WWUTT 839 Job Trusts in God's Steadfast Love?

Job is in great despair, and he knows that the grief that has come upon him has been caused by God, yet he continues to trust in God as his hope that he will be delivered through his steadfast love when we understand the text.

This is when we understand the text studying God's word to reach all the riches of full assurance in Christ. Thank you for subscribing and if this has ministered to you please let others know about our program.

Here once again is Pastor Gabe Hughes.

Thank you Becky. Back to our study of the book of Job and today we'll begin in chapter 13. We're still in the middle of Job's response to Zophar and one of the things that he mentioned back in chapter 12, which was just a pounding of a response, is that he basically said to his friends, if you don't understand that God is sovereign, that he is the one who has decreed even the things that are happening to me now from before the foundation of the world, he didn't say it that way, but if you don't understand that, the sovereignty of God, the creator over his creation, then there are beasts in the field that understand things about God that you don't understand, for even all creation testifies to this.

And in fact, Romans chapter 1 verse 20 says that to us as well, that what can be known about God is plain to them for God has shown it to them for his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly perceived in all that has been made ever since the creation of the world.

So they are without excuse, his eternal power and his divine nature, meaning that there is nothing that happens outside the will of God, outside of God's decree. For we read in Lamentations chapter 3 verses 37 and 38, who has spoken and it came to pass unless the Lord has commanded it.

Is it not from the mouth of the most high that good and bad come? And Job has understood this from the very beginning of this book. When he had said to his wife, shall we receive only good from God and not also evil?

Job understands the sovereignty of God. Now in this particular circumstance, or at least the way that conditions are right now, he's not comforted by that. In fact, he thinks that God's sovereignty is going to be his misery for the rest of his life.

And this is what God is going to respond to when the Lord speaks to him toward the end of this book. A lot of the things that Job is lamenting here are not going to be resolved until we get to the end of Job.

But in the meantime, he is going back and forth with his friends and he is continuing his response here in chapter 13. And in fact, chapter 13 of Job is a lot like Psalm 13 in that Job says, I will continue to hope in the Lord, just as David said in Psalm 13, but I will continue to trust in your steadfast love.

So there is a hopefulness that remains there with Job, even though what he experiences in his spirit is mostly a deep, dark depression. Chapter 13, verse 1, still responding to his friends, behold, my eye has seen all this.

My ear has heard and understood it. What you know, I also know. I am not inferior to you. In other words, the knowledge that you have is no better than the knowledge that I have. But I would speak to the Almighty and I desire to argue my case with God.

As for you, you whitewash with lies. Worthless physicians are you all. It's a very similar thing that Jesus said to the Pharisees in Matthew chapter 23, called them whitewashed sepulchers and said that they were sons of hell who produced more sons of hell.

They don't make the body well. In fact, they bring death to a person with their lives. And Job is saying that same thing to his friends here. Worthless physicians, all of you, oh, that you would keep silent and it would be your wisdom.

In Proverbs chapter 17, verse 28, we read, even a fool who keeps silent is considered wise. When he closes his lips, he is deemed intelligent. Job is saying to his friends, it would go better with you if you were to just not talk.

You're going to condemn yourself by your words. Verse six, hear now my argument and listen to the pleadings of my lips. Will you speak falsely for God and speak deceitfully for him? Will you show partiality toward him?

Will you plead the case for God? Will it be well with you when he searches you out? Or can you deceive him as one deceives a man? He will surely rebuke you if in secret you show partiality. Will not his majesty terrify you and the dread of him fall upon you?

Your maxims are Proverbs of ashes. Your defenses are defenses of clay. Let me have silence and I will speak and let come on me what may. Why should I take my flesh in my teeth and put my life in my hand?

Though he slay me, I will hope in him, yet I will argue my ways to his face. This will be my salvation that the godless shall not come before him. Keep listening to my words and let my declaration be in your ears.

Behold, I have prepared my case. I know that I shall be in the right. Now let's stop there for just a moment. So Job is saying that he would rather speak with God than speak with these men. There is nothing that he's going to be able to say to his friends that's going to convince them that he is a man of uprightness.

