An Odd Connection: Muggeridge Meets Elihu

I scare myself. My mind makes such odd connections sometimes. The odd connections fascinate me, but simultaneously confuse me. They fascinate me because typically the odd connection is to a verse in the Bible which I have read many times and I get excited to see the link. The thoughts confuse me because I typically have not heard a preacher connect that Bible verse to anything else, which makes me wonder “am I the only one who thinks such strange things?”

For instance, I was listening to Ravi Zacharias on a podcast recently as he lectured a group of students at Oxford. He quoted Malcolm Muggeridge: “Indeed, I can say with complete truthfulness that everything I have learned in my seventy-five years in this world, everything that has truly enhanced and enlightened my existence, has been through affliction and not through happiness, whether pursued or attained. In other words, if it ever were to be possible to eliminate affliction from our earthly existence…the result would not be to make life delectable, but to make it too banal or trivial to be endurable. This of course is what the cross signifies, and it is the cross more than anything else, that has called me inexorably to Christ.”  

As I listened to that quote, I heard the distinct sound of two previously unrelated thoughts, separated by time and space, come together like two railroad cars, now linked together on the same track. As I listened to the Muggeridge quote, I thought of a verse tucked away in the book of Job, words spoken by Elihu, the only wise man among the four friends of Job. 

"But those who suffer he delivers in their suffering;
   he speaks to them in their affliction.
 ¹⁶ “He is wooing you from the jaws of distress
   to a spacious place free from restriction,
   to the comfort of your table laden with choice food.
¹⁷ But now you are laden with the judgment due the wicked;
   judgment and justice have taken hold of you.
¹⁸ Be careful that no one entices you by riches;
   do not let a large bribe turn you aside.
¹⁹ Would your wealth or even all your mighty efforts
   sustain you so you would not be in distress?
²⁰ Do not long for the night,
   to drag people away from their homes.
²¹ Beware of turning to evil,
   which you seem to prefer to affliction."

Elihu was the last of Job’s friends to speak, hesitant because of his youth and his respect for the elders who had spoken before him. What I find so interesting is the last line from this speech: “Beware of turning to evil, which you seem to prefer to affliction.” Couple this with Muggeridge’s quote: “everything that has truly enhanced and enlightened my existence, has been through affliction and not through happiness, whether pursued or attained. In other words, if it ever were to be possible to eliminate affliction from our earthly existence…the result would not be to make life delectable, but to make it too banal or trivial to be endurable.”

Odd things to say, perhaps, even cold and heartless things to say to a man who had suffered as Job had; by this time. Job had lost house, property, servants, family, prestige, health and even the support of his wife. There seemed to be nothing else that could be taken away from him. Yet, Muggeridge, a writer and editorialist, who witnessed much affliction in the lives of others and experienced it in his own life apparently agreed with Elihu.  A twentieth century brilliant writer agreed with the sentiments of Elihu, spoken around 450 B.C., by some accounts.

Do we agree?  Do we normally perceive, let alone, accept, affliction in this way-whether that affliction be in our own lives or in the lives of those we love? I dare say not. Normally, in our earthly skin, we typically seek comfort and are averse to affliction. We do all we can to avoid affliction. I avoid it not only for myself, but even try to keep my teenage children from encountering affliction, even though at times it seems they are on a willful and intentional crash course with what I know will be cause for affliction. Affliction is, at all costs, something we seek to avoid, deflect, and pray, end quickly. In fact, affliction has become nearly synonymous with evil; it is unwanted, unwelcome and unappreciated. 

Elihu saw, however, that for all of the afflictions that had befallen Job, those afflictions were, in fact, being used by a sovereign God to woo Job from the very jaws of distress, being used by a perfect God to bring Job into a spacious place free from distress. And, he warns Job to not “kick against the goads” as it were. Sometimes, to resist affliction is, perhaps, a preference for evil over affliction. Indeed, to return to Muggeridge’s wisdom, a life free from all affliction will most likely turn us to ingratitude, to boredom, and ultimately, to evil. 

Elihu reminds Job, and us, that in the midst of affliction, God speaks to us.  As the famous twentieth century apologist, C.S. Lewis wrote in The Problem of Pain” “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks to us in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: It is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”  May we be people who train our hearts to not run from affliction, but in the midst of our affliction to run straight into the arms of the loving God who speaks to us, holds us in His tight divine embrace and whispers His love to us.