Job 20-23: A Fate Worse Than Death

Job and his friends see things differently, much like many Christians today.  'It is the wicked who are distressed and destroyed.' they say.  'You must have done something wrong to deserve all of these calamities.' 
“Surely you know how it has been from of old,
   ever since mankind was placed on the earth,
that the mirth of the wicked is brief,
   the joy of the godless lasts but a moment. - Job 20:4-5 NIV
Not so says Job, 'Look around, you will see many of the wicked prosper. '
Why do the wicked live on,
   growing old and increasing in power?
They see their children established around them,
   their offspring before their eyes.
Their homes are safe and free from fear;
   the rod of God is not on them.
Their bulls never fail to breed;
   their cows calve and do not miscarry.
They send forth their children as a flock;
   their little ones dance about.
They sing to the music of timbrel and lyre;
   they make merry to the sound of the pipe.
They spend their years in prosperity
   and go down to the grave in peace. - Job 21:7-13 NIV

'Don't you see what I'm struggling with?' Job asks his friends. ' It's not a matter of me being wicked or not, of shutting out God.  I haven't shut him out.  He has shut me out.' 
 “But if I go to the east, he is not there;
   if I go to the west, I do not find him.
When he is at work in the north, I do not see him;
   when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him. - Job 23: 8-9

What his friends fail to see is that Job is not looking for justification for his life, an accounting of whether or not he deserves his fate.  He is looking for God and he can't find him.  That fate is far worse than any thing else that has befallen him thus far. 

 2010 Post - Job 20-23:  Confused But Not Bitter