JOB 1-32 LIFE LESSONS FROM THE SUFFERING OF JOB2016 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: Job 1-32 Life Lessons From The Suffering Of Job

Well, when you decided to come to church for Valentine's Day, I'm assuming you weren't expecting to be turning to the book of Job.

But this is where we are in the Bible in three years. And over the past couple of Sundays, I haven't been able to be here to be able to teach from the book of Job. And so what I'm going to be doing today is a little bit of an overview of some of the big concepts and things that are in the book of Job that we've been reading thus far. This coming week, as we continue the reading process,

We'll be finishing up the book of Job and getting to see the conclusion of these things. But there's a lot of important truths that are found in the book of Job and some important concepts that we need to wrestle with a bit. And so I've titled the message this morning, Life Lessons.

from the suffering of Job. And as we look at this book and the suffering that is contained therein and the things that Job goes through and the dialogue that takes place, there's some really important life lessons, some valuable lessons that are necessary for us, that are helpful for us for the life that God has called us

Now, as we begin talking about the book of Job this morning, I know that there are many people who wish that the book of Job was not in the Bible. It would be much better, you know, we might think if Job wasn't in there, we don't like to read it that much. There's some hard questions that are presented there in the book of Job that we don't really want to talk about or deal with. There's a lot of suffering and pain there.

And we maybe, you know, well, I know for the most part, the book of Job is not on the top of the list for people as their favorite books of the Bible. And yet, Job is in the Bible because there are some valuable things here for us. And I would suggest to you that Job is a much needed reality check for us. You know, many times as we're looking through the scriptures, we're

We can see things and kind of like spiritualize them a bit and kind of live in our own bubble and not really make much application or not make much impact to our lives. But then we get to the book of Job and it's like, you know, just down in the dirt, in the suffering, in the trenches, and there's great difficulty there presented for us. And it's a lot of times much more like real life for us than other passages of Scripture.

For example, a few weeks back, we studied the book of Esther. And you know, you read the book of Esther and there's this tragedy about to happen. And yet through Esther and God's provision, he delivers the Jewish people and they're saved from annihilation.

And, you know, they have now the feast that celebrates that every year. And so you get through the book of Esther and you can think, wow, and they lived happily ever after. And everything was always awesome and wonderful because God, you know, provided that deliverance for them. But then you head from there into the book of Job and it's like, boom, straight into the dirt, straight into the muck and the mire. And that's where...

frankly, a lot of us actually live. And more of what we experience is, you know, like the book of Job than perhaps even we would like to admit. And so as we look at this, there's some valuable truths here. There's some skills that we need, some life lessons for us. And four specific lessons that we'll look at as we look at various parts of the book of Job this morning. The first life lesson to share with you is found in chapters one and two, and that is that Satan seeks to destroy you.

Here is something that you need to know. Now, it might not be, again, you know, something you want to think about a lot or something you're real excited about, but this is a reality. It's a truth that you must accept for your own good so that you prepare yourself for the battle.

We have an adversary. We have a real enemy who is out to get us. And he is not a gentleman. He does not want to play fair. He wants to exploit every weakness and any physical or emotional attack that he can to bring destruction to your life. Let's begin considering this thought in Job 1, verse 8. It says, Then the Lord said to Satan, Have you considered my servant Job?

And so we're introduced here to this dialogue, this discussion happening between the Lord and between Satan.

And as they're having this discussion, God presents Job to Satan. And he says, hey, have you thought about this guy? Have you considered him very much? There's no one like him. He's upright. He's righteous. He fears God and he shuns evil. And it begins already automatically to stir up the question within us, why would God present the target to Satan? Why would he present Job in this way?

And it, of course, gets into that question that we all have. Why does God allow suffering? Why is there evil in the world? Why does God allow these things to take place? And I'm going to give you the best answer that you will ever hear on that subject. The answer is, I don't know. That's the reality. Why does God allow suffering? Why does God present Job as a target? Why does God allow pain in our life? Why does God allow these things to take place?

The best answer is we really don't know. Now, there are a lot of things that we could discuss about pain and suffering and evil, and there's lots of points that could be made, and they're valid points, but the bottom line is that God doesn't tell us most of the time why he does what he does and why he allows what he allows. And so the answers that we come up with

are actually going to be lesser than God's real answer. He's usually doing like 4,000 things at once. And so we might point out one thing and say, well, see, God allowed this because of that, or God allowed this to accomplish that. And that may be like a little part of what God is doing, but God is doing so much more than we understand. And so God doesn't tell us all the details about why he does what he does. Instead, what he tells us is, trust me, trust me, and it will be worth it.

And we look forward to that day in eternity where we understand what God understands and where we can agree with God and say, it's worth it. But on this side of life, we don't have those answers. And so we have this place where we're kind of stuck in this position of, we don't know exactly. We have to live by faith because, well, the faith or the just or the righteous live by faith and not by sight.

If we have to have all the answers, then it's not living by faith. We have to trust God and know that he is good. And so why does God allow this to happen? Well, we don't exactly know, but here's what we do know. God did allow it to happen, and he does allow these kinds of things to happen. We have an adversary, Satan, who seeks to destroy us, just as Satan sought to destroy Job.

And so Job brings an accusation against, or sorry, Satan brings an accusation against Job. As God presents Job to him, he says, does Job fear God for nothing? No, look, you've blessed him. In verse 10, he says, you have a hedge around him. That's kind of developed into a prayer. Maybe you've heard that prayer. You know, Lord, we pray that you'd provide for us. You put around us a hedge of protection. It's not talking about shrubbery, you know, to kind of keep you safe on the outside. It's talking about God setting boundaries.

