Have you ever called a friend who was physically suffering to be told, “I’m not very good company today?” That was the answer I heard years ago when I asked a friend if she was home. Her body was being taken over by cancer and she was in pain. She assumed I simply wanted to visit and she wasn’t up for it. I was actually bringing her a pain-relieving salve. 

How difficult is it for you to sit with a loved one and watch them suffer? Job was an upright, God-fearing man, living a good life until… God allowed the enemy to strike him in every way short of killing him. He had already lost everything: herds of animals, servants, all ten of his children–one on the heels of the other. His response to that was: “ADONAI [the Lord] gave; ADONAI took; blessed be the name of ADONAI.” (Job 1:21)

Unsatisfied with that reaction, the enemy “struck Iyov [Job] with horrible infected sores from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head.” He itched so intently that he used a broken pot to scratch with. His wife’s advice was: “Curse God and die.” (Job 2:9) Job replied, “Are we to receive the good at God’s hands but reject the bad?” I imagine if Job had a phone he would have told his  three friends he didn’t want visitors but they came. When they saw how horribly he was suffering they first “wept aloud, tore their coats and threw dust over their heads toward heaven. Then they sat down with him on the ground. For seven days and seven nights, no one spoke a word to him, because they saw how much he was suffering.” (Job 11-13)

No one likes to watch their loved ones suffer, but suffer they will, with or without you. Are you the type to run to or run away from hurting people? Do you sit in the comfort of your own home and say, “I’ll pray for you,” or do you say, “I’ll be right there?” Suffering people need to know someone cares even if they don’t want to talk about it. Who can you comfort today just by sitting in silence with them?