Latest / Reformed Thinking / Am I a Sea, or a Whale? (Job 7:12) | Charles Spurgeon

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Am I a Sea, or a Whale? (Job 7:12) | Charles Spurgeon · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to reformed thinking. I want to set a visceral scene
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for you right out of the gate. And I should warn you, it is not
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an easy image to stomach. No, it's it's pretty brutal.
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Yeah, it really is. We are looking at a man who has
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lost absolutely everything in a matter of hours.
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I mean, his children are dead. His massive wealth has been
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completely wiped out in this series of freak, catastrophic
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disasters. Just back-to-back tragedies.
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Right, but we aren't just talking about his external
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circumstances. We are looking at his physical
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body. He is sitting on a literal
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garbage dump and ash heap outside the city gates.
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Yeah, out in the dirt. And he is covered from the crown
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of his head to the soles of his feet in festering, diseased
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boils. Oh man.
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He is in such absolute blinding agony that he has taken a piece
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of broken pottery, like a rough jagged Shard, and he is scraping
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his own diseased skin with it just to find some kind of
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relief. It's just an unimaginable level
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of suffering, both physical and psychological torment.
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Absolutely. And in the middle of this
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torment, he looks up at the sky, and he screams out a question
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that on its face sounds almost absurd.
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He yells out to the heavens. Am IA sea or a sea monster that
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you set a guard over me? Yeah, that that is just one of
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the most arresting cries of anguish in all of recorded
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history. It really hits you.
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It does, and that and of course, is Job.
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That question comes from the 7th chapter of the book bearing his
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name, specifically verse 12. It captures this moment of
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total, unvarnished human desperation.
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It's so raw. Oh, totally raw.
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And to really grasp the weight of that cry, we have to
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understand the stage Job was standing on before the collapse.
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I mean, Job was a man of massive standing.
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He had immense wealth, renowned righteousness.
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He was considered the greatest man among all the people of the
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East. The.
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Guy had it all. He had it all, and then in a
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cosmic instant, the floor just falls out from under him.
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He loses his oxen, his donkeys, his sheep, his camels, his
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servants and then, tragically, all ten of his children in a
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single windstorm that collapses the house they were feasting in.
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Just devastating. And then comes the physical
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affliction you mentioned. The reason his outburst in
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Chapter 7 is so shocking is that Job was famous for his patients.
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When the initial disaster struck, his response was
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actually to worship. Right, he says.
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The Lord gave, and the Lord is taken away.
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Yeah, may the name of the Lord be praised.
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But as the physical agony dragged on, as he sat on that
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ash heap scraping his sores day after day, the agonizing
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friction of his reality just wore down his legendary
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restraint. And that bizarre, highly
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specific question from Job is the entire basis for our
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mission. Today.
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We're taking a deep dive into a 19th century sermon delivered by
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the English preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon A.
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Brilliant message. Yeah, it's fascinating.
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He takes this ancient cry from a man sitting on a dunghill, and
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he applies it to something that I think almost everyone
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listening is felt at some point, that universal human sensation
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of being relentlessly tracked. Oh yeah, that feeling of being
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shadowed. Right.
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The feeling that you were being blocked, thwarted, and pursued
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by God. We're going to unpack how
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Spurgeon uses this text to speak to anyone who has ever felt like
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the universe is actively conspiring against their plans,
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frustrating their ambitions, and basically watching their every
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single move. So Spurgeon makes a highly
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astute observation about Job's mental state right at the
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beginning of his analysis. He points out that while we
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marvel at Job's patients, we really should not be surprised
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by his impatience. Wait, why wouldn't we be
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surprised? He's the poster child for
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patients. Well, Spurgeon identifies this
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fascinating pattern throughout historical and biblical
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accounts. Individuals who are noted for a
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specific virtue very often fail in the very areas they are most
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known for. Let's investigate that pattern
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because it seems, I don't know, it seems counterintuitive.
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You would assume a person's greatest virtue would be the one
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thing that holds up under pressure.
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You would assume so, right? But the historical record proves
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otherwise. I mean, Spurgeon lists several
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massive historical figures to demonstrate this reality.
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He points to Elijah, for instance, known as the bravest
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of the brave. Oh, the showdown on Mount
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Carmel. Yeah, this is the process
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prophet who stood down 450 prophets of Baal on Mount
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Carmel, mocking them while they slash themselves, calling down
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fire from heaven, utterly fearless.
