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In this episode John and Gregg discuss the idea that being a Christian should be “easy,” a notion with which Gregg largely disagrees.
As part of doing his own work John has been making slow progress in his reading of a Chronological Daily Bible, with commentary by F. LaGard Smith. John has been in Genesis and comes across a section where Smith inserts a section observing that the book of Job possibly happened at the same time. Gregg references Dillard and Longman’s Introduction to the Old Testament to offer some information on Job, including considerations of its genre.
John questions Smith’s conclusion about the reason for Job’s adversity.
Job’s life will become the basis for a literary masterpiece dealing with suffering and the issue of its causes. Little does this humble man know how his very personal adversity will be a source of comfort to multitudes of fellow-suffers for centuries to come. That fact alone might well have something to do with why he is called upon to experience such adversity. (page 22)
So John wonders, does God really bring suffering? Or, at what point does suffering amount to “evil”?