This is a wonderful church family. And I was thinking this morning as I began by intending to chide you about bringing your Bibles that I’ve been saying that to you for and I see John has it right here and Colin has so let’s see your Bibles. All right. And you know there are two reasons I say that. It’s not just to hassle you which I’ve been doing for eight to nine years.

But it’s it’s it’s also for a couple reasons today in the book of Job. We’re going to move through some different passages. And frankly, I think it’s going to be easier for you to do it with a Bible in front of you than on your phones. If you didn’t bring a Bible, there’s a Bible probably underneath the chair in front of you. But the second reason I encourage you to bring your Bibles is this that wonderful admon admonition by Paul in Thessalonians.

It says, “And we also thank God continually because when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as it actually is the word of God which is at work in you to those who believe.” Here’s what’s going on. What we know about God, we know from the Bible. And in the Bible, it is the energizing work of the word of God coupled with the spirit of God that changes our life. You probably saw the email from Jason, who I’m happy to report is not in prison this weekend, although I create those rumors that have to be squaltched.

Jason in the email on Thursday, you remember when he said, and if you’re not on the on the email list, sign up on that card in front of you so we can get on the mailing list. He said, ‘You know, I’ve been to this passage a number of times, and it hit me differently this time. And I I was reminded of that as I prepared today because I’ve taught the book of Job, both at the Bible college and in this church and other places, probably 20 times. And yet today, I’m more enthusiastic about the things we’re going to talk about today. Things that I I’ve got to admit, I’m not sure I ever saw before.

But it’s that work of God in our life and the spirit of God that quickens our spirit and takes us to the place that God wants us. So for that reason, as well as moving through the text this morning, I’m glad you brought your Bible if you did. We are in Job chapter 2 and we’re trying to ask and answer the question and debunk the myth of Shakespeare and McBth. In McBTH, Shakespeare wrote, “Life is a total is a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury signifying nothing.” Do you realize how terrifying that worldview is?

It’s absolutely staggering to think that there’s no rhyme or reason in life. And I’m here to tell you, and I’ll stand here and say it, that we as Christians should be the most enthusiastic about life and the things that happen to us. We should be the most realistic. News [snorts] flash, we’re all living and we’re all going to die short of the Lord’s coming. And we have a way to face those facts in a way that brings joy and satisfaction and an understanding of eternity.

And it’s in that respect that the book of Job is broken open to us today. The book of Job is an old book of the Old Testament, one of the oldest. And it was given to us as a primer to teach about why the innocent suffer. It was not given to us to talk to us about why consequences come to our life for foolish decisions. There’s other passages for that.

But with that disclaimer, this book has said when things happen in your life, they crash down on you and it’s through no fault of your own that you can trace back. It’s nothing that you’ve done. It can be certainly events associated with the loss of things around you. And Job catastrophically had that happen in chapter one or it can be the loss of personal health in chapter 2 as again Job had that happen. So in those respects when the catastrophic kinds of things in ha happened in life this book says we’ve got some answers.

Now we’re in five parts of the book of Job. We’ve been through the first two and I’ll review those for you and we have three to go. But here’s what is our knee-jerk reaction when something hard happens to us. What’s the first thing that comes to our mind? What’s the first question that we ask?

Why? Wrong. That’s the last question we ask. The book of Job in the first two chapters is a prologue. It’s a preface.

It’s an introduction to the subject of why do the innocent suffer? And then the whole rest of the book answers three questions. The first question today, who is God? These bad things happen in my life. Who is this one called God?

And how do I factor that into the things in my life? The next time we meet for Job, it’s going to be asking and answering the question, where is God? And that has to be asked also. And then finally we get to the end of the book of Job. And now we can ask the question why.

And Job does. And God gives an answer. You can’t answer the question why until you’ve answered the question where. And you can’t ask the answer the question where until you answer the question who is God. And that’s where we are at today.

You know the Christians in the second century, historians tell us in the second century in the Roman Empire faced a catastrophic flood of disease and and death. And the historians tell us that deadly plug plague swept through the Roman Empire in the second century. It swept through the Roman through the northern African regions in the third century. And historians tell us the most puzzling thing. In the midst of people in panic, turning out the dying, discarding bodies, not burying them, tossing unburned bodies into the garbage in the hope of averting the spread and contagion of the disease.

