Saint Jerome, Priest and Doctor of the Church (Memorial)

Have you noticed my servant Job?

We’re just at the beginning of the Book of Job. If you’re familiar with the story, you know what’s coming. Job will lose everything—his family, his wealth, his health. He will struggle and wrestle with God’s goodness and will eventually come to know the loving provision of God.

But how does it all start? God is with his angels when Satan presents himself. God asks him, “Have you noticed my servant Job, and that there is no one on earth like him?” (Job 1:8). God has noticed Job. He loves him and sees the good in him. Even though he needs to grow, Job is God’s treasured child.

God sees Job. There are countless people on the face of the earth. And yet God sees Job. He is aware of Job’s righteous heart and his love. God sees you and loves you, too. He sees what you’re going through, and he recognizes all the ways you seek to love him and love the people in your life.

God knows Job. More than just the external details of Job’s life, God knows everything in Job’s heart—the goodness and also the pain, the maturity and wisdom and also the weakness. He appreciates Job and wants the best for him. And that’s the same way he knows you. The good, the bad, the ugly. God knows it all, and still he treasures you.

God loves Job. We might ask how God could love Job when he allowed such terrible things to happen to him. It’s true: God did allow the testing Job endured. But beyond merely allowing it, he used it to bring Job to a deeper relationship with him and greater wisdom in his life. We might find the same thing when we face suffering or setbacks. Difficulty does not “prove” God has withdrawn his love from us. Rather, it invites us to enter more deeply into a relationship with the One who sees and knows and loves us.

The Book of Job is a story that asks questions about unanswerable things. But the truth here is that God sees, knows, and loves us. He uses everything we experience—even our suffering—to deepen our relationship with him. And that relationship offers us all the healing and guidance we need.

“Lord, help me trust in your goodness and love!”

Job 1:6-22
Psalm 17:1-3, 6-7
Luke 9:46-50