Job 16-21

Hey, hey, welcome to Coffee and Devotions. It is, let's see, Tuesday morning, January 5th. That's where every weekday morning and weekend, you and I, we get together. We have a cup of coffee, we get into God's Word, and we grow in our love for the Lord together. And this year, 2021, we'll make it through all the wisdom literature. Well, this morning we continue our trek through the book of Job, taking big chunks at a time to make sure we understand the full context of what's going on. So here we go, Job chapter 16 through chapter 21. Let's go ahead and have some coffee, pray, and get into God's Word.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for this day, and we thank you for your Word. We thank you that you do not hide things from us that we need to know. but that you lovingly care for us and that you have blessed us with your word. We pray now that you would let us understand. In Jesus's name, amen.
All right, Job chapter 21, or sorry, Job chapter 16. Let's go ahead and pull up the words there. While we do that, remember to hit that like button. Let Facebook and YouTube know that this is valuable to you. Job chapter 16. Then Job answered and said, I have heard many such things.
Miserable comforters are you all. Shall words of wind have an end? Or what provokes you that you answer? I also could speak as you do. If your soul were in my place, I could heap up words against you and shake my head at you. But I would strengthen you with my mouth and the comfort of my lips would relieve your grief. Do you hear the heart of what Job is saying here? If I were in your shoes, I wouldn't be heaping accusations against you. All I'm wanting is some comfort and some peace. Though I speak, my grief is not relieved. And if I remain silent, how am I eased? But now he has worn me out. You have made me desolate all my company. So you have made desolate all my company. You have shriveled me up, and it is a witness against me.
My leanness rises up against me and bears witness to my face. He tears me in his wrath and hates me. He gnashes at me with his teeth. My adversary sharpens his gaze on me. They gape at me with their mouth. They strike me reproachfully on the cheek. They gather together against me.
God has delivered me to the ungodly and turned me over to the hands of the wicked. I was at ease, but He has shattered me. He also has taken me by my neck and shaken me to pieces. He has set me up for His target. His archers surround me. He pierces my heart and does not pity. He pours out my gall on the ground. He breaks me. With wound upon wound, he runs at me like a warrior.
Do you hear again Job's heart here, right? He's saying, I don't know what I've done against God, but God's got something against me. The arrows of the Lord have struck me. These things have happened to me. It's like God set me up as his target and I'm his practice. He's just nailing me down and I don't get why. I have sewn sackcloth over my skin and laid my head in the dust.
My face is flushed from weeping. and on my eyelids is the shadow of death, although no violence is in my hands, and my prayer is pure. O earth, do not cover my blood, and let my cry have no resting place. Surely even now my witness is in heaven, and my evidence is on high. My friends scorn me, and my eyes pour out tears to God.
O that one might plead for a man with God, as one pleads for his neighbor. For when a few years are finished, I shall go the way of no return. Job is just saying, I'm crying out to God, I'm crying out to God, I'm crying out to God, and it's like he doesn't hear me.
This is what he wants of his friends. He wants his friends to just pray for him, to intercede for him, to go to God and to care for him. Thank the Lord we have one who sticks closer than a brother, Jesus Christ himself. That is Jesus. who loves us and cares for us, that it's Jesus who is our advocate before the Father.
Job continues, My spirit is broken, my days are extinguished, the grave is ready for me. And are not mockers with me? And does not my eye dwell on their provocation? Now put down a pledge for me with yourself. Who is he who will shake hands with me? For you have hidden their heart from understanding. Therefore you will not exalt them.
He who speaks flattery to his friends, even the eyes of his children will fail. But he has made me a byword of the people, and I have become one in those whose face men spit. My eye has also grown dim because of sorrow. and all my members are like shadows. Upright men are astonished at this, and the innocent stirs himself up against the hypocrite. Yet the righteous will hold to his way, and he who has clean hands will be stronger and stronger. But please come back again, all of you, for I shall not find one wise man among you. My days are past. My purposes are broken off. Even the thoughts of my heart, they change the night into day.
The light is near, they say, in the face of darkness. If I wait for the grave as my house, if I make my bed in the darkness, if I say to corruption, you are my father, and to the worm, you are my mother and my sister, where then is my hope? As for my hope, who can see it? So they go down to the gates of Sheol. Shall we have rest together in the dust?
Job is just crying out that he's in despair. The grave doesn't give him any hope. He doesn't have any hope to go home. He doesn't have anything. His eyes are dim. The grief of his heart has shadowed over his eyes. And they're giving him platitudes, right?
