Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. Everything He says that you and I have is all alone. You get that? That's everything. You know how you come into the world? With nothing. You know how you're leaving the world? With nothing.
He said that's the way life is. Everything I have is given to me by the Lord. He gives and He takes away. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's Word meets our world. There's some principles here for us in these first verses, these first twelve.
One is this. You and I have an enemy who's real and he'll try to ruin your life and your testimony if he can. We have a real enemy.
And so often when you're going through real troubles in your life, you have to think this way. Is Satan behind this? Is this somehow going to discredit the testimony of the Lord? You see, is this going to bring about sin in somebody's life? Secondly, there are trials that come into our lives that are not deserved, but they are permitted.
They're not deserved, but they are permitted. Trials in our own life. Thirdly, and this will evolve as we go through the book, God has a plan for us that we may never understand.
You can go all the way through this whole book. God has a plan for us that you and I may never understand short of heaven. Then we'll know as we're known, but until then we may never understand it. And lastly, the silence of God will make you wonder if he's there or he cares. And the Book of Job will make it clear to us he is there and he does care. So Satan touches almost all that Job has, starting in verse 13. He says, Now what happened on the day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother's house, that a messenger came to Job and said the oxen were plowing and the donkeys were feeding beside him. The Sabians attacked and took them, and they slew the servants with the edge of the sword. And I alone have escaped to tell you. And while he was speaking another, he also came and said the fire of God fell from heaven and burned up the sheep and the servants and consumed them. And I alone have escaped to tell you. And while he was still speaking to another, he also came and said the Chaldeans formed three bands and they made a raid on the camels and they took them. They slew the servants with the edge of the sword.
And I alone, he said, have escaped to tell you. That's a bad day. He lost every stock market crash. He lost everything and all the servants.
In one day, three messengers running in panting. Everything you own is gone. If you were Job, what would you be thinking right then? Beside how feeling sorry for yourself, you might be thinking, at least my kids are alive.
I still have my children. And then right after that, this man runs in. And it says in verse 18, while he was still speaking, another also came and said, your sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine with their oldest brother's house. And behold, a great wind came across the wilderness, struck the four corners of the house. It fell on the young people and they died.
And I alone have escaped to tell you. Well. How would that make you feel? This is one day isn't something building up. This isn't something this is instantaneous.
There's no expectation any of this is ever going to happen. And all of a sudden, all of this happens in one day. First, 13 made it so clear now it happened. Sometimes the worst things we go through are instantaneous. And we wonder about it. Someone we love died in an accident. No thought that anything would happen.
Some young person dies. No expectation that that could ever take place. It seems unimaginable to us. There isn't a movie and I think probably more men saw than women. But maybe you saw it Saving Private Ryan.
It's a great movie. But I want to say this, that there is a scene in the movie where there's a woman in a country house. There's this long road up to her country house. And if you notice carefully, there are four stars in a window representing her four sons.
And there comes this all of drab vehicle done, this long winding road to her. And then a military man gets out of the car and he walks up to the door and he says, we regret to inform you that three of your sons have been killed. That's the whole point of Saving Private Ryan, her fourth son. And if you remember the movie, she takes her apron and pulls it over her face. She just found out three of her sons are dead instantly.
And then she just falls to the ground. So overwhelmed by that fact. That pales in comparison to what happened to Joe.
And it's so overwhelming to us, we can't help but emote when we see it. So how is Joe going to react to this? You see, how do you react to that kind of news? It says, then Job arose. We don't know when then is.
We don't know. It could be right then, that same day, it could have been quite a bit later. By the way, it could have been after he, just imagine this, went through 10 funerals. He just buried 10 children along with his wife and him burying his children.
We don't know when it is, but it says then he arose. And it says then he tore his robe, the outer tunic. He tears it the way a Jew later even will grieve. The tearing of the robe is my grief. He has real grief. And then it says, and he shaved his head. Now, to an Eastern or Semitic person, the hair was the glory. He shaved his hair off. I have no glory left.
