She Suffered Too

Job 2:9 

Then his wife said to him, “Do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die!”

Oof. This scripture makes me upset every time I read it. Job's wife is so inconsiderate and harsh. God esteems Job as like no other... Blameless and upright. But his wife doesn't see it. Her tone suggests that she sees him as being self-righteous jerk. Doesn't she see Job is suffering, hurting? He's lost everything. He was the head of their household as God would have it. And they were under spiritual attack. He was receiving the brunt of the attack. Everything he had was taken away and his body and mind were suffering too. 

Why can't she see it? 

Because she was hurting too. We don't hear much about her but she was the Homemaker of a huge household. She was married to a very rich man and had many, many children. She probably wore the best fashion and frequented the best markets. Her friends esteemed her house with awe when they would come over. Then, one day, she lost it all. She went from being the best of the best to having nothing but a grieving husband. She lost everything right along with Job. And what was her husband doing while she was hurting? Sitting in the middle of ashes scraping his wounds... 

I cannot imagine her pain. I know the pain of losing children, but not all at once. I know the pain of not knowing where my life was headed, but I was surrounded by loving family. She was alone, poor, and desperately in need of her husband emotionally and instead she was rebuked. Rightfully so. She wasn't right in what she said. My brain kept reading the passage like this, "What, are you still claiming innocence? This is obviously your fault." She wasn't right at all in her response. I don't think we often look at her as a human, but more like an antagonist in a story line.... She wasn't the antagonist. Really, she was a victim of the same circumstances as Job. She just went about it the wrong way because she was emotionally, physically, mentally, and spiritually depleted. 

And man, we know what that feels like, don't we? To be so empty of everything that the only words coming from our mouth are negative. When we're hurting, we easily cut down those we love the most. How many times, when we're tired and in the middle of a spiritual attack do we attack our fellow soldiers? They're hurting as much as we are. 

The good thing is that we don't have to be like Job's wife, even in the suffering. We can go to God in prayer. We can encourage those around us even when we feel empty. We can fight the enemy of our souls too! We don't have to sit in self-pity. I'm not saying it doesn't hurt, but if we're going to be in pain, we might as well being fighting in the war. Your family, your friends, your church family are not the enemy. Fight, but fight the right enemy. Speak against, but speak against the right enemy.