Latest / Collierville Radio Network / Harvester Podcast - Bumper-Sowed 21: Lessons From Job (Part 9) - God's Concluding Lessons on Job
Transcript
- 0:22Welcome to the Harvester Podcast.
- 0:24We are glad that you have chosen to join us today,
- 0:27and we look forward to wrapping up this what we have been calling a bumper sode.
- 0:31That is a bunch of episodes in between seasons.
- 0:35And so I am one of the hosts, Brian Kenyon,
- 0:39and with me today is
- 0:41Stevhen Ford.
- 0:42Alright, and Forest is usually with us,
- 0:44but as we have been mentioning,
- 0:45especially during these bumper-sodes,
- 0:47we are very, very busy this time of year,
- 0:49so it's hard to get all three of us together.
- 0:51But I am thankful that we have two of us here,
- 0:54and we look forward to beginning our next season,
- 0:57and that is minoring in the majors,
- 0:59in which we will give some lessons from the major prophets to go along with
- 1:04the season before these bumper-sodes,
- 1:06which was majoring in the minors,
- 1:09lessons from the minor prophets.
- 1:11And so
- 1:12We're gonna wrap up the book of Job today,
- 1:14and it's a very intriguing book,
- 1:16very interesting book, very encouraging book,
- 1:18and a book that really shows us about life.
- 1:21You know, tells us about life and the struggles that many people go through,
- 1:25even even people who are righteous.
- 1:27And of course, Job does not have the information that we are privy
- 1:31to in chapters one and two of the book,
- 1:33where Satan challenges God about Job's faith.
- 1:38And as we've been saying all along,
- 1:40God is in control and he allows Satan number one to destroy everything that Job has,
- 1:46including his children. And his wife even indicates turning against him.
- 1:52And then Job passes that test,
- 1:54and then Satan challenges God again,
- 1:56and God allows Satan to take the health away from Job.
- 2:00And we see this throughout the book.
- 2:01but Job still endures, and so we have seen the
- 2:05Job's cursing the day of his birth in chapter three,
- 2:08and then in chapters four through twenty-seven,
- 2:11there's that three-round dialogue between the friends of Job,
- 2:15Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar, and Job answers each of them,
- 2:19and that goes for three rounds.
- 2:21And then we have chapter 28 is a hymn to wisdom,
- 2:25and it serves as a pretty good go-between between the three ~ dialogues
- 2:31and then the three monologues,
- 2:32and those three monologues are.
- 2:34Job's oath of innocence, ~ the Elihu speeches,
- 2:39and then the Lord speech speaks to Job.
- 2:42And so last bump or so we did look at the Lord speaking to Job,
- 2:46and ends in chapter 42, verse 6,
- 2:50where actually verses 5 and 6,
- 2:53where Job says, I have heard of you by the hearing of the ears,
- 2:58but now I see you, and therefore I abore myself and repent in dust and ashes.
- 3:04And so what Job longed for throughout the dialogues anyway,
- 3:10and and even in his oath of innocence,
- 3:12was that he could meet God to to explain to God how he's righteous,
- 3:17how he doesn't deserve this, but yet on the other hand,
- 3:20Job realizes that that's kind of far-fetched,
- 3:23no one can go before God, etc.
- 3:25And then God speaks to him from the whirlwind.
- 3:28Could you imagine the surprise of that?
- 3:31Absolutely no, I cannot. ~ I have read this,
- 3:34studied this, taught this, preached this,
- 3:36and this is one of those occasions.
- 3:39This one and as Elijah runs away,
- 3:42there's these, cataclysmic events that take place.
- 3:46These are ones that's just difficult to kind of conceptualize in your mind what this
- 3:50must have been like for Job, just a feeble man like you and I haven't gone through
- 3:55everything that he went through those first thirty-seven chapters.
- 3:58Screaming out for God. Where is God?
- 3:59Looking for justice. What's going on?
- 4:01Why is God not answering me? And then all of a sudden you get to see
- 4:06I wouldn't even say the fullness,
- 4:08but you get to see an overwhelming presence that's physical.
- 4:13you can see it, feel it, hear it,
- 4:15you know, all this stuff has to be so intimidating to Job.
- 4:17Yeah. Kind of like the children of Israel standing there.
- 4:20at the foot of the mountain as it's thundering and it's lightning and
- 4:23all this kind of stuff as God is presenting himself to to Moses.
- 4:26It just has to be awe-inspired.
