Job CXXXV

 You approach someone differently when presuming innocence on their part than when you’re presuming guilt. If the presumption has already established itself that the individual you are addressing is guilty, but you just haven’t figured out what they’re guilty of, you’re likely to be more aggressive, confrontational, and lacking in empathy.

Once they’ve made up their mind about an individual or a situation, most people cling to their presupposition with a death grip because admitting they were wrong is a nonsequitur and something they are unwilling to allow the possibility of. They would rather continue to wrongly accuse someone of the most heinous of failures than admit they misjudged the situation or that their conclusions had no basis in truth.

I know what I know even though what I know is wholly based on mental gymnastics of the most basic intellectual tier, but I’m so sure about it that I will not hear the words you speak in your defense or allow my knowledge of your character to deter me from my course.

Save for God clarifying the situation and bringing light to it, there was nothing Job could say at this point that would compel his friends to change their minds. The presumption of guilt was well and fully established in their hearts and minds, and each one took a different route to the same destination. Job is guilty! No doubt about it, he did something to displease God, because the proof is in the pudding, and if he hadn’t, then he wouldn’t be suffering the torments he was currently undergoing.

Whenever we attempt to take a complicated situation that we only have a partial understanding of and wrap it up in a nice little bow, chances are, whatever conclusion we’ve come to is nowhere near the truth. We all want to believe the world is black and white; there are good guys and bad guys, sinners and saints, and while the sinner gets judged, the saint gets blessed. No mess, no complications, just straightforward arithmetic.

This worldview of causation brought Job’s friends to the conclusion that he must have done something to displease God. He had sinned. Therefore, he was enduring the consequences of his actions.

It is wisdom itself to resist the urge to pontificate when someone is going through a trial, when they are suffering, when they’ve lost a loved one, or when they are going through something you couldn’t possibly understand. In those moments, your presence is what is required rather than your sermonizing because they’re already at their lowest, and pushing their face into the dust even more will benefit no one.

Matthew 25:34-36, “Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; I was naked and you clothed me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.’”

When we reach out to someone who is hurting, our purpose isn’t to add to their burden but to help carry it for the little while we are with them. Everything Jesus lists as having been done by those who are blessed of His father were actions. Whether feeding the hungry, giving a drink to the thirsty, taking in a stranger, clothing someone without, visiting the sick, or going to someone in prison, none of them were accusations or judgments but actions confirming a tender heart who understands that when someone is in pain or in need the one thing we should focus on is being a comfort, and meeting the need.

We’ve grown callous through the years. We’ve each identified the hill we’re willing to die on, and rather than being the kind of people Jesus can look upon and say, “Inasmuch as you did these things to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it unto Me”, we huddle in our cliques and tribes weary of everyone else, quick to declare Ichabod on anyone who disagrees with us even on the most tertiary of issues.

It seems as though we can no longer see the forest for the trees, and rather than focus on being more like Jesus, we are defined by our theological positions, allowing them to become de facto objects of worship. Yes, there are baseline salvific issues to which we must adhere to be counted among the family of God, but beyond that, much of the arguing and debate regarding tertiary matters will be settled on their own by time.

We can’t be more concerned about being right about something than we are about being present and ready to be deployed to wherever God has need of us. Some people will look back on their lives and realize they spent more time arguing over issues that had no bearing on salvation, rather than being about the Father’s business, and doing the work of the Kingdom as they were mandated to do.

As an aside, admitting that you don’t know something is neither a sin nor an acknowledgement of general ignorance but an acceptance of reality that for now, we see in a mirror, dimly, and the best of us know only in part. If Paul was humble enough to acknowledge this truth, it should be no great feat for us to do likewise.   

When we stop seeing the body of Christ as a whole and deem it to be a discombobulated basket of parts, we are no longer eager to bear one another’s burdens as the Word instructs but are constantly vying for supremacy or authority.

Zophar did his best to browbeat Job into confessing to sin he had not committed, even going so far as to insist that the punishment was light and not at all equal with the perceived crime. Be grateful this is all you’re having to suffer because it’s less than your iniquity deserves. Those are words everyone being crushed by their situation wants to hear, I’m sure. 

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

Posted on 11 March 2025 | 11:23 am