The Lord Gives, Takes Away

God Commends the Character of His Servant Job 1:32

“Have you considered My servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil?”

— Job 1:8 (NKJV)

In today's text, God is going to come about as close as He will ever come to bragging about a man of flesh and blood. As close as He's ever going to come to bragging about a guy is what He's going to say in this text. Have you considered My servant Job? Oh devil, you come from walking around the face of the earth.

You've seen a lot of men and women. You've seen it all. But have you seen Job? Have you seen Job?

There's none like him on all the earth. There's none like him. He's blameless and he's upright. He's one who fears God and shuns evil.

In the eyes of God, Job's character is worth emulating, which is why it's sad that no one is ever named after Job. His character is what stood out to God, not the wealth and not the health and not even the suffering. His character. Have you considered my servant Job?

There's none like him. He's blameless. He's upright. He runs to God and he flees from evil.

That's the man. That's the man. Job's character stood out in a dark and evil world. It was a bright light in a sea of human depravity.

Now, with that said, the devil has a somewhat different opinion. So we have this conversation, which we'll get to in just a moment, but what we're going to see is that the devil's going to have a different opinion, and he's going to suggest to God that the only reason that Job has this character — the only reason he's such a goody-two-shoes, so to speak — is because God has blessed him so greatly and kept this hedge of protection around him.

Satan, as we're going to see, he's going to look at God and he's going to say, you know what, you take that from him, this guy will be no different than all the rest. The fact is that he'll curse you to your face. What do you think is going to happen next? Well, in today's text, we're going to see that God's going to permit the devil to afflict Job.

And it's not as a repudiation of Job himself. It's not because his actions merited discipline. It's rather so that his character would be revealed, not just before the devil and not even just before his generation, but across 4,000 years since.

Job Introduced: The Setting, Date, and Wealth of Uz 3:33

“His possessions were seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, five hundred female donkeys, and a very large household, so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the East.”

— Job 1:3 (NKJV)

If you would, let's take a look at verses one through three and dive into the story of Job. So verse one, there was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and shunned evil. Now seven sons and three daughters were born him.

Also his possessions were 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, 500 female donkeys, a very large household, so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the east. All right, in verse one, this man Job is introduced for the first time in all the Bible. If you'd gone back into Genesis — I think it's around Genesis 36 — there's a king named Jobab, and some people think it's the same guy.

I'm not convinced. This is the introduction — verse one, chapter one of the book of Job — the first time we see him. Now, what do we see about him? Let's set some context.

Well, immediately in verse 1, we see that he lived in the merry old land of Uz. Now, where is Uz? Well, we don't know. We don't know exactly where Uz is.

If you go to your travel agent and say, one ticket to Uz, please, they'll stare at you. We don't know where Uz was, but we have conjecture, and we have archaeologists, and we have people who study these things, and in their studies, they've concluded that the land of Uz is probably within what we would call Saudi Arabia.

So we know roughly where he lived. The next question then is when did he live? Who is he a contemporary with? When did this guy live?

Well, once again, the nature of this book being what it is, we don't know for sure, but there are strong hints in the text. In Job 1, which we're reading today, and then if you were to go all the way to Job 42, which is at the end, you see something interesting. You see that Job is offering sacrifices, sacrifices on behalf of his family.

But what's interesting is he's not relying on a priest. There's no sign of a temple, nothing like that. And because there's no picture of those attributes or those things or entities that existed in Jewish culture, because we don't see that, most folks believe that Job was before Moses. He was before Moses, and generally speaking, we believe he was probably a contemporary of maybe Abraham, which would put him about 2200 B.C.

Beyond that, the book of Job says Job lived like a really long time. You go to chapter 42, you see this guy, he was around for a while, at least 180 years, possibly north of 200 years. Now, where did people live that long in the Bible? In the book of Genesis.

Really only in the time of the patriarchs and prior was the age range stretched out in this fashion. So for these reasons and others, we think he was a contemporary, possibly of Abraham. He certainly lived a very, very long time ago in a galaxy very far away. Now, in verses 2 through 3, we know more things about him, himself.

