There was a Day | Part 2
One ordinary day, Job lost everything—his wealth, his health, and even his family. How can anyone survive such devastation without turning away from God? In this episode, we step into Job’s story and discover how his response speaks into our own trials. Don’t miss this powerful look at what real faith looks like when life falls apart.
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Transcript
Welcome to the Fortifying youg Family podcast.
Speaker A:It can be daunting to navigate through an anti marriage and family culture.
Speaker A:Our teacher will expound biblical principles to help fortify our families and keep these sacred institutions strong.
Speaker A:And now, here's this week's teaching from Sam Wood.
Speaker B:God knows that it's necessary for the world to see that man's worship and love for him is in no way dependent upon what he has done for man.
Speaker B:So he allows it to prove Satan is wrong.
Speaker B:Peter says something very similar.
Speaker B:If you remembered in First Peter chapter one and verse six and seven, he says, wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, you're in heaviness, heaviness through manifold temptations.
Speaker B:Here's why.
Speaker B:Verse 7.
Speaker B:That the trial of your faith being much more precious than that 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.
Speaker B:At the appearing of Jesus Christ, the whole world will see that the suffering Christian stood fast in his faith.
Speaker B:Even through the mistake, even through enduring severe trials, the suffering Christian shows the universe that God is worthy of all worship, even when God's blessings are taken away.
Speaker B:Lloyd Jones calls this the acid test of Christianity, that the true Christian stays faithful to God even when it appears that God is nowhere to be found, nowhere around.
Speaker B:Christopher Ash adds, he says, the glory of God is more important than you are my or Job's comfort.
Speaker B:Satan has a ministry.
Speaker B:It is the ministry of opposition, the ministry of insisting that the genuineness of the believer be tested and proved genuine.
Speaker B:It is a hostile and malicious ministry, but a necessary ministry for the glory of God.
Speaker B:Therefore, to prove to the universe that Job's faith, Job's love for God is genuine, God says in verse 12, look at it with me.
Speaker B:And the Lord said unto Satan, behold all that he hath is in thy power only upon him, put not forth thine hand.
Speaker B:So Satan went forth from the presence of the Lord.
Speaker B:So we see in the next scene, in this earthly scene, that God allows Satan to take all, all of Job's worldly possessions, everything he has, and even allows him to kill all of his children.
Speaker B:You know, when I think and I reflect on that, we know the whole story.
Speaker B:But if you were living this out real time, you were actually living this out, I can't imagine how somebody could bear that.
Speaker B:To lose all of that in a day, to lose 10 children in one single day, I can't imagine what that would be like.
Speaker B:I don't want to Imagine what that would be like.
Speaker B:Do you?
Speaker B:What a day.
Speaker B:There was a day.
Speaker B:But how does Job respond?
Speaker B:Look at verse 20.
Speaker B:Then Job arose and rent his mantle and shaved his head and fell upon the ground, and worshipped and said, naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither.
Speaker B:The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away.
Speaker B:Blessed be the name of the Lord.
Speaker B:In all this, Job sinned not nor charged God foolishly.
Speaker B:Again, all I can say is, wow, what a response after going through what he has went through.
Speaker B:Even in the final scene, when Satan has taken away Job's health and Job's wife even comes to him and says, why don't you just curse God and die?
Speaker B:Job answers in chapter 2 and verse 10, Thou speakest as one of the foolish women speaketh.
Speaker B:What shall we receive good at the hand of God?
Speaker B:And shall we not receive evil?
Speaker B:All this.
Speaker B:Did not Job sin with his lips?
Speaker B:There's so much.
Speaker B:We could elaborate on all of this story here tonight.
Speaker B:We could really preach on this for weeks.
Speaker B:But let me close by drawing several important conclusions here tonight that I think would be helpful to us here tonight.
Speaker B:The first one, as I read through this, I thought Job is the extreme example of human suffering somebody could go through in this world.
Speaker B:And it's very interesting, I think to myself, why is Job going through all of this?
Speaker B:I think it points to the fact that nobody in this world, no human being in this world, has went through suffering like Job.
