Job chapter 19, we're back to Job speaking, the Bible says in verse number 1, then Job
answered and said, how long will you vex my soul and break me in pieces with words?
And he's referring to his three friends of course, we just heard from in the last
chapter Bildad the Shuhite, who is again attacking him, criticizing him.
No one has been able to tell Job what his sin is, and he's asked him repeatedly,
what is my sin?
What have I done?
And they can't tell him, but they just tell him, well because these bad things are happening
to you, you must be in sin.
We don't know what that sin is, but that's just the way things work, and of course they're
completely wrong and God says they were wrong.
But he talks about them breaking him in pieces with words.
Now this made me think of Ephesians chapter 4, which is, you don't have to turn there,
but in verse 29 it says, let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth,
but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.
And the word edifying means to build up.
Even in Spanish the word for a building is an edificio.
And so what the Bible is talking about here in Job 19 is that one person can break
somebody apart with their words and tear them down, and then Ephesians gives us the
opposite when it talks about building someone up with your words, encouraging them,
helping them.
Now as God's people, the Bible is very clear that we should love our brothers and sisters in Christ.
The Bible says, by this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, that ye love one another.
He said, a new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another as I have loved you.
Anyone who is saved, we should love them.
Anybody who is a believer is our brother or sister in Christ.
And so therefore we should never want to see our brother or sister destroyed or fall.
Our goal should always be to build them up.
Even if they're in sin, even if they're doing wrong, we should still want to help them
and restore such an one in the spirit of meekness, considering our own selves also,
lest we be tempted.
We should want what's best for God's people.
If they do wrong, if they sin against us, we should say, Father forgive them for they
know not what they do.
We should pray that God will go easy on them.
We should speak to them in a way that will encourage them and help them and cause them
to be restored.
We should try to build people up with our words.
But there are some people who go around tearing down the people that they speak to.
And a lot of times it happens because of jealousy.
You know, we see someone maybe succeeding and doing well and we want to take them
down a notch instead of trying to help them and build them up.
And the Bible says that we should seek one another's good for their edification.
We should seek that the church would be edified, that our brothers and sisters
in Christ would be built up and edified.
That's not what Job's friends are doing because if you look at what Job's friends are saying,
they're not really giving anything productive.
They're not helping him.
You know, even if somebody's committing a sin, you might have to say some negative
things to them, but you're doing it to help them.
You know, you're doing it in a way that builds them up.
Have you ever heard of constructive criticism?
You know, it means you're telling somebody, hey, here's a mistake you're making, here's
something that you're doing wrong.
But you're not doing it with the purpose of tearing them down.
You're doing constructive criticism.
What's it mean to construct, to edify?
You're trying to build them up.
You know, maybe, for example, at the preaching class, somebody preaches a sermon and I
say, hey, here's something that you could do better.
You know, I'm trying to help them improve as a preacher.
You know, if I look at my children's schoolwork and say to them, you know, you've done
this problem wrong in your schoolwork, let me show you how to do it the right way.
You know, well, how dare you tell me that I've done something.
Well, I'm trying to help you, I'm trying to build you up, trying to edify you.
But there could be a way of doing the same thing, of just saying, what in the world?
You idiot.
You know, what have you done here?
This is ridiculous.
So when we talk to people, we should always examine our motive for why we're talking
to God's people.
Are we trying to build them up?
Are we trying to help them?
Are we trying to fix a problem and be constructive?
Or are we just trying to attack them, sock it to them, just to take them down a notch
and break them in pieces with our words, as Job said.
Look at the next verse.
It says, these ten times have you reproached me.
You're not ashamed that you make yourself strange to me.
And when he says, make yourself strange to me, the Bible usually uses the word strange
like we would say a stranger.
Basically he's saying, you're treating me like we're not even friends.
You're making yourself strange to me, it's as if we don't even know each other.
You've been friends and now you just turn on me.
And it is hurtful when your friends turn on you.
Even Jesus had a friend turn on him, what was his name?
Judas Iscariot.
And he even said to him, friend, betrayest thou the son of man with a kiss?
And so in our lives we will have friends turn on us.
And it's hurtful when that happens.
But look what he says in verse four, and this is pretty much the theme of the whole
chapter 19.
He says in verse four, and be it indeed that I have erred, mine error remaineth with myself.
If indeed you will magnify yourselves against me and plead against me my reproach, know
now that God hath overthrown me and hath compassed me with his net.
So in these three verses, he gives the crux of this whole chapter.
He says, look, okay, let's say for argument's sake I've sinned.
I've done something wrong.
And of course, all the way up to this point, he's maintained the fact that he believes
that he's innocent and that he hasn't done anything wrong.
But he says, let's say I have sinned.
He's saying, you know, you haven't really been able to reproach me with anything specific.
If I have done something wrong, doesn't it seem like God's already punishing me?
