Job 2:11ff
11 W hen Job's three friends, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite, heard about all the troubles that had come upon him, they set out from their homes and met together by agreement to go and sympathize with him and comfort him. 12 When they saw him from a distance, they could hardly recognize him; they began to weep aloud, and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads. 13 Then they sat on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights. No one said a word to him, because they saw how great his suffering was.
1 After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth.
23 “Why is life given to a man whose way is hidden,
whom God has hedged in?
24 For sighing has become my daily food;
my groans pour out like water.
25 What I feared has come upon me;
what I dreaded has happened to me.
26 I have no peace, no quietness;
I have no rest, but only turmoil.”
[Eliphaz] 7 “Consider now: Who, being innocent, has ever perished?
Where were the upright ever destroyed?
8 As I have observed, those who plow evil
and those who sow trouble reap it.
9 At the breath of God they perish;
at the blast of his anger they are no more.
5 Is not your wickedness great?
Are not your sins endless?
10 That is why snares are all around you,
why sudden peril terrifies you.”
Christian Friendship: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
There’s a poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox that speaks to the solitude of human sorrow. It goes like this:
Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone;
For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth,
But has trouble enough of its own.
Sing, and the hills will answer;
Sigh, it is lost on the air;
The echoes bound to a joyful sound,
But shrink from voicing care.Rejoice, and men will seek you;
Grieve, and they turn and go;
They want full measure of all your pleasure,
But they do not need your woe.
Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad, and you lose them all, -
There are none to decline your nectared wine,
But alone you must drink life’s gall.Feast, and your halls are crowded;
Fast, and the world goes by.
Succeed and give, and it helps you live,
But no man can help you die.
There is room in the halls of pleasure
For a large and lordly train,
But one by one we must all file on
Through the narrow aisles of pain.
Ms. Wheeler Wilcox first published that poem in 1883, but the words she wrote are timeless. They were true in Job’s life thousands of years ago. And they’re true for us today.
There was a study done in America just a few years back that found that the number of people with no close friends has tripled since 1985. Nearly a quarter of the people surveyed said that they have no one in their life that they can confide in. And when it comes to talking about “important matters,” on average those surveyed only had 2 people they could talk to.
We live in a lonely world and friends are a priceless commodity, a precious blessing from God. So, when we hear that Job had 3 friends who came from great distances to comfort and console him, we rejoice for him! It is good to have friends, and Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar were good friends to have.
The Good
Look at all the good they did for Job: “When Job’s three friends, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite, heard about all the troubles that had come upon him, they set out from their homes and met together by agreement to go and sympathize with him and comfort him.”
They didn’t wait for an invitation. They took initiative. They went to him. They were organized and coordinated. And maybe best of all, they understood the importance of “being there” for someone. And I don’t mean like when we say, “I’m here for you buddy; call me if you need anything,” and then walk away. No, they were there. They left their families and homes, they traveled to be there and be present with him.
When they got there, their hearts broke at the sight of him. “They could hardly recognize him; they began to weep aloud, and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads.” That’s the sign of a good friend. Their sympathy was sincere, and their actions matched their sentiment. They didn’t just pat him on the head and say, “It’ll be OK.” They sat in the dust with him. They wept with him. They tore their clothes for him. They acknowledged and validated his grief and pain, and they shared in it with him.
And for seven days and seven nights there they sat. That’s commitment. That’s friendship. That’s what good friends do.
The Bad
But then you turn the page, and the first verse of chapter 3 reads, “After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth.” Now, I’m convinced that this verse begins the way it does (“after this”), not so much to communicate the passage of time, but to tell us the cause of Job’s reaction. The reason (or at least one reason) that Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth was because his good friends – Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar – did something bad:
“They sat on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights. No one said a word to him.”
Can you imagine having your best friends in the world be there to comfort you at the death of your children and the decay of your body and they don’t say anything? Where were the good intentions that they set out from home with? They had agreed to sympathize with him and comfort him. There was plenty of sympathy as they sat in the dust, but zero comfort. No one said a single piece of good news or consolation to him. And for 7 days Job stewed in his own sorrow. For a week, Job sat unassisted as Satan assailed him with thoughts of God’s injustice against him.
That’s not being a good friend. That’s being a bad friend. And if their weeklong silence wasn’t bad enough for Job’s psyche, the words they finally spoke to him were about to get ugly.
