Lavender & Lace

The greatest trick the devil ever pulled is to convince the world he doesn’t exist.

There’s more to this life than just what you can see. The scriptures talk so much about an “earthly realm” and a “spiritual realm” that is more important in scriptures eyes, kind of the behind the scenes drama of the scene we see played out before us.

One day the angels came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them. The Lord said to Satan, “Where have you come from?”

Satan answered the Lord, “From roaming throughout the earth, going back and forth on it.”

Job 1:6-7

When it comes to Satan a lot of Christians find themselves caught between one of two extremes. On the one hand, there are those who are very frightened of him and the evil that pertains to him. Who, either because of Hollywood portrayal, or just something they’ve been taught, see demonic influence behind every bad thing that happens to them. But then on the other side, we’ve got folks who either trivialize it or just ignore it all together.

But the scriptures are quite clear. Satan is no myth. He’s quite real. He is a created being, first and foremost. And as a created being Satan is subject to the will of God as we just witness in the opening scene of Job. Satan has to ask permission in front of Gods throne to do the work he wanted to do.

Recently with the flooding the devastated Texas I found a disturbing number of people asking why God would do such a thing. And I had to catch myself in pointing out the irony of placing blame on God for destroying a church camp filled with young girls worshiping the name of Jesus. And you just go, well, is he really all that subtle?

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

John 10:10

But then the obvious response I get back is, well if God doesn’t stop these things then he allows them to happen and isn’t that just as bad? And the response I have, from my study in the Book of Job is this:

God is not a vending machine who dishes out blessings in return for belief in Him. We are never guaranteed comfort in this life.

And the thing I have to remind you of is this book was an ancient book that was written, arguably before the book of Genesis, to an ancient people who expressed what we would define as suffering in ways that we simply cannot relate to. In the 20th century, we put ourselves in Jobs shoes, having come home to a home with AC and a fridge full of food, we give Tylenol to our kids for their bumps and bruises and have a hospital down the road for emergencies, we just can’t relate to the experience of Job. We are so pampered, so healthy, so carefree.

I remember reading stories from the Victorian era when I was a girl and trying to wrap my mind around living in a time period where getting a scraped knee could be a death sentence. When thatched roofs caught whole cities on fire, where natural disasters didn’t come with warnings and animals carried people off in the night.

When we come to the Book of Job as modern readers the question posed is not, “Why does God allow bad things”…as if we were entitled to a world without suffering. But rather, what does this say about the order and justice of the world.

At the end of the book, God speaks to Job about two terrifying creatures, the Behemoth and Leviathan. These were well known creatures in antiquity and symbolize the dangers that exist in God’s world, illustrating that while the world is good, it’s not always safe and does not operate as humans assume. God’s world is beautiful, but it is also wild and dangerous.

Look at Behemoth,
    which I made along with you
    and which feeds on grass like an ox.
What strength it has in its loins,
    what power in the muscles of its belly!
Its tail sways like a cedar;
    the sinews of its thighs are close-knit.
Its bones are tubes of bronze,
    its limbs like rods of iron.
It ranks first among the works of God,
    yet its Maker can approach it with his sword.
The hills bring it their produce,
    and all the wild animals play nearby.
Under the lotus plants it lies,
    hidden among the reeds in the marsh.
The lotuses conceal it in their shadow;
    the poplars by the stream surround it.
A raging river does not alarm it;
    it is secure, though the Jordan should surge against its mouth.
Can anyone capture it by the eyes,
    or trap it and pierce its nose?

Job 40:15-24

Now whether you believe these creatures were prehistoric animals long deceased, or just fictitious mythological creatures depicted in other ancient writings know at this time. The idea is the same; these creatures symbolized chaos in the universe.

God asks Job if he is able to pull in Leviathan with a fishing pole, or take it home as a pet (Job 41:1-7). God counsels Job to do no such thing because Leviathan is the kind of animal that will bite off your arm without a second thought (Job 41:8). And, notice this important point, Leviathan is not evil or bad. Nowhere in this speech is Leviathan called wicked or unfortunate or described as a sad consequence of sin or the fall (referring to Gen 3). Just the opposite, Leviathan is beloved by God, a wonderful creature of great power and might. God is proud of this animal, and apparently, thinks it belongs in this world. Just don’t touch it or it will annihilate you.

What God is saying is that there are forces in the world that are powerful and scary, and we can’t handle them. I guarantee you that, as a child, you were terrified of monsters at some point in your life. Somebody came along and told you, “Don’t be silly. There is no such thing as monsters.” It didn’t help right away, but eventually you probably stopped being scared of monsters. What God does in this passage is remind Job — and us — that there are forces that are more powerful than us. There are supernatural forces in this world that we cannot control.

Most ancient minds thought chaos and order were in constant battle. Sometimes chaos would win, other times order would win.The best you could do was hedge your bets, worship the right gods, and pray you make it out alive. But the Bible understands that God is in charge of both chaos and order. Both Behemoth and Leviathan are on leashes. 

Sometimes terrible things happen for no reason discernible to any human. The point is that God’s world is very good, but it’s not perfect, or always safe. It has order and beauty, but it’s also wild and sometimes dangerous, like the two fantastic creatures he avows. Whether from earthquakes, or wild animals, or from one another? God doesn’t explain why. He says we live in an incredibly complex, amazing world that at this stage at least, is not designed to prevent suffering. Where control is an allusion.

The other point that comes from the Book of Job is that God is able to redeem everything. We just might not get to see the full picture on this side of eternity, so we trust. We have faith. That the God who created the universe, the Behemoth and the Leviathan, knows the comings and going of ordinary people and works everything for His good.

Now we modern, pampered, individuals are not satisfied with this answer. We would much rather a God who operates on our terms. Who functions in ways that we can understand and justifies our answers to this “problem to evil”. No one is comfortable with the answer; I don’t know, when bad things happen. Justice to us, means that it makes sense and it fits inside our preconceived boxes of right and wrong. We don’t like having to follow a God who doesn’t play by our rules, so inevitably we build our own golden calf’s. We run to this god, or this practice, or this thing, and cherry pick our way into comfort and control. But it’s all an illusion anyway.

Unfortunately, just because I don’t like that the speed limit outside my house is 35 mph doesn’t mean I won’t get pulled over and hauled off to jail from going 100 mph. No matter how much I scream that it isn’t fair. The laws of the road exists whether I want them to or not.

We don’t get to decide to live in a universe created by God. We just do.

But luckily, we have a God who doesn’t just sit in condemnation of the world. God himself came to earth in the form of Jesus of Nazareth, and suffered on our behalf to save us from death and Satan for eternity.

So when bad and horrible things happen, because they are bound to happen, we can turn to The one who has suffered, who comforts us in our sorrows and who redeems.

In Him there is life and hope for a future.

This life is not all there is.