“What strength do I have, that I should still hope? What prospects, that I should be patient? – Job 6:11

Today’s Scripture Reading (March 17, 2012): Job 6

Spring is getting closer. Officially, the first day of spring is only days away. But where I live the actual beginning of flowers and birds and warm weather is a little more distant. No one in my neighbourhood is getting ready to plant their flowers quite yet. The problem is that even if it is warm today (and we are starting to get a few warm days) we have no guarantee that it won’t snow next week. In fact, some of the old timers would tell you that it isn’t really safe enough for most planting until at least the middle of May. And so, even though the calendar might say spring, we are still waiting.

The problem with planting now is that the seed or the young plants just won’t survive the cold that is most likely still to come. And if we spend all of our efforts now, we won’t have anything to show for our effort when summer rolls around. In the words of Job, we won’t have any prospects because the seed we have planted is already dead, and we won’t have any strength, or seed, left for a new planting. And when that happens, all hope is lost. Waiting won’t help. There is nothing left to grow even if the warm weather does come.

And that is the position that Job finds himself in. All the seed in his life has already been planted and the seed now has died leaving him no prospects for the future and no strength to plant more. There was no longer any reason to be patient and there was no reason to have hope. The game had ended – the final bell had already rung.

Except that Job’s hope had never been placed in his own strength and on his own prospects – his hope and his prospects had always been dependant on God’s strength and it was God that he had constantly waited on. And that hadn’t changed. But what Job’s friends had started to do was to transfer Job’s focus from God onto himself. And that was a problem.

We often feel like we have lost both prospects and hope. But that would assume that everything in this life depends on us – and it doesn’t. It depends on God. It always has – and it always will. As long as we can find within ourselves the ability to place our faith on God, we will always have strength and prospects – and hope.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Job 7