- 4:29And then the internal awe of it too,
- 4:32by just the questions that God asks,
- 4:34and Job is I mean, I can just imagine like,
- 4:37Wow, I never thought of that. Wow,
- 4:39I never thought of that. Wow. I never thought of that.
- 4:42And then Job responds, of course,
- 4:44by closing his mouth, not no further speech to God.
- 4:48And then, as we just read, he repented in dust and ashes.
- 4:51And so now we get to see
- 4:54the restoration of Job's wealth and such.
- 4:57And so, and you know, a lot of times people they know about the first
- 5:00two chapters of Job, and then they know about the the last chapter.
- 5:04Right. And so here's maybe some familiar grounds,
- 5:07but notice first of all, Job is commended and his three friends
- 5:10are restored in verses seven through nine.
- 5:13And so it was after the Lord had spoken these words to Job that the Lord said
- 5:17to Eliphaz the Temanite
- 5:19My wrath is aroused against you and your two friends,
- 5:23for you have not spoken of me what is right as my servant Job has.
- 5:30Now therefore take for yourselves seven bulls and seven rams,
- 5:34go to my servant Job and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering,
- 5:38and my servant Job shall pray for you,
- 5:40for I will accept him, lest I deal with you according to your folly.
- 5:46Because you have not spoken of me what is right,
- 5:49as my servant Job has. And so in verse nine,
- 5:53so Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite,
- 5:56and Zophar the Namathite went and did as the Lord commanded them,
- 6:00for the Lord had accepted Job.
- 6:03And so the three friends, and to their credit,
- 6:06they do follow what God says. ~ Again,
- 6:09these these four men, Job and his three friends,
- 6:12they were, you know, powerhouse wise men.
- 6:16of the day and ~ and their wisdom shows that they did do what the Lord
- 6:21had said because they wanted to be right with God.
- 6:24Mm. Yeah, they ~ they questioned Job and and like Job,
- 6:29it was like, you know, they they kind of wrestled and grappled with each other,
- 6:33but then when God speaks, it's like,
- 6:35Well, we're all gonna just be quiet and accept it and ~ again to their credit,
- 6:40they didn't, you know, debate God on it and anything.
- 6:42It's like once God speaks, that's the final word,
- 6:45period.
- 6:46Yep. And then we have in verses ten through seventeen,
- 6:49God blesses and restores Job. And so verse ten or well,
- 6:54yeah, verse ten. And the Lord restored Job's losses when he prayed for his friends.
- 7:00Indeed the Lord ja the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before.
- 7:05Then all his brothers, all his sisters,
- 7:08and all those who had been his acquaintances before came to him and
- 7:12ate food with him in his house,
- 7:13and they consoled him.
- 7:15And comforted him for all the adversity that the Lord had brought upon him.
- 7:18Each one gave him a piece of silver,
- 7:21and each a ring of gold. And so now and of course it could be you could say,
- 7:26same old, same old that when he's going through all this struggling and stuff,
- 7:30his friends, his family, they they keep their distance from him,
- 7:33they abore him to a certain extent,
- 7:34but now they're all coming back to him and they're bringing him gifts and such.
- 7:40And then verse twelve we have this statement Now the Lord blessed the latter days
- 7:44of Job more than the beginning,
- 7:46for he had fourteen thousand sheep,
- 7:48six thousand camels, one thousand yoke of oxen,
- 7:52and one thousand female donkeys.
- 7:53He also had seven sons and three daughters,
- 7:56and he called the name of the first Jemimah,
- 8:00and the name of the second Kiziah,
- 8:02and the name of the third Karen Hapuch,
- 8:06or Hapuch or Hapuk.
- 8:09And in all the land there were found no women so beautiful as the daughters of Job,
- 8:14and their father gave them an inheritance among their brothers.
- 8:18And it's very interesting that all the stuff was doubled except the children.
- 8:23The children were the same, but yet he does give the names of the daughters,
- 8:29which was very unusual for that culture.
- 8:32And ~ he did talk about the land the women were so beautiful and such.
- 8:37And then verse 16, after this,
- 8:39Job lived 140 years and saw his children and grandchildren
- 8:45for four generations. So Job died old and full of days.
- 8:50And all those things were blessings,
- 8:54especially in that culture. And I know at one point in Job,
- 8:58and we discussed this last episode,
- 9:00that, you know, one of the things he feared is to die,
- 9:04but yet his innocence go unresolved.
