When Your World Falls Apart — E.A. Johnston

I vividly remember the time I was sitting in the congregation of Bellevue Baptist Church in Memphis, Tennessee, and Dr. Adrian Rogers was preaching, and he made a comment that I'll never forget. He said, if you're presently living your life, enjoying all sunshine beneath bright blue skies, just wait for, if you live long enough, a storm is coming.

And at the time, I was a young and wealthy businessman with a fine home and a beautiful wife, and everything was sunshine and honey blossoms in my life. Then time passed, and the skies in my life became dark, and the wind blew with fierce adversity, and everything I had back then I lost.

Job 1 and the Sudden Collapse of Job’s World

The title of my message today, friends, is When Your World Falls Apart, and my text can be found in the book of Job. You can turn in your Bibles there now, friends. We will be in chapter 1 and in verses 13 through 22.

Let me read us a striking passage of scripture at this time. Here now is the word of God, and may the Spirit of the Lord attend the reading of His holy word. And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house.

Let me pause here, friends. Notice two things about this opening paragraph. And there was a day. A day came suddenly and unexpectedly into the life of Job and his family, and after that, after that day, things were never the same again.

Secondly, it was a normal day and a happy occasion for the family of Job at the home of a loved one, but everything is altered in verse 14. And there came a messenger unto Job, and said, The oxen were plowing, and the asses feeding beside them, and the Sabians fell upon them, and took them away, yea, they have slain the servants with the edge of the sword, and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The fire of God is fallen from heaven, and hath burned up the sheep and the servants, and consumed them, and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, The Chaldeans made out three bands, and fell upon the camels, and hath carried them away, yea, and slain the servants with the edge of the sword, and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, Thy sons and thy daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house, and behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and smote the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young men, and they are dead, and I only am escaped alone to tell thee.

Standing on God’s Word When Tragedy Strikes

I will pause here. Notice, friends, the rapidity of the chain of events that transpire in the life of Job. Bad news comes on the heels of another, until all was lost, and Job's world came suddenly crashing down.

Tragically, life can be that way. We get some bad news, and then more bad news, and our world seems to fall apart all around us. It may be a bad doctor report, or a financial loss, or a loved one snatched away in sudden death, a storm of circumstances so overwhelming and heavy that all you can do is bend beneath the avalanche of tragedy.

That's what happened to this man, Job. As a believer, we have more to stand on than an unbeliever. I really don't know, friends, how an unbeliever makes it through the storms of life, but when the world comes crashing down around you, and your life falls apart, you can still stand on God's word and lean on Him.

Jesus Christ will never let you down, and He'll never let you go. No matter how hard things get, friend, you can still go to your God, and that's what Job does, for we read,. Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped, and said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither.

The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. In all of this, Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly. I will stop there. This passage of scripture that I have just read to you began in verse 13.

God’s Purpose in Job’s Testing

All Job knew was what had happened to him in a sudden storm of change, and he had to deal with it. He had to learn to live with it amidst his grief and loss. But if Job had been able to read the preceding twelve verses of his remarkable story, he would have seen the reasons behind his tragedy.

God was placing Job in a furnace of testing. For what purpose? To prove to Satan what a godly man Job was under trials? No, I don't believe that that was the primary purpose. I believe the primary purpose of God in allowing all the losses to befall his servant Job were to deepen the love relationship between Job and his God.

If we go over to Job chapter 42 and verse 5, we see Job's great discovery. I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee, meaning that through his trials Job learned more about himself, and he discovered a deeper knowledge of his God.

The Cross, Saving Knowledge, and Love for God

When a sinner sees what God has really done for him at the cross, through the death of his son, and he enters into a saving knowledge of Christ, his life is never the same, for he loves God with a burning love because he is an object of God's love.

We love him because he first loved us. The story of Job is a love story between God and Job. I believe that, friends, because when God allows a tragedy to pass into our lives, it is an opportunity to love God more.

The Disciples’ Grief and the Hope of Resurrection

Oh, friends, I hope you don't miss that. When Christ was taken from the disciples and crucified, don't you think that their world came crashing down? All their hopes, their deep love and affection was nailed up on that ignoble cross.

Their master was dead and gone, and their world fell apart to such a sad degree that they hid themselves behind locked doors for fear of their own skin and lives. But God had a deeper purpose in the death of his beloved son, and praise God, he did, in reconciling sinful man back to himself through the death of the blood of Jesus, the sinner's substitute.

Those brokenhearted disciples would see the resurrected Lord, and when they did, their hearts were filled with joy. Jesus asked Peter at the morning breakfast by the seashore, do you love me? And that is the answer God searches our hearts for in times of tragedy and trial.

Loving God Through Suffering

Do you love me? Do you love me? Can you still love me amidst all your suffering? God wants to bring us into a deeper knowledge of him and a deeper love relationship with him, whether it be beneath sunny, clear skies or storm-filled nights of desperation.

Jesus asks, do you love me? What can we say with Job? But now mine eyes see a thee, let us pray.