Job 19:7-29

We should have had them on record years ago, but we'll have them on record as it is now. Okay? All right, we're going to be in Job 19 this evening. Job 19.

I'm thankful to have the opportunity to gather together with you as always, and thankful for our time to be in a word. So we'll be in Job 19. We're going to pick up in verse 7.

Last time we were together in the book of Job, which would have been Wednesday night, we looked at the 18th chapter, and we carried it over to the 6th verse of the 19th chapter, because we were seeing the weight of despair that really rests upon Job with accusations.

We saw how Bildad responded during his second round of discourse, if you will, and really the severity of that weight that was resting upon Job, he introduces there in the first 6 verses in the 19th chapter.

We'll kind of touch on that in just a moment. But that was really connected, I think, with the 18th chapter, because it kind of shows us really all that he was walking through. But we'll get into some deeper things tonight.

So let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for this day. We are thankful to have the opportunity to gather together. We're thankful that we can come to you and look at the word of God with one another, and we can learn together and grow together as we seek to know more and more of you.

We pray that our understanding of it would bring assurance to our walk, and it would bring faithfulness to our actions so that you may be glorified. We thank you for the fellowship we can have as brothers and sisters in Christ.

We thank you for the encouragement that it can be to one another, and we thank you for seasons where we lean on one another. So I do pray that you continue to undergird this body of believers for your glory and honor, that Christ be magnified in all that we do, and be with us now as we study your word with one another, and we ask it all in Christ's name.

Amen. In the first six verses of this 19th chapter, Job speaks of kind of the weight of the accusations that his friends are bringing against him, and he says that if he had sinned, that that is with him.

And really the purpose of his friends was not to tear him down further, but rather to encourage him and to console him, but they're not doing that. He makes the definitive statement that it is God who opposes him.

It says in verse 6, Know then that God has wronged me and has closed his net around me. Now we want to understand that properly, not that God has done him wrong, but rather his assertion here is that the wrong that is exhibited in his life, which his friends are perceiving as wrong, the judgments, all the trials or the tribulations, is a result of the work of God, not the effect of sin.

And it is maintaining the testimony he's had all along, that there is no known sin in his life that is deserving of the judgment and the consequences that are before him.

He's challenging their worldview. He's challenging their perception. We keep saying it, their conventional wisdom that says, You are suffering wrong because you have done wrong. And essentially what he's saying is, I'm suffering wrong because God is doing it in my life.

And now that's a true statement. We know that. We understand that. It's not that God is the giver of bad gifts. Every good thing comes from the Father above. We understand that. But we also know that God has permitted this suffering, these trials, these testings.

It is the work of the enemy who is against him, but it is through the permission of the sovereign God who has allowed it. Now what he is doing in this is showing the genuineness of Job's faith and the genuineness of his character because it is kind of, you'll see this in just a moment when we read further, the enemy, that is Satan, has accused God of putting a hedge of protection around Job so that Job's faith is very shallow.

He has said, You have walled him in and protected him. There's no attacks against him. So really, how hard is it for him to believe in you? How hard is it for him to walk faithfully?

Job will now turn that reference around and say, Yes, God has indeed walled me in, but it is a wall of judgment. It is not a wall of protection. It is a wall of discomfort.

It is a wall of suffering. It is a wall of attacks. And I am being entrenched, if you will, by the enemy. So it is kind of ironic that what Satan accused God of, that is putting a hedge of protection around him, Job accuses God of, too, of putting a hedge of judgment around him.

And both of these are kind of similar, but either way, what is happening here is that God is revealing the character of Job's faith. But he's also teaching mankind what it looks like to live in relation with him.

He's teaching mankind the necessity of dependence upon the Lord God Almighty, not upon our own works and our own efforts and our own righteousness, not upon accomplishing things more and receiving great gifts, but rather leaning into the giver of the gifts rather than the expectation of the gifts.

And that's a big difference. It's kind of a fine line. We've said this in the book of Job before, that it is a primer for what God is going to do in Abram. I believe, the more I study it and the more I walk through it, that Job is a contemporary of Abram, later to become Abraham, but he is a little bit before him.