We know that he was wealthy. We know he had a great deal of possessions. I can't even fathom the 6,000, 7,000 donkeys and sheep, and I would have lost count. He had a lot.

He had more chickens than Chick-fil-A. He had everything you could have there. He's referred to as the greatest, the greatest of all the people of his time. If you were to go out and stand on a hillside looking at all that Job had, it went out to the horizon.

And yet, although in the eyes of his peers, that wealth would have made him great, like when we look at really wealthy, rich people, we think of their greatness by virtue of all the things they have. With that said, what made him great in the eyes of God, it wasn't his wealth. Rather, it's the first attribute mentioned in the text, and that's his character.

Again.

Blameless, Not Sinless: The Meaning of Job's Righteousness 7:07

And verse 1 says that this man was blameless and upright, fearing God, shunning evil. Right from the start, he's identified as one who is a good man, a righteous man, a devout man, a just man. He gets up early to sacrifice. He does what is right.

Now, the word blameless sometimes throws people because we sometimes equivocate that with sinless. So the question is, was Job sinless? Well, no. And we know he wasn't sinless because later on in the book of Job, he's going to repent in sackcloth and ashes. The word repentance applies to Job.

Now, who needs to repent? Sinners. Exactly right. So we know he wasn't sinless, but what Scripture is painting a picture of is one who's just a stand-up guy, a man of God.

He's a stand-up guy. He does what's right. He's a man that other people see, and they know this is a devout individual.

A Devout Father Interceding for His Children 8:00

Now, let's look at verses four through five to see some more discussion about how he lived his days. So verse four, now Job's sons would go and feast in their houses each on his appointed day and would send and invite their three sisters to eat and to drink with them. And so it was, when the days of feasting had run their course, that Job would stand and sanctify them, and he would rise early in the morning and offer burnt offerings according to the number of them all.

For Job said, it may be that my sons have sinned and cursed God in their hearts. And so this Job did regularly. All right. Earlier in this morning's text, we saw that Job had 10 children.

And these children not only loved their father, but they loved one another. Now, how do we know that they loved one another? Well, they hung out together. This was a close-knit family.

They ate and drank together frequently. Verse 4 says they did so on their appointed day. And the majority of scholars think this is a reference to the birthdays. They would come together and they'd have a party.

Now, I don't know about you, but having 10 kids or any number thereabouts would tend to wear most people out, but not our man Job. In verse 5, we see that Job is a very attentive father. He's attentive and he's concerned about the spiritual well-being of his children, even after they've left the house.

You know, for some of us, it's all we can do to keep our hands on them when they're in our house, and we worry and obsess about where they're at and how they're doing and the like. Well, Job, even after his kids have left, he's praying for them, he's thinking about them. He's worried that perhaps my child has sinned or cursed God in his heart, and so he's offering sacrifices in the morning on behalf of his own children.

We know that the children were good and close-knit. We also know that the father was one who doted upon them, cared for them greatly, and he felt compelled even to make sacrifices on their behalf. He tried to intercede before God in case his sons had cursed their God. Now, I want you to keep that word curse in mind, because in a couple verses from now, the devil is going to tell God that if Job was to lose his possessions, what would he do?

Satan Before the Throne: The Fall of the Accuser 10:05

He would curse God. All right, let's look at verses six and seven. Now, there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them. And the Lord said to Satan, From where do you come?

And so Satan answered the Lord and said, From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking back and forth upon it. All right, in the previous five verses, we saw that this man Job was introduced, but then again, the scene shifts here in verses six and seven. At this point, we are granted something Job didn't have, and that is a heavenly perspective that describes a particular encounter that God had with Satan on this day when the sons of God, which is a euphemism for the angels, came to present themselves before him.

Now, a reasonable question to ask is, what in the world is the devil doing there? I mean, I get the angels up in heaven being with God and parading around God and the like. I get that. What is the devil doing in heaven?

