Spiritual Depression Pt16. Trials

Trials, Spiritual Depression, and the Opening of 1 Peter

Okay, all right, we're continuing. This is part 16 of spiritual depression. Okay, introduction. We're looking at 1 Peter. 1 Peter, starting in chapter 1, verse 1. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ to those who reside as aliens scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, Bithynia, who are chosen, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with his blood.

May grace and peace be yours in the fullest measure. I always like, when you're, you know, going into a book, to read the introduction, because it does kind of set the context. Who is Peter? Remember, when we studied hermeneutics, we talked about some of the important questions to ask.

Who is the book written by? Who is it written to? What's the occasion of the writing of the book? And this will all help in our understanding of it. So that's why I included this. See, we're not going to be looking at these verses tonight, but they're helpful.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who, according to his great mercy, has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith, for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

And now the two verses, the main two verses that we're going to be looking at tonight are 6 and 7. In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold, which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

And though you have not seen him, you love him, and though you do not see him now but believe in him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, obtaining as the outcome of your faith the salvation of your souls.

Great verses, aren't they? All right, starting with the opening paragraph from Martin Lloyd-Jones' book, having considered many reasons why Christians may suffer from spiritual depression, we come to the particular reason with which the Apostle Peter deals with in this section.

There can be no question but that his only object in writing this letter was to deal with this very state. So he starts by reminding these people of certain things. Then he comes at once to his theme.

He introduces the matter by talking about the great salvation. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy has begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away.

Wherein, he then says, ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations. And this is what he's looking at. What is the source of spiritual depression that he's looking at tonight?

That is the various trials that come upon us. So though these Christians greatly rejoiced in the living hope, in fact, let me just pause again. Remember that Peter is writing to believers. I mean, that's again one of the reasons we want to see those opening paragraphs.

He's writing to those who are scattered. So this was in all likelihood, this was a circular letter. When we were members of ARPCA, one of the things that we used to do as an association was every year there would be a circular letter that was sent to all the churches.

That tradition not only goes back to the days of the Reformation, but goes all the way back to the New Testament days, because that's exactly what they did with what turns out to be Scripture in many cases.

Much of Scripture were circular letters that were sent and passed around from church to church. So what he says here is they greatly rejoiced in the living hope, yet they were still heavy of heart. All right, that's the issue.

All right, so Peter describes them even as being distressed. So once again, we find the condition of these Christians as almost contradictory. In verse five, remember what it said? They're rejoicing, yet they're in heavy distress.

And sometimes people on the outside of the Christian faith, they don't understand that. They say, well, that's contradictory.

All right.

Once again, we find the condition as almost contradictory. All right, I underline the almost, because it's not contradictory. In fact, non-Christians often ask, how can you be rejoicing and be distressed at the same time?

Martin Lloyd-Jones answers, you may, if you like, call it paradoxical, but it is not contradictory. Indeed, the condition of the Christian as described in the New Testament seems always to include these two elements, and at one and the same time, we find that these Christian people, of whom the apostle writes, are greatly rejoicing and are also in heaviness.

It does seem like a paradox, doesn't it, that we're told to rejoice always. Again, I say rejoice, says the apostle Paul, and that's in the imperative mood, so it's a command. And yet, we're also told to grieve.

There are times we are supposed to grieve, but that doesn't take away our rejoicing. This condition of being blessed and yet suffering is not unique to Peter's audience. Remember how Paul describes himself to the church in Corinth.

We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed. Perplexed, but not despairing. Persecuted, but not forsaken. Struck down, but not destroyed. You see, you have the two sides to the coin, okay? So, it's not inconsistent for the Christian to experience both joy and yet have a heavy heart.

So, where then is the problem that we're speaking of in this chapter? The problem is not maintaining a balance between the two conditions, okay? Specifically, to let the grief or the heavy heart become the ruling factor in your life, all right?

That's where the issue comes in, because we are told, as Christians, we have reason to rejoice with every breath that we take, as those who have been redeemed, those who are bound for heaven, and who have been called into the kingdom of God.