They have seen this affliction that has come upon him, so they are absolutely convinced that Job has done something evil. But Job knows that he is righteous in his heart. This is the way the book starts, Job chapter 1.

Job is a righteous and upright man who fears God. He is telling his friends, you don't fear God. You speak blasphemy of him when you cite his name to these things that you say, and the judgment of God is going to search you out.

So you need to be careful, and you need to shut your mouth before these words come against you. As even Jesus has said, you are going to have to give an account for every careless word that you speak.

And so Job is kind of warning his friends, it would be better for you to not talk at all than to come into condemnation because of this. But he says here that even though he is in such misery, even though he feels like his life is over and it would be better for him to die, or even that he should never have been born at all.

That was the way he began his soliloquizing in chapter 3. He yet says in verse 14, why should I take my flesh in my teeth and put my life in my hand? In other words, Job is saying, I'm not going to commit suicide because my life is not mine to take.

He fears God and his friends do not. Job knows that if he were to kill himself, that he would commit murder and he would have to stand before God and give account. He knows that he has not committed any wrong against God for which this calamity has come upon him.

He's not done anything to incur this judgment or this wrath from God. So he is ready to take his case before the Lord. He knows that he has walked in uprightness because Job knows that he has a righteousness that is not his own.

It has come from God. And so he feels bold to be able to stand before God and take his case. He can't do it for his friends. His friends are absolutely convinced they've already drawn their conclusions.

There's nothing that Job will say that will change their mind. But he's ready to stand before God. Verse 15, though he slay me, yet I will hope in him. I will argue my ways to his face. You could possibly take that disrespectfully.

Job is pretty frustrated here. But nevertheless, what he is saying here is that God is a righteous judge and he will deliver me ultimately at that final judgment. I know that I will be delivered from his hand.

Though right now I suffer in this life, I will be delivered from the hand of God in eternity. And I say again, Job is relying on a righteousness that is not his own. It is the righteousness of God. That is what he is comparing his righteousness to.

That this righteousness has come from God, not of himself. Because he is not so confident or bold in himself and in his own action that he thinks that he can stand before God and say, hey, I'm right, you're wrong.

That's not what he's coming to here, because he's previously said God is the judge who is righteous and he what he has decreed stands and you can't turn it back. Job has already made those declarations.

So he's not coming forward here to say that that I'm going to prove God wrong. What he's saying is that God knows I'm righteous. He searches you out talking to his foolish friends. He's going to search out your hearts and you're going to be held liable for the for the words that you've said.

But when he searches my heart out, I know that I'm going to be found in the right at the final judgment. I'm going to be fine, even though I stand horribly in the place that I'm in, which is why he says, though he slay me, yet I will still hope in him.

And this is like what David has said in Psalm 13. How long, oh, Lord, will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day?

How long shall my enemy be exalted over me? Consider and answer me, oh, Lord, my God, light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death. Lest my enemies say I have prevailed over him. Lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken.

But I have trusted in your steadfast love. My heart shall rejoice in your salvation. I will sing to the Lord because he has dealt bountifully with me. And there are other times where David pleads to the Lord God to find him innocent because he has not done anything to deserve the wrath that these enemies have brought against him.

And so he though he does not see God in the midst of his circumstance, yet before the Lord, he comes and pleads his case that he would be delivered. And though we do not understand why things happen to us in this life, why things transpire the way that they do on this side of heaven, yet we continue to place our hope and our trust in God, knowing that even if we won't be delivered from this plight here, we know that we will stand before God in glory and be received by him because we have a righteousness that is not our own.

For you who are listening, who is a Christian and you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, whose righteousness was given to you by faith in him, knowing his work that he accomplished on the cross for the forgiveness of sins, he has clothed you in his righteousness and you stand before God as innocent.

Then though you struggle and you suffer in this life, yet you know with confidence there is a day that will come on which you will stand before God in judgment and you do not fear that day because of a righteousness that you have that is not your own.

