“Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that was come upon him, they came every one from his own place: Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite: for they had made an appointment together to come to mourn with him and to comfort him. 12. And when they lifted up their eyes afar off, and knew him not, they lifted up their voice, and wept; and they rent everyone his mantle, and sprinkled dust upon their heads toward heaven. 13. So they sat down with him upon the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spoke a word unto him for they saw that his grief was very great.”
Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar heard of their friend Job’s tragedy and they came to him out of great concern for him. In fact, their stated aim was to “come to mourn with him and comfort him.” No one knows how much friendship means until they have had friends come to them to comfort them. At first, they did everything right. Initially, they had the right idea, but as you know, their “comfort” ceased to be comfort. First, they sat with Job for seven days and did not breathe a word. I think that a good sign of friendship is to sit for a full week and not say a word, just grieve with the stricken friend. When I first entered the ministry, I thought that when I visited grieving people that I needed just the right text, or just the right word that would relieve their grief. I finally discovered through experience that the best thing that I could do initially was to just be there. You know it is a fact that if you do not know what to say, the best thing to do is to say nothing. Usually in those cases we say the wrong thing that will not offer comfort at all. We see in verse 13 of Job 2 the value of silence. It is true that timely words can help, but it is equally true that untimely words can hurt. Take, for example, Proverbs 15:23: “A man has joy by the answer of his mouth: and a word spoken in due season, how good is it!” True! Now allow me to paraphrase the opposite of this: “A word spoken out of season, how bad is it.” Remember this about Job’s friends when you encounter grieving friends. Second, Job’s three friends wept for him and with him. Verse 12 tells us about this: “And when they lifted up their eyes afar off, and knew him not, they lifted up their voice, and wept, they rent their mantle (tore their robes) and sprinkled dust upon their heads toward heaven.” Obviously, we would not do all of this, for these were signs of grieving in that day. It was obvious that they were deeply touched by Job’s grief. Their friend was so emaciated that they would not have recognized him if they hadn’t known who he was. So they wept and grieved like good friends should. When one is grieving, it really does help to know that good friends are sharing his or her grief. Third, in the fourth chapter of Job, his three friends begin to tear down every good thing that they had done to that point, and this continued through three different speeches by the friends through Job 31. What did they do? They began to run their mouths and they ceased being Job’s friends and became his judges. They thought they knew exactly why Job was in these dire straits. They accused him of all sorts of gross sins. They had no idea what had transpired between God and Satan that caused all of this trouble for Job. (Read the first two chapters of Job if you don’t know what transpired.) Eliphaz, who was the first to speak in 4:7-8: “Remember, I pray thee, whoever perished being innocent? Or where were the righteous cut off? 8. Even as I have seen, they that plow iniquity and sow wickedness, reap the same.” That is a serious accusation against a man that the Lord saw as the most righteous man on earth. On and on the three friends go, judging Job when they had no idea what was going on. The lesson for us here is if we want to be true friends to people, we need to remember that what we say is not as important as what we feel and what we do for them. And when we do say something say it with love and choose our words wisely, saying to them only what we would want said to us. Bro. Joe
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AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
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