Some give and take

"Jesus Christ" someone wrote at a Yahoo poker table we visited recently.

"He's my hope of salvation," I wrote in reply. (Rom 10:13) A short reply, more factual than preachy.

An actual discussion about Jesus then followed, which is rare for online games. Someone else wrote the first writer had best be careful with that name. And that led to this comment:

"He giveth and he taketh away."

Downright King James -- and Biblically accurate. It's what Job said in the Old Testament (Job 1:21), after Satan took away much more than a tall stack of poker chips.

Job lost all his belongings, then most of his family. Yet his initial response was one of worship toward God (verse 20) -- and the Bible notes he did NOT sin in what he said (verse 22).

Read on in Job, and you'll find his frustration slowly seems to build. But that first reaction was quite impressive -- and as they say in government these days, faith-based.

How do you respond when a bad beat or a big bust-out happens? It's only natural to say something you'll later regret. Yet it's better to be like a spur-of-the-moment Job, instead of the one who starts sulking the more he thinks about what happened.

But back to the table. I answered the quote from Job by writing God has given me a lot. I did NOT write, but could have added, that we should focus on what God gives more than what He takes.

By the way, Job ends with him receiving greater blessings than he had before (42:10-15). So God can give again, even after He takes. The ultimate hope of the believer is that God will do that, in the form of eternal life.