I've lost all my children. You see, and you've got almost the same kind of scene and you wonder, the poor guy, look what he's going through. And you expect this is going to be terrible. It says he fell to the ground.
Oh, my goodness, you just knew how gut wrenching this is. But he doesn't wail. He doesn't wallow. He worships. He worships in that moment. And when it says here that he fell to the ground, the idea is face first.
My guess is knees, palms and forehead are on the ground. When have you worshiped like that, by the way? When have you worshiped God that way? He's worshipping God. What a humble position.
And, you know, it's humility because notice what he says. Naked I came from my mother's womb and naked I shall return there. The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away.
Blessed be the name of the Lord. Fearing 10 children. Losing everything you had. And that's his response. Everything he says that you and I have is on loan. You get that? That's everything. You know how you come into the world? With nothing.
You know how you're leaving the world? With nothing. He said that's the way life is. Everything I have is given to me by the Lord. He gives and he takes away. Then he says blessed be his name. What an incredible statement.
Everything I have is on loan. And if the Lord wants it back, it's his. That's hard to get our thoughts around.
Notice it's so clear. It says through it all, Job did not sin nor did he blame God. Look, I'll be honest with you. Very few of us act this way. Most of the people I've been with that go through suffering of almost any type blame God. Now you say, what's wrong with those people? Those people are you.
All right. But you're too clever to say you blame God. You never do that. You always say, pastor, you know, God can do anything. So why didn't God stop this?
Do this? Why didn't God do this? Do you know what your implication is? He is not good. He is not good. You see, it's his fault. If he can do anything, could it be saved my little boy? Of course. The implication is that he's not good. Job's view is naked, I can't make it.
I'm leaving everything I have is on loan. Blessed be his name. You see, we have this tendency to be all excited about saying we say God is good sometimes all the time. But God is good. And we do so because of the blessings we have. God is good. You see, and people tell me, I got to tell you, pastor, how good the Lord is.
Why? He did this for me and he gave me this. He's good. But when you go through a kind of day, not like, but a kind of day like Job, you never say that. He's not good that day. He's good when he gives me what I want. I'm thankful for the blessing, but I'm not necessarily thankful for him. Job's different. He figures that out on his own.
Here's another point there to that first chapter is, and I wrote in my Bible years ago, hold everything loosely. None of it's mine. Now, you might be thinking, what a terrible day that is. No one has a day like that.
And one thing for sure. It can't get worse. Can it? Yes. It can get worse.
It can get much worse. Notice what happens now. Chapter two. And there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord and Satan came among them to present himself before the Lord. And the Lord said to Satan, where have you come from? And then Satan said, from roaming about on the earth and walking around. And the Lord said to him, have you considered my servant Job? I don't know about you, but whenever I read this passage, I keep thinking, Lord, I hope I never come up in a conversation between you and Satan.
Have you considered Bill? Just leave me alone. You know, how do you say that? You know, have you considered my servant Job? He said there's no one like him on earth, blameless and upright, a man fearing God and turning away from evil. You know what that is?
That's God putting his thumb in Satan's eye. Thought you had him, huh? Thought you had him. You said he'd curse me. He worshipped me. He just brings it up. You said he'd curse me and he worshipped me.
He said he still holds fast his integrity. Although you incited me against him to ruin him without cause, it's not fair. I gave you the permission, but it's not fair to Job.
What happened wasn't fair here. You incited this. And I think Satan's like, wait, you brought the conversation up, you know, but God's teaching us something here. He said, Satan said to the Lord, skin for skin, yet all that a man has, he will give us life. Now, that's a Hebrew ism. It's a very old Semitic phrase that's used here.
It means. Yeah, but that's not like suffering on a personal level. He suffers on a personal level. He'll curse you. If you make him suffer his skin because we'll give skin to save our skin, we'll do anything to save ourselves. That's human beings, he said. You put forth your hand now and touch his bone and flesh.
