Now in Job chapter 22, the Bible reads in verse number one, then Eliphaz the Temanite
answered and said, Can a man be profitable unto God, as he that is wise may be profitable
unto himself.
Now, thank God this is the last time in the book of Job that we have to hear from Eliphaz
the Temanite.
In fact, we're almost done with Job's three friends, because Eliphaz answers in chapter
22, and if you just flip over the page to chapter 25, Bildad is only going to say very
little in chapter 25, and then Job just kind of cuts him off at that point.
And those are the last two chapters where we hear from Job's three friends.
And let me just quickly remind you that the book of Job, most of it is a conversation
between Job and his three friends.
And at the end of the book, God clearly tells us that that which Job spoke was right, and
that what the three friends spoke was wrong.
So going into this chapter, we know that there's going to be error in what Eliphaz
the Temanite is saying.
Now that doesn't mean that some things that he says aren't right, but we know that when
God looked back over their whole conversation, he says that Eliphaz the Temanite spoke that
which was wrong.
So you say, well good night, why even preach through a chapter that God said is wrong?
Because of the fact that we can look at it and understand why it's wrong, and what's
wrong about what he said, and we can see if there's anything that he said that's right.
Now the first thing that Eliphaz starts out by saying in verses two and three, can a man
be profitable unto God as he that is wise may be profitable unto himself?
Is it any pleasure to the Almighty that thou art righteous?
Or is it any gain to him that thou makest thy ways perfect?
Now in those two verses, Eliphaz is basically saying that it doesn't matter to God whether
people do right or wrong, God doesn't really care.
It's no skin off his back, you know, if you live a wicked life or, and you know what this
shows is basically like a cold and heartless view of God, where God just doesn't really
care if people go to heaven or hell.
He doesn't really care whether we live our lives right or whether we live a life of sin.
You know, if we do good, he's going to bless us.
If we do wrong, he's going to curse us.
If we believe on Jesus Christ, we'll be saved.
And if we don't, we'll be damned, but God doesn't really care.
Now is that really true?
Does that really line up with the rest of scripture that God just doesn't care?
No, absolutely not.
And in fact, there are a lot of scriptures, go to Ezekiel chapter 33, let me just show
you one scripture that directly contradicts what Eliphaz is saying.
Because Eliphaz is saying basically that God doesn't take any pleasure in a man being righteous
or in a man doing righteous acts.
That basically God doesn't take any pleasure in that.
God doesn't really care.
I mean, it's no skin off his back, if you do right, he'll bless you.
If you do wrong, he'll curse you, but he doesn't really care.
Look what it says in Ezekiel 33.11, say unto them, as I live, saith the Lord, God, I have
no pleasure in the death of the wicked, and then he says, but that the wicked turn from
his way and live.
And if you understand just basic English grammar, what he's basically saying there is, I don't
have any pleasure in the death of the wicked, but I do have pleasure when the wicked turns
from his way.
And in fact, in Luke chapter 15, it says that there's joy in the presence of the angels
of God over one sinner that repented.
So apparently there is a lot of joy when someone does what's right.
And there is great rejoicing, and God does take pleasure in that when people do right.
God does care, by the way, whether people go to heaven or people go to hell.
And God clearly tells us in 2 Peter 3, says that he is not willing that any should perish,
but that all should come to repentance, and not only that, but in 2 Timothy chapter 2
it says he will have all men to be saved and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.
I mean, God is willing that all men would be saved.
He gave himself a ransom for all, the Bible says.
He's the savior of all men, especially of those that believe, but it's God's will that
all men be saved.
Now let me ask this, are all men going to be saved?
Absolutely not.
But what is God's will?
That all men would be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.
That's why Calvinism is false, you know, which says, well, it's just God's will for certain
people to be damned.
No, God doesn't take any pleasure in the death of the wicked.
God wants people, if it's possible, you know, if it's not too late, to be saved.
Not people is too late.
After you die, by the way, it's too late.
And God will damn those who have not believed on Christ, but he would have preferred that
they get saved.
It does matter to him.
And so what life has is dead wrong on that point.
Look back at Job 22, he says in verse 4, will he reprove thee for fear of thee?
Will he enter with thee into judgment?
And look at verse 5, is not thy wickedness great and thine iniquities infinite?
Now all throughout the book of Job, Job's three friends have accused him of living a
life of sin simply because of the fact that so many bad things have happened to Job.
So they're saying, well if all these bad things happened to you, you must have been doing
something wrong for these things to happen to you.
But what's interesting is that so far in the book of Job, they've never really accused
him of anything specific.
The Bible tells us at the beginning of the book of Job that Job was a perfect and an
upright man that feared God and eschewed evil, he was a great man, a righteous man.
In fact, God specifically says that he's the greatest man on the earth at that time, that
he was alive.
He was the greatest man that was alive.
And his friends are saying, well, if you were really righteous, this stuff wouldn't be happening
to you.
You must be living in sin.
But what's funny is that when we get to chapter 22 finally, Eliphaz starts to make specific
accusations based on no fact whatsoever.
So far they've just been saying, well you must be wicked, look at all the bad things
that happened to you.
But now in chapter 22 he actually starts to specifically say, this is the stuff that you're
guilty of, these are the sins you've been committing, with no basis.
And by the way, we're living in a day where the Bible says that in the last days men will
be false accusers.
You know, he lists a lot of different sins that people will commit in 2 Timothy 3.
One of them, he says, is that they'll be false accusers.
And today there are a lot of false accusations that just get thrown around without any basis
in fact, without any evidence.
And we should always be careful, of course, not to make false accusations, not to repeat
false accusations.
You know, we hear someone accuse someone of something, we don't see any evidence and we
just repeat that, and we're bearing false witness.
What does bearing mean?
To carry false witness.
And we need to be careful that when someone says something bad about someone to us or
accuses someone to us that we don't just automatically believe what we hear about other people.
And the Bible says in the mouth of two or three witnesses should every word be established,
and we should do diligence to make sure that things are really true before we just believe
them or just repeat them.