The Christians did something different. They didn’t run from that disease. They ran toward it. And we have to ask and answer the question why. Job chapter 1.

In this dark cauldron of innocence who suffering, we meet Job who as we know is innocent and blameless in all that he does. And that’s a an adage that’s said about him and it’s said twice by God about him as well. He feared God and shunned evil. And in chapter one with the collision of heaven and hell, Satan comes like a toad to God and gives a report to God about what he’s doing in the world. And I love that.

And we can claim that Satan is not out of control in terms of your life. He is under the edicts and direction of your heavenly father. And Satan came to God and said, “Strip everything away that he has and he’ll curse you.” God said, “You can do that, but you can’t lay a finger on him.” So Job’s seven sons and three daughters and camels and oxmen and everything He had he lost in chapter one.

And we learn in our first study that Job came back and said, “Naked I came from the womb. Naked I will depart. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away.” And we say that’s the message of the why do the innocent suffer? We don’t know why it happens, but we trust God.

But that’s only chapter one and there are 41 chapters left. So there must be more things we need to learn about this subject. So we come back again and snarling Satan comes back to God and says, “Hey, let me lay my hand on him. He’ll curse you if in fact you allow me to do that.” God’s adage about about Job is he’s blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil, and he maintains his integrity.

He adds that additional description of Job in chapter two. And yet God allows Satan to strip Job of his health. And we said in that second session, there’s something up close and personal about the loss of personal health. As much as we can be sympathetic about the calamity that happens in the lives of others, it’s not quite the same as when it happens in our own flesh. But when it hammers us as opposed to our spouse, as opposed to family, as opposed to friends and others around us, that doubles down on us.

We feel that in a way that we can’t otherwise experience. And so as Satan peered out of the regions and watched Job, Job again says, we found in chapter two with the turning of his wife on him says, Job said, can we accept good from God and not trouble? And we learned then that while Job’s wife responded in a foolish way, I prefer understanding her as a wise woman who got worn down by what she saw her husband going through. She’d already lost 10 children and now she has a husband who’s stripped of his health and she says, “Curse God and die.” And Job said, “No.”

So the operating principle is can we accept good from the hand of God and not trouble in all this job did not sin and what he did and so we say okay sila let’s close our Bibles now we have the message of the why do the innocent suffer not only does it apply to everything we lose around us but it applies to our health thank you Lord but we’re not nearly done with this subject yet because now we’re through the primer we’re through the prologue and we have to ask and answer three questions. The first question is answered in the context of what we see as what the Bible calls friends of Job. So we read in chapter 2 and verse 11 when Job’s three friends Alfaz the Tim Timmonite, Bildad the Shuite, shortest of the men in the Bible, and Ze Zephar the Naamite heard about all the troubles that had come upon him. They came to him from their homes and they sat together in agreement to go and and sympathize with him and comfort him. When they saw him from a distance, they could hardly recognize him.

They began to weep aloud and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads. Then they sat on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights. No one said a word to him because they saw how great his suffering was. Good for them. The Bible calls them trim friends.

We’ll not lose track of that as we go through the text. But they did the right thing. They came and grieved with him and they just sat with him. And it’s no magical explanation to explain that times. That’s all you can do when someone is grieving next to you.

They’re not looking for great words. They’re not looking for a sermon. They’re looking for comfort and contact with you. And for seven days, these friends, Elephaz, Bildad, and Zofar, sat and didn’t say a word. And then the text turns in a way that surprises us.

Job takes a nose dive. Chapter 3, verse one. After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. He said, “May the day of my birth perish, and the night of it, when I said when it was said, a boy was born. That day, may it turn to darkness.

May God above and not care about it. May no light shine upon it. May darkness and deep shadow claim it once more. May a cloud settle over it.” And further then in verse 11 and 12, why did I not perish at birth?

Why did why did I not why did I come out of the room womb? You see what happened? Even Job, the greatest of all the men in the Old Testament, had his limits. He had times he said, “This is too much for me to bear. I don’t even understand why I’m alive.”