Repent and you can go home and be happy. What home? My wife just walked away. She said, curse God and die. My children are dead. My household is ruined. And then Bildad, the Shuhite, it's like he didn't listen to Job at all. He says, How long till you put an end to words? Gain understanding and afterwards we will speak. Why are we counted as beasts and regarded as stupid in your sight? You who tear yourself in anger. Shall the earth be forsaken for you? Or shall the rock be removed from its place?
The light of the wicked indeed goes out. And you can imagine him pointing to Job here. The light of the wicked indeed goes out. And the flame of his fire does not shine. The light is dark in his tent, and the lamp beside him is put out. He's saying it's the Job, the one who God himself has declared was a righteous man.
The steps of his strength are short, and his own counsel casts him out, for he is cast into a net by his own feet, and he walks into a snare. The net takes him by the heel, and a snare lays hold of him. A noose is hidden from the ground and a trap for him in the road.
Terrorists frighten him on every side and drive him to his feet. His strength is starved, and destruction is ready at his side. It devours patches of his skin. The firstborn of death delivers his limbs. He is uprooted from the shelter of his tent, and they parade him before the king of terrors. They dwell in his tent, who are none of his. Brimstone is scattered in his dwelling. His roots are dried out below, and his branch withers above. The memory of him perishes from the earth, and he has no name among the renowned. He is driven from the light into darkness and chased out of the world.
He has neither son nor prosperity among his people, nor any remaining in his dwellings." Listen to what this dude is saying. He's saying, it's your sin. That's why all your children were murdered. He has neither son nor posterity among his people, nor any remaining in his dwellings. And he's saying this is because Job is sinful, that the light for him is even darkness.
This is not a friend who is a comforter. Those in the West are astonished at his day, as those in the East are frightened. Surely such are the dwellings of the wicked, and this is the place of him who does not know God. Really? Really, Job doesn't know God? Have you not heard everything he said, his high elevation of God's sovereignty and of God's transcendence? He doesn't know God? No, he's pouring out his heart because he knows God, but he doesn't understand why this is happening to him.
Job then answered and said, How long will you torment my soul and break me in pieces with words? These ten times you have reproached me. You are not ashamed that you have wronged me. And if indeed I have erred, my error remains with me. If indeed you exalt yourselves against me, and plead my disgrace against me, know then that God has wronged me, and has surrounded me with his net.
Again, Job is saying, I know that God is sovereign, and I know that God is the one who's doing this to me. This isn't sin, what Job is saying here. Notice what Job is saying. I'm innocent, but I know God is sovereign. God is doing this to me. It's not my sin. If I do have sin, it's known to me. Again, Job is a type of Christ here and our minds are taken back to Jesus on that cross when he knows he has no sin.
And yet in his humanity, in the pain and sorrow that he's suffering, he cries out, Ali, Ali, Lamash, Apakhtani, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? This is the crying out of an honest soul to God. If I cry out concerning wrong, I am not heard. If I cry, Allowed, there is no justice.
He has fenced up my way so that I cannot pass. He has set darkness in my path. He has stripped me of my glory and taken the crown from my head. He breaks me down on every side and I am gone. My hope has uprooted like a tree. He has also kindled his wrath against me and he counts me as one of his enemies. His troops come together and build up their road against me. They encamp all around my tent.
He has removed my brothers far from me, and my acquaintances are completely estranged from me. My relatives have failed, and my 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 repulsed to the children of my own body. Even young children despise me. I arise and they speak against me. All my closest 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. Have pity on me, have pity on me, oh you my friends, for the hand of God has struck me. Oh, this is true. Now what he doesn't know is that God has allowed Satan to do these things. But he just wants his friends to comfort him. We don't know why this is going on either, Joe. But we'll pray for you. We love you. How can we help you? How can we care for you? Why do you persecute me as God does and are not satisfied with my flesh? Oh, that my words were written. Oh, that they were inscribed in a book. Thank God they are. That they were engraved on a rock with an iron pin and lead forever.
For I know that my Redeemer lives. and he shall stand 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 yet not another, how my heart yearns within me.
If you should say, how shall we persecute him, since the root of this matter is found in me, be afraid of the sword for yourselves. For wrath brings a punishment of the sword, that you may know there is a judgment. Did you hear Job's cry? This takes us back to yesterday's reading.
Though the Lord might slay me, I know him, I will serve him." And here we see what he says, 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.'" He's speaking of Jesus Christ. Job, the type of Christ, is saying that there is one who will purchase him.
