This page is in honour of the 'pesky, perpetual, predictable and persistent return of the Sabbath'!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This Week's Sermon !

October 6, 2024 - -

Job 1: 1; 2:1-10
Psalm 26
Mark 10: 2-26

“Job’s Search for Meaning”

59 years ago, for the first time on the silver screen, The Sound of Music, depicted Fraulein Maria and Geog VonTrapp, a novice nun turned governess and a retired officer of the Austrian navy, (played by Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer) standing in his gazebo, expressing their love for each other and singing:

 “PerhapsI had a wicked childhood
Perhaps I had a miserable youth
But somewhere in my wicked, miserable past
There must have been a moment of truth.
For here you are, standing there, loving me
Whether or not you should
But somewhere in my youth or childhood
I must have done something good
Nothing comes from nothing
Nothing ever could
So somewhere in my youth or childhood
I must have done something good.” 

Andrews and Plummer sing of the same awe and wonder every Christmas season, delighting the hearts of those who know every line, every scene, yet watch it again and again.

Singer, Kris Kristofferson, wrote these words in 1972:

“Why me Lord, what have I ever done
To deserve even one
Of the pleasures I've known
Tell me Lord, what did I ever do
That was worth loving you
Or the kindness you've shown” 

In this way of looking at life, it is assumed that our unfortunate circumstances are a result of our own actions, as well as our seemingly undeserved and unexpected joys. When it does not happen that way, we are surprised! Many people believe that we should get what we actually deserve in this “tit for tat”, “quid pro quo” world. Or we think that we are supposed to believe that!

What about all those times when the scales of justice are tilted in the wrong direction? Why do the innocent suffer and the guilty seem to prosper. Surely those thousands killed on 9/11 did not deserve that fate, nor those who went down with the Titanic on that cold April morning in 1912, or who have perished in wars and local conflicts in this century alone! Where is the fairness? What is the use of believing? Surely it must have some reward!

Human beings have an innate expectation of justice and fairness. If there is more than one child in a family, the desert portions must be the same size, bedtimes, tv time and other privileges must be the same. Once we had more than one channel, but still only one TV, I wondered why the ones who wanted to watch hockey ALWAYS got their way!!!! Children in school feel all should be equally punished for the same rule breaking - and some NOT let off because of who their parents were!

The book of Job has perplexed its readers for several thousand years. What is it trying to tell us? When we look at the book of Job it may be helpful to remember that the land of Uz was a foreign country, it was not in Israel, and that Job himself was a foreigner and not one of the children of Israel. Its message is more universal. The story is not meant as biography, it is likely a parable, a story crafted to convey a spiritual truth, a story to tease the mind into deep thought. Job never existed; but, Job has existed in every time and place where human beings have lived!

For over 100 years the term, “Job’s comforters” has come to mean the opposite of what it appears to mean! When misfortune befalls someone, friends who show up, intending to be helpful, but utter words of seeming encouragement and comfort which are neither encouraging nor helpful, probably should have stayed home! We’ve all probably been on both sides of that experience!

Many of us have suffered the untimely death of a loved one or had an illness which was debilitating and caused life-long limitations and we may have wondered where God was in all of it.

In this story, Job has suffered both and his friends, the so-called “comforters,” tried to give him reasons. First they came and sat in silence but unfortunately. After 7 days they began to speak; and their speeches were not helpful.

When I was serving my very first Pastoral Charge, I recall visiting a parishioner whose husband had just died, quite suddenly. I lived about 25kms away, but because he lived a few houses away, a minister from another denomination had already arrived by the time I got there. He was in full-blown “pastor mode” telling them to have faith and to trust in God. Finally, he prayed with them - and then left. I could not wait for him to go because I was so uncomfortable with what he was saying with the intention of bringing solace to the family. My firm belief was that the widow had to sit with her feelings of shock and grief before she could take any comfort in the promise of heaven, which, to him, made mourning a mockery of faith. My goal was to sit with her in her pain and loss, to listen to her and affirm that her feelings were all perfectly okay. In time she would be able to put the pain behind her.

The unhelpful involvement of “some” other clergy in such situations has repeated itself over and over since then. Different denominations have radically different perspectives on the issues of grief and suffering and sin and salvation and they don’t tend to mix well.

When reading the book of Job, it is easy to get lost in the details. We may ask, “Who said that; who is speaking.” Most of the speeches ask, in one way or another, “what HAVE you done, Job? There must be SOMETHING you can think of.” So, these verses are not, equally “the word of God,” that we can quote out of context, but set up as a “counter opinion.”

The details of those speeches will be in the passages read over the next few weeks but I wont likely be preaching on them ; I will be preaching on the Gospel texts. So this week I have to cover Job from a to z.

I will state up-front that I actually don’t like the premise of the book; God and the heavenly beings are staging a bit of a game in which Job is but a pawn. God says, “Job will not” and the Satan says, “Job will too!”. The only way that it makes sense is that it is a story written to make a point. Job is not a real person being batted back and forth between God and Satan. By the way Satan in this book is not the same Satan as appears in the New Testament.

We can affirm that Job is innocent; the story tells us that. It tells us that he is so diligent that he even makes extra sacrifices on behalf of his children in case they have done something wrong.

The truth is that we do not know why the innocent suffer. As the book nears its end we hear God tell Job that his friends are all hot air. They spend a lot of time speculating, but really know nothing. In the end, Job is not punished but his blessings are restored, as much as that is possible.

What is the real question in the book of Job?

The Men of the Deeps, is a coal miner’s choir, and one of the little ditties they used to sing at concerts is called, “Why Study?.” I don’t think they wrote it but they d=sang it well. I have not heard it more than a few times in the last 40 years but I think it goes something like this.

“The more you study the more you learn.  
The more you learn the more you forget.  
The more you forget the less you know.  
So, why study?” 

This leads us to the question: “if faith does not come with guarantees, why believe, why be faithful” If you are not guaranteed to “get something” from being a persona of faith, why bother? Are we not just wasting our time?

One of the messages of faith is that faith and religious commitment is not like a vending machine. You know how they work: put in your money, press the right button and your bag of chips, bottle of pop or chocolate bar, drops into the slot and you retrieve it. In Pearson (airport) you can buy deluxe pieces of cake from a vending machine, at least in the Air Canada terminal, or even an I-pad or I-phone! Those require a credit-card!

Faith is not a transaction of the same nature as we find in commerce or contracts; we don’t believe in order to receive a benefit of some kind. So the innocent do suffer and they do prosper, just as the guilty do. Faith and a relationship with God are ends within themselves and are their own reward. Faith is not a “ticket” to heaven or a “get our of jail free” card. The life of faith is not a Monopoly game. Job knew that in the midst of his troubles God was still there and had not abandoned him. The ultimate why’s cannot be fully answered or understood. We are called to live in trust, knowing that whatever happens we can proclaim the love of a God who is with us, always.

Amen.

1995- 2021 The Rev. Beth W. Johnston.

For some good stuff go to:

journeywithjesus.net

A Teaching Communion Service