Please remain standing for the reading of scripture. A couple of passages from Job, mainly from chapter 16 and 19. O earth, cover not my blood, and let my cry find no resting place. Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven, and he who testifies for me is on high. My friend scorned me. My eye pours out tears to God, that he would argue the case of a man with God. As a son of man does with his neighbor, for when a few years have come, I shall go the way from which I shall not return. My spirit is broken, my days are extinct, the grave is ready for me. Surely there are mockers about me, and my eye dwells on their provocation. Lay down a pledge for me with you. Who is there who will put up security for me? Since you have closed their hearts to understanding, therefore you will not let them triumph. And again, from chapter 19, verse 23 to the end of the chapter. Oh, that my words were written. Oh, that they were inscribed in a book. Oh, that with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever. For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the dust. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, Yet from my flesh I will see God, whom I will see for myself. My eyes shall behold, not another. My heart faints within me. If you say how we will pursue him, and the root of the matter is found in him, be afraid of the sword, for wrath brings the punishment of the sword, that you might know there is a judgment. Please be seated. You know, Wendy asked me whether we're having another son or a daughter this time. I was rooting for a daughter, but we're having a son. And this reminds me, because I had a brother, a younger brother growing up. And my family was a family that fought with loud voices. We were yellers, not excusing it. Some of that was certainly sinful. But if you will, just think of us as a weird Italian-Korean family. I'm not Italian. But think of how arguments go on. When arguments don't end, people aren't seeing each other's point of view. And what happens then? How do the people continue to argue, assuming they continue and they don't just brush under the rug and try to forget about it? Well, people's voices are going to raise. You're going to run out of steam. You might get angry. You might get sad. It might make you want to cry or just run away from home. Well, brothers and sisters in the Lord, our friends, as we see in the book of Job, they're getting angrier and angrier with him. The speeches get shorter. They're much less polite. They don't beat around the bush at all. They're less friendly. In fact, at the end of the first point of this sermon, spoiler a little bit, We'll see that Eliphaz, who was normally the most polite of these three, he doesn't offer Job any kind of plea that he would repent. He just kind of leaves it right there, talking about how Job fits in with the ungodly. Well, because the friends and Job, they continue to just speak past each other, and as the friends actually, all three of them, they're argument ends up blending together more and more. We're going to just treat them all in this one sermon for the second cycle. We'll look at the friend's complaint in the first point. Secondly, we'll look at Job's response to them, largely from chapter 21. And lastly, we'll consider Job's prayer to God from the passages I just read, chapter 16 and 19. Job's sections of prayers here, especially, mark the high point of his faith. We'll see in the next few chapters, even John Calvin will leave him and say, Job, you really crossed the line here. But the main point that we should really understand is that we, like Job, we might be tempted to sin in unbelief. When we see and experience the madness of this fallen world. When we see the wicked, the ungodly, prospering, enjoying God's good creation. And when we think about how even believers suffer as Job is. We shouldn't give up on our sure hope that God himself is our redeemer. He testifies for us in heaven. Let me say that again. God is our Redeemer testifying for us. He'll make all things right in the end for us in Christ our Redeemer. And so we don't need to be afraid when we see these things, when we see the nightmares of hell described in these chapters or the nightmares of injustice that we can see ourselves and that Job describes in chapter 21. So let's look at how the friends talk to Job again. First, Eliphaz decides to psychoanalyze Job. He says, Job must surely be covering something up with all this declaration of his innocence. He says, these must be empty words. And in fact, he says, Job, you're damaging true piety. You're making the youth group start doubting things. Eliphaz says, Job is distancing himself from his friends. You remember how Eliphaz back then, he said, I had a vision. I had a message from God for you. Do you remember that? Eliphaz says, by Job ignoring that, he's actually ignoring God's counsel. And that's a pretty strong rebuke, isn't it? It's a strong rebuke that matters if Eliphaz is right. Otherwise, if Eliphaz is not quite on the mark, if he's wrong in a certain way, then Job is right, as we heard in the last part of chapter 19. And as he says throughout, The friends need to be worried about breaking the ninth commandment, bearing false witness. Eliphaz doubles down. Before, he had just said that God doesn't justify people because we're people, because we're creations. We're creatures, creations. We're finite, infallible people. We're fragile. But now, he says it's because people are so abominable, so corrupt. In fact, he says people sin by nature. He says, this is almost like how people need to drink water every day. We can empathize with that, right? I drink, I don't know, probably more water than I need to. But this is Arizona and it's still summertime. LFS says, that's the way people sin. And he's right. By nature, born under Adam, we're not free to do anything but sin to one degree or another. But you see, the full truth of that is that's not true for the Christian. To the believer who's made alive by the Spirit of God, it's not true that he