And someone like me who's a pastor, I get falsely accused of stuff all the time, and
it's amazing how people just don't hesitate to just make false accusations against me
and against other pastors without seeing any evidence, without even seeing if it's true.
For example, one thing that I've often been accused of is they'll say about, for example,
the After the Tribulation movie, like, oh well you just did that, you're preaching that
because it sells and you want to make money.
When in reality, I didn't make any money off that film.
You know, I'm not selling the film.
In fact, I have boxes of them and they're all free.
And they're all on the shelf, they're free, and I've never sold that film at this church,
I'm not selling it online, I mean, you know, it's the filmmaker selling it.
And by the way, he ought to, he spent, you know, twenty, thirty-some-thousand dollars
on that movie.
I mean, he has to make some money, he has to make a living.
That people will just fall, oh you're greedy, you're selling that thing, you know.
But I mean, that's just the kind of bizarre things.
I mean, I was accused of being a Mormon.
What?
They said, we've got a picture of him playing an organ at Brigham Young University in Salt
Lake City.
I've never even been to Brigham Young University.
I don't even play the organ, okay.
I mean, I play piano, you know, close, I guess.
But you know, I've been accused, somebody said, I went to Bible college with Steven
Anderson and I was in the same dormitory room with him, and I'm like, I didn't stay
in a dormitory because I was married with three kids when I was in Bible college.
I wasn't in the dorms.
So I mean, just crazy accusations are constantly coming at me of just everything under the
sun.
I mean, I just got an email like two hours ago that said, you know, I guarantee that
you supported the invasion of Iraq and that makes you wicked, and I'm like, what in the
world?
What are you talking about?
You know, just crazy, but just constantly people just throw around accusations and just
repeat stuff that they hear, just crazy stuff.
And so we need to be careful that we don't fall in that, but that's what he's doing here.
He has no basis for what he's saying, and look at these specific accusations he starts
making in verse 6, for example, it says, For thou hast taken a pledge from thy brother
for nothing, and stripped the naked of their clothing.
Thou hast not given water to the weary to drink, and thou hast withholden bread from
the hungry, but as for the mighty man, he had the earth, and the honorable man dwelt
in it.
Thou hast sent widows away empty, and the arms of the fatherless have been broken.
Now what exactly is he accusing Job of?
He's making things up, but let's look at verse 6 first of all.
He says, For thou hast taken a pledge from thy brother for naught, and stripped the naked
of their clothing.
Now go back to Exodus chapter 20, keep your finger in Job 22, go to Exodus 22, because
in Exodus 22 you'll see the exact commandment that Job's being accused of breaking, in fact
Job's being accused of even doing more, Job's being accused of taking the pledge from his
brother for nothing, for naught.
Now what does it mean to take the pledge?
Well a pledge is basically like collateral, and there are a lot of stories in the Bible
where that word, a pledge, is used.
For example there's the story of Judah when he goes in unto a harlot, you know, who actually
is Tamar but she's dressed up like a harlot, and he goes in unto the harlot and he tells
her that he's going to pay the harlot with a kid of the goats, but he doesn't have it
with him.
So she says, what are you going to give me for a pledge?
And he gives her the bracelets that are on his hand and his signet ring and his staff.
That's basically collateral saying, I'm going to pay you back later with that kid of the
goats, but until then you can hang onto my stuff.
And by the way, this is something that we still do today, collateral.
Probably the best example of this type of practice would be the pawn shop right across
the parking lot, right?
People will drop their stuff off at the pawn shop and then they borrow money against their
stuff and then when they pay back the loan, they get their stuff back, okay?
So the stuff that they leave at the pawn shop, that's the pledge.
And then when they pay back the loan, they get it back, okay?
Let's look at Exodus 22 and understand this, look at verse 25.
If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him
as an usurer, neither shalt thou lay upon him usury.
Now you say, what's usury?
Usury is interest, you know, when you loan somebody money and you charge interest.
Now I was wrongly taught as a child in school that usury is a really high interest rate.
And usually if you look it up in a dictionary, that's what the dictionary will say for usury.
It'll say it's really high interest.
And in fact, there are laws in the United States against usury.
And those laws say, you know, you can only charge 29.99% interest and anything above
that is usury.
You know, there are laws like that.
But is that how the Bible defines usury?
No.
If you look up every time usury is mentioned in the Bible, the Bible calls any charging
of interest usury.
In fact, I could even take you to the book of Nehemiah and show you an example where
they're charging 1% and he says that's usury.
So it's not the percentage in the Bible.
You know, we in America think, well yeah, 25% interest, 28, that's fair.
10% interest, 15%.
But if you have a credit card, it could be in the 20s.
You know, if you have a car loan, if you have a home, you know, your home loan's hopefully
in the single digits, but you know, a car loan could be 15% or whatever.
Credit cards could be in the 20s.
You know, if you default or get a cash advance, it's 29.99999 compounding every second or
whatever.
And that is considered okay.
That's not usury as long as you don't get to 30%.
Look, the Bible says 1% is usury.
Any percent is usury because it is a sin, according to the Bible, and I did a whole
sermon on this called The Sin of Usury, it is a sin to charge people interest and to
make your money that way.
And the whole banking industry is just in sin tonight.
All of them.
Okay?
And they're part of a lot of the corruption in our country and they're behind a lot of
the corruption in politics and you know, the bankers are behind a lot of this stuff because
the love of money is the root of all evil.
Now how does this apply to us as believers?
You know, I still use banks just because it's kind of hard to exist in today's world without
using banks and without using federal reserve notes, but you know, we are getting ripped
off when we use those things.
But you know, we have to live in the world, but we shouldn't be of the world, therefore
the way that we should apply this in our lives is that we should never charge people interest
when we loan them money.
So if I loan you money, if I loan somebody money, I will never charge you interest because
if I did, I'd be in violation of scripture.
So if you don't want to loan somebody money for no interest, then don't loan anybody any
money because charging interest is a sin according to scripture.
