Job 29-31

“Oh, that I were as I months gone by … when the friendship of God was over my tent” (v1-4).  Job believed that when he was successful, it was because God was pleased with him, and if he suffered, God must be angry with him.  This was Job’s complaint: God is angry with me, but I am innocent.  He remembered his years of prosperity as “friendship with God.”  Yet the book tells us that far from being angry, God approved of Job (ch 1). 

Obeying God does, in general, lead to a better life.  But many of God’s friends have endured loss, like Job, and trusted Him anyway.