can only sin. And that's the only thing he can do, day in and day out. God's grace does sanctify people to himself, justifying them and sanctifying them throughout this life, which is to say he makes them grow in grace. A people who were once only sinners can, if I use the just theological terms, they're now sinners and saints. And this just nicely gets at the whole point of the book. I see a couple of unfamiliar faces, this is the whole point. This is the point of the book of Job from the very first chapters as we saw God call a divine counsel, right? The point of the book is that Satan is arguing that God can't save people, that salvation is just a joke. that what God promised to Adam and Eve after the fall, that he would send a savior, he would make things right, he would make things new again, that God can't do that. And God says, watch me. Or maybe more relevantly to Job, consider my servant Job. So we see here again, just one way that Eliphaz and really all the other friends, they're just serving This kind of mouthpiece, they're arguing against Job, but they're not quite right. He continues, and listen to the words he uses. I'll just pick a few verses. He describes the ungodly. He says they are barren. Job is barren. He says fire will consume their property. Job's property was consumed by fire. His wealth will not endure. Distress will terrify him. In fact, he uses the same words that Job uses to talk about what has happened to him, how he has suffered this calamity. He says, the ungodly will writhe in pain all his days. And isn't that what Job's doing? All this leads him to imply at the very end that Job must have stretched out his hand against God and defied the Almighty. in chapter 15, verse 25. Well, Eliphaz doesn't conclude this second speech with a plea for Job to repent. He doesn't talk about how good it is to walk right with God. And that's just a way of showing they're losing steam, they're losing their tempers, and this can't keep going on. This is going to come to an end. Bildad follows suit in chapter 18. His speech is a sermon rivaling Jonathan Edwards' Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. He accuses Job that he himself is tearing himself apart. Bildad is so convinced that this world, this world is not fallen. This world is one where God operates with perfect justice. He says, Job, your complaint, your prayers, don't make sense. It's like you're asking God to just like change the whole world for you. And all this on the coattails of Job's longing for heaven on earth. If you would remember the last time we were in the book of Job from chapters 13 and 14. Remember how Job wanted God's presence and joy with him right now? He said, I don't want to wait. for glory. That's what I want right now. I don't need all the other blessings on this earth. Well, Job has cried out that all he can see in this lifetime is darkness, the shadow of the grave. Bildad says that's the fate of the wicked. Job's lamented to God. He's prayed. He said, God once smiled upon me, and yet now he considers me his enemy. And Bildad says, do you know what God does to his enemies? This is a very scary passage. This passage, Bildad talks about what hell and demons are like. They'll eat you alive, he says. Job, you don't know the half of it. Job, this is going to be a terrorist operation. He's going to drag you out. out of your home. There's going to be no survivors. It's going to be bloody. It's not going to be rated PG. He even talks as if this demon has a name, the King of Terror. The wicked won't be remembered, like you, Job. There won't even be any kind of people denying what's going on here. They just won't remember you. He doesn't quite come out to say it. But he leaves all the dots in a row. It's almost like when you hear David and Nathan, the prophet Nathan, who says, you are the man. That's what he's saying to Job. And Zophar, the last of the three friends, well, he chimes right in. He agrees with the other two. In chapter 20, he says, the wicked might prosper, sure. But they get washed away so quickly. They get washed away. In fact, they fly forgotten like a dream, dies at the opening day. His children will be forced to return his wealth, which isn't that just like a knife in the wound for Job? Job doesn't even have kids left to return any kind of wealth he supposedly got by stealing or by extortion or anything like that. He then starts to use the language of poison. And he says, Job, sin is like poison. Sure, it might be like honey, but it's not going to last. It's going to force you to vomit. You're going to be so sick, you can't stomach food, regular food anymore. And haven't we heard that's what's going on with Job? So Zophar is now pointing at Job and his waste bucket. He's saying, Job, your body is testifying against yourself. We don't even need to start talking theologically anymore. We can just start pointing fingers at Job's body. These are frightening images of God's judgment. I don't say this just to alarm the children or the fainthearted. These men speak the truth in part. Surely God will judge. the wicked, and those who do not repent and turn to Christ. It'll be more terrifying, more horrifying. It'll be more violent to the point words will fail us. It'll be worse than these word pictures in the book of Job. But the friends of Job, they get one thing terribly wrong. They're preaching hellfire to a man who's trusting in God for salvation. They think they have God all figured out, put him in a box. But truth be told, that world of perfect justice is not this one we live in. There will be a day coming soon, Lord willing, when God will rescue and bring all of his redeemed, adopted children and save them from sin, liberate them from this present world filled with violence and injustice and all kinds of wickedness. But friends, this world really is fallen. Which is another way to say there really is an offer of salvation. Let's see how Job responds to all this in chapter 21, in the second point. Job responds and he says, I've heard this over and over again. Troublesome