Like Plows and Harrows

We would remember that afflictions are like plows and harrows that prepare the soil by painful operations to receive the seed. The soil is put into condition to drink in the rain when it comes. "For the earth [or land] which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God." Heb. 6:7.
The reference in James 5:11 is the only allusion to the book of Job in the whole Bible, although Job's name is twice mentioned in Ezek. 14. Job, in all his explanations of his afflictions, attributed them to God's actions, but he did not recognize that God had any beneficent purpose in them. The only prospect of escape from them that Job could see was by death. The difference between Job's view and that of His three friends was that Job maintained that God sent evil upon men, just as He sent good, and that being God He had the right to do as He pleased with His own creatures. Therefore men must accept evil uncomplainingly just as they accept good at God's hands. Job's words to his wife state his views: "What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this did not Job sin with his lips." Job 2:10.
Job maintained this until he had silenced his three friends.