And if you look at all the next verses from verse eight all the way to verse 13,
look what word they all start with, okay, he, he, he, he, his, he.
And what he's saying is that God has already done all this.
You know, he's saying theoretically, hypothetically, if he has sinned, well then, according to
you guys, God's punishing me for my sins.
Well, I've already been punished.
Why do you feel the need to punish me more?
Doesn't it look like I've already got what's coming to me?
And he says all the things that God's done to him, verse eight, he hath fenced up my
way that I cannot pass, and hath set darkness in my paths.
This is all referring to God.
He hath stripped me of my glory and taken the crown from my head.
He hath destroyed me on every side and I am gone, and mine hope hath he removed like
a tree.
He hath also kindled his wrath against me, and he counteth me unto him as one of his
enemies.
His troops come together and raise up their way against me in a camp round about my tabernacle.
He hath put my brethren far from me, and mine acquaintance are verily estranged from me.
He's saying, obviously God has done these things to me, he's saying.
So if I've erred, because Job is still not admitting to having done any sin because
he didn't.
We know from Job chapter one and two that he had not done anything wrong.
But what he's saying is, whether I've sinned or not, God has done all this stuff
to me.
I mean, God obviously allowed it to happen.
God obviously destroyed him.
And he's saying, okay, if I've erred, God's already punished me for it because look at
all the bad things that have happened to me that God has brought upon me.
Come down to the end of the chapter, and he revisits this in verse 28.
At the end of the chapter, he says in verse 28, but ye should say, why persecute we him?
They should ask themselves, okay, why are we persecuting him?
And then it says, seeing the root of the matter is found in me.
Basically he's saying, it's between me and God.
I mean, God's already punished me.
If he did have a sin, it's definitely not an open sin because nobody knows what it
is.
Nobody's been able to point it out.
I think that where the question mark is is a little bit confusing in verse 28.
I believe that the question ends when it says, why persecute we him?
And then Job goes back to talking about himself when he says, seeing the root of
the matter is found in me.
But just grammatically, that's where the question mark would go because it continues
the same sentence.
That kind of threw me for a loop at first when I was reading it until I understood that
part of it.
So I want to point out a few things here.
Go back, if you would, to verse number 11.
Because in verse 11, remember, he's listing off, he's saying, okay, let's say I've sinned.
Let's say I have done something wrong.
Look what God's already done to me.
Why do you feel the need to persecute me more?
I mean, do I really need more punishment?
My 10 children have died.
I've lost all my wealth.
I'm covered in sores from head to toe.
Is it really necessary for you to attack me and break me in pieces with your words
on top of that?
But when he's listing off what God has done unto him, he says in verse 11, he has
also kindled his wrath against me and he counteth me unto him as one of his enemies.
He's saying, look, God's attacking me.
God's angry at me.
I don't know why, but for whatever reason, God's angry with me and he's treating me
as an enemy.
But jump down, if you would, to verse number 25.
In verse 25 he says, for I know that my redeemer liveth and that he shall stand at the latter
day upon the earth and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh
shall I see God whom I shall see for myself and mine eyes shall behold and not another
though my reigns be consumed within me.
What I think is interesting about this is that Job, even though he believes that God
is angry with him, even though he believes that God is counting him as an enemy, he
still knows that he's saved.
Notice that because he says, I know that my redeemer liveth.
Now you say, well, you know, if God's wrath is kindled against you, you're not
saved.
But wait a minute.
What about when Moses was at the burning bush?
God's wrath was kindled with Moses at the burning bush when Moses did not want to go
to Pharaoh and say, let the people go.
And Moses kept making excuses saying, I'm not eloquent of tongue.
I'm not a good speaker.
Send someone else.
And God's wrath was kindled against Moses.
Now obviously we know that the unsaved have God's wrath abiding on them.
They will experience God's wrath in the future.
We've been delivered from the wrath to come and they will be under God's wrath for
all eternity in hell.
But it is possible for us as believers in the short term to have God get mad at us
because that's all wrath means.
Wrath just means anger.
Wrath is just a really strong word for anger.
All throughout the Bible we'll see people become a wrath and it just means that they're
angry, they're mad.
So it is possible for us as believers to have God's wrath kindled, you know, for
him to get angry like he got angry at Moses.
Later on he got angry at Moses again over some other things.
And obviously Moses was saved, no question about that.
But he says, I know my redeemer lived.
What is a redeemer?
It's someone, if you think about someone being in slavery or in servitude and somebody
comes along, I was just reading about this in Leviticus actually, somebody would
basically be sold as a bond servant or a bondmaid and then one of their relatives
could come redeem them.
So it would be like if I had a huge debt that I couldn't pay, right?
And I had to sell myself as a servant for three years or six years and I was going
to be someone's servant because of the fact that I couldn't pay my bill.
