When caught in the web of the oppressor, when under the affliction of the enemy, when under the stocks of the wicked, the tendency is that our ears become obstructed from perceiving the voice of God. We become used to hearing the voice of our oppressor, the pain of our affliction (oppression) and the agony of our minds. And none of these later voices speaks comfort, hope and deliverance. When your soul is afflicted and the voice of God is cut off from you, it’s really a sad situation to bear.
Most times, we don’t ever expect God to be speaking to us in and through bad situations. We know that it’s possible that He can speak to us in those difficult moments, but we just believe that God is majorly in the places where there is merriment and jubilation and will hardly visit people who are under any form of affliction. We associate God only with the good and exclude Him from everything else. But reading Job 36 verse 15 throws a better light.
“He rescues the afflicted in their affliction,
And opens their ears [so that they pay attention to His voice] in times of oppression.”
It is true that God is always willing and ready to deliver us from our afflictions. But sometimes, God allows our affliction as a necessary instrument to draw our attention toward Him. He uses negative circumstances to halt our unbridled gallop towards the precipice. He slows us down to get His message to us and redirect us on the right path.
So, even while you’re in the affliction, He opens your ears to hear His voice, He opens your eyes to behold His reassuring face and your mind to perceive His warmth.
His voice brings peace, calmness, and comfort because He is an ever-present help in times of trouble.
His voice brings hope and ignites faith. This is what the enemy doesn’t want. The enemy doesn’t want you to ever believe that the pain will end someday; he wants you to believe that the rest of your life will be spent in misery. But God wants you to have faith in Him and believe that the affliction will soon end and won’t rise the second time.
His voice brings clarity amidst the fog and noise. You get direction when you can hear from him.
His voice brings deliverance from the spiritual and physical stocks of the enemies.
And after you have heard His voice in affliction, he does something beautiful in verse 16 – He brings you into a large place and grants you fatness.
“Then indeed, He enticed you from the mouth of distress and confinement,
Into a broad place where there is no constraint or distress;
And that which was set on your table was full of fatness (rich food).
Search for God’s voice amid afflictions. He is always speaking, but we are not listening. He speaks in and through your affliction. Job 36:15-16.
