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An Invitation to Study
The Book of Job
Lesson 7November 5–11

Retributive Punishment

Read for This Week’s Study: Job 8:1–22, Job 11:1–20, Isa. 40:12–14, Gen. 6:5–8, 2 Pet. 3:5–7. 

Memory Text: “ ‘Can you search out the deep things of God? Can you find out the limits of the Almighty?’ ” (Job 11:7, NKJV). 

The problem of human suffering surely continues to daunt humanity. We see “good” people suffer immense tragedy, while evil ones go unpunished in this life. A few years ago a book came out called Why Do Bad Things Happen to Good People? It was one of numerous attempts over the millennia to come to a satisfactory answer to that problem. It didn’t. Many other writers and thinkers have written of their struggle to come to terms with human suffering. They don’t seem to have found the right answers.

This theme, of course, is the theme of the book of Job, and in it we continue to explore why even “good” people, such as Job, suffer in this world. The crucial difference between the book of Job and the others, though, is that Job is not based on human perspectives of suffering (though we get plenty of that in the book); rather, because it’s the Bible, we get a look at God’s perspective on the problem. 

This week we read more speeches from the men who came to Job in his misery. What can we learn from them, especially from their mistakes as they, as others have done, try to come to grips with the problem of pain?