The story of Job is a fascinating, dramatic one, full of lessons for God’s people.  This post will focus on a couple of specific verses in the book, but first, some needed background: We learn at the beginning of the story that Job is a wealthy man, and also a man of impeccable character, who loves God and loves his family.  Satan accuses Job of only loving God for the good things God has given him and says that Job would curse God if these blessings were removed.  God permits Satan to torment Job to see what would happen, first killing all of his sons and daughters, and then striking him with sores covering his entire body.  Truly, Job was in agony.

Then the bulk of the book consists of a dialogue between Job and three of his friends who came to comfort him.  If you know the story, you will know that they did the opposite of comfort Job.  While we have the privilege of knowing that Job’s calamity was not the result of his sin, his friends make assumptions about why Job suffered.  They believed that because all these terrible things have happened, Job must have committed some terrible sin.  God is just, after all.  They urged Job to confess the sin or sins that brought death and sickness upon his family and him, and all the time we, the readers, know Job is innocent.  The dialogue goes on and on; I’d guess it’s about 35 chapters.

During this time, Job declares his innocence and cries out that God should hear his case and vindicate him.  Job tells his friends that they are not helping; they are no comfort to him.  They are wrong, he says repeatedly.  Yet, they don’t give up on their accusations and demand that Job confess and repent.  Imagine if you were in dire straits and this was how your friends treated you!  If it was me, I would find it very hard to forgive them.  I would find it impossible to continue being friends.  Yet that isn’t what happens.

In Job 42:7, God says to one of Job’s friends, Eliphaz: “My anger burns against you and against your two friends, for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has.”  God rebukes the friends, not for lacking compassion or sympathy, but because their theology made assumptions about God and about Job that just weren’t true.  They didn’t represent God well during the long dialogue.  Job may have felt vindicated at this point in the story.  He could have said “look, God agrees with me” and wonder what punishment was coming for these “friends.”  Again, this isn’t what happens.

This is what God says next in Job 42:8, “Now therefore take seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job and offer up a burnt offering for yourselves. And my servant Job shall pray for you, for I will accept his prayer not to deal with you according to your folly. For you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has.”  God wants Job to intercede with Him for his friends, who are to provide the sacrifices.  Job doesn’t hold a grudge or demand apologies or vengeance, but he offers sacrifices for them so that they can be forgiven!

If I was in Job’s place, I can’t believe that it would be that easy to forgive after what his friends put him through at a time when he really needed friends.  They only made him feel worse, and the physical and psychological wounds were still fresh.  Regardless, we get no indication that Job hesitated or forgave reluctantly, just that he did it, and that “the LORD accepted Job’s prayer.” (v 9)

In this matter, Job was foreshadowing Christ, His sacrifice, and His forgiveness, because as Paul wrote in Romans 5:7-8, “For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die – but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”  Then in the second half of Colossians 3:13, Paul wrote: “as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.”

God didn’t wait for us to come around and get straightened out before He died for us and forgave us; He died for people who were sinners, while they were sinners.  We weren’t even born yet, and He still died for us, knowing what we would be like – unrighteous sinners.  He also expects us to forgive as He did, and as Job did with his friends, even though it can be unnatural and hard.

Have you experienced God’s radical forgiveness?  If so, is there someone who needs your forgiveness?  Think of how hard it would have been for Job to forgive his friends, and know that forgiveness is possible in all circumstances, because God has made it possible.

“As the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.”

Amen.