comments of people who
suggested the death of their child was part of some divine plan. I remember wanting to rent a billboard near the hospital and
post the advice of my mentor in ministry who always taught me, “If you don’t know what to say, for God’s sake,
(literally) shut up.” And
finally, there are the Zophars in life and their schtick is, “Look,
this is God’s will and it is because you are such a lousy person.” Like
I said, with friends like that, who needs enemies.
And Job, for all his distress and trauma, holds on to his own faith and
says a resounding “No” to all of
it. Job had to find his own way,
and he wasn’t about to acquiesce to something that didn’t ring true in his
own soul. It’s
a comforting and realistic picture of a person of faith who is, on the one hand,
confident about some aspects of their relationship with God and, on the other
hand, aware of the mystery and what they don’t know about God. One of the great messages of Job is that it’s okay to rail
and make complaint against God and that we can say exactly how we feel and trust
that God will hear and understand. In
moments of deepest distress, honesty brings more comfort than easy answers.
Job’s
friends were so busy trying to explain away his suffering and answer the
question “Why me?” that they
failed to recognize that wasn’t Job’s question.
Job is not asking, “Why?”
Job is asking, “Where is God?” It’s
a very different question. As
the third act unfolds and Job’s distress deepens, it is partly out of
frustration with his clueless friends, but more because he cannot find God in
his pain. And that’s the essence
of the 23rd chapter. It
is Job’s lament at God’s absence. It
seems to Job that God has caught the last train outta town and the divine
silence is unbearable. In moments
of great struggle, often, the question is not whether or not God exists, but
whether or not God cares. That’s
Job’s crisis—his dark night of the soul.
St John of the Cross, a Carmelite priest of the 16th century,
writes of the dark night of the soul as those moments in life when the faith
that has always worked doesn’t work anymore.
It is often triggered by life-shattering events that require new faith
constructs if we are to hold onto any faith at all.
It’s a hard place to be. Swedish
Poet Eric Johan Stagnelius speaks to such moments, Friend, in the desolate time, when your soul is enshrouded in darkness When in a deep abyss, memory and feeling die out, Intellect timidly gropes among shadowy forms and illusions Heart can no longer sight, eye is unable to weep When, from your night-clouded soul the wings of fire have fallen And you, to nothing, afraid, feel yourself sinking once more, Say, who rescues you then? Who
is the comforting angel… None but the powerful being who first from the limitless darkness Kissed to life seraphs and woke numberless suns to their dance. None but the holy Word who called the worlds into existence And in whose power the worlds move on their paths to this day. Therefore, rejoice, oh friend, and sing in the darkness of sorrow; Night is the mother of day, Chaos the neighbor of God. That
is the dark night of the soul. John
of the Cross said those seeking God will walk the paths of others but eventually
those paths will end and there will be no path.
They will be left with nothing … nothing … nothing … and they will
find their own way. The
integrity of Job’s witness lies in his willingness to hold out for God’s
presence. Job was counting on God to come to him and speak the word he most
needed to hear. His faith balanced
on the razors edge of what he had always believed and what had not yet happened.
Job wasn’t sure what to believe about God, but he believed God cared
about his unraveled life. And
sometimes that the best we can do—trust that God cares about our unraveled
lives, believe that God journeys with us in what Joan Halifax calls the “hell
realms”. Sometimes, the best we
can do is rail at God and trust that’s enough.
Sometimes, the best we can do is say no to the answers that are too easy
and too shallow and too stupid to honor the places of our pain even though we
don’t have any other answers ourselves. And
there, in the moments of emptiness between what we have always believed and what
we don’t yet know, God comes. Richard
Bach writes, “When you come to the edge
of all the light you have known, and are about to step out into the darkness,
faith is knowing one of the things will happen.
There will be something to stand on, or you will be taught to fly.
I trust it will be so for us in these days.”
Amen. |