He has a richer relationship with God, yes, as a result of this horrendous difficulty through which he has passed. He says, I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you. He knows God better.
He understands a little more of him, but I think what he understands most is what he doesn't understand. He sees that God is incomprehensible. God is great. God is majestic.
God knows the end from the beginning. The book of Job reminds us that pain actually helps us to see things we couldn't otherwise and to let go of things that we grasp too tightly. Most importantly, pain points us back to God. Welcome to this Wednesday edition of Renewing Your Mind.
I'm Nathan W. Bingham, and it's good to have you with us today. In the final chapter of the book of Job, we see the resolution of Job's intense trial. After losing his children, his livestock, virtually everything he owned, even his health, Job struggled to make sense of it. And as time went on, he began to question God. And we can be tempted to question God as well when we go through trials. That's why a study like this from Derek Thomas can be so helpful and one to dig into deeply before we face the storms of life. For the final day, you can request the complete series plus Dr. Sproul's book on the existence of evil when you give a donation of any amount at renewingyourmind.org or when you call us at 800-435-4343. Thank you for helping take the truth of God's purpose in suffering to countless Christians through your support of Renewing Your Mind. Even though we might not understand, God's ways, even in the midst of suffering, are meant for our good.
Here's Dr. Thomas to explain. Well, we're in lesson 11 of Job, and we're actually in the final chapter. Chapter 42, let's pick it up at verse 10. And the Lord restored the fortunes of Job when he had prayed for his friends, and the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. It sounds almost anticlimactic. There's been all this darkness and gloom and trial and difficulty, and it ends in this very positive way. And Job has 10 more children and his 14,000 sheep and 6,000 camels in verse 12 and 1,000 yoke of oxen and 1,000 female donkeys. It's how the book actually began almost.
What's going on? One thinks of King Lear, Shakespeare's king, everybody's dead at the end, including Cordelia. But here, we don't end on a tragic note like much of 19th and 20th century literature.
Hardy, Steinbeck, one thinks of these authors and their works often ended on this very dark note. And here, there's an element of restoration. It begins in verse 7, after the Lord had spoken these words to Job, the chapters 38, 39, all the way through to chapter 41. And Job had responded at the beginning of chapter 42, I know that you can do all things and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted. And then he quotes something that God had said back in chapter 38. And then he concludes in verse 5, I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you.
Therefore, I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes. He's not repenting of the sin that his friends had charged him with that suggested this was in fact the cause of his trial. Job's case has been vindicated, but he has sinned in the course of the trial. And that is what he now repents of, his attitude toward God that he has expressed in the course of his trial.
Now, there are three things I want us to see in this closing section. And the first in verses 1 to 6 is the fact that he has a richer relationship with God. You know, as a result of this trial, yes, as a result of this horrendous difficulty through which he has passed. He says, I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you. He knows God better.
He understands a little more of him, but I think what he understands most is what he doesn't understand. He sees that God is incomprehensible. God is great. God is majestic. God knows the end from the beginning.
He doesn't have any obligation to explain to us the reason for our trials. Sometimes that reason may become evident. Maybe God will reveal that to us in some way, but sometimes they are wholly inexplicable.
They're beyond our ability to fathom. And what has Job been brought to? He's been brought to faith and trust and dependence. God is a God who can be trusted. There is a purpose.
Look at verse 2. I know that you can do all things and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted. Yes, this trial was part of a purpose, a divine purpose, a divine plan. So, a few weeks ago, a horrendous tragedy took place. It involved the loss of a person's life, and a family is involved. It was through no apparent fault on this person's part that this death took place. It was, as they say, an accident.
It was inexplicable. And the death was instant. And the family is grieved. The bottom of their world has opened up and almost swallowed them. And what do we say?
Well, actually, what they said was Job 1.21. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. They're passing through later stages of that grief now, where questions come and doubts creep in. Satan accuses.
