Please turn in your Bibles to Job chapter 19, and the little section I'm going to read has been the basis for some amazing music, but also has been a comfort for people all down through the ages. Job 19, beginning to read at verse 25. For I know that my Redeemer lives, and He shall stand at last on the earth, and after my skin is destroyed this I know, that in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold and not another. How my heart yearns within me. Father, I thank you that from the beginning of creation, even with Adam and Eve, your grace has been at work in the hearts of people. You have revealed yourself to people. You have drawn people to yourself, and it is our desire that our hearts would be drawn even closer to you as a result of digging into your word. May you anoint my lips and enable each one of us to, with discernment, hear your word. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Well, down through history, cults, false religions, agnostics, and atheists have tried to discredit Christianity and do everything in their power to undermine and attack the most important of Christian doctrines. And you might wonder, why in the world would they care what Christians believe? But they do, and I think part of the answer may be that there are demons behind some of these men that motivate them to undermine, undermine, undermine. And one of the core doctrines that has come under relentless attack has been the true doctrine of Christ's resurrection as well as of ours. Those two really are tightly linked together, and demons know how critically important that doctrine is. They know if they can do away with the doctrine, at least put doubts in people's minds about this doctrine, eventually they can hollow out the core of Christianity. Now sadly, many sincere hyperpreterists don't have a clue that they are messing around with fire when they misinterpret our resurrection and or Christ's resurrection. But let me give you Paul's inspired take on what is at stake and why this is such a critically important talk, and in your outlines I've listed some of the scriptures so that you don't get lost. And I'm going to begin with 1 Corinthians 15 and start reading at verse 12. The whole chapter is just an incredible chapter, but we're only going to touch on a few verses. 1 Corinthians 15, verse 12. Now if Christ is preached that he has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? So in this verse we see that the doctrine of the resurrection came under attack even while the apostles were alive. And it's been a nonstop fight of Satan against this doctrine since that time. And the true churches always stood fast in defending this doctrine. Verse 13, but if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen. I won't get into the logic of why that is the case. I think you could just trust Paul. He knows what he's talking about. He indicates that whatever you say about our resurrection, whether you're reinterpreting it or you're denying our resurrection, it's going to automatically impact the resurrection of Christ and vice versa. Christ's resurrection is the pattern for our own. Verse 14. And if Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty, and your faith is also empty. Now the Greek word for empty is kene, and it's been translated in various versions as bankrupt, without purpose, in vain, or worthless. You might wonder, how on earth would a denial of the resurrection have that much damage? Why would it make our faith bankrupt? Well, again, I can't get into all of the logical implications that would prove that this is the case, but you can trust that Paul knows what he's talking about when he says, you don't want to mess around with the doctrine of the resurrection or it's going to strike at the heart of Christianity. Okay, Paul also said that his apostolic authority would be discredited, his preaching would be worthless, the Corinthians' faith would become worthless. Now elsewhere I have tried to demonstrate that if you tip over the domino of the resurrection If you're logical at all, eventually it's going to have to impact other doctrines, and before you know it, every doctrine in Christianity is negatively impacted. And again, I'm not going to get into that, but just trust Paul. You don't want to monkey around with the doctrine of the resurrection, or you're going to find the heart of Christianity undermined. And so what I'm going to be teaching on today is critical stuff. Very, very important. Verse 15. Yes, and we are found false witnesses of God because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he did not raise up, if in fact the dead do not rise. So he is saying that if our bodies don't rise in the future, then ipso facto, you have to deny, logically you have to deny that Jesus rose from the grave, and in the process you make Paul out to be a liar. And again, we're not gonna get into the logical reasons for why, but It's just another illustration that Christ's resurrection and our resurrection are inextricably bound up together. You misinterpret one, you're going to be forced to misinterpret the other. He repeats this idea in verse 16. For if the dead do not rise, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile. You are still in your sins. Then also those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable. And the word for futile there is mataios, which means of no use, fruitless, or powerless. And I do want to clarify that the controversy that's been swirling around Gary DeMar they don't deny that we go to heaven, and they say that they affirm a resurrection. At least some of them claim to believe in the resurrection of bodies, though a good deal of them say that it's a corporate