In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Why do bad things happen to good people?
Rabbi Harold Kushner once wrote, "that every discussion of religion either begins with this question or eventually gets around to it. And really this is the only question that matters. Certainly there is a great deal of truth in Kushner’s statement. For if we participate in life to any degree and witness both the good and the bad this question is eventually either thought or uttered aloud.

We watch the news and see footage of an overpass which has collapsed unexpectedly on motorists in Laval, Quebec. The question emerges. We stand at the bedside of a loved one struggling with cancer, we greet friends in the receiving line at the funeral home after the tragic and sudden death of a loved one. The question emerges either as thought or uttered speech.

But the misfortunes of good people are not only a problem to the people who are suffering and to their families who struggle with them. They are a problem for all of us who want to believe in a just, fair and liveable world. They are a problem for all of us who want to believe in a just, fair and loving God.

And certainly it is not a new problem nor a new question. About twenty-five hundred years ago, a man lived whose name we will never know and set out to answer our question. He was a sensitive man who saw good people getting sick and dying around him while proud and selfish people prospered.
He heard all the learned and pious attempts to answer the question and explain life and he was as dissatisfied with them as we are today. And so he wrote a long philosophical poem on our question. This poem appears in the Bible as the book of Job.

Now as we pick up the story of poor Job, his three friends have failed in their efforts to provide him comfort, having failed to answer the questions concerning his sufferings. Job believes his only hope is to receive an answer from God. To bring God before the bar of justice and have his day in court.

Suddenly the time has arrived. God would answer. Job is terrified with the prospect of facing God but it is his only hope for the answers that he seeks. But Job is in for a surprise. The first three verses of our reading this morning rather than providing answers offer a direct challenge to Job. A challenge to prepare himself for what God will say.

And then the voice of God emerges out of a storm. This is an image of God we rarely hear anymore. No walk in the garden while the dew is still on the roses.
This is the God that Martin Luther discovered so long ago which led Luther to insist that there is mystery, darkness and paradox in the heart of God. A God who does "strange” work along with his proper work.

"Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge?
Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me.”
In the midst of this confrontation Job realizes that his questions will not be addressed, no reasons will be given for the loss of his children or his own sufferings, there is nothing concerning the wager with Satan which started his whole ordeal. Rather God responds with words pointing to power, majesty, awe and mystery.

And yet I think in each of us there is that longing for God to give Job the answers that he seeks. There is that longing for God to answer the question, why do bad things happen to good people? There is that longing for certainty in what often seems to be one ol’ crazy mixed up world. We all fear uncertainty. We want to be surrounded by some system that will uphold us and support us in our self-doubt. We want security and we want certainty and we have allowed Christianity to play this role for a very long time.

Evangelical Christianity plays the role still today. Seeking to give followers of this type of Christianity that sense of security and certainty in the midst of human life. But it stands in contradiction to the Biblical story. God simply refuses to offer such certitude and this refusal is not once and for all, but an ongoing refusal throughout the story.

In looking specifically at our passage from Job, his questions and our question is not acknowledged by God. But rather it is God who offers a new perspective framed in a series of questions. Questions dealing with the measurement of the earth’s foundations and the ordering and movement of the stars.

Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?
Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it?

Like Job, we can only answer quietly that we were not there. But God is merciful. God does not meet our need for security only with refusal. God offers us an alternative to that certainty that we seek. it is called trust. We walk by faith and not by sight. God reveals Godself as one who may be trusted. As one who may be trusted in the midst of darkness, in the face of tragedy, in the midst of mystery.

And as we move from Job ever deeper into our story we are surrounded and immersed in mystery, the mystery of the cross. For the cross of Christ is more than just a call to denial and discipleship it is also the supreme expression of God’s love for us and for the world. The cross shows us that God is not an abstract idea or the supreme being of the philosophers but rather a living expression of love.

God through Christ allows himself to become weak and powerless in the world and that is the only way in which he is with us and helps us. This is once again a paradox in the heart of God. This is a reversal of what we expect from God, God suffering with us in an effort to bring meaning through the power of unconditional love.

As we face our question, why do bad things happen to good people? Faith in God is all we have despite the tragic aspects of our human existence. God refuses our certainty but offers us trust and we are strengthened to know that God is fellow sufferer offering us grace and insight to enter ever deeper into the mystery of the cross.
THANKS BE TO GOD. AMEN.