Job's Strong Second Answer

Job chapter 16 and Job chapter 17. Now this past week I had an opportunity to talk to one of the men of our church who has gone through some very difficult times and he was telling me how he longed to be here on Wednesdays or how he longed to be here on Sundays. Physically, he's just incapable of being here, and yet he said these words, "'As sick as I am, I realize that these are the best years of my life in the Lord.

And my wife and I are rejoicing about what God is doing in our lives.'" And as I sat and listened to him, he just began to talk. And as I listened to him, I realized that here was a man who truly wanted to be here but couldn't. There are many who could be here, they just don't come.

But he longs to be here. He says, "'I love our church,' he says, "'I love the people of our church. I love how they pray for us and we can pray for them.'" He goes, "'I just wish I could be with them every Wednesday and Sunday.'" And I was so impressed, so impacted by his words because he really longed to be here, and yet his walk with the Lord is the best it's ever been in spite of his pain, in spite of his misery, in spite of the hardship he's going through.

I thought about him, of course my heart was turned to Job and realizing that as impressed as I was with this man who was a part of our church, I wonder how impressed people were with Job when they walked by him and they heard him and they listened to him. I wonder if at any time they were impacted by his life. The more I read the book of Job, the more impressed I am with how he responds and how he sits in silence and waits for the opportunity to speak, and doesn't interrupt anybody.

It's hard to talk to people today because we always have to get a word in edgewise, right? And so we're always interrupting somebody when they're talking, but Job never interrupts anybody. He just sits and he listens. And yet as I go through this, I realize that I'm reading some of the same things I've read before and I'm reading them again and again, and the conversation's over and over.

It becomes so monotonous and so tedious, and I think, I wonder what Job thought, heard the same thing over and over again, you're a wicked sinner. That's why God's punishing you. You sinned against God.

He hears it over and over and over again, and as often as I read the book of Job and realize that as I study it, I'm so tired of hearing the same argument over and over and over again. I wonder how tired he must be, how worn out he must be, how grieved is his soul when he listens to his comforters criticize him and condemn him. And so as I read through the book and as you read through the book, you go after one conversation to the next conversation to the next conversation, it's like, okay, enough already, let's move on to the end.

Let's get to what God has to say about this whole process. It's all a part of learning about hope and belief in your God and trusting your God amidst difficult circumstances, because God is sovereign, He rules over all. And so the next time you're reading through the book of Job or you come to Bible study on Wednesday night and we're going through the book of Job and take care of all 42 chapters and you get tired of hearing the same thing over and over again, just think of how tired Job was of hearing the same thing over and over and over again, except you don't have to answer his critics, he does.

And the way he responds is so remarkable. So as you look at Job 16 and 17 this evening, four points, three in chapter 16 and one in chapter 17, we're going to look at Job's disappointment, then Job's distress, then his dependency then his despondency, that's chapter 17. So four points, we're going to look at it as we read through it together, and then we're going to draw four principles from these two chapters.

It's very important to realize that as you go through the text, there are certain principles that we draw from them to help us understand what it is we learn from Job, what it is Job is learning as he's going through this every single day that we might apply it to our own lives. Okay? So let's begin with Job's disappointment. It begins in verse number one.

He says, I have heard many such things. What things? I've heard many of these maxims, I've heard many of these solemn platitudes, I've heard what you guys have had to say, it's not anything new to me. This is this, miserable comforters are you all.

I wonder how they took this. Well, next week when we talk about Bildad, Bildad is going to be pretty angry next week when we talk about him. But he just calls them miserable comforters.

Now remember back in chapter 6, he called them deceitful brooks, and in chapter 13, he called them worthless physicians. In other words, he knows that their words did not bring any comfort to him. They did not meet him at his deepest level.

And so he's finally going to say, okay, you guys have to realize what I've heard you say is nothing new to me. But I want to let you know that in your effort to comfort me, you've only increased my misery. You truly are troublesome comforters.

And that had to hit them pretty hard to realize that they're really trying to convince Job that he is a wicked man. And he is so wicked that God has caused this punishment to come upon him in such a way that he is suffering immensely. You see, Job knows he's not.

Job knows he's a sinner, but he knows he hasn't committed some violent crime, some violent sin against his God. And so he calls them miserable comforters. Now we know that from the text that Satan isn't on the scene.

