Why did I not die in the womb?
January 21, 2019 (Bible Devotion)
Why died I not from the womb? why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly? — Job 3:11
Why
We never stop to ask why-questions. From the early days of natural curiosity to the latter days of deeper reflection, we are always eager to know why. When we were little to ask why because wanted to know how things work. We feel clueless then. As we get older, we do not simply ask why to gather information but in an attempt to make sense of the things that are forced upon us.
Sometimes we ask why to get an answer. Other times we ask why simply to unbury more question. Yet, at time even when our queries are answered with are still left a deeper desire to want to know more. The book Job depicts the situation of a wealthy and godly man who has been deprived of almost all his possession. His wealth, his family except for his wife, all vanished in a day.
Yet this was not all his lot. He became terribly sick. So sick that his visiting friends remain silence for a week at his sight. No one dares to console him before his suffering appeared unrelated. Job lost everything that could have been lost. He even lost his health. And it gets the point where some starts to wonder would he also lost his life. Yet amidst all his losses. Job declared: “the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.” At the same time, some serious inquiries and reflective questions followed this declaration.
Why did I not die
Job hit the mark where He feels like maybe the world did not need his presence. He was not thrilled about his birthday. He expressed some depressive thoughts about the day he came into the world. He even goes as far to curse that day. In his imagination, he wrestles with the idea that maybe a curse, not a blessing, was brought into the world that day.
The current situation makes Job so inquisitive. He wonders why his incubation process was so favorable. He seems to indicate that he would have been happy if his mother’s knee collided and the world folded to reject the newborn. Slowly his mind is faded in this notion that death at birth would have been a blessing.
Give up the ghost
Like Job, we might encounter very tough situations in life. We might feel into deep despair and even panicked about our existence. We can have very deep questions. We might even be tempted to believe that it is greener on the other side of the earth. Questions upon questions may mount in our minds. We can be asking why without a clear answer, yet be of good cheer.
In his shameful state, Job wished that no one would have to share his misery. He was sick, destitute, stagnant. Tough he can speak and expressed his feeling, he felt like a vegetable. His feeling was hovering over his mind. He wonders why did he even had a chance to see the light day. Why not die peacefully at birth where no eye could see him.
I came
As with Job so with us, our perspective of life is limited. We may not know why we face certain circumstances. Yet we come about the belly for a divine reason. The very circumstance that pricks us to cry out in despair will help to shine forth as gold if we endure. Everything might not make perfect sense to us in the short term, but we can be assured that God is in control.
Job came out of the belly for reasons unknown to him. Yet his faithfulness show to the world and unfallen being that God is worth worshipping. Elijah pleads for God to send him all the way to the earth, yet God still had a work for him to do. We were born for such a time as this. We came out of the belly as God’s workmanship to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. There is indeed prayer God will never answer. It is the prayer made out despair and self-pity. Is it the prayer that begs for death before God’s appointed time.
Why did I not die in the womb?
Because God who causes bones to grow in the womb, saw it fit to grant me life. Even in adversity, he knows his plan towards me. I am his workmanship. And so are you!
