An introduction (to who-knows-what).

A few hours ago I was in the mood for reading Job.

I must say I have a weakness for the gloomy prophets (maybe we don't often think of Job as a prophet, but that's one of the points of this post, as we'll see). Jeremiah's one of my favourite characters in the Bible, and I think I'll like Job for a similar reason - I love what they can get away with.

I think over the last 5 years or so, honesty has become more and more important to me in my relationship with God - particularly as my family has been through the mill a bit during that period. It's been vital that I've felt able to express my true feelings to God, safe in the knowledge that He can take it, and that as I beat against him, He's holding me fast. As a little example let me share this George Herbert poem that spoke to me so much in the weeks and months after my mum died:

Ah my dear angry Lord,
Since Thou dost love, yet strike;
Cast down, yet help afford;
Sure I will do the like.

I will complain, yet praise;
I will bewail, approve:
And all my sour-sweet days
I will lament, and love.

So the appeal of Job and Jeremiah (and George) for me, is that it's like the pain and suffering they go through gives them the need (and the right?) to be frank with God about how they feel He's treated them. They don't run from the place of pain, or even from death, and I firmly believe that their faithfulness in occupying those places left us some precious treasures to enlighten our understanding, and to help us in our own troubles. Neither of them are mentioned by name in the "Hall of Faith" in Hebrews 11, but surely the words of verse 39-40 hold true for them:

Yet all these, though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better so that they would not, without us, be made perfect.

That last bit is intriguing, isn't it? I'll probably come back to it in time (certainly hope so), but that'll do for now as an introduction to some thoughts I'm gonna share as I read Job.