You know, it was before bankruptcy and just, you know, whatever ways people get out
of paying debts today.
Back then it was like you had to pay that debt.
So a lot of times people would have to just sell themselves into servitude.
The way I like to explain it to people, it's kind of like the old thing of you're at
the restaurant and you can't pay the bill, you know, so you end up washing dishes
in the back, right?
So I mean, you know, it's a little less extreme to just do it for a few hours instead
of a few years.
But then again, you know, the bill wasn't that expensive anyway.
But if you owed somebody a lot of money back then, a lot of times you would become
their servant until you worked it off.
If you can't pay it off, you work it off.
That obviously being in bondage or being a bond servant or being an indentured servant
like that is not a good situation.
So one of your relatives could pay that for you and redeem you.
And that is given unto us also in Leviticus as a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ.
That's why the Bible says, what know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy
Ghost which is in you and you're not your own for you're bought with a price.
Or glorify God in your body and in your spirit which are God's.
And so the Bible calls Jesus Christ our Redeemer.
He's our Savior, but he's also our Redeemer.
He's redeemed us from that bondage of sin.
He's freed us from the curse of the law.
And so when Job is saying, I know that my Redeemer liveth, just by using the word
Redeemer, he's acknowledging the fact obviously that he has sins that need to be accounted
for in his life.
Obviously Job was not sinless, but that he's redeemed or saved by someone who is his Redeemer.
Obviously we know his name is Jesus Christ.
That name had not been revealed in the Old Testament, but they knew that the Lord was
their Savior.
They knew that one day that sacrifice would be made.
Even the woman at the well said, I know that when Messiah cometh, he's going to reveal
to us all things.
You know, they knew the Messiah was coming.
They believed on the Lord as their Savior.
They did not know the name of Jesus, but he still knew that his Redeemer would come
upon this earth and be on the earth in the latter day and that he would be bodily
and physically resurrected.
Because look what he says in verse 25, for I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that
he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth, and though after my skin worms destroy
this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God.
And what's so profound about that is that he's acknowledging that his flesh is going
to be destroyed by worms.
He's saying, I'm going to die, my body's going to go to the grave, and my flesh
is going to be consumed and devoured of worms.
There's going to be nothing left.
But then he says, in the latter day, in my flesh shall I see God.
So he believes that even after the flesh is completely gone, that there's going to
be a resurrection when he basically gets a new body that is a flesh and bone body,
where he comes back at the latter day, he's resurrected, and it's a bodily resurrection.
You see, when a saved person dies, you know, we need to understand this very clearly
because a lot of people get mixed up on this.
When a saved person dies, the moment that they die, their soul goes to heaven immediately.
But the body obviously remains behind, right?
I mean, it's not like somebody dies and then they just start like fading away and
disappearing and there's just a pile of clothes.
And when someone dies, their body is still there.
But the soul goes immediately to heaven.
You say, prove it from the Bible.
Paul said, for to me to live is Christ and to die is gain, for I have a desire
to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better.
Nevertheless, to abide in the flesh is more needful for you.
So he said, I desire to depart and to be with Christ.
That's all death is to me.
Oh death, where is thy sting?
Oh grave, where is thy victory?
So he said in 2 Corinthians 5 that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
He said that the tabernacle of our body, he said if it were to be dissolved,
we have another tabernacle.
And he said that we are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body
and to be present with the Lord.
So a lot of people believe in what's called soul sleep.
Seventh-day Adventists, Jehovah's Witnesses, I've even heard Baptists teach it, believe
it or not.
I was in a Baptist church and my youth leader taught soul sleep in a Baptist church
when I was a teenager.
And he's preaching out of an NIV also, by the way.
But anyway, he taught this.
And basically soul sleep says that when you die you're asleep, you're unconscious, you're
in the grave, and then later on you're resurrected, way later.
But in the meantime you're just kind of unconscious.
And it's not a biblical doctrine because Paul didn't say I have a desire to lay in
the ground.
He said I have a desire to part and be with Christ.
I want to be absent from the body and present with the Lord.
And we see in Revelation chapter 6 when the fifth seal is open that all the people who've
been killed for the cause of Christ, they're up there saying how long, O Lord, holy and
true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?
Look, they're up there, they're conscious, and he said I saw the souls of them that
were slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held.
They're up there, their soul is up there, and they're saying how long.
They're conscious, they're aware of time, they're waiting.
That is what the Bible actually teaches.
Soul sleep is a false doctrine.
Now does the Bible use the term sleep to refer to death?
Absolutely.
Does the Bible talk about those who are asleep in Jesus?
Yes, but it's the body that is asleep.
When the Bible says many that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake in Daniel
chapter 12, he's talking about the body.
The body sleeps in the earth and rises again, but the soul departs immediately for heaven.
Now when it comes to the unsaved, the same thing is true that when they die, the
body remains of course, but the soul immediately goes to hell.
