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What would you say if you were Job?
You've lost everything—all your wealth, your children, your health, your happy marriage—and three of your best friends come a long distance to visit you. What do you say to them? "Hi, fellas. Glad you could make it. How was the trip?"
But Job's culture was not big on small talk. In Job's world, people didn't "shoot from the hip" when speaking. Instead, they thought very carefully about what they would say. And the listeners paid attention. When someone spoke, people listened so closely that, when it was all done, all the lengthy dialogs could be recorded from memory.
So when Job's friends arrived, no one spoke for a long time—far too long for people of our day to be comfortable.
When Job's three friends arrived and saw Job's terrible condition, their culture demanded that they observe a certain protocol. Part of the protocol was that no one had the right to speak until Job spoke.
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. 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. (Job 2:12-13)
Their manners were quite different from ours! Their custom required them to keep silent, waiting for Job to speak first. When Job spoke, they all listened without interrupting, until Job finished.
Again, their culture was very different from ours. Job, having the right to speak first, was in no hurry. His friends would stay as long as necessary. If they didn't show up for work Monday, someone would cover for them. And so they waited seven days. And then Job spoke.
If you were Job, what would you say? Every word counts. You have the full attention of every listener, and they will take your words home with them. Your exact words will be repeated around campfires and in tents all across the land.
Job's first words were a beautiful but morbid bit of verse, that can be summarized this way: "I'm so miserable I wish I was never born!"
He said: "May the day of my birth perish, and the night it was said, 'A boy is born!'" (Job 3:2-3)
On the night a child was born, the whole community would throw a party. Job wishes the party had never happened:
May that night be barren; may no shout of joy be heard in it. (Job 3:7)
He adds:
May those who curse days curse that day, those who are ready to rouse Leviathan. (Job 3:8)
Are there dates that have an especially painful meaning to you? My youngest brother, whose birthday was December 6, died when he was 25. Now every year on his birthday, the loss feels more painful than it did the rest of the year. In a sense, I "curse that day".
Some people experience grief in a richer, more painful way than I do. For these people, even the mention of a painful date brings fresh waves of pain. To remind them of their loss is to "rouse Leviathan" (a monster).
So when Job says, "May those who curse days curse that day …", what he's really saying is "I wish that every year on my birthday, my parents experienced grief instead of joy, because I died at birth."
He says the same thing more clearly a few verses later:
Why did I not perish at birth, and die as I came from the womb? … For now I would be lying down in peace; I would be asleep and at rest (Job 3:11, 13)
And so Job's first words to his friends were an eloquent expression of his pain and hopelessness.
Well, yes and no.
Yes, complaining is sin. Many scriptures point to this fact. Notable examples come from the time of the Israelites' wandering in the wilderness:
Now the people complained about their hardships in the hearing of the Lord, and when he heard them his anger was aroused. (Numbers 11:1a)
The Lord said to Moses and Aaron: "How long will this wicked community grumble against me? I have heard the complaints of these grumbling Israelites." (Numbers 14:26-27)
(God speaking:) "I will rid myself of this constant grumbling against you by the Israelites." (Numbers 17:5b)
Other examples come from the New Testament:
And do not grumble, as some of them did—and were killed by the destroying angel. (1 Corinthians 10:10)
Do everything without complaining or arguing (Phillipians 2:14)
At the same time, no, Job's complaint was not a sin. Three times, the book specifically says that Job is not guilty of wrongful speech.
In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing. (Job 1:22)
In all this, Job did not sin in what he said. (Job 2:10b)
(God speaking to Eliphaz:) "I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has … You have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has." (Job 42:7b, 8b)
Why does God find no fault with Job's complaint, while finding serious fault with other complaints?
The difference is this: Job's complaint is accompanied by faith; the complaints of the Israelites in the wilderness are expressions of their lack of faith. God doesn't seem to have a problem with our honest expression of our troubles; but our lack of faith is a serious problem.
Observe the lack of faith expressed in the Israelites' complaint; they wished they had never gotten involved with God in the first place:
The Israelites said to them, "If only we had died by the Lord's hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death." (Exodus 16:3)
Contrast that with the expression of faith that stands tall in the middle of Job's complaint:
[Job] said: "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised." (Job 1:21)
When the Israelites had a problem, they assumed God had plotted against them:
But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, "Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?" (Exodus 17:3)
When Job had a problem, he believed God still deserved his trust:
Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him (Job 13:15a)
The Israelites' complaint showed that they refused to follow God:
All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, "If only we had died in Egypt! Or in this desert!" … And they said to each other, "We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt." (Numbers 14:2,4)
Job's complaint expressed his intention to follow God all his days:
As surely as God lives, who has denied me justice, the Almighty, who has made me taste bitterness of soul, as long as I have life within me, the breath of God in my nostrils, my lips will not speak wickedness, and my tongue will utter no deceit. (Job 27:2-4)
Or are there other examples of complaint united with faith? Is God offended by all complaining, or does He consider complaint together with faith a legitimate human expression?
Psalm 6 was written by King David, the "man after God's own heart". Notice how it alternates between complaint and faith.
Faith:
Be merciful to me, Lord, for I am faint; O Lord, heal me, for my bones are in agony. (Psalm 6:2)
Complaint:
My soul is in anguish. How long, O Lord, how long? (Psalm 6:3)
Faith:
Turn, O Lord, and deliver me; save me because of your unfailing love. (Psalm 6:4)
Complaint:
I am worn out from groaning; all night long I flood my bed with weeping and drench my couch with tears. My eyes grow weak with sorrow; they fail because of all my foes. (Psalm 6:6-7)
Faith:
The Lord has heard my cry for mercy; the Lord accepts my prayer. (Psalm 6:9)
See the interaction? God isn't upset because we recognize our troubles. He is upset by lack of faith. If we have faith, it's OK to have troubles too.
We see this same idea—alternating complaint and faith—in Psalm 22, the famous Messianic Psalm, from which Jesus quoted while he was dying.
Complaint:
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, and am not silent. (Psalm 22:1-2)
Faith:
Yet you are enthroned as the Holy One; you are the praise of Israel. In you our fathers put their trust; they trusted and you delivered them. They cried to you and were saved; in you they trusted and were not disappointed. (Psalm 22:3-5)
Complaint:
But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the people. All who see me mock me; they hurl insults, shaking their heads: "He trusts in the Lord; let the Lord rescue him. Let him deliver him, since he delights in him." (Psalm 22:6-8)
Faith:
Yet you brought me out of the womb; you made me trust in you even at my mother's breast. From birth I was cast upon you; from my mother's womb you have been my God. Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to help. (Psalm 22:9-11)
And so on.
The idea is simple: God isn't hurt by our complaints alone; He is hurt if our complaints express lack of faith. Complaints that express our faith in Him are music (or psalms) to His ears!
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