Our bodies, we want to discard them. We're not interested in them, they say. What do they mean by the corporate body view? They mean that the church got resurrected when Jesus got resurrected, so we're now seated with Christ in the heavenlies. That's all that matters, okay? But there are some who say, no, the moment we die, we get a resurrection body. And yet they say that that body is a completely different body than the ones that we are in right now. No connection, and it is not a body that has flesh and bones. Now that's a complete misuse of the word resurrection. It's not a resurrection of anything. It's something new that's happening in their view. The true doctrine of the resurrection says the very same body that Jesus lived in on earth for three decades was the body that was resurrected and transformed. Not replaced, but resurrected and transformed. Now there are cults like Jehovah's Witnesses, there are professing Christians today like hyper-preterists who absolutely deny that and they say that these bodies are going to be replaced with a spiritual body. And by spiritual they mean a body without flesh and bones. Now why do they think that Jesus' body got discarded? Well, I believe they are forced to that if they're at all logically consistent, because the scriptures are crystal clear that Christ's resurrection body is the pattern for our resurrection bodies. If his body had flesh and bones, then our bodies are going to have flesh and bones. And of course, they deny that. If his body in Luke chapter 24 was able to eat fish and honey, then our bodies are gonna be able to enjoy food. If his body was able to be touched and handled, then the same is going to be true for ours. Jesus told them, why are you troubled? Why do doubts arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Handle me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have. Now these heretics absolutely deny that that our resurrection bodies will have flesh and bones like this Luke 24 body did. And so the more consistent ones are forced to say Christ at some point replaced that body with a fleshless body, a boneless body, what they call a spiritual body. And by that term, spiritual body, they mean something completely different than what the Apostle Paul meant by that. What they mean is a body made of spirit, an incorporeal body, a boneless body, okay? Well, that's about as ridiculous as saying that a steam engine is an engine that's made of steam. Oh, it can't be made of metal. It's a steam engine. Steam engines are made of steam, right? No, we realize that a steam engine is powered by steam, characterized by steam, made useful by steam. And the same way, our resurrection bodies are still going to be bodies, albeit glorified, but they will be bodies 100% governed by the Holy Spirit. And I've put a handful of scriptures that you guys need to be aware of. If you're on Facebook at all, you're probably running across these people who are denying the resurrection. And so I'm just going to quickly go through each one. Philippians 3.21 says that God will transform our lowly bodies and conform them to Christ's glorious body. So in some way, we're going to have transformed bodies, not replaced bodies, but transformed. And again, he indicates our bodies will be just like Christ's resurrection body. 1 Corinthians 15.54 says that the very body that decays and rots in the ground is a body that will be raised. It says, so also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown into decay, Greek word is thora, it is raised in incorruption. So the very same body that decays in the ground is the body that's going to be raised. Now these people will say, that's absolutely ridiculous. What do you make of a body that's burned up? and the ashes are scattered in the ocean, and the fish eat those ashes, and then the whales eat those fish. There is no body to be raised. So obviously, this cannot be something that is what Paul is talking about. And I admit, it would take a miracle to do that, but any resurrection of the body is going to take a miracle, right? And so if God says that he can do it, he can do it. Now, interestingly, and I think you guys need to be aware of this, this has been true of cults all down through history. Initially, when they're trying to convince you of their heresies, they're not going to be immediately confronting you. They're going to be asking questions and sowing seeds of doubt into your minds. And if you challenge them and say, are you denying this fundamental doctrine? They'll say, well, I'm just studying this. I'm asking questions, you know? But they're trying to bring you along into their doubts as they go along. So don't buy their defense that they're just asking questions. I've got a handout that's got all kinds of questions that the Bible says are sinful questions, sinful questions that sow trouble. Okay, the next verse is Isaiah 26, 19. It spoke about people whose bodies were in the dust of the ground. And he said, your body shall live. Together with my dead body they shall arise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in dust, for your dew is like the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead." I want you to notice, he doesn't say, your live spirits will arise. No, it says, together with my dead body they shall arise. And the word for body is nivela, which the dictionary defines as a corpse or a carcass. It's decayed carcasses that will arise and be transformed into glorious bodies. And also notice that even though the body is dead, the body still belonged to him. It's not discarded or unconnected to the real Him. And there are so many scriptures that contradict the hyper-preterists of today that it astonishes