SCRIPTURE: Job 15
OBSERVATION/APPLICATION:
Like trees, they will be cut down in the prime of life; their branches will never again be green. They will be like a vine whose grapes are harvested too early, like an olive tree that loses its blossoms before the fruit can form. For the godless are barren. [Job 15:32-34]
Eliphaz’s logic goes like this: wicked people suffer; Job is suffering, therefore Job is wicked.
This is the wisdom that he speaks of, but there is a huge flaw in his logic.
First of all, the opposite of this is that good people will prosper; if a person is prospering, then they are good.
Secondly, reality goes against this – there are many good people that suffer and many wicked people that prosper.
This is the complaint of the Psalmist in Psalm 73.

A good tree produces good fruit, and a bad tree produces bad fruit. A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit. So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire. Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions. [Matthew 7:17-20]
Jesus does not look at peoples’ circumstances to discern good people from bad people; He looks at their ‘fruit’.
By ‘fruit’ He means the words and actions and attitudes that flow from their hearts and lives.
If a person is generous, patient, forgiving, kind, merciful, loving, then they are a ‘good tree’.

I have had conversations with people who saw their success as a sign that God was blessing them; they were also qwick to point out that the suffering of people they knew was because of their sinful choices or actions.
I knew a family where the parents were very legalistic and strict, and prided themselves as a people that followed God’s law and were doing well as a result.
I remember the father of this house referring to another family, where the children were not walking a straight line, and suggesting that the parents should have followed God’s laws in their parenting and family life.
But what was really interesting to me was the secret bitterness harboured in the hearts of many of his children, and the underlying dysfunctionality of their family life – even though outwardly everyone “walked the straight line”.

Its not so simple.
The idea that good people have good lives and bad people have bad lives (or good people have good children and bad people have bad children) is both wrong and hurtful.
I find Jesus’ standard so much more motivating: do not focus on the results, focus on the behaviour.
Focus on the qualities that reflect God, that please God – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, etc.
These are the things that God will ultimately bless, even if for now we may suffer or go though hard times.
Whether things are going well for us, or for our families… or not, our calling is to produce good fruit.
The bottom line for God is how we live, whether we are “blessed” or “suffering”.
This is what God is looking for, the kind of ‘fruit’ that He desires.

PRAYER:
Lord, please encourage those who are suffering, whether or not their circumstances are the result of their choices or not. Assure them that You love them, You are with them, and that You are at work in their lives to refine and renew them!