The Gospel According to Bildad: When Bad Things Happen to Good People

by Tad Lindley

Let me recap the historical setting in case you are unfamiliar with it. At least several thousand years ago there was a godly man named Job who lived in the land of Uz. He was blessed with ten children and great wealth (see Job 1:2-3).

Job’s tragedies

In one day, all ten of Job’s children died in a storm and all of his animal wealth was stolen. He was left heartbroken and penniless. All he had left was his wife. Then Job was stricken with boils all over his body. At that point his wife began to urge him to commit suicide. (Job 2)

If you’ve ever had a boil you know how painful they are. Job was covered with them. He was using pieces of broken dishes to try to cut into the boils to relieve the pressure.

Job’s friends

It was in this miserable state that Job’s three friends, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar, found him. You or I probably would have loved on Job and tried to comfort him in his grief and to minister to his stricken body, but not these guys. Instead they tore their robes, wept, and sprinkled dirt on their heads. Then they sat there in silence for a week, watching Job.

Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar had a different gospel than we do. The Lord had not yet revealed himself in the flesh. They did not have the benefit of the Law of Moses and the Prophets. Their understanding of God went like this: God blesses people who are good and he blasts those who are evil.

The gospel according to Bildad

You know how when someone gets raped, people often ask the question, “I wonder what she was wearing?” When a woman is savagely beaten by her husband, some will ask, “What did she do to make him do that to her?” They believe the gospel according to Bildad; that people bring curses upon themselves.

As Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar sized up Job’s situation, the bankruptcy and the withered body oozing pus, they put two and two together and they said to themselves, “Job must have sinned pretty bad to get in a mess like this”. As they began to talk to Job, they confront him with the facts, and then they try to get a confession out of Job, as if to say, “You messed up big time, and God caught you, why don’t you admit it!”

Job steadfastly maintains his innocence. Chapter 31 is dedicated to a description of his righteous life. In fact, if you read the whole book, you know that God also viewed Job as an exemplary human being.

Why do bad things happen to good people?

If you will allow me to, I will reverse the question: Why do good things happen to bad people? It is because God loves all people. Even those who curse God with their lifestyles still are blessed by him. The dope dealer who poisons the minds of the people still eats moose meat, and sometimes even when a godly neighbor doesn’t.

You see God’s love is perfect and it is unconditional: He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Just as God’s blessings are shared by both the good and the evil, misfortune and tragedy strikes all people. Neither is a reliable indicator of whether a person is good or bad.

Job’s gospel

Job knew all of this and he also had a deeper insight into God. He didn’t know the gospel as we know it: the death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. Even as Job understood that God loves and blesses all people, he himself had the same unconditional love for God: Though he slay me, yet will I trust him (Job 13:15) And from the bleak chasm of his tragedy, he was able to grasp this sustaining fact: For I know that my redeemer lives, and He shall stand at last on the earth; and after my skin is destroyed, this I know, that in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold and not another. How my heart yearns within me! (Job 19:25-27)

Reverend Tad Lindley is a minister at the United Pentecostal Church in Bethel, Alaska.

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