When we think of heaven, however we picture it, we usually don't think of Satan there. So what's he doing there? Well, as some of you undoubtedly know, the devil used to be an angel. Ezekiel 28 and Isaiah 14, other passages as well, they all describe the devil, Satan, Beelzebub, whatever you want to call him, they describe him as one who used to be an angel, perhaps even a top tier or the top tier angel, prior to his rebellion and then his expulsion from heaven.

Remember what Jesus said about the devil in Luke 10. He said this — He said, I saw Satan fall like lightning. In Second Peter, the apostle said that God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them — cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness. The devil used to be an angel, and heaven used to be his home.

Get this — to be cast down into one place means that previously you were in someplace else. The devil used to be an angel. Heaven used to be his home. But you'll notice in verse 7, it's no longer his home.

And you see that because of the question God asks. God says, hey — hey, you, you, you — from where did you come from, you slippery little rattlesnake — from? Where did you come from? And what is the devil's response?

He says, from going back and forth, walking to and fro on the earth. See, he's been cast down. And now he spends his days as a nomad, wandering the earth. Heaven is no longer his home.

Now he is consigned into a fallen estate. He's going about the earth and he's looking for those that he can devour. In 1 Peter 5, that's how Peter described it. 1 Peter 5 says the devil walks about like a roaring lion seeking those that he may devour.

So you see this picture of this one angel who had once been in a great and lofty estate, who instead has been cast down like lightning, now spends his days on this mortal coil, walking to and fro like a roaring, furious lion, seeking those that he may devour.

The Roaring Lion and the Doctrine of Permission 13:22

Now that's Peter's language, but why the word may? Well, because it's a word of permission. What it suggests is that the devil can't devour just anybody. You get the distinction?

Yeah, the devil's out there. I mean, he is real. You might not see him with your eyeballs, but he is real, and you can see the damage that he wreaks throughout this globe. With that said, he cannot wreak any damage that is not permitted to him to wreak.

He cannot do anything or touch anyone that God has not allowed or permitted him to touch. And that's why scripture says he walks around like a roaring lion seeking those that he may devour. There is a sense of permission here. And that sort of permission is what we're going to see in the verses to come.

Let's look at verse 8. Then the Lord said to Satan, in all your walkings, O Satan, have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on all the earth? Blameless, upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil. All right, we're only eight verses deep in the book, but once again, from no less than the lips of God Himself, Job is described as a blameless and upright guy.

God knew Job, but He also knew the devil, and He knew that the devil, as he walked to and fro on the earth like a roaring lion, that he was looking to destroy and to pervert the very people who were made in the image of the God that he now loathes. So he knew that was Satan's intent.

When the devil walks around, his anger isn't against that shrub. His anger isn't against the rocks or the trees or the forest or the fauna or any of that stuff. His anger is against you. Why?

Because we're made in the image of the one he truly despises. And so God knows that this one goes about the face of the earth seeking to destroy and to pervert mankind. And so God, knowing this, says to Satan, hey, did you miss one? Have you considered Job?

Have you considered Job? There's none like him in all the earth, righteous and blameless, one who fears God and shuns evil.

Satan's Accusation: Is Job's Faith Merely Circumstantial? 15:24

Let's see how the devil responds to that in verses 9 through 11. In verse 9, so Satan answered the Lord and said, does Job fear God for nothing? Have you not made a hedge around him, around his household, around all that he has on every side? See, you've blessed the work of his hands.

His possessions have increased in the land. But now, verse 11, stretch out your hand, touch all that he has, and he'll surely curse you to your face. All right, you see what's going on here? Verse 8, God mentioned Job — He mentions Job.

In verses 9 through 11, this devil says, I know Job. Yep, I haven't missed him. I know Job, and I know this much. You say he's blameless, you say he's upright, you say he's righteous — all right, I'll stipulate all that.

I'll acknowledge that. But I tell you what, the reason he's as upright and blameless and such a good guy and goody-two-shoes and all that is because you've built him up with all the possessions and things and health and wealth and prosperity. You touch it. You just take that away.

