There Was a Man | Part 1
In a culture that often downplays fatherhood, this episode looks to Job—an earthly father who reflected the heart of our Heavenly Father. Discover what made Job a man of integrity, compassion, and deep reverence for God—and how today’s dads can model those same traits. Whether you're a father or someone impacted by one, this message will challenge and encourage you to live a life that leaves will leave a godly legacy.
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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:Despite what the world says today, what an awesome blessing it is to have children.
Speaker B:But as much as we dads love our children, God loves His children with even a greater love.
Speaker B:Because God loves His children with a perfect love.
Speaker B:As much as I try to love my children the way I do and in the power of the Holy Spirit and grace that God gives me, certainly God that much more loves his children with a perfect love.
Speaker B:He calls us in the word of God.
Speaker B:And I love, I love it in the New Testament when God says and calls us and describes us as his dear children.
Speaker B:Isn't that a wonderful thing to think?
Speaker B:You're a dear child of God and there's no greater father that we could look to certainly than our Heavenly Father.
Speaker B:And I believe that's why Jesus takes the word Father and holds it like a picture frame, we might say to frame our concept of God with using the word Father.
Speaker B:For example, Jesus never preached a sermon.
Speaker B:Think about this.
Speaker B:Without mentioning the word Father, he never spoke a prayer without it being in the prayer at least once.
Speaker B:The first recorded sentence of Jesus life was, know you not, know you not that I am about the Father's business.
Speaker B:The last recorded sentence in Jesus life was, father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.
Speaker B:Over 150 times in the Gospels, God is called Father.
Speaker B:Over 275 times in the New Testament, God is called our Father.
Speaker B:God's love, folks, is a father's love that wants the best for all of his children.
Speaker B:God's wisdom is a father's wisdom that always knows what is best, despite what we might think for all of his children.
Speaker B:And God's power is a father's power that is always able to do what what is best for all of his children.
Speaker B:The question as I think about that, as I contemplate on what I'm sharing with you here to begin with as an introduction here this morning, the thing I ask to myself is the question, how can I be an earthly father?
Speaker B:That is a reflection of my heavenly Father to my children.
Speaker B:And I believe that's a question certainly that every dad should ask.
Speaker B:Dad, your children need to see the love of God in your fatherhood.
Speaker B:They need to see the compassion of God in your fatherhood.
Speaker B:They need to see the forgiveness of God in your fatherhood, they need to see the wisdom of God in your fatherhood.
Speaker B:As I began to think on that, I began to think and ask God and say, God, where is it in the Bible that really pictures this in a wonderful way?
Speaker B:And as I began to think about that, God showed me an example of an earthly father that I believe pictures these characteristics that are reflection of our heavenly Father.
Speaker B:And I believe that's in the little book named Job.
Speaker B:And so I want to look at him this morning.
Speaker B:If you would turn with me to Job, chapter one.
Speaker B:And I'm just going to read the first five verses.
Speaker B:And we want to look at Job this morning and what it means to be a godly father.
Speaker B:Job 1:1.
Speaker B:I'll read down through verse 5.
Speaker B:There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job.
Speaker B:And that man was perfect and upright.
Speaker B:And one that feared God eschewed evil.
Speaker B:And there were born unto him seven sons and three daughters.
Speaker B:His substance also was 7,000 sheep and 3,000 camels and 500 yoke of oxen and 500 she asses and a very great household.
Speaker B:So that this man was the greatest of all the men of the East.
Speaker B:And his sons went and feasted in their houses every one his day, and sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with them.
Speaker B:And it was so, when the days of their feasting was gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them and rose up early in the morning and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all.
Speaker B:For Job said, it may be that my sons have sinned and cursed God in their hearts.
Speaker B:Thus did Job continually notice our text begins with the words There Was a Man.
Speaker B:I guess if I had a sermon title today, it would be There Was a Man and what a man, as we see in these verses, that he is what a father he is.
Speaker B:And this man named Job lived in a place called Uz, which most likely, we don't know for certain, but most likely was in the land of Edom, which is east of the Promised land.
Speaker B:He appears to be a contemporary of Abraham, of Isaac, or Jacob.
Speaker B:And we're shown in these first five verses that I read this morning in Scripture.
Speaker B:Two important things about Job.