- 9:08And so he wanted it to be engraven in stone and et cetera,
- 9:11et cetera, because that was a fear and that was a a a true concern
- 9:16in that culture that if you died being thought of as a scoundrel,
- 9:20then that would curse your whole family for e for eternity.
- 9:23And so these verses here not only show that God doubled what he had,
- 9:29but it also showed that he was,
- 9:31you know, f so far as an earthly life,
- 9:33he lived four generations, he saw his grandchildren.
- 9:36And he was blessed beyond measure.
- 9:39Yeah, the sometimes ~ well in times past I've heard this passage taught
- 9:44or preached in a nearly health and wealth sort of a thing.
- 9:49~ you know, if God's gonna give you double if you just hold on tight,
- 9:53you know, and that kind of a thing.
- 9:54And ~ while it is great to read Job's end,
- 9:59the story is not about receiving double.
- 10:01The the the the blessing is not receiving double.
- 10:04The blessing is ~
- 10:07Kind of a healing of the relationships with Job,
- 10:10~ with his peers, with his family,
- 10:13and with God. Yes. there's kind of a restoration or healing
- 10:16of all those relationships. And and even with the children,
- 10:19~ it says that he had seven sons and three daughters.
- 10:23So you look at, everything got double,
- 10:24but he didn't get the double children.
- 10:26you know, poor Job. Well, in in a I guess in a biblical sense,
- 10:31the children aren't lost. You know,
- 10:32I'm thinking about David and 2 Samuel.
- 10:34He says, My children can't, my child can't come to me,
- 10:36I will go to my child.
- 10:38And so the souls of those children still exist.
- 10:40And so when he gets seven more children,
- 10:42~ seven so sons rather and three daughters,
- 10:46the ten more children, ~ that is double.
- 10:49And so those souls are doubled,
- 10:51so he will have those children again.
- 10:53~
- 10:53Yeah.
- 10:54Job one five he does offer sacrifice for them,
- 10:57lest they sin and curse God in their hearts.
- 10:59So
- 11:02And ~ just la one last thing, just think about this,
- 11:04you know, you we verse eleven is is really an awesome verse,
- 11:07God bless Job. he was just so richly blessed materially.
- 11:11but again it's just not about the the getting double.
- 11:14It it's about trusting God. I'm thinking about Hebrews eleven six.
- 11:17that God is a rewarder of those that diligently seek him.
- 11:21Even though Job was frustrated,
- 11:22he was still seeking answers from God.
- 11:25And it never was a thing like,
- 11:26you know what, that's fine. Where's Baal?
- 11:28I'm gonna go worship him. Where's Molech?
- 11:30I'm gonna go worship him. It was a thing of I'm frustrated,
- 11:33I'm curious, I'm angry maybe, but I'm still gonna stay with God.
- 11:38and he was rewarded and the reward in this instance was
- 11:43physical but also spiritual. But for the believer in God,
- 11:48the physical is not the true reward.
- 11:50You know, it's always the spiritual and the restoration and healing
- 11:54of the relationship we can have with God.
- 11:55Yep, that's the ultimate reward.
- 11:57And of course you see also that God is always good too.
- 12:00Before the tragedy, through the tragedy,
- 12:04and now afterwards, God is still the same God.
- 12:07Same love and everything. All right,
- 12:09so Job, he's mentioned well, a couple of places after the book,
- 12:13obviously, mentioned twice in the book of Ezekiel,
- 12:16chapter fourteen, verse fourteen and twenty.
- 12:20And and what Ezekiel is doing there,
- 12:22he is showing how wicked the people are that Ezekiel is preaching to
- 12:26the captives by the river Kibar,
- 12:28but he makes this statement, even if there even if these three men,
- 12:32Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it,
- 12:35they would deliver only themselves by their righteousness,
- 12:38says the Lord. And he repeats that in Ezekiel 1420,
- 12:42even though Noah, Daniel, and Job were in it,
- 12:45as I live, saith the Lord.
- 12:47They would deliver neither son nor daughter,
- 12:49they would deliver only themselves by their righteousness.
- 12:51So it does go to show that Job was a historical character,
- 12:56right along with Noah and Daniel,
- 12:58and it goes to show that he was righteous,
- 13:00and but it also shows the complete wickedness of the people
- 13:04to whom Ezekiel prophesied that even if those men were there,
- 13:08they would have rejected them and their what they taught,
- 13:10and thus they would have they would not have been saved.
- 13:13All right, and then then the
- 13:15Second time, which actually third time,
- 13:17but these two are kind of the same context,
- 13:19but is in James 5.11. And that's really a verse we want to really focus in
- 13:24on as we learn from Job.