So he is in the pre-patriarchal season, I think right before God calls Abram out of the land of the Erechaldeans. And because at the end of Job, what man desperately needs is what does it look like to be a people in relation with Holy God?

It's a covenant relationship, not a work-based relationship. If this whole retribution theology doesn't work anymore, if this whole do good, get good, do bad, get bad doesn't work anymore, and now the lid has been blown off of that, how then are we to respond to Holy God?

How are we to live accordingly? And God will put that on prominent display, or at least he's seeking to put that on prominent display through Abram and later on the nation of Israel. And he is calling men to enter into a covenant relationship, not a works-based relationship, two totally different connections to the Father.

And it is that affirmation that's going on. So Job is going through all these trials and all these sufferings and all this struggle, and we look at it and say it's unfair, but rather, and this is again, I know this is a long introduction, but say it with me, this is why I believe in a literal reading of Job, that this literally happened to a man in history, rather than theoretical reading, saying that, oh, this is just some kind of great metaphor, a great parable, I believe in the literal existence of Job, not only because Scripture testifies to him over and over again in the New Testament, but also because it fits the purposes and plans of God.

God is doing something in the history of man, and he is beginning to reveal something more and more. Okay, so let's pick it up here in verse 7, a long introduction because we're going to get to a verse that is so familiar to us, and we'll be so excited to read it.

It's kind of a touch of good news, if you will, a little bright sunshine that's here found in these pages. It says, Behold, I cry violence, but I get no answer. I shout for help, but there is no justice.

He has walled up my way so that I cannot pass, and he has put darkness on my paths. He has stripped my honor from me and removed the crown from my head. He breaks me down on every side, and I am gone.

He has uprooted my hope like a tree. He has also kindled his anger against me and considered me as his enemy. His troops come together and build up their way against me and camp around my tent.

He has removed my brothers far from me, and my acquaintances are completely estranged from me. My relatives have failed, and my intimate friends have forgotten me. Those who live in my house and my maids consider me a stranger.

I am a foreigner in their sight. I call to my servant, but he does not answer. I have to implore him with my mouth. My breath is offensive to my wife, and I am loathsome to my own brothers.

Even young children despise me. I rise up, and they speak against me. All my associates abhor me, and those I love have turned against me. My bone clings to my skin and my flesh, and I have escaped only by the skin of my teeth.

Pity me, pity me, O you my friends, for the hand of God has struck me. Why do you persecute me as God does, and are not satisfied with my flesh? Oh, that my words were written.

Oh, that they were inscribed in a book. That with an iron, stylus, and lead they were engraved in the rock forever. As for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will take his stand on the earth.

Even after my skin is destroyed, yet from my flesh I shall see God, whom I myself shall behold, and whom my eyes will see, and not another. My heart faints within me.

If you say, how shall we persecute him, and what pretext for a case against him can we find, then be afraid of the sword for yourselves, for wrath brings the punishment of the sword, so that you may know there is judgment.

I want you to see this evening the deep roots of the struggle. The deep roots that are formed in the midst of the struggle. It is the roots that are only formed during difficult seasons and difficult times that give us confidence to stand during those times.

And here Job is going to make this profession of confidence. He says later, I know, this I know. It is a profession of confidence, and it is confidence that it really is in spite of his circumstances.

And it is a confidence that only flows through the deep roots that are formed in that struggle. But before we can get there, we need to understand what God is doing, because I think there is this imagery here in this chapter of how God allows those roots to be formed.

It is not comforting. It is not encouraging. I have said this before. I know I have told you this. It is the first outline I ever wrote out to preach from was written for a church retreat.

I was not yet the pastor there at that time. I was getting ready to teach. It was First Baptist Normandy. I was just a church member, but I was a church member who felt to call to preach. We were without a pastor. We were without a pastor.

We were going to go on a retreat anyway. And so they needed someone to teach at that retreat, so I got to Sunday morning draw. Now, that guy accidentally raised his hand one time and said he felt called to preach.

So he is teaching Sunday morning. So Carrie was over the retreat scheduling. Being the administrator she is, she said, I have to have an outline. So the very first outline I ever typed up, the very first outline of any message I have ever preached was at that retreat.

