Job has gone through the worst ordeal that anyone had ever gone
through.He lost his wealth, his family,
and his health.And to make things worse,
when his friends showed up to comfort him, they only made things worse by
trying to discover which secret sin Job has committed that must have led to
such horrible things happening.As the
last fellow was speaking with Job, a storm began to develop on the
horizon.
It’s from this storm that God finally speaks to Job.
We received an interesting newsletter from our church insurance company
this week. The lead article was entitled: “Safeguarding
Your Ministry – Staying Grounded in High Winds”. The article went on to
say:
“When the wind picks up, make sure your church stays on the ground. Every
part of the country has its own unique weather concerns - blizzards in the
north, tornadoes in the Midwest and hurricanes in the south. Regardless of
where you live, these storms sometimes come out of nowhere, leaving you little
time to prepare. And, they often come with high winds, which increase the
likelihood of severe property damage and the potential for injury. Though it's
difficult to predict these types of storms, steps can be taken ahead of time to
protect against severe damage and injury. Following are some things you can do
to minimize damage and injury - before, during and after a windstorm.”
Funny that this arrived this week.I
guess this must be the time for storms.
:1 Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said,
Job had earlier been complaining and asking for an audience with God:
(Job 13:22 NLT) Now summon me, and I will answer! Or let me speak
to you, and you reply.
Now God has finally shown up to address Job.God speaks from inside the storm.
:2 Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?
(Job 38:2 The Message) “Why
do you confuse the issue? Why do you talk without knowing what you’re talking
about?
:3 I will demand of thee, and answer thou me.
Job wants answers to his questions, but instead God will turn things around
and ask Job questions. Lots of questions. There’s a point to the questions.
38:4-7 Creation of the earth
:4-7 Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?
Not a bad thing to put in the front of all geology textbooks. God is the
Creator.
Illustration
Creation Contest
One day a group of scientists got together and decided that man had come a
long way and no longer needed God. So they picked one scientist to go and tell
Him that they were done with Him. The scientist walked up to God and said,
“God, we’ve decided that we no longer need you. We’re to the point that we can
clone people and do many miraculous things, so why don’t you just go on and get
lost.” God listened very patiently and kindly to the man and after the
scientist was done talking, God said, “Very well, how about this, let’s say we
have a man making contest.” To which the scientist replied, “OK, great!” But
God added, “Now, we’re going to do this just like I did back in the old days
with Adam.” The scientist said, “Sure, no problem” and bent down and grabbed
himself a handful of dirt. God just looked at him and said, “No, no, no. You go
get your own dirt!”
Lesson
Remember the Big Creator
If you’re going to receive help from God through your difficult times, you
need to step back and realize who He is. He is your Creator. He is awesome. He
is powerful.
When Hezekiah found Jerusalem surrounded with the fearful Assyrian army
that had never been defeated before, he prayed:
(2 Ki 19:15-16 KJV) …O LORD God of Israel, which dwellest between
the cherubims, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the
earth; thou hast made heaven and earth.
{16} LORD, bow down thine ear, and hear: open, LORD, thine eyes, and see: and
hear the words of Sennacherib, which hath sent him to reproach the living God.
When the early church began to suffer persecution, they gathered together
to pray,
(Acts 4:24 KJV) And when they heard that, they lifted up their
voice to God with one accord, and said, Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the
sea, and all that in them is:
When you go through difficulties like Job, there are times when life just
seems too difficult to deal with. Yet Jeremiah reminded us that because God is
Creator, there is nothing too difficult for Him:
(Jer 32:17 KJV) Ah Lord
GOD! behold, thou hast made the heaven and the earth by thy great power and
stretched out arm, and there is nothing too hard for thee:
When we stop and think about God being the Creator, take time to think a
little about just what this means.He’s
created more than just the things within your living room.He’s created more than just the things on
your street.Sometimes it helps to step
back and get a bigger picture of the world around us.
38:8-11 Oceans
38:9 When I made the cloud the garment thereof
Before the flood of Noah, we believe that the earth was surrounded by a
thick cloud canopy. This canopy filtered out harmful radiation from the sun as
well as creating a greenhouse effect, making the entire planet a warm tropic
climate.
A fallen 90-foot fruit tree with ripe
fruit and green leaves still on its branches has been found in the frozen
ground of the New Siberian islands. The only tree vegetation that grows there
now is the one-inch high willow. Palm tree fossils have been found in early
tertiary strata in Alaska. Large fossil leaves of tropical plants have been
found in Permian sandstone 250 miles from the South Pole. Crocodiles were once
prolific in New Jersey and England.
