Job 19:10

He has broken down every part of me, myself is gone,

   He has uprooted hope in myself like a tree.

 

I was either ill or touched by food poisoning last night. Afterwards, I was thinking at least I lost some weight in the process. I think the intent of this verse is a complaint, but when I read it I see it as the aftermath of God changing me to be more Christlike. My life is not about me, and I have no hopes based on what I can do. I want only to serve and to trust in God’s strength to do those things He calls me to.

‘Broken down’ was also ‘torn down’, ‘destroyed’, and ‘shattered’. ‘Every part’ was ‘every side’ every other time. ‘Myself’ was ‘I’ every other time. ‘Gone’ was also ‘perish’ twice.

‘Uprooted’ was also ‘removed’ and ‘carried off’; and ‘tree’ was once ‘lumber’.

The hardest part of life is being purged of those things you do not want to give up. In the easiest sense, this is like losing my dog Butch. That really hurt and although it was forty years ago, it still does. I never wanted to experience that again, so I have refrained from getting a dog. As much as these cats are part of my life, I won’t miss them as much as I do Butch when they go.

I recently read in Corinthians about how Paul views marriage, and my biggest confusion is what is from God and what is from Paul in those verses. Marriage is hard, and every time I get frustrated, I realize the issue is me. I do not want to go to bed when the tv is still on. My wife does not want to go to bed without the tv on. One of us is put out every night. I have tried all kinds of ideas of how to work with this, but in the end, I just need to give up what I want.

But at the same time as I talk about giving up myself, I have to remember that some parts of me are set the way God wants. Those aspects of me that make me the me that God wants are the aspects of me that I need to make sure are being fed (in the old ‘which wolf wins’ scenario). If God is calling me to follow Him, I cannot deny that to make my wife happy. There is a path in there that is hard but is following God to make a change in her not me. The trick is to discern which path God is calling us to.

My oldest is wrapping up her education this year (done now: Whoop), and her next step will be the first real job in her career. She is trying to decide what job she should take (Decided), and the task of finding and deciding is not easy. I have told her repeatedly how our (my wife and me) past lives are full of decisions we would not have made except we heard the clear call of God for one way or another. The more you ask God and listen for His call, the better you will be at hearing it. One trick I find delightful is to ask Him to make it clear so that I may follow His will. I encourage you to try this for your next decision, and then just repeat that pattern.

Written 10/29/25, Posted 1/1/26, Job 440/~1070