We live in difficult times — here's how we can cope

I think we can all agree that we are living in some difficult times. Whether we are facing personal tragedy or national crisis, difficult times are painful to live through.
So how do we cope through difficult times? I can’t give us an easy-to-remember formula or a twelve-step program for coping with difficult times, but I can give us a biblical example of someone living in extremely difficult times.
Job was a man who was blameless and upright. He feared God and shunned evil. Job sounds like a good person who was someone we could all look up to. Not only was Job a good person, he was also extremely wealthy and successful. He had ten adult children who all enjoyed each other’s company. It seemed like Job led a charmed life.
As wonderful of a person as Job was and as charmed of a life he seemed to be living, his life got extremely difficult in a single day. Job’s difficult day began by his finding out that everything he owned had been stolen from him or destroyed.
That would make any wealthy person have a bad day, but the day wasn’t done. Job soon found out that all his children had been killed when the home they were in was destroyed by a violent wind. There were no survivors except for a single servant who came to give him the devastating news.
Imagine how Job felt. If there is anyone we can relate to living in difficult times, it would be Job. So how did he respond to this? How would you or I respond to something like this? How have we been responding to our own difficult times?
Job got up and tore his clothes in anguish and pain, shaved his head, and fell to the ground. This is exactly what we would expect from someone going through difficult times.
What Job does next is a lesson for all of us as we live in difficult times. Job falls to the ground and he worships God. Job doesn’t get angry and bitter. He doesn’t look for a human solution to his problem. Instead Job turns to God.
Are we turning to God in difficult times? Or have we been looking to other human beings like ourselves for answers?
Maybe like Job we should be trusting God in our time of greatest need instead of trusting in the human solution.