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Yet immediately after that victory, he receives a single
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threat from Queen Jezebel. And what does he do?
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He flees in terror into the wilderness, asking God to take
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his life. Wow, so the bravest guy runs
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away in absolute fear. Exactly.
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Well, yes, absolutely. Then Spurgeon points to Moses,
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described as the meekest of the meek, the most humble man on the
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face of the earth. Yet how does Moses fail?
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He speaks in unbridled rage, striking the rock in his anger
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instead of speaking to it as God commanded.
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Right, his temper flares up. And then we have Job, the most
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patient of men, who completely loses his composure and bitterly
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complaints, declaring that he will not restrain his mouth, but
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will speak in the anguish of his spirit.
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You know, we can look at this through an analogy from the
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world of structural engineering. Oh, I like that.
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Yeah, when engineers want to evaluate a new material they
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subjected to structural stress testing, they put it under
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massive compounding pressure to see where it will break.
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To find the breaking point. Right.
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And very often when you subject to supposedly flawless, highly
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engineered material to extreme pressure, it snaps at the exact
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point the engineer thought was the strongest.
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The reinforced joint gives way before the thinner beam.
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That's a spot on comparison. O Looking at this pattern with
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Job, Moses, and Elijah, it raises a heavy theological
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question. Does God intentionally pressure
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these specific strong points to prove that human virtue, even at
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its absolute peak, is entirely fragile without divine support?
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That framing captures the theological reality of human
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frailty perfectly. The virtues these men possess
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were not inherent indestructible properties.
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They were derived. They didn't own them.
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Right. Even the most sanctified
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individuals possess massive blind spots, and their greatest
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strengths can become their points of catastrophic failure
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if they rely on themselves rather than the Creator.
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The pride comes in. Yes, the weaknesses of these
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individuals live very close to their strengths.
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When the Creator allows the pressure to increase, the
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illusion of self-sufficiency shatters.
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For Job, the pressure fell agonizingly targeted.
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He felt like God was concentrating all divine
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strength on crushing him. Spurgeon uses the phrase that
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Job felt he was getting 50 stripes, save none.
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And usually the law permitted 40 sprays -1 right to ensure the
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physical punishment did not become excessive and kill the
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person. 39 lashes. But Job feels he is getting 50
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out of 50. No mercy, no holding back.
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He feels beaten black and blue by the Almighty, spared no
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suffering and crucially, he feels he is being relentlessly
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watched and checked. Shadowed, yeah.
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Job is essentially asking why are you harassing me?
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I am a tiny, insignificant creature.
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I am not the raging ocean that needs to be held back by
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boundaries. I am not a massive sea monster
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that requires a hook in its jaw to control it.
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Why spend all this divine surveillance on me?
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Job feels like an absolute nobody who has somehow made it
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onto the universe's most wanted list.
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That's a great way to put it. He feels the gaze of God is
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fixed on him with microscopic intensity, examining every flaw
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and punishing every misstep. He cannot comprehend why the
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creator of the cosmos would expend so much energy policing 1
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broken man on an ash heap. And that localized feeling, that
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sensation of being unfairly targeted by God's gaze, that
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shifts our discussion perfectly into Spurgeon's broader
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application. He takes this ancient, localized
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complaint from Job and brings it right into the present day.
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He brings it right home. He does.
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He shifts his focus to the everyday people sitting in the
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pews. Or you know, the person
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listening right now. He takes this concept of divine
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surveillance and applies it to how ordinary people experience
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this exact same terrifying sensation.
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Spurgeon states that some men are specifically shadowed by
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God. He uses the language of law
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enforcement, comparing the sensation to how police track a
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suspect. Like a detective falling you
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down an alley. Absolutely.
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Theologically, God's omnipresence is universal.
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He is everywhere. But Spurgeon makes a distinction
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regarding how that presence is felt.
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For some individuals, this universal presence becomes
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acutely, uncomfortably personal. They feel the eyes in the back
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of their neck. Yeah, they feel mysteriously
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tracked by the Great Spirit wherever they go and eyes upon
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them, and they know they cannot hide.
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They feel like prisoners under arrest who can never get out of
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the reach of the law. He gives some highly vivid
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examples of how this psychological pursuit plays out
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in everyday life. He talks about those lingering
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childhood habits. Oh, the prayers before sleep.
