Job 14

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Back to Chapter 13, we looked at part of the chapter last week, and I want to finish the chapter this week as we continue to work through the book just by way of a quick review for you remember last week, which for some might be an issue.
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But if you remember what we talked about last week, we talked about the fact that Job's friends have kind of gone through their first round of rebuke, if you will, and their speeches that they've given to Job.
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And then I said to you in Chapter 12, 13, and 14, Job responds because he's basically frustrated and put aside by the fact that the three friends who supposedly would be comforters have turned out to be hindrances, and we've talked about that as we've been continuing through it, how that's really the way, how life should be more of being a comforter than a hinderer.
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And that Job basically in these three chapters gives a defense for what he has been saying to them all along, and that is that he doesn't say he's sinless, but he says he keeps his integrity, that he's still trusting God and that the integrity of his heart is still intact.
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And so we began to look at the chapter last week and kind of got through it.
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Today I want to look at Verse 20 through Verse 27.
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And the reason why I want to look at Verse 20 through 27 is number one, we didn't finish that part last week.
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And number two, Verse 28, and we'll read it, but to me Verse 28 belongs to the next chapter.
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Remember, the chapter divisions are not really inspired.
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So I'm going to pick it up in Job Chapter 13 and Verse 13, and again our focus will be on Verses 20 through 27.
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So as Job continues his defense, if you will, and his speech back to them, he says, hold your peace with me and let me speak.
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And then let come on me what may.
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Why do I take my flesh and my teeth and put my life in my hands? Though he slay me, yet will I trust him.
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And just stop there for a second.
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If you remember what I tried to present last week, that when he makes this statement, though he slay me, yet will I trust him, it's the thought is not eternally being cut off.
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But that word slay, if you look at the use of it in the scriptures, almost always it deals with physical death.
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And so what Job is really saying is, even though God has brought me to this point, and even though God is in that sense, and even in Job's mind, God is tearing me apart, he realizes that it's not his eternal state, but rather the state he's in now because of the situation of his life.
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And that's why he says, though he slay me, yet will I trust him, even so I will defend my ways before him, and he also shall be my salvation.
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There again, supporting the fact that Job doesn't see himself as separated from God eternally, but rather in this life.
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And to that end, he's now going to pray to God, and you'll see as we go through.
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So he says, he also shall be my salvation, for a hypocrite could not come before him.
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And remember, that's the accusation that his friends have made, right? He's a hypocrite.
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There's secret sin.
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Nobody's seen it, but God's seen it.
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Now God's judging him.
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And Job, you need to repent and then to get on with your life.
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And then he says in verse 17, listen diligently to my speech, and to declare my declaration with your ears.
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See now I prepared my case.
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I know that I shall be vindicated.
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Who is he that will contend with me? If now I hold my tongue, I perish.
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Now, for this morning, at this point, I believe he turns away from speaking directly to his friends, and he speaking now to God.
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And in that sense, it's prayer.
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And so he says this, only two things do not do to me.
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And again, the me is God, not his friends.
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Then I will not hide myself from you.
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Withdraw your hand far from me.
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That's one.
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And then, and let not the dread of you make me afraid.
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But I want you to focus in on what he next says.
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Then call, and I will answer, or let me speak and you respond to me.
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Wow.
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This is what he's saying to God.
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How many are my iniquities and sins? Make me to know my transgression and my sin.
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Why do you hide your face and regard me as your enemy? Will you frighten a leaf driven to and fro? Will you pursue dry stubble? For you write bitter things against me and make me inherit the iniquities of my youth.
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You put my feet in the stocks, and you watch closely all my paths.
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And you set a limit for the soles of my feet.
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And as I said, I'll leave off verse 28, because I really think it belongs to the next chapter as he speaks.
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So with that as a review of what we looked at last week, here's what I want to do.
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Just for a few minutes before we look directly at the verses, a little bit of a sidetrack, but I think it fits, and I hope you would agree too.
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So I want to ask you a question.