Physically, he's not on the scene. We know about Job chapter 1 and Job chapter 2 and the conversation in the heavens and how God offered up Job to Satan. But we know that Satan is not here.

But we do know where Satan is. Revelation 12.10 tells us he accuses the brethren day and night before the throne of God. Satan is an accuser.

And so he's always accusing the brethren. That's why we have an advocate, the Lord Jesus Christ, 1 John 2 verse number 1. He's our advocate. He's our defense attorney.

He's the one who lives to make intercession, Hebrews chapter 7, for us constantly. He intercedes on our behalf. He's our advocate.

We need an advocate because we have an accuser. Satan is the accuser. But Satan will use people in such a way to get them to throw his fiery darts.

And he's using these three miserable comforters. And the sad thing is they don't even know they're being used by Satan, like most people don't. Job's wife, she had no idea she was used by Satan, right? Remember back in chapter 2 verse number 9, curse God and die.

Just be done with it. Why would you hold fast your integrity? Just curse God and die, and it's going to be over for you. She was used by Satan to move Job off of the purpose for his life, like Peter was used by Satan.

When he confronted the Lord in Matthew chapter 16, the text that Tim read earlier this evening, when Christ would talk about how he was destined to live and to die and to rise again, and Peter confronted him about that, said, oh no, Lord, you're not going to do that. And Christ said to him, get thee behind me, not Peter, but Satan. Because even the great apostle Peter could be used by Satan in a way he didn't even know because he was trying to thwart the ultimate mission of the Messiah.

You see, when someone is used to thwart you from the mission that God's called you to accomplish for His purposes, they're very easily used by Satan to get you off track. And these three men thought they were being used by God, but really they were just hindering Job. They were miserable to him.

And they were being used by Satan because, you know, Satan's not omniscient, right? Satan doesn't know what's going on. His minions have to tell him what's happening because he doesn't have omniscience. He's not omnipresent.

He's not everywhere. Only God's omnipresent, right? Satan can only be in one place at one time. And so, he has to be informed as to what's happening, and yet these men unwittingly were being used by the adversary to move Job away from his progress towards godliness.

Even though he's an upright, God-fearing man, turning away from evil, blameless man, they were coming against him. And there's something about Job that would be so disappointing, that somehow these guys who were his friends, right? They were his friends, could not come alongside and at least just sit with him and just pray with him. They just had to figure out a way to explain to him why you are in this misery.

And the only thing they could figure out is that it must be because you're a sinner. There is no other reason for this, but they have no idea about the purposes of God. And so, Job calls them miserable comforters.

He says, is there no limit to windy words or what plagues you that you answer? I too could speak like you if I were in your place. I could compose words against you and shake my head at you. I could do exactly what you guys are doing.

But listen to this, verse 5, I could strengthen you with my mouth and the solace of my lips could lessen your pain. You know what I could do? I could do what you do or I could truly soothe your pain. Remember Proverbs 18, verse number 21, life and death are in the power of the tongue.

What has potential for good has an equal but opposite potential for evil. Because life and death are in the power of the tongue. And I can use my words to build you and encourage you and lift you or I can use my words to rip into you and tear you down.

And Job says, you know, if I was in your place, I could say exactly what you're saying, but you know what? I wouldn't do that. I would do it differently than you did it. And how do we know he did that? Because later in the book, you're going to read in Job chapter 28, I believe it is, I'm sorry, Job 29.

It says, these words in verse number 12, I delivered the poor who cried for help and the orphan who had no helper. The blessing of the one ready to perish came upon me and I made the widow's heart sing for joy. That's what Job did.

I put on righteousness and it clothed me. My justice was like a robe and a turban. I was eyes to the blind and feet to the lame.

I was a father to the needy and I investigated the case, which I did not know. That's Job. So we know that what he says is true.

If I had the opportunity, I would just do it so differently than you guys do it. I would use my words to encourage you, to motivate you, to stimulate you, and he could probably even use his words to pray and ask God to do a great and mighty work. Not these guys.

Nope, they weren't there. So Job goes on from his disappointment to number two, his distress, verses 6 to 14. He says, if I speak, my pain is not lessened and if I hold back, what has left me? In other words, if I'm silent or I speak, it makes no difference.