- 13:27And of course in that verse, James five eleven,
- 13:32indeed we count them blessed who endure,
- 13:35who have heard of the pr you have heard of the perseverance of Job and seen
- 13:40the end intended by the Lord.
- 13:43That the Lord is very compassionate and full of mercy.
- 13:48Yeah, that's that's a great passage.
- 13:51And I love that both Ezekiel and James highlight
- 13:57Job ~ as a kind of a beacon,
- 14:00a pillar of of you know goodness,
- 14:03perseverance in James and righteousness and in both of those I think
- 14:07is it's not just that these were good guys.
- 14:09There are lots of good people that we can read about in the scripture.
- 14:12We could turn to and say, hey man,
- 14:13this was an exemplary person. This was a z exemplary person.
- 14:16But the three that you find the context in Ezekiel,
- 14:19and then now James mentioned,
- 14:22it seems that they kind of stand out because their circumstances were
- 14:26so just devastating. I mean, Ezekiel's in this national crisis.
- 14:32The people are just out of control.
- 14:33Daniel, he's carried away into captivity.
- 14:36Everything's
- 14:37bad, he's got every opportunity to go ahead and sin.
- 14:40He's far away from home, got a new name,
- 14:43new identity, and then Noah, literally the entire world is given in sin.
- 14:48And here you have these three kind of lights in in the middle of all that kind
- 14:53of stuff.
- 14:54It's like, yeah, and you mentioned the entire world and there's a sense
- 14:57in which the entire world's against Daniel,
- 15:01against Noah, and against Job and the things that they endured.
- 15:06You know, the pressure on them due to their circumstances.
- 15:09So that's a good point.
- 15:12Yeah, I I couldn't imagine. ~ you know,
- 15:14we we would all want our names to be remembered.
- 15:17I w I was just in Washington, DC over the summer,
- 15:19and it was great to go to those different monuments,
- 15:21Jefferson Monument, ~ the Washington Monument,
- 15:24and or Jefferson Memorial, Washington Monument.
- 15:27And then in the Lincoln Memorial,
- 15:29I was standing there talking with my stepdad,
- 15:31my wife, and and I was thinking like how amazing it is for a person like Lincoln
- 15:37to be remembered. ~ but if you would ask Lincoln
- 15:42Like, hey, would you want to go back through that?
- 15:44I mean, you'll get a huge monument.
- 15:46I'm sure he'd say, Man, absolutely not.
- 15:48He was the right guy for the right job at the right time.
- 15:51But to go through that, and that is why he's remembered that here's
- 15:55a person who didn't choose it.
- 15:57It was just thrust upon him and he stood fast.
- 16:00And here's a guy in Job. Job, like you mentioned,
- 16:03he didn't he wasn't privy to the conversation.
- 16:05He didn't get a vote in the conversation.
- 16:07He didn't get a say so. He just had to deal with it.
- 16:10And everything was unbeknownst to him.
- 16:12But then on the other side of it,
- 16:13when we get through to chapter 42,
- 16:15here's this guy that went through something that's,
- 16:17you know, almost incalculable for us to,
- 16:20you know, even consider going through.
- 16:22But he made it. And so now in in these periods of time where people
- 16:29are going through crisis with Ezekiel,
- 16:31people are going through crisis,
- 16:33the suffering Christians with James,
- 16:34of all the people they can name,
- 16:37they turn back to Job.
- 16:39And said this is what it looks like to stay faithful,
- 16:41maybe be curious, maybe be upset,
- 16:43maybe be whatever, but to stay faithful to God.
- 16:46Yeah, wow. It's a good point. That'd make a good sermon one day.
- 16:49Points
- 16:50Yeah, I think that might be
- 16:51right there. But yeah, so when we look at what James has to say,
- 16:55f number one, he pronounces a blessing on those like
- 16:59Job who persevere even to the end.
- 17:02And of course in the book of James right here,
- 17:04James five, actually seven through eleven,
- 17:07that whole section right there is dealing with patience.
- 17:09You know, he gives the example of the farmer,
- 17:11~ of those who wait for the Lord's coming,
- 17:14of the prophets, etcetera.
- 17:16And then he gets to Job. But there's a blessing when it comes to persevering.
- 17:22And ~ you know, that word blessed or happy sometimes some translations might have.