And what Satan is saying is, you've set a boundary, you've set a hedge around Job, so I'm not able to enter in and mess with him. And so he's got abundant possessions. He's living a blessed life. Of course he's righteous, Satan says, because he's blessed. The enemy brings his accusation. If you stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, he will surely curse you to your face.

And the Lord said, okay, you have permission. I'm going to remove that boundary and you're going to be able to mess with his possessions. And I'm going to show you. Job's going to continue to prove himself to be faithful. But notice Satan's objective in this. There in verse 11, he says, stretch out your hand and touch all that he has and he will surely curse you to your face. Notice the removing of Job's possessions wasn't Satan's goal.

Satan wasn't plotting and planning and trying to figure out, how can I take away all the blessings that Job has? That wasn't his goal. That was just a method. That was just a tool that he was using to try to accomplish his real goal, which was to get Job to curse God. And see, that's Satan's real goal. It's not some temporary removing of possessions or blessings or abundance, but it's the destruction for eternity of

For Job and for us. And so Satan is looking to bring this eternal destruction. He's looking to use whatever methods he can to get us to curse God, to get us to turn away from God, to get us to throw out the belief in God, the trust in God. And he's not a gentleman.

Now, God allows this to take place. God removes the boundary. Satan brings this destruction. And in one day, all of this destruction hits Job. He loses all of his livestock, his property. He even loses his children. But it tells us there that he did not sin with his lips. He did not charge God with wrong. He did not curse God the way that the enemy accused that he would. But Satan is not a gentleman.

And so he will try again in Job chapter 2. Now he doesn't wait, you know, hey, let's have some time, give Job opportunity to rest a bit and recover because he's had a hard, you know, situation here, a hard life, hard time. All these things happen to him in one day. He doesn't go easy on Job because Job has it hard. He's not a gentleman. Now, when Job's at his weakest, Satan is going to bring his strongest attack. And in chapter 2, Satan asked God for permission to touch his body.

God says, look, he was faithful. He didn't curse me as you said he would. And Satan said, skin for skin. In Job chapter 2 verse 5, he says, stretch out your hand now and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will surely curse you to your face. And God says, okay, you can touch his body, but you can't take his life.

And so now begins another addition to Job's suffering. And these boils break out all over his body. And he's in such misery, it describes him there in chapter 2, just sitting in the dirt and scraping his sores with broken pieces of pottery. It's a very miserable picture, to be sure. And yet, even in that, Job does not curse God. But that is Satan's objective. Again, he tells God,

Stretch out your hand and touch his bone and his flesh, and he'll curse you to your face. You see, the taking away of Job's possessions, that wasn't Satan's goal. The taking away of his health, that wasn't Satan's goal. Just to make him sit there in misery and pain, that wasn't Satan's goal. Satan wanted something much bigger, and that was eternal destruction. He wanted to get Job to turn from God completely, to curse God. But Job would not.

And as we look at this, you need to know this is a life lesson for you. Satan wants to do the same to you. He wants to get you to curse God, to turn away from God. And he's looking for an opportunity. He's looking for weakness to exploit. Consider what Peter warned in 1 Peter 5, verse 8. He says, be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, walks about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.

You see, this wasn't just a truth back in Job's day, but this is a truth for us today. Peter warns, hey, you need to be sober and vigilant. You need to be watching. You need to be on alert because you have an enemy that's not just trying to mess up your life a little bit. That he's not just trying to like, you know, play some pranks and make you suffer a little bit because he thinks it's funny and it makes him giggle. He is looking to use you.

those weaknesses and those things in your life to cause you to turn from God and be lost for all eternity. He is trying to take you out. And as we look at the book of Job, I think many times we look at Job and we want to figure out how to keep that from happening to us, right? Okay, what can I learn about this? How can I figure it out so God doesn't put me, you know, with the target on me and say, have you considered, you know, my servant David? And

Have you considered my servant Jonathan? Have you considered him? And we don't want that target, right? None of us want that. But as we look at Job and try to figure out how to keep that from happening to us, we need to change our perspective and instead look at Job to learn how to survive as well as he did. Because Job survived this test and he survived it well. I would suggest he survived it way better than I would. And so I need to be looking at Job and learning how

how to do as well with affliction and suffering as he did. And there's two things I would suggest for that. Number one, pursue a right relationship with God. You look at the beginning in Job chapter one, you see that Job pursued right relationship with God. He was seeking after, he was desiring, he was making sure that he did not only for himself, but his family as well. He wanted to do the best that he could for him and his family to have right relationship with God.

And that is the safest place for us to be. When we get lazy in our relationship with God, when we get lax in our relationship with God, we put ourselves in a vulnerable place. But the best way to be prepared for these kinds of sufferings, for these kinds of trials, remember the parable of the wise and the foolish builder? The wise man built his house on the rock. The foolish man built his house upon the sand. Jesus says, look, the storms happen to both the wise and the foolish, the righteous and the unrighteous. The storms happen to both.