me that they could be so blind. So please don't be fooled by Gary DeMar and those with him who are trying to put doubts into people's mind about there being a future coming of Christ, a future end to sin and of history, and a future resurrection. Anyone who denies those three doctrines by definition is a heretic who needs to be opposed. The entire church for the last 2,000 years has held to this. John 5 29 says that people will be raised from the tombs. Well, that doesn't sound like their kind of resurrection, even the ones who say, yeah, the moment we die, we're going to get a new body. Uh, I don't think when the moment you die, you're in the tomb. But he says right here, do not marvel at this, for an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment. So notice the location where this resurrection occurs, all who are in the tombs. Now, some of the corporate body view people say, well, that's just using a metaphor of resurrection to talk about the church as a body being raised with Christ, but I go back and say to them, so you're saying he's using a lie to teach a truth? I mean, a metaphor is based on reality in the world. It's taking something from the world as a symbol that points forward. And so either way they take it as literal or a metaphor, you can't have your cake and eat it too. There's gotta be a real resurrection. And on their view, there is no such thing and never has been such a thing as a carcass being raised up like that. Now, in Romans 8.23, Paul said that our bodies would be redeemed, not replaced. There's a big difference between redemption of something and replacement of something. He said, not only that, but we also, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves, grown within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, that is, the redemption of our body. The redemption of our body. Redemption is a pretty central doctrine, and if you deny that our dead bodies will be resurrected, you have automatically attacked the doctrine of redemption. Now, before we dive into Job, I'm going to just give you one more scripture. Everyone, including full Preterists, agree that the Pharisees held to a doctrine of a resurrection of corpses out of the ground, a very literal resurrection. And I don't think there's any controversy on that. So it's very significant that in Acts 23, verse 6, Paul sided with the Pharisees against the Sadducees on the doctrine of the resurrection. Now, if Paul, I'm not gonna take the time to read it here, but if Paul's doctrine of the resurrection is the same as the Pharisees, then by definition, the view of the resurrection espoused by all of the modern hyper-preterists is false. And there are many other Old Testament, New Testament scriptures that say the same thing. Today we're gonna look at Job 19, 25 through 27. It's the earliest, that we recorded testimony to the resurrection, probably one of the most controversial ones too. But I've picked this verse because Gary DeMar recently posted an article mocking the idea that this passage says anything about a resurrection or anything about the future Jesus. But I hope you will find sweet comfort in this passage that has comforted the souls of millions of Christians over the past thousands of years. And I love the first three words. Job says, for I know. He was not confused. The resurrection was something that Job was absolutely confident about. In fact, the Hebrew is particularly strong because the placement of the word for the I at the beginning emphasizes something. And so one commentary translates the Hebrew this way, I have a firm and full persuasion. There's no doubt and pull on Job's mind as to what he was about to say. And I believe the reason that there was no doubt in his mind was he was a prophet. God had revealed to him by his inspiration all kinds of doctrine long before the time of Moses. Hebrews 1 talks about that. And this is why I think it's absolutely ridiculous for a hyper-preterist to claim that there is absolutely no way that Job would have known about a resurrection or would have known about a future Messiah being a God-man, because he didn't have any scriptures to which to appeal to. There are brands of biblical theology that do the same thing. They think that people knew next to nothing prior to the time of Moses. Why? Because in the first chapters of Genesis we have hardly any information. Well, that's not the only things that they knew. They had all forms of revelation according to Hebrews 1 verse 1. I'll just give you one example. Jesus said, your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day and he saw it and was glad. How did Jesus know that Abraham saw his day and was glad about it? What scripture did he have to appeal to? Well, he knew it by inspiration, and actually there's a number of New Testament scriptures indicate that the Old Testament saints, long before they even had a canon, had all kinds of knowledge about the things that we take for granted today. Hebrews 1 verse 1. Anyway, let's move on. In Hebrew, the first thing that Job says that he knows is that he has a redeemer. Now, the Hebrew word for redeemer here is gaal, which means a kinsman redeemer. By definition, you cannot be a kinsman redeemer unless you are a human who is related in some way to the person being redeemed. The word actually makes no sense whatsoever unless it's applied in some way to a human related to mankind. Now, of course, Gary DeMar's article emphasizes that fact. The critics who say this says nothing whatsoever about Jesus say, oh, easy. This is just one of Job's relatives whom he was hoping would be a kinsman redeemer, who would come to his rescue. And I'll explain in a bit why that is absolutely