I'm still in pain. I'm still in misery. No matter what I do, nothing's coming back to me.

I've lost my children. I've lost my source of income. I've lost my house.

I've lost my health. So whether I speak or I'm silent, nothing changes. It's all the same.

Nothing's coming back to me. So he says this, but now he has exhausted me. Now think about this, 13 times between verses 7 and verse number 14, he attributes everything to God.

13 times he says, he, it says, he exhausted me. You laid waste all my company. You shriveled me up.

His anger has torn me. He has gnashed at me. He is my adversary.

God hands me over to the ruffians. He shattered me. He has grasped me.

He has also set me up as a target. It's his arrows. He splits.

He pours. He breaks. He runs.

In other words, God's doing all this. It's not that Job's complaining. It's not like Job's blaming God.

Satan wants us to blame God. He's not blaming God, but he's attributing everything to God. That's very important to understand.

He's not blaming God for his condition, but he is attributing everything that's happened to him to God. In other words, he is focused on the sovereignty of God. What did he say to his wife in Job 2, verse number 10? Should we accept good from God and not adversity? So he's already made that statement earlier on, and so all he is doing is accepting the adversity that's come from God.

He said in chapter 13, verse number 15, talked about last week, though he slay me yet I will hope in him. In other words, God can slay me. In fact, he's in the process of slaying me as I speak, but I'm still going to hope in him.

The writer of Ecclesiastes, Solomon, said this, chapter 7, verse number 13, consider the work of God for who is able to straighten what he has bent. In the day of prosperity, be happy, but in the day of adversity, consider, God has made the one as well as the other, so that man will not discover anything that will be after him. Now, think about that.

God has made the one as well as the other. What? The day of prosperity and the day of adversity. How would you explain that to the 11,000 people that have lost their lives in Turkey and Syria because of the earthquake that happened this past week, or to their families, excuse me? That the day of adversity and the day of prosperity, God has made one as well as the other, and why does he do that? He said, you'll never know what's going on, so you're never in control.

See, man wants to be in control of everything. He wants to be in control of his job, his family, his income, he wants to be in charge of his church, he wants to be in charge of everything. And God just says, the day of adversity, I've created, the day of prosperity, hey, listen, be happy, but in the day of adversity, consider this, I made that one as well.

Why did I do that? So you know you're never in control of anything, but I am, because He's sovereign. So here is Job attributing his situation to God. He is bowing in subjection to the sovereignty of God.

This is what God has done. He has scorched me. He has caused me to be wrinkled.

He has done this. So he's saying that God is at work. Now, it might not be the way he'd like God to be working at this time, but he is attributing everything to God, which, by the way, is one of the major steps in understanding how you deal with grief and distress and hardship and pain and suffering, is to realize that my God's in control.

He created the day of prosperity as well as the day of adversity. So God is behind this. Job just didn't understand how or why.

And then he says this, verse 7, but now He has exhausted me. You have laid waste all my company. Now most would believe that, as you read through the different commentaries on Job, that this is referring to his family.

He's laid waste his company. In other words, they're no longer around. They're not available.

I think it goes beyond that to even his own wife, right? Remember, she's only on the scene once, and that's to say something to get him to curse God. That's it. It's the only time she speaks, first and last time.

But we forget that Job's wife lost everything just like Job did. So before Job lost his health, she was looking for Job to curse God and die, and all that part and parcel, as he was losing his ability to function as a man because of all the turmoil that was ravaging his body. She had the perfect opportunity to be the suitable helpmate.

You've heard it, for better or for worse. This was the worst. For richer or for poorer, this was the poorest, right? In sickness and in health, this is the sick part.

And you know, when you think about Genesis 2, verse number 18, God looks around and He says, it's not good for man to be alone. So I'm going to make him a suitable helper. You know, when God joins you together, you ladies become the suitable helper to your husband.

But what happens when this protector, this provider for you, who has been there all your life now loses everything that you lose, but now he's lost his health and is incapable of doing anything? Where is she? When he needs her the most, she's not there. She's not present. She's absent, but she could be there.

So the encouragement to you, ladies, is to realize that no matter how strong your man might be, and I'm pretty sure that Job was a strong man. He was a fit man. He got things done.