But he says right here, if thou lend money, verse 25, to any of my people that is poor
by thee, thou shalt not be to him as a usurer, and just in case you didn't know what that
means, neither shalt thou lay upon him usury, saying don't charge him interest.
And then it says in verse 26, if thou would all take thy neighbor's raiment to pledge,
thou shalt deliver it unto him by that the sun goeth down, for that is his covering only.
It is his raiment for his skin wherein shall he sleep, and it shall come to pass when he
crieth unto me that I will hear, for I am gracious.
So what he's saying there is don't charge usury when you loan money to the people that
are, you know, somebody's poor, they need to borrow money, don't charge them interest.
And he says if you take a pledge from them, meaning, okay, I'm going to loan you the money,
but I need some collateral.
That's okay, the Bible does condone of that, saying okay, you know, I'm going to loan you
this money, but I'm going to take something of yours and hang onto it just to make sure
that I get paid.
But he says if you take their garment, he's saying if somebody's so poor that all they
can give you is, you know, the shirt off their back as it were, their jacket, he's
saying don't sit there and take their jacket for use.
And there are other verses, this is in Deuteronomy, this is in other places where God says, you
know, don't take that and hang onto that and make him sleep out in the cold with no jacket,
you know, because you're hanging onto his jacket to make sure he pays that loan back.
He's just talking about that we shouldn't be unmerciful to the poor, that we shouldn't
just, you know, leave somebody out in the cold like that.
So if you think about that in regard to what's said in Job 22, verse number 6, it says,
For thou hast taken a pledge from thy brother for naught, and stripped the naked of their
clothing.
Now you can kind of see how those two things go together.
And what he's saying there is that basically Job's taking collateral from somebody and
not giving it back, even though they've paid everything that they owed.
You know, it'd be like if you dropped off something at the pawn shop and then, you know,
you take out a loan, which by the way, don't ever do that.
If you're smart, you'll never borrow money from the pawn shop and you'll never borrow
money from the check cashing place, advance till payday, you know, because they are a
serious usurer and you're wasting huge amounts of money doing that and it's a ridiculous
thing to do.
But it'd be like if you went down there, you know, you dropped off your flat screen TV
or whatever people drop off down there, your guitar, you know, whatever you dropped off
and then you paid the bill, you paid it off and they're just like, oh well, sorry, we're
not giving you your stuff back, you know, you were late, or you know, no, I gave it
back.
No, sorry.
Just basically, he's saying not only, Job, have you been a lender unto the poor, you
know, but you have also ripped him off.
You've stolen from the poor.
You've been like a corrupt check cashing place, Job.
You're like a corrupt pawn shop.
So that's a pretty serious accusation just to come out of nowhere.
He says in verse number 7, you know, just picture sending a guy away naked because you've
got his clothes as collateral.
See ya, sorry buddy.
I mean just totally a heartless, you know, mean spirited type of a lending practice.
That's what he's accusing Job of.
Look at verse 7.
Thou hast not given water to the weary to drink, and thou hast withholden bread from
the hungry.
So he's saying, you know, people that needed water, people that needed food, you wouldn't
help them.
You wouldn't help anybody.
Now later on, Job responds to this a few chapters later and he explains, no, actually I did
help a lot of poor people.
I gave a lot of, you know, charitable things away and I did help a lot of poor people.
Now go to James chapter 4 if you would, because remember, Eliphaz the Temanite says that Job's
wickedness is great and that his iniquities are infinite.
You know, he just says, you're a huge sinner, Job.
I mean you're a major sinner.
He doesn't, you know, and he can't really point to like adultery, he can't really point
to murder, he can't really point to any theft per se, because he doesn't really have evidence.
So he's just thinking, well, you know, you're rich though, Job.
So you know, I'll bet because you're so wealthy, I'll bet you loan out a lot of money.
And I'll bet when people leave collateral with you, you don't give it back, huh?
That's why this is happening to you.
And I'll bet God looks down from heaven and he sees you with all your wealth and all your
goods and all the poor people that have come to you and you turned them away.
I mean people that were just thirsty, all they wanted was a glass of water, Job.
And you're like, no, sorry, you know, the next house is two miles down, you know, and
they're parched.
And I don't know if it's California or Arizona that has the law that says if anybody comes
to your door, there's a law, I forget, is this Arizona, where if they come to your door
or if they come to your restaurant, you must give them water.
Is that Arizona?
And it's a law, which obviously any decent person would do if somebody's just out there
just dehydrated and they need some water.
So he's just speculating.
And you know, we know that there are a lot of rich people that are wicked, because the
love of money is the root of all evil, and so a lot of people when they go down that
route in life of just trying to get really wealthy, they can sometimes become very wicked
people.
But you know, we need to make sure that we're not making the mistake that a life as is making
by just assuming, hey, if somebody's got money, they're a wicked person.
You know, we shouldn't just jump to that conclusion, because there are some good people who are
wealthy, like Job was a good guy, he was wealthy.
People in the New Testament, you know, Philemon was probably a pretty wealthy guy, he had
servants, he had a big house, you know, the church met in his house and everything.
So he had money, and he was a good guy.
There were other wealthy men in the Bible that were good guys, but look down if you
look at James chapter 4 verse 17, it says, Therefore to him that knoweth to do good,
and doeth it not, to him it is sin.
So Eliphaz is accusing Job of two things.
He said, number one, here's a sin you committed.
You took this guy's clothing for a pledge, and then just even though he deserved it back,
you wouldn't give it back to him.
You sent him away naked.
And then he says you also failed to help the widows and to help the fatherless, you failed
to feed the hungry, you failed, now, it would be a sin to fail to do those things, because
the Bible says, Whoso hath this world's good, or hath, you know, goods in this world, whoso
hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion
from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?
My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth.
So the Bible does command us to help people that are in need.
And the Bible does say that if we know to do good and do it not, then to us it is sin.
Now flip over to James 1, just a few pages back in your Bible, because in Job 22, Eliphaz
said in verse 9, Thou hast sent widows away empty, and the arms of the fatherless have
been broken.