Speaker B:Job, I think, first was a man of great character as we look in these verses.
Speaker B:The second thing I just want to share with you here this morning is that Job was a man of great concern.
Speaker B:Now, I know most preachers have three points in the message, but this morning I only have two.
Speaker B:Tonight you can come and get the Third one.
Speaker B:Okay, so make sure you come back tonight.
Speaker B:You don't want to miss it tonight.
Speaker B:We're going to have a wonderful service here tonight.
Speaker B:But I want to talk about these two things here this morning.
Speaker B:Job was a man of great character, and Job was a man of great concern.
Speaker B:First, he was a man of great character.
Speaker B:Look at verse one again.
Speaker B:There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job.
Speaker B:And that man was perfect and upright and one that feared God and eschewed evil.
Speaker B:Now, as we look at that verse, it's easy to single out four different aspects of Job's character.
Speaker B:In fact, you might want to circle each one of them as you look at verse one, and we go over them to remind yourself in the future of these different aspects of this great man of character that are certainly an example for each of us as men of God, for each of us as fathers here today.
Speaker B:The first thing it says, and we see is Job was a man of integrity.
Speaker B:You say, preacher, what do you see that?
Speaker B:It says he was perfect.
Speaker B:Okay, it says he was a perfect man.
Speaker B:Now, the word perfect does not mean, obviously, it does not mean sinless.
Speaker B:He was not a sinless man.
Speaker B:There's only been one sinless man who's walked this earth.
Speaker B:That's Jesus Christ.
Speaker B:But rather it means he was a blameless man.
Speaker B:And it speaks of him as being genuine and authentic.
Speaker B:We might say the same Hebrew word, when you look this up, is used in the famous passage in Joshua 24 and verse 14, where Joshua exhorts the Israelites to serve the Lord.
Speaker B:Here's the word in sincerity, in sincerity, and in truth, that is, Joshua was exhorting the Israelites to genuinely serve God.
Speaker B:Not just give lip service to God, but in their hearts to sincerely or genuinely serve God.
Speaker B:We see another example of this word in a very, I think, statement in Bible that we're familiar with in Genesis 17 and verse 1, where God instructs Abraham, saying, walk before me and be thou what church.
Speaker B:Remember the verse, be thou perfect.
Speaker B:This word used here again is the word perfect.
Speaker B:God is instructing Abraham to walk before him.
Speaker B:Sincerity, blamelessly, genuinely, with personal integrity.
Speaker B:Now, I like to use that word, integrity, because it really summarizes all of these things that we're describing here about this first attribute or this first aspect of Job's character.
Speaker B:We might say the opposite of having integrity is being a hypocrite.
Speaker B:And the word hypocrite means to act or to be an actor.
Speaker B:So someone who is pretending, someone who is pretending they're something that they're not is a hypocrite.
Speaker B:They're acting hypocritically.
Speaker B:They're not being a man of integrity.
Speaker B:They're not being sincere, they're not being genuine.
Speaker B:And really, through the story of Job, as we look at this, his integrity is tremendously tested over and over again.
Speaker B:Yet God's testimony of this man, Job, even after he goes through all the trials that he goes through, he is that he maintains his integrity.
Speaker B:What a great testimony that is of this man named Job.
Speaker B:And dads, one of the greatest things your children can say about you is that my dad is a dad, a man of God that has integrity.
Speaker B:I believe that's why it says in Proverbs 27, it says, the just man walketh in his integrity and his children are blessed.
Speaker B:And him that is.
Speaker B:It's a great blessing.
Speaker B:You're leaving a tremendous legacy to your children when you're walking as a man who has integrity.
Speaker B:This past week, I heard an example of this as I was listening to a sports station on the radio.
Speaker B: y brought up the story of the: Speaker B:And he denied the famous Bobby Jones of his second Open championship.
Speaker B:But during the first round, Bobby Jones was going, getting set to hit an iron shot off the rough on the 11th hole when he felt his club move the ball ever so slightly.
Speaker B:No one else seemed to have seen this movement of his ball, but Jones called the penalty on himself.
Speaker B:After officials were unable to confirm that the ball was actually moved, they allowed Jones to make his own ruling on whether or not he should be penalized.
Speaker B:Jones said he was certain the ball had moved and he penalized himself.