And I gave it to her, and I remember it was on fruitfulness and bearing fruit. And I did it on the text where it says that the tree that doesn't bear any fruit and the landowner wants to destroy the tree.

I touched on it actually this past retreat and how the keeper of the vineyard says, no, leave it alone. Let me dig around it, fertilize it. And if it bears fruit next year, then so well. If not, after that, bear it down. And I looked at kind of the pain of the fact that what God does is he digs down our roots and he fertilizes and he prunes.

He takes out of our life and he works out so that we will be fruitful, that fruitfulness is a result of painfulness at times. I remember that. And all of my, you know, I'm 20 years into it now.

I just remember that was the first outline. I remember the first sermon I preached because it was so horrendous on a Wednesday night when I stood up as pastor. And it was, you know, I don't even want to tell you the title of that one. But anyway, I'm not going to go there.

But I remember that one in particular, that God wants to dig around in our roots and he wants to fertilize and he wants to prune and he wants to prepare us for fruitfulness. So what happens before the deep roots are formed are the preparatory works of what we refer to as the Father.

Here in Scripture, in the book of Job, it is the Almighty. And it is what he does to form those roots in our life. Here in the passage before us, Job begins to speak that out.

And the first thing that he tells us is that there is the surrender of all self-confidence. There is the surrender of all self-confidence.

Now, if we were to open up the book of Job and we were to look at the book of Job, Job chapter 1, and we weren't kind of given the information of what transpires in the throne room of heaven.

If we didn't get to see behind the curtain, so to say. But we saw Job, this man who would sanctify his children every year, that would offer sacrifices for them, that would pray for them and intercede for them.

The one, his own friends said that he would help the fatherless and the orphan and the widow, that he was really ministering, that Job was a man of religious stature. He was a man of ability.

He was a man of being. He was a man of intimacy with the Father. Even though he didn't refer to him as a father, he was a man of intimacy with the Lord God because he knew what it looked like to be the priesthood of his own home.

He would pray incessantly for his children. He would sanctify them at the end of every year of their circling. And it does not necessarily imply that it was excessive partying, but just in case they did something wrong at one of their birthday parties that they had, then he would intercede for them and he would call his children together.

He would offer sacrifices for each of his children. And God was using him in a mighty way, so much so that the enemy sets his heart on Job.

And he was considering him before he even went into the throne room and God brought it up. And Job is a man of not only physical means, but of spiritual means as well.

But now, in the midst of the struggle, he says, I cry violence, but I get no answer. I shout for help, but there is no justice. He has walled me in.

He said, what I could do for my children, I can't do for myself. What I was able to do for others, I cannot do on my own.

I would vindicate the orphan, but I can't vindicate myself. I would defend the helpless, but I have no defense for my own being. And all confidence in self is gradually removed.

Until he finally says there, in that verse 10, He breaks me down on every side, and I am gone.

I'm gone. There is nothing of myself that I can trust in. And often what God does to begin to establish the deep roots necessary is he leads us to a place of surrender, of self-confidence.

Many times, spiritual growth is hindered because we do not realize or acknowledge our own dependency. We have too much confidence in ourselves, in our own ability.

And what I have noticed in Scripture, I've noticed in my own life, not that I enjoy it, I say I've noticed it, is that the Father loves us enough to put us into a position where we can't do it on our own.

He loves us enough to put us in a position where we, like Job, have to say, I have nothing for this situation. And that's a place of surrender.

He loves to put the church in that position, too. Too often, churches are afraid to be in that position. Because when we begin to look at the church from a financial perspective, when we look at it from a business perspective, and then we begin to seek what the Lord God would have us to do, too often we weigh the odds and we say, oh, that's too much, because we want to make sure that we can maintain it.

And that is self-sufficiency is what that is, rather than Christ-dependency. We would call that walking by faith. Not blind faith, but walking by faith, right?

We're not blind to the realization of who we trust in and who it is that is our provider and sustainer and all of those things. But rather, he brings us to the place where we realize that we have to admit, like, Joe, at this point, in these circumstances, I'm gone.

I can't do a thing about it. My own salvation is a testimony of such things, right? I try to maintain and work and try to put on this old appearance, and most of you are the same way, until you finally get to that point where Christ shows you, you can't do it.

