Some things I want to start with before we get into it. If you don't mind opening your Bibles to Ephesians, I'd like to share some things for you to help give some clarity to what we're going through on Sundays. And some of you are saying, why are you doing that? Because it connects with what Job went through. As we started this book, all of us understand how there's a confrontation between God and Satan in heaven. I just want to share some verses that can give us some clarity on that. Is that okay? Sure it is, Jerry. Good. Man, you guys are all agreeable. Amen. I'm so used to saying, yeah, Chaplain Jerry, go ahead, add it. Well, that's about what it is. So if you turn to Ephesians chapter one real quickly, I want to read verse three. Is everyone there? Good, good. Ephesians 1 verse 3. Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. How many of you have heard, or how many of you might pray prayers like God bless me in this, or God bless this, or God bless that? Do you know that we've already got all the blessings of God in the heavenly places? You don't need to pray for blessings. We're already blessed, amen? And so that's one thing I wanted to share with you real quickly, and then if you would turn over to Ephesians chapter five, or excuse me, chapter six, in relationship to what we've been learning about the armor of God, which is so important, because we're in a battle, amen? We're all in a battle. We're in a battle. We're in a battle. So I want to start with verse 10. It says, finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you might take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers and against the authorities and against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Isn't that interesting? That sort of goes contrary to a lot of people's theology because obviously we come away with God's word saying that God does not allow sin to be present in, was that someone screaming or what? I didn't, oh that's okay, praise God, I just thought maybe somebody was screaming for help. Help me, all right. So anyway, so, so, This battle that goes on in heaven, most just don't quite understand how it happens, but God's glory is so... important to God that he is utilizing Satan to bring glory to himself. And how is he doing that in the book of Job? Through Job's life. Isn't that interesting? And so, God has let Satan do his bidding with Job, except taking his life, to do what he thinks he can do to stop Job from praising God. And so that's why I wanted to share these verses because first of all, we're blessed in the heavenly realms with all the spiritual blessings that we could ever imagine. And then also the forces of evil are in the heavenly realms basically making battle against God and his forces as well as ourselves. And so there's a battle that rages on, and I hope that you understand as we go through Job, Job was in a battle, and Job was very much focused on God. Have you ever thought about the fact that Job, we don't know how old he was, but he had life experience. Most generally, it's important that we understand that God isn't wasting any of our days or any of our years, that he's developing us as we grow and as we get to know him. We have very little time on earth, it could be 80 or it could be more, but the point is, is what we have, we must invest in Christ, amen? We must get to know Him intimately and closely because we never know how God might choose to use us in our sufferings, correct? And so this past week, I don't know about you, but I entered into suffering. Let me explain how it happened. Last Saturday, my mouth began to hurt and I discovered that I was having a toothache. Well, in the midst of this toothache that actually grew more intense by Sunday night, that I just didn't feel like eating anything because it hurt when I chewed. And so on Monday, I went to the dentist and he said I needed a root canal and that I needed, that my tooth had cracked, actually, in the corner of it. Well, as time went on, it just became more and more painful that this is about how I live for several days, just holding my cheek. And as I processed this and had my root canal yesterday, which I'm about the biggest coward around, I hate shots, I hate anything that has to do with pain, amen? How many of you hate pain? We got a congregation that's united here, bud, I'm telling you. And that's one of the principles that I got from my tooth and my set of experience with pain is that nobody chooses pain. Nobody chooses pain. Pain comes to us through the things that life presents us. And obviously, nobody, at least I've never heard of anyone signing up for pain. Nobody wants pain. Well, God brought me through. My wife is an RN, like I've told you before, and I called and talked to her about some things, and she said, well, where is your appointment? I'll go with you. And I said, no, I'm not gonna have you go with me. I'm gonna face this pain alone. Can you guys all clap for me? Praise God. I faced the pain alone. I told her, I don't want to be a boy anymore. I want to be a man. I want to be your man. Oh, shoot. Boy, I'll tell you what, every time I go to the dentist and sit in the chair, it's gotta be the day of the rapture, amen. I kept telling people all over the jail, Pastor Phil, I am going to the dentist and the rapture's occurring, you better have your goods ready because we're going. It didn't occur. I'm here, you're here. But let me tell you, the word of God comes alive when you go through pain. And as I sat in the chair, I quoted several verses to help me have peace and to help me not have anxiety. Because God says be anxious for nothing, even root canals. And quite frankly, the dentist said, man, you didn't even flinch when I gave you 10,000 shots, it felt like. I got home last night and finally it all wore off. It was about nine o'clock. And let me tell you what, I felt every shot he gave me. I felt like my mouth had been through World War III. And I try not to take meds, you know, I try not to take any meds. So I, Patty, of course, here they are, here they are. And I said no, and so about three o'clock, I gave in, because I could not