There can be no circumstance that should cause us to be completely depressed. The Christian must never regard himself as one who is exempt from natural feelings, all right? There's going to be times where we have mixed emotions.

No, I got to do it. I got to do it. I have to tell you, I had a great relationship with my mother-in-law. She was like a mother to me, and so I could tell all the mother-in-law jokes I wanted. She just said, oh, Richie, you're such a kidder, you know?

So I told her one day, I said, Mommy, you know the definition of mixed emotions? She said, what's that? I said, that's when you see your mother-in-law drive off the cliff in your brand-new Cadillac.

And she loved it. So not everybody here loves it. You might as well have a couple of mother-in-laws here. Okay, we have mixed emotions, all right? He has something that enables him to rise above these things, but the glory of the Christian life is that you rise above them, though you feel them.

It is not an absence of feeling. An important point to bring out here. Christianity is not Stoicism, okay? The Stoics had their own set of problems, et cetera, and it's not, as the British would say, stiff upper lip, all right?

No, Christianity does not deny emotions. It does not deny feelings. What it says is you need to bring those feelings and those emotions under the lordship of Christ, okay? And that's how you can be rejoicing and yet be grieving at the same time.

This particular manifestation of spiritual depression comes when the feelings of grief dominate the Christian life, all right? And we know that there are some people who are radical in their asceticism, you know, trying to—you have to be miserable in order to be a Christian.

That's not the message of the gospel. So what is the specific cause that Peter points to? Verse 6, you have been distressed by various trials, all right? And various—notice the word that's an important word in this.

You have been distressed by various trials. Various in the original language means many colored. I think the King James Version says manifold trials, okay? So what does that mean? In other words, the trial is not just one single trial but a many-faceted series of trials.

Doesn't it seem that way that when something starts to go wrong that it just continues and it's one thing after another? In fact, there's an old saying, these things come in threes. You ever hear that?

Okay, that's where it comes from because it seems like it's never just one thing that gets you down, okay? In fact, that's biblical. Remember Job? Job is saying it's bad news messengers coming one right after the other, all right?

That's what it means by various trials. Notice that the trials is plural. And if we read further in the epistle, we find out what some of these trials were. All right, I'm just going to list a couple.

One, they were an outright persecution. All right, remember in that first century to name the name of Christ was immediately one they had persecution on different sides. The Jews were persecuting them because they had departed from what they considered to be the true faith.

And the Romans were persecuting them because the Jews had riled up the Romans saying that Christians were responsible for all the trouble. Okay, so they were subject to outright persecution. Second, they were battling the flesh.

We read further on in the epistle. He says, Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul. Peter puts that in there because that obviously was a situation that the first century Christians were part of.

Remember, you know, we look at our society today and we bemoan and say, oh, what has happened? Look at the declining morality, et cetera, et cetera. Do you think they had it any better in the first century?

The immorality was more rampant and the debauchery was incredible. If you read anything about the history of that time. All right, so they had the same struggles. They were living in an extremely ungodly society.

And then they're standing and trying to abstain from this when it's all around them. Okay. Third, they were suffering because they lived a different life, different from that of the world around them.

That can be one of the most subtle and yet one of the most dangerous things. What happens when you profess faith? You come from a family that's not godly. How often are they ostracized? Even in our society today, you see this.

A parent comes to faith or a child comes to faith and they have to fight. Nobody wants to. You know, you're not getting any support, you know, from the family. So these were at least three things that the trials that these people were going through.

First, Peter 220. For what credit is there when you sin and are harshly treated? You endure it with patience. But if when you do what is right and suffer for it, you patiently endure it. This finds favor with God.

All right. You notice, remember, Peter and later on, too, he gets even more direct with this, talking about, you know, you're blessed if you suffer for righteousness sake, but don't suffer as a criminal.

I remember one chaplain that I had dealt with saying that he was working in a particular prison upstate. And he came to me and said, I'm glad to report, he says, over half of the tier that I work on, they're all Christians.

And I asked him a question. I said, were they did they get saved in in jail? He says, no, they were Christians before they were sent to jail. I said, oh, well, that's no reason to rejoice. The world in its heart of hearts hates Christ and it hates the Christian because such holy living condemns it.

