[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hey, thanks so much for listening to this message. My name is Jason and I'm one of the ministers here at the Madison Church of Christ. It's our hope and prayer that the teaching you hear today will bless your life and draw you closer to God. If you're ever in the Madison area, we'd love for you to stop by and study the Bible with us on Sundays at 5pm or Wednesdays at 7pm if you have questions about the Bible or want to know more about the Madison Church, you can find us
[email protected] be sure to subscribe to this podcast as well as our Sermons podcast. Madison Church of Christ Sermons. Thanks again for stopping by. I hope this study is a blessing to you.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: So turn your Bibles to Job, chapter 38. Job 38. You know, over the past few weeks we've had some deeper, more intense, somewhat even emotional topics. Tonight is definitely, definitely one of those, especially getting into the Book of Job. And I'm sure even when you hear Job, there's a lot of different feelings that may pop in your mind. Maybe it for some of you is a book that actually got you through some very difficult times. But I also know of some people that the Book of Job has actually raised more questions than it's given even answers. So Job is one of those books. And so we're going to dig into it tonight. And I know when I ask this question in just a second, just to kind of get the ball rolling and to break the ice tonight, that this question may not mean a lot if you don't know about Job and his background. So I want to give you a little bit. Job is a guy that lost everything and he lost his livelihood, he lost his family members, he lost his land, he lost his home. He even had sores on top of it while losing everything. And so he lost a lot of things. And what makes it even worse is that God allowed Satan to do this to him. Okay? And when you read a lot of the things that happened to Job and you read his narrative, one of the things that I heard a lot growing up is people say something like this man, he or she is just a modern day Job, right? And as you think about that statement, I want you to think about it for yourself. And I'd love to hear if you have anybody that comes to your mind that is a modern day Job. One of the people that I kind of thought of that fit the bill is not necessarily someone I know, but one of the examples I gave, I think in a sermon a year or so ago is about the man that wrote the song. It is well with my soul. And if you know his story, I mean, it's incredible. This guy was a, had a lot of money and he had a nice home, a nice area that he lived in. The Chicago fires came through, destroyed his livelihood, destroyed his home, destroyed his business. He and his family had a very rough year. People that he loved lost a lot of stuff. So what this guy decided to do, hey, my family's already been through a lot. With all that we've gone through and experienced, what I'm going to do is I'm going to send my, my whole family, we're going to go on a vacation together. So again, in a very selfless act, let's get, spend time together, let's get away. He was actually on a trip and so he said, I'm going to go ahead and send my wife and my kids so they can go ahead and start enjoying it. They hop on a boat and if you know anything about the story, they die on that boat.
And what made it also worse for him is he had to get on the same boat to go back, same boat route, excuse me. In order to go where they were, he gets on a boat and he has to pass over the very waters where his wife and his kids died. And it was over that very water that he passed over that inspired him to write that song. It as well. And one of the things that kind of stuck out to me about him and why I think of him as kind of like a modern day job. He lost his business, he worked very hard for, lost his home, he lost his wife and he lost his kids.
And we say job lost everything. But one thing that I think about that he did not lose is his faith. Now some will think, well, no, he lost his faith.
You can see glimpses of his faith still there even during times of doubt. And we've talked about that before, that you can have doubts and still have faith. You can have frustrations and still have faith. And so maybe you know somebody like that that's lost a lot of things, but they still had that relationship with God that kind of got them through it. Anybody have a modern day job that you think of?
[00:04:27] Speaker C: There was a family here several years ago now that went to the air show out at the airport and there was this.
I forgot what the weather thing was called. It was. Anybody remember?
Microburst.
[00:04:42] Speaker B: Thank you.
[00:04:42] Speaker C: Yep. That was the first time I heard what a microburst was. And yeah. And they lost.
Was it the husband or the wife? One of the family members died. Well, the. The Blue Angels later on flew them down to Pensacola, gave them a big grant and just really try to treat them. Well. Yeah, something else happened there and. And someone else died in their family and so I don't remember the exact details of that, but I remember within like a year and a half that family was devastated.
[00:05:10] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:05:10] Speaker C: And particularly at two air shows. So just a. Yeah. Very bizarre and incredibly tragic.
[00:05:16] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:05:16] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:05:17] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:05:18] Speaker B: Yeah. It's one kind of like Job one bad thing and then another bad thing. Anybody else?
