“Yet Will I Trust in Him”

How to read this week

• Know the frame. Chapters 1–2 and 42:7–17 are prose; everything between is poetry. The opening tells you what Job never learns: his suffering is a test, not a punishment.
• Don't take the friends as the book's answer. They say suffering always means sin. God rejects their view at the end (42:7).
• Let Job be honest. His complaints are raw (ch. 3). The book shows that bringing our pain to God is part of faith.
• Read the poetry in pairs. Hebrew poetry repeats ideas in parallel lines (e.g., 38:7). The manual's “Reading Poetry” essay explains how.
• Notice what God's answer is. God doesn't explain the test. He shows Job the vastness of creation and His care for it. For Job, encountering God was enough (42:5).

The shape of Job

1. Chs. 1–2 — Prose prologue: the test and Job's losses
2. Ch. 3 — Job's lament
3. Chs. 4–31 — Three cycles of debate with his friends (19:25 is the high point)
4. Chs. 32–37 — Elihu speaks
5. Chs. 38–41 — God speaks out of the whirlwind
6. 42:1–6 — Job's response: “now mine eye seeth thee”
7. 42:7–17 — Prose epilogue: restoration

Restoration connections

• D&C 121:7–10 — “Thy friends do stand by thee … thou art not yet as Job.”
• D&C 122:7 — “All these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good.”
• Abraham 3:22–26 — The premortal council, related to Job 38:7.
• 2 Nephi 2:11 — “There must needs be an opposition in all things.”

Questions for the week

• How would you answer Satan's question, “Doth Job fear God for nought?” for yourself (1:9)?
• What can you learn from the friends about how to comfort, and how not to (2:13; 22:5)?
• What does Job's testimony in 19:25–26 mean to you in a hard season?
• How have your trials refined you “as gold” (23:10)?
• Job never got an explanation, but he saw God. What does that teach about seeking answers versus seeking Him (42:5)?