There are times of great euphoria, times of special peace, special sense of God's presence, and then there are times when God seems far away. and they descend into a very dark place. and wish they'd never been Born. It's troubling, isn't it? when people don't listen to us?
It makes it seem like they don't care or aren't interested in us. But what do we do when it seems like Almighty God isn't listening to us? when it feels like he's distant. Hello, and welcome to another edition of Renewing Your Mind. I'm glad you're here.
This week, we've been exploring the book of Job, guided by Dr. Derek Thomas. Today, Dr. Thomas will lead us into the bleakest moment of Job's life. what has been called by theologians the dark night of the soul.
At the end of this episode, you can learn about how to receive a lifetime of digital access to Dr. Thomas' entire series on the Book of Job. But now. How will Job get through this darkness? And how can we get through similar trials?
Here's Dr. Thomas.
Well, we come to Job chapter 3. This is a dark night of the soul. Passage. It probably doesn't get much darker. than this chapter in the whole of the Bible, except maybe Our Lord Jesus in Gethsemane.
Let's read a few verses. From chapter three. After this Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. How much time has gone? Since chapters one and two, since the loss of his children the loss of his health.
You know, perhaps we're thinking here of Weeks Possibly months have passed by. Let the day perish on which I was born, and the night that said a man is conceived. Let that day be darkness may God above not seek it, nor light shine upon it. let gloom and deep darkness claim it let clouds dwell upon it, let the blackness of the day terrify it, at night let thick darkness seize it, let it not rejoice among the days of the year. Let it not come into the number of the months.
Behold, let that night be barren. Let no joyful cry enter it. Let those curse it who curse the day Who are ready to rouse up Leviathan? Let the stars of its dawn be dark. Let it hope for light but have none.
Nor see the eyelids of the morning, because it did not shut the doors. of my mother's womb nor hide trouble. from my eyes. And it goes on. through the third chapter.
Perhaps the closing verse of Psalm Eighty-eight psalm by Hayman the Ezrahite. My companions have become darkness or As another possible translation, darkness has become my only. Companion. Bear in mind. Before you make a judgment on this passage, Jeremiah cites this passage.
In Jeremiah 19 and 20. after Jeremiah has spent a night in the stocks. He's released the next morning. I think he goes home. The text doesn't say that, but I think he goes home.
And then he utters these words. As though Well, as though Job chapter 3 was a passage of scripture that Jeremiah had memorized. What's your favorite passage of scripture? The one that you memorize. Says something, doesn't it?
Jeremiah. employed the very words of Job Chapter three It might embarrass us. Why is this chapter here. If you were Well, if you are putting the scriptures together, I know that. a dangerous question to Consider.
And I don't mean to be irreverent or anything, but if you were trying to decide what should go in a Bible and the inerrant word of God, would you. Would you have a place for this third Chapter of Job, where Job cusses the day that he was born, wishes he'd never been born, says. That he wishes that that night on which a midwife says it's a boy be obliterated completely from the calendar. There are probably conversations in dimly lit. counseling rooms that have uttered similar words.
to this. It's a lament. It's a curse. Lament. It's not addressed to anyone in particular.
It's not particularly, especially addressed to God. Perhaps we should view it as a matter of fact. the swings that we sometimes experience from euphoria to Depression. This is certainly indicative of what happens to A great many people, when they experience great loss, and suffering and ill health. that there are times of great euphoria, times of special peace.
special sense of God's presence and then there are times when God seems far away. and they descend into a very dark place. I wish they'd never been. Born. Before rushing in to criticize this passage.
We need, I think, to listen. job. First thing I want us to think about is the background. And there are four things in particular. One is Time has gone by.
Time can...
Well time can change your mood your perspective, the way You view things. A week can be an eternity. In politics, it can change everything. But it can change everything in the Christian life too. Six weeks after a bereavement.
I was told a long time ago when somebody experiences bereavement. You should check up on them six weeks later. Call them. Send them a note. Because very often the mood is very different.
So time has gone by. Friends.
Well, the friends have arrived. They arrived at the end of chapter two. They haven't actually said anything. They've acted in a way that seems to indicate they are already expecting Job to die. Their demeanor, their silence, what they do in putting ashes on their heads and so on.
All of this would be symbolic of the fact that, as far as they're concerned, they've got nothing to say, and Job. is as good as dead. Job's wife. had urged him to curse God and die. Maybe now he had been pondering.
That's a gesture. Maybe that's what he should do. Get this over with. Exit this life. And then there's been the silence of God.
And this is going to be an increasing issue, of course, as the book goes on. Bob doesn't say anything. There's been no vision, there's been no word, there's been no prophet to counsel him. Nothing. Hmm.
Feelings. and thoughts that Job expresses here. A shocking And they are. He curses the day of his birth. When a midwife says it's a boy Let that day be removed from the calendar.