Now, you know, what does he mean by that?
The arms of the fatherless have been broken.
You're sending away widows empty, the arms of the fatherless have been broken.
He's being pretty dramatic, but I was wondering if maybe, you know, he pictures some kind
of a debt collector, you know, that starts breaking fingers and breaking all, you know,
if he doesn't get paid, I don't know.
But you know, he's accusing him of doing wrong by the widows and by the fatherless.
But look what the Bible says in James chapter 1, it says in verse 27, Pure religion and
undefiled before God and the father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their
affliction and to keep himself unspotted from the world.
So God does expect us to help widows and to help the fatherless and to keep ourselves
unspotted from the world.
He says that is what true religion is, that is what pure religion is.
And by the way, I hate this trend today of attacking religion.
And a lot of the little trendy, new evangelical Christian types, the types from kind of the
Christian bookstore with the trendy t-shirts of like, This Blood's for You, or like Starbucks
logo with the long hair Jesus, or you know, just this type of neo-evangelical, they'll
have t-shirts and slogans and bumper stickers saying like, hey, you know, I hate religion.
Have you seen this?
You know, or religion stinks, or I hate religion, or dude, it's not a religion, it's a relationship,
bro.
You know, you'll hear this kind of talk of just, bro, get free, bro.
We're not in a religion, it's a relationship.
Now look, does religion save you?
No.
But does religion just stink and religion's bad and I hate religion?
No.
Because religion is the works that we do.
Okay, now by the way, a relationship isn't going to save you either.
Believing on the Lord Jesus Christ is going to save you.
Faith is going to save you.
You know, when you talk about having a relationship, I have a good relationship with my wife, but
it takes work to have a good relationship with my wife.
Because if I just put no effort into my marriage, I would not have a good relationship with
my wife, would I?
If I just put no effort into it?
No, because having a good relationship involves time and effort and money and more money,
no I'm just kidding, but anyway, it takes effort and time, you know, in order to have
a good relationship, wouldn't you say I'd have to talk to her?
And wouldn't you say that she would have to talk to me?
So there would have to be some communication going back and forth, right?
And then we'd have to spend time together and all kinds of things in order to have a
good relationship.
Well, in order for me to have a good relationship with God, what's it going to take?
I'm going to have to talk to him.
How do I do that?
Prayer.
And he's going to talk to me and how do I do that?
Read the Bible.
He's talking to me, okay?
I've got to spend time with him.
I'm going to spend time in his house.
We're going to be communicating.
We're going to have fellowship.
Okay, are my wife and I going to have a good relationship when she disobeys everything
I tell her to do?
Okay, am I going to have a good relationship with God when I just disobey everything he
tells me to do?
No, so in order to have a good relationship with God, it's a lot of works, because I have
to obey him and I have to talk to him in prayer and he's going to talk to me.
That means I have to read my Bible.
Let me ask you this.
Is that what it takes for me to get to heaven, doing all that stuff?
Because the Bible says, for by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves
it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.
So for me to get to heaven, it's faith in Jesus Christ.
It's not just this ongoing, I'm saved because I'm keeping this relationship going.
Because let me tell you something.
If I did not talk to God for the next week, and God did not talk to me for the next year,
and God didn't talk to me for the next year, meaning I don't read my Bible for a year,
and I don't go to church for a year, I don't set foot in his house for a year, and I start
breaking a lot of God's commandments, what kind of a relationship do you think I would
have with God a year from now?
Lousy, terrible, not at all.
Okay, but wait a minute, am I still saved?
Because I'm saved by faith.
He's going to chastise me, but I'm still saved.
So it's best to use biblical terms, not this worldly term of like being saved is having
a relationship with Christ.
Should we have a relationship with Christ?
Absolutely, but it's not going to save you.
What's going to save you is just the fact that you've believed on Jesus Christ.
The relationship is something that you were.
Just like the relationship that I have with my wife doesn't make me married.
You could have a relationship with a woman that you're not married to.
That doesn't make you married, does it?
Okay, or what if my wife and I just have a horrible relationship, we never spend any
time together, we never talk to each other, we don't have anything in common, but we stay
married.
We're still married, right?
Relationship stinks, but we're married.
So what I'm saying is it's possible to still be saved and have a bad relationship with
God, or little or no relationship with God.
He's going to be disciplining you, you're going to be living a cursed life, you're going
to be living a miserable life, but it doesn't mean that you're not saved.
So this whole thing of Christianity is a relationship, not a religion, well it's both.
It's both, but salvation is neither.
Salvation is just faith in Jesus Christ.
But Christianity, living for God, serving God, is going to entail both a relationship
and religion.
Think about this, what if I had a really good relationship with my wife, but I didn't do
any work, meaning I never went to work, so I'm not getting a paycheck or anything, I'm
her husband, I should be paying the bills, right?
But let's say I just do no work.
I mean I just get up, sit around, eat, hang out, talk, play games, I just don't do any
work.
I mean honey, I'm a great listener, let's talk, I want to talk with you honey, any time
you want to spend time with me honey, I'm available.
I'm going to make you gifts, I can't buy you any gifts because I don't work, I don't have
any money, but I'm going to be really nice to you, we're going to have a great relationship.
Do you think that's going to make her very happy?
No, she wants both, she wants me to work and pay the bills and she wants me to have a relationship
with her.
What about the other way?
What if my wife just did no work, right?
I wake up in the morning, I'm trying to go off to work for the day and it's like kids
are screaming, no food has been cooked, glasses are shattering, diapers are filled, it's just
pandemonium and I, what in the world, I'm trying to line out the big kids, I've got
to go to work and then I come home, the place is trashed, nothing's been cooked, my wife's
just in a sweat suit on the sofa just watching soap operas.
Not that we have a TV, but this whole situation is hyper though, she doesn't have a sweat
suit either, but anyway, but I'm just saying, what if I just came home and she's just done
no work, she's just been a slob, she's been disobedient, but she says honey, let's go
on a date honey, I want to have a relationship with you, I want to talk to you, I want you
to talk to me, it's like do the dishes, cook dinner, get something done.