Speaker B:Sure, we go through a lot of different kinds of suffering.
Speaker B:A parent might lose a child, you might lose your wealth, you might lose your house, you might lose a lot of things.
Speaker B:But Job literally lost everything he had.
Speaker B:He lost all of his wealth.
Speaker B:He lost every child.
Speaker B:Listen, he lost his health.
Speaker B:He's sitting down with a potsherd, scraping boils from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet.
Speaker B:And if that isn't bad enough, his wife comes to him and says, she's really encouraging, why don't you just curse God and die?
Speaker B:I mean, that's about as bad as it can get.
Speaker B:That's one conclusion.
Speaker B:I think God is setting it up and saying, listen, here's an example of suffering for you.
Speaker B:And I don't think you're going to see an example in this world that's worse than this example that you're seeing in the person of Job.
Speaker B:Now, here's another thing in this story, another conclusion I want to share with you.
Speaker B:Job never asked God the question, what anybody knows, why isn't that Interesting.
Speaker B:If you go through the Book of Job, he never asked God why.
Speaker B:And notice if you go through the Book of Job, you read through the Book of Job, that God never offers Job an explanation except that he is God and Job is not.
Speaker B:That's really about the only explanation that God gives to Job, but he really does never give him an explanation.
Speaker B:But let me add that the big answer to the question we so often ask that is the question why?
Speaker B:The answer to that question is because of evil and suffering are the result of sin.
Speaker B:Sin because of our sin, because of our fathers and mothers.
Speaker B:Sin in the Garden of Eden because of Adam and Eve and their disobedience to God.
Speaker B:And in the Garden of Eden because of sin, we have suffering.
Speaker B:Suffering is a result of sin.
Speaker B:However, because of sin, man tries to answer also in his depravity, the question of suffering.
Speaker B:I think in two ways.
Speaker B:And let me just share with you here tonight, I think it's helpful.
Speaker B:And the first one is the religious person's answer to suffering.
Speaker B:The religious person's answer to suffering.
Speaker B:The religious person's answer is to ask the question, why is God punishing me?
Speaker B:What am I doing wrong?
Speaker B:So they strive, the religious person strives, thinking that God is punishing them, to be more moral.
Speaker B:We might say, in their life, I'm sick.
Speaker B:Maybe it's not it's because I don't have enough faith.
Speaker B:Or maybe it's because I've sin.
Speaker B:If I'm experiencing financial difficulties, maybe I'm not believing God enough in my finances.
Speaker B:They start saying things like, maybe I need to go to church more, maybe I need to pray more.
Speaker B:I'm not praying enough.
Speaker B:I'm not reading my Bible enough.
Speaker B:Maybe if I start doing the right things, God will love me more, God will bless me more, and I won't suffer as much.
Speaker B:Now, before I continue, let me add that we should search our hearts when we're going through trials and tribulations to make sure that we have not sinned against God.
Speaker B:Because it does say in Hebrews chapter 12 that God will chasten those sons whom he loves.
Speaker B:And that is if we have sinned against God.
Speaker B:God says because he loves us, he's a loving father, that he will chasten us for our sins.
Speaker B:But many times there are dear saints of God, like this man we're reading about here tonight, named Job, where there is no sin.
Speaker B:Their life.
Speaker B:God is not punishing them because they are sinful.
Speaker B:God is showing that they are faithful in the midst of trials and tribulations because they are Genuine, because they genuinely love God, I remind you.
Speaker B:And I can't help think about it, since I preach a message on it.
Speaker B:In Isaiah, chapter 50 and verse 10, it says these words, who is among you?
Speaker B:That fear?
Speaker B:It is the word feareth the Lord.
Speaker B:Here's a man, Job, who feared God, who's among you, that feareth the Lord, who obeys the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness and hath no light.
Speaker B:Exactly where Job is right now.
Speaker B:Who is among you, it says in Isaiah, chapter 50.
Speaker B:Like that says, let him stay upon his God.
Speaker B:Let him keep leaning upon God.