Look at the rich man in Luke chapter 16.
It says he died and was buried and in hell he lift up his eyes being in torments and
seeth Abraham afar off and say that even father Abraham have mercy on me and send
Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue for I
am tormented in this flame.
Well I'm not sure if there's fire in hell.
There's a flame.
There's fire.
I mean how else can he say it to you?
But I've had people balk at that.
You know I was just giving somebody the gospel a couple days ago and they balked
at that and said well how can somebody go to hell you know before the final judgment
because they're condemned already.
That's why.
Because people will say like well how can you send them to hell if the final judgment
had occurred?
The Bible says he that believeth not is condemned already because he had not believed
in the name of the only begotten son of God.
And the moment that an unsaved person breathes their last breath they will lift up their
eyes and they are in hell that fast.
But their body goes to the grave just like that of a believer.
And what's going to happen is at that final judgment with the great white throne in
Revelation 20 there's going to be what the Bible calls the resurrection of damnation.
Nowhere does the Bible teach that those people are coming back to life or living again.
The word resurrection if you look at it the first two letters of resurrection re.
What does that prefix re mean?
Again.
You know you if you rebuild it you're building it the second time.
So that word resurrection and then you could look at the second part of that word
as erection.
You know you think of erecting steel where they they build a building out of steel and
big cranes will put big pieces of steel right.
It means to build something up to raise something up.
So the word resurrection means to be lifted or brought up again.
Now does that necessarily mean that they're coming back to life?
No it's called the resurrection of damnation.
That's why after those people are resurrected in Revelation 20 the unsaved and they stand
before God it says I saw the dead small and great stand before God.
He doesn't say I saw them and they're living.
He said death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them.
I saw the dead small and great stand before God.
They're still considered by God to be dead.
As they stand before God they're judged by their works.
It's not and look here's the other proof that what I'm saying is true.
Jesus called it the resurrection of life and the resurrection of damnation.
So they're not both resurrections of life.
And you say well why why even make that point there are so many reasons to make that
point.
I don't have time to go into it tonight but it has a lot of implications with Bible
prophecy with other doctrine because a lot of people try to twist the word eternal
life and say well everybody's going to live forever somewhere.
No the people in hell are not alive according to the Bible.
So to sit there and say oh everybody's going to live somewhere you know try to twist eternal
life.
No eternal life is salvation.
If you have eternal life you have salvation because those who do not have salvation shall
perish.
They shall die.
Jesus said whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.
The body will die but the soul of the believer will never die.
But the unsaved guess what their soul will die.
Fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul but rather fear
him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.
See false religions like the Jehovah's Witnesses they teach that basically eternal life would
be like if they're consciously existing in hell that's still eternal life.
No wrong.
That's not a biblical teaching.
So that's why we need to be very careful that we read every word of God and that
we pay attention to every word.
Make sure you have an every word Bible, King James Bible, but pay attention to every word
because the words of the Bible matter and these doctrines matter.
So we need to understand what happens to the saved when they die.
Immediately they're in heaven.
At the rapture or the second coming of Christ when that trumpet sounds the body
will be raised.
That's why the Bible says in First Thessalonians 4 and a lot of people miss this but in
First Thessalonians 4 it says but I would not have you to be ignorant brethren concerning
them which are asleep that you sorrow not even as others which have no hope for
if we believe that Jesus died and rose again even so them also which sleep in Jesus will
God bring with him.
So think about that.
What direction are the saved coming from if it says that God will bring them with
him?
They're coming from heaven right because he's coming in the clouds and he's bringing
them with him.
But then here's why it says this.
For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord that we which are alive and
remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.
For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout and with the voice of
the archangel with the trumpet of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first.
What direction is that?
Up.
Going up.
So when he talks about the asleep in Jesus, the dead in Christ, he talks about them
rising but then he also says he's bringing them with him.
Well how does that work?
Because it's the body that's rising and it's the soul that he's bringing with him.
And then they're going to be basically reunited with a brand new glorified body because
the Bible says that they'll be changed in a moment in a twinkling of an eye.
The Bible says that Jesus Christ shall change our vile body that it may be fashioned
like unto his glorious body according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue
all things unto himself.
You know, if you think about it, a dead body that's been in the grave for a long time,
that's going to be a vile body.
You know, if we were to go dig up a grave right now, it'd be vile, it'd be disgusting.
It'd be decayed, it would be corrupt.
Those are the words the Bible uses.
But God's going to change that body so that in a moment it'll be a new glorified,
perfect, redeemed body and then that's what takes place at that first resurrection.
And right now our flesh is a sinful flesh that's constantly leading us into sin unless
we mortify the flesh and walk in the Spirit.
We have a tendency to sin because we're in the flesh.