So what I'm saying is we need both, we need a relationship, we also need work, but not
only do we need work, we need a third thing, because religion actually entails two things
according to this.
First of all it's doing good works like visiting the fatherless and the widows and their affliction,
but also it involves keeping himself unspotted from the world.
What if my wife and I had a great relationship and what if she did all the work around the
house but she's living a filthy sinful life?
You think that's going to work for me?
Think that's going to make me happy?
Or what if I'm going out and just living a filthy wicked sinful life, you know I'm a
drunk, I'm committing adultery, but I'm paying the bills and I'm willing to have a really
good relationship with her, is that going to work?
So what I'm saying is to sit there and say, you know, it's not religion, it's just a relationship,
it would be stupid in any area of life.
If we apply that logic to marriage, if we apply that to any other area, it just doesn't
make any sense, we need both.
But today, if you look at this modern, worldly Christian movement, you know your typical
giant Christian fun center, you know where it's just the party church, the fun church,
it's like a McDonald's Playland church, instead of a real T-bone steak from God's word, you
get a little happy meal, they make you happy like Joel Osteen and you basically get a little
toy in it and everything, instead of real nutrition, real protein, a real meal, okay?
But these types of churches, if you think about it, you know what they're really lean
on?
Religion.
What do they lean on?
Visiting anybody.
I mean think about it, the typical, you know, capital Christian fellowship fun center church,
when was the last time they went out knocking doors of anybody and visiting anybody?
They don't.
They don't give anybody the gospel.
They don't go out and preach in the highways and hedges and try to help people and reach
people and especially not to the poor, they're sending out their little glossy postcard with
a bunch of stock photos on it to the wealthy neighborhood.
You think they send their little stock photo colored, and I hate stock photos by the way,
but you know you think they're sending their little glossy advertisement with all the stock
photos to the ghetto?
No way, they're sending it to the wealthy neighborhood because that's who they want
in their church, the middle class and the upper class because they want money and they
want people that look like them and everything.
They don't go to the fatherless, they don't go to the widow, they don't go to the ghetto,
they're not bringing the gospel to those people.
They just want, you know, to reach the perfect little family.
They don't want the people that have baggage, they don't want the people that are poor,
they don't want that type.
That's who they're going after.
That's why they have stock photos of little perfect models all over their literature and
website.
Don't show me a real person in your church.
Don't show me a stock photo.
It's disrespectful.
I need to preach a whole sermon just like the sin of stock photos.
I'm just kidding.
I guess I can't authoritatively say that it's a sin because there's not really a commandment
in the Bible that says, Thou shalt not use stock photos, but there's got to be something
in here that I could find something.
Yeah, deception, there we go.
You're deceiving, you know.
I want to show up and say, where is this guy, I want to meet this guy.
Where is he?
Where is this family with two kids?
It's always two kids, a boy and a girl.
There's the one that's black, the one that's Asian, the one that's white, the one that's
old, the one that's young.
Then you get there, everybody's white as snow.
Or everybody's old, everybody's young.
It's not like it was on the brochure or whatever.
They're leaning on religion today.
Not a lot of visiting going on.
You know what a lot of churches call soul winning?
Visitation, where they go out and knock doors.
Not a lot of visiting going on.
And then not a lot of keeping yourself undefiled from the world going on in these churches
either.
You go to these churches and hear a hard sermon against alcohol, against fornication, against
pornography, against watching junk on TV and going to the movies and seeing all Hollywood's
garbage and dressing like a hoochie mama and a hooker and preaching against that guy.
You just get a happy sermon, but what does the Bible say pure religion is?
What's a right religion?
It's visiting the fatherless and widows and to keep ourselves unspotted from the world.
Both things that modern day Christianity is pretty lean on, and is that a coincidence
then that they say, oh we hate religion.
Oh religion's a bad word.
Every time the Bible mentions religion, it's negative they say.
Well are you looking at James 1.27, I mean that's not negative.
Go back to Job 22 though.
I just want to point that out that this I hate religion t-shirt, I've seen a shirt like
that, I've seen a billboard like that, we hate religion, it's a relationship not a religion.
Church for people who don't like church, well I'm never going to step foot there because
I love church.
But anyway it says in Job 22, he says in verse 9, this is a life as accusing Job, they say
thou hast sent widows away empty, and the arms of the fatherless have been broken, therefore
snares around about thee, and sudden fear told me, he's saying in verse 10, look that's
why these bad things have happened to you Job, that's why snares around you, and what
are the bad things that happened to Job, do you remember?
All his kids died, he lost all his wealth, he lost all of his business, and he has sores
all over his body and he's got a disease now, and his friends quote unquote like Eliphaz
are accusing him, hey you've done these sins and that's why this is happening to you, and
these accusations are totally unfounded.
Look at verse 11, or darkness, that thou canst not see an abundance of waters cover thee,
verse 12, is not God in the height of heaven?
And behold the height of the stars, how high they are, and thou sayest, doth God know?
Can he judge through the dark cloud?
The thick clouds are a covering to him that he seeth not, and he walketh in the circuit
of heaven.
Now can somebody point to me where Job said that?
So now not only has Eliphaz just fabricated these sins that Job supposedly committed,
how he's ripping off the poor, he's stealing their clothes, he's sending them away hungry
and thirsty, now he says, here's what you said Job, and since it's all written down,
all we have to do is just go back, starting in chapter 3 and just go and look at everything
that Job said, and we can see that he never said anything like that.
So this is just a complete fabrication, and some of my people will do this to you, they'll
say, well you said, you know, I didn't say that.
That's one good thing about having all the sermons recorded too, because somebody can
say like, well Pastor Anderson you said this, well let's listen to it.
My pastor back in Sacramento, he had somebody confront him one time and say, you said thus
and so, and he said, okay, let's get the tape, and they sat and listened to the tape and
it was never said.
So here this is just another lie, another false accusation of basically accusing Job
of saying that God doesn't really know what's going on on the earth.