sleep. But man, from three o'clock on, Pastor, it was like the lights went out and I slept well. So I wanted to share about suffering, because here's the thing, as I talked to God about that, I said, Lord, why'd you let me have to go through this? He said, well, you're teaching Job. I want you to know what it is to suffer, just a little tiny bit. Maybe some of you, because you've been going through Job, maybe you have had your little bit of suffering because we have, no one will ever have suffered like Jesus Christ, amen. And as what I'm getting out of Job is that this is the gospel in pure form that Jesus Christ suffered for us, and so did Job. God was using Job to show Satan that you can't get to this man because he loves me. And you can't get to Jesus because he loves me too. He's my son. What a great passage that we're gonna look at tonight, the mudslinger. Quite frankly, it's just the opposite of sort of my giftings. I'm an encourager. I'm a Barnabas. So I have a real hard time thinking about slinging mud. I just like to sling love, you know what I mean? That sort of rhymes, doesn't it? It's a whole lot better to sling love than mud, amen? And at the end of this, I've got some application for us that I hope that will be helpful to you and to me. Well, some of you might wonder, what in the world have I got this, anyway, like I'm going on a picnic. Well, I brought, I brought some, some milk, and there's not much in it, but I brought some milk because I wanted to read something real quickly to you that I think might help. When we came to this world, we entered it with a longing, and some of the things I'm gonna be sharing tonight is developing a relationship with Jesus Christ, because without Him, we can't have anything at all, amen? It's all found in Christ. And so, when we entered into the world, In fact, before we did, we had a longing for milk. Did you know that? Even in our mother's womb, we had no idea what milk was. We had never tasted it. We had never seen it. Nobody ever told us that it existed. And yet, the longing for milk was deep inside our being before we had the assurance of our existence. This teacher that's sharing this concept paused for a moment and he turned out that it did exist. It turned out that we long for what we know only from the hunger deep inside our being was real. There was a mother and the mother's breast to answer our longings. Do you know where the word mother comes from? I never thought of it, the student said. The word was created by babies. He said all across the world in almost every language on the earth, You can hear the word for mother to cry of a baby, mama, or mom, or ama, or ima, or mia, or mapta, or maa. It comes from those first longings, the longing for milk. And all these words bear witness that to our longings, there existed an answer. But this is not about babies. No, our longing for milk passes away, but we find another longing within our hearts, another emptiness, another hunger, but deeper, a longing for that which the world never answers. And amen to that, right? The world never answers the longing of our hearts. We long for the perfect, we long for the perfect love, the perfect happiness, the perfect contentment, and the perfect peace. We long for that which doesn't fail, that which never disappoints us. As we grow older, It will never pass away. We long for the eternal and the perfect, but the world can never answer those longings, still they say with us all the days of our lives. We long for it, though we've never tasted it. And our very longings bear witness that what we had never seen or tasted was real. We long for the perfect because the perfect exists as we once longed for milk, knowing Christ. Yes, and we long for the perfect love because there's a perfect love. We long for the eternal because there's an eternal existence. And the eternal put that longing into our hearts so we would seek him. Eternity is written on our hearts. That's in the scriptures. And so that eternity is what God placed in us because we long for God, we long for a relationship with Him. We long for that perfect love, that perfect love, we long for eternal because eternal exists, eternal put that belonging in our hearts that we would seek Him and find Him. And I wanna ask you, are you seeking after God? I don't care how long you've known Him, but are you seeking after God? Because as we seek Him, we shall find Him if we seek Him with all our hearts. That's why we have to guard our hearts to make sure we are wanting him with all our hearts. Like I wanted cigarettes, or I wanted drugs, or I wanted alcohol, or I wanted the things before. I longed for them, did I not? And then I went after them with all my strength. We need to do that with Jesus Christ, amen. So is he your deepest longing? Because he's the milk of heaven. I thought that would help us understand what Job had going on in his heart. He longed for God. He desired God more than anything. That's why he could withstand these three friends that were brutal at destroying him so that Satan could win. Do you understand? These friends were inciting him to call out God. and refute God in a sense to reject God would then give Satan the victory. And yet it didn't happen. In fact, in this passage or in these passages, as you see across the top, 10 through 14, we're gonna find that Job makes this powerful statement that exactly, set Satan's tail spinning because Satan loses the battle. We're gonna find out later on as we go through the book how this occurs even more, because Satan is relentless and doesn't give up. So here's the key thought. We see Job become more animated and vocal in both his complaints and in his own defense. And with his tongue, Let's quote this verse together. Can we do that please? It says, with our tongue, we praise our Lord and Father, and with it, we curse men who have been made in God's likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be. The reason I brought this up is because here these three friends were now not encouraging him, but they basically were saying, just curse God and die like his wife said. In fact, they were saying, you