And so what you need to do is prepare for those storms. The storms that happen in Job's life happen in all of our lives. Maybe not all the details the same, maybe not to the same degree, maybe not all at once, but we will suffer. And the best way for us to prepare for that is to pursue a right relationship with God because Satan will want to use that suffering to cause you to curse God, to be angry with God, to turn away from God. So that's the first thing to consider here.

from looking at Job as an example and how to survive. The second thing is to, I would encourage you to not play with sin. So many times we think, hey, it's just a little bit. It's just a little bit of compromise. It's just a little bit of fun. I've got it under control. But remember who our enemy is. Our enemy is walking about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. When I was in Okinawa this last October, Pastor Tom was freaking out

And you might have seen the picture posted on Facebook by Pastor Mike Ramsey, one of our good friends. He used to be a firefighter here. He was a pastor in the Philippines for many years, good friend of the ministry. And he was in Thailand for a missions conference. And while he was in Thailand and a bunch of the missionaries did this, they went to this like wild animal park and took some pictures with some wild animals. And so he posted this picture on Facebook of him holding the tail of this humongous tiger.

And Pastor Tom was freaking out. I mean, literally, he was like freaking out. And he was scolding Pastor Cisco and myself and saying, you guys better not ever do that, ever, ever, ever, ever. Because he said, look, all it takes is just like one half second for that tiger to just kind of get a little something in his mind. And his claws come out. And your face is gone. And what are you going to do? You're in Thailand. And now your face is gone because this tiger went a little bit crazy. And

Don't ever do that. You know, he was all freaked out. Now, I got to say, I would probably do that if I had the opportunity, but that would be against Pastor Tom's good counsel. But this is what we do many times. We're kind of playing with the tail, right? It's just like, hey, we think we've got under control. We think we're safe. And then we forget the enemy is like a roaring lion. So don't play with sin. Pursue a right relationship with God.

And prepare yourself because you have a real enemy who seeks to destroy you. Well, going on now to the second life lesson from the suffering of Job, we see in chapters 3, 10, 13, and 14, and a few other chapters if we wanted to, but God can handle your emotional outbursts. So kind of switching gears a little bit as we look at the suffering of Job, now we see Job's response to the suffering.

And this is an important lesson for us because many times we try to pretend like the things that are happening within us are not actually happening within us. And it's not a good way to handle what's happening within us. It's not a good way to handle what we're going through and how we're handling things. And here in the book of Job, as you see the words of Job and the expressions of Job, what you see is Job crying out in confusion in the midst of his great adversity.

He's not speaking for God. He's not attempting to speak for God. He's not claiming to have all truth or to know everything. He is simply expressing the things that he is feeling. And so I describe that as an emotional outburst. And you know, God can handle your emotional outbursts. God can handle them. Sometimes we get freaked out about the things that people say. And sometimes we kind of have this picture of God as...

Like this little old lady, like really fragile, like make sure you don't use those words. Make sure you don't say those things because, you know, that's really going to upset them. That's really going to, you know, violate their conscience or whatever. But you know what? God is so much bigger. He can handle your emotional outbursts.

He can handle the overflow of what is actually happening within you. In fact, God already saw and already knows what's happening within you. And that's why he died upon the cross for your sin. That's why he sent Jesus to be crucified so that that could be dealt with and forgiven. And yet so many times we try to hide and pretend like those things really are not going on within us. Check out Job chapter three for a couple of moments here. Job chapter three, looking at verses one through three, it says this.

After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. And Job spoke and said, may the day perish on which I was born. And the night in which it was said, a male child is conceived. Job, as he begins talking about this suffering and talking about what he's going through, the first things he says, he opens his mouth and he curses Job.

The day of his birth. Now, if the person sitting next to you today cursed the day of their birth here this morning, you'd be like, you know, freaked out. Like, what are you doing? Don't do that. God's going to strike you down. Job curses the day of his birth. And of course, many people give Job a hard time for that. But consider the context. Consider what he's lost. He's lost his children, his property, his livestock. He's lost his health. He's lost everything all at once.

And so he opens up his mouth and he says, I wish I had never been born. And here's what you need to know. That's okay. These kinds of cries that come from our grief, that come from our anguish, that come from our suffering, they're okay. God can handle it. And God does not rebuke Job.

for this. I want you to consider, we're going to jump ahead a little bit to Job chapter 42. At the end of the book, as God shows up and he's dealing with Job and also Job's friends, in Job chapter 42 verse 7, it says, "...after the Lord had spoken these words to Job, the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, my wrath is aroused against you and your two friends, for you have not spoken of me what is right as my servant Job has."

Notice what he says there. Now we're going to get to the friends in the next point. So I'm not going to deal with that right now. But he points out Job and he says, hey, Job spoke what's right. Now that doesn't mean that everything Job said was the best thing to say or that it was the truth in all cases or anything like that. But he didn't offend God with his words. He didn't offend God with what he said. God didn't have to rebuke him for cursing the day of his birth and saying, I wish I had never been born.

You see, what God desires when we have those emotions, when we have those feelings, when we have that anguish within, what God desires is our honest communication and for us to be true with him and genuine with him and say, God, this is how I feel. And many times we know we're not supposed to feel that way. And so then we try to pretend like we're not feeling that way.

Because I know I'm not supposed to feel this way. But the reality is, you know you're not supposed to feel that way, but you do feel that way. And that's what you take to the Lord. And you say, Lord, I know I'm not supposed to feel this way, but this is how I feel. I wish I had never been born. I wish I could be in heaven right now. I wish you could just take me out of this. I wish. And God is not easily offended. Now, if someone said it next to you, again, you would gasp. You would be like, don't say that. You'd be really offended. But God says, no, bring that to me. I can handle that.