And this blameless guy, he's going to curse you to your face. Does Job fear God for nothing? Look what you've done for him. Look at the hedge.

You know you're keeping me away from him. It's like the devil's telling God, you know what I do if given a chance, but I know that I can't because there's a hedge that you've placed around him. But man, let me at him. All bets are off.

See, Job's faith is fickle. Job's faith is fickle. It's based on idealized circumstances. If circumstances change, Job's faith will change.

You'll see. You'll see, O Jehovah. You'll see how that works. See, Satan is implying that faith is strengthened or exists on the basis of idealized circumstances, and if the circumstances change, the faith departs, or at least it can depart.

Faith Is Not Contingent on Circumstances or Emotions 17:22

With that said, the Bible's filled with guys who had their circumstances completely upended and yet who stayed faithful. Job isn't the only case we have of this. He's one of the more famous ones, but there's other men and women in scripture whose worlds were absolutely rocked — and yet who stayed faithful. You think of Paul in a Philippian prison?

You think David holding his own dead son in his arms? You think of things that were taken away from others too, and they stayed faithful. Well, God knew it would be true of Job. He knew it would be true of Job because He knew that faith isn't contingent on idealized circumstances, and it's not contingent on emotions either.

You may not feel as happy Tuesday of this week as you might on Thursday, but that doesn't necessarily mean that your faith wanes between the two days, because faith is not contingent on our emotions. In fact, faith is oftentimes strengthened through God's Spirit when we're hurting.

God Sets the Parameters: Sovereignty Over Satan's Power 18:19

All right, speaking of hurting, let's see how God responds to the devil's words in verse 12. Verse 12, And the Lord said to Satan, Behold, all that he has is in your power. Only do not, do not lay a hand on his person. And so Satan went out from the presence of the Lord.

As an aside, know this much. There are some people and some belief systems, even some religions, that see God and the devil as locked, as dualism. They're both contending against each other. Well, know this much.

It's Satan who leaves and departs the throne of God, not the reverse. It's Satan who slinks off and has to depart from the heavens. All right, so in the previous verses, verses 9 through 11, Satan had contended that Job's faith was circumstantial. Let me at him, we'll see how long his faith lasts.

Now, in response, God agrees, for reasons that are God's alone. He agrees, but He gives parameters. Remember, He's the one who had a hedge around Job, and He could change that hedge, but there's always going to be parameters that are based on His volition, not the serpent's. So he agrees, and he says in verse 12, he says, All right, behold, all that he has is in your power, O serpent, O slippery one, but withhold your hand from his health.

Now, his health would be impacted, but that wouldn't come till chapter 2. Now, let's just stop there for a moment. Let's say verse 12. You've got the serpent.

He's got the okay to do what he wants to do, to go and wreak havoc in Job's life. So that's where we're at in verse 12. Let me ask you a question in your own life. How long do you think it would take the devil to turn your world upside down if he was given permission to do so?

How long do you think it would take for the devil to just mess you up if he was granted the opportunity? How long do you think it would take the devil just to bring you to your knees if God's restraining hand was removed and you were left vulnerable? How long could your own strength possibly sustain you if God took a step back and let a lion loose, a roaring lion.

How long would it take? Well, in Job's case, the most blameless, upright man of his age, it took less than a day, probably less than an hour, based on this text. Don't underestimate the strength of our enemy if given access to do what he wants to do. It doesn't take long.

And with that said, no matter how bad things are in your life, remember this much, there still must be a hedge around you. No matter what's going on in your life, no matter how bad or terrible it may be, just remember what could happen if God removed all protection from you. You crumble like that.

The Day of Loss: Four Messengers and Total Calamity 21:02

Let's see what sort of destruction Satan brought in verses 13 through 19. Now, there was a day when Job's sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother's house, and a messenger came to Job and said, the oxen were plowing and the donkeys feeding beside them when the Sabaeans raided them and took them away.