The man of the world does not like it because it makes him feel uncomfortable. Right. So when you stand for truth, you can expect to lose friends and support of even family members. And Martin Lloyd Jones uses the example of Charles Spurgeon, who suffered in this way during what's become known as the downgrade controversy.

How many people know about the downgrade controversy? Now I am heavy of heart. I'm distressed. You've got to. Huh?

Was that the events that he was preaching at where people died?

No, no, no. This is this is where he was. He was absolutely at one point when it got as bad as it did because he was standing for the truth of the gospel. He was fighting against Arminianism. He was fighting against hyper Calvinism and he was disowned by the entire Baptist Union, which was the association there.

People who he had mentored and where his friends were turning their backs on him and slandering him. And it really affected him so much so that his health was affected by it. And there's a whole book.

I mean, you've got to read it if you're a Charles Spurgeon fan at all. You've got to if you don't know about the downgrade controversy, you've got to read it. OK. And there's many books that have been written, you know, about Spurgeon and what he suffered in the downgrade controversy.

But here's this one of the most famous preachers that now everybody looks back on, just like the prophets. Right. In his own day, Spurgeon was was burned. All right. And now, 100 years later, everybody looks at, oh, one of the greatest preachers, the prince of preachers.

And everybody tries to own him. It's amazing how many Armenians say, oh, I loved Charles Spurgeon. I said, yeah, you just don't love his doctrine. Spurgeon lost many friends in the ministry because of his stand for the truth.

Why Trials Are Necessary and Designed by God

So then what is the remedy for this sort of spiritual depression? First, you must understand why these things happen. And it's so important. All right. And how do we do that? By asking the right questions of ourselves.

Now, how many times have I stood here in just even in just this study and said, as a Christian, you've got to learn how to talk to yourself. Got to ask yourself questions. You've got to be able to reason through things.

And that's what I mean by talk to yourself. Talking to yourself means reasoning, reasoning through things by asking the right questions. OK. Anybody ever see the movie I, Robot? All right. And just a couple of people.

Do you remember the hologram of the doctor that created him or fixed him up? He's trying to find out and he's asking. And what did the guy come back? That's not the right question. And he wouldn't answer the question he says until finally he comes on to it.

He says, now that's the right question. That's what we have to do as Christians. We have to learn how to ask the right questions. He says, I sometimes think the whole art of the Christian life is the art of asking questions.

All right. Our danger is just to allow things to happen to us and endure them without saying anything apart from a groan, a grumble or a complaint. We have to learn how to what we're talking about is evaluating our circumstances.

How did I get here? Why did I get here? You know. And asking the right questions, what that does, it takes the emotions out of your response. We've talked many times about we don't want to make an emotional response to whatever situation that we are in, because usually that first emotional response is what?

Just that an emotional response and it's not grounded in truth. So when you start to reason through these things, then you can figure out what the problem is and it will help you to respond in a biblical manner.

OK, so it's not merely a general statement to the effect that in a world like this, these things must happen. You'll hear this a lot. All right. How many people have heard of Rabbi Kuchner? He wrote the book when things when bad things happen to good people.

All right. And you know what? You know what? The bottom line, the conclusion of his book. Things just happen. There's no reason for it. If something bad happens, you just may be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

That's the conclusion of his book. All right. That's not I mean, that's a secular humanistic response. That's not a biblical answer to why things happen. All right. It is much stronger than that. He does not say, well, you are greatly rejoicing in this blessed hope, though, in a world like this, you may have to endure things.

He says that is all right. That is perfectly true. But the apostle does not merely leave it at that. This is a positive statement. He says you are at the moment and during this grief because it has proved needful for you that you should do so.

Now there then is our principle. There is a definite purpose in all of this. That's the big difference between Rabbi Kuchner and the Christian response is that nothing just happens by chance. It doesn't just happen.

It's just like, oh, well, that's the way it is. No, that's not the response of a Christian. OK. And if you find yourself responding that way, you have moved out of the biblical realm and you need to get back.

