Decided to switch things up and stray away from my usual post on here. See, I’m the type of guy who would rather make you laugh and smile than talk about my feelings. But I feel that God has laid this on my heart to share. I recently started diving into the book of Job. If you are anything like me, you’ve heard the story of Job many times before. In short, Job’s entire life is taken away by Satan. His family, belongings, health, you name it, Job probably lost it. Yet, despite his suffering, Job did not sin against God. In the last part of the story, everything is returned to Job and more. Well, there you have it. The pinnacle of how to deal with earthly suffering, at least, that’s what I thought before jumping into this book. What I failed to realize is there are like 34 chapters in between those two events where Job is pretty miserable, like so miserable it’s a bit depressing to read. He continually wrestles with the questions: “Is God really good?” and “Is God really just?” He even goes as far as cursing the day he was born and claiming the arrows of the Almighty are upon him. Job didn’t understand why these hardships would seemingly fall upon him out of the blue, leading him to question God’s character. In many ways, I have felt like Job recently. Obviously, not to the same extent. Jeff, Steph, and Abbie are very much alive and well. It seems like things haven’t been going how I thought they were supposed to go, and it’s so frustrating and confusing. I thought I had finally realized what God wanted for me, only for all of that to be completely flipped on its head. It felt like I seemingly had everything, and all of that was gone within an instant. I didn’t understand. I couldn’t comprehend why God would want it to be this way. Similar to Job, I took things up with the Lord. This can’t be your plan for me, right? There must be some sort of mistake here. Life was better before, can’t you see that? I knew God was good, and his plan for me was perfect, but it was hard to see. When life is going great, and everything falls into place, it’s easy to say, “God is so good.” But it stops being so easy when things don’t go your way. (See comments for the rest)