Whereas that new body that we receive at the second coming of Christ, that new body
is a perfect, sinless, holy body.
So that's why when we get to heaven we're not going to sin anymore because we're not
going to have that sinful flesh.
And after the resurrection we're not going to have any sin because our body will be perfect
and blameless and saved and we'll be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ.
So that's what happens to the unsaved and that's what happens to the saved.
You know, we can see those two doctrines that the Bible clearly teaches.
And it's interesting that Job, back in the Old Testament, long before a lot of the scriptures
have been given in a written form, he knows this.
He understands this.
He understands that there's going to be a second coming of Christ where he's going
to be upon this earth and that there will be a bodily resurrection of the saved.
And the Bible says if we believe that Jesus rose again, we know that he shall also raise
up us by his own power.
If he raised up Jesus, the same one who raised up Jesus, he's going to raise up
us also.
How was Jesus raised?
Bodily.
No matter what the Jehovah's Witnesses tell you, it was just a spiritual resurrection.
He said, put your finger in my holes in my hands.
And he said, thrust your hand into my side and be not faithless but believing.
And then he said, do you have anything to eat?
I mean Jesus said, children, have you any meat?
He said, give me something to eat.
And what did they give him?
In the upper room they gave him a piece of fish and a honeycomb.
And he ate it.
He was not vegan, you know, because he's eating fish.
He's not vegetarian.
He ate fish, he ate honey.
He ate fish again, bread and fish.
So I don't know what Jesus just loved fish or if that's just what the apostles kept
serving him because they'd been fishing.
But either way, fish is good for you.
You know, I recommend eating a lot of fish.
I think it's got a lot of good nutrients in it as long as it's, you know, wild caught,
not the farmed.
You're not going to believe this.
I know this has nothing to do with the sermon.
Did you know that a lot of the fish that you buy is raised on GMO corn?
Did you know that?
Seriously.
I mean feeding corn to fish, that's just not natural.
But that's what they do because corn is like the cheapest food, you know, because
it's all subsidized by the government.
It's genetically modified corn so they can really make each acre just produce a lot
of corn.
That's why corn's in everything.
I mean if you buy processed foods, pretty much everything either has some kind of high
fructose corn syrup or some kind of a corn starch.
Just some product with the word corn in it anytime you get a processed food.
It's genetically modified and it's not good for you by the way.
But they even fish.
They'll farm raised fish, you know, they'll have these hatcheries and fish.
I don't know exactly how it all works but I know that they feed them a feed that's
based on corn.
So you're getting those GMOs through the fish unless you get wild caught fish.
So it's something to watch for when you're buying your fish.
You know, Jesus didn't have that problem.
He didn't have to specify, hey guys, no GMOs, alright?
Although his glorified body probably could have handled it.
But anyway, the bottom line is Jesus Christ was clearly raised bodily.
The Jehovah's Witnesses will try to pull this out and say, well the Bible says flesh and
blood shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
But you know what Jesus said?
Every word in the Bible matters.
Jesus said, come handle me because the spirit does not have flesh and bone as you see
me to have, as you see that I have.
So Jesus had flesh and bone.
Did he say I have flesh and blood?
So when the Bible says flesh and blood shall not inherit the kingdom of God, that does
not mean that flesh and bone shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
You see, what is the life of our flesh right now?
The blood.
The Bible says the blood is the life thereof.
The life of all flesh is in the blood thereof.
So our current earthly body right now is powered by blood.
I mean blood is the life force that keeps us alive.
But in the new body, after we're resurrected, that will no longer be the case.
We will not have blood in our bodies.
It will be the spirit that gives us life because the spirit gives life and blood gives
life to the flesh.
But in the new body, it will be spirit that gives us life and we will not have
blood.
Because flesh and blood will not inherit the kingdom of God.
But flesh and bone, well Jesus said I'm flesh and bone.
And our body is going to be like his body when he was the first fruits of the resurrection
and then we will be resurrected at his coming, 1 Corinthians 15.
Interesting.
A lot packed into these few verses here in the book of Job.
But what's also interesting is he says, look, God is angry at me.
He said earlier in the passage, of course we know that that's not true.
Job didn't read chapters 1 and 2.
He didn't read about the fact that he was a perfect and an upright man and how
the devil came and accused him before God.
And that basically God and the devil have this thing going where they're going to see
whether Job retains his integrity.
He doesn't know that.
And in fact, when you read the whole book of Job, there's no indication that he ever
found out.
He at the end, he's repenting and sackcloth and ashes, I mean he doesn't know that he
hadn't even done anything wrong.
I mean he doesn't know what he could have done wrong, but you know, we have the benefit
of being able to look back and know the whole story and understand it because God
explains it to us.
But he says God's wrath is kitted against me.
I am as an enemy unto him, but yet he believes that he's going to be saved.
You know what that tells me?
That Job believed that salvation was by faith and not works.