Speaker B:So sometimes, certainly there can be times when someone might suffer, sometimes when somebody might go through trials and tribulations because of sin in their life or God is chastening them.
Speaker B:But many times there's dear saints just like Job here that go through tremendous times of trial and tribulation, who are dear to the heart of God that God may have pointed down and said, have you considered my servant?
Speaker B:Because he is a man, she is a woman that loves me.
Speaker B:They're a person of integrity.
Speaker B:There's a person who fears God, who is upright, who eschews evil.
Speaker B:Have you considered them?
Speaker B:So the religious person might answer the question of why by saying, I need to be a better person.
Speaker B:And then maybe I wouldn't go through this suffering.
Speaker B:But then there's the cynical person's answer.
Speaker B:And where the religious person sees suffering as punishment, the cynic sees suffering as being random.
Speaker B:We might say, Cynical people might say, see, if there was a God, he would never allow us to go through this.
Speaker B:Or perhaps he's just indifferent to my suffering.
Speaker B:If there's really a God in heaven, then he's indifferent to me.
Speaker B:He doesn't really care care about me.
Speaker B:He's not loving.
Speaker B:He's not compassionate.
Speaker B:Cynicism is based on the idea that nobody is in charge, that life is just totally random.
Speaker B:It's just a matter of chance that this happens to you or this happens to me.
Speaker B:There's not a good, there's not a powerful, there's not a sovereign God in heaven that's in charge of everything.
Speaker B:That's the cynic.
Speaker B:In fact, in his book, and you've probably heard of this book, when Bad Things Happen to Good People, Rabbi Harold Kushner solves the problem of suffering this way.
Speaker B:He says God is like a grandmaster taking on a room of amateur chess players.
Speaker B:Usually he wins the game against all comers, but once in a while, an amateur wins in the same way.
Speaker B:God wins most of the games, but not all of them.
Speaker B:But does a God, Does a Bible?
Speaker B:Does God allow for this kind of thinking in his Word?
Speaker B:Certainly not.
Speaker B:No.
Speaker B:The Bible teaches that God is sovereign over the affairs of man, that God is in charge of everything that happens to us.
Speaker B:G. Campbell Morgan says he Satan cannot touch a hair upon the back of a single camel that belonged to Job until he has divine permission.
Speaker B:That Satan does what he is told.
Speaker B:No more and no less.
Speaker B:So the story of Job tells us that both of these approaches to answering the question of suffering really are incorrect.
Speaker B:They're really wrong.
Speaker B:In the story of Job, we see that God permits suffering, but God is in control of it.
Speaker B:God limits it.
Speaker B:And God offers no explanation for it.
Speaker B:I like what Tim Keller says in his writings on suffering.
Speaker B:He's written much about suffering.
Speaker B:He says that God permits suffering to prove that we are free lovers of God.
Speaker B:He says the Screwtape letters are based on the book of Job, from what he can tell, because the devils are always saying, there's no such thing as love.
Speaker B:There's no such thing as love.
Speaker B:There's no such thing as love.
Speaker B:Yet they know the reason their enemy, Jesus Christ, often puts his disciples through the wringer is Screwtape says he wants to turn them into free lovers.
Speaker B:That's the only way to become a free lover, someone who loves God for himself alone.
Speaker B:He continues and says, what are you being called to?
Speaker B:You're being called to stay in a relationship with a God you can't control.
Speaker B:Accept and embrace the mystery of not knowing why you're suffering, not expecting you'll ever know and realize that is a way for you to learn to love God for himself and for himself alone.
Speaker B:I believe he's saying that God allows us to suffer to prove Satan wrong and to show the universe around us, the world around us, that we freely love God for who he is, not for what we get from Him.
Speaker B:God does not tell us why, because if he does, and our motivation for why we are enduring the suffering will change.
Speaker B:God desires free lovers.
Speaker B:Listen.
Speaker B: ,: Speaker B:You would be here listening, and he would be used as an example in the word of God of how to endure suffering.
Speaker B:He knew nothing about that.
Speaker B:God is using all of this for the glory of God.
Speaker B:So this brings up a question too.