[00:05:24] Speaker E: Yeah, my in laws, Oxford, Mississippi. And their preacher's name is Les Ferguson. And you can look him up, I believe. And his first wife and one of his sons who was disabled was murdered by one of the men that would used to come over and help watch the sun. It was a murder suicide and so they were both murdered. But he's since been remarried for close to 10 or 15 years now and he's had, I think two or three more kids and.
[00:06:03] Speaker F: Yeah.
[00:06:05] Speaker B: Wow.
And I know who you're talking about. Anybody else?
So again, when you think of those modern day jobs and you think of Job himself, you go through those kinds of stories. And again, just like Job does sometimes, again, it answers some questions, but sometimes it raises more questions than we even have answers for. And that's kind of the point.
Sometimes we don't have answers to everything.
And one of the things that God is going to build into this whole interaction with Job as we're going to kind of. I'm kind of giving you the ending before we get there, of where we're going to go with it, is that God sets limits in this whole situation, even when it doesn't feel like there is.
And it's in the limits that he is still involved in. And he sets that where there is hope in the middle of a very painful, difficult situation. Okay, so we're going to get into this interaction that Job has with God and it's an interaction that you can tell he's definitely craving. But we have to understand where this started from the very beginning. If you look in Job one one, it sounds like, if you read the very first verse, like it's a fairy tale. It says, there was a man in the land of Uz, Not Oz for you wicked people, but us.
Get it?
Sorry, play on words. All right. Whose name was Job and he was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil, of evil. So again, you read job 1 1. Sounds like a fairy tale. Sounds great. And so then you get into a conversation that God has in verse 6 with the sons of God. If you remember when we did our study on angels, we talked a little bit about the sons of God. A lot of the sons of God is.
Sons of God is different than son of God. Sons usually refer to angels, and in this case it does, because one of those angels was the fals fallen one, Satan. And so if you look in verse six, it says that all the sons of God had come together. The Lord was there, but Satan was also among them. And the Lord said to Satan, where'd you come from? And then Satan brags and says, hey, listen, I've been going all across this earth and I have had a whole lot of success. Now, here's what's interesting. This is not what the lesson's about, but the timing of when this would have been. One thing that's interesting about the book of Job is most people, most scholars date Job to be the oldest book of the Bible, the oldest manuscript that we have, even older, many years older than Genesis, which also can connect pre flood. So there's a lot of thoughts about that. Just I'm trying to paint a picture of how evil the world was, okay? And he's basically bragging, hey, the world is super sinful. I'm having my way around here. And then Satan. Then God said, well, actually, I know you think you've had your way around here, but there's this man named Job. There's nobody like him on earth. He fears God. He's upright and he turns away from evil. But then look what Satan says to the Lord in verse nine.
Does Job fear God for no reason? And he says this. Have you not put a hedge around him and his house and all that he has on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands and his possessions and have increased the land.
But stretch out your hand and touch all that he has and he will curse you to your face. And so he basically says, yep, the reason why Job is faithful to you when everybody else is not is because you've had your hand in everything. You've helped him. You've helped him get from point A to point B. And then God said, okay, all right, we'll try it then. So he says, behold, all that he has is in your hand. This is what God says to Satan. The only thing you cannot do to him is touch him. So Satan went from the presence of the Lord.
So that's the whole setup. Kind of intense, right?
Again, raises some questions, maybe.
So then we get to job 38. Now keep in mind before this, all the things that have happened. What are some things that Job lost that you remember?
His children, what else?
Servants, cows, cows, livestock.
And I don't mean this in a petty way at all, but what some things he didn't lose that probably would have helped him if he lost his wife. His wife, yeah. And yeah, the nagging voice. It's not that. Yeah, Vic really laughed at that one. I'm just kidding.
But you think about all the things he lost. Yeah, that's right. On top of that, he had sores all over his body. And so. And then he had friends, some of his friends. What were the good ones at certain times? What did they do?
[00:10:45] Speaker F: They sat silent.
[00:10:46] Speaker B: That's it. They sat silently. Right. He was going through a very difficult time. And here's that detail matters because in just a second God is going to address the friends that feel like they have a need to say everything and its impact on Job. So he had friends in the middle of a crisis that just sat there, didn't say anything. And maybe you've been in a spot like that before where those kind of people were the most helpful, that they didn't overshare. They just sat there. And we understand if you've gone through something difficult that you oftentimes don't want the answer because they don't have the answer to the problem. You just want to know that someone cares that they're there. Right. That's kind of what happened in that moment. But then he also had some other friends or those other friends, like not good examples. Right. They were actually trying to say, well, hey, you got stuff to ask God. Like you, I can't wait for you to have this one on one with him. So that's the whole situation. And I mentioned earlier, did he lose everything?