impossible. But I do think it is useful to dig into the meaning, the normal meaning of the term. like they do, because once you understand the literal meaning of this term and you apply it to Jesus, you will see it opens up the person and work of Jesus in a marvelous way. The Hebrew word is ga'al. In some contexts it's pronounced go-el. And again, depending on the context, it's sometimes translated as kinsman redeemer, and sometimes it's translated as avenger of blood. Okay, it's exactly the same word. So what these hyperpreterists point out is that this term points to the most powerful relative in a clan who had responsibilities to act as a civil magistrate to avenge blood, but who was also wealthy enough to be able to pay off your debts if you were a slave, you know, buy you out of slavery. And I agree with that. That's exactly what a kinsman redeemer would do. He was able to protect you. If you're a widow without children, on certain circumstances, He could marry you and care for you. And in the book of Ruth, Boaz was a kinsman-redeemer. He bought back the land that Naomi had lost. He gave it as an inheritance to Ruth's son. Now, if I can prove that Job is referring to Jesus as the kinsman-redeemer, then this word, Geol, is an incredibly rich concept that shows all that Jesus did for us. He purchases us out of slavery. Are you enslaved to drugs or to porn or to something else? Well, Jesus can liberate you from that bondage. Jesus purchases our inheritance for us. He marries the church. He protects us from our enemies. He is the avenger of blood to whom we can appeal for vengeance. There's so much in there. He cares for us. When we're going through all the kinds of troubles that Job went through, and he even redeems land. Now that last thing that the kinsman-redeemer did was one of the most important things. Unlike hyper-preterists who only apply redemption to the invisible soul of the man, and they do not apply it to the body or to the land or to this cosmos at all, The literal kinsman redeemer, yeah, he redeemed land, and it was not just invisible things. And here's the point. According to the Old Testament and the New Testament, God is interested in the physical. Every time somebody gets healed here, when we pray over them, they are getting a down payment of what Paul calls the redemption of our body. Redemption applies to everything. As Abraham Kuyper says, there is not a square inch of this universe that is not going to be redeemed, purchased by Christ and belonging to Christ that he declares to be his. And so the question is, does this indeed refer to Jesus or was it simply a lesser kinsman-redeemer whom he was hoping would get him out of his fix. Let me give you three reasons why the human side of this kinsman-redeemer cannot be referring to a currently living relative, absolutely cannot, and then I'll give you four reasons why this kinsman-redeemer is clearly identified as a divine being. But first, the human side. Why can this kinsman-redeemer not be one of Job's immediate relatives? Well first, the book of Job clearly identifies Job as being the kinsman, redeemer of his nation. He was the most powerful man in the land. He was always the most powerful man in the tribe or in the nation. And Job, Job didn't need one by definition because there was nobody higher than Job. When we did the overview of the book of Job, I showed he was the king of Edom, so there was nobody over him. By definition, there couldn't have been a kinsman redeemer who was a civil magistrate over top of Job. In fact, it says in chapter 1, verse 3, he was, quote, the greatest of all the people of the East. And so by definition, he could not have had a kinsman redeemer. over him as merely a human relative. Whatever Redeemer this was, it was a very unusual Redeemer. It was someone more powerful than Job. Get that, more powerful than Job. Second, Job states that whoever this Redeemer was, he was already his current Redeemer. He's not hoping, okay, now that I'm poverty stricken, I need to have some Redeemer in the future. No, he's already Job's Redeemer. Okay, so that makes no sense if he's just one of Job's relatives. He calls him my Redeemer and says that he was living. In other words, he's not going to become a Redeemer once that person finds out about Job's situation. He's already acting as a Redeemer in Job's life. Third, chapter 42, verse 11, makes clear that there was no one person who redeemed Job out of his poverty. He was poverty stricken. Everything was removed. But instead, since he didn't have a kinsman redeemer, it says that each and every relative came by and gave him a piece of silver and or a ring of gold. So that proves that there was no one person acting as a kinsman redeemer. Instead, all of the relatives kind of helped out. But there are additional four proofs that destroy Barnes's thesis and Gary DeMar's article. And I should have pointed out earlier that Gary DeMar's article that mocks our position extensively quotes from Albert Barnes to prove that this passage is not talking about a resurrection at all, certainly not talking about the resurrection of Jesus. And I don't understand why on earth he would appeal to Barnes because Barnes was a substandard theologian who twice was convicted of heresy by the Synod of the Presbyterian Church. not the lower presbytery, but by the synod. And he was convicted of heresy because he denied quite a number of doctrines, like original sin. He denied the imputation of our sins to Christ and the imputation of Christ's sins to us, and other doctrines that Charles Hodge opposed, like, for example, he held to the Greek critical theory. But hey, bad theologians can also have good exegesis on occasion, so