In the [clears throat] law, we call that suicide ideology. He was suicidal. He had been overwhelmed with the circumstances of his life. He didn’t let go of the principle, can we accept accept good from God and not trouble? It’s just that trouble had overwhelmed him.

And I want to stop for a minute and take a little rabbit trail because as Christians, we have this tendency to beat up on ourselves. Don’t do that. If you’re struggling with something, if you’re absolutely not knowing how you’re going to get past this darkness into the next stage of your life, if you’re depressed, if you’re discouraged, you’re human. You know better than Job. Job reached a point where he doubled down and was flat on the ground and despared for why God even gave him life in the first place.

And yet, we’re going to get to the end of the book, if I can give you that last chapter, and God’s going to still come back and commend Job who did not sin. So, I want to encourage you that if you’re struggling emotionally with things in life, if you don’t understand where things are going, why certain things have happened, why you came out of that family, why you’ve had those reversals, and you can’t track it back to anything you did, leave it with God and trust him to allow you to get through it, but in a way that provides resolve and determination for you for the future. Well, the three friends saw Job go into the tank and they said, “Okay, after seven days, it’s time for us to give Job our thinking.” And so, while the bottom of grief for Job was hit, now we go into the compounding of Job’s situation because his friends begin to give him a theology that is [snorts] not correct. So we find first Elephaz and Elephaz in chapter 4 and verse 7 and 8 is a good way to summarize that.

Elephas says, “Consider now who being innocent has ever perished. Where were the upright ever destroyed? I’ve observed those who plow evil and those who sow trouble reap it.” You know what he’s saying? He’s saying the same things we think when we hear something bad happens about to another Christian, to someone in our in their life.

We say, “What did they do wrong? They must have done something wrong to have God hammer them like that.” That was Elephaz’s view. And it’s wrong. That’s not the way God works.

God is not that troll on top of the bridge so that when the billy goat gr under the bridge so that when the billy goats gruffs try to tiptoe over the bridge, God says, “It’s my time to smash this goat on top of the bridge.” That’s not the character of God. God was structuring Job’s life in a way to teach him, to enlarge him, to winnow him, to refine him in a way to understand who God was in a better way. Elephaz said, “I don’t have any trouble figuring this out. Job, you messed up in life, and so God is hammering you.”

And so we go from chapter 4 through chapter 31 with Elephaz taking about three runs at Job with the same message. And we find that Billad does the same thing. If you’ll turn to chapter 8 in your Bibles, chapter 8, verses five and six. Now, Bildad the second one says, and we’re reading in verse six, if you’re pure and upright, even now he will he will h rouse himself on your behalf and restore you to your rightful place. Your beginnings will seem humble and will prosper in what your future will be.

Just confess it, Job. Come on, tell us what you did wrong and then God will restore you. That’s wrong theology. And these are friends, but they’re wrong. The third friend is Zofar in chapter 11.

And in chapter 11, Zofar, like his friends before him in verses 2-6 say, “Are all these words to go unanswered? Is this talker to be vindicated?” You see how he’s getting personally offended at the fact that Job is defending himself? Has that ever happened? Will your idol talk reduce men to silence?

Will no one rebuke you when you mock? You say to God, “My beliefs are flawless and I am pure in your sight.” Oh, how I wish that God would speak that he would open his lips against you. Wow. Wow.

We want to remember that these men were his friends, but they’re after him and they’re determined to say to him, “This doesn’t happen if you live your life in a correct manner.” And they are absolutely categorically wrong. Rabbit trail number two, be careful what you listen to. We’re in a media and word blitz without parallel between the internet and other things going on. Everybody has solutions for life.

And you need to be careful and discern. I don’t know about you, but every paragraph I hear and every paragraph I read, I have to evaluate that and say, “Is that right? Is that partially right?” The last time I remember doing that was with Chuck Swendall. I love him.

He said, “Everything I’ve learned, I’ve learned everything I’ve learned in life from the hard lessons of life.” And I had to say, “No, Chuck, about 90% for me.” But my point is, you got to evaluate everything the way the Bereans did. They listened to the Apostle Paul and then they went and studied to find out if it was true. And you’ve got to do the same thing.