He lost everything but his faith in God. And I know that some people say no, he lost his faith completely. I don't think he did. And the reason I don't think he did is because of how he responds when he actually has that conversation with God. It was tested to the extreme. For sure. He went through moments of frustration and doubt, but he still kept coming back to the fact that he wanted to talk to God. So, any thoughts before we move on?
[00:12:10] Speaker C: I think that's part of it, is that he goes to God with his questions, with his anger, with his confusion. And even when he articulates that you still hear it's because of who God is that he says what he says about why are these things he's going to the only one that he knows could actually give substantive answers to. All of his friends seem to focus on the circumstance they. They accuse him of being unrighteous. There's gotta be something wrong with you. So I think that's a human tendency, is to gravitate towards our circumstance as defining whether we're righteous or not, when all throughout the Bible, really righteous people find themselves in really unfortunate circumstances. But I think that is a human tendency to when things are going well, then it's exclusively God's blessing. And when things are going bad, then God has ceased blessing and, you know, those kinds of things. So we kind of have a black and white approach to things that have apparently a lot more nuance to them.
[00:13:04] Speaker B: Yeah. And what Jason just said there is very important that sometimes we try to have a black and white response or a black and white thought to something that our minds cannot comprehend that God is doing, orchestrating, or putting limits on. All right, can you read this verse?
[00:13:19] Speaker C: Yep. Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said, there you go.
[00:13:24] Speaker B: All right. So that's okay.
[00:13:26] Speaker C: Mine has a colon.
[00:13:28] Speaker B: Okay, okay. You know how I am about colon.
[00:13:30] Speaker C: I do understand.
[00:13:31] Speaker B: All right. But you would think. All right, well, what's in this verse? Well, it turns out there's a lot in this verse when it says, then the Lord, here's why this is a big deal. For the past 35 chapters, however long that was, Job had nothing from God.
No interaction, no words. He was craving, obviously, something to maybe hopefully make sense of all the things that had just happened. If you read back in those 35 chapters before this moment, it's almost like he's trying to talk himself into hope this is happening to him, knowing that he's a good guy. And so the Bible is saying, I'm not. We're not answering them yet. I just want to answer you. But then notice what it says. He answers Job out of a what whirlwind? Now, that is a very important detail for several reasons. The whirlwind represents kind of like a tornado. A tornado cannot be tamed. A tornado cannot be controlled. And so throughout Scripture, you'll notice God shows up in whirlwinds twice in the book of Psalms, and I think it's once in Isaiah that God speaks in a whirlwind. Elijah, you know, he was carried off in a whirlwind. You have Ezekiel that, you know, is seeing the presence of the Lord in a whirlwind. And the whole point of that, again, is he makes his Self known from a place of, you cannot tame me, you cannot control me. Now, do you think that's going to matter in context to what Job has experienced? That there is a God that is untamable, uncontrollable during a time like this? But here's the other part of it that has very significant meaning. If you go back to job one 19, that's where when Satan's like, all right, one of my first things I'm going to do is I'm going to send a wind to destroy the house that your kids are in.
It knocks down the house and kills his kids that are inside. It was a wind that did that. And the reason I mentioned that is one of the commentaries I read yesterday made this point that throughout Scripture, God, when something happens that seems like man, this is it. Like, the world is in control. The world is calling the shots. Satan is calling the shots. God will come back to reinforce. No, I'm in control.
So if a wind destroyed the home, now he's bringing a window to show that he is actually in control. Okay. That he's still involved. It's kind of like, y'all remember when we looked at the Red Sea a few weeks ago when God said, hey, I know you just left Egypt. I want you to go back and park at Belsavan and Bel. Savannah, Zavon was the false God that owned the sea. And they would go out in the sea and say, make a way, Savannah bring fish. Zavon, they thought Savannah owned the sea. So God, when he tells them to go there, he's basically saying, hey, that sea that you think Zephon owns, I own. Like, that's my sea. So this is kind of one of those moments where he's. He's doing that. Any thoughts? Anything?
