“We have to be continually reminded of what we believe.” – C. S. Lewis

Five reasons not to “shut down” when someone wants to show you evidence that purportedly contradicts what/who you believe:

1. Curiosity. Curiosity is virtuous and healthy, and the only faith worth having is a curious faith. Faith seeks understanding. Faith should increase curiosity, not squelch it.

2. Humility. Humility implies a posture of, “I don’t know all of what I don’t know, I don’t know all of what I need to know, and I should be open to learning things people think I need to know.”

3. Faith that honors. To honor something as trustworthy, you don’t endlessly protect it in the dark — you let it demonstrate its trustworthiness in the light of scrutiny. Honor what/who you trust by letting it “come outside” and endure the examination.

4. Love for neighbor. The love-ethic of Jesus (“love your neighbor as yourself”) requires that we be interested in understanding and knowing and empathizing with our neighbor, even when — especially when — our neighbor disagrees with us.

5. Love for the one you trust.

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.” (C.S. Lewis)

A thought-experiment:

Imagine a “heaven” where you first sit down and watch a great movie. After each movie an even better movie is played. And so on, in a never-ending succession of ever-increasingly more wonderful, more enthralling, and more enjoyable movies. With every movie you watch, you have the assurance that the next movie will be ever better.

But soon it hits you: This is all this “heaven” will ever be. Not even never-ending, ever-increasingly enjoyable movies is good news. A feeling of dread settles over you. This is all of what your existence will ever be. And it is nothing but vanity, or meaninglessness, and breath in the wind. Not even this never-ending, ever-increasing joy is enough to satisfy the cavernous heart of yours. You were made for something so much greater. Something is still missing.

The outlook in Ecclesiastes is even worse. The book assumes the finality of death and does not assume a resurrection (although it logically implies one at the end). And not even the conclusion, to fear God and keep his commandments, is clearly a solution to the problem the book laments.

Jumping ahead, this is the solution: “This is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” (John 17:3) The solution is this personal relationship. Without it, our existence is ultimately a lonely and meaningless breath in the wind.

See also

• A Movie So Good It Ruins You Would You Watch It?, by Tony Reinke

A story to go with this song. God had used Waterdeep to minister to me deeply, like medicine to my struggling soul. I remember some very sweet moments with me, God, and a Waterdeep CD.

I heard Waterdeep was coming into town for a performance, so I took Stacie to this very small place downdown in Dayton, Ohio. There was this other band playing before Waterdeep taking forever to finish up. So I walked up to this random lady and asked her, “Hey, do you know when Waterdeep will play?” She said, “Oh, probably in about 5 minutes.”

Well, five minutes later, she got up on stage with Don Chaffer. She was Lori Chaffer, the female singer. I felt dumb, not recognizing who she was! But then they played one of the most beautiful songs. This was it. Over the years Stacia and I have enjoyed singing it together.

“Doing missions when dying is gain is the happiest life in the world.” (John Piper)

“Laziness pretends to yearn for rest, but what sure rest is there except in the Lord? Luxury would gladly be called plenty and abundance, but You are the fullness and unfailing abundance of unfading joy. Promiscuity presents a show of liberality, but You are the most lavish giver of all things good. Covetousness desires to possess much, but You are already the possessor of all things. Envy contends that its aim is for excellence, but what is as excellent as You? Anger seeks revenge, but who avenges more justly than You? Fear shrinks back as sudden change threatens the way things are and fear is wary of its own security, but what can happen that is unfamiliar or sudden to You, O God? Or who can deprive You of what You love? Where is there unshaken security except with You? Grief longs for those delightful things we’ve lost because it wills to have nothing taken from it, just as nothing can be taken from You.” (Augustine, Confessions, Book 2)

“The reasoning of those who distort or suppress reality, or alter historical manuscripts to protect the delusions of the simple believer, is similar to that of the man who murders a child to protect him from a violent world.” (Frances Lee Menlove)

“Cast your whole vote, not a strip of paper merely, but your whole influence. A minority is powerless while it conforms to the majority; it is not even a minority then; but it is irresistible when it clogs by its whole weight.” (Henry David Thoreau)

The Book of Job puts its readers in the middle of an unresolved dialog with people struggling to understand, or claiming to understand, the reason for suffering.

“If [Job] is a theodicy, it raises the question without providing the expected answer. God’s response is that the answer is beyond the ken of men and women. Perhaps a better designation of the genre of the book is ‘wisdom debate.’ (Longman & Dillard, 232)

All the interlocutors, with the possible exception of Elihu, are rebuked for their misunderstanding, and God establishes himself as the true source of wisdom.

“The central message of the book is implied in the hymn to wisdom (chapter 28). Wisdom belongs ultimately to God (vv. 20–28), and all human attempts to grasp it or contain it are doomed to failure.” (Arnold & Beyer, 296)

In Romans, Paul says, “But who are you, O man, to answer back to God?” (9:20) Paul reminds us that God is the potter, and we are the clay. Notably, he doesn’t provide an actual, direct answer to the question in view (how can God find fault if we can’t ultimately resist his will? v. 19). Similarly, Job himself is never given an answer for the reason for his suffering.