At the time of the flood, the canopy collapsed.
:11 And said, Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further
God put boundaries on the ocean.
(Job 38:10-11 The Message) Then I made a playpen for it, a strong
playpen so it couldn’t run loose, And said, ‘Stay here, this is your place.
Your wild tantrums are confined to this place.’
71 percent of the world’s surface is covered with ocean, or 140 million
square miles. The total volume of the ocean is approximately 322,300,000 cubic
miles.
The greatest depth measured so far, the “Challenger Deep” is in the Pacific
Ocean, at the southwestern end of the Marianas Trench, just off the island of
Guam. It has been measured at 36,198 feet or 6.85 miles. If you cut Mount
Everest off at sea level and put it on the ocean bottom in the Challenger Deep,
there would still be over a mile of water over the top of it! If you are in a
boat at the surface and you drop a rock above this point, it will take over an
hour for the rock to hit bottom.
In January 1960 Swiss ocean engineer Jacques Piccard and United States Navy
Lieutenant Donald Walsh descended into the Challenger Deep in the French-built,
U.S. Navy-operated bathyscaphe Trieste.
Piccard and Walsh took the Trieste to a depth of 10,915 m (35,810 ft), the
deepest descent in history.
If you level out the land of the earth, and the waters of the ocean spread
equally, the earth would be covered with 1 ½ miles of water.
The ocean is HUGE. Somebody put it there.The Bible says that God
(Isa 40:12 KJV) …hath measured the waters in the hollow of his
hand, and meted out heaven with the span …
38:31-32 Stars
:31-32 Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands
of Orion? Canst thou bring forth Mazzaroth in his season? or canst thou guide
Arcturus with his sons?
sweet influences – ma‘adannah –
bonds, bands
Pleiades – Kiymah –
originally thought to be a cluster of seven stars, we now know that it is
actually a loose cluster of 400 to 500 stars, about 415 light-years from the
solar system in the direction of the constellation Taurus. The stars are about
1 light-year apart, on the average, and photographs show them to be surrounded
by a nebulosity that shines by their reflected light.
Mazzaroth – mazzarah –
Mazzaroth; the 12 constellations of the Zodiac, associated with the months of
the year.I found it interesting that
historians say that the Zodiac originated somewhere around 2000 BC, which is
also around the time when the book of Job was written.
Arcturus – ‘Ayish –
Arcturus, fourth brightest star in the sky, is part of the constellation Ursa
Major, the Great Bear.
When we talk about God’s relationship to the stars, our concept of God
ought to explode.
Our Sun itself is pretty big.
1,300,000 earths could fit inside our sun.
It is fueled by nuclear fusion. Every second, fusion reactions convert
about 700 million metric tons of hydrogen into helium within the Sun’s
energy-generating core. In doing so, about 5 million metric tons of this matter
become energy. This energy leaves the Sun as radiation, and the part of this
radiation that constitutes visible light is what makes the Sun shine.
Arcturus is about 40 light-years
from the sun. Because it lies relatively nearby, its diameter has been measured;
it is about 23 times that of the sun. Arcturus is one of the first stars to
have its actual motion in the sky detected, through comparisons with its
relative position in ancient charts.
Some have called Arcturus the “runaway star” because of its motion. It
travels at 125,000 miles per second. Interesting that God speaks of “guiding”
it.
One of the reddest bright stars, Antares
is classed as a supergiant, having a diameter of about 300,000,000 mi, more
than 300 times that of the sun. It is approximately 400 light-years from the
earth.
There is another star, Alnilam,
also known as Epsilon Orionis,
fourth brightest star in the constellation Orion, the Hunter. It is one of the
stars in the belt of Orion. It produces a light output of about 50,000 suns.
The largest
known star (so far) is known as the Pistol
Star.It has a mass of about 100-150
times that of the sun and is 10 million times brighter than the sun.
God says to Job – hey pal, do you know how to run these things?
39:26 Birds
39:26 Doth the hawk fly by thy wisdom
Even though there are some birds that are incredibly dumb (like the
ostrich, which God speaks about), there are some birds that have incredible
smarts.
God has built into birds some amazing things.