There is one who will redeem him with something more valuable than silver or gold, but by the very blood of Jesus Christ. And that in Jesus Christ, as the firstborn of the resurrection, brothers and sisters, we know that in our flesh, we too will rise from the dead and we will see God face to face.
Oh. Is it your heart cry when everything is going on wrong around you and your friends are far from you and you have no hope in the physical of this world? Can you cry out, I know that my Redeemer lives? We haven't highlighted anything so far, but oh boy, I'm gonna highlight verse 25 and verse 26.
After that highlight, let's see what his friend Zophar has to say. Then Zophar the Nemethite answered and said, therefore my ancient thoughts make me answer because of the turmoil within me. I have heard the rebuke that reproaches me and the spirit of my understanding causes me to answer. Do you not know this of old, since man was placed on earth, that the trumpeting of the wicked is short and the joy of the hypocrite is but for a moment?
Though his haughtiness mounts up to the heavens and his head reaches the clouds, yet he will perish forever like his own refuse. Those who have seen him will say, Where is he? He will fly away like a dream and not be found. Yes, he will be chased away like a vision of the night. The eye that saw him will see him no more, nor will his place behold him anymore.
His children will seek the favor of the poor. and his hands will restore his wealth. His bones are full of his youthful vigor, but it will lie down with him in the dust. Though evil is sweet in his mouth, and he hides it under his tongue, though he spares it and does not forsake it, but still keeps it on his mouth. Yet his food in his stomach turns sour. It becomes cobra venom within him. He swallows down riches and vomits them up again. God casts them out of his belly.
He will suck the poison of cobras, and the viper's tongue will slay him. He will not see the streams of rivers flowing with honey and cream. He will restore that for which he labored, and will not swallow it down for the proceeds of business. He will get no enjoyment, for he has oppressed and forsaken the poor. He has violently seized the house which he did not build."
Did you just hear what his friend Zophar just said? Dude, you're going to drink poison from snakes and die. You're going to be wiped out. Why? Because you must have oppressed and forsaken the poor. You must have seized the innocent person's house by force. What? Does this sound like the Job we've learned about?
No, no, something is desperately wrong here. because he knows no quietness in his heart. He will not save anything he desires. Nothing is left for him to eat. Therefore his well-being will not last. In his self-sufficiency he will be distressed. Every hand of misery will come against him. When he is about to fill his stomach, God will cast on him the fury of his wrath. and will rain it on him while he is eating.
He will flee from the iron weapon. A bronze bow will pierce through him. It is drawn. It comes out of the body. Yes, the glittering point comes out of his gall. Terrors came upon him. Total darkness is reserved for his treasures. An unfanned fire will consume him. It shall go ill with him who is left in his tent. The heavens will reveal his iniquity and the earth will rise up against him. The increase of his house will depart and his goods will flow away in the day of his wrath. This is the portion from God for a wicked man, the heritage appointed to him by God."
Man, I... Did you just hear what he said? He just said Job's family, Job's household, everything would be stripped away from him because that's what God does to the wicked people. Again, it makes me think of Christ, right? Who though he was tempted in every way like we are yet without sin, that Jesus was numbered among the transgressors. That Zophar here wants to say, This is the only way that there's any calamity, and obviously you are a wicked, sinful man. Isn't it interesting that the high priests and the Pharisees and the Sadducees thought the same thing of Jesus? That they thought Jesus was a sinner, a blasphemer, a drunkard, and a glutton. He was numbered with the transgressors, though he himself had not transgressed.
Again, Job is given to us here as a type of Christ. Why don't we go ahead and have some coffee and we'll finish chapter 21. Then Job answered and said, Listen carefully to my speech, and let this be your consolation. Bear with me that I may speak, and after I have spoken, keep mocking. As for me, is my complaint against man? If it were, why should I not be impatient? Look at me and be astonished. Put your hand over your mouth. Even when I remember, I am terrified and trembling takes hold of my flesh.
Why do the wicked live and become old? Yes, become mighty in power. One of the psalmists say that, right? Why do the righteous perish and the wicked flourish? This is a reality of if we live in this fallen world and there's a reality that as Christians were able to cry out to God God I don't know what you're doing in your sovereignty. I know you're good Lord. I know you have a plan I know that you're bringing all things to completion, but yet Lord, why do I suffer and That person over there who has no desire for you whatsoever has everything in this world That's what that's what Job is saying here Their descendants are established with them in their sight, and their offspring before their eyes.