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Yeah, imagine someone who grew up saying our father before
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going to sleep. Now, as an adult living a
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completely different lifestyle, they still feel that echo in
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their mind. It just won't go away.
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Right. Or the person who trembles when
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they hear blasphemy. They might be trying to fit in
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with a rough crowd, but when someone curses the holy Name, an
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involuntary shudder goes through them.
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There's this undeniable whisper that God is near keeping tabs on
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their actions. And he provides a much darker,
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more intense illustration regarding the sailor.
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Spurgeon's context involved a lot of maritime references, of
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course, and sailors were a primary audience for some of
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these messages. It was a.
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Huge part of the culture back then.
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Oh, definitely. So he describes a sailor who is
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trying to be jolly with his crew during the day, surrounded by
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his messmates. He laughs, he drinks, he tries
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to be the life of the party. He's putting on his show.
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Yeah, but then comes the night watch.
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He is left entirely alone on the deck of the ship, under the
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silent massive canopy of the stars.
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And in that silence, his conscience calls him to account
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for the follies of the day. The noise is gone.
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The merriment fades and the sheer scale of the universe
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presses down on him, making him start in his sleep, dreaming
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over his past sins and the judgement to come.
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Conscience wakes up even when the rest of the man sleeps.
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I think a modern listener might want to push back on this entire
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framework. Oh, for sure.
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Today, if someone came to us describing those feelings, you
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know, the lingering childhood prayers, the guilt during the
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night watch, a modern psychologist might just label
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this a condition guilt complex. They'd say it's just your
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upbringing. Right, they might say you were
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raised in a strict religious environment.
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You internalize those rigid rules and now your brain is just
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misfiring guilt signals when you deviate from your childhood
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programming. It's.
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A common argument today. It brings to mind the analogy of
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a guard dog. Is the human conscience merely a
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trained animal that only barks because of early conditioning,
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or is it an actual divine tripwire installed by the
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Creator to track our movements? Well, that is the core debate
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surrounding the nature of conscience.
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We can actually look at Spurgeon's own biographical
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details to answer that, because he was not just theorizing, he
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lived this reality. Oh, he went through it himself.
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He describes his own youth as being put in irons by the Holy
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Spirit. Even as a young boy, before he
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had committed any massive scandalous the sins he felt the
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crushing weight of divine justice, he.
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Was just a kid. Right.
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But he dreaded punishment so intensely that he lost all
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relish for normal boyish sports. He woke up terrified he would
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read chapters of the Bible or arousing books first thing in
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the morning just to try to appease his mind.
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He describes himself as a criminal who dared not deny his
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guilt. A kid who cannot even play games
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because he feels the eyes of God watching him with anger sounds
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absolutely exhausting. It was.
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Exhausting. And Spurgeon uses this personal
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exhaustion to differentiate between mere psychological
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conditioning and divine intervention.
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How so? He explains that a condition,
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conscience can be silenced. You can train a dog not to bark,
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Spurgeon says. A conscience can be made like a
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muzzle dog unable to bite the thief of sin, or like a man with
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a cold who has lost his voice. So you can deaden it.
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Yeah, people can sear their consciences through repeated sin
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until they feel nothing. They adapt to their
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conditioning. But for those who are being
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actively shadowed by God, the conscience refuses to be
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muzzled. It keeps howling.
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Exactly. I mean, yes, absolutely.
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Spurgeon talks about the man who tries to escape this feeling by
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sailing to the ends of the earth.
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He arrives in a foreign port where the Sabbath bell is never
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heard, thinking he can finally take his swing in sin.
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He thinks he's free. But he finds that the dog of
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fear howls at his heels. Even there, merriment seems like
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mockery. This is not just a localized
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cultural conditioning. This is a relentless pursuit
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that crosses oceans and defies the individual's desperate
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attempts to silence. It so the internal alarm system
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is ringing and the individual cannot find the snooze button.
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But what happens when someone just puts in earplugs?
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What happens when a person successfully ignores that
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internal guilt and decides to push forward with their plans
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anyway? According to Spurgeon, that is
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when God stops working solely in the mind and starts physically
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altering their reality. The roadblocks become literal.
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This shift from internal conviction to external
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roadblocks is what Spurgeon calls the blockade of
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Providence. God actively uses physical
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circumstances to forcefully stop individuals from sinning.
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So he steps into the physical world.
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Yes, he uses things like sickness, financial ruin, and
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what society might call bad luck.
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God does not just whisper in their ear, He actively alters
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their circumstances to prevent their intended actions.