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What is prayer? What is prayer? How would you define it? How would you, if someone asked you that question, are you just walking and someone comes up to you, you're having a conversation, and someone says to you, what is prayer? And the reason why I'm bringing that up is because I do believe this is Job's prayer before God, although it takes a rather different turn.
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But let's just think about this for a minute.
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How would you define prayer? Could you define prayer? Conversation? Somebody else? Anything else? Petitioning God? Let me help.
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Let me throw some wood in the fire.
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So many of us are familiar with the Westminster Confession, which is the Presbyterian Confession of 1646.
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Along with the confession, the Westminster Confession, there's catechisms, which are like, in a sense, school books that go along with the confession in order to expand on what the confession states on different subjects.
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And if you look at the Westminster Confession, they have a longer catechism, what they call catechism, and a shorter catechism, which is a series of questions and then answers attached to it.
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And so when it came to this question about what's prayer, let me read to you what they say if you look at their catechism.
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It says this, that prayer is the offering up of our desires before God for things agreeable to his will in the name of Christ by the help of the Spirit with confession of our sins and thankful acknowledgement of his mercies.
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Now, that's a rather lengthy statement, if you will, and it's got many parts to it.
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But again, let me just read it again.
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Offering up of our desires before God for things agreeable to his will in the name of Christ by the help of the Spirit with confession for our sins and thankful acknowledgement of his mercies.
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So with that in mind, can we expand on this at all? So when you pray, what are you doing? Communication? Conversation? Giving thanks.
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Ma'am? I always give thanks.
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Ah, OK.
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So here's what's interesting about this.
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Not interesting, but there are specific parts of prayer, are there not? I want to do something, just for a minute.
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We'll get to Job here shortly.
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Can you, can we identify? See, it's hard sometimes to conceptualize what prayer is.
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It sometimes breaks down to specific areas, like you just said, Thanksgiving, conversation.
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So what would be those areas that we can say that is our ingredients in prayer or components of prayer? Just think about it.
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When you pray, when we pray, what are the various things that we do? And I've listed a number of them, and I'm not saying that they're all, but I'll start it this way.
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Whatever.
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A-A-T-I-O.
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What? Adoration? T-I-O.
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I went blank, but that's nothing normal for me.
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Adoration, isn't it? In other words, a great component in prayer is worship, isn't it? Again, that's adoration, and I guess we could, if we wanted to, do it this way.
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Adoration and what? Praise.
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Our Father who art in heaven, what? Hallowed be thy name.
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That's certainly a great component.
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It's actually one of the primary components in prayer.
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So when we say that prayer is conversation with God, in many ways it's our lifting up of ourselves to him and praising him for who he is, right? Not always only for what he does, but for who he is.
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Because he's the worthy one, and he's worthy of our adoration.
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He's worthy of our praise.
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And then someone, we mentioned this, but let me put this down.
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Petition.
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What's petition? How would you, what is that? Would we be right to say this? Yeah, and certainly that is, in prayer, that whole thing has to be coupled in what? Anything in prayer.
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Submission, right? It's always our Father who art in heaven.
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Hallowed be thy will be done on earth, where? As it is in heaven.
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So petition, brother.
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This may fall under the adoration and praise.
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I'm not sure.
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Correct me if I'm wrong.
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But you know, when we start to pray, we acknowledge who he is.
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Yeah, and I do think that.
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Yes.
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Yeah, it is.
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It's an acknowledgement of who he is, and it's an acknowledgement of his rule over us.
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And really, again, if we come to God with an attitude in prayer as if we are equals, and the reason why I mention that is, I think as we look at these verses, I think Job's kind of saying to God, hey, let's go mano a mano here.
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I think that's what he's saying, and I'll try to show it to you.
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So anyway, what else? And would I, would you, what if I said this? That there is a distinction to be made between adoration, praise, and thanksgiving.
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And if I said to you that Thanksgiving really has to do with specifics, would that be, would that be valid to say that? That we not only thank God for who he is, we thank God for what he does in the affairs of life, and particularly we're thankful for what? Our lives, right? And again, so you think about that.