Indeed, they've killed the servants with the edge of the sword, and I alone have escaped to tell you. Now, while he was still speaking, another also came in 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, another also came and said, The Chaldeans formed three bands, raided the camels, took them away, yes, killed the servants with the edge of the sword, and I alone have escaped to tell you. And while he was still speaking — all this is happening virtually simultaneously, to show you the power and speed with which the devil can act if given freedom to do so — while he was still speaking, another came in and said, Your sons and your daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother's house, and suddenly a great wind came from across the wilderness and struck the four corners of the house, and it fell on the young people.

And they are dead. And I alone have survived to tell you. Have you ever had a moment in your life where everything changed? A moment that you can't go back to?

A moment where you were given some news, where someone told you — maybe it was a doctor, maybe it came over a phone call, maybe it's an email or text message you read. But have you ever had a moment where on the basis of some news that you heard, everything changed and there's no going back?

Well, that's what we see here. What we see in verses 13 through 19 is the worst realization of virtually all of our nightmares. We see multiple messengers who show up almost simultaneously to declare to Job that he's lost everything that he has. And the last one gives the worst news.

Job, it's not just your servants, and it's not just your camels, and it's not just your possessions. It's your kids. They have died, and I alone am there to tell you. You know, if a parent loses one child, it's heartbreaking.

That situation leaves a scar upon your back. It doesn't go away all of your days. But what about losing all ten of one's kids? And it wasn't probably just these ten.

There were probably grandchildren involved in this as well, which is what may have been implied by the death of the young people that you see in verse 19. Whatever the case, this one moment in time represented a near total loss for Job. From possessions to wealth to family, gone. Gone.

And the time it took for four guys to run into a room and tell you. That fast. Now the question is — and this is the question — the serpent was sitting there waiting to see. You can just picture, what's going to happen, Job?

He's watching. He knows the damage he's done. What is Job going to do? Is Job going to satisfy the devil's thesis that he would reject God, that he would curse God?

How is Job going to respond?

The Lord Gave and Has Taken Away: Job Worships in Grief 24:18

“Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return there. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”

— Job 1:21 (NKJV)

Let's look at our final three verses now, verses 20 through 22. Then Job arose, and he tore his robe, and he shaved his head, and he fell to the ground, and he worshipped. And he said, naked I have come from my mother's womb, naked I shall return. The Lord has given, the Lord has taken away.

Blessed be the name of the Lord. And in all this, verse 22 says, in all this Job did not sin, nor did he charge God with any wrong. You know, when people in our culture are sad, they do their best to hide it. Have you ever had someone come up to you and ask you, hey, how's it going?

How are you doing? What's the instinctual response? To say fine, good, well — I'm well, thank you. How are you?

I am also well. How many conversations work just like that? You're good, I'm good, we're all good. I mean, if you ask a hundred people that question, you discover everybody's good.

Lucky day that we're all doing so well. With that said, our culture works really hard to obscure weakness and frailty and hardship and pain and sadness from others. We work really hard to take the heartache that we have and just bury it in our time and age and culture. But it wasn't always so.

In many cultures of antiquity, and especially Jewish cultures across the centuries, sadness and lament was something that was displayed publicly. In fact, this is kind of an interesting thing, but in the time of Christ, you could actually hire people to mourn for you and to weep and to wail and the like. So sadness was something that was publicly exhibited.

Well, in verse 20, that's what we see even as far back as the time of Abraham. We see Job, he's wearing his heartache on his sleeve. He tears his robe. He shaves his head.

He'll end up sitting in ashes. And he does this to say he's not fine, to say that he's not well, to say that he's not good, but rather to demonstrate that he was absolutely heartbroken. He did these things publicly. But I want you to notice that's not all he did.

Job's response also included worship. It also included worship. You see, Job didn't understand what was going on. I mean, there's no doubt about that.

Job didn't get it. And furthermore, he didn't like it. On the one hand, he didn't understand the pain and heartache and how could this happen. And on the other hand, he didn't like it either.

He didn't understand it. He didn't like it. But that did not mean that his faith went out the window. How many times have you experienced some sort of hardship or loss in your own life?