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That's a heavy thought. It is.
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Spurgeon lists several highly specific, vivid scenarios to
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illustrate this. He talks about a man who plans
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to attend a dance, fully intending to engage in the vices
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associated with it, but suddenly he falls sick with yellow fever.
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Wow, yellow. Fever.
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Yeah, he becomes so weak he doesn't have a leg to stand on.
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Tossing and turning on a hospital bed to a very different
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tune than the ballroom music he intended to dance to.
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The physical illness acts as a literal chain holding him to the
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bed. And then there's the guy who
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plans to have a massive drinking binge but his finances collapse.
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Right, the bankruptcy scenario. He goes bankrupt, he cannot get
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a berth on a ship for months, and he has brought down to total
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poverty. He literally cannot afford to
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fund his own destruction. Consider the even more extreme
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example Spurgeon provides the man who thinks everything is
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finally going his way. A fair wind is blowing, but a
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Tempest hurries up and his ship goes down.
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It's just a total shipwreck. He loses everything but the
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clothes on his back, becoming a shipwrecked mariner.
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Everything goes against him. His ship leaks, his sails are
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rent, his yards are snapped. Furthermore, God sends human
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roadblocks too. Oh, like the runaway boy.
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Yes, Spurgeon tells the story of a boy who ran away to sea
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specifically to escape his parents prayers and chidings.
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He thinks he is finally free, but as soon as he gets on his
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new ship, he is confronted by a devout sailor who immediately
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starts talking to him about his soul.
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He can't get away from it. The boy realizes he jumped out
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of the frying pan, right into the fire.
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That brings up the highly humorous anecdotes Spurgeon
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shares about his friends Fullerton and Smith on the
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Steamboat. Oh I love this story.
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It's great. Mr. Fullerton approached a rough
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looking man on the Steamboat and asked him plainly if he was
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saved. The man was furious, completely
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vexed by the question, and stormed off to the other side of
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the vessel to get away from him. Just trying to mind his own
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business. Right.
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And over there he bumps into Mr. Smith and complaints, saying
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that man over there asked me if I was saved.
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He's a fool. Smith looks at him and replies,
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very likely. But then you see he is a fool
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for Christ. I think it is better to be a
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fool for Jesus, that it'd be wise for the devil.
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And then Smith begins to plead with him too.
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The poor. Guy.
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The frustrated Sinner throws his hands up and cries out.
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There is a regular gang of them. I cannot go anywhere but they
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are on to me. The Sinner feels completely
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surrounded, ambushed by divine agents at every turn.
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But, you know, viewing these circumstances through this lens
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brings up a massive theological question.
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It really does. If someone ships sinks, they
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lose their livelihood, they lose all their possessions, and they
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are left freezing in wet clothes on a foreign shore.
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Society calls that a tragedy. We set up relief funds for that
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kind of disaster. How does Spurgeon justify
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viewing financial ruin and physical illnesses like yellow
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fever as acts of Divine Mercy? That is the crux of the matter.
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If God is good, why is he breaking people's legs and
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bankrupting their businesses? Spurgeon synthesizes this
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through the concept of divine sovereignty over suffering.
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He uses an analogy from his era, the Custom House Officer.
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Oh. The port authorities.
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Right When a ship pulled into port during the 19th century,
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the Custom House officer boarded it to search for smuggled
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illegal goods and confiscate them.
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Spurgeon argues that God acts as the ultimate Custom House
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officer, boarding the ship of a person's life to violently
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confiscate their smuggled sins. So he's taking the contraband.
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He is seizing the contraband that will destroy the soul.
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The destruction of the cargo is the saving of the vessel.
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Spurgeon uses another vivid mechanical analogy.
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He says God places a skid on the wheels when someone is running
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downhill toward destruction. A skid on a wagon wheel.
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Yeah, a skid was a metal shoe placed under the wheel of a
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horse drawn wagon to prevent it from rolling too fast down a
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steep hill. It caused massive friction,
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sparks and an awful grinding noise, but it prevented the
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wagon from careening out of control it.
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Slowed everything down, yeah. Spurgeon says that poverty,
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sickness and ruined plans are the divine skid.
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They are painful. They cause friction, but they
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stop the breakneck run downhill. I want to focus on the sheer
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violence of that mechanism for a second.
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The sparks, the grinding metal, the violent shuttering of the
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wagon when you were the 1 sitting in the wagon.
