Countless people seek God, driven by a variety of motives: philosophical rumination, a quest for personal fulfillment, moral anguish. Job wanted to make sense of senseless loss. Reasoning with friends had proved fruitless; they urged him to submit to simplistic cause-and-effect formulas. Job wanted to reason with the ultimate authority, God.
Eventually Job was granted his audience, but what took place wasn’t “reasoning.” Instead, he got a thunderous verbal barrage delivered by the Master of the universe, naked in divine majesty, unbounded by the laws of physics or even by the ethical Law that God-self had given. Job received no reasoning, no good news in response to his soul-destroying personal plight. Apart from God-in-Christ, neither would you or I. Hence humanity’s sin: destruction of self and others and God’s creation.
What we need is God-clothed. “And the Word became flesh and lived among us …” (John 1:14) We need Jesus Christ who bids us come, “ … you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28) In the face of life’s terrible uncertainty, we need God incarnated as Saviour, who by sheer grace creates in us the certainty of faith.
O God, in your tender love and mercy in Jesus Christ, give us the peace that only you can give. Amen. —