Speaker B:The decision cost him the title, but forever added to his legacy.
Speaker B:Spectators praised him for his sportsmanship, but he would have none of it.
Speaker B:Listen to what he said.
Speaker B:He flatly replied.
Speaker B:You might as well praise me for not robbing a bank.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker B:When I heard that, I thought to myself, wow, what a man of integrity.
Speaker B:When it would been so easy.
Speaker B:They left it up to him to decide whether or not he had actually moved the ball had slightly, maybe with a quarter of an inch, just slightly touched the ball.
Speaker B:He could have said, no, I didn't move the ball and won't this U.S. open.
Speaker B:But he said, no.
Speaker B:You know, it had been like me robbing a bank if I hadn't have been honest about what I did with my golf ball when it was laying Right there.
Speaker B:I am a man of integrity.
Speaker B:And he has been remembered ever since because of what he did in that U.S. open.
Speaker B:And I again remind you here, Dads, the just man walketh in his integrity.
Speaker B:His children are blessed after him.
Speaker B:One of the greatest contributions you can make to your children is to be a man of integrity.
Speaker B:You probably heard this before, but it bears repeating again this morning.
Speaker B:One writer put it this way.
Speaker B:When wealth is lost, nothing is lost.
Speaker B:When health is lost, something is lost.
Speaker B:But when character is lost, everything is lost.
Speaker B:I believe that's something that needs to be resounded around this nation right now to our men, and certainly as Christian men, we need to be mentioned integrity.
Speaker B:But notice a second description of Job's character.
Speaker B:Not only was he a man of integrity, but also it says he was upright.
Speaker B:He was an upright man.
Speaker B:You say, preacher, what does that mean, he was standing upright?
Speaker B:No, it means a lot more than that.
Speaker B:It refers to how Job treated other people.
Speaker B:He was upright in his treatment to those around him.
Speaker B:And how he treated other people was a natural, we might say, consequence of his own personal integrity.
Speaker B:In fact, in chapter 31, hold your finger in chapter one, turn over to chapter 31 in job and look down with me at verse 13.
Speaker B:It gives us a glimpse of exactly what this looked like to be upright in his life, what it looked like and how he treated others around him.
Speaker B:And certainly it gives us a model as a father to be the same way.
Speaker B:Look with me at Job, chapter 31, and verse 13.
Speaker B:If I did despise the cause of my manservant or my maidservant when they contended with me, or they brought a complaint against me, what then shall I do?
Speaker B:When God rises up and when he visits or inquires of me, what shall I answer him?
Speaker B:Did not he that made me in the womb make him?
Speaker B:And did not one fashion us in the womb?
Speaker B:You say, what is he saying?
Speaker B:He's saying, we're all made in the image of God.
Speaker B:That person, my maid servant, that person who works for me, is no less than I am.
Speaker B:I am no greater than he is.
Speaker B:We're both made in the image of God.
Speaker B:Look at verse 16.
Speaker B:If I have withheld the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail, or have eaten my morsel myself alone, and the fatherless have not eaten thereof.
Speaker B:For from my youth he, the fatherless, was brought up with me as with my father, and I have guided her.
Speaker B:Referring to the widow, from my mother's womb.
Speaker B:If I have seen any perish for want of clothing or any poor without covering, if his loins have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep, if I have lifted up my hand against the fatherless when I saw my help in the gate, and then let mine arm fall from my shoulder blade and mine arm be broken from the bone.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker B:For destruction from God was a terror to me.
Speaker B:And by reason of his up highness, I could not endure.
Speaker B:You know what Job is saying?
Speaker B:He's saying, listen, let my arm be torn out of socket.
Speaker B:It would be better than facing God's judgment.
Speaker B:If I had not done these things than I have just mentioned.
Speaker B:If I had not treated my employees right, if I had not gone to help the poor, if I had not helped the widow, if I had not helped the fatherless, then let God let somebody pull my arm out of its socket.
Speaker B:Because I'd rather that happen than God judge me for not doing that.
Speaker B:What a testimony.
Speaker B:What a description of his uprightness and how he treated those around him.
Speaker B:Can you imagine the kind of testimony this was to his children?
Speaker B:They watched a dad.