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That intervention feels like an attack.
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It feels terrifying. Because God places these
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intense, painful roadblocks in our path, human nature
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instinctively and violently rebels against that friction.
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Nobody likes the sound of the skid on the wheel.
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People utterly despise being watched and restrained.
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They absolutely loathe it. Spurgeon lays out the dark
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desires of the human heart with unflinching honesty.
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He says people crave the liberty to sin.
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They just want to be left alone. They want to be let loose, to
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follow their wild wills. They want to climb from sin to
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sin, hand over hand, and, as he dramatically phrases it, empty
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every cup on the devil's sideboard.
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Empty every cup on the devil's sideboard.
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That is quite a phrase. It really paints a picture.
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They demand liberty to put their hand into the fire, liberty to
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ruin themselves, liberty to leap into hell before their time.
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It is the ultimate expression of the teenage rebellion against
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curfew, but scaled up to cosmic proportions.
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Spurgeon points out that people actually envy the hardened
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profligate. Oh, they look up to them.
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Yeah, the young Saley who drops 1 oath and feels wretched, looks
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at the old foul mouthed sailor who can swear till all is blue
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and he actually wishes he could be like him.
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He wants that numbness. He wishes he could pour down
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grog without a wink and swear without flinching.
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They wish they could be deaf and blind to their own moral alarms.
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It is a tragic irony, Spurgeon points out, that we do not envy
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the blind because they cannot see danger coming, and we do not
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envy the deaf because they cannot hear a warning siren
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right. That'd be crazy.
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Yet the young man envies the old Sinner who has become
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spiritually blind and deaf. He sees a seared conscience as a
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sign of bravery or pluck rather than the fatal handicap it
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actually is. He wants the freedom to destroy
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himself without the nagging interference of guilt.
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Spurgeon introduces a chilling thought experiment in the text
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to illustrate this hatred of divine restraint.
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He says if tomorrow we could hear by telegram from heaven
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that God was dead, what crowds would buy the newspaper?
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What a statement. I want you, the listener, to
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really consider that. What would your reaction be to a
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universe suddenly entirely devoid of moral guardrails if
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the sky opened up and announced that the Divine Detective was
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gone? That the Custom House officer
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was dead. What would happen in the
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streets? For those who love God, Spurgeon
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notes, this news would be death. They would have lost their
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father and comforter. But for the godless person who
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feels shadowed by God, it would be the greatest relief in the
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world. They would celebrate.
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They would throw massive parties.
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The psychological fallout would be immediate.
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If there is no final judgment, no divine surveillance, the
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human will would completely unspool.
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This thought experiment reveals the terrifying concept of God
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granting absolute autonomy. Just letting the wagon roll.
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Spurgeon explains that short of hell itself, the worst judgment
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the Creator can inflict on a human being is simply giving
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them completely over to their own desires.
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He references God saying let him alone, mirroring the biblical
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account of Pharaoh's hardened heart.
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When God removes the skid, the wagon plummets.
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And it does not just plummet alone.
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The demand for autonomy is incredibly destructive to
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bystanders. Humans do not just want to ruin
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themselves, they actively lay traps for others.
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Spurgeon speaks sharply to those who thirst to ruin others.
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He talks about men who lead women astray or old sailors who
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teach young boys to drink and swear.
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Passing on the poison. They are not satisfied with
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their own ruin. They drag sailors, women and
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boys down with them, and Spurgeon delivers a terrifying
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warning. He says you may sail away and
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leave your victims behind, but you will have to face those
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ruined individuals at the Day of Judgement, where they will curse
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you to your face for eternity. The human desire to corrupt
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others proves that Job's original argument that he is too
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small and insignificant to warrant God's attention is
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entirely flawed. Right, Job asked.
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Am IA sea or a whale that you set a watch over me?
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The implication was that he was too small to warrant such
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massive divine surveillance. He's saying I'm just a guy on an
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ash heap. Well, yeah.
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Spurgeon argues that arguing from our insignificance is
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incredibly poor pleading. He points out that in life, men
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fall by very little things. You do not need to watch against
22:05
a dog half as much as you need to watch against a horse, fly,
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or a mosquito. Because the little things will
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sting you and you least expect it.
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Yes, little things require more watching, but Spurgeon goes much
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further. He asserts that the human heart
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is far more dangerous, chaotic, and capacious for evil than any
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physical ocean or mythical leviathan.