I can handle your emotional cries. I can handle what's really going on within you. And what he wants is for us to bring those things to him. Let's jump ahead a little bit to Job chapter 10 and consider...

verses 1 through 3 in Job chapter 10, here we see not only are our emotional cries okay with God, but in verse 1, Job says, my soul loathes my life. You know what that means? I hate my life. I wish I were dead. He says, I will give free course to my complaints. I will speak in the bitterness of my soul. I mean, these are pretty strong words that Job is using. I hate my life,

My soul is bitter, and so I'm just going to let myself complain. Now, if you came to me for counseling and you said, I just want to let myself complain and show my bitterness to God, probably my first reaction would be like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Calm down a little bit. Like, hey, maybe you shouldn't do that. But look at the end, Job 42. God says, hey, you didn't speak what's right of me like Job has. God can handle. You have bitterness. You're angry with God. You're bitter against God. You're troubled. You're troubled.

You hate your life? Bring it before the Lord. Confess that to the Lord. Express that to the Lord. God can handle your complaints. He can handle your grumbling. He can handle your bitterness, your anger. In fact, what's best for you is for you to bring those things to him because then he can begin to help you address those things and heal in those areas.

Not only are complaints okay, but in verse 3 it says, does it seem good to you that you should oppress, that you should despise the work of your hands and smile on the counsel of the wicked? Hey God, what do you think you're doing? Does it seem right for you to treat me this way and let the wicked people have good things? Not only are complaints okay with God, but questions are okay with God. God, I don't get it. This doesn't make sense. Why would you allow this? Why would you do this? Why would you behave this way?

Why? And again, if you ask this question and the person next to you heard it, they'd be like, I can't believe you're asking, you're questioning God. How dare you? But if those questions are there, don't try to pretend like they're not. Take them to the Lord. That's what God desires. And so Job is doing the appropriate thing. He's expressing his cries of grief, his complaints, his questions.

We could see also different passages where Job admits his ignorance and he talks about life and he doesn't have the whole eternal perspective. And he says later, as the Lord appears to him, I spoke in ignorance. Ignorance is okay when you speak and you don't know what you're talking about. It's okay. Now, this is about talking to God. Now, if you go around and talk to everybody and you're questioning God and challenging God and angry with God, that's a whole different thing.

I'm talking about expressing those things to the Lord. That you take your heart, you take where you're at, you take what you're going through, and you can challenge God with those things. Not that God will actually be challenged, but from your perspective, like, I'm going to challenge God. I don't understand. You've got to show me why you're doing this. Hey, God can handle that. Take it to Him. God wants that kind of communication. He wants that kind of expression from us. He can handle your emotional outbursts.

And as Job said, all the things that he said throughout this book, some of it was not that great. A lot of it was nonsense. A lot of it was just him expressing how he was feeling without any bearing on what's reality and what's true. But as he brought it before the Lord, God said, that's okay. I can handle that. You're hurting. You're going through terrible things. You're going through great anguish and pain.

I can handle that. And notice this. In Job chapter 13, verse 15, Job says something interesting. He says, though he slay me, yet I will trust him. Even so, I will defend my own ways before him. Job says, even if God kills me, I'm going to trust him. And that's a key element here. Job trusted God. And yet at the same time, he had all of these feelings and emotions.

He still trusted God. And even if he kills me, Job says, I trust him. But I'm going to defend my ways because I don't understand why this is happening to me. And so again, you see him trying to sort through the reality of he trusts God and yet what he sees and what he feels and what he experiences is different than what he would expect for trusting in God. He didn't understand God and he's trying to sort that out and figure that out. And that's okay.

You see, that's the place where we need to be, where we can make the statement, though he slay me, even if this costs me my life, I'm gonna trust God. I do trust God, but I don't understand why it hurts this much, why I have to suffer in this way, why these things are going on. I don't understand why I feel like I wish I'd never been born. I trust God, I do believe in God, but I still have all of these feelings and emotions going on.

And God says, yeah, that's good. You trust me, now bring it to me. Take it to God and talk it out with God. You're having doubts, tell them to God. Talk to God about those doubts. Present those doubts to God. You're having fear, I know your word tells me, God, I'm not supposed to fear, but I fear and I don't know what to do with that. That's what you're supposed to do. Take it to the Lord. You have anger,

Take it to the Lord. He can handle your anger. You have sorrow? Take it to the Lord. He can handle your sorrow. God can handle your emotional outbursts. And he invites you to bring them. Cast your cares on me because I care for you, the Lord says. Bring it. Bring it to the Lord and let him help you. Sort out and navigate those emotions, those feelings, those things that you're experiencing while you trust in him.

Well, another life lesson as we continue on, we're going to look now at the example of Job's friends. And here, life lesson number three, people speak a lot of nonsense. If you haven't learned that yet, I'm happy to tell you, I'm happy to share with you, introduce this idea to you. Listen, there's a lot of nonsense. In fact, maybe the majority of what is said, the majority for sure of what you see online, it's nonsense. It's not real. It's not meaningful. It's not

And we need to learn to filter out the nonsense. Going back to Job chapter 2 for a moment. In Job chapter 2 verse 11, we're introduced to Job's three friends. It says in Job 2 11, when Job's three friends heard of all this adversity that had come upon him, each one came from his own place. Eliphaz, the Temanite, Bildad, the Shuhite, and Zophar, the Namathite,

for they had made an appointment together to come and mourn with him and to comfort him. And so these three friends of Job hear about what happened and they say, we need to go comfort Job. And so they go to mourn with him and to comfort him, it says in verse 11. And then in verse 13 of chapter two, it says that they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him for they saw that his grief was very great.