“While God chooses not to reveal the answer to this question to his human creatures, we still learn much from this book about suffering. For instance, if we do not learn why we suffer, the book does disabuse one common belief, the so-called doctrine of retribution.” (Longman & Dillard, 234)

Specifically, we learn that retribution is not necessarily an accurate or sufficient explanation for *all* suffering. While it is generally true that sin leads to suffering, not all suffering is due to sin. The God whose invisible hand is behind suffering is bigger than retribution. Neither is he smaller than retribution. As with the man born blind spoken of in John 9, the suffering in view may be designed by God to display his glory in a non-retributive manner.

For these reasons I think of the Book of Job providing comfort like I think of Ecclesiastes providing meaning. They both remind us that God is ultimate, but both set up inadequate answers to the problems they address. At the very least they help a person feel like they are not alone — there have been others, even those of ancient times, who have struggled with the same sense of meaninglessness and unfairness. But God is still good, and ultimate, and wise. And we can simply trust him for that. God is God, and we are not. Let us put our hand over out mouth and worship.

But that was not the end. We can now read the Book of Job now canonically, within the wider scope of a Christ-centered canon.

Quoting Longman & Dillard (235–236):

“The story of the relationship between God and human suffering does not end with the book of Job. Job teaches that God is in control; he reprimands the innocent sufferer for questioning his wisdom and power. Job appropriately responded with repentance.

“The New Testament brings us to a deeper understanding of God’s dealings with suffering. In Jesus Christ he reveals his love toward his sinful creatures by sending his Son to die on the cross. Jesus Christ is the true innocent sufferer, the only one completely without sin. He voluntarily (as opposed to Job) submits himself to suffering for the benefit of sinful men and women. As Andersen (1976, 73) states it, “That the Lord himself has embraced and absorbed the undeserved consequences of evil is the final answer to Job and all the Jobs of humanity.” In Jesus, God enters into the world of human suffering in order to redeem humanity. Jesus experienced the height of human suffering on the cross, and he did so without complaining. The early Christian community saw the connection between Job and Jesus, so it was a common practice to read the book of Job during Passion week (Delitzsch 1975, 32).

“Jesus’ death on the cross did not bring suffering to an end. Indeed, Christians are characterized by their sharing in the sufferings of the Lord. To say that Christians are removed from the evil and pain of the present world on the basis of their conversion is a perversion of the gospel. In 2 Corinthians 1:3–11 Paul likens the suffering of Christians to that of Christ in order to communicate the comfort that is also available from Christ. It is interesting that he goes on to describe the Christian community as a fellowship of suffering and comfort.

“Thus the book of Job retains its power for contemporary Christians. It can now, however, be properly read only in the light of the suffering of the totally innocent sufferer, Jesus Christ.”

Sources

Arnold, B. T., & Beyer, B. E. (2008). Encountering the Old Testament: A Christian Survey (Second Edition) Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic.

Longman, T., III, & Dillard, R. B. (2007). An Introduction to the Old Testament (Second Edition.) Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan.

We use overstatements to help people feel the force of what we are really saying.

We use understatements to be gentle, or graciously indirect, or simply because our language is inadequate.

This is part of being human.

“Moses describes the special use of this expanse, to divide the waters from the waters from which word arises a great difficulty. For it appears opposed to common sense, and quite incredible, that there should be waters above the heaven. Hence some resort to allegory, and philosophize concerning angels; but quite beside the purpose. For, to my mind, this is a certain principle, that nothing is here treated of but the visible form of the world. He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. Here the Spirit of God would teach all men without exception; and therefore what Gregory declares falsely and in vain respecting statues and pictures is truly applicable to the history of the creation, namely, that it is the book of the unlearned. The things, therefore, which he relates, serve as the garniture of that theater which he places before our eyes. Whence I conclude, that the waters here meant are such as the rude and unlearned may perceive.” (John Calvin, source)

Notice that Calvin here rejects *both* the concordist and metaphorical reading.

Vows to God with grandiose guarantees or penalties are “from the evil one.”

“But I say, do not make any vows! Do not say, ‘By heaven!’ because heaven is God’s throne. And do not say, ‘By the earth!’ because the earth is his footstool. And do not say, ‘By Jerusalem!’ for Jerusalem is the city of the great King. Do not even say, ‘By my head!’ for you can’t turn one hair white or black. Just say a simple, ‘Yes, I will,’ or ‘No, I won’t.’ Anything beyond this is from the evil one. (Matthew 5)

“God, I promise you nothing. Help me.” Jesus prefers that over temple vows.

We should be pro-life for the same reason we should be environmentalists:

“‘Image of God’ also elevates humans above all other created things, indicating their responsibility to provide a benevolent and ethical stewardship over the rest of creation.” (Faith Study Bible)

The kind of environmentalism that values humans over fish and dogs. But still, an unabashed environmentalism and stewardship and care for the massive garden God has given us dominion over.

The same reason we have to keep the air and streams clean is the same reason we have not to unnecessarily and electively and singularly murder unborn human beings: we are in the image of God.