Hank Smith: 00:05 Hello, everyone. Welcome to followHIM Favorites. If you’ve been following us this year, you know the routine. John and I take a question from each week’s lesson to focus on. John, this week’s lesson is on the book of Job. So, the question becomes, I think, really easy. And this is a question that hasn’t just been asked by our students, but it’s been asked by all human beings throughout all of time, and that is why suffering? Why do bad things happen to good people on this planet?

Hank Smith: 00:37 So, John, if we’ve got listeners out there who are wondering that same thing, why is there so much suffering, what would you say? What can I get from the book of Job and other scriptures that will help me at least maybe not answer this question completely, but give me some semblance of peace?

John Bytheway: 00:52 I love that you said maybe don’t answer this question completely. Because in the book of Job, all these things happen to him. In a matter of a few verses, he loses everything in chapter one, and the next 41 chapters are trying to figure it out.

Hank Smith: 01:10 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 01:11 Just some amazing things happen. I love that his friends come up first and they just sit with them.

Hank Smith: 01:17 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 01:18 They don’t try to explain it. They don’t try to say… And as soon as they do try to explain it, that’s when things actually get worse.

Hank Smith: 01:26 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 01:27 Because they’re, “Well, maybe God’s doing this, or maybe God’s doing this,” and they’re in error. They think, oh, maybe you sinned or that sort of a thing. It’s such a good question, such an ancient question. And it comes down to the you theme. Do you trust God? There’s a purpose and a plan. Will you trust Him when you don’t have the answers right away? You know that verse, Hank, that we all love in Abraham 3, what is it, 24, 25 that gives a purpose of life type of statement?

Hank Smith: 01:56 Right.

John Bytheway: 01:56 I will prove them now herewith, to see if they will do whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them. And I like to add, even when it doesn’t make sense. I wonder what Job will do when everything goes south and there’s no reason for it.

Hank Smith: 02:15 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 02:16 Will he stay faithful? Will he keep his integrity? And he does. Job keeps his integrity. And at the very end, Job gets everything back. But the Lord never tells him. He never explains why. He just says to Job, “Hey, were you there when I set up everything, when I created everything?” And talks about the grandeur of His creations and everything. But He still never really tells him why. And it’s that kind of a test. Can you hang on when things don’t make sense? And boy, sometimes they don’t.

Hank Smith: 02:47 God tells us in Moses 1, My work and my glory is to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of men. So, we know His end goal. Children who choose to be like him. Right? Children who choose to be exalted. In my mind, John, this process of exalting people involves suffering. I don’t know why it has to involve suffering. I’d rather instead of suffering, I’d rather just lay in a hammock all day and drink yummy drinks and then choose to be exalted.

Hank Smith: 03:18 But there’s something about this that isn’t easy, that involves a lot of change, a lot of transformation. And those often happen in painful experiences. So, for me, I take comfort in all of this has a purpose. That we know the Lord’s end goal. We trust His end goal is exalted children. And so, I believe that whatever I specifically go through or you specifically go through or whoever, their plan was designed for them to get to that end goal.

John Bytheway: 03:54 There is something that is so helpful about a belief and a faith in God that just says there must be a reason, even if you don’t get it. You have this hope that ultimately I will know. There must be a reason. Maybe someday next life I’ll know. Just that can help us go on. Just knowing there’s got to be a reason, and maybe I’ll struggle my whole lifetime to figure it out. Maybe I will, maybe I won’t. But there’s got to be a reason. But I know God loves me.

Hank Smith: 04:30 I think it was Viktor Frankl who said it’s not suffering that hurts us so much. It’s suffering without purpose. So, what the gospel does is it gives us the knowledge that there’s a purpose in all of this suffering. Elder Holland was quick to point out that the Lord didn’t ask us to go through this suffering alone.

Hank Smith: 04:49 He didn’t say, “I’ll stay up here while you suffer down there.” He said, “Yes, this process, this end goal, involves suffering. And I will suffer the most of everyone.” Wasn’t it Elder Holland who said, “How could we think it would be easy for us when it wasn’t easy for him?” This is the business of salvation and exaltation. It’s not easy. It involves great difficulty and great suffering.

John Bytheway: 05:13 He talks about the significance of the wounded Christ who comes to our rescue, one who has chosen, at least for now, to keep those wounds so that we will know I went through it, too.

Hank Smith: 05:27 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 05:28 I went through earth life, too. And oh, the lesson from that is, wow, even he had to suffer.

Hank Smith: 05:34 The son of man hath descended below them all.

John Bytheway: 05:38 One of the things that really helped me was a talk that President Oaks gave back in October of 2000 called the Challenge to Become. And we’ve talked about this talk before. The purpose of coming to earth wasn’t just to pass a test or to check some check marks. It was to become something. Suffering can help that.

John Bytheway: 05:59 Let me read something that Orson F. Whitney said. “I know you all have favorite quotations of Orson F. Whitney. This is a long time ago, but listen to this statement. No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility.

John Bytheway: 06:22 “All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God. And it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we came here to acquire and which will make us more like our Father and Mother in heaven.” It helps me to think I’m not just going through something. I’m becoming something through all of this.

John Bytheway: 06:56 I know you’ve experienced this, Hank. We both did. We both had deaths in our family in these past couple of years. You can look at me and say, “John, I know how you feel.” And I can look at you and say, “Hank, I know how you feel.” This is how we dealt with the loss of my mom, or with you your dad, your brother.

John Bytheway: 07:15 The Lord uses us sometimes when we’ve been through something and puts us next to somebody who’s going through the same thing where we can just be a little bit of help and say, “I’ve been there. I know what you’re going through.” And here’s the ultimate, the Savior, saying, “I’ve been there.” I know according to the flesh, to use Alma 7:11 and 12, what it was like to be on that earth that you’re on right now.

Hank Smith: 07:39 Thank you for joining us for this week’s followHIM Favorites. Come back next week, we’ll do it again. And come join us on our full podcast. It’s called followHIM. You can get it wherever you get your podcast. We’d love to see you there. This week, we’re studying the book of Job with Dr. Adam Miller. We think you’re going to love it. So, come find us soon.