Job scraped his skin with a piece of broken pottery as he sat among the ashes. Job has received another of the horrible curses handed out to him by God. All that he could do is scrape himself clean. In one of the most compassionate outbursts of eloquent care ever given from a woman to her husband, His wife said to him, “Are you still trying to maintain your integrity? Curse God and die.”
A little context is helpful to grasp just how ugly these words are. Job is in agony. She is saying that is obvious God has completely abandoned him. Stop acting that God has anything to do with all of this except to mock you and humiliate me. End it! Now! It is obvious where her affections lay.
But in Job 2:10 he replied, “You talk like a foolish woman. Should we accept only good things from the hand of God and never anything bad? So in all this, Job said nothing wrong.” Even in all of this Job pleads with his wife and makes an appeal to trust the timeless truths of the Gospel!
We must pursue the beauty and wonder of God, no matter how badly things may appear in life.
I received the last of the chemotherapy treatments today. All that is left of the radiation are the eight or nine of the electronic procedures, performed by an instrument with the heart-warming name of, Cyber-Knife. The knife skillfully attacks the area of tumor that may or may not be left. Please, don’t misunderstand. By describing the cyber combat as accurately as I can, it helps me to understand how seriously the cancer must be attacked.
Sin is very much like the cancer that is attempting to take over my body. From a human perspective, only the most lethal combinations of mercy and biblical warfare will get the job done. From God’s perspective only what he has willed is sufficient. The physical side-effects are anything but pleasant. But as this time of physical battle draws to a close, at least with regard to the cancer, I find myself asking this daunting question:
Over the course of my life, have I hated sin more than I have loved Christ?
It is a question, even now, that I fear to answer, but answer I must!
Thank you for going through this part of the journey with me.
Curse sin and live.
Joy to the world, the Savior reigns!
One thought on “Curse God and Die!”
Fantastic post as usual. May God be with you on your journey.