The Book of Job

SERMONS ON SUFFERING

JOB OUTLINEDShock and Sorrow (Job Responds)Struggle (Job and Friends wRestle)Surrender (God Revealed through Elihu)Sanctification (God Reveals Himself)Service (God Reverses Job’s life)

2 EXPLANATIONS FOR SUFFERING

1. To demonstrate God’s victory over Satan

2. To refine faith

REFINE AND HEAL

Not an executioner’s whip….

But a surgeon’s scalpel!

37:2 “Listen to the roar….rumbling of His mouth”

ELIHU: A GATHERING STORM

38:1 Then the LORD answered Job out of the storm…

GOD SPEAKS

GOD SPEAKS1. 4 chapters2. Job is asked 56 questions.(80 % of questions are statements

in disguise.)

GOD SPEAKS1. Names 24 environmental

phenomena

2. Names 12 animals

lion raven mt. goat

deer donkey ostrich

stork horse hawk

Eagle _____ _______

storms planet angels morning

dawn light springs expanse

snow hail lightening wind

rain desert dew ice

stars rivers clouds sea

lakes grass frost seasons

ENVIRONMENT ANIMALS38:1-38 38:39 – 40:24

GOD SPEAKSGod of power

“More than meets the eye.”

JOB IS GETTING IT

40:4-5 “I am unworthy- how can I reply to you? I put my hand over my mouth. I spoke once, but I have no answer –twice, but I will say no more.”

JOB IS GETTING ITa finite creature who has no wisdom to run this world and is utterly ignorant of 99.999% of its processes has no business instructing his Maker and Ruler how to run the world or even condemning God for the way he runs it.

GOD SPEAKSGod of Justice:

[Job, can you] “Look at every proud man and bring him low…” (40:11)

GOD SPEAKS: TWO MORE ANIMALS

behemoth (beast par exellence)leviathan (large marine creature)

DINOSAURS IN THE BIBLE?

Behemoth and Leviathan

Figurative or……?

JOB’S CONFESSION

42:2-6 “I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted… surely I spoke of things I did not understand…

JOB’S CONFESSION

My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you.

JOB’S CONFESSION

Therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes.”

GOD’S ABSOLUTION“my eyes have seen you”19:25 ff. “my redeemer lives…I myself will see him with my own eyes…”

WHAT GOD DOESN’T SAY:

A word about Job’s suffering

A word about Job’s righteousness

A word about Job’s losses

WHAT GOD DOES SAYThis is so much bigger and more complex than you can possibly imagine

It all happens for a reason, MY reason… though YOU might not get it all

I am involved in it all, I am involved in your life

WHAT GOD DOES SAY

All this I do out of LOVE.

I am your REDEEMER, you cannot save yourself