You know, it says, how does God know, verse 13, can he judge through the dark cloud, thick
clouds are a covering to him that he seeth not, and he walketh in the circuit of heaven.
So basically he's accusing Job of saying that God's up in heaven, and like he can't see
through the cloud cover.
You know, like he's looking down on the earth, like, I don't know what's going on down there,
you know.
I mean that'd be a pretty stupid thing to think.
But Job never said that.
God doesn't know.
And in reality the Bible says that the eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding
the good and the evil.
The Bible tells us that no matter where we are, it's impossible to escape the eyes of
the Lord.
He knows everything that we do, he sees everything.
And the Bible even says we cannot escape from him.
He said if we were to ascend into heaven, he's there.
If we make our bed in hell, he's there.
I mean, if we dig down into the earth, if we're in the sea, we cannot flee from the
Lord's presence.
His eyes are everywhere.
So that obviously makes no sense.
But what's funny is that he's accusing Job of saying, well God doesn't really know what's
going on in the earth.
He's the one who just finished saying, well God doesn't really care what we do.
He says at the beginning, jump back if you would to verse 2, can a man be profitable
unto God as he that is wise may be profitable himself?
Is it any pleasure to the Almighty that thou art righteous or is it gain to him that thou
makest thy ways perfect?
So he's the one, life as the one who's saying God doesn't really care what we do, it's really
no skin off his back.
And he accuses Job of kind of the same thing, saying, yeah, God doesn't really know what
we're up to down here because of the thick cloud.
Look at verse 15, hast thou marked the old way which wicked men have trodden, which were
cut down out of time, whose foundation was overflown with a flood, which set into God
depart from us?
And what can the Almighty do for them?
And then it says, yet he filled their houses with good things, but the counsel of the wicked
is far from me.
Now, this is kind of interesting because it makes you wonder, is he referring to the literal
flood or is he just kind of talking about a flood in general?
Because if you were to take this as the fact that Eliphaz referring to the flood when the
whole earth was flooded, it really would fit.
Because if you remember in Luke 17, it says that up into the day that Noah got on the
ark, that they were basically eating and drinking and marrying and giving in marriage and they
knew not until the flood came and took them all away.
And it says it'll be the same way in the time of the coming of the Son of Man.
So Christ's second coming will be the same way where, and then it says two will be in
the field, one will be taken, the other left.
Two will be at the mill, one taken, the other left, what's commonly referred to as the rapture.
He says it'll be the same way where the same day it rained, Noah got in the ark, it'll
be the same way at the second coming of Christ, at the same day that we are taken out, like
Lot was taken out, the same day that Noah got on the ark, then it'll rain fire and brimstone,
the Bible says.
Because it's not going to rain water like it did in Noah's day.
God will actually rain fire and brimstone from the sky when he comes back in the clouds.
And obviously I don't have time to preach a sermon on end times Bible prophecy, but
Luke 17 is a great place to start because it's actually the first time that Jesus really
taught his disciples about Bible prophecy is in Luke 17.
What we think of as the main teaching of Christ on Bible prophecy is in Matthew 24, Mark 13,
and Luke 21.
Luke what?
21.
So Luke 17, actually chronologically Jesus is teaching that a little bit earlier in his
ministry.
So Luke 17 is a good place to start for Bible prophecy, but this kind of jives with what
we see here where he talks about basically the wicked in verse 18, before the flood had
their houses filled with good things.
What does that mean?
They're prospering, right?
He said basically the wicked are prospering, their houses are filled with good things,
kind of like Jesus said, you know, they were living their normal life, they're marrying,
giving in marriage, whatever.
And then the flood came and destroyed them all.
And it's saying how these ungodly men have, it says, have marked the old way that wicked
men have trod in verse 15, which were cut down out of time whose foundation was overflown
with the flood, which said unto God, depart from us, and what can the Almighty do for
them?
Yet he filled their houses with good things, but the counsel of the wicked is far from
me.
The righteous see it and are glad, and the innocent laugh them to scorn.
So what's he saying?
The argument that he's making here is, you know, even when wicked people prosper, even
when you see them prospering, you know that they're going to be eventually judged.
That's what a life has to say.
You know, eventually they're going to be cut down, like they were prospering before the
flood and then God sent the flood and destroyed them.
And what he's trying to imply there is that that's Job's situation.
He's like, because think about it, life as this whole argument is like that if you do
right, God makes you rich and prosperous and everything goes great for you, and that if
you do wrong, you know, you're going to be destroyed.
You're going to lose everything.
Well what he's saying is, well yeah, I know you were prospering before, but it's not because
you were doing right, Job.
You were just one of those wicked people that prospers and then eventually gets taken down.
He's like, that's what you're doing right, you're being taken down right now.
God's given you what you finally have deserved all these years, it's finally coming to you.
And that's the argument that he's using.
So I think if you want to apply this to the flood, it's probably what it's referring to,
and it does seem to fit.
And by the way, there's some new movie out about the flood.
Has anybody heard of this, Noah movie?
Is it out yet or is it about to come out?
Is it already in theater?
Oh, let's go watch it.
Let's not.
Because I didn't even have to know anything about this movie to just know it's not going
to be biblical.
Because I've seen enough Bible movies to know that they have nothing to do with the Bible.
I mean I've seen some crazy Bible movies.
I saw a Bible movie one time where it was about Noah's ark, and this is an older one,
and God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah like before Noah gets on the ark.
It's like, what in the world?
Because the flood happens in Genesis 7 and 8, and Sodom and Gomorrah is like chapter
18 and 19, but that's the way these Hollywood movies, they take a lot of liberties.
And they basically just change everything.
And I saw some articles about the new movie, so I actually read up on the new movie.
I already knew.
Somebody asked me about it before I read up on it.
Are you going to go see that?
I'm like, I haven't gone to the movie theater in like 12 or 13 years.
I'm not going to go to see this.
Because everything that Hollywood puts out is garbage.
It's all there to brainwash you according to their agenda.
They have a really specific agenda.
