Job’s Sufferings and the New Creation

Introduction

Many Christians use Job and his sufferings as an example of a situation where God sometimes allows (and even sends) sickness in people’s lives (Christians included) with the sovereign purpose of either teaching them something, testing them and their faith, or disciplining them. The line of thought goes like this: since God allowed sickness in Job’s life to test him, then what if my sickness is a “Job” type of situation where God allowed it with a sovereign purpose in mind? Let’s see if that is true. The purpose of this article is to prove from the Word of God that Job’s situation doesn’t apply to the new creation in Christ at all and Christians should never identify themselves with Job whenever they are attacked with sickness.

 

First Proof

First things first: the one who attacked Job was Satan and not God. Period. God was actually protecting Job and his belongings, and Satan was the direct source of Job’s attack. Satan is the one that never comes into someone’s life with any other purpose except to kill, steal, and destroy. God is a good God who always gives good gifts to His children.

 

Second Proof

Second, Job suffered for a few months (some say around 9 months, but the Bible doesn’t mention exactly), but at the end of that period, JOB WAS HEALED, and God blessed him way more than before. God doubled his fortunes. God gave him other 10 children in the place of those 10 that he lost and doubled his wealth:

Job 42:10–16 (NKJV)

¹⁰And the Lord restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends. Indeed, the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before.

¹¹Then all his brothers, all his sisters, and all those who had been his acquaintances before, came to him and ate food with him in his house; and they consoled him and comforted him for all the adversity that the Lord had brought upon him. Each one gave him a piece of silver and each a ring of gold.

¹²Now the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning; for he had fourteen thousand sheep, six thousand camels, one thousand yoke of oxen, and one thousand female donkeys.

¹³He also had seven sons and three daughters.

¹⁴And he called the name of the first Jemimah, the name of the second Keziah, and the name of the third Keren-Happuch.

¹⁵In all the land were found no women so beautiful as the daughters of Job; and their father gave them an inheritance among their brothers.

¹⁶After this Job lived one hundred and forty years, and saw his children and grandchildren for four generations.

So, if you identify yourself with Job, you should eventually be healed as well, and have everything doubled in riches, lifespan, sons and daughters, as he had. Job didn’t end up dying, but living.

 

Third Proof

Third, it seems that Job was not a Jew and lived somewhere south east of Israel between 2000-1000 BC, after Noah’s flood, and long before Moses and the commandments. The best approximation places him living while the sons of Jacob were in Egypt, but he wasn’t a part of the people of Israel. He didn’t have a connection with Abraham.

He even says it in Job 9:33 that there was no mediator between him and God, like we have Jesus today:

Job 9:32–35 (NKJV)

³²“For He is not a man, as I am, that I may answer Him, and that we should go to court together.

³³Nor is there any mediator between us, who may lay his hand on us both.

³⁴Let Him take His rod away from me, and do not let dread of Him terrify me.

³⁵Then I would speak and not fear Him, but it is not so with me.

However, the new creation has a mediator, Jesus Christ, and has the promises of God on healing:

1 Timothy 2:5–6 (NKJV)

⁵For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus,

⁶who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time,

Whoever identifies with Job and his sufferings, actually places himself or herself outside of the Law of Moses, and outside the New Covenant in Christ. Moreover, it is actually offensive to the sacrifice of Jesus, when Christians identify themselves with Job, and say that God allows sickness in their lives. Even in Job’s case, who didn’t have any promises and rights before God, and who had no Mediator, God had mercy on him, healed him, and blessed him twice more than he had before. This is the God we have, a God of love and mercy, who is ALWAYS WILLING and capable to heal his people.

 

The Lord Gave and the Lord Has Taken Away

Job 1:21 (NKJV)

²¹And he said: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; Blessed be the name of the Lord.”

We even have a famous song singing the above verse: “Blessed Be the Name of the Lord”. No, that verse is not true in the new creation era, and it’s not true about God in general. That was Job’s limited revelation and understanding. Job didn’t know about the existence of Satan, that’s why he thought the Lord took away his children and fortunes. If something is taken away from us, it’s either because we allow Satan to take it away by default (by not doing anything and by being passive), or because we forfeit it through our own lack of understanding and knowledge. The devil is the one that takes away, kills and destroys. God only gives good gifts to people

James 1:17 (NKJV)

¹⁷Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.

 

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Job’s Sufferings and the New Creation