- 17:27It's you know, from a word that means to consider fortunate or happy,
- 17:32and as a verb it occurs one other time in Luke one verse forty eight,
- 17:37but the noun is found several times,
- 17:40a few in the book of James, chapter one,
- 17:42verse twelve, for example.
- 17:45And in verse twenty five as well in James.
- 17:49And blessed is you know, blessed,
- 17:51indeed we count them blessed who persevere who who endure.
- 17:55Yeah, you've heard the perseverance of Job and so yeah,
- 17:58that blessing is pronounced upon those that endure.
- 18:03Mm-hmm. Yeah, that's a that's a great section.
- 18:07As he says in 10, ~ take, for example,
- 18:10these prophets that have spoken the name of the Lord for example,
- 18:13for an example of suffering affliction and patience or endurance.
- 18:17So think about these people who have suffered immensely,
- 18:20and they did so with endurance,
- 18:22and faithful to God. They bore the pressure of their certain circumstances,
- 18:25and then says, Look, we count those people happy or blessed that endure.
- 18:29And then of all the prophets.
- 18:32I mean, you could go down the list of those who stood up for God.
- 18:35You know, we mentioned Elijah,
- 18:37we cited Ezekiel. you go to Jeremiah,
- 18:41~ you can go to any of them that spoke up for God.
- 18:44And of all those prophets, again,
- 18:46you've got Job, who is mentioned for being steadfast ~ in all that he did.
- 18:53And again, when James is writing,
- 18:55again is thinking, like, well,
- 18:57what's this book about in the first place?
- 18:59And he's writing to the
- 19:01Twelve tribes that are scattered abroad,
- 19:03these individuals who are likely scattered from the persecution that's coming
- 19:07to Christians. And so here are these people who are being encouraged
- 19:11to stay faithful to God. And in those first few verses of chapter one,
- 19:15he says, Look, count it all joy.
- 19:16But then he says, Look, man, here's an example to look to.
- 19:19Here's a real life example of a believer who went through,
- 19:22you know, all kinds of terrible hardship,
- 19:24but he stayed faithful to God.
- 19:25I mean, I can't imagine what it must have been like to read this letter
- 19:28for the first time and then maybe get that
- 19:31Boost of morale to you know what,
- 19:33Job could do it, I can do it.
- 19:34Yeah, and that's the thing, because he's he's just like us,
- 19:36I mean, so far as his human nature is concerned,
- 19:39different circumstances, but the same temptations,
- 19:42the same thoughts, same feelings,
- 19:44all that kind of stuff that we would go through.
- 19:45And so, you know, so happy or blessed is the one that does endure,
- 19:50and which tells us that the one who doesn't endure will not be blessed.
- 19:55And so there is not a blessing in giving up.
- 19:57And so Job is a prime example of perseverance,
- 20:02of persevering.
- 20:04And we he did you know, he did that throughout the book.
- 20:07We see that. he did not curse God and die like his wife suggested he should do.
- 20:11He did not leave God or, you know,
- 20:14some today might quit the church when adversity comes upon them.
- 20:18And he also h in the end, he humbled himself and accepted God's rule,
- 20:23accepted God's authority, and thus he was very submissive to God.
- 20:29There's something else that I think about,
- 20:32~ just what you were talking about,
- 20:33Job's response kind of to God.
- 20:35I want to just kind of briefly throw in God's response to Job and not just
- 20:41in what's written, but how do we observe what is written?
- 20:44So what I mean to say is God allows and affords
- 20:49man the opportunity to come to him even in frustration,
- 20:53which is something I I love about in scriptures.
- 20:56God does not say we have to
- 20:58kind of grovel before him and only say nice things.
- 21:01Like, you know, y you think about Jonah.
- 21:04Jonah comes to God and or God approaches Jonah and he kind of goes off,
- 21:10you know, I didn't want to do this.
- 21:11You made me do this. And in the text,
- 21:14God didn't rebuke him for having his frustrations.
- 21:17Job f is very,
- 21:21very frustrated and he, you know,
- 21:24cites all these reasons. And there's various others in the scriptures who
- 21:28in the Psalms, David and others at times who are curious and they're frustrated
- 21:32and they're, you know, angry or whatever the case,
- 21:34sad. And it seems that God allows for that man to come to him,
- 21:39whether in prayer or otherwise have we seen in the scriptures to come to
- 21:43him in our frustrations, in our fears,
- 21:44in our insecurities, whatever those may be,
- 21:47but it seems the only time that there is a ~ frustration on God's part with
- 21:52man is that when we doubt his holiness or his sovereignty or his care for us.