[00:16:38] Speaker C: I think there's a maybe significance that God's presence in the midst of chaos, even. Yeah, just peace. It's a different kind of peace when it represents his might and his power. And we've all experienced hurricanes or tornadoes, and it's significant, the power that those possess. But in the midst of that, still is God's presence. To me, there's kind of an interesting contrast.
[00:17:02] Speaker B: Yeah, that's true. Yeah. Especially because the whirlwind was usually letting people know, I'm present.
[00:17:07] Speaker G: Who's your dad?
[00:17:08] Speaker B: And again, this is.
How can God do both these things at once, be present, but at the same time? Let Satan do what he wants. Okay, again, we're going to come back to that. That's a. Interesting balance to let our minds go to. All right.
[00:17:24] Speaker C: All the words this time or all the words.
[00:17:27] Speaker B: Yeah, except for the last two, if you can. I'm just kidding.
[00:17:29] Speaker C: Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Now, prepare yourself like a man. I will question you and you shall answer. Okay, me with one this time.
[00:17:39] Speaker B: Yeah.
So now this is again the first time in 35 chapters for us. While for Job experienced a lot that he hears something from God. And the very first thing God addresses, who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? He's basically saying, you have gotten a lot of counsel from people that have no clue. All right, now, some people think, who is he talking to here? Is it Job or is it Elihu? Most people believe it is Elihu, and here's why.
He had several friends, and maybe you've had this happen to you before, that they like to give advice, but they don't have necessarily much knowledge of it. And by the way, it's okay to give words of encouragement and advice. We can't all say we've always been to every situation and through every situation that people have. But at the same time, sometimes we like to, if we're not careful, give advice as if it's concrete when we don't know what they've been through or we don't fully, even more with this context, know really the ways of God. Okay? And so they, most people believe was Elihu that he was kind of referring to, hey, this guy's trying to give you wisdom and give you words without any knowledge of who I am. And then he says this to Job, now, I want you to prepare yourself like a man, and I'm going to question you and you will answer me.
So that's a lot, you know, he's hearing. I want you to. To be ready to be a man. And to me, when I've read this, up until this point, I thought, man, he's done a pretty good job being a man with a lot of the things that he's handled.
But one of the other things that I think about is if you think about what Job was thinking going into this moment, knowing that he's finally going to talk to God, do you think he was going into it thinking, I have questions for you, and my friends have questions for you, I think that's what he was going into. When I get that moment with God, I've got questions for him and my friends have got questions for him.
But what's interesting is the very two things that I think Job was wanting to do was to ask him questions and to get his friends questions answered because maybe he's wondering, I'm going to be justified. Maybe through this conversation, or they're going to be justified. God gives no opportunity for either. He said, you're not going to ask me a question, and they're not asking me questions.
I'm actually going to put you on the stand and I'm going to ask you the question. So why do you think God here is asking Job the question? Let it. Instead of letting.
Or asking Job the question. Instead of Job asking God questions, why do you think he's going about it that way?
[00:20:20] Speaker H: He can prove to Satan that Job is faithful without, like, feeding him answers or reassurance.
[00:20:30] Speaker B: Okay, I had not thought about that. It's a really good point. Awesome. All right. Anybody else?
[00:20:35] Speaker I: I think sometimes some of the lessons I've learned in the hardest ways have been when someone has questioned me instead of just giving me the feedback I need.
[00:20:47] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:20:47] Speaker I: You know, they pose those, you know, we. This credit the Socratic method, you know, like posing questions to get you to think and to come to, you know, your own conclusion. The right conclusion, you know, whatever that is.
[00:21:01] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:21:01] Speaker B: Well, you know, you're right. It's. If. Especially if somebody is like, in a moment where there's a book called Scream Free Parenting, it's a really good book.
I should apply it more. But anyway, it's a really good book. And in it, one of the things he talks about is when moments are heated. Ask questions to let it cool down. It's kind of the idea, too, but it also gets you thinking. So you're spending time actually thinking about what's going on more than reacting. Okay. Any other thoughts?
[00:21:29] Speaker G: I thought it was just to add insult to injury.
[00:21:31] Speaker B: Okay, okay, I'm kidding. Okay. Well, if you're given the context, it might be easy to think that anything.
[00:21:38] Speaker C: It's a pretty common pattern, I think, that we've seen in almost every encounter. We've studied God a lot of times. Leads with questions.
[00:21:45] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:21:45] Speaker C: What were you doing? Where are you? Those kinds of things. So this fits into the character of God's response to humanity consistently.