The bone and flesh, the flesh there means his soul. Do something that affects his body, his mind, his soul, his emotions. Touch him like that. He said he'll curse you to your face. And so the Lord said to Satan, behold, he's in your power. Only spare his life.
You can do anything you want to do. You can't kill him. Wow. And Satan went out from the presence of the Lord and smote Job with sore boils and the sole of his feet to the crown of his head. And he took Pacha to scrape himself while he was sitting among the ashes.
At the city dump. This is amazing. If you read the whole book of Job, you start realizing what is going on to him physically. It says in Chapter two, it says this. He was inflamed. He had ulcerous sores. He had persistent itching. In Chapter two, near the end, it said he had degenerative changes in facial skin. His friends saw him and couldn't recognize him. He had suffered.
It distorted his face so much. In Chapter three, it says he lost his appetite. In Chapter three, it also says he had fears and depression. In Chapter seven, he said it had that he had sores that burst open, scabbed over, cracked, and then would scab over and ooze pus.
Then it says worms that form in the sores. The worms would form in the sores and cover him with worms as they ate at the sores that he had in his body. In Chapter nine, it says he had difficulty breathing. It says in verse 16, he had the darkening of his eyelids and his eyes. In Chapter 19, it says that he had foul breath. In Chapter 19, it also said he lost a lot of weight. In Chapter 30, it said he had excruciating continual pain. It also says in Chapter 30, he had a high fever with chills and the discoloring of his skin, as well as anxiety and diarrhea. He endured delirium and sleeplessness in the rejection of his friends and family. That's what he went through on a personal level, inside and out, with all the other suffering that Job had. Warren Wiersbe says this about him at the ash heap. He said, there the city garbage was deposited and burned, and there the city's rejects lived, begging alms for whoever passed by. At the ash heap, dogs would fight over something to eat, and the city's dung was brought there to be burned. The city's leading citizen was now living in abject poverty and shame. And all that he humanly had left was his wife and three friends, and they're about to turn against them. That suffering. And then it says, and then his wife said to him.
She comes out of the city to the dump, probably kneels down beside him, and like they just whispered in her ear. Don't forget some things about her before we're too critical of her. I'll talk about that in a moment, but notice what she says. Do you still hold fast to your integrity?
Wow. Notice what God said. God said in verse three, he still holds fast to his integrity. She said, do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die.
It's all you have left is death. Get out of here. I know we're really hard on her. She's criticized. But remember, she lost all 10 of her children in one day. She lost all of her possessions, her standing in the community all in one day. She lost everything, just like Job, except there's a difference. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that she was nearly as spiritual as he was. She may not be the spiritual giant Job was. She had to endure the same things that Job did, other than the physical infirmities.
Watch how gentle and great Job handles this. He said to her, you speak as one of the foolish women speak. Don't miss this. He didn't say you're a foolish woman. He said those words you speak are as or like a foolish woman speaks. I'm not going there, he says.
I'm not even going to entertain this to talk to you about it. That's the way a foolish woman would speak. You speak as a foolish woman speaks. He said, shall we indeed accept good from God and not accept adversity?
Same idea again. In all this, Job did not sin with his lips. Your perspective, hun, is unspiritual.
That's what he is telling her. He understands something that we don't understand when we're suffering. God's the shepherd, you and I are the sheep. God's the potter, you and I are the clay.
You see, you have to see that. God's not one of us. He's not like a superman, he's God. Notice, he says it in this way. He said, shall we indeed accept good from God and not accept adversity?
If this came through God, I accept it. Robert Alden in his great work on Job says, this is a hard lesson for some believers to learn, especially if they feel that they have been promised health and wealth, and they misunderstand God's wonderful plan for their lives involves they think that God's wonderful plan for their life only involves pleasantries and no trouble. By the way, you never hear one prosperity preacher in America ever preach on Job. Not ever.