Counselors give, well, just bad advice. They've been driven to the Lord. They've been driven to cast their burdens on the Lord, knowing that He cares for them.
They're growing in their relationship. They thought they knew God before. They know Him much better now, and in a different way, and a deeper way.
That's what Job has learned. He has a richer relationship with God. God moves in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform.
He plants His footsteps in the sea and rides upon the storm. Deep in unfathomable minds of never-failing skill, He treasures up His bright designs and works His sovereign will. Blind unbelief is sure to err and scan His work in vain.
God is His own interpreter, and He will make it plain. That, of course, is part of William Cooper's hymn, a friend of John Newton. William Cooper was a tragic man, brilliant manhood, a tragic man, a man who suffered from acute bouts of depression. Probably today we would refer to him as bipolar or something like that. And he knew times when he was suicidal. He tried to take his life on at least five different occasions. He once jumped into a river to drown himself, and the river was only about four or five inches deep.
He didn't realize it. Tragic. And there were other occasions. And in God's providence, he lived within a short distance from John Newton, the great former slave trader and the amazing grace John Newton, and was counseled by John Newton.
It's a wonderful story. But here's a man who, through trial and darkness and difficulty, grew in his relationship with God. Many of you can say that on a different scale, you know, about marriage. What marriage doesn't have a trial or two? Well, I want to know who you are if you haven't got a trial in your marriage. You've never had a misunderstanding. You've never had a crossword. You've never insisted on your own rights. You've never stood, as I have in a garage, saying, I'm in the right here, and I need my wife to apologize.
This was a previous lesson. I love my wife more now than I did the day I married her. It's true for any marriage, in which that marriage is built on solid gospel foundations and looks to the Lord for his blessing. Well, it's the same in our relationship with God.
Pain helps that relationship to grow, causes us to see things, let go of things that otherwise we would perhaps hold onto and would impact in a negative way our relationship with the Lord. Well, the second thing we see here is the reconciliation of friends, these three friends. Verse 7, the Lord had spoken these words to Job, and the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, my anger burns against you and against your two friends, for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. Let me take the last phrase first, as my servant Job has, and you might protest that Job hasn't spoken what is right. And I think as commentators seem to point out that what God is alluding to here is not that everything that Job said was right, but his attitude in the end is right. He repented of his sin. He confessed his sin. He lays hand upon his mouth, and he repents in dust and ashes. And so in that sense, Job is now in the right, in a right relationship with God.
But these three friends evidently have not done that, and they're still insisting that they are right. And God is angry. My anger burns against you. I wonder if there is a place in your understanding of who God is, what God is like for divine anger.
C.H. Dodd, a great New Testament scholar of the 20th century, didn't believe in the wrath of God, didn't believe that anger was something that was personal. Anger in the Bible, Dodd insisted, was just the fact that the world and the universe is out of place. It's out of sorts. It's something objective. It's something out there. It's something that exists. It's the fact that there is pain and distress and so on. That is anger, but it's not personal with God. Well, God is saying here to Eliphaz and his two friends, my anger burns against you, burns against you. They had failed to speak what is right.
I find that a little scary. To be honest, I'm involved in the business of giving counsel. I find almost every day I'm giving advice and counsel to somebody or another.
And if that counsel is being given incorrectly from personal motives, selfish motives, the advancement of a position or a career, wanting to ingratiate oneself to another rather than seeking the good of that person's soul. God is angry. Yes, the anger of God. They lacked compassion. What's the chief sin of the three friends? Well, of course, they were wholly wrong in their interpretation and analysis, but I think what gets me the most is their lack of compassion, their complete lack of compassion. They're so long-winded.
They're so angry with Job. It seems no compassion in what they say. And God is kinder with honest inquirers. There's more compassion in God than there is in these three friends.