He was the greatest man on the planet, according to God, but yet when he lost everything, including his own health, all he could do is sit in ash heap and scrape the boils that were oozing with pus day after day after day. He got very little sleep because the pain was so severe, but his wife wasn't even there to touch him and to put her arms around him and to hold his hand. When God gives you a man, and when he gives you a wife, he's given you the perfect helpmate, the suitable helper, and the time you needed the most, are you present? Are you there? Are you available? We need to be there because when God puts two people together, he puts them together and makes them one.

One plus one is one in marriage only. Everywhere else it's two, but not in marriage. One plus one is one.

And Job says, you've exhausted me. You laid waste my company. Those closest to me, they're not here.

I'm all alone. This is his distress. You have shriveled me up.

Your anger has torn me, verse number 9, hunted me down. You've gnashed at me with your teeth. My adversary glares at me.

He sees God as his adversary because he's so against Job in Job's mind. Now, remember, he's not complaining to God. What he's doing is he's voicing that what's happening to him is under the control of God.

They, his three miserable comforters, have gaped at me with their mouth, verse 10. They have slapped me on the cheek with contempt. They have masked themselves against me.

God hands me over to ruffians and tosses me into the hands of the wicked. Wow. Now, listen to this.

This is so important. I was at ease, but he shattered me. Just circle that in your Bible.

I was at ease, but he shattered me. You know, it was, I think it was Teddy Roosevelt who said, there's never been a man who lived a life of ease whose name is worth remembering. Think about that.

Would we ever remember Job if he had not gone through the shattering experience? We wouldn't even know he existed, right? But because he went through the shattering experience, he goes, I was at ease. That's not a negative thing. Things are good for Job.

He was wealthy. He was healthy. His kids were great.

They were walking with the Lord. He had a wife, good income. Things were great.

All of a sudden, all gone. Bang, gone. In a moment, God shattered him.

Because God is learning or teaching Job how it is to truly trust and obey him. Living a life of ease, everybody wants, but what we need is a shattering. Job needed a shattering.

Now, he didn't want a shattering, but he got one. And at the very end, he realizes the blessing of what God was doing, how God was shattering his independence from him to establish his dependence upon him. More about that in a moment.

But you go on and you see that he shattered me, he grasped me, verse 12, he has also set me up as his target. It's his arrows. He splits my kidneys open.

He pours out my gall on the ground. He breaks through me with breach after breach. He runs at me like a warrior.

I'm at war here, and I'm being shred apart because God has made this my day of adversity. This is his distress. He is articulating his agony that the men who are of his comforter should hear and listen and figure out a way how they can better minister to him and serve him and come alongside of him, but that's just not that important to them.

So when you come to verse number 15, you move from Job's disappointment to Job's distress to Job's dependency. I have sewed sackcloth over my skin and thrust my horn in the dust. This is his humility.

I am humbled as to what God has done. He says, my face is flushed with weeping and deep darkness is on my eyelids. This is his agony.

He goes from his humility to his agony to his purity. Although there is no violence in my hands and my prayer is pure, my prayer is pure. O earth, do not cover my blood and let there be no resting place for my cry.

In other words, let there be nothing hidden in my life. He speaks of his integrity, his purity, his agony, and his humility because he's thrown himself all in God. Everything is, Lord, I have nothing.

So I need you. And so he says, even now, behold, my witness is in heaven and my advocate is on high. And he doesn't know Jesus, right? He doesn't know about the mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, right? He doesn't understand those things, but he knows that there's an advocate in heaven.

You see, his dependency is seen by going to God and crying out to God. So important for us to realize that when pain erupts in our lives, the very first place we need to go tells us a lot about what we depend upon. And we need to be going to our knees.

We need to be dropping in humility amidst all of that agony with a pure and holy heart, crying out to God and saying, Lord, Lord, Lord, please intervene. Please help. Please work.

Look at the psalmist in Psalm 130, who says these words, Out of the depths I have cried to you, O Lord. Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications.

That should be our cry. If you, Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? Lord, thanks for not counting all my iniquities. Thanks for not keeping a record of all my iniquities, because if you did, who would be able to stand? But there is forgiveness with thee that thou mayest be feared.