And the first step to salvation is the admittance of, I can't. And that is a hard thing to do. But the first step in growth, in all spiritual growth, is the same thing, that I can't do it on my own.

It does not seem gracious or merciful in that moment. It is not pleasant at all in that situation. But the Father permits circumstances to arise in the believer's life that brings them to the realization they have to surrender all confidence in self.

Because until we do, we will not walk in desperate dependence upon him. And I think if we would all look back in our lives and see moments of spiritual growth, we would know that's a reality that was taking place at that moment.

We couldn't do it. And he brings us to that sweet season in hindsight, not in the midst of it, of surrender.

We say, at this moment, I just can't. I can't do a thing. I don't have the ability. I don't have the means. And we have to cry out like Job and say, I'm gone.

No matter which way I turn, there's no hope. I could do it for others. I could intercede there. But as far as it goes for me right now, I'm gone, he says. And he has uprooted my hope like a tree.

Now, it's painful to read. It's painful to see. It's painful to walk through. But it is a realization that deep roots are beginning to form because now he cannot trust himself.

But God's not done there. We wish that he would. Because if we don't trust in ourselves, natural ability and a natural reaction to that is let me look outside of myself and we look to those who are closest to us.

So we see, secondly, that he isolates the individual. Isolation is a difficult thing. Isolation is a challenging thing.

And we do not preach isolation. It says in Proverbs 18.1 that a fool isolates himself. That when we separate ourselves from the counsel of godly individuals, then we are being foolish by nature. We are being foolish in our actions.

That we ought to seek wise counsel. And we need to fellowship. It tells us in the book of Hebrews not to forsake the assembling together of one another. That we need to be built up. But there is a balancing act to that as well because while we have dependency upon one another, our greatest dependency is not on one another.

There is a friend, Scripture says, that sticks closer than a brother. There will always be a moment where individuals let us down. And the reason there will always be a moment where individuals let us down is because we are all mankind.

We're not the perfect. We're not the complete. We're not all knowing, all wise, nor all powerful, nor all present. We are limited by our abilities, our understanding, and our perceptions.

Job had three friends that gathered around him that could have built him up. Yet the three friends that came around him only brought greater shame and greater suffering and greater struggle to the situation. They were not upbuilding him.

Job uses some harsh words. He calls them windbags. He tells them they're useless counselors. And, you know, he gets a little upset. It's okay to get a little upset every now and then. But at least he's honest and he calls it to them to their face.

He doesn't wait until they leave instead of a bunch of windbags. No, he just tells them straight up. It's okay. By the way, I can respect that. I have no problem. If you think I'm a windbag, you want to tell me I'm a windbag, just tell it to me to my face. I don't mind that at all.

As long as you permit me the same thing towards you. Same freedoms, right? That's all I ask. But I have no problem with that. And what we're finding here is Job is saying, you can't help me.

Job couldn't help himself. And we'd have to say his three dearest friends, the only friends that would travel so far to come meet with him couldn't help him. He says in the text, he shifts over.

He says, he has removed my brothers far from me and my acquaintances are completely restraints from me. My relatives have failed. My intimate friends have forgot me. Those who live in my house, my maids and my servants want nothing to do with it.

My own breath is loathsome to my wife. Children won't have anything to do with it. Listen, he has no one. One commentator said it right.

He started on the outside and moved inside and then went on the inside and moved back outside. He said, the people I know won't help me. Those I know a little bit better won't help me. And he moves all the way until he gets to his wife and he starts moving back out. And what he's doing, he's emphasizing the reality that no person can help me.

I'm isolated in my suffering. Because Job's circumstances are the first recorded circumstances in the history of mankind of someone that is just and suffering.

He broke the mold. It made no sense. When Cain left the presence of the garden with a mark on his forehead, everybody knew why Cain's trajectory was going to be downhill.

The descendant of Cain, Tubal Cain, who does seven times more than his ancestor, we know why his judgment is there because we see that. But now the mold is broken because here is a righteous, complete individual who is suffering and it doesn't make sense.

It is abnormal at best. It is unthinkable at worst. No one can figure it out. No one can reconcile how these matters could be true at the same time.

