Job 10:15

If guilty, woe betide me,

   Yet, if innocent, I could not raise my head,

      Being filled with shame,

         And sated with misery.

 

I wanted to write about my trip, and yet I want to write about these verses. So, in compromise, I’ll do both. We just got back from a trip to the UK to visit a sister and see some sights. At one point, we engaged in a conversation with the big kid about how the church she was attending at college was going to put on a mission trip to witness to Mormons in Utah. I related to her a story in the media that created a storm when the Southern Baptist Convention had a goal to reach Jews for Christ. On the surface, it seems an odd use of resources for one group to reach into a conflicting one for new members.

For my mentor, yes, this one looks to be a long one.

In my original version, I used “I sin”, “I am righteous”, and “cannot” rather than “guilty”, “innocent”, and “could not”. We all sin and none of us are righteous, so those terms seemed to make the idea not applicable to the average person. We at least have a chance to be innocent and guilty of some individual things, and so I went that route.

For “I sin” some sources had “I am wicked”, “I do wrong”, and of course guilty. Wicked looked like overkill. “Woe” was also, “the worst”, “alas”, and “too bad” for me. I did not understand alas and too bad sounded like gutter slang. I picked “betide” from my favorite source, but only because it forced me to think more each time I read it.

In addition to “righteous” and “innocent” one source had “if I am good”. It seemed more generic, but it arrived with the “too bad” and was rejected as too informal. “Raise” was also “lift up”. I saw no real difference between the two.

“Shame” was also “disgrace” and “confusion”. Confusion was off point and “disgrace” seemed to be outward rather that the inward I sense in shame.

“Sated with misery” was “look upon my affliction”, “drowned in my affliction”, “see my misery”, “drenched in my misery”, and “surfeited with disgrace”. I did not even bother to look up surfeit in ignoring it, and yet it would probably be the best word if any future reader knew what it meant. Some of these asked the listener to see the terrible condition he was in. Some indicated how overcome with his condition that he was. And I felt this was the intent. However, now I think it might be “Being filled with shame (internal) and surfeited with disgrace (external). I’ll have to think more on that to decide.

Back to the conflicts between groups and use of resources. The concept that rang true for me was the there is substance to the phrase “earn the right to be heard” and often times we as Christians need to take time to develop relationships to be able to share Christ with someone else. My UK sister did not grow up with the constant presence of Jesus that my mom gave to me and my other sister. I did not need someone outside my everyday life to share the good news with me as I heard it and saw it every day. Knowing Jesus as I do, I want everyone to know Him as well. This includes my kids, my sisters, my nieces and nephews, my brothers-in-law, the Mormons who live around me or not, and the Jews who I run across or don’t.

The key to a relationship with Jesus is that it is personal. One on one. A group of Baptists have no more ability to relate to God that a group of Mormons, a group of Jews, or agnostics, or atheists, or whatever other groups there may be. Each individual Christian needs to accept Christ to be a Christian. Growing up in the church is not enough and not growing up in a church is not a deterministic hindrance.

The other side of this equation is that God calls everyone to a different action. Some individual Christians are called to go argue with Mormons or debate with Jews or simply love their neighbor whatever their background. Others are called to live in conversation with family members and friends about how Christ impacts them hoping that someday, their efforts will have fruit.

When the kids were little, we would pray with them every night showing them how we prayed. As they grew older, they began to pray themselves with us. And now they pray on their own. Along the way we would pray for my sisters, my nieces and nephews, my brothers-in-law, the grandparents (and the pets) and even this trip we prayed that our interactions would shine a light on Christ and draw our relatives closer to Christ. I even had a soap box moment with my sister’s mother about one specific example of how I followed Christ in actions to improve an important relationship. I wasn’t asking her if she knew Jesus or assuming she did or did not, I was simply sharing my story to glorify God and trust Him for any outcome.

Jesus called Christians to be fishers of men. Fishermen have different ways of fishing. For some it is casting a net and pulling in a variable number all at once. Others put out the bait on a string of hooks and come back much later to pull in however many fish were caught. Many cast out bait in a particular spot over and over trying to catch that one special fish they have spotted. Our actions as Christians can have us using similar group, long term, and specific methods to share Christ with others. I assume we are all called to different actions at different times according to the will of God.

Job was filled with misery, but he never doubted that God loved Him, and he did his best to follow God. He may have been disgraced by his condition. But he was never ashamed of God, and he never rejected God. As with how we live our lives, we are to compare our actions or choices to what we hear from God. If we have a choice that seems odd to men, yet follows the Biblical standards God has provided, then we can move forward without shame for following God.

 

(Written 1/1/23, Posted 1/7, Job 223)