And so as they get to where Job is and they see the devastation and they see what happened, they just sit there quietly for seven days. This is the highlight of the ministry of Job's three friends. This is the best comfort they offer the whole book. There in verse 13, they sit with him quietly for seven days and they don't say a word. Now after this, they open their mouth and it's downhill from there.

Now, we can jump all over these guys and say, oh, look how terrible they are. But usually, we start speaking nonsense without first spending the seven days sitting quietly with the person who's suffering. So we shouldn't be so quick to jump down their throats. But the reality is, as they speak now, as they go into their dialogues with Job...

They are speaking nonsense. Generally speaking, when you see the words of Job's friends in the book of Job, you can just put a label on it, just put a label across it and say, that's false, that's nonsense. And that seems kind of maybe like bold words to you. But again, let me ask you to consider Job chapter 42, verse 7.

When God appears at the end, he speaks to Eliphaz the Temanite and he says, my wrath is aroused against you and your two friends for you have not spoken of me what is right as my servant Job has. It makes me cringe a little bit when I hear people quote from the book of Job. A lot of times it's the words of Job's friends that are being quoted and it's like presented as like a good thing. But here at the end, God says, my wrath is aroused against you because of what you said. What they said is

was not the right things to say to Job. What they said was false and deserving of judgment and deserving of punishment. In fact, in the next verse, in Job 42, 8, God says, hey, you guys better make an offering and you better go to Job and ask him to pray for you. And if he doesn't pray for you, if you don't ask him to pray for you, I'm gonna deal with you according to your foolishness in the things that you've said. In other words, I'm gonna punish you for your words because you've spoken so foolishly.

They speak a lot of nonsense. Now, you might be able to look and see, well, there's an element of truth there. There's an element of truth there. But in the way that they applied that to Job, it was false. It was nonsense. It was not right. It causes some people to wonder, well, why have it in the Bible then? Why have a book in the Bible filled with nonsense? Well, here's one suggestion, one reason to help you develop a nonsense filter within the safety of the scriptures.

Listen, this isn't the last time you're going to hear these kinds of arguments and concepts. The things that are presented by Job's friends are presented in the church today and all in the world around us. And there's a bunch more nonsense that's presented that aren't even dealt with here. But you need to learn to develop and think about, is this really what God says? Is this really from the Lord? And we need to develop that filter because too many of Job's friends attend church and

And I mean that, seriously. These concepts, I'll share a couple examples later on. But I hear them in church. I hear them from those who would call themselves believers. I hear them from those who have walked with the Lord for many years. We need to learn to filter out the nonsense. So let's look at a couple examples. First, we have the words of Eliphaz in Job chapter four. And I'll just kind of give you some summary of some of the things that he said. First of all, he says in verses one through 11,

Has anybody ever perished who was innocent? Eliphaz asks. Now, any rational person would say, yeah. But his accusation against Job here is, look at what's happening in your life, Job. This wouldn't be happening to you if you were innocent.

It's obvious you're not innocent because look at what's happening in your life. And then he goes on to talk about this word secretly brought to him. And he describes this like spooky little thing, you know, spirits, you know, kind of moved upon him and the hairs are bristled and, you know, stuck up and, oh, you know. And can a man be righteous? Clearly you're not righteous, Job. Look at what's happening in your life. Innocent people don't perish. You know what God says? God says that is nonsense. Nonsense. Nonsense.

I mean, all you got to do is think about Jesus. Jesus was an innocent man and he suffered greatly. According to the will of God, by the plan of God, he suffered greatly, even though he was innocent. We learned at the beginning of the book, Job is righteous. God says so. He didn't have anything to repent of. He didn't have anything that God was saying, I'm trying to deal with this sin in his life. It wasn't that he was not innocent. That wasn't the issue here. But Eliphaz says, that's it. That's the problem.

You're not innocent. Well, Bildad gives his attempt in Job chapter 8. Here's some of the things that Bildad says. In verses 1 through 7, he says, if you were pure, God would awake for you. So yeah, maybe the innocent do suffer. But you know, if you were really pure, God wouldn't let it go on this long. He wouldn't let it get this far. He wouldn't let it get this bad. If you were pure, God would awake for you. He would fight for you. He would defend you. He wouldn't let it go this long or this far. He says, the hope of the hypocrite shall perish.

But if you really had hope in God, you wouldn't perish. It wouldn't happen like this. In verse 19 through 22, he says, God won't cast away the blameless. Clearly God's cast you away, Job. And he won't cast away the blameless. What does that say about you? You know what God says about that? Nonsense. It's nonsense. The idea that God wouldn't let this happen to a good man is nonsense. We know Job is a good man. God declared it from the beginning. Again, you can look at the example of Jesus.

And so much of what we would consider, if you would just look at the example of Jesus and apply that supposed truth to Jesus, you would see, oh, that's false. That's not the reality. But we forget to do that many times. And yet people hold to this truth and people think this way. So here's an example. About five years ago, Pastor Sisko was diagnosed with cancer, kidney cancer. And there were people in his life who seriously, literally came to him and said,

Boy, you must have some serious sin in your life for God to allow this to happen. People in the church approached Pastor Sisko and told him that. And then I took a two by four and I knocked him out. No, I'm just kidding. I didn't. But that's the reality. That's what I said. Too many of Job's friends come to church. And you know, when you're suffering, you might hear this kind of thing. And you need to learn to filter out the nonsense. Listen, God's not trying to pay you back for your sin. Jesus died upon the cross for your sin.

