Job stared into the empty tomb. Of his life.  His children. His livelihood.  His barns and fields.  His beasts.  His honor. His pride.  All dead. And gone.  He stared into the empty tomb and then walked his road to Emmaus,  crying out, “But we trusted that it had been He…”  That The Christ was his Savior.  Then why did it appear that all was lost?

When The Christ is one’s Savior, suffering and loss makes no sense.  When the Maker of Heaven and Earth, who can move mountains, is one’s God, an empty tomb in one’s life does not, in one’s brain tainted by sin, compute. It can’t compute until the mind is washed with the blood from His Hands and Feet, cleansed with the water that flows from His Side.  Only then can one see on the road to Emmaus that Jesus is The Companion, walking alongside all along. But the washing, in the blood, the cleansing, in the water… hurts, baring Pain. Pain that, with and only with Jesus, is baring Beauty. Because it is baring Jesus. Revealing Himself to the one in which Pain has been bared.

 Job had not yet been acquainted with The Man of Sorrows, despised and rejected of men.  Job stared into the empty tomb looking for his King, His Savior in the land of the living, and did not see Him. Or rather did not recognize him for he stared, not through the lens of the cross, but through the lens of the law.  Looking.  For the Love of God to come forth in his life and make everything right.  He was listening for his “Lazarus, come forth.”  Yet he heard nothing. God was silent and the tomb was empty.  Job rejoiced, “The Lord gives, the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.” But the empty tomb and God’s silence did not make sense. Why had God’s Great Love not come forth to save him from his suffering? not compensate him for his loss?  Why?  God? Why?  Where are You, LORD?

 Job knew of The Christ, but he knew (Yada) Him not.  If he had known Him, he would have recognized Him.  Seen His Shadow covering his path with the suffering and despair. If he had known Him, Job would have smelled His fragrance in the air.  Heard His cries, for all Job had to bear. The Christ walked with Job through his valley of the shadow of death - but Job did not recognize him. Yet.

Job was tempted in his wilderness, in his valley.  Three times. Three witnesses urged him to believe what he saw looking through the lens of the law.  These three witnesses - the world, the flesh, and Satan, tempt all Christians in the valley.  To test God by the letter of the law. To sense Him through the lens of the law.

But something inside Job caused him to be steadfast and not believe what he saw with the eyes of the world, not believe what he understood with his brain tainted by sin, not believe what he heard in the whispers of Satan that float in the air. Something inside Job caused him to keep crying out into the empty tomb until the echo of the gospel could be heard with his ears, seen with his own eyes, believed with the mind - of Christ.  Something, no… some One, the Spirit, inside Job caused him to keep fighting the fight until the scales fell from his eyes so they could see through the lens of the cross. It was then he could see His LORD, God’s Great Love for him, face to face, coming forth from the empty tomb.  It was then he would hear His LORD voice echoing in the air. It was then he could understand His LORD, who had been coming forth all along, but unseen, crying out “Lazarus, come forth.” It was then he would know (yada) His Savior coming forth with a new crown for Job. Not the shining crown of the world that had been taken from his head, but with a crown of thorns.  For Job, Jesus’ companion. 

God took Job on a journey that went back to In The Beginning and forward to The Amen… and onward to what will be the final destination, Come, Lord Jesus….The New Beginning.  The New Beginning that began after the It Is Finished and continues when Jesus returns, no longer hidden in the bread and the wine and the water and the preacher, hidden in the suffering and the loss, but revealed once again in the flesh.  He will be dressed no longer in the bread and wine and water and preacher, but dressed in the garment he put on to reconcile humanity to Himself.  Flesh.

 It was/is not an easy journey, for Job, for the Christian, because the journey does not pass by but goes through the Road to Golgotha. The journey’s destination is the empty tomb.  Job was a man of Cyrene, as all Christians are men of Cyrene, compelled to bear the cross that he, that we, might know (yada) The Christ.  Become friends.  Companions.  With Jesus. The Man of Sorrows, despised and rejected by men, by me.  And he, Job, and we, Christians, wearing our own crown of thorns. Not despised.  And not rejected.  By Our LORD.  All of us in One Voice, coming forth from the empty tomb, His Word proclaiming,

He is Risen.  

He is Risen, indeed!  

Halleluiah! 

I have seen Him face to face, in the land of the living.  Now in the shadow of the bread and the wine and the water and the preacher.  Now, in the shadow of the cross where we take refuge under His Wings that cover us. Until Tomorrow. When the Sun sets down His Crown on the new earth and we see Him in all His Glory. In Human Flesh.

He is Risen.  

He is Risen, indeed!  

Halleluiah!

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