I'm not gonna discount the exegesis that he and Clines and other commentators have given to prove that this Redeemer could not be divine, because they have somewhat credible arguments. I'm gonna give four counter-arguments that this Redeemer was indeed divine. If you wanna read more, you can go to John Hartley's commentary in the new International Commentary series. And he actually gives five more proofs that I'm gonna give this morning. I think all together is about nine proofs that this Redeemer had to be divine. First, contrary to commentators like Clines or Barnes who say Job's dispute was with God and therefore God could not have been the Redeemer, the defense or the all, more conservative commentaries have pointed out, hey, the book of Job's already identified this Redeemer as being from heaven and from heaven acting as Job's witness, advocate, intercessor, and friend. He's already been identified. For example, commenting on Job 16, 18 through 22, Robert Alden in the New American Commentary says this. In verses 19 through 20 are four terms describing the one Job hoped would come to his defense. Witness, advocate, intercessor, and friend. All these terms can and do apply to human beings elsewhere in the Old Testament, but the prepositional phrases in heaven and on high push the interpreter to think in terms of a divine redeemer. There is the word for advocate. As Hartley explains, the best candidate for this witness-advocate within Job's limited knowledge was God himself. The word intercessor is one who passes messages between those who cannot meet or understand each other. Verse 21 defines what the intercessor-advocate does. He argues the case of his friend before the bar of divine justice. His task is similar to that of the Messiah in Isaiah 2-4 and 11-4, where the same verb appears. Also compare Romans 8-34 and Hebrews 7-25. The point is, Job already identified his Gaal as God Himself using those four synonyms, and he does so elsewhere. In chapter 17, verse 3, he uses language clearly associated with a kinsman-redeemer, and he says, it's God who would put down a pledge for me and strike hands for me. Those are references to what a Gaal does. Elihu, the good counselor, speaks of God redeeming a man's soul from going down to the pit so that his soul sees the light. So the point is, we should interpret this in light of what the whole book of Job says. And chapter 16 especially says, Job's Redeemer is in heaven. So that's proof number one. Second, the grammar of verses 25 through 27 in the Hebrew strongly indicates this Redeemer is divine. Now Barnes and Clines and Gary DeMar all say, hey, we can't make too much of this because it's very, very difficult Hebrew grammar. Well, of course it's difficult if you already assume that it can't be a divine person, that Job wouldn't have known about any divine Redeemer like this. But it's straightforward Hebrew if you do. The Tyndale Commentary says, verses 25 through 27 are so tightly knit that there should be no doubt that the Redeemer is God. No doubt. The New International Commentary, many other commentaries say they are forced by the grammar to the conclusion, this Redeemer is God himself. And that's why the New King James Bible capitalizes the he. Whoever Messiah is, the Hebrew grammar itself shows he's clearly divine. So that's my second proof. Third, several commentators point out that the word Geol is frequently used throughout the Old Testament as one of the names of God. Okay? And it's most natural to take it that way here. It is simply false to say that no one in the Old Testament would have had an understanding of this coming Messiah. Both Luke and Paul say that Paul did not teach a single thing without proving it from the Old Testament, and that's why the Bereans were able to check all of his doctrines against the Old Testament, and Paul praises them for doing so. Now, Gary DeMar's article claims there's no way anybody in the Old Testament would have known about a resurrection until it was revealed in the New Testament. Well, that completely contradicts Paul, who said, to this day I stand, witnessing both the small and great, saying no other things than those which the prophets and Moses said would come. They did know about a kinsman redeemer. They did know about the resurrection in the Old Testament. Anyway, that was one of his names, and I think it's crazy that people try to put doubts into people's minds about that. fourth, although Albert Barnes tries valiantly to change the meaning of all of the terms, the Hebrew terms, in the rest of the passage so that he could explain away Divine Redeemer, the New American Commentary points out, we should interpret those terms, define those terms in exactly the same way that Job has interpreted those terms in the rest of the book. And that's a normal, straightforward meaning of those terms. You really have to have an agenda to translate these verses in unusual ways. Now, as I said, John Hartley gives five additional reasons, I'm not gonna get into, of why it has to be God. I just wanted to introduce enough here so you could see the traditional view on these verses is very well grounded. Now, obviously, liberal commentaries and conservatives who have been unduly influenced by liberals have balked at this conclusion. They say there's just no way that they could have known about a resurrection or about the Messiah being both God and man. They think that's ridiculous. But there are many other Old Testament passages that clearly identify the Messiah as both man and God. And so the New American Commentary says, Okay, enough of heavy exegesis. We're going to start getting into the practical now. This is a remarkable text. Job knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that his future kinsman-redeemer would be a human, otherwise he's not a kinsman-redeemer, and would be God, otherwise he wouldn't be identified as being the divine being in heaven. And I think it beautifully illustrates the fact that the Bible is revealed by God. Even though it was written by around 40 people, over a period of 1,500 years in different countries, it shows a unified view of redemption. There's no way that Job would have come up with what we're going to be going through now on his own. And we, too, have a revelation from God that gives us a certain and absolute knowledge. If God says it, we can believe it. We can believe something as incredible as the fact that Jesus was both God and man. Now the third thing that Job knew beyond any shadow of a doubt was that Jesus was His own personal Savior. He calls Him my Redeemer. It's not just a Redeemer of a corporate entity, you know, where maybe us as individuals is lost. No, He's a Redeemer of each of us individually, and He knows each of us individually. It's amazing. thing to read about Boaz redeeming Ruth and Naomi. It shows such selfless love. But you know what? When God sends His Holy Spirit into your heart and unites you to Jesus, you're not only able to say to Jesus, you are mine, but you're able to say to the Father, Abba Father, Daddy Father. I mean, that's the kind of personal relationship that he had. It's a personal trust. It's not just a historical faith, yeah, I believe that happened in history. No, it's right now a personal trust in Jesus. And this was not just a future Redeemer who did not exist. If it was just human, then then he wouldn't be living then. He would be coming into existence in 2,000 years. But Job says, I know that my Redeemer lives, and the text means he's alive right while Job was speaking. The coming Messiah is a living being that Job had intimate communion with in chapters 1 and 2, and he knows his name. In chapter 12, verse 9, he calls them Yehovah or Jehovah or Yahweh, however you want to pronounce that. And in chapter 29, he remembers the sweet fellowship that he had with God. Let me read Job 29, 2 through 5. Oh, that I were as in months past, as in the days when God watched over me, when his lamp shone upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness. just as I was in the days of my prime, when the friendly counsel of God was over my tent, when the Almighty was yet with me. And I love that phrase in verse four, when the friendly counsel of God was over my tent. Two versions translate that, when God's intimate friendship blessed my tent. Another says when God was my home's familiar guest. This is not just a theoretical redeemer. Okay, it is true Job didn't understand why God was allowing him to go through all of this pain and this suffering. He was tempted to complain, but he was never tempted to deny the existence of God, or to deny that God was his friend, or to deny that he was a kinsman redeemer. He trusted the word of a God who cannot lie. Can we do any less? But then comes a remarkable phrase he could not have known apart from divine revelation. He says, and he shall stand at last upon the earth. Now, to stand is a possible translation, but for centuries, commentators have translated literally as shall rise up from the earth or shall rise up above the earth. Either of those translations, to rise up from the earth or to rise up above the earth, implies he was in the earth earlier, right? And they have taken, this is a reference to the resurrection of Jesus at long last. The Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, John Sawyer authored that article, he points out that the word in this verse, yakum, is one of the Hebrew words to refer to the resurrection. It's a word for resurrection. And so this is why Jameson Fawcett in Brown's commentary says this, above that very dust, Wherewith was mingled man's decaying body shall man's vindicator arise. A rise above the dust strikingly expresses that fact that Jesus Christ arose first himself above the dust and then is to raise his people above it. 1 Corinthians 15, 20, and 23. Now the rest of the passage shows that Job believed his body was going to rise But this one shows he had no shadow of a doubt in his mind that his future kinsman redeemer would himself be resurrected. Now that implies that he had to have died. It doesn't say so, but it implies it. And of course, his death is needed for our redemption. But the death and resurrection of the future Messiah had always been believed by Old Testament saints, all the way back to Genesis 3.15. You know, the whole sacrificial system which started in Genesis 3.15 was pointing forward to the suffering of Jesus, who would be our substitute, dying in our place. And that is what is implied by at last. There were people looking for the resurrection of the Jesus long before Job even existed. The Messiah's victory over Satan through suffering was prophesied in Genesis 3.15, and that victory implied what? Death would not hold him. Saints of old knew that at long last the coming Messiah would finally defeat death and provide the way to resurrection life for all of his people. Now here's the thing, if Job knew that 4,000 years ago, which was 2,000 years before Christ, before these events even happened, then we have no excuse for doubting that we have a divine human redeemer who loves us as a kinsman redeemer and who can provide for every need. We have no excuse for doubting that his death and resurrection provides for us all things that pertain to life and godliness. If God says it, that settles it. Be confident that your kinsman redeemer, if he is for you, who can be against you? Amen? And