HAVE YOU EVER GIVEN ORDERS TO THE MORNING?

PRAYER MOMENT                      

Friday 3 October 2014.

HAVE YOU EVER GIVEN ORDERS TO THE MORNING?

Pause. Be still in God’s presence.

Reading: “Have you ever in your life given orders to the morning or sent the dawn to its post?”(Job 38)

Reflection. Often, growing up, I heard adults comment, ‘you would need the patience of Job to live with so and so.’ Job was the ultimate example of patience. He was a prosperous man and he lost everything and what is more he became ill with repulsive sores. ‘Comforters’ came but only made matters worse with their moralising chatter. In his misery Job complained but he never abandoned a deep. trust that somehow God had a purpose in all of this and would bring things to a happy conclusion. And so it turned out. In today’s reading God plays with him, taunting him with his limitations; ‘have you ever given orders to the sun to rise?’ The story of Job is not just one of patient endurance by itself – not just grinning and bearing suffering. It is all about hope. It is about a deep sense that God knows what he is doing in our world and, even if we only see a tiny part of it, there is a wonderful whole – yet to be revealed. 

Prayer. Lord Jesus, teach us patience but a creative patience full of trust in you.  Amen..  

David Harold-Barry SJ