Enjoy fast, free delivery, exclusive deals, and award-winning movies & TV shows with Prime
Try Prime
and start saving today with fast, free delivery
Amazon Prime includes:
Fast, FREE Delivery is available to Prime members. To join, select "Try Amazon Prime and start saving today with Fast, FREE Delivery" below the Add to Cart button.
Amazon Prime members enjoy:- Cardmembers earn 5% Back at Amazon.com with a Prime Credit Card.
- Unlimited Free Two-Day Delivery
- Streaming of thousands of movies and TV shows with limited ads on Prime Video.
- A Kindle book to borrow for free each month - with no due dates
- Listen to over 2 million songs and hundreds of playlists
- Unlimited photo storage with anywhere access
Important: Your credit card will NOT be charged when you start your free trial or if you cancel during the trial period. If you're happy with Amazon Prime, do nothing. At the end of the free trial, your membership will automatically upgrade to a monthly membership.
Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.
Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.
Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.
OK
Audible sample Sample
Consider the Ostrich: Unlocking the Book of Job and the Blessing of Suffering (Organic Faith) Paperback – April 14, 2023
Purchase options and add-ons
We all know the story of creation in the Bible. In the beginning, God created. But what if creation isn’t where things started? Not in the Bible anyway. What if the first book of the Bible wasn’t about creation…it was about pain.
Scholars have debated for years about what the first book of the Bible really is. Most have concluded that the Book of Job was probably the first book written.
Think about that: what if the message God wanted us to receive wasn’t about how we were created, but what to do when life gets bad.
Being a Christian means happiest. Joy. It means you get that white picket fence and have friends that bring you companionship. Hardship and spiritual warfare may be words that Christians know, but it’s not exactly something we talk about.
Job is a complicated and messy story because it address the elephant in the giant room that is Christianity: that believing in God doesn’t mean happiness. Or wealth. Or even goodness.
Job is a story that teaches us an ugly truth about what we believe: that things aren’t always better on the other side of the mountain—that good things don’t always happen to good people—and that sometimes life is just messed up.
Most people know the story of Job. He’s the guy who had bad things happen to him. But we often look to the story as more a Sunday school fairytale. Sure, it’s believable. But we often look at it as a moral tale about a guy who had it all taken away.
There’s more to it than that. Rarely do we study it to find out what God is trying to teach us.
The lesson here is deep, and one every believe should hear.
- Print length182 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- Publication dateApril 14, 2023
- Dimensions5.5 x 0.46 x 8.5 inches
- ISBN-13979-8390249550
The Amazon Book Review
Book recommendations, author interviews, editors' picks, and more. Read it now.
Popular titles by this author
Product details
- ASIN : B0C1J3FF82
- Publisher : Independently published (April 14, 2023)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 182 pages
- ISBN-13 : 979-8390249550
- Item Weight : 10.4 ounces
- Dimensions : 5.5 x 0.46 x 8.5 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #3,932,540 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #4,500 in Christian Death & Grief
- #27,670 in Christian Personal Growth
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
Scott Douglas wrote this about page, which, he admits, makes him sound a bit like a narcissist; so narcissistically speaking, Douglas is the esteemed author of a memoir about his experience working in a public library ("Quiet, Please: Dispatches from a Public Librarian," which began as a series for McSweeney's), several bestselling theology books, a young adult series, and more. Esteemed writing aside, Douglas teaches humor and memoir writing for the Gotham Writers Workshop, and UX Design for UC Berkeley. He lives in Anaheim, but to sound cooler, he usually says he “lives five minutes from Disneyland.” He lives with his wife, Diana, in a home that is a registered California landmark. His burbs smell like roses.
If Scott Douglas did not write this about page, it would read:
Scott Douglas lives in Anaheim with his wife. He is the author of other books. He likes to think that his organic deodorant holds back his BO for more than 30 minutes, but who is he kidding?
Customer reviews
Customer Reviews, including Product Star Ratings help customers to learn more about the product and decide whether it is the right product for them.
To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. It also analyzed reviews to verify trustworthiness.
Learn more how customers reviews work on Amazon-
Top reviews
Top reviews from the United States
There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.
Douglas injects each chapter with his wry, subtle, and sometimes not-so-subtle humor. But he made me think, not just chuckle. This is not a boring book at all, and in fact, it made me want to go to the Bible and read Job again.
He in no way tries to answer the universal question of “why good people suffer” in fact, he asks another equally ponderous question. But at the end, I was surprised to feel satisfied. Hint: here’s where the ostrich illustration comes in. (And no, it’s not about sticking your head in the ground!)
Also, Douglas says the most important person in our churches is the person who is suffering the most. Read that again! (I had to stop and think about that!) And he says the most important question is, what will you do?
After the conclusion of the book, there are 5-6 questions on each chapter to refresh your memory. My advice is to read/copy these questions first and use them while you read the book.
I received this book free from the author, publisher, or other source. My only obligation is to provide a fair and honest review.
The Book of Job is primarily interested in answering the question of "why God allows believers to suffer.” Before diving into the book, the author provides a brief introduction to Job and his friends who drive much of the Socratic dialog that explores this theme. Then we get to the prologue of the book that setups a celestial courtroom drama by which the story of Job’s suffering unfolds … and to be honest, I have never found Job to be an easy read with the continual repetition and verbosity making it difficult to pay attention and focus on the details. This is where the humor and organization of the author saves the day to break up what to me is a monotonous and overly formal dialog … and provides an interesting interoperation that I had not considered before (and rather like). Ultimately there is no real answer to the question of suffering, only an example of how we should respond to it … with an overlooked perspective on how the friends of Job treated him in his suffering … highlighting a way of interpreting Job as a modern critique for how we respond to the suffer of others around us (something that seems to be lacking in today’s world).
I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.