have the problem And you need to let God fix you. When Job was sitting in the ash heap, knowing that he had done nothing wrong, and that God was silent and it drove him nuts. Because I don't believe God was silent before. That's why Job was a godly man. He had a conversation with God. He knew God. Well, that makes human beings so interesting is the very fact that we are not robots. Amen to that. But I've talked to many, many people, those in the jail and outside of the jail, that just wish God would change this and change that and that nothing would ever be bad and that Consequently, God would just simply be working with robots and he would do his will without our consent or without our involvement at all. And yet he's made us free will agents, has he not? And so that we can choose to do whatever we want. We can choose it, but the consequences will be devastating and we won't choose them at all. Well, we are emotional creatures and we respond and react to every given environment and no matter how timid someone may be, there will always come a point where they will stand up for themselves in the midst of abuse. Job has had enough of his three friends after they're wounding him. Now it's Job's turn to respond to their accusations. Job doesn't understand why God would give him life and then not respect him as one of his creations. Interesting. Job no longer wants an umpire, he wants a deliverer. God has a profound appreciation for the creative process that brought him into existence. This sort of summarizes the passages that we're gonna go through tonight, but Job feels like a marked man being watched every moment by God. Every moment by God. Job understands why God would, does not understand why God would bring him out of his mother's womb to live such a purposeless life. Job is so desperate that he asked God for just a few moments of peace before he dies. And then Zophar, is described in a sense as we read about his interaction with Job as a mudslinger. He's there trying to create problems. It's interesting, all of us know C.S. Lewis, listen to this. C.S. Lewis wrote a book on the doctrine of why we suffer. And he called that book The Problem of Pain. Well, it was popular and it was a great, it was written as a defense against atheist charge that the reality of suffering proves that God does not exist. Have you ever heard that? If God exists, then there shouldn't be suffering. Well, I have heard that it's said that if there's so much suffering, why is there so much good? Have you ever thought about that? In other words, if there's no God, then why is there so much good going on? The atheists say if there's suffering, then God does not exist. But suffering is much more than an intellectual problem, it's an experience that engulfs the body, mind, and soul of the sufferer. It sure got my attention this week. I'm not hardly ever suffered, but you know what I'm saying, it was a tiny tidbit, but it got my attention. How about you, when you've suffered? Well, 20 years after he wrote The Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis wrote another book with painful, angry questions, and the book was called The Grief Observed. It reads a lot like the book of Job. It opens with intense questions, it offers no answers, and it shows the author moves through a terrible time of pain and loss with his faith bruised but intact. You see, C.S. Lewis wrote The Grief Observed after watching his wife of three years, Joy Davidman Lewis, die of bone cancer. He wrote the book because he watched the book be written by his wife as she suffered, and he was only married to her for three years. So there came counselors Eliphaz, eloquently questioning Job's integrity. Biladad told Job that his children's death were due to their own sin. Now we've got our friend Zophar. And so let's get into the book. Well, Zophar's three accusations. After listening to Eliphaz and Biladad accuse Job, now it's Zophar's, he begins his tirade against Job by talking all about what else? Job's sin, that's where he got fixated. Job, you've sinned because of your pain. Job's iniquity, as you can see there on your sheet, his iniquity, his iniquity, And that begins with verses three and four, three and four. And it says, should your empty talk make men hold their peace? And when you mock, should no one rebuke you? For you have said, my doctrine is pure, and I am clean in your eyes. According to Zophar, what Job, said about God was not true. And what Job said about himself was an outright lie. Zophar tries to paint Job into a corner based upon his few misinterpretations. First of all, Job never claimed to be sinless. In Job 7.21, he claimed the complete opposite. And when God claimed that Job was blameless and upright, that was still true, Job 2.3. Having integrity before God, having integrity before God is not the same as being flawless and sinless, sinlessly perfect. In fact, at the end of this lesson today, I wanna talk a little bit about blameless, what blameless means. Job's, so far, indictment and misleading and untruthful. So far his indictments were misleading and untruthful. Job's ignorance, this is what he claimed Job had, that he was ignorant. That's the second point there, ignorant, his ignorance. Zophar continued with biting, sarcastic words in verses five and six. But oh, that God would speak and open his lips against you, that he would show you the secrets of wisdom, for they would double your prudence. Know therefore that God exacts from you less than your iniquity deserves. Zophar considered Job to be ignorant of wisdom of God. But what he did not understand was that both he and Job needed that wisdom. James tells us, you guys, that chapter 3, 13 through 17 says wisdom from above is first of all pure and lovely and it's perfect. And it's all about real wisdom is right living. If you wanna write down what wisdom means, it means right living, meaning that your character is such that wisdom comes out of it, has nothing to do how smart you are, intelligent, has nothing to do. It's all about character, found in James chapter three, verses 13 through 17. Very good that you would read that