Job suffers not because he’s the worst of men but because he’s the best: “there is none like him” ( Job 1:8).
“There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was blameless and upright, and one who feared God and shunned evil” ( Job 1:1). And what a man he was! Regarding his own conscience, blameless; regarding others, upright; regarding God, reverent; regarding evil, repulsed by it. His name âyab is linked with words like “animosity,” “hostility,” and “enmity.” It might be translated “persecuted one.” Commentators make educated guesses as to the location of Uz (perhaps northeast of Israel in modern Syria or southeast in Edom), and we have already seen the speculation regarding the times in which he lived. Perhaps this is all part of the design, a vignette fading into its background without a definite border. Thus Job is a man for all seasons, a believer with whom every generation of suffering saint can identify. It is remarkable, isn’t it, that a book written four millennia ago can speak to us as if the ink was still wet on the scroll? But there is fraternity between every soul who has lost a child, or suffered extreme physical pain, or been falsely accused, or wrestled with God in the dark. But as the apostle Paul would remind the Corinthian believers, who lived halfway back to the time of Job, “No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it” (1 Cor 10:13). Thus we are introduced to the man who is embraced by heaven and targeted by hell. Then again, we all are! It will be good to make friends with this man, as multitudes have through the ages. He prospered. He suffered. He questioned. He learned. He endured!