“To him who is afflicted, kindness should be shown by his friend…”-{Job 6:14-NKJV}
While Job’s friends were taken up primarily with the “why” of Job’s suffering and leaning to their own understanding interjecting “why” he was suffering, they had no idea, for God had not revealed to them. How could they comment when they were ignorant of Job chapter 1 and what God was doing? Yet it did not stop them interjecting their two cents, and in doing so instead of relieving the man’s pain were adding to it ! Remember you don’t have to know the “why?” of another’s suffering to understand they are suffering and be taken up with the “how”…” I am not minimizing asking the right questions, but sometimes I wonder, if as people we sometimes ask questions for own benefit, to satisfy our own curiosity. How will you know the difference? If it doesn’t lead to kind actions following then it is just an exercise in intellectual curiosity and satisfying of self’s inquisitiveness! With that brief explanation, remember it’s not “why,” but “How,” can I show them kindness in their suffering. This is the one thing Job wanted from his friends.{Job 6:14 NASB}. Kindness is a manifestation of love according to 1 Cor 13:4. Love well the suffering ones, for love is their greatest need. Stimulate them with your love to see His Word and what they can be and do in their suffering as I have shown you from the few above verses, and you can draw on from your own time in “the furnace of afflictions” {great pressures, crushing’s}. Be concerned with the “How” can I show them kindness in their time of affliction!
How I love 2 Cor 1:4- which speaks of being equipped to comfort the crushed, having experienced His comfort in your own crushing. He commissions the crushed to comfort others with the comfort He has imparted to them! Leave the “why’s!” of vain inquisitiveness to satisfy ones’s curiosity,INSTEAD choose lovingly, like the good Samaritan to seek to serve others… and be to others…
Don’t let the suffering walk alone, be a “How?” person, and remember,…
“You’ll Never Walk Alone…”