if you would, because it's all about character. of wisdom. Well Zophar considered Job to be ignorant of wisdom. And so finally there's a Zophar statement in verse six that God was exacting from Job less than he deserved. This ranks right up there at the top of the most insensitive statement in the book. Can you imagine Job suffering more than he has? Zophar has no idea what he speaks of to whom he is speaking. This guy experienced suffering on the major scale. Do you not reflect on Jesus and what he did for us and that he suffered the greatest of sufferings because he took all our sin on himself? There is no greater suffering than that because he became hell for us. Anything you read about hell in the Bible, Jesus experienced in getting to the cross, amen? And so the point of the matter is Jesus was acquainted with suffering and Jesus understood. Well, Job suffered and this man was relentless to attack him. And the final shot of Job was found in verse 12 where he basically calls Job an idiot and tells him that he can do no more, he can do, he can no more become wise than a donkey can become a man. Boy, this guy is a slinger, isn't he? What a guy, what a great friend. Now Job's inflexibility, the third count against his accusations towards Job. 13 through 20 reveals Zophar's third and final criticism of Job. According to Zophar, Job's unwillingness to repent and acknowledge his sin is the reason for his great suffering. Have you guys ever watched someone suffer and thought in your mind, what did they do wrong? Have you ever had that thought? I think that's a normal, natural thought, is it not? What did they do wrong? And yet, sometimes God allows it, not because of something wrong, but because of something good. Everyone with me? What is the good? God has begun a good work in us and he will complete it into the day of Christ. Even my, Even my root canal was for the good of Christ in Jerry. It was for my good in developing character I would not ever learn. Are you with me? So we need to embrace it and be thankful for it because God has an eternal purpose in it. Supposedly to motivate Job to repent, Sovar tells Job nine things he could experience if he would only confess. Let me just share these nine things with you. He could lift up his face without spot, verse 15. He could be steadfast and not fear, verse 15. He could forget his misery, verse 16. His life would be brighter, verse 17. He would be like the morning, verse 17. He would be secure, verse 18. And he would have hope, verse 18. He would not be afraid, verse 19. He would be courted by many, verse 19. In order for Job to experience those nine things, Zophar says he must prepare his heart and confess his iniquities, verses 13 and 14. But once again, if Job confesses his sins, now this is so important, if Job confesses to sins that are not committed just so that the things will get better in his personal life, this is so important, he will turn his faith into a commercial enterprise and he will fall into the trap of Satan and dishonor God. Have you ever thought about that? that if you don't know of any sin in your life, don't be confessing stuff that isn't true, amen? You all amening with me or? Okay, okay. So it's important that we understand that. Job's three affirmations are next. His three affirmations. Now this is Job that's going to be talking. His words in the next three chapters are direct replies to Zophar's attacks. But at the same time, his answers also affirm the holiness of God. So at the same time Job is being honest with God, Job is also glorifying and worshiping God. Are you with me? Are you with me? That's why it's so important that whenever we enter any circumstance, we always give thanks, right? In every circumstance, give thanks. I thank God for my root canal. I thanked him when I cracked my tooth. I was thanking him because he was working through those things in my life. So, I'm saying and acknowledging to God, you're in control, you're sovereign, and you're calling the shots. Well, The greatness of God is where Job starts, chapter 12. Do you see it? Job begins his appeal by displaying how small and insignificant man is in comparison to a great and holy God. Can we say amen to that? Last week I said that understanding God is like trying to help an aunt understand my cell phone. In fact, in Jeremiah, man is described as a grasshopper. And so we need to understand just how minimal our understanding of God is, and that's why I believe we have all of eternity with God. Because it will take all of eternity for God to pull back the drapes, for us to understand the dynamics of who God is, even in our glorified state. And so it won't be boring in heaven at all, trust me. Every day, God will just simply reveal one more thing. One more thing will be good enough probably for maybe a thousand years in heaven, amen? I mean, we won't have to, well, is there any more? I mean, is that it? You follow what I'm saying? I get so, I guess, irritated at Christians who say, well, what will we do in heaven for thousands of years? Oh my goodness, don't hang out with me. Don't hang out with me because I believe we will, I believe that this is training for the real performance and I believe as you serve him here, he will give you service there. Are you with me? So if you're wasting your time and you're not doing any service for God, you're really blowing it because you're not gonna be of much equipment for God to use to send you all over the universe and I believe we will do that. And so I don't know about your heaven, but my heaven's real big, amen. And we're gonna have a good time there just learning about God. That's enough, amen, just learning about him. But why can't we practice doing that here? You know, because it says in John that if we obey his commandments because we love him, it says that he will show himself to us. I don't know about you, but I'm excited about seeing God, amen. And so Job wanted to see God more and more, and I believe he did in his life, and that's what gave him strength to go through this, because he knew who God was. It wasn't an assumption. It wasn't something that was a