- 21:57Like, you know, Jesus in the ship,
- 21:58don't you care that we perish.
- 21:59And it's not that they were afraid.
- 22:01It's that, you don't you think I don't care about if you die,
- 22:05you know? And it it's a comfort for me as a believer to know that I can come
- 22:09to God if I'm upset. Yeah. If I'm frustrated.
- 22:12That's a good point, because that sometimes Jesus will say,
- 22:16ye of little faith. Mm-hmm. And every time he says that,
- 22:19it's to people who should know better.
- 22:21Yeah. Who should, you know. And so like you said,
- 22:23it's not the fear so much as it is the distrust in God when they
- 22:29of all people should trust God the most 'cause they've been with him
- 22:31for three years and all that kind of thing.
- 22:33And so ~ that's definitely a factor in here.
- 22:36All right, so so Job was blessed ~ because he persevered
- 22:41But also in James five eleven,
- 22:43~ that the Lord is very ~ or seen the end of the Lord,
- 22:49that statement, and I'm reading from the New King James,
- 22:51you have heard the perseverance of Job and have seen the end,
- 22:54and the word intended is in italics intended by the Lord.
- 22:58And that word end is telios, which means the completion of it,
- 23:02and that you have seen the end of the Lord,
- 23:04that He is very merciful, but but God is is good,
- 23:08He is good. He is very merciful,
- 23:10pitiful.
- 23:12very compassionate, the new King James would say.
- 23:16And ~ it comes from a word that means that has many plus affection
- 23:23attached to it. You know, he is he's much affectionate,
- 23:27if you will, very kind, very pitiful,
- 23:29very sympathetic.
- 23:32Yes, good work.
- 23:33And ~ and so he he he knows, he understands and and and it's kinda like again
- 23:39I mean, we we have a much greater advantage than Job did in looking
- 23:42at a situation because we have God's revelation,
- 23:45especially chapters one and two,
- 23:47that Job did not have. And that tells us a whole lot about God,
- 23:52about Job, about the devil, just information that Job did not have,
- 23:56but we have, and so we see that throughout the whole thing that God is always good.
- 24:02He hasn't changed ~ from before the the events happened to Job,
- 24:06through the events and after the events.
- 24:09God never changes. I like that he's ~ he is pityful,
- 24:14full of pity for mankind. And it's ~ I I love that God reveals himself in that way.
- 24:19You think about how the Hebrews writer talks about we don't have a high priest that
- 24:23can't be touched by the feelings of our infirmities.
- 24:24I studied ~ mythology in college.
- 24:28had took had I don't know why I took that course.
- 24:30But anyway, I took that course and some of the the so-called gods that
- 24:35are worshipped in various cultures.
- 24:37They do seem at times, some of them,
- 24:39not all of them, but some of them are aloof to man's feelings.
- 24:41Why are these people crying or why are these people feeling this way?
- 24:45And or they are just like the gods are like stoic.
- 24:49They just have responses. But the God of heaven is not like that.
- 24:53The God of Heaven does have a quote heart or a seat of emotion.
- 24:57He does have ~ compassion and he does ~ have mercy on us and he does understand
- 25:03our frustrations and all those sorts of things,
- 25:05and so it makes
- 25:06the believers feel heard. is one of the most frustrating things I think that people
- 25:11experience is feeling not heard.
- 25:13you know, whether in in any kind of relationship,
- 25:15a marriage, whether kids with parents,
- 25:16parents with kids, or you know,
- 25:18employee, employer. I just want my my voice to be heard and understood.
- 25:23And when we talk to God, he hears us,
- 25:25he understands us, he can relate to us,
- 25:28especially so since Jesus came and literally walked in our footsteps.
- 25:32So that we don't have an excuse to go to God and say,
- 25:35Well, you don't know what it's like.
- 25:36Well, he does know what it's like because Jesus endured all of that.
- 25:39Yeah, I've taken leadership classes when I became an elder and even before that,
- 25:44and that's one of the things they talk about as a leader,
- 25:46you don't have to do everything people say that you're over,
- 25:49but you at least they need to listen.
- 25:51Right. And a lot of times and I think that's the case with Job too.
- 25:54Just just listening and so even though when God finally spoke to the whirlwind,
- 26:00the questions God asked Job were nothing what Job expected.
- 26:07But just the very fact that God responded to him was enough for Job to know that
- 26:13God hadn't given up, that God was there.
- 26:15In fact, I I would say that Job even came to realize God was there the whole time.
