Job 30:1-15 (ESV)

“But now they laugh at me, men who are younger than I, whose fathers I would have disdained to set with the dogs of my flock. What could I gain from the strength of their hands, men whose vigor is gone? Through want and hard hunger they gnaw the dry ground by night in waste and desolation; they pick saltwort and the leaves of bushes, and the roots of the broom tree for their food. They are driven out from human company; they shout after them as after a thief. In the gullies of the torrents they must dwell, in holes of the earth and of the rocks. Among the bushes they bray; under the nettles they huddle together. A senseless, a nameless brood, they have been whipped out of the land.

“And now I have become their song; I am a byword to them. They abhor me; they keep aloof from me; they do not hesitate to spit at the sight of me. Because God has loosed my cord and humbled me, they have cast off restraint in my presence. On my right hand the rabble rise; they push away my feet; they cast up against me their ways of destruction. They break up my path; they promote my calamity; they need no one to help them. As through a wide breach they come; amid the crash they roll on. Terrors are turned upon me; my honor is pursued as by the wind, and my prosperity has passed away like a cloud.”

Time out. This actually happened? His neighbors started picking on him after his downfall? Do they actually not hesitate to spit at the sight of Job?

Apparently so. That says something. Why would people act this way towards someone who had treated them so well? What strange aspect of sin is at work here?

This sounds like the bizarre treatment of Christ by the crowds during his trial. They suddenly switched from adoring him to mocking him. Why? What strange aspect of sin was at work there?

It’s covetousness. People hated Job for the same reason the Pharisees hated Christ – he makes them look bad. Jesus “wrecked the curve.” Next to him, everyone else looks mediocre (or worse). Seeing great people brought down is a cause for joy because it feeds people’s pride.

This may explain a curious modern phenomenon. Lots of people resent the so called “one percent” but seem to make an exception for sports stars. Why?

They don’t seem to have a problem with not being able to dunk a basketball, but resent someone else succeeding in business.

“You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's.” – Exodus 20:17 (ESV)

This is a universal sin. Many great pieces of literature are devoted to it. Here’s a classic.

http://www.mrlocke.net/EnglishOne/Novel/Pearl/Chapter1.htm

 The weekly study guides, which include discussion questions, are available for download here:

https://www.ailbe.org/resources/itemlist/category/91-deep-studies