Job 38

The information age feels like an all-you-can-eat buffet. I’m stuffed.

The information age feels like an all-you-can-eat buffet. I’m stuffed.

Poet Michael Shewmaker imagines a suffering Christian in Kilgore, Texas, with three unhelpful friends.

Before Satan, there was the biblical sea monster Leviathan.

Before Satan, there was the biblical sea monster Leviathan.

Sometimes I picture its author looking down at us and shaking his head.

Sometimes I picture its author looking down at us and shaking his head.

In Yehiel Poupko’s poems, Jewish belief in God groans under the burden of divine silence.

In Yehiel Poupko’s poems, Jewish belief in God groans under the burden of divine silence.

I don’t want to hear any more from Eliphaz, Bildad, or Zophar. I want answers.

I don’t want to hear any more from Eliphaz, Bildad, or Zophar. I want answers.

God’s response to Job is cold comfort when you have terminal cancer.

I mostly agree with Jeffrey Weiss about prayer. I think St. Paul would too.

Alfred Lord Tennyson called Job "the greatest poem of ancient and modern times." Excerpts are regularly included in anthologies of world literature and religious poetry. It is an undeniable literary classic.

Why is it rarely preached in Christian churches? 

Alfred Lord Tennyson called Job "the greatest poem of ancient and modern times." Excerpts are regularly included in anthologies of world literature and religious poetry. It is an undeniable literary classic.

Why is it rarely preached in Christian churches? 

If God’s response to Job in chapter 38 were meant only to shut Job up, seven verses would be sufficient. But God is only getting started here, and the exuberance of the rhetoric insists that vastly more is at stake.

If God’s response to Job in chapter 38 were meant only to shut Job up, seven verses would be sufficient. But God is only getting started here, and the exuberance of the rhetoric insists that vastly more is at stake.

In science, when negative data isn’t reported, the result is a silence that silences. A life-saving drug or a new discovery may be missed.

In science, when negative data isn’t reported, the result is a silence that silences. A life-saving drug or a new discovery may be missed.

The answer that comes out of a tornado is not the kind of answer we want.