Teaching Notes

TH1081: JOB

As we continue our study in the book of Job, we see Job countering the counsel of Eliphaz. And His counsel can be summed up very simply. It went like this, "The innocent do not suffer. Thus Job is suffering because he is not innocent but has some concealed sin in his life." Eliphaz told job in very eloquent terms, that the death of his children and the loss of all his servants and possessions was the result of some hidden sin in his life and he needed to get right with God. In the mind of Eliphaz the righteous are blessed and the wicked are punished.

It is out of all of that we see Job cry out and tell Eliphaz that his words are dry, his words are empty, his words are nothing more than a bunch of hot air. And so lets pick up our story in Job chapter 7, as Job continues to speak what is on his heart.

JOB 7

VERSES 1-5

1. Job is comparing his life to what others face in their lifetime. One of the differences is that their problems last for days, and Job sees his problems lasting for months. He speaks of a military man, one who does hard service, he has a certain time to serve and then it is over. There is an allotted time to serve even for the hired man. And yet for Job the days went into months, and still there was no rest. When night would come, there was still no comfort, there was still no rest. He only tossed and turned due to the pain and itching of his blisters and the extreme loneliness he was suffering. And as morning came, it was another day of sorrow and pain. There seemed to be no rest for Job. His flesh was covered with worms, eating away at the dead tissue that was blistering and cracking away. Job, as we can see, was a broken man, and thus he is speaking forth from this condition.

VERSES 6-7a

1. Job is coming face-to-face with his own mortality and he sees his life coming quickly to an end. In our own life we see that adversity causes us to focus on the things that are truly important. Those things that may have seemed important yesterday become meaningless when we are looking at death. Our life is a breath, it is short, and we should use it to the fullest in serving our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We should be involved in the work He has called us to do, whatever that may be. And whatever people may think, the death rate remains the same, one per person!

VERSE 7b

1. When people sink to this level, they have no hope, they see no good coming into their life, and so many times they just end it by committing suicide. And if any of you are at that point in your life, don't give up. For Job the best years of his life were still ahead of him, God was going to bless Job twice as much as before this trial began. There was still good to come into Job's life. Remember what Psalm 23:4 says "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me." Notice that David did not say that we are to be staying in the valley of death, but our Shepherd will lead us through it and as we move towards the mountain top, a place of rest, we have grown in the valley experience.

2. One woman was asked what her favorite Bible verse was, and she said "and it came to pass". The pastor, confused by what she said, asked her how that verse helped her, how it was helpful to her. She told him that when she goes through difficult times, trials, that she always remembers "it will come to pass!"

VERSES 8-10

1. In death we do not enter a state of nothingness, that goes for the just and the unjust. Hebrews 9:27 says "And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment." We are not recycled or reincarnated until we attain some spiritual level of holiness, you have one chance in this life, and if you reject Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you lose. God has done everything possible to have you enter into that abundant life, but if you don't accept it, He will not force it upon you, but you will suffer the fate of rejecting the truth.

VERSE 11

1. Job is going to pour his heart out, not holding anything back. And let me say this, it is wrong to be angry with God but it is not wrong to honestly come before Him and ask God to help you to understand what is happening in your life. He wants to comfort you, and He might not always give you all of the answers that you want, but He will give you what you need to know to help you through those times. And sometimes the answer is just found in knowing the goodness of God, and falling back upon His character, never really understanding why, but knowing the richness and depth of God's love for you. That will comfort your heart.

VERSE 12

1. Now Job is questioning God, and asking Him why He is watching over his life so closely, like a watchman who is standing guard on board a ship, watching out for any sea serpents.

VERSES 13-15

1. Not only was Job trying to endure the physical and emotional pain, but even when he went to sleep he was having nightmares that terrified him. Maybe some of them were the result of Eliphaz's spiritual encounter and the harshness of the rebuke he was getting from his friends.

VERSE 16

1. Job is saying that he did not want to live forever, and who would in the condition that he was in? But even in the bodies you have now, would you like to live in them forever? I don't think to many of you would say yes to that question. That would not be a blessing for we groan in these bodies of flesh that have been affected by sin, and are subject to all kinds of diseases.

2. In I Timothy 6:19 we read "storing up for themselves a good foundation for the time to come, that they may lay hold on eternal life." The Greek word that is used for "life" is ZOE, which speaks of the principle of life in the spirit and the soul, a fullness of life. There is another Greek word used for "life" and that is BIOS, used in II Timothy 2:4. It reads "No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier." This Greek word is different than ZOE in that it speaks of the physical life, while ZOE speaks of the highest blessedness that God has bestowed upon us. Now that eternal life does not begin when these physical bodies die and God gives us new bodies, but it begins at the moment we accept Christ into our life. That is when God gives to us that fullness of life, that joy everlasting. And this will continue on, past the death of these physical bodies, but it begins as Christ comes into our life. As Psalm 16:11 says "You will show me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore."

VERSES 17-18

1. When you compare this with Psalm 8:4-5, you see Job present his case in a negative way, "Why in the world are you even bothering with me God? I am nothing!" But in Psalm 8 it is in a positive light, "God, you are so magnificent, and yet You are so concerned with even man!" Same words, different perspective of God.

VERSE 19

1. Job feels that every step he takes God is right there ready to strike out at him. He doesn't even get a chance to swallow the saliva in his mouth before God does something else to him. God is not out to knock you down, but to build you up. But Job, like us, can develop this wrong perspective of God.

