My days are past, my plans are torn apart,
The wishes of my heart.
They make night into day, saying,
‘The light is near,’ in the presence of darkness.
If I hope for Sheol as my home,
I make my bed in the darkness;
If I call to the grave, ‘You are my father’;
To the maggot, ‘my mother and my sister’;
Where then is my hope?
And who looks at my hope?
Will it go down with me to Sheol?
Shall we together go down into the dust? (vv. 11-16)

There are times in our lives when we feel hopeless. Things that we think are important are gone—money, houses, families, jobs, health, etc. We sometimes think we have no hope in life. Many prophets lived lives of deprivation. They were mocked and ridiculed by those who called themselves children of God. Job’s lament is that of a man who has lost all hope.

Job wants to seek help from God, but he knows it is God who made him suffer. He tried to live a blameless life. He was better than anyone in terms of morality. Yet, he had received all those disasters at once. If there were a sin he needed to confess, he would have confessed it. But those who commit crimes live better lives than he does. Is God unjust? Is God merciless?

When we hit rock bottom in our lives, we realize that our life on earth is just a shadow. We are given eternal life through faith in God, who will fulfill everything that He said in the Bible. We believe in the promise that God gave to Abraham—salvation through Jesus Christ.

Job had to suffer in order to understand God and His promise of salvation. This life is only a shadow. We undergo training. God gives us things to enjoy in this life. However, over time, we slowly become less interested. As we age, we lose the ability to taste, hear, and see. We have fewer things that we enjoy in our lives. Although our bodies become weak, our hope for eternal life grows stronger.

Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the stomach of the fish, and he said,

“I called out of my distress to the Lord,
And He answered me.
I called for help from the depth of Sheol;
You heard my voice.
For You threw me into the deep,
Into the heart of the seas,
And the current flowed around me.
All Your breakers and waves passed over me.
So I said, ‘I have been cast out of Your sight.
Nevertheless I will look again toward Your holy temple.’
Water encompassed me to the point of death.
The deep flowed around me,
Seaweed was wrapped around my head.
I descended to the base of the mountains.
The earth with its bars was around me forever,
But You have brought up my life from the pit, Lord my God.
While I was fainting away,
I remembered the Lord,
And my prayer came to You,
Into Your holy temple.
Those who are followers of worthless idols
Abandon their faithfulness,
But I will sacrifice to You
With a voice of thanksgiving.
That which I have vowed I will pay.
Salvation is from the Lord.” (Jonah 2:1-9)