theory. He knew God. He just knew that God was acting different than what this relationship was like before. Haven't we all had relationships that change over time? Maybe because of what someone's going through or whatever. God was entertaining Satan and it was God's turn to stand back and say, okay, there he is. And he remained quiet because the test was with Job. Well, the greatness of God. Job begins his appeal by displaying how small and insignificant man is when compared to a giant and a holy God, a great and holy God, amen. Job's rebuke, number one, Job's rebuke. Verses one through six and verse two, Job says to his friends, no doubt you are the people and the wisdom will die with you. In other words, he rebukes them about the fact they don't really have any wisdom at all. In fact, all they have is techniques to hurt people like him. We've been waiting for Job to finally stick up for himself, and here he finally does. He sarcastically tells his friends that when they die, there will be no one left to tell anyone how to live life like them. Have you ever met people like that that are assured of the fact that they just know all about everything and especially God, but oftentimes their life doesn't reflect that at all? Of course, this thought is absurd, which is exactly Job's point. Only God is the source of all knowledge. Only God provides by his hand. In a sense, Job listened, and he listened, and now it's his turn. Number two, Job's ridicule. Job gets even more pointed and sarcastic when he tells his friends to look for the godly wisdom in three other places. He tells them, look for the animals. They're wiser than you guys. Job says in verse seven, but now ask the beast, they will teach you, and the birds of the air, they will tell you. Job suggests that his friends could learn a lot by talking to the animals. Talking to the animals. Why did he do that? Well, Zophar used a donkey to insult Job, so Job came right back and insinuated that the fish and the cattle are a lot wiser than his pious friends. Do you guys ever let creation speak to you? Do you ever learn things from creation? You ever notice how birds are happy? Flowers are beautiful? And neither are worried at all about their existence. It makes me quite sad many times when I hear birds joyfully chirping and joyfully singing because they're content. We can learn a lot from animals. How about asking animals and then ask anyone. This is verses nine through 11. Job then asks in verse nine, who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? It is essentially evident to everyone that Job's plight is a result of God's will. Evident to everyone, that is except his three friends. So Job advises his counselor to seek counsel from literally anyone they meet because it is not hard for others to see the truth. So in other words, others felt compassion for Job. Others understood this man had it all, but only God could take it away. Do you understand what I'm saying? And they understood where he was at, but these three friends came to blast on him. and to break him down. Well, then last of all, Job's ridicule is ask the aged, you know, the senior citizen, ask him. Just ask that guy or gal because typically with age comes understanding. Often comes wisdom because their character has developed, hopefully. Hopefully, we all have met older senior citizens that don't have much character or need a lot of it in their lives. It's because I believe they've missed the opportunities of pain and sorrow and grief and the memories of their life to help them grow in their walk with Christ. You see, it's all on an individual basis. God is asking us to take advantage of the things he allows in our lives. No one really likes growing older, but the Bible gives us a direct benefit of aging process right here. Job tells his friends that if they ask the opinion of some of those who had seen a lot of life, their eyes and hearts might be open to the truth. So now he's saying the animals can help you guys if you just listen to them. Anyone else around here would tell you and help you if you'd ask them. And then the aged, the elderly would help you if you ask them. Well, Job's reverence, Job's reverence, chapter 12. 13 through 25, and we read here, Job was able to vent a little in the past few verses and to display his frustration to his friends, but he immediately comes back to God. Because it really doesn't matter about them or about others around him, what matters most is God. What matters most is God. Remember I told you that it's often sad that when things come up, people run to their phone to go call someone. Why don't we run to our knees and call out to God? Why don't we talk to God about what's going on in our lives? I think God would be the better source, don't you? To help us get through, to help us get on. Well, so Job offers Three attributes of God that he knows are true. Let's look at them now. First of all, Job's reverence, and first of all, God is shrewd, God is shrewd. Now this is speaking of God. Job says, with him are wisdom and strength. This is in verse 13, do you see it? He has counsel and understanding. Notice that these are all attributes of his friend's greatly lacked. These are all attributes. This is chapter 12, verse 13 of Job. Again, God, Job is trying to show his friends that these are evidence of who God is that I'm well acquainted with. B, God is strong. God is strong. This is chapter 12, verses 14 and 15. Do you see it there in your Bibles, 14 and 15? In verse 14, Job says, Job says in verse 14, if he breaks a thing down, it cannot be rebuilt. If he imprisons a man, there can be no release. God is undeniably in his power and cannot be stopped or withheld. God is strong, amen. God is strong. He's strong in our behalf, is he not? As children of God, he is strong in our behalf. He is our Father. He is our warrior. He is our conqueror. He is our shield. He is our rock. He is our foundation. He is strong for us who trust in Him, amen? He is strong. And so, So we go on here and see is God is sovereign. That means in control. That means knowing all things. Nothing surprises him. You might wanna write