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Is there anything else that we could put on that, on this list? I think a lot of times we ask for forgiveness during the prayer.
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Ah, okay.
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So what if we would put this? Yeah.
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Right.
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This is an acknowledgement of our what? Our frailty, of our stiff neck, stiff heart, coldness, all these different things.
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So certainly confession, right, enters into it.
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Think of anything else? How about this one? Okay, hang on one second.
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Would you not say that this is part of prayer, a component of prayer? It has to be.
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Right, that we intercede, and that the intercession is not always what? It's not always for self, is it? When we intercede in prayer, what are we asking God to do? We're asking God to work in lives, even in that sense, outside of ourselves.
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Our petitions certainly deal with many of the things that we have, right? And each one of us have our own prayer life in one manner, way, or the other.
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But this whole idea of intercession has to enter into it, doesn't it? That we are willing to, if you will, come to the throne of grace, not only for ourselves, but as the Westminster Confession says, in grateful acknowledgement of his Godhead, Godhood, of his being the first and the last and the only one.
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And I'm going to write one more.
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I had six.
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One, two, three, four, five, six, yeah.
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And I'm not so sure if some of these don't bleed over.
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As a matter of fact, I know they do.
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But how about this? And I think you could, and I don't want to spend a whole class on this whole thing, but nevertheless, the supplication that we come to God, I always think of what it says about Elijah, right? You remember the story of Elijah when he went and the rain had, God told him to go to Ahab and told him, you're not going to get any rain for three and a half years.
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And then the time came and God says, now go tell Ahab it's going to rain.
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And it hadn't rained yet.
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And you remember, he sends his servant to do what? To go out and look out into the atmosphere.
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And he comes back and he says, nothing.
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And he goes back and forth, what, seven times? And then the servant comes back and he says, I see a cloud like a man's fist.
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And that's when Elijah says, go tell Ahab he better get in the house before the rain comes.
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But remember what it says in James.
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It says the effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man does what? Availeth much.
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And I think when we think about this, supplication to me is the, if you will, it's like the oil, it just fires it up.
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It's the earnestness.
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It's the fervency.
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It's the, if you will, the pouring out of what's in us before God.
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So I agree that we could say that this is conversation or perhaps maybe use this word.
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I mean, the Lord Jesus Christ spent nights in prayer.
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Now you and I would, to me, it boggles my mind.
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What is a sinless man doing? Praying all night.
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I think you start to look at some of this and you begin to understand, right? Not only that, but he was asking for, if you will.
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He was asking God to lead him.
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You know, one night he goes up, he spends the whole night in prayer.
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Next day he comes down and he picks 12 apostles.
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There's this whole idea.
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And again, the reason why I brought this into focus is I wanted us to think about what Job is really doing here in his prayer.
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And before we just deal with the text specifically, how often should we pray without ceasing? What in the world does that mean in our daily life? How many of us want to say we pray without ceasing? Come on.
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Go, we'll pray for you once you tell us that you pray without ceasing.
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But in essence, there is a reality if we are in relationship with God.
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And if we're in communion with God through Christ by the spirit, then there is, in a sense, a never-ending relationship that's continuing on.
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Right, sister? It's, I think it's being always in an attitude of prayer.
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Like if you're going down the street and you're just, you know, minding your own business and there's obviously an accident, they're ready to cease and now they're ceasing, you know, to pray.
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Yeah, and I know I said something two weeks ago and some looked at me like I'm a little cuckoo, and I am a little cuckoo, but so are you.
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So keep your cuckoo-ness to yourself.
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But I said two weeks ago on Sunday morning before I came to church, and I was thanking God that I had the arms to brush my teeth.
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And some of you thought I kind of went over the ditch, but I didn't.
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But I think about that, and some of you thought I kind of went over the ditch, but I didn't.
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But I think about that.
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And so, yeah, we don't always pray without ceasing, but yet if you think about it, and here's a question that you could deal with on your own.
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If you had to gauge, if we did a pie chart on prayer, with all the various parts, you know what a pie chart is, right? It divides on prayer.
