The Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time [B]
Job 38:1,8-11   +   2 Corinthians 5:14-17   +   Mark 4:35-41

The Book of Job is 42 chapters long, and today’s First Reading is from Chapter 38, so it’s clearly part of the end of the story of Job.  Nonetheless, to reflect meaningfully upon the First Reading, and to contrast it with today’s Gospel Reading, you have to know the entire story of Job.

 In Western culture, you’ll hear the phrase “the patience of Job”.  Some might think the chief point of the Book of Job to be his example of patience.

Certainly Job had many reasons not to be patient.  At the start of the Book of Job, the devil strikes Job by having his livestock raided and killed, and all of his children killed.  The devil is trying to get Job to curse God because of his suffering, but Job refuses to do so.  Then the devil strikes Job with boils from his feet to his head.  Job still will not curse God, though he does question why he was ever born.

Job has three friends who try to console him by trying to convince him that his suffering is a punishment for Job’s wrongdoing.  But Job rejects his friends’ claims.  Instead, he challenges God to explain the reason for his suffering.

That’s where today’s First Reading is set.  The passage only offers four verses of God speaking to Job “out of the storm”.  Did you notice that phrase in today’s First Reading, and how it connects to today’s Gospel Reading, where Jesus sleeps in the boat in the middle of a storm?

+     +     +

Before reflecting specifically on the First Reading and Gospel passage, stop to consider two different ways to reflect upon Scripture in general.

The first way to reflect upon Scripture is to apply the scriptures to your own life.  Maybe that’s easy where today’s scriptures are concerned, because maybe your life—right now—resembles a storm or even a whirlwind.

But what if your life right now is very peaceful?  What if this current year of your life on earth is one of the best years you’ve ever had:  no illness, no money problems, and no problems with work?  In that case, how do you listen to today’s scriptures?  Or do you just ignore them?

If a given day’s Scriptures don’t seem to “apply” to your life today, they might describe your life at sometime in the past, or in the future.  If they describe your life in the past, then reflecting on the day’s Scriptures might help you deal with past difficulties that are still unresolved or unaccepted.  After all, your past can bear a great weight upon your present self.

On the other hand, since you don’t know today whether in your future you will face what’s described in the day’s Scriptures, it’s good to reflect upon them to prepare yourself for something that might well be coming down the pike.

The second way to reflect upon Scripture is for the sake of another person:  someone around you.  While you might well be having one of the best years of your life, someone around you might be having the worst.  Maybe you have a clearer frame of mind, and can help that someone see things more clearly.  We can do this in part by taking the scriptures, reflecting upon them, and relating them to what that someone is dealing with.

+     +     +

So given all that, consider today’s First Reading and Gospel Reading.

Out of the whirlwind, God responds to Job’s question about suffering.  God responds, but He does not answer Job’s question in the way that Job was hoping.  God does not explain where suffering comes from, or even if there’s a deeper meaning to it.

God’s response to Job is much like Jesus’ response to the disciples in the boat.  The disciples’ cry is perfectly understandable.  Their cry is like the prayers that you and I might offer when we’re in distress.  “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”  The disciples’ cry is perfectly natural.  Yet how does Jesus respond?  His response is not perfectly natural.  It’s perfectly supernatural.  Jesus calls us to be more like Him, and less like our own fearful selves.

Jesus calls us to rest in Him, even in the midst of suffering and distress.  That’s the first point, but not the key point.  The key point is that Jesus is with us—present—in the midst of our suffering and distress.

Two of the four evangelists stress this point when they start their Gospel accounts.  St. Matthew, in the first chapter of his Gospel account, speaks about the birth of Jesus by quoting the prophet Isaiah:  “‘Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,’ which means ‘God is with us’” [Mt 1:23].  St. John, in the first chapter of his Gospel account, speaks about God the Son becoming man in this way:  “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth”; “to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God” [Jn 1:14,12].

God is with us.  He’s in the boat beaten by the waves.  First, He’s with us to help us make the changes needed amidst the suffering that we’ve inflicted upon ourselves.  Second, He’s also with us to help bear the suffering imposed upon us by others, and to pursue justice when that’s needed.  Third, He’s with us against the suffering that arises from natural causes in this world that’s full of sickness and storms.  He’s with us in all things, and wants to strengthen us in the midst of our suffering.

We are the children of God.  Yet that truth does not exempt us from suffering.  After all, how did the life of Jesus, the Father’s only-begotten Son, end if not in the suffering of His Passion and Crucifixion?  God’s love does not exempt us from suffering, but it does assure us of His Presence in its midst.

+ + +

references to the Catechism of the Catholic Church cited for this Sunday by the Vatican’s Homiletic Directory:

CCC 423, 464-469: Jesus, true God and true Man
CCC 1814-1816: faith as gift of God, and human response
CCC 671-672: maintaining faith in adversity