The idea that God wouldn't let this happen to a good man, that's nonsense. Good men suffer all the time. And you might say, well, you know, technically, there's none who are good. None is righteous. Except for at the beginning in Job chapter one, God says, have you considered my servant Job? He's a just man. There's none like him. He fears God and shuns evil. As a believer in Jesus Christ, God views you the same way. He views you the same way. And yet we suffer. Yes, we suffer. Good people suffer.

Redeemed people suffer. That is a reality of life. Job chapter 11, we find the third friend, Zophar. Zophar is extremely comforting, I said, ironically or satirically. Verses one through six, God exacts from you less than your iniquity deserves. Doesn't that comfort you? What's he telling Job? Job, this is pretty bad. I mean, you look like you're in a lot of pain. You lost a lot, but you know, it could be worse and you deserve worse. So you should feel pretty good about that.

That's not comforting. That's not helpful. Yeah, I know I deserve hell, but that doesn't help me with the pain and the anguish and what I'm experiencing right now. There might be an element of truth in that, but that is nonsense. That's nonsense. That's not helpful. He goes on in verses 13 through 20 to say, if you would repent, you would forget your misery. God would turn all this around if you would just repent.

You should just be thankful, first of all, that you're not suffering as much as you deserve. And secondly, if you would just repent, you could just forget about all this. All this would go away. Now, these things strike a chord with me. And I don't know if you could tell, but I kind of get a little bit worked up on these things because I've seen these things happen over and over again. I remember when I was young with my mom in a church service and there was a woman who came in to pray for her.

We didn't know her, and my mom had been sick for many years. The woman was praying for healing, and in her prayer and in her exhortation to my mom was, you will be healed. God will heal you if you repent. All you got to do is repent. There's just some hidden sin. There's just some real issue, and you know what it is, and you just got to repent. Too many of Job's friends attend church. It's nonsense.

And you need to learn to filter out the nonsense. People speak a lot of nonsense. Sometimes the suggestion, innocent people don't perish. Sometimes they say, God wouldn't let this happen to a good man. Sometimes they say, everything would be better if you just repent. And you could look at the prosperity gospel and all the nonsense that fills that. You could look at politics. And boy, nonsense upon nonsense upon nonsense. You could look at philosophy. There's all kinds of nonsense. You know, it cracks me up.

If you don't know about this website, please educate yourself. Snopes.com. Because the majority of articles and things that people get all worked up over online are fake.

They're not real. It's nonsense. And yet, oh, you know, make sure you read this and scroll down, you know. I saw this picture. I think Jake posted it a few days ago on Facebook. It was like, if you love Jesus, share. You know, if you don't, then keep on scrolling. But it's, you know, the picture of one guy smacking the other guy. Like, that's stupid. Like, what are you talking about? That's nonsense. Share it with 10 friends if you really love the Lord. If you're really my friend, you know, make sure you read. That's nonsense. That's nonsense.

It's all kinds of nonsense. You need to learn to filter out the nonsense. Consider what the apostle John says in 1 John 4, verse 1. He says, Just like you have a real enemy who's out to destroy you, there really are false prophets, there really are false messengers out

on all kinds of levels who just want to deceive you, get you worked up, get you messed up, get you on a wrong track, get you on a wrong thought, chasing down a wrong doctrine, chasing down, getting worked up over things that you don't even need to be worried about. There's all kinds of false prophets. And so John says, you need to test the spirits, test the message and find out whether or not it's from God. And how do we do that? What evaluation tool do we use?

Well, of course we use the word of God. That's the standard. And you need to evaluate what you hear, what you listen to, what you read by what the word of God says. Remember what the scriptures talk about with the Bereans in Acts chapter 17, verse 11. It says that they were more noble than the Thessalonians because they heard what Paul was preaching and then they searched the scriptures daily to see if it was true. And that is how we need to be.

even in service, even the things I'm sharing with you. Don't just accept it as truth. That's foolish. Take what you hear and search the scriptures daily and find out, is that really the truth? You need to learn to filter out the nonsense because nonsense is abundant. Well, the final life lesson for this morning, there's much more depth to all of these and I wish I could spend a lot more time in them. But finishing up,

Life lesson number four, comfort is desperately needed. And I would maybe add on to that, yet it's rarely provided. Comfort is desperately needed. People need comfort. But very many times, what people receive is all the nonsense like Job's friends provided. Back in Job chapter two, verse 11, it tells us that those three friends came to mourn with Job and to comfort him.

But then for the next 35 chapters, it records the dialogue back and forth between those friends and Job, and there's not one bit of comfort offered in 35 chapters. He's not comforted one bit. That is sad. That is tragic. And yet that is an accurate reflection many times of what happens in people's lives, especially when they're suffering. There's a lot of nonsense that's presented.

but very little real comfort. I'm not an expert on comfort. I could tell you that. I think many times I'm just as bad as Job's friends. But again, it strikes a chord because, listen, this is to be a place of comfort. If people are going to find comfort anywhere, it should be here. And so we need to learn and to recognize that people need comfort. It's desperately needed. The people around you, the people in pain, the people who are hurting, they need comfort.

And they should be able to find it in this place. They should be able to find it in you. But so many times it's lacking. I'd ask you to consider what Job says in Job chapter six with me for a moment. Job chapter six, verse 14. Job says, to him who is afflicted, kindness should be shown by his friend, even though he forsakes the fear of the Almighty. Job tells us when someone's afflicted, you know what he should be able to expect from his friend? Kindness, right?