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With all the various parts, you know what a pie chart is, right? It divides, and it shows the percentages of each that they're doing.
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If your pie chart was to be visualized, how much of a piece would each of these ingredients get? In other words, what I'm saying is, would Thanksgiving be the largest portion, or would intercession be the largest portion? Or, sir? I mean, we were talking about prayer, and I just think, sadly, and part of this complaint is the structure that Islam has, and it's sad that, you know, like I said, we have to pray.
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We have to pray.
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Yeah.
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Three times a day.
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Yeah.
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And it's easy for us to just look down on that.
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But the sad part is, as Christians, there are people who profess Christ and pray when they go to bed, if that, and sometimes forget, over their meals.
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And oftentimes, if it's in public, it's a quickie.
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Yep.
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And, you know what I'm saying? No, no, I agree.
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And that pie chart would be filled with petitions.
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Yep, and you think about it.
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And no honor or respect.
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Daniel what? Daniel opened his window three times a day, right? And that's how he got jammed up, because he was told not to do that, and he did it anyway.
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And it says men ought always to pray and what? Not faint.
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But just think about that.
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Where would you chart come? How would it break out? And here's one other thing I wanted to ask.
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Because I think this troubles people sometimes, and I've termed it this way.
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That we don't always need to pray the alphabet.
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What I mean by that is we do not always, because some people feel if they don't pray for everybody and everything, then they're not right.
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And I've had that in my own heart at times.
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So that's why I said we don't have to pray the alphabet.
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In other words, we ought to pray for one another.
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And we ought to seek to, in truth, think about each other.
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But there are times when we perhaps will pray generally that God will bless Sovereign Grace Family Church.
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And then there are other times, specifically when we bring up specific petitions and we add people to the prayer list.
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I guess it's on my mind this morning.
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I'm going to say it in the worship service.
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We put, putting people on the prayer list is good.
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Praying for people on the prayer list is far better.
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Just think about that.
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And so we don't always have to pray the alphabet, but we ought to be, prayer ought to be at times, to your point, both structured and specific, right? And not always just general.
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And then at other times, it could be more of a general nature, like you get up on a Sunday morning, you ask God to fill the pulpits with power.
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And you don't just mean here, you mean where? Across the face of the earth.
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So again, when you think about this and you think about the different parts of prayer, and now we've come to look at what Job does in these seven verses.
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He's very specific at the beginning, isn't he? And so I think what Job wants to do is he wants to, in a sense, have this conversation with God, and almost in the sense of a setup like a court, like a situation where there's two people in the courtroom, and one's the plaintiff and one's the defendant, and they're going to face off with each other, and they're going to deal with the issue, and then they're going to resolve it.
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But before that, Job asked God to do two things.
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First, he asked him, withdraw your hand far from me.
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And what I think he's asking God to do is to give him strength and take some of the pain and the suffering and the issues away from him, because it's complicated his life, and it's going to complicate his, if you will, his dealing with God.
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And it's interesting how he says this, because he says, withdraw your hand far from me.
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Let not the dread of you make me afraid.
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Then call, and I will answer.
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Then he gives God a choice.
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Or let me speak, and you respond to me.
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Now, just if you've read through the book, just let your mind go forward to the end of the book.
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What does God do starting in chapter 38? He says to Job, stand up.
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I'm going to question you, and you're going to answer me.
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But here, I believe Job is so frustrated with his friends, and he's frustrated with his situation, and he can't find an outlet.
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And so at this point, I would not say this is the most positive of prayers and requests before God.
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But one thing he's asking God to do is to take some of the sting out of his life so he can be good at what he wants to do in his conversation with God.
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Just think about it.
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How many of us would not say, when we're physically not doing too well, there's a spiritual relationship that comes into it? Yes, no, maybe so.
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Way off base, somewhere in the right area.
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Because we have been created as, if you will, both the tangible and the intangible and the visible and the invisible, that they are so connected by God in creating us that many times we find ourselves being either spiritually hindered by physical issues, and I think I remember reading that proverb to you where it says, a man's spirit will maintain himself in his sickness, but a wounded spirit is destructive to the whole thing.
