Job - Dialogue with Three Friends (1)

I. Sometimes it's Best Just to not Say Anything

We are exploring why God allowed Job's suffering to continue even after He had already defeated Satan's challenges concerning Job in chapters 1 and 2. Let's look together at these months of Job's misery and the comfort offered by his friends, starting with 2:11-13.

Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came each from his own place, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite. They made an appointment together to come to show him sympathy and comfort him. And when they saw him from a distance, they did not recognize him. And they raised their voices and wept, and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads toward heaven. And they sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his suffering was very great. (Job 2:11-13)

If it had stopped there, we might have admired them as friends with great compassion for their suffering friend. But, unfortunately, like many of us, it did not stop with them quietly comforting Job. For the next 29 chapters (through 31) Job will be responding to what these three friends have to say about his suffering. There are three cycles in the conversation.

Cycle 1 Eliphaz – 4&5 Job – 6&7 Bildad – 8 Job – 9&10 Zophar – 11 Job – 12 –14

Cycle 2 Eliphaz – 15 Job – 16 &17 Bildad – 18 Job – 19 Zophar – 20 Job – 21

Cycle 3 Eliphaz – 22 Job – 23 & 24 Bildad – 25 Job – 26 – 31 Zophar (silence)

After this long conversation, comes a six chapter speech by a young man named Elihu (32-37). Then God Himself speaks to Job (38-41), as well as the last chapter of reversal and restoration.

The question is: what does the author of this book want us to learn from the speeches of Job's three friends and Job's responses to them as he endures month after month of this misery? First, we will consider the practical lessons involved in being a friend to someone who is going through a trial. Then we will consider the theology of the three friends and the implications for us. We will finally consider Job's response and his progressive movement from despair to confidence in the justness and goodness of God.