He says. When there was Joy in verse 7. Let no joyful cry enter it. I remember the birth of my daughter. I remember the birth of my It was at that time in British sort of social Um awareness that that husbands were present at birth.
It was only just before that that that did not take place. It was somewhere in the 60s or 70s or so, at least in Britain. And I was there. I remember the sense of... joy, the sense of Yeah.
Euphoria. He wants Leviathan. Chapter 3 and verse 8. great monster, this chaos monster, and we'll come back to it. He's mentioned again in chapters uh thirty eight, thirty nine and forty of the book of Job.
Whatever it is exactly. This creature of destruction, this creature that is associated with all that's. evil. Let this creature rise up and curse and remove this day that I was born from ever having taken place. The second half of Job chapter 3.
is a full-blown Lament. He wishes he'd never been born. pours out a series of questions. A battle of while a battle of faith is erupting. His belief in God.
is belief in What God is. Like He says in verse Eleven. Why did I not die at birth, come out from the womb and expire? Why did the knees receive me, or why the breasts that I should nurse. For then I would have lain down and been quiet, I would have slept, then I would have been at rest with kings and counselors of the earth who rebuilt ruins for themselves or with princes who had gold, who filled their houses with silver, and so on.
But still Born Child This isn't suicide. There's a place to talk about suicide. Yeah. And I've known believers, true Christians, who have taken Their lives. Lost all.
Sense of of purpose in this world. for whatever reason that is. I do believe that Christians Born again, children of God. Oh commit suicide, can be saved and they're in God's presence and have the experience of being at Uh probably a couple of dozen funerals of such instances, but that's not what's here. This is This is Job saying, I think Let's Let God do this.
remove this day as as though I had never been born. He talks about life here as being Well, misery. Look at verse 20. the bitter in soul In verse 24, he talks about sighing. And groaning He talks in verse 25 of nightmares.
That have come true, the thing that I fear comes upon me, and what I dread. befalls me. And it ends, I am not at ease, nor am I quiet, I have no rest. But trouble comes. I got to mention Um that we would want to make this chapter our favorite chapter.
of Scripture. Uh there's a great deal of cynicism here. There's nihilism. Here. A darkness.
Well, C. S. Lewis. When he lost his uh wife. He writes about it, the experience of bereavement.
And he says And he felt a month after the loss of his wife, he felt that. Cynicism. It kind of engulfed him. What's the point of it all? What's the purpose of it all?
But l life is a Well, it's a mirage. And and this kind of There is no point to life. What kind of mood engulfed? him. We were promised sufferings.
They were part of the programme. We were even told, Blessed are they that mourn, and I accept it. I've got nothing that I hadn't bargained for. Of course, it is different when the thing happens to oneself, not to others, and in reality, not imagination. Not that I am, I think, in much danger of ceasing to believe in God.
The real danger is of coming to believe such dreadful things about him. The conclusion I dread is not, so there's no God after all. But so is this what God is really like? Deceive yourself no longer. What do people mean when they say, I'm not afraid of God because I know he is good?
Have they never even been to a dentist? Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't really matter what Whether you grip the arms of the dentist's chair or let your hands lie in your lap, the drill drills on. Lewis says.
Well, of course, Lewis had experienced British dentistry. Tuna. Yes, this is a very, very sad chapter. Full of grief. Full of woe, full of darkness.
Like Psalm 88. The concluding verse. Darkness is my only friend. That's pretty dark. If the only friend you have is darkness.
Oh. I want to ask a question or two of this chapter. What are we to make of this chapter? How should we approach it, as believers, as Christians? I want to say four things.
First of all. It is part of the inerrant word of God. It's in the Bible. Holy men wrote as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit, driven along by the Holy Spirit. All scripture and Paul is writing this to Timothy, but he's writing about the Old Testament.
All scripture is given as a product of the out-breathing of God. He uses a particular word, theop neustas. All scripture is the result of God breathing out. Like on a cold morning.
Well, we're in Florida, so we have to use our imagination there. But but on a cold morning and you breathe and you can see your breath, you can see that that breath before you. God breathed out, and the result. Scripture. And the result Well, Job chapter 3.
This is... This is part of God's inerrant word and is therefore profitable for doctrine and reproof and correction. and instruction in the way of righteousness. that the man of God might be thoroughly furnished into every good work. There's something in this chapter for you and for me.
I sometimes think of it like this. I do a lot of traveling, way too much traveling. I fly a lot. It used to be fun. It's not fun anymore.
It's almost the opposite of fun. Yeah. And you're put in this this metal coffin. Yeah. And people are in your personal space.
And some people in particular are in your personal space. And sometimes when you get on these very small planes, if you live in like I do, in Colombia.