And he says, even though he forsakes the fear of the Almighty, even if he's thrown off the fear of God, even if he's rebelled against God, even if he's suffering and it's self-inflicted because he ignored what God said, when someone is afflicted, you know what he should be able to expect from his friends? Kindness. They should be able to expect kindness.

And so here come these three friends. He's expecting to hear kindness, to receive kindness from them in the midst of his affliction. But what does he get? He gets nonsense. In verse 15 here in Job 6, it says, My brothers have dealt deceitfully like a brook, like the streams of the brooks that pass away, which are dark because of the ice and into which the snow vanishes. Job's using poetic language here that goes all throughout the book of Job. But essentially, here's what he's saying. He says, My brothers have dealt deceitfully like

Job is expressing here that he feels betrayed. My friends deceived me. I expected to hear kindness, to receive kindness from my friends, but instead I've experienced lowliness. Even though I have my friends here, they've added to my hurt. And now in the midst of my hurt, with the addition of hurt, I'm lonely now. They've deceived me. I haven't received kindness from them.

from my friends. And that again is what happens so many times. We're suffering. We're hurting. And the people that we think are going to show kindness to us, give us nonsense, causes us to feel more alone and doesn't take away the pain. Jumping forward a bit to Job chapter 12.

Job chapter 12 verse 1, Job says, behold, my eye has seen all this. My ear has heard and understood it. What you know, I also know. I am not inferior to you, but I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to reason with God. As his friends are going back and forth with him, he says, look, guys, I know what you're saying. I know I've heard all those arguments. I know those arguments, but what I'm telling you is I want to talk to God. I'm trying to figure out

Those arguments, they don't have the answers. That's not the truth. I want to talk to God about these things. He goes on in verse 4. He says, He calls them forgers of lies. Job and God agree. The friends of Job, speaking nonsense. He says, you're worthless physicians.

You haven't helped. There's no healing taking place. You're not helping. He says, oh, that you would be silent. I wish you would just be quiet, and it would be wiser for you to be quiet than all this nonsense, these words that you're speaking. And that points out a really good truth for us. That is that many times silence is more comforting than words. When someone is suffering, when someone's in agony, depending on where they're at, and people suffer in a

Just speaking a little bit generally, people know that things aren't solved by quick, easy answers. And so if what you have to offer is some quick, easy answer, just repent, everything will be okay. Well, people know and they recognize that that's not really helpful. That's not really the truth. And it'd be much better for you to just be quiet than to say something stupid like that. Now, if people are asking questions in the midst of suffering and they want to have the dialogue, well, sure, then there's a different thing going on. But here's what happens many times. We speak in

Because we are uncomfortable. And so in essence, we're speaking nonsense in an effort to comfort ourselves, not the other person. Because it's uncomfortable for us to be quiet. It's uncomfortable for us to just sit there, to allow that expression, to allow the outcries of grief and sorrow. And we have to say something and we got to fix it.

But we're really focused on us. I want to feel better about this. I don't like how I feel in this situation. So I'm going to try to feel better. And we speak because we are uncomfortable. Our focus is in the wrong place. And out of that comes all kinds of nonsense. Aren't you glad it's not worse? You're not getting what you fully deserve? You know, I had a friend who had it a lot worse than you have it. You should be thankful you're not that guy. That's not helpful. Is that comforting? Who finds that comforting?

It's not that bad. It'll get better. All kinds of things that we say that really aren't actually helpful. We need to be careful. One final passage. Let's jump to Job chapter 16. In verse 1, Job says, well, actually verse 2, I have heard many such things. Miserable comforters are you all. Let's just do a quick survey. By a show of hands, how many have ever experienced a miserable comforter? Anybody? Yeah, I think probably most of us. Miserable comforters are you all, Job says. Now, here's the thing.

Miserable comforters usually mean well. Job's friends did not want, they weren't trying, they didn't intend, let's go hurt Job more. That's not what they were trying to do. They wanted to help Job. They just weren't helping him. They weren't good at it. But the thing is for us, as we suffer and people are miserable comforters, it's easy to become bitter because they hurt us in a time where we're already hurting. And so it's, you know, even more painful.

And so it's easy to become bitter and resentful. But notice at the end of the book of Job, and you'll read it this week, Job says, or God tells Job's friends, hey, you better go ask Job to pray for you. And I think if I was Job, I wouldn't pray for them. I'd be like, forget you guys. Look at all this nonsense, all the ways that you hurt me. Yeah, you deserve. Receive the foolishness that you've built up for yourself. But Job prays for his friends, and they don't experience the repercussions that they deserve.

He doesn't hold it against them. It's something valuable for us to learn. In verse 4, he says, I also could speak as you do if your soul were in my soul's place. I could heap up words against you and shake my head at you, but I would strengthen you with my mouth, and the comfort of my lips would relieve your grief. Job says, look, if you were in my place and I was in your place...

I could say those same words that you say. I could heap up words against you and shake my head. I can't believe you, Job. You better repent. You know, this doesn't happen to innocent people. I could say all those things. He says, but you know what? If our roles are replaced, switched, I would strengthen you with my mouth. I would comfort you. It would relieve your grief. I would want to make sure to do that. No, how do we do that? I just want to give you a couple quick tips to comfort those who need it. First of all, we need to rethink comfort.

