September 4, 2025 - Job 2:10 - "Strengthened in the Face of Adversity"

Job 2:10

"But he said unto her, Thou speakest as one of the foolish women speaketh. What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this did not Job sin with his lips."

Job’s world had collapsed in a matter of moments. His wealth was gone, his children taken, his body covered with sores, and even his wife urged him to curse God and die. Yet in the midst of all this darkness, Job’s response was not bitterness or rebellion but a steady confession of trust in God and His sovereignty in every detail. His words cut against the natural thoughts of the flesh. Only by the God-given Faith in Christ can one see the sovereign Hand of God directing all things and do so with joy, no matter how difficult the hardship. Job’s suffering was beyond what most of us can imagine. He acknowledged that all things—both comfort and trial—come from the sovereign Hand of God. This echoes what we hear later in Scripture: “Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?” (Amos 3:6). Even in affliction, Job teaches us that God’s purposes are never shaken.

In this, Job becomes a faint shadow of Christ Himself. Though a man, Job in his suffering points us to the One Who was more than a man. Jesus Christ, Who came in the flesh, and though He is God, He endured every kind of suffering. In His humanity, He hungered. He thirsted and grew weary. He was tempted by Satan, and He was afflicted not only in body but also in soul, as He bore the sins of His people. “Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows” (Isaiah 53:4). Like Job, Christ did not sin with His lips. In His greatest trial—the cross—He did not curse His Father but entrusted Himself to Him. Isaiah 53 tells us, “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth” (Isaiah 53:7). Even when mocked, betrayed, and crucified, He held fast His integrity and remained the faithful Substitute for His people.

Job’s words remind us that affliction is not outside of God’s hand. Satan can only go as far as God ordains. The boils on Job’s skin, the insults of his wife, the schemes of his adversary—none of these were outside the sovereign purpose and will of God. And so it was with Christ. The cross was no accident, no victory of Satan. It was the will of the Father: “It pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief” (Isaiah 53:10).

So where do we draw strength when trials come? The same place Job did, and the same place Christ did—in the fellowship of the Father, by the Spirit, and in the assurance that God’s purpose cannot fail. Jesus declared, “It is finished” (John 19:30). That cry is all our Hope of salvation. Because He held fast till the end, we who are in Him will never be forsaken. As Paul reminds us, “If God be for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31).

When we feel the weight of affliction, when our body is weak or our heart is weary, we remember this: Christ has already endured the greater suffering for us. Job could say, “Shall we not receive evil from the hand of God?” but Christ went further—He received the wrath of God that we deserved, so that we might receive grace upon grace. “For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich” (2 Corinthians 8:9).

Let us then look to Him. In trials, He is the One Who holds us and keeps us, even when we are too weak to hold to Him. In suffering, we do not despair but by His grace draw near to Him. And in all things, let us confess with Job—and even more with Christ—that our God is faithful. “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him” (Job 13:15). That was the confidence that the LORD had in His Father in the crucible of God's wrath. And when He was completely tried to the satisfaction of the Father, He came forth as gold (Job 23:10), and that for the salvation of His people.

He Who spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, will surely work all things—whether in affliction or in abundance—for the everlasting good of His redeemed (Romans 8:32-35). May we then, like Job, rest our souls in the sovereign Hand of our Redeemer, knowing that His purpose is perfect, His mercy unfailing, and His glory certain.