A Sermon preached on Sunday 23 June (Pentecost VI) at St. Augustine’s, Wiesbaden and St. Christoph, Mainz
Job 38:1-11, 2 Corinthians 6:1-13, Mark 4:35-41
Have you noticed how both our first reading from Job begins and the Gospel passage from Mark Gospel ends with almost the same question? Who is this? God asks: “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?” (Job 38:1) and the disciples ask: “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” (Mark 4:41) You might think that these two questions, one addressed by God to a pretty miserable human being and the other addressed by humans to the Son of God can have nothing to do with each other. But they do. The Bible has a lot to do with identity, its stories tell us who we are, or who we should be, who God is, and most importantly, how we – God and humanity - should relate to one another.
On the surface, the answer to those questions that the story of Job seems to give is not a good one. Humanity, specifically the human Job, suffers without any fault of his own, and when God turns up in chapter 38 of that book, he puts Job down. The book of Job is not usually where we expect to find good news. Job is a wealthy and God-fearing man with a comfortable life and a large family. At the beginning of the story, which we think has an ancient folktale as its basis, God asks Satan (literally “the adversary or accuser'') for his opinion of Job's piety: “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man who fears God and turns away from evil.” (Job 1:8) When Satan states that Job would turn away from God if he were to lose everything, “But stretch out your hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face,” (Job 1:11 God agrees to this wager and allows him to take everything away. And so, Job loses family, wealth, home, and health, and has to defend himself against three unsympathetic friends, who assume and tell Job that he must have done something to deserve this punishment.
Job does not turn away from God, but he does demand to speak to God to understand why he has been punished “O that I had one to hear me! Let the Almighty answer me! O that I had the indictment written by my adversary!” (Job 31:35) which he hopes to be able to answer “I would give him an account of all my steps; like a prince I would approach him.” (Job 31:37)
And so here, towards the end of the book of Job, we find him finally meeting God. But God doesn’t answer his question, God does not explain God’s actions, and God doesn’t apologize. Instead, God asks Job a series (38 in total) of impossible questions, that are meant to show how much Job, and we, do not know and understand and to put him, and his problems into perspective.
The Book of Job is good for a couple of things. It counteracts the idea that only good things happen to good people and therefore bad things to bad people, a notion that is not only contradicted by experience, but that has been much abused to justify oppression and discrimination and to place blame on particular groups of people.
The Book of Job also puts us in our place and acts as a useful corrective to the Genesis creation story and to Psalm 8 that I quoted from in my weekly email. We have abused the exalted position as beings “made a little lower than God and crowned with glory and honour (and) given dominion over the works of your hands.” (Psalm 8:5-6) to justify the excessive and sometimes irreparable exploitation of God’s works. We are not the centre of the universe, God is, and while we are made in God’s image, we are not God. Our relationship with God must be marked by humility.
And yet, God appearing to Job, God entering into a conversation with him, God giving him a unique experience of the divine – these are all pointers towards a key part of our identity: We are God’s Beloved, we are not the centre of the universe, but we are at the centre of God’s attention and love. On the one hand God appears as the unknowable creator, on the other as a God desiring relationship.
Turning to Mark’s Gospel, I can understand why the disciples were a little dissatisfied with Jesus’ initial reaction. How can he sleep when there’s a storm going on, how can he not understand and accept just how frightened his companions are? Their fear and lack of trust come from their lack of understanding of Jesus’ identity. This lack of understanding, as expressed in the final question, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” persists even after this demonstration of his power, even when he accesses the same powers that God wields, just as we heard depicted in the Psalm (107): “Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he brought them out from their distress; he made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed.” (Psalm 107:28-29)
One answer to the question, “Who then is this?” is that this person, this Jesus is God. Just as the Book of Job corrects the idea that only good things happen to good people, we must avoid a new bad idea that Jesus in some way guarantees physical protection and freedom from harm – and idea that has proven to be fatal at times (e.g. when handling poisonous snakes). The disciples were saved from harm at this time, but that is not a guarantee for every occasion. We are not protected from pain, suffering and death – it might even be part of our path – but we are always guaranteed God’s loving presence. Wind and storms will come our way! In his commentary on Mark’s Gospel William Barclay writes. “When the disciples realised the presence of Jesus with them, the storm became a calm. Once they knew he was there, fearless peace entered their hearts. To voyage with Jesus is to voyage in peace even in a storm.”[1]
And quoting from a sermon[2] I read on today’s readings, “Like Job, we have caught the ear of the one who laid the cornerstone of earth; like the disciples, we are never alone, no matter what happens to that boat, or to us.”
Who are we? We are God’s creatures, God’s beloved, made in God’s image. Who is God? God is the unknowable, the creator and sustainer of all and the God who seeks relationship with us. Who is Jesus? Jesus is God and Jesus is relationship turned human.
What God in Jesus offers us, just as he offered Job and the disciples, is relationship, his presence and his love in the middle of whatever trials and storms we have to face. We only find our full identity only in relationship with God and one another.
Amen.
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