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So you think about this.
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What Job's asking God to do, he's saying, okay, God, you remove some of the tension in my life, physical tension, to the whole thing.
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So you think about this.
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What Job's asking God to do, he's saying, okay, God, you remove some of the tension in my life, physical tension, and then he says, and don't make me afraid, and I think what he's saying, in part, is God, don't overpower me.
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Basically, don't overwhelm me with your majesty.
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Let's kind of, and then he says, and don't make me afraid, and I think what he's saying, in part, is God, don't overpower me.
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Basically, don't overwhelm me with your majesty.
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Let's kind of get down, and you look me in the eyes, I'm gonna look you in the eyes, and then I'm gonna call, and you will answer, or let me speak, and you respond to me, and it's interesting that Job never waits for God to respond to verse 23, to me.
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He begins to go.
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How many of my iniquities are my sins? He is beginning to now question God, and I think we talked about this at one point.
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Is it good to question God? Yep.
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Do we have to be careful about how we question God? Yep.
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Do we not need to have the right attitude? Right? Same thing in prayer, because that's really what's going on, right? I mean, I don't think Job is in a good state of spiritual mind right here.
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Basically, he's kind of challenging God, saying, I'm gonna, we're gonna figure this thing out, because my friends have really got this all messed up, and I know that I'm yours, but this situation is so overwhelming, God, let's hash it out, and again, I do think we should question God, but I do think we better be very careful, and at this point, I would like to say Job is doing really good, but I don't think he is.
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Now, if you don't agree with that, that's fine, but I'll pray for you.
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Yeah, and is that not one of the, is it not one of the themes of the book? That we've been talking about? Is that not one of the overall themes in the book of Job? That both his friends and Job misunderstand and misappropriate the actions of God in life? And does that not also happen to us? We misunderstand the situations of life, and then we almost want to turn around and say, God, why did you do this? God, why did you not do that? Brother? You know, it's oftentimes, we, when I was reading this, I was thinking, and how blessed we are that God has spoken to us and made himself known.
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Here, all of these people know about God, at this point in history, is from nature, as it were, and so now here you have Job really desiring to know another side of this God, whom he loves, and whom he serves.
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Now just think about how blessed we are to have that life, that revelation, and yet so often, To have that communion, right? Yet so often, we can act like Job, when really Job, in a sense, is validated in his actions, based on the robe, in a sense, is validated in his actions, based on the light of revelation that he has.
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So I was just, actually this morning, just asking God to forgive me when I have acted as if.
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Actually, this morning, just asking God to forgive me when I have acted as if.
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I don't have this beautiful relationship, have the Holy Spirit, and have, I can see God's grace, what he says here is, withdraw your hand from me.
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We would never ask that, or I'm going to hide my faith.
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We know, based on revelation, that we can't hide our faith.
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But yet, the danger in us, with all of this revelation, still acting like Job, and I mean, again, I believe Job is a little validated in our faith.
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But yet, the danger in us, with all of this revelation, still acting like Job, and I mean, again, I believe Job is a little validated, based on the revelation that he has, because, like you said, still acting like Job, and I mean, again, I believe Job is a little validated, based on the revelation that he has, because, like you said, the basis of this is God revelation to us, showing God revelation to us, showing his sovereignty.
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So that's just what struck me, is how we can act that way.
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And I think I mentioned this two weeks ago, I said that if you read through the book of Job, you're going to find that the word El Shaddai, which means all-powerful, God all-powerful, that El Shaddai is spoken 57 times in the Bible.
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Of those 57 times, they're mentioned 31 times in the book of Job.
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And they're not only mentioned by Job, but they're mentioned by Job's friends.
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And so, to what you had just said, brother, there is, in many ways, a lack of understanding, but I think we've got to be careful to say, I think we've got to be careful to say, that El Shaddai is not the only God revelation in the Bible.
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Of those 57 times, they're mentioned 31 times in the book of Job.