And that Job believed you cannot lose your salvation.
Because think about it.
If Job thinks that God is so mad at him, I mean how mad does God have to be at you
to kill your 10 children?
To wipe out all your wealth.
To cover you in boils and sores from head to toe so that you're just miserable and
in pain and burning and even when Job believed that it was that bad between him and God
and that God was that angry, he still knew that he was saved.
Which shows that he didn't believe he could lose your salvation.
Because if anybody would lose their salvation, it would be somebody who God is that mad
at.
Right?
I mean if God's going to take anybody's salvation, it would be somebody that he's that mad at.
That's it, I'm taking your salvation.
But you know God will never take anyone's salvation.
Because he said I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish, neither
shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
And so that shows that Job was not relying on his works to save him, but rather he
was relying on his faith in the Lord.
He said I know my Redeemer liveth.
He's trusting the Redeemer.
He's redeemed.
He's saved not by works of righteousness, which we have done the Bible says, but according
to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost.
And so that's really a fascinating point here about this chapter is that you know
even if God's angry, for example the Bible says ye adulterers and adulteresses know
ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God.
Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.
But you know what, even if a Christian were to commit adultery, that would obviously
cause God's wrath to be kindled, wouldn't you agree?
Someone who's saved, commits adultery, God's going to be really angry, God's wrath
is going to be kindled.
Even if they were to be a friend of the world, which would anger God and infuriate
him, they would not lose their salvation.
They would still be saved.
Their Redeemer still liveth and they would be raised up in the last day there.
And so that's a great passage on the resurrection.
It's a great passage to show that Old Testament saints knew a lot more than we give them
credit for.
There were a lot of prophets that were speaking the word of God unto them.
Even though they didn't have the written word, the Bible says that God in time past,
He said at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers
by the prophets.
And so they did have the witness of the prophets, that verbal preaching.
Go back if you would, let me just finish up the chapter here, but go back if you would
to verse 14.
After he went through all the things that God had done unto him.
He says in verse 14, my kinsfolk have failed and my familiar friends have forgotten
me.
They that dwell in mine house and my maids, count me for a stranger.
I'm an alien in their sight.
I called my servant and he gave me no answer.
I entreated him with my mouth.
Now one thing I want to point out there about the fact that he calls his servant
and his servant won't answer him, he's talking about the fact that he's not getting any
respect from the people around him anymore.
People that were his employees, people who were his servants, they are not treating
him with respect and I think one of the most disrespectful things that you can do
to someone is to ignore them.
And this is a big sign of disrespect.
When you see, for example, a parent that will say something to their child or call
out to their child and they don't answer them, that's very disrespectful.
You know, children will sometimes pretend that they don't hear their parents, right?
You know, they're in a different room and you're calling them and they don't hear
you.
But really they do, they just don't want to go, oh, were you calling me?
And then it's like, well, did you hear me?
You know, I think so, I don't know.
You know, they're like, you're lying, you know.
But anyway, it's very disrespectful.
It's very rude.
This is not how we should treat people, where we just ignore them or just pretend that
they don't exist.
You know, when you come to church, be respectful to people, don't ignore anybody.
Because ignoring people is a disrespectful thing to do.
And you might sometimes come to church and you're in your own little world and you're
just talking to your buddies, you know, your small group of friends, and you just
kind of ignore certain people and just don't even acknowledge them, don't say hi to
them.
You know, I try to say hi to everybody that I can at church.
Sometimes there are a lot of people at church, I don't get a chance to say hi to everybody.
But I want to acknowledge people.
And if someone walks by me or walks up to me, you know, if I just pretend that
they don't exist, oh, what were we saying?
You know?
That's very rude.
It's disrespectful.
So children, when your parents call you, you need to answer them immediately.
And obviously, this is just courtesy and respect not to ignore people.
Because that is a major sign of disrespect when you ignore people.
Look at verse 17, my breath is strange to my wife, though I entreated for the children's
sake of mine own body.
Now this is kind of a sad verse because it kind of shows that things haven't really
changed between him and his wife since chapter 2.
Because if you remember, the last time we heard from Job's wife was back in chapter
2, when his wife said to him, dost thou still retain thine integrity, curse God and
die?
I mean, when your wife says to you, curse God and die, your marriage is not going well.
And then here it says, my breath is strange to my wife.
And he says, though I entreated her for the children's sake of my own body.
I mean, he is basically begging his wife to even be with him, to even acknowledge
him.
I mean, she's just forsaken him.
She's just turned on him.
I mean, could Job really be in a worse situation?
I mean, his marriage is messed up.
His wife won't even stay with him and be there for him.
She's not encouraging him.
His friends aren't encouraging him.
He's covered in sores.
He's lost all his wealth.
I mean, no wonder he's saying that he wishes he was dead in pretty much every chapter
of the book of Job.