And your response to that is to put God on the shelf and just put Him over there — and I'll live out my life over here — to cause a distance between you and God. That's not what we see here. The loss that he had and the fact that he didn't understand it didn't give him a reason to take what he knew to be true and put it at arm's length.

In fact, it was his theology. It was what he knew. It was the faith he had that is what gave him comfort in the midst of that loss. He remembered God's good.

He remembered that God is sovereign. He's in charge. This wasn't an accident. Job knew it.

And how do we know that he knew that? Well, what does he say? He says, the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, but blessed be the name of the Lord. Whether God — this good and wise and holy and just and righteous God — deals with me in a way that I perceive to be wonderful, or whether He removes something from my life that I have valued and I view that removal as a negative to me, in either case, the character of God doesn't change based on the way I feel about Him.

He's still good, even if I don't see the goodness manifest in this event. He's still in charge, even if I can't explain how a good God who's in charge could allow this event.

Why Theology Matters: God's Character Does Not Change 28:19

Theology matters. It really does. If your faith hinges only on your emotions, guess what? Your emotions will change from day to day because you'll experience hardship and loss in the future.

If your faith is based on your emotions and how you feel about God rather than what the book tells you about God, then your faith will only be as good as you are on any given day. And when you're fine, God will be fine. But when you're bad, you'll be angry at Him and bitter.

That's creating an idol. That's not the God of the Bible. Job, despite his heartache, despite his pain, he demonstrates good theology. He says, I know this to be true, that He is good and just and loving and wonderful and patient and kind and merciful.

And yet, He's done this. And I don't get it and I don't like it, but that doesn't change Him. How I feel about Him doesn't shake the throne of heaven one inch. You know, your life will involve two things over and over and over again.

One will be accumulation. You come into this world, and how much do you have? Nothing. Into this world, I was born naked.

I have nothing. And in time, you accumulate stuff. You know, maybe it's possessions and wealth and gold and clothing and cars and boats or what have you. Maybe it's things.

Maybe it's relationships that you have with others. You accumulate a matter of things, but guess what? The nature of this world is also to take these things away from you. If you live long enough, one thing I can guarantee you will be taken from you is your health.

One thing I guarantee you, if you live long enough, that you will no longer have by the time you're 90 plus, if you get that far, is your health. But other things, relationships, things you used to have, things you used to own. Life is a balance. You accumulate things, but you also lose things.

Lord giveth and Lord taketh away. Now Job, he's cool with that, at least the theology of that.

Why God Takes Away: Refining Faith Through Hardship 30:04

As an aside, why would God ever take anything away from you if it's a good thing? Why would He ever do that? Well, there's at least two reasons. Number one is to demonstrate to us that we weren't made for this place.

Dear heavens, we're playing with the equivalent of Tonka toys in our life, and He's got so much better for us. If He takes away something that is just distracting and worthless in comparison to what He's offering us, good for Him. Absolutely, that's one of the reasons. He's pointing us to someplace better.

But the second reason is this, because in hardship, your faith will grow far more than when things are going well. Again, ministerially, I've said this before, but I've seen it all the time. No one ever comes into the pastor's office and says, oh, pastor, things are going so great, I just had to tell you.

Pastor, let's sit down. I am having the best year. You cannot believe what's happened. I'm so happy.

I'm so happy. I just had to share it with you. No, that's not the way it works. People don't go to the pastor, and honestly, they don't necessarily even go to God or Scripture nearly as much when things are going well as they do when things are going badly.

It's in times of trial. It's in times of difficulty. It's in times of diagnosis that we don't want. It's in these moments, I guarantee you, that your knees hit the ground in prayer more than when everything was going well.

It's those seasons that people return to church, return to Christ, come to the table, do all these things more and more, more frequently and honestly with more rawness of emotion and heart and even repentance than they do when everything's going swimmingly. God knows that. And He has appointed this small season — the here and now is a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of eternity.

