He Is the Breath of All Mankind

In his hand is the life of every creature and the breath of all mankind.

(Job 12:10 NIV)

The book of Job is certainly not one of those books of the Bible that I think about when I’m feeling all cheerful, happy and fuzzy inside…though, now that I think about it, feeling “fuzzy” inside might not fit in the same category as cheerful and happy – not sure what that’d feel like – asthma attack comes to mind, so “fuzzy” may actually be a poor choice of word here...at any rate, I digress. 

Even though, Job is a book that I associate more with words like resignation, obedience, hardship, suffering, loss, acceptance and sadness; if I pay attention, all of these words imply a state in which the soil of our soul becomes prepped and ready to receive the Good News of His Word.  So Job could be a book where I can actually find hope, true hope.  Hardship, loss, suffering, sadness, and all those states of being that don’t sound or feel so pleasant; God can use to do the work of a plow in the field,- to break it-.  Like the blades on this divine plow, difficult, and often almost unbearable circumstances break us and turn us like the harden earth on the field that is our soul.  They prepare us to receive the seed that is His Word so the Holy Spirit can create a fertile garden in our hearts where His fruits can grow.

Thus, I do find hope in the book of Job.  I find the hope of the realization that it is by Him, through Him and because of Him that I have the breath of life.  Job reminds me that “The Spirit of God has made me; the breath of the Almighty gives me life.” (Job 33:4) Nothing can change that truth.  No difficulty or hardship can change the fact that He sustains me as He lives in me.  And as long as I remain in Him, I will have true hope, for He is the only source of it.  Only those who break away from His vine are hopeless, “For what hope has the godless when he is cut off, when God takes away his life.”  (Job 27:8)

As I prepare to travel to Panama to visit my ailing and very frail Father once again; my heart aches for I fear it might be for the last time.  However, I find hope this morning in the words of Job because he reminds me that the hand of the Almighty is the life of every creature, including my Dad’s, and that His Divine Breath is the breath of all mankind.  Our Lord has His hand on my Father and He is the only one who knows the day and the hour of his last breath.  Until then, I praise God for the life He has given him, for who he was and for who he still is.  I have hope that whatever the year might bring regarding the fate of my Dad’s condition, there is always hope as long as we remain in Him who is The Breath of Life.  He, who is hope Himself, will lead us to hope, even if in the most unlikely places.  For as long as we have life, His breath will remain in our nostrils. (Job 27:3)  - and He’ll keep us from feeling “fuzzy” inside as if with an asthma attack : )