I wait for the Lord. My soul does wait. And in His word do I hope.

My soul waits for the Lord more than the watchman for the morning. Indeed, more than the watchman for the morning. Why? Because it's God's loving kindness that he needs.

So what does Job do? He demonstrates his dependency by saying, Lord, my prayer is for you, is out to you. It comes from a pure heart, a heart set upon God. And then he says, my friends are my scoffers.

My eye weeps to God. Oh, that man might plead with God as a man with his neighbor. That's what he's asking for.

My friends are my scoffers, right? They become my enemies. They become my adversaries. And yet, Lord, my prayer goes out to you.

This is Job's dependency. Here's a man who has nothing. He has no one.

You see, we forget this. We so easily depend upon people around us. We so easily depend upon others to come through for us.

But so many times they're unable to do so. But God always is, always can. He's always available.

He's always there for you to cry out to Him, call upon His name. And that's what Job does. And then when you come down to verse number 22, all the way down to chapter 17, verse number 16, this is Job's despondency.

Listen to this. For when a few years have passed, I shall go the way of no return. My spirit is broken.

My days are extinguished. The grave is ready for me. He's facing the jaws of death.

He's looking right into the grave. He's at a point now where the suffering is so intense. It's so great.

He knows that death is imminent. It's there. So he says, surely mockers are with me, and my eye gazes on their provocation.

Lay down now a pledge for me, speaking back to the Lord, with yourself. Who was there that will be my guarantor? For you have kept their heart from understanding. Therefore, you will not exalt them.

Wow. I wonder what they thought when they heard that one. Lord, you have kept them from understanding.

You have blinded their hearts for them to understand me. And you know what? You're not going to exalt them either. And guess what? God doesn't.

I get to read Job 42. God doesn't exalt them. He can't.

But he does exalt Job. He lifts Job, but not as miserable comforters. Job was speaking prophetically, and then he says this.

He says, he who informs against friends for a share of the spoil, the eyes of his children also will anguish. The effects of your judgment upon me is going to affect your children. But he has made me a byword of the people, and I am one at whom men spit.

Think about that. Job says, I am sitting here in this ash heap, and I am a disgrace to people around me. People walk by and they spit at me.

My eye has also grown dim because of grief, and all my members are as a shadow. The upright will be appalled at this, and the innocent will stir up himself against the godless. Why? Because their belief is very simple.

You are this way because you're wicked. That's why they spit at him. That's why they mock him.

That's why they scoff him. Think about that. Then he says, nevertheless, the righteous will hold to his way, and he who has clean hands will grow stronger and stronger.

Oh, how true that is. Job was growing stronger and stronger. Physically, he wasn't, but the inner man was being renewed day by day because he was a righteous man.

And just as the crisis reveals the true character of a man, so crisis builds courage in the heart of a man. And that's exactly what's happening with Job. The righteous will become more and more courageous.

He says in verse number 10, But come again, all of you now, for I do not find a wise man among you. Not a wise man among you. Sorry, guys.

You're all a bunch of idiots. I wish you guys were smarter, but you're not. He says, my days are past.

My plans are torn apart. Even the wishes of my heart, every plan that I had, every aspiration I had for my children, gone. Every aspiration for my future, gone.

Everything about my family, gone. It's all been destroyed. All my plans have been washed away.

He says, they make night into day, saying the light is near in the presence of darkness. If I look to Sheol, the grave, as my home, I make my bed in the darkness. If I call to the pit, you are my father.

To the worm, my mother and my sister. In other words, he realizes that in the grave, these will be his friends. Because he has no friends.

He says, where now is my hope? And who regards my hope? Not his hope in God. His hope for recovery. His hope for healing.

Because he's at the point where he says, you know what? I'm at the end. The grave is open. Death is right around the corner.

And I'm ready. Will it go down with me to Sheol? Shall we together go down into the dust? That's how he ends. Great despondency.

Why? The end is near. That's how he sees it. And you know, I'm not there.

I'm not Job. I don't know how he's feeling. Physically.

I can only imagine. But emotionally, what's happening in his life? The man is struggling greatly. But I want you to notice four things that God is doing in Job's life.

That God wants to do in all of our lives through chapter 16 and 17. Very, very important. See, Job is... He can't read Job chapter 42.

