Mu humble blog on me and my family

Sunday, January 29, 2006

Reason for Suffering (3) - Job's friend's advice

The arguments from Job friends sounds suspiciously like those offered by many Christians to me in the past 2 years.
The Old Testament is filled with examples of prophets warning Israelites that they will face calamity if they flouted God's laws. This makes Christians think that when someone is facing a trial, God is teaching them something or because they have sinned.
Christian friends usually thinks :
"Suffering is God's punishment for mistakes. You must have done something to deserve this punishment."
but it sounds harsh, so they usually say :
"You will look back years later and see that God is moulding your character. I have a friend so and so, something bad happened to him, but when he got right with God, everything changed and he began to do very well."
Christian friends are so "nice". At the very moment when i most need hope and strength, i get accussation thrown at me, resulting in a greater dose of guilt and doubt.
PLEASE!
We have no right to stand beside a sick person and say "this is the will of God".
Lets look at what God said to his 2 friends. God dismissed all their theories with "I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has."
I am really so fed up with people coming to me and give me advice that is any way similar to Job's friends. If you ever need to bring advice to your friends who are sick and going through a trial, make you you dont repeat the same mistake as Job's friends. Think "is what i am about the say the same as what Job's friends advised?" Of course this presumes that you have
read the book of Job.

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