Start asking yourself the right questions. While we are called to endure things in this world, that's not all there is to it. These things happen, says the apostle, because they are good for us, because they are part of our discipline in this life and in this world.

Because let me put it quite plainly, because God has appointed it. OK, so in other words, there is a very definite plan and purpose to your life. You're a believer in Jesus Christ. That means that the plan and purpose, everything in this life is going to work out for your good and for his glory.

OK, so we can't just say, OK, Sarah, Sarah, the overriding principle is that you are being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. Got to pause and just look at that for a minute. I don't want to pass by this one too quickly.

The ultimate reason you are sitting here, that you are on this planet, that you were born and that you are living a life is that you are to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. And if you ever lose sight of that, then you've lost your way and you are not where you belong spiritually.

And chances are you'll be in some sort of spiritual depression because this is your whole purpose. All right. The reason you were saved was to be conformed to his image. Under that general statement now, there are several reasons for the trials which we encounter as children of God.

Faith Tested Like Gold, and Trials That Do Not Last Forever

So this is I'm going to give you somewhat of a sampling of some of the questions that you need to ask. All right. First, the trials are necessary. OK, it's said that's right in the text. It is needful.

The apostle says you may have heard me say this before. I know I've said it from the pulpit. I used to have a saying when something happened that disrupted what I was doing. Like if I'm driving, I'm late getting someplace.

I'm driving. And of course, I'd never exceeded the speed limit, but I'm in a hurry to get someplace. Why are you laughing? And you get a flat tire and first things out of my mouth. I don't need this right now.

Then I became reformed and I started to understand the providence of God. I stopped saying that because I realized and now I'd say, you know what? This is what I need right now because God has brought it into my life.

It's needful. All right. So you start to ask yourself, is this necessary? And you're going to come across it's necessary for me to go through this. You may not know why it's necessary at the time. Hopefully you'll figure that out at some point.

But they're necessary. Verse six, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials. Says it very clearly. If you're experiencing various trials, it's because they're necessary. If necessary. Sometimes the trials are to prepare you for something specific.

All right. Look how God used calamity in the life of Joseph to prepare him to save his people. Joseph is the poster boy for this type of spiritual depression. Think of all the things that happened to him.

You know, he was the victim of treachery by his brothers. Part of his wife lies about him. He's forgotten by the candlestick maker, whoever it was in jail. But what happens to him through all of that?

He winds up the number two man in Egypt. All right. All of those trials prepared him for the day when his brothers came and he could say what you meant for evil. God meant for good. There's the difference.

OK. Think of Esther. And remember the words of Mordecai to her. I love these words. And who knows whether you have not attained royalty for such a time as this. And we know what happened. Esther was used by God to save his people.

All right. So, I mean, Joseph, how many times could Joseph is his woe is me. Why? Why is this happening to me? All right. Esther could have said, oh, my goodness, all my people are going to be wiped out.

I can't even approach the king unless he asked me to come. She didn't take it at that. What did she do? She says, I have to go. Spurred on by Mordecai. She says, I have to go in front of the king. Have all the people praying fast.

It seems also from the teaching of the scriptures and the lives of saints that God sometimes prepares a man for a great trial in this way. I mean that he prepares him for a great trial by giving him some lesser trials.

God will not give you any more than you can handle. We're going to look at that in just a minute. Second principle is that these manifold temptations or trials come as a trial of their of their faith to purify it like gold is purified by fire.

Look at verse seven. So that the proof of your faith being more precious than gold, which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

This is what Peter does there. It's a logical tool. It's called an argument from the lesser to the greater. If gold, though gold is precious in this life, it's one of the most precious things in this life.

If that perishes and even then it has to be tried by fire, how much more should your faith, which doesn't perish, be tried by fire? In other words, if you want pure gold, you've got to heat it up, melt it, scrape off all the dross.

Otherwise you got impure gold. OK. Faith works similar. That's what Peter is saying here. He says if we're going to try gold by fire, your faith needs to be tried by fire because that's the most precious thing you have is your faith.

So why would you not think that it's going to be tried by fire? So these various trials come upon you because of the very nature of faith. Faith by its nature needs to be tried. It needs to be tested.