that down. Nothing surprises God. Even the evil of our day does not surprise God. He sees it all, does he not? He sees it all. Well, Verse 23, verse 23 of chapter 12. He makes nations great and destroys them. He enlarges nations and dispenses them. Isn't that interesting? Have you ever thought about or have you ever read about how England basically controlled the whole world at one point? Nebuchadnezzar as well? And those nations are nothing, are nothing. In fact, it's all tied for England that they became completely weak and not even a force in the world when they kicked the Jews out of England and they rejected them. And so after that, God didn't have his hand on that nation any longer and that nation completely was destroyed in a sense of their power in the world. I don't know about you guys, but as America deals with the Jews or Israel, you will see us, you will see us become nothing. Are you with me? And so God's goodness, chapter 13, Job now shifts from talking about the greatness of God to the goodness of God. Job's hostility towards his friends is that next blank, his hostility towards his friends. Chapter 13, one through 12. In the midst of extolling God, Job still has some strong words for his friends. I like the fact that Job was silent and he listened, but now he responds, and he responds, I believe, respectfully because he was speaking truthfully. Are you with me? Nothing's wrong with that, by the way. And sometimes, I don't know about you, but sometimes it seems that the world can be more honest in their dealings with each other, I'm talking about sharing maybe their feelings or their hurts or whatever, than some Christians can be. It's like we all, are sort of checking out when it comes to just being honest with each other. Maybe getting hurt or saying the wrong thing. Going up to someone and saying, I'm concerned about your decisions and things like that. It's just important that we be honest with each other. Do you not agree? The A here is I am not inferior to you. This is verses one and two of chapter 13. My eyes have seen all this. My eyes have heard and understood it. What you know I also know. I am not inferior to you. Do you see it? I am not inferior to you. Job comes right out in verse two and says what you know I also know and I'm not inferior to you. He made a similar statement at Job chapter 12. Three, his friends are being put in their place and they are in no way greater, smarter, or wiser than Job and he wants to make sure that they are aware of that. In other words, they're on equal ground is what he's saying. He's not saying I'm better than you, I'm just on equal ground with you. So then B, I'm not impressed by you. This is verses three and five where it says, But I desire to speak to the Almighty and to argue my case with God. You, however, smear me with lies. You are worthless physicians, all of you. Worthless physicians. This is a term for today that would be considered, you're a quack. His friends are nothing but a bunch of quacks. Job is hardly impressed by his trio of comrades. Now, the next one, C, is I am not intimidated by you. I'm not intimidated by you. Have any of you ever been intimidated by somebody? I know I have. Man, oh man, I get around somebody and maybe it's their things or maybe it's their character or their personality, maybe it's their abilities, and I become intimidated. And so Job says, I'm not intimidated by you, and this is verses six through 12. Look at Job's words in verses 12 through 13. I'm trying to move on to this. Will not his excellence make you afraid? This is talking about God. And dread of him fall upon you? Your platitudes are proverbs of ashes, and your defenses are defenses of clay. Meaning these men weren't really considering God and honoring him, they were more focused on destroying Job's life in the midst of his suffering. Job is basically reasoning with his friends that one day his current state of affairs could be theirs. Isn't that the truth? He who thinks he stand, take heed lest he fall. Any one of us can find ourselves with a root canal, amen. May God bless you if you do. In fact, I've got his business card, the one that worked on me. He's tremendous. And he had fun doing it too, I'm sure. All the way to the bank, amen. We can all say amen to that, right? Woo, man, I'd like to make that kind of money in an hour and a half. Anyway, Job is basically reasoning with his friends that one day his current affairs will be theirs, possibly. Well, that is why he does not fear or heed their words, because he knows that he sits before a sovereign God, and he knows that if they were in his position, their current counsel would be as ashes to them. Therefore, Job is not intimidated nor inclined to to agree with them on their bully techniques. Now, number two, Job's honesty about himself. This is chapter 13, 13 through 19. I'm not gonna read all of it. What I wanna do is bring out some highlights. Out of all these verses in chapter 13, the one verse that stands out alone is verse 15. Can you read that with me or can you see it? Though he slay me. Yet will I hope in him. I will surely defend my ways to his face. Wow. Though he slay me. Though he slay me, yet will I hope or trust in him, though he slay me. This represent the ultimate in Job's faith. Do you understand this verse is the verse in the book that shows where his faith is at. His faith is solid rock. This represents the ultimate in Job's faith because the bottom line here is that Job is that God is enough. Just put that out to the side. God is enough. God is enough. He's not going to have people telling him how to believe in his God along with Abraham's statement concerning the death of Isaac and Jesus' statement from the cross, this one of the greatest statements of faith in all of the Bible. No wonder it's the first book in the Bible, amen. What a stage to set for the forerunner, Christ, our King, who came and suffered for you and I, and came as a servant for you and I. Didn't have anything. He was rich, became poor for our sakes, that in his poverty we might become rich, amen. That's what it's all about, you understand. This