The history of Job, a wealthy man, recorded in the Old Testament has occupied the thought of students of the Bible throughout the centuries. The story relates that Satan asked permission of God to test Job's loyalty to the Almighty by causing him to lose all his possessions and by bringing death to all his sons. Patiently Job endured the loss.
Then, the story reads, Satan received permission to put him to a greater test. Job was stricken with a loathsome disease which made him an outcast from his fellow men. The subsequent history of this man shows that three friends visited him to mourn with him. When Job desired to die, these friends told him that he must be suffering from some hidden past sin which he had committed. But Job insisted that he knew of no great sin, and, unconvinced of guilt by the arguments of his three friends, he yearned in sincere desire to come face to face with God.
There followed a period of communion with the Almighty, in which God was revealed to Job as all-powerful and all-knowing. Convinced of God's great love and care for His creation, he cried out (42:5), "I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee." Then Job's prosperity was restored to him.
