Job 4-7: Mercy, Mercy

The dialog between Eliphaz and Job sounds familiar.  'What is God doing?' Job asked.  'I have done nothing wrong to deserve this treatment.' and his friend replies, 'You must have done something wrong.  Calamities befall people only because of their actions.'

It occurs to me reading these chapters that even if Job had committed grave wrongs, even if he had sorely tested God, where is the mercy.  As Job put it:
“A despairing man should have the devotion of his friends,
   even though he forsakes the fear of the Almighty.
But my brothers are as undependable as intermittent streams,
   as the streams that overflow - Job 6:14-15 NIV

I look around and mercy calls, but few answer.  Friends, brothers and sisters, fellow Christians, can all be strangely silent when disaster strikes or abandon one another all together.  Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy, (Matt 5:7 KJV) Jesus says.  I don't know about anyone else, but I have needed mercy, many times over and still need it.  I need God's mercy and I need the mercy of fellow pilgrims on this journey of discovery.  Perhaps that is all that Job was looking for...not the answers that his friends were so willing to give, but a little mercy.

2010 Post - Job 4-7:  Searching for Answers