is the gospel in purest form. Jesus dying for our sins, Jesus paying the ultimate price, and Jesus ultimately in the garden of Gethsemane saying, though he slay me, will I still worship you, Father, because I'm trusting you. I'm putting my life in your hands. You are in control. Well, This is a beautiful. because we see this phrase. When Job said these words, God won his wage with Satan, his wager with Satan. Do you understand? This is a pivotal verse. Satan had nothing more to go on because Job explained it all. Though he slay me, I still will worship. I still will trust in you. You see, there was nothing Satan could do to destroy Job's faith and trust in God. Now, let's stop. Have you ever thought about what would it take to destroy your faith and love for God? Have you ever thought about would you let anything destroy your love and faith for God? We have a lot of people suffering now more than ever. I think that's why this room's full, because we can all identify with suffering, amen? We can all identify with friends and family that suffer. And I think it's so important that we prepare ourselves for suffering, don't you? I didn't sign up for Jesus so that it would be a ticket of great blessings and happiness all the way to heaven. I signed up because whatever he feels he wants to do in my life, he can do it. How about you? Are you giving God permission? Number three. Number three, Job's humility before God. His honesty about himself. And then his humility before God, this is chapter 13, 20 through 28, coming humbly before God, Job has only two requests. The first is that God to withdraw his hand because Job's faith and trust is in God. Do you understand? So, Coming humbly before God, Job, is only two requests. The first is for God to withdraw his hand because Job hardly thinks he can handle it anymore, verse 21. The second is to communicate with Job either by speaking first or letting Job speak first and then responding in turn. In other words, Job just wanted to hear from God. He just wanted to hear his voice, because God has been silent. and it's driving him nuts. He can't stand it because he's heard God speak. Job just wants to connect with God about all these things happening in his life. In other words, can you see a relationship here? God, what's going on? You're my friend. You're my closest. You're the closest to me than anyone. I can't live without you. I can't be, I can't do anything. I need you desperately. Today I was walking through the hallways of the jail and I was just thinking about why don't we love God? Why is it such a struggle for us as humans, as humanity, to love God? And just think about God creating each one of us. and giving us the opportunity to know Him and to have an eternal existence with Him forever, and yet we live life as though He doesn't exist, or we live life as though He's a second thought. We live life as though we are so busy and we are so important. God, just leave me alone. Why is that? Why is it that we don't love the Creator who loves us? Why don't we do that? I just started crying because I just couldn't think why. Why do we make you so sad? Have you ever thought about that? We make God sad because he loves us. Why don't we love him back? Why don't we let other things take our heart away from him? I don't understand. Maybe you can tell me. Well, we go now to the grievance over the mystery of death. Or wait a minute, we're at this point, the grievance against God, Job 14. Are you there with me? I'm sorry. The grievance. The grievance over the brevity of life. Well, in order to get his message across, Job uses some picturesque metaphors about his life. Man is like a soon-cut flower. Do you see that fill in the blank? A soon-cut flower. Man is like that. It's beautiful, but you cut a flower, you put it in the water, and it only lasts for a few days. Why is that? Well, because you cut the life off of it. He comes forth with a flower and it fades away. This is what man is like. Much like a flower, life is beautiful, but it is short and it fades away before you know it. B, man is like a shadow. He flees like a shadow and does not continue, verse 2b. Shadows disappear just as quickly as they appear. See, man is like a servant or a laborer. This is 5 and 6 of 14. It says, man's days are determined. You have decreed the number of his months and have set limits and he cannot exceed. So look away from him and let him alone till he has put in his time like a hired man. Have you ever felt like life is so repetitious that it just seems like that's all we do is do the same things? Get up, go to work, go home, go to bed. Get up, go to work, go home, go to bed. Without God, those things are vain, do you understand? But with God, I have purpose, don't you? To get up and go to work so that people can get saved. Go home and pray so that more can get saved the next day, amen? Isn't that what it's about? We have purpose. Not just going home, eating, going to bed, and getting up. We got purpose, to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. That's what our purpose is, to know Him and to love Him. I don't know about you, but that excites me about getting out of bed. So it's not just about being a servant or a laborer, but although Jesus being a servant wants us to be servants, amen, that's how we get to share Christ, because we humble ourselves before them. Well, the last one here is the grievance over the mystery of death. Boy, death is a mystery. How many of you have been to a funeral lately and looked in the coffin and thought to yourself, boy, that's a mystery. I just saw him alive and now he's there and he's cold. Have you ever felt them? I do that, especially if I know them. I just want a connection with them. But man, death is a mystery, is it not? We're so vitally alive and then it's all gone. But yet it's not gone, it's just the clay shell that's left behind, amen. Boy, we can't see what really life's about, can we? Well, let's move on. The grievance over the uncertainty of hope. Do you see it? 18 through 22. Even in this section, finally Job has come to the conclusion that there isn't any hope. You know, you