These three friends were categorically wrong in their assumptions about Job. And when you’re around chatter that’s wrong, you can say it with grace. You can act with what’s the word I want. You can act with a calming manner, but you can also say I don’t agree with that. And Job continued to persist in his view that he did nothing wrong to deserve what happened.

So with this stripping of his possessions and his family and having to redirect his wife with his reduced health down to probably what we call elephantasis. So much so that if you’ll look in chapter 19 now, look at the description of Paul, excuse me, look at the description of Job, even said by Job, chapter 19 and verse 17. My breath is offensive to my wife. I’m loathome to my brothers. Even the little boys scurry, scorn me, and when I appear, they ridicule me.

All my intimate friends detest me. Those I love have turned against me. I am nothing but skin and bones. I have escaped with only the skin of my teeth. Have pity on me, my friends.

Have pity, for the hand of God has struck me. Why do you pursue me as God does? Will you never get enough of my flesh? He’s saying, please give me a break. I’m absolutely devastated and you’re piling on.

My wife I my breath repels her. My children run from the side of me. He’s absolutely there in a pile. And with that, and I want you to catch this because we’ll pick up on it on the fourth time. We’re going to find out what he reaches out and grabs a hold of.

Really great. But understand that the piling on continued past chapter 19. So as you look at what we’re going to look at now as to the things that stabilize Job, understand that’s no guarantee that the pressure is over. In fact, it may increase. And in fact, a fourth friend comes to Job and begins to speak in a similar manner to the first three.

But in the midst of all that, when Job is just absolutely overwhelmed and he’s trying to understand who God is, Job comes up with in chapter 19 that magnificent statement as follows. Verse 25. This is what I know. This is what I know. In the midst of my destroyed life healthwise, I know three things.

One, that my redeemer lives. Two, that in the end he will stand upon the earth. And three, and after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God. You want to know something that stabilizes you in the hardest trials of life? That’s what will do it.

That’s the stake in the ground. That’s the post you hold on to. Job says, “I know that go well lives.” That’s the Hebrew word for redeemer. There’s a broad history in the Old Testament of the saints of God trusting in the visible manifestation of God.

That would be in Jesus, the second son, person of the Trinity, and in a hope that he’ll come and intervene in the future. Briefly, let me give that to you. In Genesis, God is called the seed of woman, the visible manifestation. In Exodus, the Passover lamb. In Leviticus, the atoning sacrifice.

In Numbers, the struck rock. In Deuteronomy, the prophet who is to come. In Joshua, the captain of the Lord’s hosts. In Judges, the deliverer of God’s people. Are you getting the trend of how God’s people held on to him?

In Ruth, the kinsman redeemer. There he is. He’s coming back in Job in 1 Samuel, the anointed one. 2 Samuel, king and throne. First king, glory of the Lord that filled the temple.

Second king, the royal seed. 1 Chronicles, the glorious king. 2 Chronicles, the Lord appearing to Solomon. Ezra, the Lord God of our fathers. Nehemiah, the restorer of Israel.

Esther, the advocate pleading for his people. Job. Goel, Psalms, the shepherd, the son, the king of glory, proverbs, wis the wisdom that exists, what existed before creation, Ecclesiastes, actually Ecclesiastes is the lighter of all the Old Testament books to see the appearance and future of God and the best we can come up with wisdom personified in Ecclesiastes. Song of Solomon, the heavenly bridegroom. Isaiah, Emmanuel, God with us, wonderful counselor, mighty God, prince of peace, virgin born.

Jeremiah, the divine potter. Lamentations, Yahweh, who’s weeping for us. Ezekiel, the glory of God. Daniel, stone cut from the mountain without hands. Hosea, child called out of Egypt.

Joel, Lord that comes that roars out of Zion. Amos, the judge of the nations. Obadiah, the Lord of the coming kingdom. Jonah the messenger to the Gentiles. Micah the ruler of Israel.

Nahm stronghold in the day of trouble. Habach the Lord in holy his holy temple. Zephaniah the king of Israel. Haggi the Lord of hosts. Zechariah the Lord coming into Jerusalem and Malachi the coming messenger, the son of righteousness.