On Wednesday we talked about the Pacific Golden Plover that flies from
Alaska to Hawaii every year.The Arctic Tern, is another similar bird,
but one that migrates even further every year. Every year it travels from the
Arctic to the Antarctic, a trip that can total more than 25,000 miles. The
average Arctic tern will make this trip 20 times. The Arctic tern uses an
elaborate mating behavior that begins with the female pursuing the male to high
altitudes. The courtship continues on the ground, where the male presents a
small fish, held in his bill, to the female. Most Arctic terns mate for life,
and both sexes build and protect the nest, care for eggs, and feed the young.
The common Crow – I’ve heard Jon
Courson talk about researchers observing crows, and found that they count. As
long as the researcher was out in the field, the crows wouldn’t swoop into the
garden. They built a blind. When the researcher went into the blind, the crows
knew he was there, and wouldn’t come. Then two researchers went into the blind,
but one came out. The crows knew there was still a guy in the blind. Then three
went in, two came out, and so on, with the crows keeping track of how many were
in the blind. They kept adding people going into the blind, and the crows kept
track of who was in the blind. Finally, they got to fifty, and the crows lost
track (or got too hungry).I just wish
crows could tell time so they wouldn’t wake me up in the morning.
Jesus said,
(Luke 12:6-7 NASB)"Are
not five sparrows sold for two cents? And yet not one of them is forgotten
before God. {7} "Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do
not fear; you are of more value than many sparrows.
Lesson
More of Him
Warren Wiersbe writes,
The answer to Job’s problems was not an explanation about God, such
as the three friends and Elihu had given, but a revelation of God. The
four men had declared and defended the greatness of God but had failed to
persuade Job. When God displayed His majesty and greatness, it humbled Job and
brought him to the place of silent submission before God. That was the turning
point.[1]
Sometimes we get caught in the turmoil of trying to find answers to life’s
difficult questions, and God doesn’t seem to answer.
Maybe sometimes what we need isn’t more answers, maybe it’s more of God.
We need to step back and realize who God is.
God is bigger and smarter than you
When you’re going through tough times, it helps to stop and think about
just who God is. He knows the end from the beginning. He knows what REALLY
ought to happen in our lives. If He can handle running the universe, He can handle
the problems in our lives.
God loves you
This God who has created the heavens and the earth is also the same God who
has entered into our puny little world in time and space and took on human
flesh.
(John 1:1-3 KJV)In the beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God, and the Word was God. {2} The same was in the beginning with God.
{3} All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that
was made.
(John 1:14 KJV)And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among
us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,)
full of grace and truth.
It’s this same awesome Creator of heaven and earth who made a choice of
laying down His life for us in order to pay for our sins.He did this because He loves us.
(John 19:13-30 KJV)When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he
brought Jesus forth, and sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is
called the Pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha. {14} And it was the
preparation of the passover, and about the sixth hour: and he saith unto the
Jews, Behold your King! {15} But they cried out, Away with him, away with him,
crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief
priests answered, We have no king but Caesar. {16} Then delivered he him therefore
unto them to be crucified. And they took Jesus, and led him away. {17} And he
bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is
called in the Hebrew Golgotha: {18} Where they crucified him, and two others
with him, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst. {19} And Pilate wrote a
title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING
OF THE JEWS. {20} This title then read many of the Jews: for the place where
Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written in Hebrew, and
Greek, and Latin. {21} Then said the chief priests of the Jews to Pilate, Write
not, The King of the Jews; but that he said, I am King of the Jews. {22} Pilate
answered, What I have written I have written. {23} Then the soldiers, when they
had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a
part; and also his coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top
throughout. {24} They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but
cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the scripture might be fulfilled,
which saith, They parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they did
cast lots. These things therefore the soldiers did. {25} Now there stood by the
cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas,
and Mary Magdalene. {26} When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple
standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son!
{27} Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that
disciple took her unto his own home. {28} After this, Jesus knowing that all
things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I
thirst. {29} Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and they filled a
sponge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth. {30} When
Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed
his head, and gave up the ghost.
You can trust Him
You may not understand what is going on in your life, but you need to know
that God has your best interests in mind.
(Rom 8:32 KJV) He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up
for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?
As Job began to take in the things that God was saying about Himself, all
Job could do was to surrender to God.
(Job 40:4-5 The Message) “I’m speechless, in awe—words fail me. I
should never have opened my mouth! I’ve talked too much, way too much. I’m
ready to shut up and listen.”
Put your life in His hands.
[1]Wiersbe, W.
W. (1996, c1991). Be patient. An Old Testament study. (Job 38:1).
Wheaton, Ill.: Victor Books.