Let us now carefully consider whether God ever allows evil to be forced on his saints, either by himself or by someone else.

And you will certainly find that this never happens. For another can never possibly force the evil of sin upon anyone who does not consent and who resists, but only on someone who admits it into himself through sloth and the corrupt desire of his heart.

When the devil had finally exhausted all his wicked devices, trying to force upon the blessed Job this evil of sin—when he had not only stripped him of all his worldly goods, but also after that terrible and utterly unexpected calamity of bereavement through the death of his seven children, had heaped upon him dreadful wounds and intolerable tortures from the crown of his head to the sole of his foot—he tried in vain to make the stain of sin stick to him, because Job remained steadfast through it all, and never brought himself to consent to blasphemy.

Even when his wife tried to push him to blasphemy, he remained noble with her. He wasn’t rude, even if he said with a lot of diplomacy that she basically doesn’t know what she is saying. However, he did it with love and utmost respect.

The evil one doesn’t have any force on a humble man who has put his entire hope in God.

Based on Saint John Cassian, Elder Joseph of Vatopedi

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