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JOB 10: GRIEF and Bad Theology
JOB 10 - 1 “I hate my life. I will freely express my complaint.
I will speak as bitterly as I feel.
2 I will say to God, ‘Don’t condemn me.
Let me know why you are quarreling with me.
3 What do you gain by mistreating me, by rejecting the work of your hands while you favor the plans of the wicked?
4 Do you actually have human eyes? Do you see as a mortal sees?
5 Are your days like a mortal’s days? Are your years like a human’s years?
6 Is that why you look for guilt in me and search for sin in me?
7 You know I’m not guilty, but there is no one to rescue me from your hands.
HATE.
Job says he HATES his life.
Red voters seem to HATE Blue voters … and vice versa.
Some say they HATE our President.
Some say the President HATES them.
Some say God HATES certain people.
Certain people fear that God HATES them.
Do we HATE the Covid-19 virus? Or do we at least HATE the impact it is having on our lives?
Is it all the same kind of HATE?
Some will tell you that HATE and LOVE are connected. Some consider HATE and LOVE as polar opposites. Others think HATE and LOVE are interconnected, kind of like Yin and Yang. You can’t have one without the other.
I will submit to you that HATE and GRIEF are connected, perhaps even interconnected.
You have heard it said that there are five stages of Grief: Denial, Anger, Depression, Bargaining, and Acceptance. Oh that it could ever be so easy. If it were that easy, perhaps we could conveniently schedule our grief like a train trip. Five train stops on the journey. Spend the allotted time at each destination and move on. When you arrive at Acceptance you have made it. The journey is over and you have healed. You are well. Your grief is done.
But it never is. That easy. Is it? For each of us. For all of us. For any of us. Grief is a mess. It isn’t easy. It isn’t fun. And truthfully, it is never over. That’s the part, I think that nobody really wants to tell us. Or tell themselves. Grief is never, ever quite over.
Grief gathers; it accumulates. Before we finish grieving one loss, adjusting to one change, another comes crashing into our lives. Losses and changes and transitions overlap, sometimes randomly, sometimes suddenly, sometimes tragically. They say that bad things happen in threes. But that’s probably only to acknowledge that grief is complicated. And far more overwhelming than we ever want to admit.
And I think that’s how HATE enters into the equation. When we are overwhelmed by the complexity of change and loss and grief. HATE is simple. When we can’t understand why this is happening to us, HATE gives us something and someone to blame. Ourselves. Or somebody else. Or both.
If grieving were simple and straightforward. If the arrow only went one way. Toward healing and resolution. We wouldn’t need HATE.
But the arrows don’t just point one way, toward Acceptance. Sometimes we feel like we are going backwards, through Depression, past Anger, and back into Denial. Sometimes we feel like there are a hundred steps between Depression and Bargaining, and the arrows are going everywhere … except toward healing. We feel lost. We feel confused. We feel miserable.
And HATE gives us a quick and easy exit. Blame them. Or Blame ourselves. But blame somebody. So that. We can dump all of our fear and rage and loathing and disgust where it belongs. On the source of our HATE. And that will finally, make everything better. Somehow.
Only it doesn’t. Maybe it should. Although nobody has ever really demonstrated how that might happen. That HATE would actually fix something. I mean, after all, the whole point of HATE is to isolate, destroy, decimate, annihilate, and eradicate somebody or something. To restore order to our life. To restore balance to our being.
What they forget to tell us, what they rarely document well is that HATE, when we act upon it … HATE when we give it voice and actually express it in the direction of the thing or the person we HATE …
What they forget to tell us is that HATE, when we act upon it … just causes more grief. And never just to the object of our HATRED. HATE hurts us too. Whether we are doing the HATING. Or we are the one who is HATED.
Because HATE is VIOLENCE. And VIOLENCE is designed to do just that. HURT somebody.
So now I’m going to tell you a little secret that is the hardest thing in life to discover. To figure out:
Hate and Violence are the tools of those who secretly feel quite powerless. And alone. And vulnerable.
