Job: When Life Doesn't Make Sense--the counselors

In our first lesson we looked at the person of Job. The second lesson focused on the role of the satan in this story. Today, we’ll consider the group of characters who are sometimes called Job’s “friends,” “comforters,” or “counselors.”

What kind of guys are they?
How do they try to help/guide Job?

You…have given no help. You have seen my calamity, and you are afraid. – Job 6:21

Why would Job tell his “counselors” that they were afraid? What were they afraid of?

If only you could be silent! That’s the wisest thing you could do. Listen to my charge; pay attention to my arguments. Are you defending God with lies? Do you make your dishonest arguments for His sake? Will you slant your testimony in His favor? Will you argue God’s case for Him? What will happen when He finds out what you are doing? -- Job 13:5-9

Job says that the counselors are defending God “with lies”? What were those lies?

What are some ways that people today try to defend God with lies and dishonest arguments? How do they rationalize their behavior?

Since they place their system of belief above their compassion for their troubled friend, their exhortations to repentance become a temptation by encouraging Job to seek God for reward, not for God Himself.

Because of their rigid understanding of [the doctrine that the righteous are always blessed and the wicked are always punished, the “counselors”] can only explain Job’s suffering as the result of some sin that he has committed. Then the only solution they can offer to him is the way of repentance. Because they encourage Job to repent primarily to escape his suffering and to receive God’s blessing, they unsuspectingly tempt him to use God for personal gain, the essence of sin. Therefore, if Job followed their counsel, he would confirm the Satan’s proposition that human beings are totally self-serving in their worship of God. [John Hartley, The Book of Job, NICOT series, (Eerdmans, 1988), 44, 48-9]