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And they're not only mentioned by Job, but they're mentioned by Job's friends.
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And so, to what you had just said, brother, there is, in many ways, a lack of understanding, but I think we've got to be careful to say that a lack of understanding would minimize faith, because I don't think it does, because Abraham believed God, right? And he's the example set up as the father of faith.
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But I do understand what you're saying.
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And they do have issues here.
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It's not, listen, we are like fatted calves when it comes to scriptures.
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I mean, not only can we read 27 different translations, and not only do we have a complete canon, but we can get the scriptures where? Anywhere.
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Phones, computers, iPads, billboards, this thing, that way.
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And for all of that, friends, I wonder how much we really take advantage of what God has given us.
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So it's something to think about.
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And don't forget what Job does later on.
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Job says, if I only had a mediator.
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So he does have this, if you will, he's not in the same situation we're in.
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But I do think when he says, withdraw your hand far from me, that he is really asking God to remove some of the thorns.
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Because he wants to have this conversation with God, and he wants to be vindicated.
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And he wants God to explain to him what's really happening in his life.
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Brother Lee, were you going to say something? I was going to bring that up.
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And I'm glad you did.
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Because here's the thing.
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I thought about the parable of the adulterous woman.
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And you remember the parable of the story of the adulterous woman, and the Pharisees come rushing in, and they got this woman by the back of her head, and they drag her in front of Jesus and said, we caught her in adultery in the very act.
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Remember Jesus? Let him without sin cast the first stone.
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So I do think we've got to be careful with this.
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Yet, we don't want to gloss over it.
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Because here's the reality.
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We ought to, the things that were written before time were what? They were written for our instruction upon whom the ends of the world have come.
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So can we make everything fit perfectly? No.
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There's a historical component to the Old Testament that in many ways has to remain in a historical setting.
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But there is also an ability, and I would say because of the analogy of faith, which simply means the scriptures never contradict themselves, and what is said in one place ultimately is said in another place, because truth is always what? True.
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But I do think we have to be careful.
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And I think at this point what Job's doing is he's kind of bringing this up before God, and that's why he says in verse 23, how many of my iniquities are my sins? And that's the way I read it.
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How many of my iniquities make me to know my transgression and my sin? Why do you hide your face from me and regard me as your enemy? And again, calling God into question, and in that sense asking God for reasons for the situation that he's in.
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And I wonder if that's not true of us at times.
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God, why did you put me in this situation? And again, is it really us rather asking God to do what we want than what pleases God, praises God, exalts God? Something to think about.
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He says in verse 25, will you frighten me like a leaf driven to and fro? And again, all these things that he talks about, he really, he has a realization of the majesty of God.
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Would you not agree? Because he says, don't let the dread of you make me afraid.
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This is not, he's not just some arrogant ruler who comes before God.
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And that's not the point, I think.
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What he's saying is, in realization of who God is, that God basically can do exactly what he just said, frighten him like a leaf and drive him to and fro.
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Yet he's asking God for basically an explanation.
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And he hasn't gotten any help from his friends, has he? His friends have been more of a, they've been like salt in an open wound.
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And so now Job takes it upon himself because man, that's the whole point of it, of Job defense with his friends, right? Is I know, I know what I, in my heart, believe.
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And that's his frustration because his friends don't believe what he says.
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And again, we talked about that.
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Isn't it frustrating when you spill your beans, when you spill your heart to someone and they kind of don't believe you? Now, I mean, if you're a hypocrite, then there's good reason not to.
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But that's the accusation.
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So he says that and he says, will you pursue me like dry stubble? In verse 26, you write bitter things against me.
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You make me inherit the iniquities of my youth.
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And I thought about that a little bit.
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And, you know, I do, I do try.
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Here's how I try to look at the scriptures.
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I try to look at the scriptures for myself.
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I don't go to commentaries for answers.
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I go to commentaries to help me understand if I'm like, at least in the same stadium.
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Because it's easy to run hog wild, right? So I look at commentators to help me.