Hate and Violence allow them to escape that desperate feeling for at least a few moments. But usually only a desperate few.
Love and Non-Violence are the tools of those who feel quite powerful. Or perhaps GRATEFUL is the better word.
Both HATE and NON-VIOLENCE are biblical. Proverbs and 1 John kind of illustrate each of them. And the temptation toward HATRED is found on the Proverbs 8 side of the equation.
Proverbs 8:13 -
To fear the Lord is to HATE evil; I HATE pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech.
1 John 2:10-11 -
Anyone who LOVES their brother and sister lives in the LIGHT, and there is nothing in them to make them stumble. But anyone who HATES a brother or sister is in the DARKNESS and walks around in the darkness. They do not know where they are going, because the darkness has blinded them.
As one who advocates nonviolence far better than I emulate it, I set 1 John 2 as a goal I rarely reach. It just takes so much work. And prayer. But the consequences of shunning this work can be dangerous and dire. We can so easily become the very thing we hate.
In 1967 Martin Luther King wrote a book that speaks well to our time too.
“Where Do We Go From Here? : Chaos or Community.”
Great question! The civil rights leader seemed to understand so well the danger of hating those who hate.
“The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a DESCENDING SPIRAL begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy, instead of diminishing evil, it MULTIPLIES it.
Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars ...
Darkness CANNOT drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate CANNOT drive out hate; only love can do that.”
As long as we cling to our own resources … and weapons … to deal with grief and loss and struggles and changes … we will feel very alone and very vulnerable. The greatest lesson we all need to learn in life is humility. How very limited we all are. To protect ourselves. And the ones we love.
Thankfully there is a powerful solution.
GRATITUDE.
All deference to Kubler Ross aside, I think that GRATITUDE is a far better destination for GRIEF than Acceptance. Perhaps that is only my personal discovery. Perhaps GRATITUDE is not a universal destination. Perhaps we each find our own path toward Acceptance.
But I have suffered enough in life to begin to grasp what Paul means in Romans 5 when he says, “I rejoice in my suffering … because suffering produces endurance … endurance produces character … and character produces hope.”
For me the words are a bit different, but I think the concept is very similar.
I find GRATITUDE in my grieving …
because grief challenges me to learn HUMILITY …
humility challenges me to ask for COMPANIONS …
and companionship challenges me to find hope in a CIRCLE OF CARE.
With every loss, I gain new companions.
With every struggle they help me learn new skills and strategies, first to cope and then to grow.
With every transition I am humbled, but also surrounded with support and encouragement.
If I ask you to name the most powerful people in your life, perhaps you wouldn’t think first of the ones who are the most grateful.
But I invite you to think of that person in your life who is the most grateful. When you hear the word GRATITUDE, who comes most quickly to mind?
Ask them what they are most grateful about? My guess?
You’ll hear about humility.
And companions.
And circles of care.
And a power. The kind of power.
That endures.
That’s why. I think GRATITUDE is a better resolution for GRIEF. A more powerful resolution.
Than HATE. Or VIOLENCE.
Ever could be.
Don’t you?
MAJOR THEMES of JOB
Admitting the HARD REALITIES of Life. And Death.
Suffering is a given. For everyone.
Do we REACT more out of Fear?
Or RESPOND more out of Faith?
Asking the HARD QUESTIONS
What is Good and what is Bad? How do we really know?
Refuting the EASY QUESTIONS
We are tempted to trivialize the Challenges others face.
Is Advice ever helpful?
Affirming the Majestic Mysteries of Heaven AND Earth
Who can contemplate the beginning of Creation? Or the End?
Beware of believing WE understand God ... or God's purpose(s)
SIX STUDIES IN JOB
JOB 1: Cause of the Suffering
JOB 2: Reactions to Suffering
JOB 10: Grief and Bad Theology
JOB 19: Response to Bad Theology
JOB 38: Response from the Storm
JOB 42: Job Repents and Forgives