But he still, through it all, retained his integrity.
He stayed true to the Lord and he didn't sin or charge God foolishly.
He did not get angry at God.
He stayed true and said, I know my Redeemer liveth.
He stood on his principles and he stood on his integrity.
I mean, it's an amazing story.
He'd been through everything.
And you know, this is a story that can give us comfort because we, you know, sometimes
we're going to go through bad things in our life.
Things that are physically painful.
Health problems, financial problems, marital problems, whatever the case may be.
He went through all of it.
You know, Job went through all of it.
He'd been there and he made it through and God blessed the latter end of Job more
than ever.
Job was better off when all this was done.
God blessed him and also he's so well known and praised for his great patience
even to this day.
I mean, we're spending 42 weeks talking about him, you know, 42 chapters in one chapter
per week.
So what does that tell you?
It says, Yea, young children despise me.
Verse 18.
But look what he says at the end of verse 17.
He said, I'm treated for the children's sake of my own body.
He's trying to get his wife on his side and saying, honey, we've had 10 children
together.
I mean, we've been through everything.
Why are you turning on me now?
But it didn't work.
His breath was strange unto her.
He says, young children despise me.
I arose and they spake against me.
All my inward friends abhorred me and they whom I loved are turned against me.
My bone cleaveth to my skin and my flesh.
What does that mean?
Meaning that he's lost the fat and muscle tissue on his body.
He's starting to look emaciated.
You know, I mean, he's just, his skin is cleaving to the bone.
He's skin on bone.
I mean, he's, he's just wasting away.
And he says, I'm escaped with the skin of my teeth.
So if you ever wondered where that expression came from, it came from the Bible.
A lot of our expressions that we use in popular culture actually come from the Bible.
And somebody talked about, you know, just barely escaping by the skin of their teeth.
That's where it comes from right there in the book of Job.
It says in verse 21, have pity on me.
Have pity on me, ye my friends, for the hand of God hath touched me.
Why do you persecute me as God and are not satisfied with my flesh?
This I said is the theme of the whole chapter.
If God did all this to me, why do you feel like you need to punish me more?
Why can't you just feel sorry for me?
Why can't you just pity me?
Why can't you just build me up and encourage me?
Can somebody help me?
My own wife isn't even encouraging me.
Can at least you, my friends, show me some compassion here and care about me?
Nobody cares about him.
He says in verse 23, oh that my words were now written, oh that they were printed in
a book.
Well, he got his wish, right?
Here it is.
That they were graven with an iron pin and led in the rock forever.
You know what?
That prayer was answered because the book of Job will abide forever.
God's word, the Bible says, heaven and earth shall pass away, but my word shall
not pass away.
We got the verse right here, huh?
The grass withered, the flower faded, but the word of our God shall stand forever.
God's word is preserved unto us today, thousands and thousands of years later.
We have the book of Job and we will always have the book of Job.
You know what cracks me up?
I'll close with this.
I'm done with Job chapter 19, but I'll close with this.
You know what cracks me up about this modern Bible version crowd that think that we constantly
have to improve on the Bible and that's literally what they think.
They need to improve upon the Bible.
Why do they think we need a new version?
Because they want to come out with something better than the old version.
And it's not just that they're trying to make a better translation, oh no.
You know, you look at the Bibles that led up to the King James, the six versions
that came before.
Why did they translate the fourth?
Why did they translate the fifth?
Why did they translate the sixth?
And why did they eventually translate the seventh, which is the King James Bible?
Why?
They were trying to produce a better translation.
They were just trying to hone it in and get rid of any discrepancies and just do a better
job of dialing it in.
That's not what these new versions are doing at all.
They're not just trying to make a better translation.
They're translating from a different source.
See the first seven English Bibles that were printed all throughout the 1500s and
then the King James and the 1611, okay.
They're all translating from the same book.
They're translating from the same Hebrew.
They're all translating from the same Greek virtually the same, you know, whether it's
the additions of Erasmus, Stephanus, or Beza, it's still virtually the same.
That's why those Bibles all pretty much say the same thing.
They were just improving the language and improving the translation.
These new versions, on the other hand, are based on newer discoveries and new archaeology.
We found new documents.
But you have to understand the philosophy behind finding these new documents is here's
what they think.
We don't have the Bible as it was originally written.
That's what they believe.
They believe that what we have today is not the same as what was originally written.
So here's what they say.
We have to go back and try to reconstruct what the original was like.
We have to go back and try to reconstruct what the Bible was originally like and every
time we find some new archaeology of a papyrus that's old, that's from 175 AD or whatever,
they say, you know, we can get the Bible closer to what it was originally like.
Which involves taking verses out, adding in phrases, making all kinds of changes.
But here's the thing, I don't believe the Bible was ever gone.
I don't believe it ever left us.