[00:21:53] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:21:54] Speaker B: Remember Abram when he was mad that he didn't have a child and he took him outside? Hey, did you do this? Remember, he took him to see the sky? Hold on to that.
Because of what we read next. So this is the first thing he decides to tell him.
[00:22:07] Speaker C: Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me if you have understanding, who determined its measurements? Surely, you know, or who stretched the line upon it.
To what were its foundations fastened? Or who laid its cornerstone when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?
[00:22:25] Speaker B: All right, so he's basically asking him questions that he has no answer to. And that's part of the point.
Does that make sense? He's asking him questions that he does not have the answer to. And that's part of the point.
I'm going to. I was going to get to this later, but does your faith allow.
And allow sounds like a weird word because we can't really allow anything. But for the sake of no other English, I want to choose or can pick to choose. Do you allow space in your faith to not have all the answers, to not understand everything? So here's what he does here. He goes back to creation to say, all right, where were you when all this happened? Well, obviously he wasn't there. And notice this. This is an important detail for what he's going to mention later. He said, who determined its measurements? He was basically saying, I measured all of this. Who laid the cornerstone?
So you read all of this, and he sets up creation as the backdrop to answer his questions. Why do you think? Because Jason mentioned it earlier, this is, I think, our third or fourth time so far, that when someone's gone through something difficult, God goes back to creation.
He says, remember with Abram, look at the stars. You put those up there. Look at this guy. He moves water. Right. There's different things that God does. Using creation to answer their problems. Why there? Why not give philosophy?
[00:24:06] Speaker I: Creation is tactile.
[00:24:08] Speaker H: You can see it.
[00:24:09] Speaker I: You touch it.
[00:24:10] Speaker D: Yeah.
Yeah.
[00:24:13] Speaker I: It's a very good place to start.
[00:24:15] Speaker B: Okay, awesome. All right.
[00:24:17] Speaker G: It's a very visual image of God's power.
[00:24:20] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:24:21] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:24:21] Speaker B: I mean, we've all kind of.
When you see everything very horizontally from all, whether it's job, life, family, whatever, extracurriculars, whatever that is. And then you, like, step out, go to a mountain, go to the beach. You recalibrate, and it gets you in thinking about some stuff. When you see how big that is or how beautiful it is, it puts things in perspective. Seeing that there's more to me. All right, Anything else?
[00:24:48] Speaker G: Paul said, for since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities, eternal power, divine nature having been clearly seen being understood from his workmanship. So that men are without excuse. If you can look there, there's no excuse for any questioning of God because he is the ultimate authority, as evidenced by his Creator.
[00:25:10] Speaker B: Awesome.
[00:25:10] Speaker G: It's also something that man can't do.
[00:25:13] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:25:14] Speaker B: Yes. And that's kind of what I was wanting us to see about that verse. He's like, what I just did, you can't do.
And so knowing Job's situation, all that he's lost, he's basically saying, I've measured everything and I'm. I have done and will do things that you couldn't imagine. Right. I mentioned this in the lesson on angels a while back, but I kind of want us to think about it again.
The very idea that God is eternal, like, we try to wrap our minds around that one. My mind cannot go to that kind of place really as much as I try because everything in our three dimensional time and space has a beginning and an end. Right.
That's what we kind of talked about with angels. Like, hey, there's so much we don't know, but yet that's kind of what excites me is I don't want to serve. And we don't want to serve a God that we can nail down and understand everything about. About. He would cease to be God if he was that.
So anyway. Yeah, I think those are awesome reasons. Yeah.
[00:26:22] Speaker H: It also. Job did not have the advantage that even he, sitting here looking at it had in that God told us through scripture about the conversation.
[00:26:32] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, that's true.
[00:26:34] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:26:34] Speaker H: And he's telling. He's telling us that portion of the story to build our faith that, hey, there are things that go on in realms that you don't know anything about while you're going through it. Even now, he still doesn't know what happened and why he allowed these things to go on. And so we. That is to me, a very faith building thing that, hey, that space to not understand that conversation that he had kind of falls into that. You've got to have room in your faith, have no idea what's going on.
[00:27:11] Speaker B: That's a great point. Because, you know, Job understands this in the context of his situation. We understand this in the context of the whole Bible. Right. And we know what God has done, how scripture is connected, how he's done something here that foreshadows something there. He just knows what he's experiencing and then also makes you wonder, all right, well, would I be no different than some of those friends, you know, if I just saw what I saw? Okay. Any other thoughts before we. Yeah, I think he's showing me that he's in control. He was in control of the earth. He created it, so he's in control of Job's life as well.
