What is the message of the Book of Job for us today?

First, our faith is sure to be tested. Pain may be inevitable, but misery is to an extent optional. We have no control over the weather that surrounds our lives, but we can do something about the climate of our inner life. What happens to us is less important than what happens in us.

Second, the book reminds us that human horizons are inadequate for a proper understanding of suffering and affliction. Job and his friends carried on their debate in total ignorance of the background exchange between Satan, the Accuser, and God. They were trying to fit the puzzle pieces together without having all of them. The book shows that any attempt to reduce the complex problem of suffering to some neat formula is misguided. 

Third, the book gives guidance on how to comfort—and how not to comfort—those who suffer. Though well-intentioned, his friends’ advice was unhelpful. Job’s scathing rebuke of them is understandable:

“You whitewash with lies; worthless physicians are you all. Oh that you would keep silent, and it would be your wisdom!” Job 13:4–5

Job’s friends did more for him in their silent presence (Job 2:13) than in their speaking.

Finally, we should not be too quick to import New Testament ideas into our reading of the book. It yields its treasures most readily to those who let Job speak from his own perspective.

His hands reach out to grasp the more tangible forms of revelation that God would graciously offer in the future. Yet he is poignantly aware that they evade his grasp. 

In wishing fervently for an intermediary, Job “drew attention to the vacuum that existed, the need that every troubled heart recognizes. In this respect, he anticipated the incarnate Saviour.” Through his undeserved suffering, Job gave an ‘advance echo’ of Jesus Christ, who would live a perfect life, yet endure pain and death in order to win a great victory for all who repent and put their lives in His hands – totally trusting in Him.

Abstract from article WHEN FAITH IS TESTED – THE BOOK OF JOB by Peter Howe in the latest Creation Magazine Volume 45, Issue 3, 2023

“And the Lord restored the fortunes of Job when he had prayed for his friends. And the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. Then came to him all his brothers and sisters and all who had known him before, and ate bread with him in his house. And they showed him sympathy and comforted him for all the evil that the Lord had brought upon him. And each of them gave him a piece of money and a ring of gold. And the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning.” Job 42: 10-12