How can you be just and how can you suffer? That doesn't make sense. And yet Job says, there's no one to help me. Because in the midst of this, he cannot count on himself because he declares, I am gone.

And he cannot trust in those around him because he says, he has removed everyone from me. And I love how he acknowledges this. He doesn't say, you guys have all left me. He says, the Father has removed you from me.

Not the Father, but God has removed you from me. The concept of the fatherhood of God is not found. We don't want to esages that, right? We don't want to read that into our text. He says, the Almighty God has removed them from me through my suffering.

So again, he is speaking of the wrong being done to him by God. One of the wrongs is that Job has to come to the place where he says, I'm gone.

And the second wrong is where he comes to a place that says, and nobody wants anything to do with me. Because if the suffering and the struggle is a result of God's permission, then everything that happens as a result of that is also attributed to the work of God.

And that is not to say that God is doing bad because we know the rest of the story. And we'll even see it in the text before us. What God is doing is graciously good and sovereignly necessary.

But in the midst of it, it doesn't feel good. And in the midst of it, I mean, just for lack of better words, it just stinks. Because God has taken all hope of self-sufficiency out.

He's taken all help from outside sources out. And now here is Job by himself. Isolated.

The individual before the Almighty. And by the way, that's exactly what God longs to do in the life of the individual.

That will be what will happen someday where every individual will stand before the Almighty and give an account. That on that day of judgment, and yes, believers go through judgment, not to beam a seat, great white throne judgment, but we'll go before the judgment seat of Christ.

That when we stand there, we will have nothing of self to boast in. We will not be able to say, well, you know, Lord, I did this, this, this, and this, and this. He'll be like, okay. I believe the glory of the one we behold will keep our mouths wondrously shut.

And that we will be speechless because we will realize we have nothing to boast in. When we look at the lamb that was slain, yet he lives, and the price, the realization of the price he paid for us, what self-sufficiency will we bring to that?

Who will we call from mankind to stand and testify for us in light of him? We will be an isolated individual looking at the king of kings and lord of lords.

He will be purging from our lives that which is not necessary, that which cannot withstand the fire. Now this is the judgment seat of Christ for the believer. And then he will be receiving us into his kingdom, having all the dross and filth removed, purified, and prepared to enter.

But we will stand before him as an individual. The bema seat of Christ, the judgment day, the day where every knee will bow and every tongue will confess.

No non-believer will ever stand before Christ and proclaim his own or her own worthiness for there is none worthy. None will call to the testimonial stand anybody that would intercede on behalf because the intercessor is the one who is judging them.

Everyone will stand as an isolated individual before the one whom they must give a reckoning to. in his grace and mercy, God brought Job to that place of isolation while yet alive.

And in that struggle, roots were beginning to take root in the ground. They were digging a little deeper because nothing else mattered. And it brings us to this firmly established faith.

faith. We do not get to the firmly established faith until we get to the place where we have to stand isolated, helpless, and hopeless before the Almighty and say, here we are, but this is what I believe.

And he says it this way, oh, that my words were written, oh, that they were inscribed in a book, that with an iron stylus and lead they were engraved in the rock forever.

This is just a good way of Job saying, I want you to write this down. I want you to mark what I am about to say, and I want you to mark it in such a way that it will endure even after I am gone.

I want people after I am dead to read what I am about to declare to you. And what he says is not a repetition of his own innocence.

What he asks to be written down is a declaration of his confidence. He doesn't say, write it down that I am innocent. Write it down that I did no wrong.

Write it down that I suffered unjustly. He does not say that. He says, I want this to be written. I want it to be etched in stone. I want it to be engraved in such a manner that it will endure for the ages.

Thankfully, we have the word of God written for us and we have that endurance that is before us. But he says, in my desire, this is what I want the generations to come to know. that even here, where I have nothing to bring of my own and I have no one around me to help in this time of struggle, this is what I wanted to know.

As for me, as for me, I know. this is the record of a personal testimony.

He's not asking, I don't want the world to know what you think. I don't want the world to understand your accusations. I don't want to give my opinion, but I'm going to tell you what I know.

As for me, I know. Now, what follows is a glorious profession of faith. It is a glorious profession of confidence.