Speaker B:How does Job then handle it?
Speaker B:How does he handle suffering?
Speaker B:Look back with me at what he says.
Speaker B:In chapter one and verse 20.
Speaker B:This is so enlightening, I think, and so helpful.
Speaker B:Then Job arose and rent his mantle and shaved his head and fell down upon the ground and worshiped.
Speaker B:The first thing we see there is Job was emotionally real.
Speaker B:He was emotionally real.
Speaker B:Job didn't internalize his suffering.
Speaker B:He didn't deny his suffering that he was experiencing.
Speaker B:Job literally tore his clothes off, he shaved his head, he fell on the ground and.
Speaker B:And he cried out to God.
Speaker B:And that's about what you would expect anybody to do that went through what he went through or went through this kind of torment in his life.
Speaker B:He was totally emotionally distraught.
Speaker B:And even in all that emotional distress, he still didn't sin against God.
Speaker B:It says, and to me, with that saying, the Bible is saying to us that it's okay to cry, it's okay to grieve.
Speaker B:It's okay in the midst of pain and suffering to.
Speaker B:To be emotionally real before God.
Speaker B:God understands, and it's not a sin to do that.
Speaker B:But not only was he emotionally real, he was theologically real too.
Speaker B:Look at verse 21.
Speaker B:These.
Speaker B:This is rich here says.
Speaker B:And he said, naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither.
Speaker B:The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away.
Speaker B:Blessed be the name of the Lord and all this.
Speaker B:Job sinned not nor charge God for foolishly.
Speaker B:Notice what he doesn't say and what he does say, he doesn't say, God, the things that you took from me were mine.
Speaker B:The houses of children I had were mine, and you had no right to take them.
Speaker B:He doesn't say that.
Speaker B:What he does say is, naked I came out of my mother's womb.
Speaker B:Naked shall I return thither.
Speaker B:He is saying that he came into this world helpless.
Speaker B:He came to this world without anything.
Speaker B:He was totally like a newborn baby without anything.
Speaker B:He didn't have a rattle.
Speaker B:He had nothing.
Speaker B:He came into this world without lands.
Speaker B:Joseph said, I didn't have any land when I came to this world.
Speaker B:I came to this world without sheep.
Speaker B:I came to this world without cattle, without houses, without a wife, without any of my children.
Speaker B:I was naked.
Speaker B:He says, and he admits to God that since every possession he has was from the grace of God, that God has every right to take some or even all of it back.
Speaker B:He looks at all he has as gifts, total gifts of God's grace.
Speaker B:And he says, I will also leave this world in the same way I came into it.
Speaker B:I will leave it the way I came into it.
Speaker B:I came in with Nothing.
Speaker B:And I will leave with nothing.
Speaker B:I cannot take it with me.
Speaker B:You know what Job is saying here?
Speaker B:He's saying, I completely trust in the sovereignty of God.
Speaker B:He is saying, the Creator does not owe the creation an explanation except to trust him, whatever we may go through.
Speaker B:In fact, later in the book of Job, you know the verse possibly.
Speaker B:He said, though he slay me, he yet will I still what church?
Speaker B:I will still trust him.
Speaker B:Job's suffering was living proof that his life was built on God.
Speaker B:Not on money, not on his health, not on his family, not on his friends, not on anything else.
Speaker B:His life was totally built on God.
Speaker B:And I believe that's what suffering is.
Speaker B:It takes away from us earthly things that we're finding our happiness in to show us that the thing that we should be treasuring all of us the most is God's love for us.
Speaker B:Therefore, suffering drives us into a deeper experience of God's love in a way that we've never ever experienced it before.
Speaker B:I believe that's why it says, at the beginning of the book of James counted all what church?
Speaker B:Joy.
Speaker B:Kind of no joy when we fall into divers temptations.
Speaker B:I know I've explained that verse before, but that word fall means when it's like I'm stepping off this stage and something unexpectedly happens in your life.
Speaker B:It's like you're up on top of the mountain like Job was, and all of a sudden you walk off a cliff and you fall to the bottom and everything is turned upside down.