Understand that comfort is not about taking the pain away. So many times we see someone suffering and we wish we could take the pain away. But that's not really what comfort is about. Listen, even God, who can take the pain away, rarely does that. Rarely does he just take us out of a situation. All right, pain's all gone, done. I mean, sometimes he does that and we love it. We want God to do that all the time. But that's pretty rare that God just takes away pain. That's not...

Many times what's best for us, but that's what we wish. That's what we want. And so then we try the quick fixes. We try the easy answers and that's when nonsense abounds. So first of all, we need to understand comfort is not about taking the pain away. So what do we need then? How do we comfort? Well, let me give you a quick class. And again, I'm not an expert and many times I'm just as bad as Job's friends. So take it with a grain of salt, evaluated by the word of God. But first things first, here's comfort 101.

First, you need to have good theology. Job's friends started out with bad theology. They didn't understand God. They didn't understand how God worked. And they took their misunderstanding of God and they laid up these words against Job as a result. We need to remember that sin is paid for at the cross. That God is not looking for opportunities to pay people back

for their sin. There is appropriate times for correction. When there is open rebellion, when there is sin that is right there, and when God shows us that there is, I don't want to take away that opportunity. But the majority of the time, it's not about sin. We need to understand God is not trying to pay people back for their sin. He already did that at the cross. That's already taken care of. So we need to have good theology. We need to understand who God is and how he works. Secondly, we need to have compassion.

The word compassion, it's the idea of feeling something with somebody, to hurt with them. It's a sympathy to feel what they feel. Now notice, having good theology and having compassion, these first two things that are big factors in comfort take place before you ever interact with the person. Before you ever interact with someone and say, oh, I want to go comfort them. I want to be like Job's friends and go sit with him. Before you even do that, make sure that

that you can hurt with them. And see, that's the problem. We don't like to hurt. So comfort is not an easy thing. You're going to hurt if you're going to comfort because you're going to hurt with them. That's part of it, to feel as they feel. There's the saying that's so true. People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. First, you have to have the compassion. You have to have the hurt. And listen, my experience is

And I don't say I have much, and I'm not saying I've experienced the worst of anybody. I'm saying I have a little experience. But in my experience, comforting words are 90% how you say it. Through the different miscarriages and things that Kim and I have gone through, we've had a lot of people try to comfort us. And it's kind of hit and miss. It really is. 90%? Do you feel it? Do you have compassion? Do you want to give me an easy answer? I don't want to hear that. That's not helpful. That's not comforting.

Well, it's the truth. There's a lot of truth, but we need to learn to share the truth in love. It's got to have compassion. And the way you say it comes from compassion. And so even before you open your mouth, even before you try to offer, first, make sure you have a good understanding of who God is and how he works. Second, make sure you've thought about what that would look like in your life. And you have a little bit of, I'm not saying you have to feel exactly what they feel or have gone through exactly what they've gone through.

But you've got to learn to feel a little bit what it's like for them and what they feel. And then finally, kindness. This is how comfort is expressed. Again, Job 6.14, to him who is afflicted, kindness should be shown by his friend. When you have good theology, you have compassion. Now you're in a place where you can show kindness. Now, here's the hard part about kindness. Kindness is somewhat subjective. People suffer differently. People grieve differently.

And what I perceive as kindness and what comforts me in the midst of suffering is probably different for you. And it also depends on the situation that's happening and what kind of suffering it is. For some people, being there might be a great kindness. For others, they might say, would you give me some space? And giving them some space is a kindness more than being there. Sometimes talk and discussion is a great kindness. And sometimes, you know, it'd really be...

helpful and comforting if you would just sit with me. You don't have to say anything. The more you say detracts from how much comfort is given. It differs from person to person, from situation to situation. And so that's where it gets a little bit difficult. Then how do you know? Let me give you this really complex formula to figure it out. You ask them. It's okay to have a conversation. Listen, I care for you. I wish you weren't going through this. I see that you're in pain. I don't know how to help you.

how can I help you and sometimes they won't even know and so you have a dialogue you have well how about this what about this how about this it's okay to have that conversation and sometimes there's practical things you can do and sometimes it is just sitting there sometimes it is this or that but you see what happens many times is we try to force on the hurting person hey receive my kind of comfort and the comfort I want to give you right now I'm trying to comfort you just receive it take it it doesn't help it's not comforting

And we need to let there be some interaction, some guidance by the Lord. Job's friends fall short in all of these. They had bad theology, no compassion, and they were not kind. And my prayer for us as we consider the book of Job is that we would learn to be kind, that we would learn to be comforting, to have compassion. And so these are some important life lessons. Satan seeks to destroy you.

Pursue a right relationship with God and don't play around with sin. God can handle your emotional outbursts. You're gonna go through things. You're gonna have feelings. You're gonna have things. Don't pretend like they're not there. Take them to the Lord. People speak a lot of nonsense. So learn to develop a filter and test things by the word of God. And then finally, comfort is desperately needed. So put on some compassion. Have a good understanding about who God is and how he works. And do your best to show kindness to those who are suffering. Let's pray.

Lord, as we consider these lessons from the book of Job, I pray that you would teach us, Lord, that you would help us to learn from Job's example, Lord, how we could be as successful in this kind of test in our life. Help us, Lord, to put you first, to pursue you, Lord, to seek to know you more and more. Help us, Lord, to never be complacent or lazy in our relationship with you. But God, I pray that you would stir up within us a greater thirst to know you, to love you, and to walk with you.

In Jesus' name I pray. Amen.