Not Live Forever
I loathe my life; I would not live forever. Leave me alone, for my days are a breath.
Job 7:16
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Not Live Forever
These words from Job seem harsh and impious. “Leave me alone” we hear him say. Why would anyone want God to leave them alone? Job is simply crying out in pain. He knows God did not make him immortal, that he will “not live forever,” so he is imploring God to make good on His promise. Job, in faith, cries out for God to give him death and take him from his current miserable state of existence. Job knows it is only God who can end his suffering and since He has not taken it away in his lifetime, he asks for God to take him out of this world. This goes to our deeper understanding of our existence in a broken and fallen world. We know this is not how it is supposed to be. We know we have ruined it with our sin. We desire to be with God, but unlike Jesus in Gethsemane, we forget “not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). This is why Jesus had to come to rescue us. We could never accomplish what needed to be done on our own. We could never suffer as Christ did and still remain faithful to the Father’s will. So we did not have to, Christ suffered in our place. He drank the cup of wrath meant for us, so that one day “when our last hour shall come, we pray that He would grant us a blessed end and graciously take us from this vale of tears to Himself into heaven.” And in this we have the assurance of life everlasting.
Job 7:16
+
Not Live Forever
These words from Job seem harsh and impious. “Leave me alone” we hear him say. Why would anyone want God to leave them alone? Job is simply crying out in pain. He knows God did not make him immortal, that he will “not live forever,” so he is imploring God to make good on His promise. Job, in faith, cries out for God to give him death and take him from his current miserable state of existence. Job knows it is only God who can end his suffering and since He has not taken it away in his lifetime, he asks for God to take him out of this world. This goes to our deeper understanding of our existence in a broken and fallen world. We know this is not how it is supposed to be. We know we have ruined it with our sin. We desire to be with God, but unlike Jesus in Gethsemane, we forget “not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). This is why Jesus had to come to rescue us. We could never accomplish what needed to be done on our own. We could never suffer as Christ did and still remain faithful to the Father’s will. So we did not have to, Christ suffered in our place. He drank the cup of wrath meant for us, so that one day “when our last hour shall come, we pray that He would grant us a blessed end and graciously take us from this vale of tears to Himself into heaven.” And in this we have the assurance of life everlasting.
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