And if they're coming out with a Bible movie, it has a satanic purpose.
Period.
End of story.
Because every movie that they come out with, and sometimes they'll even come out with a
really good movie that has a good message and everything's great, but there will always
be one thing in it that's really bad.
And really, the devil just uses all the good stuff in the movie just to get you in there
to see that pornographic scene, or whatever it is that slipped the agenda, the message.
I wouldn't trust Hollywood to just educate me and just put whatever garbage in my mind.
That's why I don't believe that you should watch TV, you shouldn't go to movies, because
it's just all programming of this world and of Satan.
But I read up on this Noah movie, and from what I read, it's so bad, I mean, it has nothing
to do with story.
Basically, according to this new movie, God just wants to kill everybody.
Because you know, in the Bible, he wants to save Noah, and he wants to save Noah's kids,
and he basically just wants to wipe out the wicked people, and he wants them to start
over with Noah and just kind of repopulate the earth.
Well, in this new movie, basically God just loves the animals and the plants, it's like
an environmentalist thing, and basically he's saying, humans are the problem, humans are
destroying the earth, so God wants to just wipe out all humans, and the only reason that
he's even building the ark is not to save man, but it's just to save the animals.
But the animals aren't going to be able to build the ark apparently, or handle the thing,
I don't know.
Basically, you know, Noah is just kind of a necessary evil just to save the animals,
you know, it's all about saving the animals.
Whereas in the Bible, the Bible is really clear that God had Noah build the ark to save
mankind, and the animals were so that we could have something to eat when we get off the
ark.
I mean, that's pretty much it.
That's what they're even there for, is to be used and to be eaten, okay?
That's why the first thing when he gets off the ark, God tells him, every living thing
that moveth shall be meat for you.
And a lot of people will try to say, no, no, you know, they couldn't eat pigs, they couldn't
eat this, you know, the Hebrew roots crowd.
But guess what?
He said every living thing that moveth.
Who believes that?
That includes all animals.
He's saying you can eat all animals.
Now later in the Mosaic law, that's restricted that they can only eat clean beasts and that
they cannot eat unclean beasts.
Now some people will try to say, well, but the Bible talked about clean and unclean beasts
in Noah's day.
Why did he bring seven of certain animals and two of the other?
It's because he's going to eat the seven wrong.
It's because he's going to sacrifice unto the Lord of the clean beasts.
When he gets off the ark, he takes all the clean beasts and he makes burnt sacrifices
unto the Lord in Genesis 9.
It's not that he couldn't eat the ones that were unclean.
The animals that are unclean are unclean for various reasons.
Usually the ones that are clean are the ones that are herbivores.
And the animals that are carnivores are considered unclean.
But it is not wrong for us to eat animals that are on the forbidden list of the book
of Leviticus because in the New Testament, God very clearly tells us that every creature
of God is good and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving.
It's sanctified by the word of God of prayer.
And that jives with what he said in Genesis 9.
It was only a temporary restriction for the children of Israel just for a small part of
human history.
Most of human history, we've been allowed to eat all meats.
But anyway, in this new movie, it's all about just saving the animals.
So Noah feels that God wants him to murder everyone on the ark and kill himself.
So from what I understand, this Noah movie is like a horror movie in a sense where Noah
is going around, he's going to kill, I mean literally, Noah's going to kill a newborn
baby in this movie.
I mean there's like one of his, because you know he has the three sons and the three wives.
I guess in this new movie, one of Noah's sons and their wife, they have a baby and Noah's
like we've got to kill it.
We've got to kill that baby.
And he's like chasing it or I don't know.
And then there's like a stowaway on the ark.
Like you know, it's not just Noah's family, two-ball cane or some, you know, they just
pick some random name from a genealogy in Genesis 4, like let's put this guy on the
ark.
And he's trying to kill people and Noah's trying to kill people.
You say, ah, you're not getting the movie exactly right.
I don't want to get the movie right, I want to get the Bible right.
Ah, you mixed up the plot.
Oh, oh.
Look, that's what the movie's basically about.
It's about how God wants all humans dead, he just wants animals and plants to live because
human bad, animal good.
Now does that fit the world's agenda?
Does that fit Satan's eugenics agenda?
Does that fit the agenda that's described on the Georgia Guidestones that says, you
know, we need to eliminate 90% of the population and bring it down to 500 million?
Does that fit the agenda of Bill Gates and these other globalists?
Does that fit the agenda of the, who is the Prince of England, Prince Philip or whatever,
who said I want to be reincarnated as a virus to kill off 90% of mankind?
I mean, it's bizarre, but the devil hates man.
And he wants to kill as many people as he can and murder as many people as he can.
That's why he loves abortion, he loves warfare, he loves everything that just slaughters innocent
people.
And what we see in this new movie is a complete perversion of scripture.
It's not the story of the Bible which says, look, Noah is a godly man, he's going to be
saved and his family, we're going to wipe out the wickedness on the earth because the
earth was filled with violence, and we're going to start over with mankind.
It just becomes this environmental wacko kill all humans and it turns Noah into this murderer.
And of course I'm sure, I don't know anything else, that's pretty much all I know about
the movie, but I'm sure it also cuts out the condemnation of sodomy in Genesis 9, probably
cuts that out.
That doesn't fit the agenda.
So if you go see that movie, you're not right with God, and you just come out and say it.
You're not right with God.
But I just want to see what it's like.
Open the Bible and see what it's like.
You know there were people who wanted to see what was in the Ark of the Covenant too, just
to see what it was like, and they all died.
There were also people who just wanted to taste the fruit from a certain tree and just
kind of see what it was like, and they died.
They died the same day that they ate their off, spiritually, and they damned their descendants
of mankind.
We don't need to just go, let's go see what it's like.
Let's just go see for ourselves.
Why do you need to go see, I mean, do you have to just go and just eat filth off the
street just to see what it tastes like?
I mean you already know it's trash, you already know it's garbage.
You already know that what Hollywood puts out is ungodliness.
Yeah but it's fun to go to the movies.