[00:27:47] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:27:47] Speaker B: Allow what he wants to go on.
[00:27:50] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:27:51] Speaker B: There's a book that I have that basically made this statement is that when something goes wrong, our first thought is, how can I make this make sense? He said God is at a place that it's a. It's above anything that we would even know to ask a different question. I know that sounds kind of. But it's.
[00:28:09] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:28:10] Speaker G: So, Jason, I've had this conversation on a couple of occasions that what happened to Job was a test for him, as indicated by the verse that we started out.
And I wonder sometimes if we put ourselves in that situation, does God say, consider my servant Craig or consider my servant Jason, whatever. And what would he do to test us? And we consider.
And I mean, it's not to say that the things that didn't have that happen to him are not bad as our definition is, but what if our test is that we. That he allows the devil to give us everything we want and that still results in us recusing our faith? Right. It's not. We might even call them blessings. But if they. If they affect our faith and we effectively curse God and die because of that, there's no difference in that, in what happened to Job, yet he passed the test.
[00:29:08] Speaker B: That's a good point.
[00:29:09] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:29:09] Speaker G: It was a reverse Job syndrome.
[00:29:10] Speaker D: But yeah. Yeah.
[00:29:12] Speaker B: Thinking of it in that way, that's very interesting. And thought about like that, Jason, I.
[00:29:15] Speaker C: Think there's a little bit of a.
Maybe foreshadowing of the gospel is the wrong.
I don't know. Anyway, I see the gospel here in that Paul writes in First Corinthians, chapter 1. He says, for the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. I think this is all about establishing a godly perspective, which is what the gospel does. It changes our perspective. We no longer see as carnal earthly beings, but we strive to see as Christ sees. That's the whole point of the resurrection, of. Of being resurrected with the resurrection like his, and then that appearance afterwards. There's something different about us with God going back to creation.
That's always going to be the trump card. He spoke it into existence. Nothing was there. Now something exists. We can't do that. We can't make dirt without having other things to make dirt. Right. He used words. So I think the crux of all of this, it was the same thing with all those other people we've talked about with the encounters, was remember who I am. And the way they respond to these situations makes total sense to the humanity side of us. But it doesn't, but it's folly to the gospel side of us.
To your point, Job is probably the oldest or definitely one of the oldest books we have. So he didn't have my ways or. Not your ways. My thoughts are not your thoughts to rely on.
[00:30:40] Speaker B: Right.
[00:30:40] Speaker C: He hadn't been to Hobby Lobby to get that crocheted on something yet.
So I think there is all of the things really just kind of summing those together. It's establishing, kind of recalibrating Job's perspective of, hey, remember who you're talking. It's good that you're talking to me, but understand who you're talking to. Remember that as well. On, like, a deeper level.
[00:30:58] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:30:58] Speaker B: That's awesome.
[00:30:59] Speaker F: Sometimes the most valuable lessons we learn are the ones that we're not being told what the answer is.
So Job comes to the point where God never says, you're wrong about this, this, this, and that. He says, hey, here's some of the stuff I did. What can you do? And it reminds me of, you know, some of my robotic friends who have told me that, you know, people were telling them all the time, you need to give it up. You need to give it up. It wasn't until they hit rock bottom, learned that lesson for themselves, that finally they realized, okay, yeah, I've got to change.
[00:31:31] Speaker D: Yeah. Wow.
[00:31:32] Speaker B: Awesome.
Good stuff. All right, Jason.
[00:31:36] Speaker C: Or who shut in the sea? Excuse me? Who shut in the sea with doors when it burst forth and issued from the womb, when I made the clouds its garment and thick darkness its swaddling band, when I fixed my limit for it and set bars and doors, when I said, this far you may come, but no farther, and here your proud waves must stop.
[00:31:54] Speaker B: All right? So we started with a whirlwind as an example, then moved to creation. Now he's moving to the sea. And the reason this matters is in the ancient world, the sea was viewed as untamable. That was the one, like mystery, right? That, you know, big flood comes, you can't do anything to stop it. Right? And so it was the. The sea, again, similar to the whirlwind, was something you can't stop, you can't control. And so he's saying, I put doors on the sea. The very thing that you think I can't control. Here's the reason why he mentions doors around a thing that cannot be controlled is because what he says later is, I put limits. You'll notice, like, three times now. He keeps saying, there's still limits, all right? That there's still some parameters that Are in place. When all is out of control, there's still limits. There's still parameters. All right.
