One of the oldest stories in the Bible is the story of Job. Job was a righteous man who came under tremendous testing. His family died. His wealth vanished. His health failed so that by the time we find him in chapter 9, he is sitting in an ash heap with festering boils all over his body. He complains to his friends that God is too far removed from life on the ground to understand what it is like to be a suffering human being.

He laments:

     God is not a man like me – someone I could answer –
        so that we could come together in court.
     Oh, that there was a mediator between us;
        he would lay his hand on both of us. (9:32-33)

     Do you, [God], have physical eyes;
        do you see like a human?
     Are your days like those of a human,
        your years like years of a human,
        that you search for my wrongdoing and seek my sin? (10:4-5)

It’s a bold complaint to say the least, one most of us would consider sacrilegious if it wasn’t right there in the Bible. That God includes this protest in the pages of Holy Scriptures surprises us. What should surprise us even more is that God listened to Job and answered his plea.

Job cried out, “God, you don’t know what it is like to be me.”

At Christmas, God answered, not with defensiveness, but with grace: “You are right Job. I don’t, but I am sending one who will find out. I’m sending one who will indeed be able to lay a hand on both of us, so that the gulf between us might be spanned.” At Christmas, God sent one who knew what it was to both be God and human. We know him as Jesus Christ. Because of his gracious act of love, we can have peace with God.

When I watch the news and the reactions to the news and the reaction to the reactions of the news, I get the feeling that almost all of us are standing around shouting out Job’s protest to one another.

African American’s are saying to their white neighbors, “You don’t know what it’s like to walk down the street as a black person, especially a black man, in America.”

Likewise, police officers are saying to those they are called to protect, “You don’t know what it’s like to go to work every day and risk your life to protect and serve.”

Both are correct. I don’t know what it’s like to live as a person of color in America. I also don’t know what it’s like to work as a police officer. Most of us live out of our own perspective with little attempt to understand another’s point of view. At least, I know that’s true for me far too often.

When we are accused of not being able to understand another’s perspective our tendency is to resort to defensiveness. Instinctively, we seek to protect our own point of view.

What would happen this Christmas, however, if we followed the pattern of Jesus? What would happen if we left the safety of our group, our people, our place and walked alongside a neighbor and simply asked, “Tell me, what is it like to be you?”

We might just discover that the Mediator between heaven and humanity can work through us to mediate between neighbors here on earth.

Gracious Lord, we are grateful that we have a great high priest who can sympathize with our humanity. What grace to give up your place in glory to take your place beside us on this planet. What mercy to go so far as to die for our sins that we might be reconciled to God. Teach us to follow your ways that we might be agents of peace in our world today.

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