I had a discussion with Carrie this afternoon. She said, don't put up any red flags. I'm not going to do that, but I want to do my due diligence. I have to do this. I have to challenge you.

I have to challenge you as your pastor. Every passage of Scripture has how many truths? One.

One truth. Thousands of applications. One truth. I know it is not your job to normally spend hours thinking about and digging into that, but it is mine, and it is what you've called me to do, is to exegete, properly exegete the text.

When we read this text and we read this profession, it is very difficult, I'll just be honest, not to exegete the text, not to read back into it with a New Testament teaching, because we have this New Testament teaching that we really love and we really dearly love, and it is absolutely true, and we want to read our New Testament theology into an Old Testament book.

Now, I'm not saying it doesn't say that, but I want you to stay with me. We have to read it as if we are Job. Another key passage in which we do that is in Isaiah.

Isaiah 7, 14. We understand that the Virgin is Mary. We know that. We have the confidence. We have the rest of the story, so to say. So when we read it, too often, we fail to understand the immediate interpretation that follows in Isaiah 8 and 9, essentially in chapter 9, that God is also doing something else there.

And so we have to read it in its context. Can we, and we'll say this with confidence, can we see the hope of the Redeemer who is Christ and the promise of the resurrection in these verses?

Absolutely. We know that that's glorious. Did Job have a full concept of that? Probably not. Probably not.

He says, I know, as for me, this I know. I know that my Redeemer lives.

First testimony. I know that even though I can't do it and no one else around me can do it, there is one who will be my Kinsman Redeemer.

He doesn't know who he is. He doesn't know his name. But he has the ultimate faith that there is one. We know his name.

His name is Jesus Christ. We do. Job is like those in Hebrews 11 who were looking forward until the day of redemption.

Not knowing the city or the builder but looking into a country that was not their own. Job is like those angels who are looking into wanting to know who he's talking about.

All Job could say is as for me this is what I know. There is a Redeemer who will someday stand in the land of the living and vindicate me. He will someday stand upon the dust or the earth depending upon your translation.

That my Redeemer is a living Redeemer. Job was limited in his scope. He didn't know if it was someone alive that day or even if it would be someone that would come after he was dead.

But he had the faith in the Almighty to say I know I'm innocent and I know I've done no wrong and I know God will not leave me as a judged individual for eternity.

There is a Redeemer. Don't lose sight of the fact we know his name. Job did not. And he says because of that because my Redeemer lives and at the last that is at the last.

We don't know to speak transparent is he talking about in the last day or is Job talking about that before it's all said and done with me. We don't know. Now if we read the rest of the book of Job we know that before it's all said and done with God does take a stand and redeem Job's situation and before it's all over at the last God does speak and intercede and God seems to fulfill this confident expectation of Job.

That's a partial fulfillment. We know that in the last day our Redeemer will stand in the land of the living and call us home. We have the fuller. Now you say well Job should have known all that.

Well that's progressive revelation. So don't mock Job because he doesn't know but let us glory in the fact that we do know. That's the last he says before it's all said and done whenever that is because Job every other testimony of Job is he expects that when you die that's it.

We read other passages right he says when you lay me down you'll never see me again when you lay me down you'll see me the tree has hope that spring forth but I will not that I'm like a vapor passing out there but then all of a sudden this confidence begins to well up inside of him he says but I do know there's the redeemer and at the last whenever that last is he will vindicate me and so what he's look what he is basing this confident faith upon is the character of God.

He's basing it on the character of God not the wisdom of man. God what he's saying.

saying is right now it's all falling apart but I truly trust in the character of God that God will not let it end this way whatever that looks like God will not let it end this way and I'm staking all my hope and all my claim on the character of God and then he goes a little bit further even after my skin is destroyed the literal reading there is even after you have cut off my skin scraping off and all this torment all these things we don't know if he's speaking of literal death or if he's speaking of the decaying of his body if he's just speaking of the atrocious appearance that he has right now he says yet from my flesh I shall see God whom I myself shall behold and whom my eyes will see and not another three times he makes this assertion I will see God and again his confident expectation is not found in self nor other individuals but in the character of God and he is surrendering himself that God is good no matter how terrible things look and that