So, Job says that I have prepared my case, only grant me two things that I will not hide myself from your face, withdraw your hand far from me and let not dread of you terrify me. So, going on in verse 22, then call and I will answer or let me speak and you reply to me.

How many are my iniquities and my sins? Make me know my transgression and my sin. Why do you hide your face from me and count me as your enemy? Will you frighten a driven leaf and pursue dry chaff? For you write bitter things against me and make me inherit the iniquities of my youth.

You put my feet in the stocks and watch all my paths. You set a limit for the soles of my feet. Man wastes away like a rotten thing, like a garment that is moth eaten. In Psalm 25, 7, we read, remember not the sins of my youth or my transgressions according to your steadfast love.

Remember me for the sake of your goodness, oh Lord. Second Timothy 2, 22, the apostle Paul says to Timothy, flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.

So, we continue as Job continues to mourn and grieve over this. Chapter 14, we have very many profound statements, very deep philosophical statements that are made in this particular chapter. 14 verse 1, man who is born of a woman is few of days and full of trouble.

He comes out like a flower and withers. He flees like a shadow and continues not. And do you open your eyes on such a one and bring me into judgment with you? Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean thing?

There is not one since his days are determined and the number of his months is with you and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass. Now, I want to stop there for just a moment. It's going to seem like I'm going to go off topic a little bit here, but this is a verse that gets thrown at me every once in a while.

Job 14, 4, who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean thing? There is not one, especially here around the Christmas season, because there are people that are absolutely determined that Christmas Day, December 25th, was the day of a pagan festival.

And as if you've been listening to what I've been reading on the Saturday edition of the podcast, the very first Christmas myth that I started with debunked this concept. There was actually an understanding that Jesus was born on December 25th before there was ever a pagan holiday that marked that particular day.

Now, there's always been pagan holidays around the winter solstice, but that's December 21st or the 22nd, the 21st, the day the sun died, the 22nd, the day the sun comes back to life. Those pagan holidays generally don't fall on the 25th.

And so that was not a day of a pagan festival, and it was Hippolytus of Rome that calculated the birthdate of Christ on December 25th. So first of all, it's a myth anyway that anyone would think that December 25th is originally a pagan holiday, but they insist that that's the truth.

They're absolutely convinced of that. So there's no way that we can Christianize that day and make it as anything redeemable, because according to Job 14, for who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean thing, there is not one.

But that's not the context of that passage for. First of all, Paul is very clear in Romans chapter 14 that some are going to see certain days as holy and others are going to see all days as holy. Do not quarrel over opinions.

So those Romans 14 principles apply to celebrating holidays like Christmas or Easter. But secondly, in First Timothy chapter four, he says, for everything created by God is good and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer.

And Christmas Day, goodness gracious, made holy by the word of God out of Matthew two and Luke two. If you want to read those passages on that day and with prayer, with thanksgiving, giving praise unto God for sending his son into this world.

Now, of course, as Christians, we should be celebrating that every day. But there's nothing wrong with having a holiday that is particularly set aside on the calendar to remember the incarnation of Jesus Christ.

Nobody's going to come into judgment before the judgment seat of God because they celebrated Christmas and did it with a right heart. That's not going to happen. But at the same time, there's not going to be any judgment or retribution against a person who did not celebrate Christmas.

There is no requirement to have to honor that day as the birth date of Christ. But for the person who celebrates it with gladness in his heart for the gift that God has given to us and his son, Jesus Christ, he does it in a way that is holy and pleasing unto the Lord.

Do not look down on him because you hold a different opinion about that. And Job 14, four is certainly not one of those gotcha verses that declares that Christmas day is unclean and therefore there's nothing that you can do to make it clean.

Who in the world gave pagan such power over days that if they declare something about a certain day, it's instantly unclean and there's nothing that a Christian can do to redeem it? Where did pagans get that kind of power from?

Pagans have no power. The idols that they worship are empty things, according to according to what Paul says to the Corinthians. So there's there's nothing that they've done to a day to make it unholy or unclean.

