Faith

The book of Job was written a long time ago. Scholars are not sure just how long ago but say it was somewhere between 4000 and 2500 years ago. Whenever it was, the commonly held view of God was that God causes good things to happen to righteous people and bad things to happen to sinful, rebellious people.

When Job lost all his wealth - donkeys, oxen, sheep and camels - and all his sons and daughters as well as his servants in a single day, and then he got sick with sores all over his body, his friends came to "comfort" him by accusing him of being unfaithful to God.

Admittedly Job is confused. He has been a righteous man and doesn't understand why God has turned His back on him and brought this calamity. But through all of this Job proved to be a man of faith. His very first response was "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I shall return. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord." Job 1:21

His wife tells him to curse God and die. Job says, "Shall we receive good from God and shall we not receive evil?" Job 2:9-10 Job understands that God controls it all.

He even understands that their is a mediator for us in heaven, who is Jesus. Job 16:19, 1Timothy 2:5

And He knows that one day there will be a resurrection. Job 19:25-26 And this guy didn't have a church or preacher or Sunday School teacher or weekly Bible study. Yet because he worshiped God and sought to know Him, God put all this belief and faith into his heart. He'd never heard of Jesus, yet he believed in Him.

We are a lazy generation of people who lack faith because we expect someone else to feed it to us. We don't build the relationship with God to find it for ourselves. We don't turn off the busyness of life often enough or long enough to "cease striving and know that I am God". Psalm 46:10  When times are tough, we need a faith that goes deeper than Sunday morning.