"God meant it for good"

The breathtaking story of Job drives home the point that affliction is not necessarily a punishment for sin (1:1; see also John 9:1-3). Nor is it helpful to say that Satan caused the pain, since Job spoke correctly (1:22) in stating, “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away…” (v 21).

Isaiah 53 prophesies of God’s Servant, the Substitute who would bear the guilt of sinners: “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (53:6). This, of course, anticipates the sacrificial death of the Son of God who “gave his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). Was Christ’s death the grim result of sin? Yes (Acts 3:15). Was it owing to the insidious schemes of Satan? Yes (Luke 22:3). But there’s more to say: at root, the cross was God’s doing. Isaiah 53:10, “Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer…” (so too Acts 2:23).

In both cases of extreme affliction, ultimately it’s God’s hand we see in action. Same with Joseph (the guy with the coat of many colors). His jealous brothers abused him and sold him as a slave, and he ended up wrongly imprisoned in Egypt for years—all undeserved. But God was up to something—God, the key Actor behind the scenes; God, the initiator of good plans even though they lead through dark valleys. The Lord maneuvered Joseph into an influential office in Egypt in order to save countless lives from a coming seven-year famine.

This good end is recognized by Joseph (eventually!). In Genesis 45:5-9 he says four times that it was God who sent him to Egypt. Now, of course he remembers how his nasty brothers had shipped him off with traders. But he’s looking beneath the surface: who was really at work in all those years of pain? It was God. Same in 50:20, where Joseph says to his penitent brothers, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” All that misery he’d gone through was intended by God to take place and (of course) lead eventually to God’s good goals.

There’s no shortage of pain and trauma to go around today, what with economic turmoil, crime, family breakdown, disease… The Lord is stretching our faith: are you willing to trust him to weave a beautiful fabric, in his time and in his way, even when it includes the black strands of your pain and suffering? Are you willing to let God be God, and to leave it to him to put things right in time or eternity?

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