that's what verses 26 through 27 go on to say. Job didn't just have a confidence in a Savior. He had confidence that this Savior would bring about his salvation. And it was a confidence that, first of all, transcended his sufferings. Verse 26 says, and after my skin is destroyed, this I know not. His skin was a mess. If you read earlier in the chapters, you know that he had oozing, blistering, what were they, boils from head to toe. He was in a great deal of pain and misery. And so the application is it's one thing to believe in Jesus when everything's going hunky-dory for you, but when the Holy Spirit infuses true faith into his people, it sustains them even through the darkest of times. In chapter 13, verse 15, Job had already said, though he slay me, yet I will trust Him. In other words, even if God brings worse into my life and I die, I'm still going to trust Him. Nothing's going to shake my faith in this future Redeemer. Job had lost his money, his house, his children, his health, his reputation, his friends, his relatives, but look at verses 13 through 20. Show how bad things were. He has removed, my brother is far from me and my acquaintances are completely estranged from me. My relatives have failed. My close friends have forgotten me. Those who dwell in my house and my maidservants count me as a stranger. I am an alien in their sight. I call my servant, but he gives no answer. I beg him with my mouth. My breath is offensive to my wife, and I am repulsive to the children of my own body. Even young children despise me. I arise, and they speak against me. All my close friends abhor me, and those whom I love have turned against me. My bone clings to my skin and to my flesh. and I have escaped by the skin of my teeth. Romans 8, 28 obviously hadn't been written back then, but if it had, it would seem almost to be a mockery of Job's position, and yet despite these confusing circumstances that he did not understand, he had a firm assurance that God was still his kinsman redeemer who cared for him and who would eventually vindicate him. And the future resurrection, victory of this kinsman redeemer would guarantee his own bodily resurrection. Verses 26 through 27. And after my skin is destroyed, this I know, that in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold and not another. How my heart yearns within me. Now there are two key phrases that point to his own resurrection. The first is, in my flesh I shall see God. Now, hyper-preterists, they cannot get around the clear meaning of the word flesh. They know what flesh is, and that's why they try to put as much doubt as they can into your minds about whether this really does refer to the resurrection, because they don't believe in a resurrection into flesh. Job says, in my flesh I shall see God. My eyes shall behold and not another. He's confident it's not just going to be a resurrection of other people. It'll be his own resurrection. And it won't simply be his spirit going to heaven. It'll be his whole being, his body and his soul. His flesh and his eyes will stand face to face with God. Now that's remarkable, 4,000 years ago. So his resurrection will be the same as Christ. Christ told his disciples, behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself, handle me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have. Both Job and Christ identify a true resurrection as a resurrection of corpses, a resurrection into flesh and bones body. So, what's their objection? They say, well, how do you answer the question then in 1 Corinthians 15 where it says, flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does corruption inherit incorruption. Hyperpreterists love to quote that verse to deny a literal resurrection. They say, whatever resurrection it's talking about, it obviously can't be a resurrection into literal bodies, into literal flesh and blood, because flesh and blood here, it says it cannot Okay, sounds on the surface like a somewhat credible argument, so what does that clause mean in 1 Corinthians 15? Well, Paul clearly defines exactly what he means in context, and over and over his clarifications completely contradict Hyper-preterism. In verse 39, he says, all flesh is not the same flesh. He's not denying our resurrection bodies will have flesh. He's just saying it'll be glorified flesh, right? Our unresurrected, corruptible flesh cannot inherit the kingdom of God, but glorified flesh can. In the next verse, Paul explains what he means by different kinds of flesh by saying the celestial body will be far more glorious than the terrestrial body. But it'll still be a body. But in verse 41, he clarifies, the celestial body is not going to be a totally different body, utterly unconnected to this body. It's the very body that dies that will be raised into incorruption. In verse 43, he says, the same body that is sown into the ground in weakness will be raised in power. The same body that is sown as a natural body will be raised a spiritual body. And then in verse 49, and actually throughout the passage, he says, it's going to be an identical resurrection to Christ's. In verse 52, he says, our bodies will be changed. Changed is not discarded. It's not replaced. It will be changed. Now, heretics love to take verses out of context. But the context here clearly defines what Paul meant. Verse 53, this mortal must put on immortality. Paul's quite clear, our resurrection bodies will be just like Christ, a glorified body composed of flesh and bones that can eat and that can be touched and handled. As Paul said in Philippians 3.21, The Lord Jesus Christ will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to his glorious body according to the working by which he