[00:32:41] Speaker C: Have you commanded the morning since your days began and caused the dawn to know its place? That it might take hold of the ends of the earth and the wicked be shaken out of it? It takes on form like clay under a seal and stands out like a garment from the wicked. Their lights withheld and the upraised arm is broken.
[00:32:56] Speaker B: All right, so now he's moving from whirlwind. Untamable, Uncontrollable creation. You didn't do that. C Untamable. Uncontrollable. Now to seasons. You know, I think it's interesting, the whole season thing, because, you know, every time we're like, hey, it's going to. This time it was warm. Next time it was cold, Right? This season is going to come at this day. Well, then it shows up a week later. It's like, even on our best almanacs, we can't nail it down. Okay, so he picks another thing. The seasons.
[00:33:28] Speaker C: Have you entered the springs of the sea? Or have you walked in search of the depths? Have the gates of death been revealed to you? Or have you seen the doors of the shadow of death? Have you comprehended the breadth of the earth? Tell me if you know all this.
[00:33:40] Speaker B: So now that we've gotten through God's response so far, I don't take this like God is an angry man waving his finger. Like, until you make us see Sonny boy, then, you know, we're not going to talk.
I think of this really kind of. Like Heidi mentioned, this is giving him a lot to think about.
And it's giving him a perspective that again, when you have gone through what he's gone through, you just want, like, is there a perspective? Well, there is a perspective. Your only perspective is what you're seeing and experiencing. And it's so hard to get out of that. And so I think he's trying to give him something bigger than that. So here's the three things that he's basically saying. First thing is this. The God who creates is also the God who sets limits.
And the whole idea of limits. I found this somewhere. I thought this was good in one of the commentary. I think it was Enduring Word put it like this, that basically what it was saying is this. The sea is limited, Job, and so are you. Earth's dimensions are marked, Job, and so are you. And it was I, the Creator, who fixed these limits. I love that. Because if you think about what that is basically saying is, you know, I've limited the creation and you the earth. I've marked and I've marked you. And I was the one who fixed those limits. So kind of some interesting stuff there.
[00:35:10] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:35:11] Speaker H: Limited Satan.
[00:35:12] Speaker B: Yes, yes. And we're gonna mention that in a second. Let's go ahead and mention it now. Yes.
[00:35:17] Speaker E: I was just gonna say, as we're.
[00:35:18] Speaker C: Going through that whole long list, it just kind of reminds me of, like, one of my kids tries to parent one of my other children, and I'm pulling them aside and I'm like, are you a parent? Have you done this? Have you done that? Have you been up at night, you know, taking care of a baby? Have you paid the mortgage?
[00:35:36] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:35:39] Speaker C: What God is telling here is like, you shouldn't be acting like, you know.
[00:35:46] Speaker G: Because you took it.
[00:35:47] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:35:48] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:35:48] Speaker B: There still are limits. All right. And that is part of his point.
And I asked you this question earlier. I told you I would mention again later.
And again, I don't like the phrase allow because whatever is allowed is what God does. But I do think we have to make a choice to make space in our faith for the mysteries of God. The things that we don't fully understand, the things we don't fully comprehend. If we don't do that, it's really not faith.
That's the beauty of. We go back to that Red Sea moment. They were trapped between two canals that the Red Sea had no way out. They were in a place. We talked about that. All they had was, what faith. God puts people in those spots time and time again. Thoughts? Okay, so for the sake of time, we don't have time to answer this question. I thought it was going to be kind of a deeper fun question to ask, but we won't do it tonight. But give you something to think about in your dreams. What are some of God's limits for you that are sometimes frustrating? Why is it good for creation to have limits? We won't go there. So here's the second one. Those limits can give you hope. So where is the hope in limits? The fact that God has set limits? Where's. Why is there hope in that safety? Okay.
[00:37:08] Speaker F: He tells us there's no power on this earth that can take us away from him.
[00:37:13] Speaker B: That is. Yes. Amen to that.