- 26:20Even though the question seemingly had nothing to do with Job's suffering
- 26:26or Job's challenge to meet God in court or whatever,
- 26:29but just the fact that God responded was enough to let Job to comfort Job to know
- 26:36That everything was gonna be all right.
- 26:38And that he had heard like you mentioned,
- 26:40that he had heard ~ the whole time.
- 26:42~ though the response came later,
- 26:44but he had been there to hear all of the arguments from all the people
- 26:48the entire time.
- 26:49Yeah, and and of course I always wonder,
- 26:51you know, how much time was between the speeches or anything like that.
- 26:55We read it, it's all back to back to back to back.
- 26:57But it was indeed some suffering.
- 27:00All right, and so you know, James again,
- 27:03five eleven, we count them blessed to endure like Job.
- 27:07You have heard the perseverance of Job and seen the end intended by the Lord,
- 27:11and then thirdly that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful.
- 27:15And so God
- 27:18Had a plan all along. Satan challenged that plan.
- 27:22God, through Job, proved Satan wrong,
- 27:25among other things. But then also the Lord is very compassionate
- 27:31and full of mercy or merciful,
- 27:35tender mercy. And so these words are very comforting.
- 27:39And so, you know, the end intended by the Lord,
- 27:42the outcome of the Lord, blesses Job.
- 27:44And blesses us because of what we see in Job.
- 27:48This is in my opinion, I think Job in terms of just literary works,
- 27:54you know, we we believe the Bible's inspired.
- 27:56We believe it's directly breathed from God,
- 27:58it's it's inerrant, it i all those things.
- 28:01But just as a literary work, I think Job is probably one of
- 28:05the greatest written works in the world ever,
- 28:09because it answers I won't say it answers,
- 28:12it speaks to
- 28:15so many human problems. It speaks to so many human emotions.
- 28:18It speaks to so many human circumstances.
- 28:20and one of the takeaways because as there are many,
- 28:24many, many takeaways from the book of Job,
- 28:26but one of the takeaways is for us to trust God,
- 28:29period, full stop. And is you and I don't know the whole story.
- 28:34Like we don't even know the whole story in our own personal lives,
- 28:38let alone the whole story
- 28:40for our family, for our community,
- 28:42for the world. And that's why Job when he's asking these questions,
- 28:46it's like God zooms way, way, way,
- 28:48way out. It's like do you know about what's happening under the sea?
- 28:51Do you know what happens it was going on with these constellations with
- 28:53all these different animals? And it's like,
- 28:55well wait God, I was asking about my life,
- 28:56but God's like, look, Job, you can't even see the big picture.
- 29:00And so with God, it's like my job is not to ask God why things happen
- 29:05the way they happen, though he does afford us that opportunity,
- 29:08it seems, but the job is
- 29:10Trust God. You know, my life's upside down.
- 29:13I know. I know. Trust God. And it's like that's just the the main takeaway,
- 29:19at least in my estimation. As I read through Job,
- 29:21there's a lot of different questions that are asked.
- 29:22There's a lot of different things you can ~ apply and all that kind of thing.
- 29:25But like w okay, what is the main point of Job?
- 29:29Trust God, in in my estimation.
- 29:32Yeah,
- 29:32that's right. Trust God and and you're talking about the just and I've
- 29:36I just mentioned this to the students the other day.
- 29:38We were talking about the minor prophets.
- 29:40But you know, if you just take for a moment,
- 29:42just take away for a moment that this is inspired of God and all
- 29:46the deep things about it we can learn,
- 29:48and you just look at the structure of the this book and Job included,
- 29:52it's like you say, it's there's second to none.
- 29:55I mean the second is just distant,
- 29:57distant second. Mm-hmm. Because,
- 29:59you know, in the newer translations they have
- 30:01most of Job is poetry. They have the out in poetry,
- 30:04which is the parallelism and all that stuff going on.
- 30:07So you have that going on, then you have what it deals with,
- 30:10and you have the just the s the balance of the whole book,
- 30:12the cycles of speeches, the you know,
- 30:15God speaking and all that. It's just an amazing book.
- 30:17But again, just like if we were to summarize the book of Revelation as victory,
- 30:22~ the book of Job is just trust,
- 30:24trust in God, because we don't we don't know the whole picture.
- 30:27And we see that throughout, even though we think we do
- 30:30And the thing about like the friends,
- 30:31you know, when they're trying to figure it out,
- 30:33they say a lot of things true about God and about human nature.