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But I never go to them first, because if I got to go to them first, then I might as well just shut up, right? I got to be able to let every man be fully convinced in his own mind.
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But I did look at how many of the commentators felt about this prayer, Job, and they kind of, I was glad that they agreed with me.
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Let's put it that way.
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That they felt as if Job was basically, and to give an answer, give account to Job of why he's torn him to pieces.
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And again, I do think it fits if you think about our lives.
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But he has this realization.
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And what I said was in verse 26, when he says, make me inherit the iniquities of my youth.
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And I'm not saying this is right in the context, but here's what I thought about.
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Is God obligated to discipline us for sins immediately when we commit those sins? Is God obligated to correct our sins immediately when they are committed? Is God obligated to correct sin? That's two different things now.
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I said, is God obligated to correct our sins immediately when they're committed? And then I asked, is God obligated? And I mean, by his own being, is God obligated to correct sin? And I think we could find good ground to say that God, because of his character, will always correct sin, whether here or there, whatever way.
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But have you ever not just had something that you did earlier in your life? Maybe it was outwardly manifested.
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Maybe it was just an inward attitude.
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Maybe it was an inward thought.
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And then you find yourself way down further down the line that a sense of that reality is coming back at you.
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That your sins of your youth are, at times, corrected by God when you're not a youth.
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And I always thought about this.
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I'd say this to the guys that set free when I go.
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If you drank for the first 30 years of your life and messed up your liver, and now you're 50 and you've come to Christ, does that mean that God's going to heal your liver? No.
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And so sometimes the sins of our youth, what? They're dealt with by God later on.
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In God's manner, for God's purpose, and for our eternal good.
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We'll be not agreed that if we are his, everything is for our eternal good.
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Everything is not for our temporal good.
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So when Job says this in verse 26, I wonder if that's the thought.
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In other words, you write bitter things against me, God.
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Are you trying to get back at me for something that happened way back? And then he says, you put my feet in the stocks.
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You watch closely all my paths and you set a limit for the soles of my feet.
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Again, I think what Job wants is he wants an explanation.
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And I think what Job wants is he wants an explanation.
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And I do believe we ought to ask God for understanding, but in a very qualified way.
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And for understanding, but in a very qualified way.
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And again, all these different things that enter into it, the parts of prayer and conversation and communion with God and certainly.
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So I want to pick up next week because and the reason why I chose to not go through verse 28 is I really think it belongs to the next chapter, because in the next chapter, Job's going to spill his heart on what he really thinks about men.
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And certainly that's what he says.
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Even he begins in verse 28, man decays like a rotten thing, like a garment that is more to eat.
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And then he said, man is born for trouble and he's got a few days and it's full of trouble anyway.
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So I hope that helps.
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I hope that helps us in it as we think through it.
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And as we think through the situation of Job, because after he's done with this, guess what? His three friends are coming back for a second round, right? Because they're not done because they're not content.
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They're going to drive Job as far as they can.
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And by doing that, I think they're going to try to justify themselves until we get further on in the book, until we get further on in the book.
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And then ultimately, what happens? They have to come to Job.
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And it's interesting how God does what flips the table.
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And remember, Job asked at the end of the book, Job has to pray for them to appease God's anger against the friends.
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So, all righty, let's pray and we'll head out.
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Our Father in God, again, thank you for your word, Lord.
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Thank you.
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Your word doesn't change.
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Thank you for the fact that you don't change.
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And that you're the same one yesterday, today, and forever.
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Lord, help us as we study through Job.
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Lord, help us as we study through Job and help us as we study through our own lives realize that you are not hindered in anything, Lord, and that we can always trust you to do what's right.
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Shall not the judge of all the earth do right? Bless us this morning, Lord.
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May we enjoy our fellowship, may we sing in anything, Lord, and that we can always trust you to do what's right.
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Shall not the judge of all the earth do right? Bless us this morning, Lord.
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But may we enjoy our fellowship, may we sing with joy in our heart, may we pray with sincerity, may we fellowship with each other and enjoy this day that you have set aside for us in Christ's name, amen.