South Carolina, or as I used to live in Jackson, Mississippi, and often The connecting plane to Delta was a small plane. one of those Canadian CRJs and uh And they were built for very small people. of under five feet and about ninety pounds. And we're trying to get all of these people and their luggage. off the ground.
And uh this uh uh flight attendant and uh He or she points to the fact that under my seat there's a life vest. and a whistle. And a little light that in contact with water, in contact with water will come on. I have a member of First Presbyterian Church in Columbia who experienced a a terrible flight tragedy. Many, many people were killed.
Plane came crashing to the ground. He survived it. When he gives his testimony, it's it's Breathtaking. what he went through. and the fact that he survived it.
My Hope is that I have a life jacket. A whistle And a light. You know, I've I've never actually looked to see if it's there. It's supposed to be under your chair or if you're in business class it's somewhere else in a little pouch to the side or somewhere. But it's supposed to be there.
I've never actually checked. I've never said, you know, wait. Stop everything and get down on my hands and knees and search and make sure that look at the date on it. But I sometimes think to myself Well, I'm glad it's there. You know, I may need it someday.
I hope I never need it. I hope I never need it. But maybe maybe one day I'll need it. Like that. That landing on the river in New York.
You can all see it. And everybody survived. Wonderful experience that everybody managed to make it up. They were all wearing their life vests. Can you imagine the euphoria?
When you're landing on the Hudson and you're searching and you pull it out, and there it is, the life fest, and you put it on. And the sense of Well, the sense of safety. This chapter is like Oh, it's like a life vest. I've never been in Job chapter 3. Don't think I've ever come close to it.
I've had my bad days. I'm a Celt. The cup is always half empty. My daughter gave me When she was just 11 years old, 12 years old, she gave me She gave me a picture. of Eeyore.
It was for my birthday. And Io was saying, have a nice day. If it is a nice day. Which I doubt. And my daughter recognized this was her father.
He was Eeyore, and I still have it on the wall at home. Always brings a little chuckle because it Hit and raw nerf. But I've never been here, never been in Job chapter 3. I hope I'll never be in Job chapter 3. I don't wish to experience what Job is experiencing here.
But some of God's children have been here. One of the godliest men. the world has ever known Has been there. Job himself. Jeremiah the prophet.
In Jeremiah chapter 20 cites this This chapter Jeremiah 19 and 20. after he has spent a night in the stocks. Cited this very chapter.
So, this is the inerrant word of God. And it's going to teach me something. Secondly, We need to be sensitive to what believers can and do experience. And we need to be sensitive to that. This may not be my experience.
But before you raise judgmental Comments and remarks about others. We need to be sensitive to the fact that other believers, other Christians, I've been in these very dark places. The third thing I want to say, and it's important to note, that God doesn't Russian to reprimand him. You might have expected that. God to come in and say to Job, Job.
You shouldn't be saying that. You shouldn't have said those words. But there is no reprimand here.
Now, do I think that Job crossed the line? Absolutely, Job crossed the line. Of course, he crossed the line. There's no debate about that. But we understand it.
And there's sympathy for him. And our God Yes, this sovereign God and and we're going to Ask very difficult questions of God's character in relationship to. suffering and pain. But our God is compassionate too. His son has been in a dark place like this.
He didn't utter these words. But he knew what it was to be in a place that he wished he wasn't. In the garden of Gethsemane, Is there not some other way? As though the Lord Jesus himself is saying, I don't wish to walk down this road. I don't wish Providence to open up as I see it opening up before me.
It's important to note that God doesn't rush in and reprimand him. And then the fourth thing I want us to see. is a principle. It's Hebrews 4 and verse 15. We Do not have an high priest.
who is unable to sympathize. With our weaknesses. But one who in every respect has been tempted As we are. Yet without sin. Father, if it be possible, let this Cup.
Pass from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but But you're sp Be done. The Lord Jesus knew what it was to be forsaken by God. My God, my God. Why have you forsaken me?
The sense of the Lord's presence, the sense of the Lord's love, the sense of the Lord's The goodness in Providence seemed to have eviscerated from him. He cried, Not my father, my father, but my God. My God as though all that he was conscious of at that moment was that God had abandoned him. and forsaken him. As Job does here.
We do not have an High Priest. You cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. How comforting it is to know that someone else has gone through what we've gone through. And how much more comforting to know that person is our Lord Jesus Christ If you enjoyed today's message, we'd like to offer you lifetime digital access to the entire series.
As well as the complete series on DVD and a digital study guide. Simply call us at 800-435-4343 with a gift or give your donation at renewingyourmind.org. Tomorrow, we'll meet a new figure in the book of Job, one who presents an intriguing perspective on Job's plight. I hope you'll join us as Dr. Derek Thomas continues his series here.
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