Remember that faith must grow. It must be developed. OK, so then these trials are essential in order to show the genuineness of our faith. As your faith is tried and you come through it on the other side, what does that do to your confidence and to your faith?

It builds it. And that's why God gives us little trials to prepare us for a great trial. There is nothing which so certifies the genuineness of a man's faith as his patience and his patient endurance, his keeping on steadily in spite of everything.

That is the teaching of our Lord. It is the teaching of the whole of the New Testament. So part of the remedy is also to keep in mind that the various trials or troubles are not forever. All right, look again.

In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while. Aren't you glad that that's in there? All right. For a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by these various trials. It's only for a period of time.

At the very least, it ends when you die. That's the bottom line. I just think of, you know, when my mother was on her hospital bed ready to pass on, she had been really suffering. She had a very hard problems, all kinds of different things.

And she had a defibrillator and it was hurting her every time it kicked on. It started kicking on like every two minutes. And then she couldn't eat. Her throat was raw. And she says, can I pray that the Lord would take me?

I said, absolutely. And the Lord was merciful and took her and she's out of that distress. And as the Apostle Paul said, there's always a way of escape. Remember, this is such an important verse. No temptation has overtaken you, but such as is common to man.

That's an important one. I always pull this verse out because invariably somebody will come into the counseling room and they'll say to me, nobody understands what I'm going through. Time out. The Apostle Paul says, whatever has overtaken you is common to man.

Somebody's been through it before. Somebody's going to go through it again. And God is faithful who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able. You know what that takes away? It's too much for me to handle.

No, it's not. That's a lie. Apostle Paul says, God will not. He will measure out whatever trial or temptation and keep it within the bounds that you can handle. And will provide the way of escape so that you may be able to endure it.

Just think of that, just how important that promise is. That no matter what you are going through, God has promised that he'll find a way of escape. He'll measure out so there will not be more than you can handle.

And you will, in fact, be able to endure it. Coming out on the other side, what does that mean? Your faith is going to be stronger. And your confidence will be greater. Because, again, when you start to experience how the promises of God are true in your own life, by your own experience, it just builds all the time.

Now, of course, we don't need our experience to check Scripture, but it's true. When you experience this type of depression, remember what you have to rejoice about. Count your blessings, name them one by one, right?

Great old hymn. But it's true. When you're going through bad times, what do we do? We focus on the bad times. Start focusing on the promises of God. What has God done in your life? In the midst of trouble, remember the manifold blessings of God.

There is more to rejoice about than there is to complain about. Then go on to the ultimate statement, which is this. That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.

Remember, it is all, everything that you're going through is going to, when you come out the other side, will be found to praise and honor and glory of Jesus Christ. And that brings us down to the conclusion.

We may be in heaviness, though, through many temptations and trials at this present time, and we may be weeping as we go along. It does not matter. We are promised that the day will come when the Lamb, which is in the midst of the throne, shall lead us unto living fountains of water, and that God himself shall wipe away all tears from our eyes, and we shall be with him in glory everlasting.

That is the Christian way of facing trials. Thank God we are in his hands. It is his way of salvation and not ours. Let us submit ourselves to God. Let us be content to be in his hands, and let us say to him, send what thou wilt.

Our only concern is that we may ever be well-pleasing in thy sight. Great quotation. I love these quotes from The Good Doctor. Questions? Kind of what I put up there, like, all right, what is it that I'm going through?

What is it that's making me, you know, feel distressed or feel depressed? Can I see a reason? Is there a reason for it? And one of the first things that, and I do this in the counseling room, one of the first things they always say, are you in any sin?

Because if you find yourself in persistent sin and unrepentant sin, you probably don't even have to look any further because God is using that to discipline you to bring you back into the fold. So ask yourself that.

And just questions like that. If you can look at that and say, honestly, I mean, of course, you can never say, well, I'm not without sin, but I'm not in persistent, unrepentant sin, then you can continue along the line.

Have I done something else? Has this been a result of a foolish decision that I made? Those are the type of questions that you ask. And they would vary a little bit depending on what type of trouble you find yourself in.

