ONCE upon a time in a land far away - it was called ‘Uz’ actually, but don’t ask me where it was - there was a man called Job - that’s pronounced to rhyme with ‘robe’ not ‘rob’, again don’t ask me why.

This guy Job was very rich; he had 7,000 sheep and 3,000 camels - yes, it looks like a fairy tale, what with the sevens and threes - he even had seven sons and three daughters.

Now the kids used to get together for parties, and Job, like a good Dad, would be ready in case they got a bit too wild.

Nowadays he would have stood bail for them or picked them up when they staggered out of the Warehouse at three in the morning, but in those days you had to offer a sacrifice.

As Homer Simpson would say, “is this a story from the Bible - yeah, probably”, and in this case he would be right.

Long story short, Job loses everything.

He even gets covered with horrible itchy sores, and ends up wondering ‘why me?’

Now this is exactly the situation when you need good friends to cheer you up, and what does he get? - the cheerer-uppers from hell!

Granted, they start off all right - they keep their mouths shut and just listen!

But then they can’t help coming over all judgmental, and basically telling Job it’s all his own fault!

Is this just another version of ‘bad stuff happens’ (substitute your own phrase for that)?

It probably happens to most of us at some time that our lives get seriously derailed - career, marriage, family, community work, church work, whatever it is.

And we think we’ve failed.

Perhaps, as well as learning all the other necessary life skills, we need to learn how to ‘fail’.

We need the right friends to come alongside and, well, just be there. Certainly not to judge or tell us where we’ve gone wrong, or even give advice or try to provide answers.

That’s the trouble: our modern way of thinking so often sees ‘problems’ or ‘questions’, to which we have to find ‘the answer’, but real life is just not like that.

At the end of our story God breaks in and gives Job reassurance, but he also tells those so-called friends “You have not said the right thing” - after thirty-odd chapters of spouting!

Look for those friends, colleagues, family, who will come alongside, listen, pray - but know when to keep their mouths shut!