Speaker B:When some, excuse me, somebody had a need, he went over and he filled that need.
Speaker B:When he saw a widow that had a need, he went over and helped that widow.
Speaker B:The fatherless he may have taken into his home to help for a period of time.
Speaker B:Whatever it looked like, Job was a man who was upright.
Speaker B:He was a man who was willing to go out because of his personal integrity and help those around him.
Speaker B:What a challenge again to us as a father to model this kind of uprightness before our children as they watch us and how we treat others around us?
Speaker B:How do we treat those around us?
Speaker B:Are we compassionate to them?
Speaker B:Do we make jokes about them because they're different than us?
Speaker B:What do they see us saying?
Speaker B:What do they see us doing in response to the culture that we live in today where there's so many things happening around us that are so strange?
Speaker B:How do they see us handle.
Speaker B:This is a wonderful opportunity for us as a father, for our children to see in our hearts, in our lives, our uprightness and our love and compassion and what that might look like even to people who aren't necessarily like us.
Speaker B:But not only was Job a man of integrity and upright, but he was also a man, a man who feared God.
Speaker B:A man who feared God.
Speaker B:And you may be thinking to yourself, what does it mean to fear God?
Speaker B:Now, I've.
Speaker B:I hope you know this and the answer to this, because I preach much on the fear of God many times on the fear of God even in this church.
Speaker B:And I have a tendency even right now to want to go off in a rabbit trail and preach another message on the fear of God because it's such an important doctrine in the word of God.
Speaker B:And I'll say it again, I believe this.
Speaker B:America is in the shape it is today because America has lost its fear of God.
Speaker B:The reason America has lost its fear of God is because the church has lost its fear of God.
Speaker B:And the reason the church has lost its fear of God is because of men.
Speaker B:Basically, those who should be leading in the church have lost their fear of God.
Speaker B:But let me make a few statements about the fear of God briefly here this morning.
Speaker B:John Mary states the fear of God and I like this definition as a soul of godliness.
Speaker B:The fear of God is a soul of godliness.
Speaker B:He is saying that the fear of God is a holy soil which produces a godly life, godly nation and a godly home or family.
Speaker B:Jerry Bridges defines the fear of God this way.
Speaker B:He says there's an infinite gap in worth and dignity between God the Creator and man the creation.
Speaker B:Even though man has been made in the image of God.
Speaker B:The fear of God is a heartfelt recognition of that gap, the gap between man and God.
Speaker B:Then John Brown wonderfully adds this.
Speaker B:The fear of God is when God's frown is my greatest dread and God's smile is my greatest delight.
Speaker B:Do you like that?
Speaker B:Isn't that good?
Speaker B:Now being a God fearing man refers to having a awe of God, standing in awe of God and who God is.
Speaker B:It refers to being a man, I believe, who has a reverence for God, holds God, reveres God.
Speaker B:He's a man who loves God.
Speaker B:He's a father who takes time.
Speaker B:Listen to me dads, and I challenge you this morning.
Speaker B:Who takes time to teach his children about who God is.
Speaker B:Because he stands in such an awe and amazement of God.
Speaker B:He wants his children to understand the different attributes of God, to make sure they clearly understand the God whom they are serving.
Speaker B:Because he understands they will serve God and in the image they have of Him.
Speaker B:And if they have a wrong image of God, then they will serve him and worship him incorrectly.
Speaker B:So important that we as dads make sure that we're God fearing man.
Speaker B:And I believe it also describes a man whose highest ambition in his life is to please God and to obey God.
Speaker B:Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, said these words in his latter years.
Speaker B:Ecclesiastes, chapter 12 and verse 13.
Speaker B:The familiar words he said.
Speaker B:Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter.
Speaker B:Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is what church the whole duty of man.
Speaker B:Fear God, keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.
Speaker B:Dance I hope you can honestly say this morning in your heart, the highest ambition I have in my life is to live a life that's pleasing and honoring to God.
Speaker B:That to live a life where I love God with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my strength, with all my mind, so that my children, if they look at my life, they can see I'm more in love with God than anything else in this world.
Speaker B:That's to fear God.
Speaker B:You have listened to the first part of a two part message by Evangelist Sam Wood.
Speaker A:Thank you for joining the Fortifying youg Family podcast.
Speaker A: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.