Speaker B:God says, count it all joy when this happens.
Speaker B:And certainly we can't count it all joy if we're not trusting in God and we don't look at God as a sovereign God.
Speaker B:If we can't say what Job said.
Speaker B:Naked I came into this world in my mother's womb, and naked I will return.
Speaker B:Naked I'll go listen.
Speaker B:As I close, let me say that I believe the reason we all have a hard time handling suffering is that we have believed and continue to believe the lie that Satan whispers in our ear.
Speaker B:You say, what lie are you talking about?
Speaker B:I'm talking about the lie that God does not love us.
Speaker B:I believe that's a lie that Satan continually will try to whisper to us.
Speaker B:Especially if we're going through trials and temptations and we're going through suffering.
Speaker B:God doesn't really love you, you see.
Speaker B:The lie that Satan came to our parents with in the garden is that same lie.
Speaker B:Do you remember Genesis, chapter three?
Speaker B:He told Adam and Eve, God doesn't really love you if he did he wouldn't limit you.
Speaker B:God is just using you.
Speaker B:It's the exact same lie that he told Adam and Eve in the garden.
Speaker B:They listened to Satan's lie and they were seduced by this lie of Satan that if God really loves you, he wouldn't limit you.
Speaker B:Therefore, they sinned against God and plunged themselves and they plunged mankind into sin and suffering.
Speaker B:So what do we need to do to endure suffering?
Speaker B:I believe we really need to believe that God loves us.
Speaker B:We've got to embrace the love of God.
Speaker B:So how does God prove his love to us?
Speaker B:We might ask.
Speaker B:You know the answer to that.
Speaker B:Centuries later, Satan assaulted another innocent sufferer who actually ended up dying naked on a cross.
Speaker B:He cried out, why am I suffering?
Speaker B:And he got no answer from God.
Speaker B:Who was it?
Speaker B:It was the Lord Jesus Christ.
Speaker B:The difference is that when Job suffered, he was only relatively innocent.
Speaker B:But when Jesus Christ, the son of God, suffered, he was completely innocent.
Speaker B:When Job felt he was abandoned by God, he never was abandoned by God.
Speaker B:God never left Job as we see in the lat chapters of the Book of Job.
Speaker B:But Jesus was abandoned by God.
Speaker B:In fact, Jesus is the only person in history to whom God said, if you obey me, I'll turn my back on you and you will experience absolute separation from my face.
Speaker B:If you obey me, I'll send you to hell in their place.
Speaker B:God never said that to any other human being except Jesus Christ.
Speaker B:Jesus Christ is the only person who ever served God.
Speaker B:Truly for nothing.
Speaker B:Why did he do it?
Speaker B:To save you and I from our sin.
Speaker B:That's our proof.
Speaker B:And if you're a Job sitting here tonight, if you're suffering and have no idea why, and from what you can tell, it's not because of any sin that you've committed.
Speaker B:You need to see the ultimate Job.
Speaker B:We need to look to the ultimate Job, the true Job.
Speaker B:We need to look to Jesus Christ, the true innocent sufferer, when he died on the cross for us.
Speaker B:That proves Satan is an absolute liar.
Speaker B:Because God incarnate was willing to love us just for who we are in ourselves.
Speaker B:He didn't get anything out of it.
Speaker B:Jesus is God and already had all the glory.
Speaker B:He loved us for who we are in ourselves.
Speaker B:Depraved, wretched sinners without hope.
Speaker B:So you and I need to love him for who he is in himself.
Speaker B:Jesus Christ suffered not that we would suffer, but that when we suffer, we would become more like him.
Speaker B:That's why it says in 1st Peter 2:21 for even hereunto were ye called because Christ also suffered.
Speaker B:For us, leaving us what example that you should follow in his steps.
Speaker A:Thank you for joining the Fortifying youg Family podcast, and if you feel encouraged by today's teaching, give us a follow so we can invite you back and share us on your socials so more marriages and families can be strengthened and fortified through the truths of God's Word.
Speaker A:Remember, fortifying your family starts with a strong belief in God's Word.