got friends like these, they sort of put a nail in the tire and hope is fizzled out. Yeah. Yep, finally Job has come to that place where hope has become despair. I mean, after a while, you can only be pounded on so much, amen? We've seen the ups and downs of man's life, so we can't really blame Job for feeling that way. We have all experienced a hopeless day or two in our lives, amen? You ever been hopeless? But even though Job visits hopelessness, he doesn't move in. Amen. I remember we started our lessons here in Job about, we talked about depression. I think pastor talked about depression. And then I shared about how I was depressed at age 40. You know, I never lost hope because I kept in the hope book, and the hope book kept giving me hope even though I couldn't feel it, see it, or be a part of it. Do you understand? I just felt like it was so far from me. It was so distant from me. It just was more than what I could handle because I was used to God drawing near to me as I drew near to him, but that was the test. The test was will I trust God no matter how I feel? That's the battleground for all of us, is it not, when it comes to hope. We cannot embrace it because it's a lonely place that only you will be there. While he stays there for a moment, then he goes back to his hope in God and holds on for dear life. He holds on. When we hang on to hope, we can go through anything. Amen? It means that there was a day when hopelessness and hope met at the cross, though, in a person called Jesus Christ, amen? And because of his sacrifice, we can have hope beyond this life. And I hope tonight all of you that are sitting here understand the importance of a relationship with Jesus Christ, because without him, life has no meaning, no purpose at all. And in my life at 19, I had no meaning, no purpose or direction. I was empty inside. I needed something, and so I went to the wrong places to find it. How about you? Alcohol, drugs, and all kinds of other things. I give my testimony constantly because I want to identify with people that are lost. They're empty inside, amen? Just like me. Well, I want you to have an assignment here for this next week, and I want you to look in the Bible on chapter 12 of Job, and I want you to go through verses 17 through 25 and fill in these blanks. I'll do the first one for you, okay? That would be great, Jerry. Look at verse 17 in chapter 12. And it says this, he leads counselors away stripped and makes fools of judges. So I've given you two answers here, haven't I? He leads counselors away and what's the second one? Makes fools of judges. So the point is, these are all action words that I wanted you to pull out of this so that you would just see the verbs connected with the activities that are going on. Now, this past week, I had a chance to talk to one of my sons. Jared is his name, and he lives in Ames. And his church had went through the Book of Job, and so we had a great time of fellowship talking about Job. And I learned some things from my son that were just awesome. And I just feel like I wanted to share one of them with you if I could. There at the bottom, you see where it says define blameless. My son had a great way of explaining blameless to me that I wanted to pass on to you because it sure makes sense to me. Now this is it. Blameless means keeping one's slate clean with God and individuals. Man, isn't that a great definition of blameless? And if you think of Job, that's the way he lived. In other words, this is what this means, that if I have some sin or some thing in my life that's a fracture with God, I wanna get clean, I wanna get right with him, right? I want my conscience clean as well, amen? And so when it comes to people, if I've offended someone, Job, if he offended someone or if he, did something wrong, he would ask forgiveness. He would go and seek them out. I believe that's what a part of blameless is, do you not? That it's getting right with God and it's getting right with people. And that's how Job lived. I thought that was profound, at least for me. Hebrews 13, 18, if you wanna just look at that real quickly with me, it talks about the fact that, and I'm just about done, and I thought we made good time, Pastor. Hebrews 13. Hebrews 13 verse 18. Thank you, Pastor. Pray for us. We are sure that we have a clear conscience and a desire to live honorably in every way. In other words, in everything I do, I wanna live honorably. And the best way to do that is to be right with God and to be right with others. Isn't that good? I just think that's good. Now I wanna talk about mudslingers, in case you run into one going home tonight. It's gonna be a little hard, because I think it's about 30 degrees out there to find some mud around, but you know how mudslingers can do it. They can find mud, amen? So the one throwing the dirt is muddy. I want you to think about humanity, that we're all lumps of clay, right? And we're all from the dirt. So think about this, the one throwing dirt is muddy, and the one receiving it gets muddy as well. So what good is mud? It reveals that we are all but dirt. We're just a bunch of dirt walking around, amen. Looking through our mud at others, or looking to throw our mud at others, that's what we are looking to do. Mud slingers don't care how it will affect others. They do their slinging without concern or compassion. Look at 1 Thessalonians 5 11 and close tonight. Encourage one another and build each other up. Amen? That's why I told you I have a real hard time with this mud slinging stuff because I'd rather encourage and build up. I think that's God's way, isn't it? God is about building us and the enemy and Satan is all about destroying us. So when you're interacting with people, make sure your words are doing this and not doing this, amen? Especially you spouses going on home tonight, amen? Make sure you have a good, good conversation over Job. Well, I hope that this was some things that were extremely helpful to you as we think about this and as we grow in our understanding of God so that whatever he allows in our lives, we might be like Job, though he slay me, I will trust in you.