No, he's living chapter 16 and 17 as we speak. He can't see the future. He doesn't know the future, right? We know it.

So we say, Job, hang on. You're going to make it. It's going to be okay.

A few more days and it's going to be all right. We know the end. Job doesn't know the end.

In the midst of his pain, all he can see is death, agony, disappointment, distress, despondency. That's all he sees. Because he can't see tomorrow.

Why? Because in the day of adversity which God has created, He creates it so man will not be in control of what happens tomorrow or the next day or his future. And Job is completely out of control. He's not controlling anything.

First of all, he has nothing to control. It's all gone, right? And he can't control his health because there's no medication, no medicine, no IV, nothing that he can put in the system that will help heal him. He's in complete and total pain.

And so in the prison of his pain, in the darkness of his despair, he says some things that maybe if he could take them back, maybe he would. But note this, our God understands the heart of Job. And one author says this, that because God understands, He lovingly turns a deaf ear to our words, but a tender eye toward our wounds.

Isn't that good? Turns a deaf ear to our words, but a tender eye toward our wounds. God knows what's going on. He knows your pain.

He's not an ogre upstairs that says, sometimes we think that's the way it is, but it's not. God is so good. And what God is doing in Job's life is exactly the thing He wants to do in your life.

And number one is this, He wants to redirect your dependency. Job says, I was at ease and God shattered me. You know, it's so easy for us to be dependent upon what we can see.

We become so dependent upon our education or our wit or our ability to do whatever it is we do, right? We live the life of ease when our checking account is full, right? We live a life of ease. Things are good. I can handle it.

I can do this, right? But God is slowly redirecting Job's… It's not that Job was dependent upon all the money he had, all the camels he had, all the servants he had, but God is always showing we must depend solely upon Him and nothing else. And just when we think we are dependent upon God, God shows us that we're really not dependent upon Him. Because how many of us really truly lean upon God for everything? Do you lean upon God for your mortgage payment, your gas payment? Do you lean upon God for your family, your husband, your wife? Do you really trust Him and depend upon Him for everything? God wants us to walk in the Spirit so we don't feel the lust of the flesh.

He wants us to lean completely upon Him, trust Him for everything. We tend not to. We trust Him for our salvation, right? We trust Him to be saved.

We trust Him to forgive us our sins. We trust Him to take us to heaven, but we can't trust Him for our job. We can't trust Him for our family.

We can't trust Him for what's going to happen tomorrow. We get saved and we live as practical atheists as if God doesn't even exist. How do we know that? We spend very little time in prayer, very little time in prayer, very little time on our knees.

If we were dependent upon God, we would pray without ceasing. We'd be on our knees. We'd be in our closets.

We'd be seeking the throne of grace day in and day out. We'd be in the Word of God because we want to know more about the God we serve. We'd be trusting Him every single day, leaning upon Him for everything.

But so many times we just go through the day as if He doesn't even exist. We don't even offer up a prayer. We just do what we do.

You know, life is less about action and more about reaction, right? How we react to those things round about us. Because so many times we crumble, we stumble, we fall apart when a crisis comes, but God wants us dependent upon Him for everything. And God is slowly but surely redirecting Job toward Himself, totally, fully.

The Bible says in Psalm 20 verse number 7, that some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will trust in the name of the Lord our God. They are brought down and fall, but we rise up and stand firm. Who are the ones who rise up and stand firm? The ones who trust only in God.

So when you talk about horses and chariots, you're talking about a man's army, a man's warrior capabilities, a man's ability to go into combat with security because he has all the horses and the chariots that he needs. It's all about the man-made things, and we trust in those things. We trust in our car to get us to work.

We don't trust in the Lord to get us to work, just our car, right? We trust in the material things. And God says, I want you to trust in Me, because those who trust in chariots and horses, they're going to fall. But those who trust in the name of the Lord their God, they're going to rise up, they're going to stand firm.

And God is slowly but surely redirecting Job's dependency. And that's what happens in your life. Next time you go through a hardship, next time you go through a pain, next time you go through times of great distress, know that God has created the day of adversity as well.

Why? Because God is driving you to Himself. Don't resist it. We want to resist it.

We want to kick and scream. Why? No, not now. God says, come, lean on Me, trust Me, wait on Me, and watch and see what I will do.