God will not permit this to endure I believe in the progressive revelation of scripture I believe there might have been a moment where God pulled back the veil a little bit and showed Job and said yes I will not let you fail yes there will be a day and I think maybe that window shut a little bit very quickly and Job didn't know what he saw but Job says I have confidence but I think that the full revelation of the hope of the resurrection is given to Christ and Christ alone he is the first fruits he is the one that discloses to us the hope of the glorious resurrection he alone shows us that death is not the end Job might have caught a glimpse of something not knowing what he caught a glimpse of but it is Christ who brings the revelation of the resurrection it is

Christ who brings the hope that comes from eternity it is Christ that brings the security that he is the redeemer the kinsman redeemer that fulfills every picture of the Old Testament including the picture that Job is stating here he is the one that by our faith and confidence in him will vindicate us on the last day he is the one that brings the assurance that even if our flesh decays and is gone that we will stand in the land of the living and see the Lord our God almighty could Job wrap his mind all around that no I don't think so but here's the challenge but Job believed it enough in what little light of revelation he had that he said I want this etched in stone so that everybody knows even if I die this is what I believe we have the full revelation found in the entirety of scripture and in the ministry and the work and the indwelling presence of the fullness of God how much more then shall we live confidently in the midst of struggle because we have been entrusted with so much more than

Job was Job makes this declaration with very little illumination we have the brightness of the Lord God almighty shining upon not only the history of man but the fullness of scripture and the testimony and the resounding declaration of the saints I was given a book recently on praying through scripture I've been going through it a lot here lately praying through scripture and I found in that book one of the practices of Martin Luther at the end of every one of his prayers he prayed two things gave him confidence during the trials and struggles of the reformation now there are some theology things that Martin Luther I don't agree with but he took a stand in a very difficult time to take a stand with but he prayed two things at the end of every one of his prayers he prayed through

Exodus 20 and the Ten Commandments so that he'd know what he shouldn't do and then he would pray through the Nassian Creed which is this is what I believe so I began to do that myself these are Ten Commandments this is what I shouldn't do this is what it looks like to live in religion to the holy God and then to pray through the Sin Creed not that it's any supernatural thing but this is what I believe and one of those is I believe in the soon returning of Christ to judge the living and the dead that we will be with him we believe that the church has been declaring that from ages going by we have a greater revelation than Job we can name the Redeemer he just said I know there's a Redeemer we can name him we know exactly where he stood and redeemed us we know how he redeems us and then

Job closes this confident assertion he has if you say how shall we persecute him and what pretext for a case against him can we find then you be afraid of the sword for yourselves what is he saying be careful how you judge me in my confidence and it's the same testimony we see in the New Testament because when he comes to redeem me he will also judge my enemies when he!

He also comes to judge for wrath brings the punishment of the sword so that you may know there is judgment the deep roots are formed in the struggle but they're formed in the midst of that struggle where we lose all self confidence and often we feel like we're isolated in Christ we know we're not because we are being built up as Peter would say in 1 Peter into a spiritual household of the family of God we have the one another to lean on we have the church Job did not we have the comfort but our ultimate security is not found in the stones we are connected with but rather in the chief cornerstone who holds!

us all together it gives us this firm foundation of faith and enables us to endure the moment we want the deep roots but we don't always want the struggle that forms them but it's in the midst of the struggle that we see them coming out here in Job's life and God will indeed speak at some point and he will fulfill every expectation that Job has every anticipation that he longed for will come and even then some so as our roots are forming may we lean more and more into what we know as for me I know!

not on what we feel not on what we perceive because there's a lot of things hollering at us but may we say as for me this is what I know and we just sat there in what we know and what God is showing us in that moment let's pray Father thank you for the day thank you for the opportunity of coming together and fellowship looking at your word with one another I pray that you walk with each one that is here I pray that you give us an overwhelming reality of your presence and that in that presence we would bask each and every day as we realize that you are our redeemer our sustainer our comforter and our friend that sticks closer than a brother you are our confidence you are our hope and our expectation you are the shepherd and guardian of our souls may we stand in what we know and may we look to you that we may know more and we ask it all in

Christ's name amen thank you guys I really appreciate you