Anybody else? All right, here's some examples to the Israelites in Egypt. God says, their cry has reached me. And I've seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. Bring my people out of Egypt. All right? They were in a very difficult situation. God had limits to his people. In exile, God Sundays, when Babylon 70 years are completed, will I visit you and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place, to the hungry in the morning. God says that the hunger is not perpetual and that the morning will be turning into laughing. And here's the third one is out of love. God corrects believers in order to restore.
That was his whole goal with Job, was to correct how he was even going to approach the question and then to correct him himself. Right? And God's correction is there to restore. But here's. I wanted to put these things here because the only way restoration can happen, if we need to be corrected in a viewpoint, is a little bit off. You have to have humility.
And what you're going to see in just a second as you read the very ending of the narrative of Job is so much humility. When God was like, well, let me ask you a question and think about this for a second. When you've been in a situation where you're upset about something, you got questions and they're like, well, let me ask you a question. Y'all like that, right?
Okay. Yeah. No one really enjoys that. Yet Job is, you know, for a guy that has gone through a lot to still have the kind of humility in just a second like he does. Also remember God corrects people who he loves. In the New Testament, the Greek word paideia, anytime that that's used for discipline. If you didn't paideia a child, it's. You were saying that child is not a legitimate child, that you didn't love them. If you did not padilla them, then the next one is God's rebuke of Job was mild and filled with mercy and grace. I say that mild being that it sounds harsh, but I think it was framed with mercy and grace. So let's go to job 42, 1 6. So we got to fast forward through all of this.
Someone read real quick. And Jason, you can if you want to. Whoever would like to. Job 42:1 through 6. All the words, Jason, of 1 through 6. And then I want you all to share with me what you notice about Job's response to this encounter he has with God.
[00:39:37] Speaker C: Then Job answered the Lord, I know that you can do all things. No purpose of yours can be thwarted. You asked, who is this who darkens counsel without knowledge? But I have declared without understanding things too wonderful for me to know. You said, pay attention. I will speak, I will question you, and you will answer me. I heard of you by the hearing of the ear. But now my eye has seen you. Therefore I despise myself and I repent. Dust and ashes.
[00:39:59] Speaker B: What do you notice about his humble response that we can learn from? What's some things we can learn from in this?
All right, let's start in verse two. I know that you can do what.
I know that you can do all things.
And notice the sub part of that is his purpose. No matter it's going to be difficult, it can be painful, but his purpose is still going to happen. Like, say, I think about things like this, all right, what if Moses would have said no ultimately to the burning bush?
You think God will be like, oh man, what are we going to do? Like, he's going to bring up somebody else, right? His purpose is not going to be changed. All right, the next one, who is this that hides counsel without knowledge? Remember the thing God asked him from the very beginning? He said, hey, that counsel that was darkened, that was without knowledge. Now he's kind of coming back to that saying, hey, I need to let my knowledge be framed in wise counsel, right? There's things I understand, things that I don't. And I love that he said, I uttered things that I did not understand.
All right? And then he said this things that were too wonderful for me. And then he says, hear and I will speak, I will question you and you will make it known to me. So he still says, here, I'm going to have some questions, but here's what I know about you, God. You're going to make it known.
And then of course, a very well known verse I heard about you, but now I see you and know you with my eyes. So it's the idea of there's a difference in knowing about God and knowing God and kind of what was mentioned earlier, I think Vic mentioned that that's kind of when you go through things like that sometimes on the other side is what you know. You know him at the end of it when maybe before it you just knew about him.
[00:41:47] Speaker C: I think that's part of the, part of the lesson here is loving God for who God is, not loving God for the gifts we get, so to speak.
When we have salvation in Christ, we have that hope of heaven. So it's no longer just to get to heaven that we follow God. It's because of who he is. And I think that's a question we've asked a few times of what does this tell us about God? That's ultimately the question for each of us is who is God to us, right? And if he is the God that the Bible says he is, if he is the God that we believe deeply, then regardless of circumstance our devotion to him is because of his nature. And I think to me glorifying God, that phrase has taken on a deeper meaning through this study and particularly Job, God has been glorified through Job for centuries now. So I think kind of going back to what you touched on, this was also written for us in some sense. Right? So I think there's a lot that you could unpack on that.
[00:42:41] Speaker B: Absolutely. Y'all great comments tonight. Appreciate it everybody. And again, I'm not saying that if you're going through difficult time, just read this and it'll fix everything. But I do know this that maybe if you are going through a challenging time or know someone is, there are some good humble attitudes I think that can be learned of how to navigate those challenges in 421 through 6. All right. Thank you all.