So as God is redirecting Job's dependency, the same He's doing for you and me when we go through adverse circumstances and painful experiences. And number two, He's also revealing Job's spirituality. Because in a time of crisis, the real spiritual nature either rises or falls.

And that's exactly what is happening in Job's life. He's a man who trusts in his God, who works for his God. Over in 1 Peter chapter 1, Peter says these words, 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 soul, of your faith, the salvation of your soul. Peter says, I know you're suffering. I know you're suffering.

I know your trial is very timely and very taxing, but know this, you rejoice with joy exceedingly. About 17 years ago, I was going through 1 Peter, preaching through it, and the sermon, the title of the book was, Hope for Those Who Hurt, because Peter was addressing people who were suffering. I mean, after all, they were being burned as torches in Nero's gardens, and they were being wrapped in pitch and thrown…wrapped in animal skin and thrown to the lions and being shred apart, and all these Christians could hear the screams of all their loved ones at night as they were being burned, and the smell of flesh was everywhere.

And Peter says, in this you greatly rejoice. And I was sharing this with this couple who came to me because they were having such difficulty in their family. And so, I was reading through 1 Peter chapter 1, and I read this to them.

I said, you know, the great thing about this is that you can learn to rejoice in the Lord. And she looked at me and she says, how dare you say that to me? I said, I didn't say it to you. Jesus said it to you.

I didn't say it. I'm just quoting it. Don't shoot the messenger, you know.

She goes, how dare you say it to me? You don't know what we've gone through. I said, I really don't. I have no idea.

The Lord does. She was so angry. She got up, knocked my chair over, ran out of my office, and never came back again.

Her husband was kind of left dumbfounded. Of course, he didn't know what to do, so he followed his wife out and left the church as well. Just because they were unwilling to understand that God was doing a great and mighty work.

And they were unwilling to bow in submission to His authority. But you see, God was revealing their spiritual life. That's what happens.

God reveals your spirituality in times of crisis. And that's unfortunate. Remember when Abraham was up on top of Mount Moriah? And he was supposed to slay his only son of his love, Isaac? As he began to tie him up and slay his son, the angel of the Lord stopped him.

And God said to him, now I know that you fear my name. You mean to tell me God doesn't know something? God didn't know that Abraham feared Him? Oh no, God knew. But Abraham had to know that He feared Him.

So important. Over in the book of Deuteronomy, the eighth chapter, listen to what the Lord says to Israel. You shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years.

Forty years in the wilderness. Forty years traveling around. Hot desert.

You ever been to Sinai? Hot place. Dirty. Dusty.

Hot. Cold at night. Forty years.

That He might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart. God was testing you. Did God not know what was in their heart? Oh no, God knew.

They needed to know what their heart was like. It just took them forty years to get to know their hearts. See? Remember Hezekiah? Hezekiah.

More written about this king than any other king except for David and Solomon. Hezekiah. He was going to die.

So we asked for a little longer to live. So Isaiah says, God gave you fifteen more years. That's unfortunate.

But he got fifteen more years. Because he would have a son in those last fifteen years. The most wicked king in the history of Israel.

Manasseh. If he would have died and not lived, no Manasseh. But he asked for more time to live and God granted it to him.

The Bible says these words in 2 Chronicles 32 verse number 31. It says, Even the matter of the envoys of the rulers of Babylon who sent to him to inquire of the wonder that had happened in the land, God left him alone only to test him that he might know all that was in his heart. God tested Hezekiah.

Because Hezekiah needed to know how depraved his heart really was. Because he would begin to swell up with pride of all the things that had happened. And God tested him.

Not because God didn't know. God knows. But you didn't know.

So you go through these adverse circumstances. You see, God is in the process of revealing your spirituality. You need to understand this.

I've shared this with you before, but I thought it would be advantageous to share it with you again. Ernest Hemingway was wounded in the First World War. And author Ben Patterson tells us that the doctors picked 237 pieces of shrapnel out of his body.

As might be expected, he never forgot that experience. But it was not so much the memory of the pain that stayed with him, it was how close he had come to death. He felt that it set him apart from the rest of the human race for the remainder of his life.