Their houses are safe from fear, neither is the rod of God upon them. Their bulls breed without failure, their cows calve without miscarriage. They send forth like little ones, like a flock, and their children dance. They sing to the tambourine and harp. and rejoice to the sound of the flute. They spend their days in wealth and in a moment go down to the grave.
Yet they say to God, depart from us, for we do not desire the knowledge of your ways. Who is the Almighty that we should serve him? And what profit do we have if we pray to him? Indeed, their prosperity is not in their hands. The counsel of the wicked is far from me."
Right? He's like, I don't get it, God. Why, Lord, do the wicked get to have their children play while my children are dead? Lord, why? Why is my child dead? Why does my family despise me? Why were all my livestock killed and yet the wicked? They have calves, and their animals go free, and they birth happily, and no one miscarries their wealth increases, but look at me, I have nothing. Do you hear Job's heart here? Why? Why? How often is the lamp of the wicked put out? How often does their destruction come upon them?
The sorrows of God distribute his anger. They're like straw before the wind and like chaff that the storm carries away. They say God lays up one's iniquity for his children. Let him recompense him that he may know it. Let his eyes see his destruction. and let him drink the wrath of the Almighty. For what does he care about his household after him, when the number of his months is cut in half? Can anyone teach God knowledge, since he judges those on high?
One dies in his full strength, being wholly at ease and secure. His pails are full of milk, and the marrow of his bones is moist. Another man dies in the bitterness of his soul, never having eaten with pleasure. They lie down alike in the dust, and worms cover them."
Notice here that Job is preserving God's integrity. I can't teach God. No one can teach God. God is the one who judges those on high, but yet I don't get it. Why is there iniquity in this world? Why is there the guy who's able to eat and drink and be merry, but then he dies in his youth, and then the other person dies with a life full of sorrow? Why does God allow these things to happen?
Look, I know your thoughts and the schemes with which you would wrong me. For you say, where is the house of the prince? And where is the tent, the dwelling place of the wicked? Have you not asked those who travel the road? And do you not know their signs? for the wicked are reserved for the day of doom.
They shall be brought out on the day of wrath. Who condemns his way to his face, and who repays him for what he has done? Yet he shall be brought to the grave, and a vigil kept over the tomb. The clods of the valley shall be sweet to him. Everyone shall follow him, and as countless have gone before him.
How then can you comfort me with empty words, since falsehood remains in your answers? Job is saying, I know that the wicked are judged. I know that they're going to go to the grave. I know that God's going to blow them like the chaff away in the wind. And so as we wrap up this section, we're asking ourselves, why? Why, right?
The only hope that we have here in Job is what we found up above. That it is our Redeemer who lives. that all of us are wicked. This is, go read the book of Romans chapter one through five. All of us are sinners. All of us deserve judgment. All of us deserve God's righteous indignation. None of us deserves to have our pails full of milk. None of us deserve to have houses that dwell in peace. No. But the question is, why does God show such grace to those who don't love him? Well, this is a real question.
I think Jesus answers it a little bit. He answers it just a little bit in the parables when he talks about the four different soils, where the good news goes out like seeds spread across different lands or different parts of the ground in a field. And there are some that the word of God goes out and they might hear it, but they don't really care about it that much because the weeds grow up and they choke out the seed. And Jesus says that those weeds are the, are the wealth of this or the deceitfulness of wealth and the cares of this world. It's, it's difficult though, isn't it? If you're one of those people right now who's struggling, I don't want to...
This is me speaking, Pastor Brian, speaking to you pastorally here. I just want to pray with you. Please feel free to send me a message if you want me to pray for you something specifically. But I'd like to pray for you right now if you're the one who's hurting. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you that our Redeemer lives. But Father, in humility, we don't have all the answers. God, I pray.
I pray for those who are mourning, that you would sustain them and give them strength. When the time is right, please give them joy again. Lord, I pray for those who are suffering loss. financial loss, emotional loss, relationship loss. Father, I pray that they would draw near to their Redeemer who has suffered like them, who mourned the death of his best friend, Lazarus. Lord, I pray that you would be near to those who are heavy in heart this morning, that they might draw near to you and have hope that you are a God who judges justly, And one day we will see you face to face.
Lord, we pray that you would let us be able to see past our current situation and look to Jesus and to the last great day. We pray these things in Jesus's name. Amen. Well, may the Lord bless you today and may you be filled with the peace that comes through Jesus Christ. Bye.