is able even to subdue all things to himself. Now back to Job 19 verse 26. Job's confidence affirms he won't be annihilated when he sees God. He'll be with God forever. And so what kind of vision is this? Is it a beatific vision on earth in his mortal flesh? That's what some people complain. And there's actually some plausibility to that argument. As long as there have been time, there have been people who have had what they call the beatific vision. I've experienced this on a number of occasions. And it's a time where you are on your knees in God's presence and you experience his presence so powerfully, you are almost undone with joy. It's just an incredible experience of being in the presence of God. And Job had experienced this a number of times according to chapter 29. He had experienced the closeness of God's relationship with him, but you know what? All of those memories, those wonderful experiences pale into insignificance when we consider that in our glorified flesh, we will see God literally, not in a vision, but literally, and our eyes will behold God. God told Moses in Exodus 33, 20 that our mortal bodies would die if that were to happen now. He said this, no man shall see me and live. That's why he had to hide Moses when his glory passed by, because it would have killed Moses. And so Job knows that in his flesh he would see God. It's in his glorified flesh. And it's a wonderful picture of full redemption that will usher us into such happiness and joy in heaven. Here's how David expresses his own resurrection in similar language. He says, as for me, I will see your face in righteousness. I shall be satisfied when I awake in your likeness, in your likeness. It's scriptures like these that make me look forward to going to heaven and even more toward the resurrection of my body at the end of history when it will be freed from all sickness, all tears, all sorrows, all miseries. Every tear will be wiped away. I mean, it's something ought to make us say, yes, hallelujah, Lord. We look forward to that. Glory be to God. And I believe that is why Job ends these verses with the words, how my heart yearns within me. Those words show that this was not just an academic confidence in his mind. It was a confidence so deeply impressed into his soul and made him yearn for the day when he would be in his resurrection body forever done with boils and sickness and pain and sorrow and sin. He says, how my heart yearns within me. I know this has been a bit more of an academic sermon in some ways, but I hope at least it stirred up within you a yearning to know your kinsman Redeemer better. Paul said that this yearning had never ceased in his life. His aim every single day of his life was that I might know Christ and the power of His resurrection. Amen? And the reason I know is every day of his life, including the miserable days, is he explicitly connects it to his sufferings. Here's how he words it. that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings being conformed to His death." I mean, he didn't even want to experience death apart from union with Jesus. Paul could say in the midst of his sufferings, I know that my Redeemer lives. In the midst of his sufferings, Job could say, I know that my Redeemer lives. And I want you, with a loud voice, unitedly to say, I know that my Redeemer lives. Let's say it together. I know that my Redeemer lives. When Satan tries to get you down, what do you say? I know that my Redeemer lives. What do you say when you're sick and you're feeling miserable? I know that my Redeemer lives. What do you say when it seems like Romans 8, 28 is simply not true in your life? Nothing's working together for my good. You say, no, get behind me, Satan. I'm not going to think that. I know that my Redeemer lives. When we're miserable, when we're doubting our salvation, what do we say? I know that my Redeemer lives. Amen. Let's never forget that. We have a kinsman Redeemer who is so closely connected to us. He identifies with our sufferings. He knows what we go through, every problem. And he's a kinsman redeemer who is also divine, who is so powerful that he can meet all your needs according to his riches and glory. He's a kinsman redeemer who was raised from the dead. He triumphed over every principality and power, including the demons who were afflicting Job in this book. And I can guarantee you, brothers and sisters, Since this kinsman-redeemer is for you, no one can be against you. So let's go to this awesome God and just praise Him. Father, Lord Jesus, Holy Spirit, we love you, and we worship you, and we thank you for your great redemption. Father, we know that you planned it from eternity past, and we worship you, and we adore you. Lord Jesus, we know that you came came from heaven to fulfill your Father's plan, and we are so grateful that no one can pluck us out of your Father's hands. Thank you for being our kinsman redeemer. And Holy Spirit, we thank you that you always fully apply the Father's plan and the Son's redemption, and we worship you, and we just are so grateful to you. for having applied that redemption into our lives. Please empower us to live above our circumstances in the resurrection power of the Lord Jesus. Help us to always have hearts like Job displayed in chapters one and two. And with Paul, we say that we want to know Jesus and the power of his resurrection, not just this day, but every day for the rest of our lives. Please fulfill your plan in us. And we, in our part, commit ourselves to being your grateful servants for all of eternity. May all glory, honor, blessing, and praise go to you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In the name of Jesus, we pray these things. Amen.