He recalled that the men who shared the experience with him in the convalescent hospital, some of them with faces reconstructed, iridescent and shiny from the work of the plastic surgeons, they too were set apart by their brush with death. They too were suspicious of anyone who had not had the same shattering encounter. Other people seemed trivial and shallow by comparison.

From this, Hemingway derived a formula for his novels. Put a good man into a situation where he comes face to face with death, in the arena fighting the bull or in combat, then you will see him in his truest and deepest dimensions. You will find out just how good he really is.

The trial will not make or break him, but the trial will reveal him. How true he was. The trial reveals you, reveals the condition of your soul.

And what is happening is that God is revealing the condition of Job's soul, so he knows where he's at. So as God is redirecting his dependency, as God is revealing his spirituality, God is also reestablishing his humility. His humility.

His dependence upon God, but his humility before his God. That's what suffering does. It humbles us.

Remember 2 Corinthians 12, we talked about Paul's thorn in the flesh? We read that and we think that a thorn is like a little briar that we get when we prick our finger on a thorn bush, right? That's a thorn in his side. No, no, no, no. The translation is stake.

A stake driven into his flesh. A stake driven into his side. Not just a little prick, but something that was just jammed in there.

That was given to him as a messenger of Satan to buffet him. Why? Why? He says, so that I will not exalt myself. Could it be that Paul had a problem with pride? And he asked three times, Lord, remove the stake.

Remove it. Get it out of my body. I need to have relief.

And the Lord said, no, not going to do it. And he knew it remained because it would keep him from exalting himself. Here was a man who was clad up in the third heaven, had all these visions.

God had spoken to him face to face, came face to face with the living God on the road to Damascus, writing all these epistles. God kept the mumble. Why? Because that's what he needed.

Like Job, his humility reestablished. You see, when you come to Christ, you got to be humble, right? God, be merciful unto me, a sinner. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Those who have broken over to sin. That's a humble person. You don't come to Christ because of your arrogance and your pride and that you're great and God needs you in His kingdom and that you can do all kinds of things wonderful for God in His kingdom.

So here I am, Lord. Use me. I'm yours.

No, you come broken over your sin. You say, Lord, be merciful unto me, a sinner. And God saves us.

But sometimes we can get a little full of ourselves. So God has to reestablish that humility. How does He do that? The shattering process, the suffering process, the breaking process, like He did with Job.

I don't think Job was an arrogant man. I mean, I would hope not. But even though he was the greatest man on the planet, greatest man in the East, nobody greater than Job, but God reestablishes humility.

And lastly, lastly, Job had to recognize God's sovereignty. Did he? Yes, he did. But he had to not just to recognize it visually.

He had to recognize it inwardly, his heart. And that's why he cries out. He has gnashed me.

He has come against me. He has fought and fought against me as a warrior. It's He who is my adversary.

Because he recognized that in the day of adversity, God created that day. And he humbly submit to it. How about you? Next time you go through those stressful times, painful times, lonely times, those times of suffering and pain, God's doing something.

He's going to reestablish your dependency upon Him. He's going to make sure that He redirects everything in your life that you might lean completely upon Him. He wants to reestablish your humility.

He wants you to be humble before Him. God resists the proud. He gives grace to the humble.

So, when you go through a time of suffering and you find no relief, ask yourself, am I prideful? Am I arrogant? Because God resists the proud, but He does give grace to the humble. So, you ask yourself, am I humble? Am I bound in submission to my God? Humbly seeking His face. God wants you to recognize His sovereignty in the day of adversity.

God is always at work. He's never not at work in your life. That's how much He loves you.

Let's pray together. Father, thank You for tonight. A chance to briefly look into the Word of the Lord.

None of us can really begin to understand the agony of Job. But we marvel at the man's composure amidst that pain and agony. How can you ever muster up a sentence, let alone two chapters worth? But He does.

We know, Lord, what You're going to do in His life at the end. We're just saying, Job, just hang in there. You're going to make it.

It's going to happen. Wait. Just wait.

And, Lord, none of us knows the end of our life either. We don't know what God's going to do tomorrow, next week, next month. Next year.

We have no idea. We think we know, but we don't. Only You know that.

Help us to trust You, hope in You only. And just wait for You to show us who You are and what You're going to do. We pray in Your name.

Amen.