But those are the things, again, to get it out of your emotional response. Because, again, what's our first response? I don't need this. I wish this wasn't happening to me. All those things. And if we just live there, yeah, then you're going to slide into depression, spiritual depression.

Yes, Steve.

A good place to find the questions to ask are in Psalm 119. It's like, how long, O Lord? You know, you get those questions. I've been obedient and yet, why? Even though, you know, it's a great place to find the right questions.

That's an excellent suggestion that the Psalms are. Because there you see the psalmists, whether it be David or Asaph or whoever else it is, just pouring their heart out and they're being, you know, honest completely.

Sure. Yeah. And then also, how can I use the experience to help others? So all of those type of questions. And there's probably a ton more that we're not thinking of.

Yes.

Just in terms of, like you mentioned from Corinthians about, you know, nothing is overtaking except what is common to man. The Lord is faithful. He'll provide a way of escape. And so we'll say, you know, God doesn't give you more than you can handle.

I find myself saying a lot lately, like, well, yes or no? You know, and I'm sure, you know, recognizing that there's always that way of escape. There's nothing beyond. But just realizing how much we try to do things in our own strength.

You know, he had mentioned in an earlier chapter about, you know, burnout and stuff like that. You know, and it was specifically in another chapter that was talking about that, just really trying to do things on our own and not looking to the Lord.

And, like, you know, questions that we can ask. If we're not in habitual sin, unconfessed sin, something that's going on, you know, another thing that the possibility is that he's really taking the time to grow us.

You know, apart from him, we can't do anything, right? But if you buy him, you bear much fruit. But those that bear fruit, he prunes that you bear more fruit. And so bringing us to kind of like the end of ourselves, just really deepens our, you know, our understanding of our need for him, our dependence on him, going to prayer, just really kind of putting it all in line and looking to him.

And it's really a good opportunity to grow. So in that spiritual depression, you know, that it could be a real growing opportunity. So it's just something I've been seeing, you know, and, you know, having been able to share with others.

Yeah, and I just want to jump a little bit on what you said, which is excellent. And that is, are you making sure that you're doing it in the power of the Lord and not trying to do it yourself? You know, you go into the self-help mode, and if you go into the self-help section of the bookstore, you know, and they'll tell you, oh, just pull yourself up by your bootstraps, and you can do this, you're better than this.

You know, that's, you know, if you get sucked into that kind of thinking, you know, it's not going to help at all. That's when you will fail if you're trying to do it in your own power. And, well, you know self-help sections.

You see a guy walks into the bookstore, asks, he says, where's the self-help section? He says, if I told you, that would defeat its purpose, wouldn't it? Yes, Ted.

We should remember about Job that he did not know all of the explanations that we were given in the first chapter of the...

And he never did get them.

And he never did get them, and yet he still... How he reached this place is a beautiful thing that he could say, yet though he slay me, I will praise him.

Amen.

I mean, that's not something a newborn Christian just five minutes ago would say.

Right.

Amen.

And that's exactly one of the points here is that faith is something that needs to be developed and needs to grow and needs to mature. Yes.

I think sometimes that God doesn't really owe it to us to explain what he's doing. I was speaking to Erica, and something she said that really stuck with me is that the sin that didn't even is that she wanted all knowledge.

She wanted to know everything. And sometimes it's not up to us to know. We just have to have faith, and we don't have to anticipate the next step, what God's next step for us is. We just have to live and not turn to the left, not turn to the right.

So that's what I gather.

Oh, you're absolutely right. Deuteronomy 29, 29, the secret things belong to the Lord, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever. So we do have to, you know, and in fact, taking Job again, how does God answer Job when he takes that one step too far?

And what he says is, where were you? When I did this, when I created, when I set the bounds of the ocean, where were you? And he never answers. You're right. We have the benefit of reading the book of Job and seeing the backdrop of what was happening in heaven, and Job never gets that, that we know of.

And he was content with that. So in fact, how does Job wind up? He says, I cover my mouth, and I repent in dust and ashes. Any other thoughts, questions?