comforters are you all. We can sum up his response in one verse, chapter 21, verse 7, if you're turning or taking notes. Job says, why do the wicked live, reach old age, and grow mighty in power? He fleshes this out in the rest of the chapter. And this might sound a lot like Psalm 73, which we'll sing at the end of the service. This is almost as horrifying a picture to Job that the wicked would get to enjoy God's good creation. It's equally or even more horrifying to him than the horrifying pictures, the nightmares that his friends just preached to him about what God will do to the wicked. Why is that? It's sometimes phrased this way. For the Christian, there's no problem of evil. in the world, problem of suffering. We know that this world is full of sin and misery as a result of the fall. The real problem that we have to wrestle with is how God is so good, even to unbelievers. Why doesn't he just send another flood? Because he's promised to preserve the world until he comes again. Why is God so good to unbelievers, to give them businesses that prosper, give them minds that work, air in their lungs? Because he is a loving and generous God. And without that air in their lungs, there would be no one who might be saved hearing the word preached. Well, Job goes on. He says, it's not fair that the wicked get to have lots of well-adjusted children. Why do they get to buy the designer SUVs and fill them with healthy kids? Why do their kids never know what a funeral's like, and they only know happy, clappy songs? All they know is to dance. Even when these people die, it's peaceful. There's no suffering there. And Job says, don't get me wrong. These people are not closeted believers. They openly are in rebellion against God. Job says, you don't even have to think too hard. They confess that they are unbelievers. They've done the math. They say loving God is not going to pay, as all the friends seem to think the world works that way. And Job says, just to be clear, Job's not one of them, even though the friends have been telling him that he is this whole time. He says, the counsel of the wicked is far from me, in 21 verse 16. He asks, have you ever seen the wicked people who get away with murder? Have you ever seen them judged so suddenly and so thoroughly like I have been? Or is this just a theory you've worked out in your head? Does your theory tell the truth about God's world? In other words, Finally, he actually gets at more of the point, which is, who are they to actually judge what God does in this world? Even when the wicked die, they die with honor, not violence. Job, with excellent poetry, says, all of Adam pulls his casket. Behind him, the people are without number. in a culture where your good name and your reputation and your burial was worth so much more than just continued wealth and even inheritance. This is telling a lot. He concludes all that response by saying, listen, friends, you haven't lived in this world. like I have. You can't talk truthfully about God's providence. You've been cooped up in your ivory tower. Verse 29, he says, you haven't asked those who travel the roads. Because you're talking about God's justice in a perfect world, you really don't have an honest, genuine counsel or help or comfort for me. At least, friends, Brothers and sisters in the Lord, we don't yet live in that world where God's justice reigns perfectly. This is made clear from God's natural revelation. You can look at the news. You can look at history. It's made more clear in God's special revelation when we read his scripture, Job, when we read Ecclesiastes, when we read the Gospels. and even the rest of scripture. But this doesn't mean that we're without hope in this world. If you trust in Christ, like Job, you have a sure foundation for hope. God will make all things right again for his glory and for the good of his people. And we'll see that in this last point. That's Job's confidence. Let's look at those passages we read. Job cries out like an innocent sufferer. Chapter 16, verse 18, he says, O earth, cover not my blood. Let my cry find no resting place. This should bring anyone's mind who's open to scripture to think of Abel, the story of Cain and Abel, a man who's killed and yet righteous, innocent. Job said that His friends were pointing at his own body. We see this in chapter 16, 8. They say his body is exhibit A for Job's guilt. And yet, Job here says that he has a witness in heaven. Who is this witness? Well, I want to tell you one false view, which is one that many liberal Bible scholars and commentators hold, which is that Job's blood, Job is somehow personifying his own cry, his own bloodshed on the ground. Sure, his blood's on the ground, but somehow it's also in heaven. But that's not what Job's saying. Job is comparing them by saying these are two very different things, his blood, is on the ground, but his witness is in heaven. So Job pleads that God himself would stand as surety for him. He would put up security for Job. And these are kind of odd court terms, legal language. What does this mean to stand as surety? We've already kind of sung about this in a couple of these hymns. The clearest picture we have of this is in the story of Judah at the end of the book of Genesis. Judah was a rebellious son of Jacob, and yet he was humbled. Why could Jacob trust his beloved son Benjamin in the hands of this son who had once walked away from the faith, as it were, left the church, left the family, abandoned his inheritance, renounced his family name almost, Well, because Jacob knew that God himself would preserve Judah. He could see this is where the line of the Messiah was going, because Judah repented. Well, in the same way, Job is talking about surety here. He's saying nobody else will. No one is around to post bail for him. Nobody's on his side. Even his own body seems to speak against himself. And yet, somehow Job can count on God to trump all the other evidence that would seem to say that he's against him. But this isn't just a happy thought or a hopeful wish. I want you to see that Job here says, I know. In the last part of our reading from chapter 19, Job says, oh, that my words were written. He's looking for a record, a permanent record, which would lead to a permanent righteousness. He starts with these ordinary writing tools, and then he like ratchets it up a notch, right? He talks about just pen and paper. Then he talks about carving this in stone. He even talks about lead and iron. But then he moves on to an even fuller conviction, not just a tombstone or a court document, not even the most long-standing court document. He looks to something even better, a living savior. He moves on to the statement of his full conviction in verse 25, chapter 19. He says, I know myself that my redeemer lives, my kinsman redeemer. And in the latter days, he'll stand on my dust. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet from my flesh I will see God. I myself will see him. For myself, my eyes will see him and not another. my heart faints within me." Do you hear how many times he's pointing back to himself and then pointing to his Savior? Like Job, who else can we turn to when the whole world, when even our own hearts condemn us? Who can we turn to besides the Lord Jesus? If we had time, We could look at the rest of Job 19 in the first two-thirds of that chapter or so. He goes down the list. He says, I have been abandoned by everyone. He says his family, his own wife, his brothers and sisters, his community, his neighbors, even the young kids who he would expect to have respected him, at least as an elder, if not as a weak and broken man. And now he says, by his friends. And Job's been honest in his prayers so far. Sometimes he says, I feel abandoned by God. And yet, here he says, this is something I know. And what is it that Job knows? That God himself will be Job's kinsman redeemer, his deepest and truest family, a friend sticking closer than a brother, a father who's loved him, before he was born, and he won't ever abandon him. And more to the point here, a mediator who stands before his judge, pleading Job's innocence. If we had time, we'd get totally sidetracked with a whole other sermon series on another kinsman redeemer, on the book of Ruth and Boaz there. Let me just say, that picture is the same one here. Job says he knows his kinsman redeemer lives. It's saying he knows that God himself will give him new life, will prevent his name from dying out, will restore his inheritance. God will bring justice and salvation and even happiness as only God can and as he has in the person and work of the Lord Jesus, who in Job's day was many centuries off, but in our day, now he lives. He died and rose again. In that story, Naomi's bitter depression was really only cured when God, through the ordinary providence of Boaz marrying Ruth and having a child, when he put that baby in that grandmother's arms, God restored Naomi. Likewise, Job says, God will restore me. so fully, he'll even forget how it felt like to cry, how it felt to weep, to be without sleep, to have lost all his friends and family, all his business, his own name. He'll remove Job's shame, even if that means he needs a new body. Because his current body is not only his shame, it's his testimony against himself, according to his friends. This means that Job knows that God will restore him in resurrection glory. And Job, one more little point here. This is a very rich passage. Job says he won't be satisfied if a surrogate were to see God for him. He also wouldn't be satisfied if God sent only an emissary. He said, here, see this angel. OK, let that be enough. No, Job says, it's gotta be me and it's gotta be my God. That's what he wants. And you know what? That's the last part of that verse 27. This fills his stomach with butterflies. He says, my heart faints within me. This is what Psalm 73 says. Psalm 73 says, when my soul was embittered, when I was pricked in heart, I was brutish and ignorant. I was like a beast toward you. Nevertheless, I am continually with you. You hold my right hand. You guide me with your counsel. And afterward, you will receive me in glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail. but God is the strength of my heart, my portion forever. For behold, those who are far from you shall perish. You put an end to everyone who is unfaithful to you. But for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the Lord Yahweh my refuge, and I may tell of all your works. In closing, there is a word of warning here. At the last part of chapter 19, the last two verses, Friends, if you have not trusted yourself to Christ, if you don't know this Redeemer standing before God, ready, willing, loving to defend you and restore you and raise you from the dead on the last day, then I need you to hear Job's word of warning. I'm going to read those verses again. Be afraid of the sword, for the sword is the wrath of punishment. that you may know there is a judgment. This isn't just Job's warning to his friends. This is God's warning to you. Because friends, if you have not put your trust in Christ, this is where your life will lead you. Either you'll hide yourself in Christ and have no fear of the grave or the insanity, as Job described, of living in this fallen world. You won't fear the demons. as described by his friends, the torments of hell. Please, hear the words that God preaches to you and to me, that we would live. He wants you and all people to have life in the name of Jesus. Won't you pray with me? Our Father, you do love us, truly, as a father, even when all others fail us. Lord, cause us to be consecrated to you, to your service, as we would go out into the world, as we would enter our vocations during this week, as your pilgrim people. Give your people hearts of compassion for the lost. Help us to not grow weary of doing good, even as we lament when we live in this fallen world, where things are not as they should be. Those who hate you seem to get away with it. Your own people suffer. Lord, remind us of your love towards us in Christ Jesus. In his name we pray, amen.