- 30:37Right. Right. But it didn't apply to Job.
- 30:39Yeah. And Job said a lot of things too,
- 30:41but didn't apply to the situation directly.
- 30:44But they were confident in what they thought and what they said,
- 30:47but they were still not not not right.
- 30:49that was one of the things that I noted and I've really kind of came
- 30:53to appreciate about Job just as a work is that when you look at
- 30:58the series of speeches, that his friends most of the stuff that they
- 31:03say is spot on. You say amen to in a vacuum.
- 31:07yeah, that's true, that's true.
- 31:08Yeah. However, they're misapplied statements.
- 31:13You know, so they're they're talking about God's justice and
- 31:16judgment and you know, life and evil and sin and all those sorts of things,
- 31:20we're Yeah, yeah, yeah, but that that doesn't apply here.
- 31:22And of course you and I can sit back and and look at it like,
- 31:24hey, these guys are off. But to them,
- 31:27partly because of what it seems their worldview may be,
- 31:30partly because of how they seem to understand God,
- 31:32and but it all fits, but it's just not applied correctly.
- 31:37we talked about that earlier about this what's sometimes called retribution theology
- 31:41and all four of them believed it.
- 31:42but now it's tested and the test doesn't pass just on the surface because
- 31:46you know Job knew he hasn't sinned to the point he deserved that much punishment.
- 31:50But the three friends in their mind knew he did because God never does that unless
- 31:55you have sinned. And if you just stub your toe then you sinned a little,
- 31:59but if you're going through what Job went through,
- 32:00man, you got some serious stuff to repent of,
- 32:02at least in their minds. Mm-hmm.
- 32:04But yet we know that they were wrong,
- 32:06and God mentioned that and acknowledged that,
- 32:08but yet God forgave them through Job as he mediated for them through those
- 32:13sacrifices. And so Job is a great book that teaches us great,
- 32:18great things, and the main thing is just trust in God.
- 32:22Trust in God.
- 32:24Yeah, that's it. Is all those all those forty-two chapters is all just
- 32:28a reminder that God is always faithful.
- 32:30He's always faithful. And we don't always see the whole picture.
- 32:33no matter how much you learn, and Job had a great measure of wisdom and insight.
- 32:38He really did. But we are so limited.
- 32:41No matter how smart we get, how old we get,
- 32:43how much wisdom we apply, we're just limited.
- 32:46Even if we were to understand fully everything that's in the Bible,
- 32:49we still
- 32:51are limited. And so it is the idea is just,
- 32:54man, I I just I've got to trust God.
- 32:57There's times if I've I've kind of made statements to my girls.
- 32:59Sometimes they'll ask us about,
- 33:01why can't we do this? Or what about this?
- 33:03And what about that? And, you know,
- 33:04kind of when I've had enough as the parent,
- 33:06I'm like, hey, you know, you guys are asking go do this kind of stuff.
- 33:10Do do you make the mortgage payments?
- 33:12Do you understand how this works?
- 33:14And so I'll ask some questions that I know they don't have the answers
- 33:16to in an effort to kind of
- 33:19let them know, hey, your job is not to ask why mommy and daddy aren't doing these
- 33:22things. It's just to trust that we have your best interest in mind.
- 33:25We're gonna take care of you. Just sit back and do your part and we'll do our part.
- 33:28Yeah. Kinda reminds me of ~ Job.
- 33:31From a lesser to a greater, that's true.
- 33:33~ if parents know more than their children about limited things,
- 33:39then sure enough, God knows more,
- 33:41way more than we do about greater things.
- 33:45All right, so we hope that these lessons,
- 33:47these bumper sods have helped us and helped you ~ appreciate God more,
- 33:54appreciate Job more, and appreciate the struggles we go through and
- 33:58the fact that God
- 33:59has not abandoned us, he has not ditched us,
- 34:01even though we may suffer some very serious things in life.
- 34:05All right, Stephen, anything else to add to this as we close out?
- 34:10~ no, I think ~ I think that kind of sums it up.
- 34:13I think we ~ kinda covered all the bases.
- 34:16All right, we look forward to beginning our next season very soon,
- 34:19season number six, and again it will be minoring in the majors,
- 34:23and we will follow season five,
- 34:26which was a majoring in the minors,
- 34:29where we talked about the minor prophets.
- 34:30So here we'll talk about lessons from the major prophets,
- 34:34and we look forward to your being with us at that time.
- 34:38We appreciate your feedback and see you next time.