First of all, God's anger. Then there's an act of sacrifice and repentance. We read in verse 8, Now therefore take seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job and offer up a burnt offering for yourselves, and my servant Job shall pray for you. For I will accept his prayer not to deal with you according to your folly, for you have not spoken of me what is right as my servant Job has. And they do this, and Job prays, and at the end of verse 9, the Lord accepts Job's prayer. Job is to act as a kind of priest.
Job lives probably in the period of Abraham or so, maybe slightly before Abraham, but before the Levitical priesthood of the time of Moses. But he seems to be acting here almost as a kind of a priest. And they are to bring a sacrifice, and the number seven, seven bulls and seven rams, seven is a perfect number. And they are to do this, an intimation of the need that they have now as counselors to confess their sin and to be reconciled to Job. Love your enemies. Pray for those who persecute you.
The point I think I want to make here is there's something, well, there's something Jesus-like about Job here. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Yes, a willingness to forgive. And forgiveness involves their repentance. Do you notice that? It's not Job saying, well, I forgive you.
People say that, of course. I forgive you. I forgive you. But they need to repent of their sin, too.
They need to confess their sin. And Job forgives them. There's a story that appeared a few years ago.
I found it very amusing. An actress, Alison Arngrim, she played the part of Nellie Olsen in Little House on the Prairie. Well, most of you remember Little House on the Prairie. She tortured that sweet little Laura Ingalls.
You remember in Little House on the Prairie? And in almost every show, she tortured little Laura. She's an actress. She played this part from 1974 to 1981, and then all of the reruns and so on and syndicates of this show.
And then in 2005, this is 30 years after she'd been playing this part, she's signing autographs of a book that she had published. And this woman comes up to her, and she's standing there. She's seething.
She's bright red. She doesn't say anything. She's standing there. She's seething. She's angry, and she's shaking. And when her turn comes, she stands there. She's shaking, and she says to Alison Ingraham, I forgive you. I forgive you.
She was, of course, addressing the part that she had played in the show, if you understand. But all this pent-up anger, this pent-up frustration. Well, the point, I think, that I want to make here. Trials can make you bitter. I've seen it.
I've met Christians who have experienced a trial, a difficulty. It may be 20 years ago, maybe 40 years ago. In one instance, it was at least 50 or 60 years in the past. They'd never forgotten it.
Every time I visited, it came up in conversation. It consumed them. It ruined the rest of their lives.
They lived the rest of their lives in anger, in bitterness, unable to forgive, unable to put it behind them, unable to deal with it in a biblical way. What happens in forgiveness when God forgives our sin? He forgets it. It never comes up again. Love makes no record of wrongs.
It's a translation of 1 Corinthians 13. Love makes no record, keeps no record of wrongs. Well, there are certain people, and they have a record book.
You know, they have a digital little thumb drive, and whenever anybody approaches, it sort of vibrates and it reminds them. Yes, there's a record here of things that you've done in the past. Job is prepared to forgive and forget. That's not a piece of sentimentality. There's a biblical pattern here of forgiveness and forgetting, putting it behind you as if it had never been. Isn't that what God does in the gospel? When He forgives us our sins, He doesn't keep bringing it up.
He doesn't keep reminding us of past sins. They are forgotten. They have been dealt with. They've been washed away.
They may have been red like crimson, but they're as white as snow. So, there's the pattern of forgiveness in relationships. And then, a third thing, a renewed life. And it's almost anticlimactic. It's so different, say, from King Lear, or Macbeth, or Othello, or Hamlet, or plays by Ibsen, or Chekhov, or Hemingway, or Steinbeck, British authors like Golding's Lord of the Flies, and H.G.
Wells, and George Orwell. And so, we could go on and on, and the endings are depressing, thoroughly depressing. I sometimes find myself on an aeroplane, on a long flight.
And, you know, I don't always work. You might think a minister's always reading his Bible, and praying, and studying, but there are times you just have to kind of switch off, and you sort of look at the movies. And these days, you know, there was a time when you had one movie, and they would put down that screen, and everybody had to watch this movie. There was no choice about it.