And He's appointed this drop of water for you to be refined. Is that okay with you? I ask you this, if you're a child of God, you've been made for eternity, you'll live forever. 10,000 upon 10,000 upon 10,000 years, you will still exist.

And in this drop of water right now, this tiny bit of time, He's appointed this time to try your faith, using hardship to do it. Is that all right with you? I mean, it's irrelevant whether it's all right with you, but the point is, can't you kind of see the balance and say, you know, through the grace of God, even though I don't like this hardship, for this short amount of time I can steel myself on the rock of Christ, and with His grace I can stand and make it through this, because I know it's not forever, and I know that what I've lost, He is fully capable of redeeming and giving back.

I guarantee you there's not a soul you've lost that you've loved, if you've died in Christ, that you will not be reunited with in time yet to come. There's not a treasure or a trinket or a bauble that you've played with on this globe that even compares to that which awaits on the other side of glory.

What we're going to is so much better. And if you focus on that, your eyes on that, then when you experience hardship this week or the diagnosis you don't want, you'll go, you know, I don't like this and I don't get it either, but praise be to God, He's on the throne, and there are better days ahead.

If it's true of Job, it's true of us. Chapter 1 was not the end of Job's story, okay? By the time we get to chapter 42, we're going to see things are really turned up for Job. So stay tuned, five weeks from now, chapter 42, we're going to really have a good time with that.

And what we're going to see in chapter 42 is that the devil's thesis that he posits here in chapter 1, it's proved wrong. The devil's wrong. Job would not curse God to His face. He would be strengthened.

Living Without the Prologue: Faith Amid Mystery 33:22

All right, as we close up this morning, let me offer just one final observation. When you and I read the book of Job, especially chapter one, we have this perspective — this perspective that you have to remember in the weeks to come — that Job didn't get, that he didn't have. You see, we're given this prologue, right?

This heavenly prologue. Well, who wasn't there? Of the three main characters that we've read about so far — God, Satan, and Job — who wasn't there? Job.

He didn't have access to this prologue. In the weeks ahead, we're going to see all that he's going through, and he didn't know what was going on. He didn't know about this conversation that had been had in the very heavenlies. He didn't know what God and the devil talked about or that they'd even talked to begin with.

He didn't know that God was testing and trying his faith before a watching world, and he certainly didn't know that a transcript of that testing would be recorded for all time, that 4,000 years later, people in Gulfport, Mississippi, would be reading about this. He didn't know any of that. All he knew was he was hurting, even if he didn't know what was going on or why.

This week, this month, this year, or sometime in the future, you're going to have those moments of confusion. You're not going to know what God is doing. There may be tests or trials for you that you don't like, or there may be tests and trials that your loved ones are undergoing that you don't like either.

And you don't understand. Well, here's the thing. You don't have the prologue to your story or to your loved ones'. You don't know what God's doing.

But you know what? To the believer, that's all right. Because God hasn't called us to understand everything. Of all the things God is calling you to in His word, understanding everything is not one of them.

Of all the things God is calling you to do and to be, understanding the deep mysteries, understanding all that is hidden — that's not among those things. He hasn't called you to understand what's going on in the hardships in your life, but He has called you to have faith that He's on His throne.

Rest assured, a day will come when you will understand. That's an encouraging thought, right? A day will come. If right now you are experiencing a loss, or if you experienced a loss in years or decades past and that heartache still exists — well, right now you don't know the answer, but a day will come when you will.

How do we know that? Well, we know this much. We know that Job understands now. Job, for all he didn't get across 42 chapters, where he's sitting now, he gets it.

He understands. In due time, you'll understand too, but for the moment, be faithful. Keep putting your foot one in front of another. This week, this month, this year, keep putting your feet one in front of another.

Not trying to comprehend the things that are above your pay grade, not thinking you're going to understand everything God's doing and that that'll make it all better, but rather putting your foot in front of another, taking a step in the direction He has led you, and putting your hand up through faith, knowing that He is there, that He will take it, and that He will lead you on.

That's the confidence of Job. Let's pray.