I feel the same way about Halloween, too, by the way. There's no reason to have to lock yourself up in your house, fearing that you might be practicing the occult on that day just because you handed a track to a kid in your neighborhood who came up and rang the doorbell and said, trick or treat.

All right, Job 14, five, since his days are determined and the number of his months is with you and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass, look away from him and leave him alone that he may enjoy like a hired hand his day.

And here we come back again to Job acknowledging the sovereignty of God. The days of man are determined. The number of his months is with you and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass. When were these things decided?

When were the days of man appointed before the foundation of the world? This was the sovereign decree of God. This was when he appointed those things. It's in Psalm 139 where where David says, for you formed my inward parts.

You knitted me together in my mother's womb. I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works. My soul knows it very well. Skipping to verse 16, Psalm 139, 16. Your eyes saw my unformed substance in your book were written.

Every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there were none of them. God had every one of our days already written in his book before we ever even breathed life in this world. The scriptures state it plainly.

And Job even recognizes this. But again, the the struggle that he has in the midst of his circumstance is the belief that he's never going to be delivered out of this. He is going to be in this misery for the rest of his life.

So that is why he is struggling the way that he is. And we shouldn't necessarily take that from him, although he certainly crosses a line to which God speaks against when we get later on into the book.

But his his mourning right now, it's not like any of us should look at this as as a well. Hey, God is sovereign, man. He's taking control of everything. He's got the whole world in his hands. Romans 828.

God works all things together for good for those who love God and according to his purpose. So buck up, dude. You know, that's not the way that we should approach this. Somebody who is going through a serious loss like that is going to mourn.

And the best thing that we can do is follow the Romans 12 principle of weep with those who weep. That was what Job's friends did real well at the start of the book before they started talking and then just became miserable companions.

The Hope of Resurrection and Christian Empathy

So we continue on here with verse seven, for there is hope for a tree if it be cut down that it will sprout again and that its shoots will not cease, though its root grow old in the earth and its stump die in the soil.

Yet as the scent of water, it will bud and put out branches like a young plant. But a man dies and is laid low. Man breathes his last. And where is he? As waters fail from a lake and a river wastes away and dries up.

So a man lies down and rises not again till the heavens are no more. He will not awake or be roused out of his sleep. Oh, that you would hide me in Sheol, that you would conceal me until your wrath be passed, that you would appoint me a set time and remember me.

If a man dies, shall he live again? All the days of my service, I would wait till my renewal should come. You would call and I would answer you. You would long for the work of your hands, for then you would number my steps.

You would not keep watch over my sin. My transgression would be sealed up in a bag, and you would cover over my iniquity. But the mountain falls and crumbles away, and the rock is removed from its place.

The waters wear away the stones, the torrents wash away the soil of the earth, so you destroy the hope of man. You prevail forever against him, and he passes. You change his countenance and send him away.

His sons come to honor, and he does not know it, that they are brought low, and he perceives it not. He feels only the pain of his own body, and he mourns only for himself. How could you ever really truly know anyone else's grief but your own?

Can you truly empathize with somebody else? Now, I think that there is a kind of empathy that we can feel for another person, but let's say you went through a particular circumstance and you have a friend that went through almost the exact same thing, yet they have a body that's physiologically different than yours, and they are also shaped by previous experiences that they've had in their life.

So they're going to respond to that situation differently than you did, even though you might have gone through something like that, and you can share a certain like-mindedness, but you can't truly relate.

Not exactly. Not exactly the way that they're going through. And maybe you even see them fall into a deeper despair in that circumstance than you went through because you went through something similar.

And I still say that in those circumstances, we follow that Romans 12 principle of weeping with those who weep. Don't try to sound smarter than they are or think that you know better. If they ask, answer a question accordingly, but don't try to be Mr. Know-it-all or tell them to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and just do better.

The only way that we can really have a true Christian empathy for each other is to have the mind of Christ. They have the mind of Christ. You have the mind of Christ. And that is the closest you will get to a true empathetic response to another person is if you share the same mind in Christ Jesus.

Philippians chapter two, verse one. So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord with one mind.

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form.

He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth.

And every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. That's a good word to remember at Christmas, amen.

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