I believe it's been preserved from the time of Christ and the apostles unto us today
and if some new word is dug up tomorrow, I'm not going to believe it.
I don't care what it says because God preserved His word.
I don't need to reconstruct the Bible.
I've already got the Bible, we've had the Bible in modern English for 500 years and
we don't need to go dig up something and say, hey, let's reconstruct what the Bible
was really like.
You want to know what the Bible was really like?
Oh, but it wasn't in English.
So what?
English didn't exist back then.
It was in Greek, it was in Hebrew.
This says the same thing except in the language that we were born to speak, English.
God doesn't expect us to learn a bunch of foreign languages.
If you're gifted in that area, great, but not everyone is.
Not everyone is gifted to learn foreign languages.
And we have the Bible in our language wherein we were born.
And this philosophy that says we need to keep getting back to the original and finding
new scriptures and finding new, look, it's always been here.
It's been passed down.
It's a copy of a copy of a copy.
We believe that God preserved it to us through His power, because He promised to preserve
it.
Have you ever heard this word, providence?
Through providence, God has delivered us the scriptures.
And if they found some scripture and they said, wow, this is from 120 A.D.
It's the oldest manuscript we've ever found.
And you know what, why is it always Egypt?
It's always from Egypt.
If it's not from Sodom, you know, the Dead Sea, then it's from Egypt.
And they dig up, if they dug up a new manuscript and they said, well this is the oldest we've
got, 125 A.D., and it said something completely different, these guys would salivate all
over it and they would come out with a new Bible next week to reflect those changes.
And you know, it'll probably happen.
I mean, all throughout the 20th century they keep finding new documents and changing
it more, changing it more, changing it more.
You know, some things they bring it a little bit back toward the KJV, but mostly it seems
that the new versions are just drifting further and further away.
By and large.
It's like two steps forward, one step back for them of their satanic agenda.
Let me say this.
We have the Word of God today.
And what's in this book is the same thing that God originally spoke.
And we don't need to go searching, I mean, God said the Word is nigh thee.
You don't need to go up to heaven to get it, you don't need to dig down into the earth
to get it.
But he said it's nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart.
The Word of faith which we preach.
And this whole philosophy that says that we need to reconstruct the biblical text
is a bad philosophy because we've already had the biblical text, and you say, well
where was it before the King James?
Well, you know what?
It was in other languages before English came along, because English hasn't been around
that long.
And English has only been around for a little over 500 years.
Before that it was Middle English, which is pretty different.
Before that it was Old English, which is a completely different language.
And so let's go ahead and close in prayer tonight.
Father, we thank you so much that Job's words were printed in a book and that they
were graven in the rock with lead.
And Father, we thank you so much that we can read it today and be encouraged and
learn from the mistakes of his friends that we should never kick our friends when
they're down and kick our brothers and sisters in Christ when they're down.
Help us to be good friends and help us to, as Job did, retain our integrity during times
of trial and to stay true to you and your word even when things get bad.
Help us not to quit church because things are going bad in our life and quit serving
you.
Help us to stay faithful and stay true as Job did, and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
By the way, just a couple of quick announcements.
I'm going to be preaching on Friday night in Sacramento, California at Verity Baptist
Church.
So be praying for me.
If you get a chance to think about it, say a prayer for me that I do a good job and
that I preach in the power of the Holy Spirit on this Friday night at 7.
And then also back there on the table, I don't know if you saw it, but we've got
the replica of the 1611 King James Version.
And the reason that I bought that replica, and by the way, that is the real replica
because I've seen the real one.
I've held the real one that's 400 years old at a museum.
It's worth like $400,000.
And the weight is the same, the paper is the same, everything about that book back
there is identical to the 1611.
And even the typos, you know the typos that were in the original, the typos are
in that book back there.
And the reason that I got that is because so many people will try to tell you, you
couldn't even read a 1611 King James.
I've never even seen the 1611, you don't even know what, it says something
completely different.
And they try to say that the King James we have today is completely
different from the King James of 1611.
Well, there you go, folks, right?
Go look at it, what now?
Pick up your Bible, look up your favorite verses, and go look at them in
that book, and guess what?
It says the exact same thing.
So, you know, it just puts to silence the foolishness of ignorant men that
will try to tell you that the King James we have today is not the same as the
King James of 16, you know, it hasn't changed 400 and some years later,
it's the same.
So I encourage you to take a look at that.
Now, I will say this, it's in a hard-to-read font.
But, you know, Brother Corbin, Brother Corbin has never, have you ever seen
that, have you ever tried to read anything in that font before or seen that font?
He'd never seen that font before because it's a Germanic font.
German is written in that font all the time.
I put it in front of Corbin and he was able to just read it as fast.
I mean, he read it just in real time.
Just...
So there you go, check it out.
I hope that that is educational for you.
Come lead us in one more song, we'll be...