Resentment Kills

Resentment kills a fool, and envy slays the simple. ~ Job 5:2

The book of Job is profound, weird, challenging and one of my favorite books in the Bible.  Chalked full of trials, the loss of everything he had once owned, torturous physical pain down to losing his entire family, God allowed a lot of suffering to come upon Job all in the name of a “test”.  Talk about a brutal final exam.  Even though Job has been a righteous and faithful servant of God, God still allows Satan to test Job.  Yet despite horrific suffering and loss, Job still refuses to curse God and remains His faithful servant.  Now on the scene come three of Job’s friends to try to comfort him and what ensues is what sounds more like a theological debate than comfort.  They claim they want to console him, but their attempts seem a bit futile, or misguided.  They just should have kept their mouths shut!  There is no doubt that Job is in the pit of despair, but when Eliphaz suggests that Job must have done something sinful to bring this upon himself and that he needs to repent and ask God for forgiveness, this seems to bring the discussion to a whole new level.  Truly the friends don’t know how to handle this, and surely don’t have the right words to say about their friends' situation.  They don’t understand why this is happening.  So it is, or will be…. with your life.  With my life.  There will be times when we don’t understand why we are going through what we are going through.  You may have had things happen to you in the past that you still wrestle with and are harboring bitterness over.  This verse, Job 5:2, struck me hard and I heard this loud and clear in my head, “LET IT GO!  GIVE IT TO ME!  DO NOT LET IT DESTROY YOU!  THEY WILL CONTINUE TO HURT YOU UNTIL YOU LET THE BITTERNESS GO!”  There is nothing but destruction when we hold onto resentment, bitterness, or envy against people, or even God.  The verse can’t be any clearer, “resentment kills”.  It kills relationships, it leads to pain, and it will become your stumbling block if you don’t lay it at Jesus’ feet and let go.  At the end of Job, God restores Job’s life with more than what he had before Satan messed with him.  The Lord restored everything and more.  He wants to do the same for you.  Don’t let life’s trials, your past, or I dare say, even a test from God fill you with bitterness, jealousy, resentment, or envy.  Let it go! ~ Amen