They won't. And yet they'll say, if you're spiritual enough, you get a carefree, wonderful life. But no one is more spiritual than Job. And nothing in his life is that way.
Nothing in his life is that way. Believers on this side of the cross, he says, have more examples from both the Bible and church history of God's people who have suffered. Job was much more in the dark, yet out of the darkness his strong belief in the sovereignty of God showed forth brilliantly. What Job is saying, and it's amazing, he's saying, look, I don't understand this, but I trust him.
I trust him. He never sinned against God. There's a tremendous lesson for us here. You see, while that was so unfair, look, life is unfair. Ecclesiastes is one of my favorite books in the Old Testament, and one of the things Solomon says there is, life's not fair.
Don't expect it to be. And so, because I live in New Orleans, my view is when life is fair to me, I call it Lanyap. You see, just simply because it's fair. But we get all upset if life's not fair to us. But it's not fair. It's never been fair. Ever since the fall, life hasn't been fair. A couple points of my illustration here is this last part that I read.
One is this. Don't be surprised when it goes from bad to worse in your life. Sometimes that happens. It just goes from bad to worse.
And you keep thinking, what am I going to get out of here? Secondly, because we live in a fallen world, even loved ones will give us bad advice. Just because a loved one gave you advice doesn't mean it's good. It's only going to be good if it comes from God and it comes from His Word. And lastly, blessing and adversity both fall under God's sovereignty. All things work together for good, Paul wrote to the Romans.
I'm sovereign over everything. God's sovereign in Job, and that's what this whole story is going to be. The key about the book of Job is not a book about suffering. It's a book about how do we react to suffering. Suffering is understood. We're all going to suffer, not to this degree, but we're all going to suffer. The question isn't whether you'll suffer. The question is how do you react to suffering? And the book will expose all that to us.
Let me close with the word of an Australian doctor named Francis Anderson. I love what he says. He said, Job finds nothing wrong with what has happened to him. It is equally right for God to give gifts and to retrieve them, round one. It is equally right for God to send good and evil, round two. Receive is a good act of word, implying cooperation with providence, not mere submission. Such positive faith is the magic stone that transmutes everything in our lives to gold. For when the bad as well as the good is received from the hand of God, every experience in life becomes an occasion for blessing. Every experience in your life can be an excuse to start blessing God.
He says, but the cost is high. You see, it's easier to lower your view of God than to raise your faith to such a height. You see, and that's what ends up happening to us. When we suffer unfairly, whether we realize or not, we lower our view of God. Instead of raising our faith, that's what Job has to teach us.
Let's pray. Father, thank you for this remarkable book. It's an amazing story. The suffering is unparalleled.
We can't even imagine it. But Father, you're trying to teach us something, that living in this fallen world as sinful people with a spiritual enemy that you call the adversary. Pain and suffering are part of our experience. And the question as people of faith is not whether or not we'll suffer, but how will we suffer?
And especially how will we suffer when life's not fair to us? Father, I pray that in the weeks ahead that we're able to see over and over again insights into this idea of our reaction to suffering so that it can help us, not only as we live out our lives, but as we minister to others for your glory and for our good. Father, I thank you for this great story.
In Jesus' name, amen. You've been listening to Pastor Bill Gebhardt on the Radio Ministry of Fellowship in the Word. If you ever miss one of our broadcasts, or maybe you would just like to listen to the message one more time, remember that you can go to a great website called oneplace.com. That's oneplace.com, and you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online.
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That's fbcnola.org. At our website, you will find hundreds of Pastor Bill's sermons. You can browse through our sermon archives to find the sermon series you are looking for, or you can search by title. Once you find the message you are looking for, you can listen online, or if you prefer, you can download the sermon and listen at your own convenience. And remember, you can do all of this absolutely free of charge. Once again, our website is fbcnola.org. For Pastor Bill Gebhardt, I'm Jason Gebhardt, thanking you for listening to Fellowship in the Word.
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