You know it's fun to get drunk, right?
Yeah, it's fun to go out and commit fornication.
It's fun to go, look sometimes sin can be fun, it's still wrong.
The Bible says not to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season.
Of course it's fun to go to the movies, but you know what's even more fun is when you
actually live a godly clean life and actually read the Bible and let the Bible tell you
what Noah was like and what the flood was like and not let the world tell you what Noah
was like.
Say well I can handle it, it's not going to affect me.
Well it might plant some weird seeds in your mind.
Not to mention all the subliminal messages that are hidden in these movies.
Who knows what they're brainwashing you with?
I wouldn't go in there, there's no point.
Save your money.
Do what's right.
Now this is a pretty vague account of the flood right here in Job 22, but it's way more
accurate than anything that's going on at the movie theater, okay?
But anyway let's just quickly finish up here with the chapter.
It says, Yeti filled their houses with good things, but the counsel of the wicked is far
from me.
The righteous see it and are glad, and the innocent laugh them to scorn.
Whereas our substance is not cut down, but the remnant of them the fire consumeth.
So he's basically saying, well look at us Job, look at your three friends.
We're not going through the stuff you're going through.
You don't see our kids dying, you don't see our house caving in, you don't see us losing
our wealth.
So these guys are just being very ungodly.
They're not comforting their friend, they're not helping their friend, they're just accusing
them of wrongdoing, and they have this prosperity gospel teaching that says that if you obey
God everything's going to go perfect in your life.
That's not what the Bible teaches.
The Bible says many are the afflictions of the righteous, but out of them all the Lord
delivereth them.
And Job's eventually going to be delivered.
But we that do right will suffer.
That's what the Bible teaches.
He says in verse number 21, Acquaint now thyself with him and be at peace.
He's saying acquaint yourself with God.
Just get to know God Job and be at peace.
So he's basically accusing him of not knowing God.
He says, Receive I pray thee the law from his mouth, and lay up his words in thine heart.
If thou return to the Almighty, thou shalt be built up, thou shalt put away iniquity
far from thy tabernacles.
Verse 24 is where he switches into TV preacher mode.
Then shalt thou lay up gold as dust, and the gold of Ophir as the stones of the brook.
Yea, the Almighty shall be thy defense, and thou shalt have plenty of silver.
And if you just call right now, 1-800-555-5555, operators are standing by to take your call.
Put your hand on the screen.
If you give a thousand, God's going to give you ten thousand.
If you sow sparingly, you're going to reap sparingly.
You know, give a big offering today.
This is the kind of garbage that Eliphaz, you know, the TV preacher, not the Temanite,
the TV-ite, Eliphaz the TV-ite is saying.
And look, I think you could live a really righteous and godly life and never have gold
and silver and have all these riches.
I mean, does God promise that we're going to be wealthy?
All he promises is that he'll feed and clothe.
He doesn't promise us we're going to lay up gold like dust.
I mean, it's just going to be like the dirt of our house.
We're going to have so much gold.
Tons of silver everywhere.
That's no guarantee.
Now, you know, sometimes he blesses people like Job, had a lot of money, but there's
no guarantee of that.
You know why God doesn't bless most of us with lots of money like that?
It's because we probably couldn't handle it anyway.
We'd probably do something stupid.
Look at people who win the lottery and destroy their whole life.
But look at verse 26 says, For then shalt thou have thy delight in the Almighty and
shalt lift up thy face unto God.
Thou shalt make thy prayer unto him and he shall hear thee and thou shalt pay thy vows.
Thou shalt also decree a thing and it shall be established unto thee and the light shall
shine upon thy ways.
When men are cast down, then thou shalt say there is lifting up and he shall save the
humble person.
He shall deliver the island of the innocent and it is delivered by the pureness of thine
hands."
A life as is just in this chapter wrongly accusing Job saying, look, you've committed
a bunch of sins, then there are a bunch of good deeds that you failed to do, and then
he's saying, you don't even know God.
You need to start praying to God, Job.
You need to look to God.
He's going to bless you.
You're going to have all your wealth back if you'll just turn to God.
And again, we know having the benefit of having the whole book of Job that God said he hadn't
done anything wrong.
He was already godly.
Everything was good and that the three friends are just full of baloney.
So a few things we can learn from this chapter is just when people say things to us and we
know they're not true, you can't let your friends get you down when they contradict
the Word of God.
Job knows that according to the Word of God, he's doing right.
His friends are saying, oh, you need to do this, do that.
We need to just trust the Lord and not listen to people who say this kind of stuff.
People are going to falsely accuse us.
People are going to try to discourage us.
If it hasn't happened to you yet, it will, where somebody falsely accuses you, lies about
what you said or what you did, or where somebody just accuses you of being ungodly.
I mean, can you imagine, what if you're a woman who had a miscarriage and somebody said,
that happened because you're living in sin.
Wouldn't that hurt your feelings?
Or let's say you lost your job.
You must not be right with God.
Have you been praying?
Have you been reading your Bible?
What have you been looking at on your computer?
We need to be careful that that's never us that says those types of things.
And that we never make false accusations, and it seems like people are just, they don't
think it's a big deal.
But the Bible says, thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.
And the Bible says that in the last days men will be false accusers.
God forbid that it would be said of us that we are tail bearers and gossips and false
accusers who just repeat things without even knowing that they're true.
And if anybody ever comes to you talking trash about anybody else, you should defend
that person if there's no evidence for it.
And not blindly believe their accusations.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord, and what we can learn from the book
of Job.
Help us to continue studying your word, even parts of the Bible like Job 22 that are really
obscure parts of the Bible that most people have never heard before.
Lord, thank you that there is something that we can learn from Job chapter 22.
Help us to apply it to our lives.
Help us not to do the things that a life has accused Job of doing.
Help us to love the poor and to reach out to the poor.
Visit the poor.
Help the poor.
Help us to be generous with our goods.
Help us not to lend people money at interest.
Help us to be a godly example to the world around us, and in Jesus' name we pray.