The Ugly
While Job was in the throes of despair trying to understand why God would allow such trouble in his life, each of his three friends took turns kicking him while he was down. We just read one excerpt of one example of 8 times that these 3 friends come back to Job and instead of comforting him, they blamed him for every bad thing that had happened. In effect, they come to the funeral for Job’s children and point a finger in the grieving father’s face and say, “You are the reason your children are dead.”
“Is not your wickedness great?” Eliphaz asked Job. “Are not your sins endless? That is why snares are all around you, why sudden peril terrifies you.”
Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar loved Job – or at least they thought they did – and they tried to show it by being there for him. But they showed themselves to be the worst kind of friends not only by failing to console him but by laying all the fault at Job’s feet. They spoke as if they knew God’s mind. They were quick to explain the unexplainable. They came there with their verbal guns loaded ready to go off on the sinfulness and wickedness of their friend.
They became like three little satans, accusing Job of secret and horrible sins deserving the worst God could throw at him. With friends like that, who needs enemies? Job would have been better off had they not come at all.
Friends don’t wag a finger in the face of the sufferer. Friends point the sufferer to the God of mercy and love. They point to a God who does mysterious things, unexplainable things, but who makes his love, at least, clear in Christ.
You know, Jesus had friends like Job did. Some of them abandoned him; they didn’t even come to be with him in his hour of greatest need. Others, who had praised his name on Palm Sunday, cursed it on Good Friday; they called for his crucifixion and death. While he was hanging on a cross they mocked him: “Come down from the cross, if you are the Son of God!” They insinuated that his suffering was the proof of his fraud.
It certainly looked like it. You wouldn’t think that God would let someone he loves get tormented like that. Jesus himself cried out from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” A casual observer could come to no other conclusion than that Jesus must have been a horrible person to deserve to die like that.
But we heard it in our Gospel lesson today. Jesus asked, “Can any of you prove me guilty of sin?” The answer was no. Jesus was sinless, and, in a sense, you could even say that he suffered for no reason. He was not guilty. He didn’t deserve to die, but there he hung anyway. Imagine what Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar would have said to Jesus.
Thankfully we don’t have to listen to the so-called “wisdom” of men, because we have the Word of God. We’re not left with speculation and educated guesses. God gives us his explicit gospel and tells us that Jesus didn’t die for no reason. Jesus died for you. Jesus died for all of your sins, e.g. for the times that you were a bad friend; for the times that I failed to follow up; for the words you failed to speak and the times we spoke without thinking.
Jesus didn’t die for no reason. He died for us. He died to forgive your sin. In his own words, “I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.” If God has forgotten your sins, no one else can throw them in your face. Not your enemies. Not well-intentioned but misguided friends. Not even the devil himself can accuse you anymore. Your sins are forgiven in Christ.
With a friend like Jesus, what can your worst enemy do to you?
You know, the theme for today’s worship is, “Choosing the Right Friends.” You don’t want Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar to be your comforters. So, it’s a good thing you get to choose who your friends are, right? That’s important. But it’s also kind of out of your control. You can’t just pull that kind of friend out of thin air.
What you can do, though, is be the right kind of friend. Take the good from Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar. Be there for your friends. Don’t wait for an invitation to comfort someone who is struggling. Don’t give them one more job to do and force them to ask you for your help. Pick up the phone. Knock on the door. Buy a plane ticket and be there for them.
And when you get there, learn from the bad and ugly things that Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar did, or, rather, didn’t do. There are two things that Job’s three friends never once did for Job. They didn’t speak a word of Gospel, and they didn’t pray with or for him.
Now, that doesn’t mean that you have to come with your verbal gun loaded. Take some time to listen. Listen to understand. What exactly is your friend feeling? Is it grief? Is it fear? Is it frustration? Listen first, but then speak the gospel.
Talk about God’s goodness and love. Admit that you don’t know why God would allow bad things to happen, but tell them what you do know, i.e. no matter what problems we face, no matter what pain we have to bear, we have a friend in Jesus on whom we can unload every burden and care. He died for us to save us and to give us hope and a future. Nothing can take that from us. It’s a gift of his goodness and love.
We said it before – friends are a priceless commodity, a precious blessing from God – and that’s what you get to be. You get to remind others that they never have to suffer alone. Because Jesus is always with them. Be the right kind of friend and point your friends to Christ, their Savior, their Comforter, their friend. Amen.