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Spurgeon uses 4 distinct characteristics of the ocean to
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describe human nature, and he starts by looking at its
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restlessness. It never stops moving.
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He quotes the Scripture. The wicked are like the troubled
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sea when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt.
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He points to hearts that are always agitated, seeking rest,
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but never finding it. They run first in One Direction,
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then another. Just churning constantly.
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And what do their minds cast up? Not pearls or corals, but foul
22:49
language. Filthy thoughts mire and dirt.
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Anyone who has spent time with an intensely restless, angry
22:55
person knows how toxic they can be when stirred up.
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And it is not just restless. Think about how furious the
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ocean gets. A landsman might look at a calm
23:04
sea and think it looks beautiful, but when the Gale
23:06
blows, it is terrifying. It will crush you.
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Similarly, a man might seem decent when sober, but when
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consumed by drink or passion, the devil comes on board.
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He foams at the mouth. His eyes flash lightning.
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His face is black. As a Tempest, he becomes Wilder
23:21
than the ocean itself. And like the ocean, the human
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heart is completely unsatisfied. The sea swallows stretches of
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land, thousands of tons of cliffs and massive Spanish
23:30
galleons loaded with silver and gold.
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Yet it is never. Full it always wants more.
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The sea is a hungry monster. Human cravings operate on the
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exact same mechanism. If you gave a person half the
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world, they would cry for the other half.
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If they had the whole globe, they would weep for the stars.
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Man's mind is a bottomless pit that never rests in sweet
23:49
content until God fills it. Which leads to the final
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comparison, destruction. The ocean causes terrible havoc,
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making widows and orphans by the 1000 without feeling a shred of
24:00
remorse. It's completely indifferent.
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But Spurgeon brings it back to the reckless center.
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A foul word, a loose song, a filthy act, and a human life
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becomes a wreck. No shark has devoured as many
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people as the drunkard and his cups or the unclean in his lust.
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The damage a single human being can inflict on their family and
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community outpaces any natural disaster.
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But there's a massive divergent in this analogy between the
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human heart and the physical ocean.
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The literal ocean is terrifying and destructive, but it actually
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obeys God. Oh, that's a brilliant
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distinction. It operates strictly within
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prescribed boundaries. It is restrained by something as
24:38
simple as a built of sand. It's tides respond precisely to
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the gravitational pull of the moon and the equinoctial gales.
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It stops the flood, and it recedes at the ebb.
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When God tells the sea to stop, it stops.
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Even the sea monster obeys. Right when God spoke to the
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great fish that swallowed Jonah, it vomited him onto the dry
24:55
land. Nature obeys.
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Man, on the other hand, leaps over every trench and mountain
25:00
God places in the road to hell. The ocean yields, but man
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rebels. Why does a physical boundary
25:07
deter an animal or a body of water, but trigger a
25:10
psychological challenge in a human?
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This brings us to the reality of total depravity.
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Man possesses an unsearchable capacity for evil.
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God blocks up the road to destruction with hedges, ditches
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and chains, and humanity breaks over them.
25:23
We see a wall and we climb it. God piles a mountain in the road
25:27
and we leap upon it like deer. A man will actively fight
25:30
against wind and tide in a determined, willful effort to be
25:33
lost. Therefore, the human heart needs
25:36
far more watching and restraint than the sea or the whale.
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The human will is exceptionally rebellious compared to the
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physical elements. So we've established this
25:45
terrifying reality of human rebellion, the individual
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sprinting toward the Cliff edge, fighting against the skid,
25:51
ignoring the conscience, breaking through the roadblocks.
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Why doesn't God just let them go?
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That's the big question. Why keep applying the brakes?
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This brings us to the grand reveal of our deep dive, the
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storm of electing affection. Such a beautiful phrase.
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It completely reframes everything we have discussed,
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every single roadblock, the broken leg, the yellow fever,
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the missing ship, the howling conscience keeping the sailor
26:15
awake at night. These were not acts of divine
26:18
cruelty or cosmic bad luck. They were acts of extreme divine
26:23
love. If God had left the individual
26:26
alone, they would have achieved their own destruction.
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This is the turning point of the entire message.
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Spurgeon shares a personal story about Roland Hill telling an old
26:35
Scotchman that without grace, he would have been a terrible
26:39
Sinner. And Spurgeon felt the same way.
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He applied this directly to himself.