The Old Testament is full of the intervening appearance and purposes of God to his people who then will act in their behalf in the future. And that was their hope. They had not heard the name Yeshua, but they knew him as the Lord who was coming. And so when Job is in the midst of absolute pure chaos, he reaches out and says, “My redeemer, my goel, my one who will rescue me.” Now the Goel in the Old Testament is out of the lever marriage model of the nation of Israel.

It is the kinsman who redeems. If you as a widow lost your husband, you would be put into the home of your husband’s brother. They would redeem you. They would care for you. They would restore you.

They would take care of you because that was family. It was a connection whereby there was a promise that there was someone who could intervene for you. And that’s where Job landed with a hand on the staff that was driven in the ground. And he said, “I know that my redeemer lives. Nothing has happened to me.

Nothing changes the fact that God is who he says he is.” Secondly, and that he will appear on the earth. In the end, he will stand upon the earth. This intervenor, this goel is coming back. And third, that in my flesh being destroyed, I will see God.

We can’t get very far from the book of Job without introducing again the life of Ben Sassy been a retired senator from Nebraska who’s dying of prostate cancer and who has refused most of the interviews that he’s been asked to give but he’s given a couple of them. He says to you, “I’m not going to see my two girls married. I’m not going to be able to see my son graduate from college.” he has likely mere weeks or months to live. But when he’s asked about Senator Sassy, how do you deal with fear?

He says, “I I don’t really fear much fear. I believe the stuff I believe. I’m not afraid of death, but the dying part doesn’t sound very fun. He’s very honest. But later on, he says, you know, for a Christian, straight out, death is the hardest question.

And in an age that gives short shrift to the transmission of wisdom from old to young, it’s not surprising that death is the single most obvious fact of life that we constantly insulate our children from. He wrote, “We have to our detriment created a cult of denial about our own mortality. Life needs to be lived and prioritized with the understanding that it is limited. The way we say it is one out of one people die. An awareness of one’s mortality, listen to this, I’m going to say it twice.

An awareness of one’s mortality makes life richer because the important can be emphasized and the trivial marginalized. Say it one more time. An awareness of one’s mortality makes life richer because the importance that can be emphasized, the important can be emphasized and the trivial can be marginalized. We have different challenges that happen in life, but as Senator Sassy says, we’re all going to die someday. Least we can do is prepare for it well.

And this man who has lived well is preparing to die well. And the same is true of us. Job said, “I don’t know the number of my days. I don’t even know why God allowed me to live. I’ve gone through such misery.

But I know three things. I know that my redeemer lives. I know that he’s coming back to earth. And I know that after my flesh is destroyed, I’m going to see God. You know, we think much of life can be trivialized by things like if we pray, God answers our prayer.

But even prayer and the structures of our life is something that is used by God to shape and mold us. Claudia Wentz has the following poem. I asked God to take away my pride and God said no. He said it was not for him to take it away but for me to give it up. I asked God to make my handicapped child whole and God said no.

He he said his he said her spirit already is while her body is only temporary. I asked God to grant the patience and God said me patience and God said no. He said patience is a byproduct of tribulation. It isn’t granted. It’s earned.

I asked God to give me happiness. And God said no. He said I’ll give you blessing. Happiness is up to you. And then to the part that applies to Job and to Senator Sassy.

I asked God to spare me pain. And God said no. Said, “Suffering draws you apart from worldly cares and brings you closer to me.” I asked God to make my spirit grow, and God said, “No.” He said, “I must grow on my own, but he’ll prune me to make me fruitful.”

I asked God if he loved me. And God said, “Yes. He gave his only son who died for me and I’ll be in heaven someday.” I asked God to help me love others as much as he loves me. And God said, “Ah, finally, you have the idea.”

That’s what God’s doing in each of our lives. He’s structuring us and shaping us in a way to reflect something of the grace of Jesus in us, both in worship to him and in loving others. And Job is in a Tribulation a journey that is asking and answering three questions. First of all, who is God? And in this text, he is the one who lives, who redeems, who restores, who protects, who brings us back.

And he’s coming back. Surprisingly, sometimes good comes out of bad. I love the negro spirituals of a hundred years ago, and I don’t mind using the term negro. There’s nothing wrong with that. But more recently, there

Transcript machine-generated from the sermon audio, so it may contain errors. 4,939 words.