It was right there. And now, of course, you can have a selection, and there's a hundred different movies. And there's a little preview button, and you press it, you watch it for, no, next. You watch it, no, no. And I did that recently, and there wasn't a single one I wanted to see.
They were all depressing, so thoroughly depressing. And this one ends in a wonderful way. Now, we're told here, for example, Job was 70 years old when all of this happened in verse 16. He lives another 140 years, 10 children, born to him, seven sons, and three daughters, just as he had before. Look at the names of the daughters, Jemima.
You see that in verse 14? He called the name of the first daughter Jemima, the name of the second, Kazir, the name of the third, Keren, Hapuch. Jemima means dove, Kazir means cinnamon, and Keren Hapuch is a container of antimony, which is an eye shadow. But they're happy names. There are some unfortunate names. I don't know what parents are thinking of when they name some of their children. And they're kind of unhappy names, names that make you reminiscent of bad stories, depressing stories.
But these are happy names. What's this saying? Is it saying, if you trust the Lord, that God will give you a happy ending? You're in a trial, you're in a difficulty, but just trust Him, and there'll be a happy ending. He'll restore your fortunes. Is that what we're supposed to draw from this?
No, of course not. Now, some people's lives end in shadow and in darkness, marriages that are irreconcilable, relationships with children that just seem to go from bad to worse. And they're never restored, despite all their longings and prayers and urgings. So we mustn't misuse this chapter. It is saying this, though. God can change your life from what it is right now, 180 degrees. He is able to do that. I'm not saying that's God's plan for you. I don't have the authority to say that. But I can say to you, it is more than possible in the providence and power and sovereignty of Almighty God that this darkness can be taken away. Did Job ever forget the trial?
No. If this was a movie, there would be a shot, I think, of the ten graves in the background somewhere. And then the sound of children laughing and playing together. The sorrow is still there. The memory of it is still there. But it has been eclipsed for a season with joy. Springtime has come again. Maybe you think that springtime is never possible again. That the sun of summer will never shine on you again. Then read the book of Job and see how this man's life ended in the providence of God's kind and sweet benevolence.
It's a marvelous ending. But there's more for us to consider. We need to go into the New Testament there. We need to pick up James, because James tells us, you have heard of the patience of Job. Well, you might say, after all of this study, Job wasn't a very patient man. So what is James talking about when he says you have heard of the patience of Job?
That is a great question that Dr. Thomas poses, and I'll let you know how to find the answer to that question in just a moment. But first, let me thank you for joining us for this Wednesday edition of Renewing Your Mind, as we conclude three days in Derek Thomas' series on the book of Job. What great counsel from Dr. Thomas today when he said, Maybe you think that springtime is never possible again. That the sun of summer will never shine on you again. Then read the book of Job.
Why? Because it points us to God and the hope that can only be found in Him. If you've listened since Monday, you've heard three of the messages from his 12-message study. So I encourage you to request the entire series on DVD, along with digital access to those messages and the study guide, in the free Ligonier app.
It also means you don't need to wait for the resource package to arrive at your mailbox to keep listening or watching. And you'll find the answer to the question Dr. Thomas raised at the end of today's message. Simply give a donation of any amount at renewingyourmind.org, or when you call us at 800-435-4343, and we'll get this series, plus R.C. Sproul's book, Why Is There Evil, in the mail for you. Dr. Thomas is well known for his teaching on this book, so don't miss this opportunity to add the series and the study guide to your library. Give your gift at renewingyourmind.org or by using the link in the podcast show notes before this offer ends tonight at midnight.
And for those who would prefer digital-only access to the series, study guide, and book, or if you live outside of the U.S. and Canada, you can respond at renewingyourmind.org slash global. If you've spent time in the book of Romans, you know the theology of the Apostle Paul. But who was Paul? Tomorrow Guy Waters will introduce us to the man behind Romans. That'll be Thursday, here on Renewing Your Mind. you
