when it just gets worse

But when I hoped for good, evil came,

and when I waited for light, darkness came.

Job 30:26

This is the simplest description of the most personal part of Job’s suffering. He kept hoping to turn a corner on his pain. He was waiting for it to get better. It had not done so, in fact, whose who came to offer their comfort in his losses only made it worse. There was no good news for the moment. There was no breaking light of dawn. There was only pain and suffering.

And this is a feeling that was more than just emotion. It was the reality of Job’s pain. It just got worse. And there wasn’t a lot of light in his dark days. There was no comfort coming from his friends and Job has resigned himself to that. It was a really bad time in his life. The pain had settled in. The realization that this experience was his new normal was Job’s painful expression. There isn’t anything a human can do to change that kind of reality. It must be accepted and then God must be trusted despite all parts of life seeming to be incongruous with grace.

Sometimes life just gets worse. There is no other way to see it. It is best to accept this becuase given the decay of mortality and the curse on sin, that is every person’s destiny. There is hope beyond this only in Jesus. He died so death would end its finality. He rose so that hope would be our actuality. We know that God is making it all new and better eventually, but things must get dark before that dawn. The only hope for good is the gospel. That can sustain us as life gets harder and suffering dominates our days.