26:42
He acknowledged that nothing half and half would have
26:44
attended him. He would have gone to the
26:46
absolute end of his tether and sin.
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The restraint of God kept him from self ruin.
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God's intervention, no matter how painful, is a rescue
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mission. And then there was that
26:55
incredibly moving anecdote about the mother in Spurgeon's vestry.
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That story gets me every time. A mother came to Spurgeon
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bringing a small all brown paper parcel containing 50 lbs which
27:05
was an enormous sum of money in that era, especially for a
27:08
commoner. She gave it to the British and
27:10
Foreign Sailor Society A. Huge sacrifice.
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She had a son who ran away to sea years ago.
27:16
She had no idea where he was, whether he was alive or dead,
27:19
but she brought this massive self sacrificing offering in the
27:23
desperate hope that a missionary supported by those funds might
27:28
randomly bump into a runaway son in some far off port and bring
27:32
him to the Savior. She is funding the very gang of
27:35
them that the sailor on the Steamboat was complaining about.
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The runaway son might feel he's being hounded by religious
27:41
fanatics at a report, but in reality he's being followed up
27:44
by a mother's pleadings. In God's Providence, the
27:47
surveillance he hates is funded by love.
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Think about a shepherd with his flock.
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If a sheep is wandering near a Cliff edge and suddenly it
27:55
breaks into a Sprint toward the drop off, the shepherd doesn't
27:58
just stand there and gently call its.
27:59
Name No, that won't work. He takes the heavy crook of his
28:02
staff, he swings it, he hooks the sheep by the neck and he
28:05
violently throws it to the ground.
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If you don't understand what is happening, it looks brutal.
28:10
It looks like the shepherd is attacking the sheep, but it is a
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rescue. How does this reframe the
28:16
listeners past failures and traumas?
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It changes the entire paradigm of how we view our lives.
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Spurgeon calls these interventions tokens of electing
28:25
love. God resolves to save his people.
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Christ bought them, and he means to have them.
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If they will not come by a gentle breeze, he will fetch
28:35
them by a storm. Whatever it takes.
28:37
The sheep being hooked by the neck feels pain, but it is saved
28:40
from the abyss. Spurgeon references the prodigal
28:43
son, the famine in the far country, the total poverty, the
28:47
humiliation of feeding pigs. If the father had orchestrated
28:50
it himself, he could not have designed a better mechanism to
28:53
drive the son back home. So true.
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Hardship, want, and pain are perfectly orchestrated tools.
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One day the individual will look back and bless God for the rough
29:03
wave that washed them on shore, and bless God for the stormy
29:07
Providence that drowned their comfort but saved their soul.
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We've traced this incredible past.
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Today we started with Job on the dunghill, offering up his bitter
29:14
complaint, feeling oppressed and unjustly targeted by God's gaze.
29:18
The 50 stripes. Right.
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And then we investigated the chilling reality of human
29:22
destructiveness, how our hearts are more restless, furious and
29:25
unsatisfied than the ocean itself.
29:28
We confronted the terrifying desire of the human will to
29:32
demand absolute autonomy eve till it means driving ourselves
29:35
off a Cliff. The rejection of the skid.
29:38
And finally, we arrived at the comforting truth that the
29:41
Creator's surveillance, his roadblocks, his frustrations are
29:45
actually the mechanisms of a rescuing Grace.
29:48
Spurgeon offers a final, beautiful resolution to all this
29:51
turmoil. God will not always deal roughly
29:54
with the soul. Just as Jesus Christ walked onto
29:56
the raging waters of the Galilean Sea and spoke to the
29:59
warring elements saying be still, the Holy Ghost can speak
30:03
that same calm into the chaotic warring elements of a person's
30:06
soul. The storm doesn't last forever.
30:08
No, the ways that roared like lions Crouch like whip dogs at
30:11
his feet. The relentless storm of the
30:13
conscience is finally quieted, not by being muzzled or ignored,
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but by being cleansed and reconciled.
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I will leave you with a final thought to Mull over.
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Look at the current frustrations in your life right now.
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The closed doors, the failed plans, the agonizing friction
30:27
you are fighting against every single day.
30:29
What if you stop viewing them as bad luck, or personal failures
30:32
or signs that the universe hates you?
30:34
What if, instead, you viewed them as the deliberate, forceful
30:38
guardrails of a God who absolutely refuses to let you
30:41
destroy yourself? What if your greatest defeats
30:43
are actually the exact instruments of your rescue?