Job Poem

I have been grateful for the writing and excellent poetry of David Gunner Gunderson at RAW CHRISTIANITY. I’m pasting a poem of his below that he wrote for a seminary professor whom he dearly loved, when he lost his daughter in a car accident. These words also now perfectly fit our family. I’ve replaced his professor’s name at the bottom with the name of our brother and sister.

JOB 1-2

by David Gunner Gunderson

There was a blameless man who was so godly he would pray

For the sins of all his children at the dawning of the day:

“Perhaps these ones I love have cursed the ever-blessed God;

So I slay this lamb and beg that You withhold Your gracious rod.”

Still, God saw fit to bruise them in His dark, mysterious grace.

But “behind a frowning providence He hid a smiling face.”

For the Lord is not so simple as to strike without an aim;

The brightly-burning furnace is a purifying flame.

There was a tested man who lost his all and then some more.

He buried his face into his hands and bowed upon the floor.

Then he cried, “Shall we receive so much that’s good from God above,

But reject His hard calamity that strikes with equal love?”

There was a weeping man who said that God was to be blessed

Both in poverty and riches, both in safety and distress.

So the Lord received his praises both in honor and in shame,

For this broken man found strength to say, “Lord, blessed be Your name.”

There is a lamentation that says “Blessed be the Lord,”

Whether skies be blue or black and whether grace or piercing sword.

There is a hopeful countenance that praises God for all,

Saying “Blessed be the Lord” both in the still and in the squall.

There is a throbbing man who is so very dear to me.

And just like the shattered Job of Uz, he’s picking up debris.

His life is now bereft of one that he had so adored.

Still, I hear him say with quivering voice, “Oh, blessed be the Lord!”

The Lord is always giving, yet He sometimes takes away.

But the Sun still shines as brightly in the night as in day.

Greg and Heather, please keep saying, as you feel the piercing sword:

“Oh, blessed be our sovereign God. Oh, blessed be the Lord.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Grether, it hurts us so much to think of how foolish our words must be when we desire to comfort you so badly. We know that all of our words fall so short of the peace and hope we long for you to have or the changes in time we wish that we could make! Still, we do trust that in time, you will stand firmer in the Lord, and be more full of precious qualities of His heart because you have suffered through and been refined in the furnace of this tragic loss. Although it sounds painful to exhort you so, it is still needful and good and right to encourage you with the last lines of this poem. We bless the Lord that we see and have heard it from you already. You are grieving well.

Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped. And he said, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong.
– Job 1:20-22

“Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?”
In all this Job did not sin with his lips.
– Job 2:10