VERSE 20

1. Job is wondering why he is the target of God, is there a bull's eye painted on his back that God keeps shooting at. Adversity can lead to a warped concept of God, and we see that happening with Job.

VERSE 21

1. You got to love this. Job is telling God that when his life is over, when Job returns to the dust of the earth, then who is God going to pick on. He is telling God that He will be sorry when he is not around anymore for God will not have anyone to satisfy His perverse sort of pleasure.

JOB 8

VERSE 1

1. First Eliphaz spoke and he was harsh but eloquent in his choice of words. Bildad, on the other hand, just blasts Job. You might call Bildad the brutal!

VERSE 2

1. Bildad blasts Job and tells him to stop his pleas of innocence, for they are nothing more than a bunch of hot air. Stop spouting off, stop your lying, and just confess your sin!

VERSES 3-4

1. This too must have hurt Job. Bildad first tells Job that God is righteous and then says the reason for the death of your children is because of some sin in their life. You see, it would be hard to come against Bildad, for if you tried you would be calling God unrighteous. And yet we know that Bildad was wrong, and yet God remains righteous, for it was not sin that brought this upon Job's children.

VERSES 5-7

1. The call is for Job to confess his sins before God and then God will make you healthy, wealthy, He will prosper you. Doesn't that sound familiar? That is what many of the faith teachers preach from their pulpits, and it is bad theology. You see, Bildad was only speaking a half truth, and half truths are nothing more than lies. We again must understand that God does bless the just, and the unjust. And we must also fall back on the sovereignty of God, that He is in control.

VERSES 8-10

1. Bildad is saying that their wisdom is not as great as those who were before them, for they are young and not as experienced. And Bildad, living around the time of Abraham, which was only some 250 to 300 years after the flood, is telling Job to learn what the elders have spoke regarding the wrath of God and how He destroyed all the wicked by a flood, and now Job, because of your sin, you are being wiped out as if by a flood.

VERSES 11-13

1. Bildad is telling Job that if he removes himself from God he will wither and die just as the papyrus without the marsh, the reed without water. And Bildad is calling Job a hypocrite, for if it were true, if Job was innocent, then all these things would not have come upon his life. Nice friend!

VERSES 14-18

1. The wicked are not going to be able to stand, and if Job is wicked, a hypocrite, he too will not be able to stand.

VERSES 19-22

1. Bildad is calling for Job to plead his case before God. The reason is simple, if Job is innocent, he has nothing to worry about. If Job is not innocent, then God will deal with him appropriately. But the call is for Job to go before God and plead his case.

JOB 9

VERSES 1-3

1. Job is telling Bildad that his words are empty. Even if he were able to go before God, he couldn't win. And when God does speak to Job, Job has no answers for God, all he could do is listen.

VERSE 4

1. You can't fight against God and win! As Isaiah 45:9 says "Woe to him who strives with his Maker!..." When people wrestle with God, try to fight against God, they are having a problem with to much self. They think they can fight against their maker. Jacob tried to do this and it was only when he was crippled that "self" was broken and he surrendered to God. And think about it this way, if you could wrestle with God and win, you still would lose. God knows what is best for you and we only want His will done in our life and not our own will. If our will were done, if we always got what we asked for, we would be in trouble because we don't always know what is best for our life and how our actions will impact others. God has a perfect plan and ours isn't! And so, having God's will, praying for God's will to be done in your life is not a cop-out as some faith teachers would have you believe. It is what is necessary for our life, "Lord, thy will be done!"

VERSES 5-11

1. Job is just speaking of the omnipotence of God, how He is in control of everything. And the problem is that God is spirit, and because of that, how can I plead my case before Him?

VERSE 12

1. Questioning God is like Peter saying to Jesus "Not so Lord!" It is a challenge and not just a searching. And just by understanding that God is omnipotent, that He is all powerful, is not much comfort. We can look at those wicked leaders, like Hitler, who had a lot of power, but used it for evil. Thus, if God is not as good as we think He is, then having all that power is scary. We must take His omnipotence and couple it with His great love for us, knowing that He is looking out for us, that He has out best interests in mind. As Jesus said in John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."

VERSES 13-18

1. Job is allowing his circumstances to cloud his picture of God. He doesn't stand a chance with God, he can't even catch his breath. And now Job says that God has filled him with bitterness, which was totally wrong. God tries to fill us with faith using these adversities to help our faith grow. If we refuse to grow and allow these trials to make us better, then they will make us bitter! What tends to happen as we become more and more bitter is that we push ourselves away from God, and our brothers and sisters in the Lord. We spiral farther and farther away in our walk. And as we move away we develop a more clouded picture of God. Job was doing just that, seeing God as someone who is just waiting to pounce on anyone who does wrong. God is not like that, in fact in Ezekiel 18:23, 32 we read these words from the heart of God. He said "'Do I have any pleasure at all that the wicked should die?' says the Lord GOD, 'and not that he should turn from his ways and live? For I have no pleasure in the death of one who dies,' says the Lord GOD. 'Therefore turn and live!'"

VERSES 19-20

1. "Standing before a holy and righteous God, I can't win, no matter how innocent I may be" was Job's thinking. He was frustrated and discouraged and his friends were not helping him one bit.

2. Paul the apostle struggled with doing good, it seems that when he tried, he did those things that he did not want to do. Paul said in Romans 7:18 "For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find." But Paul did find the answer to his problem, for in Romans 8:1 Paul said "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit." You see, the answer is only found in Jesus, He alone can help us by His Spirit to do those things that are pleasing to God. It is not by the will of the flesh, but submission to the Holy Spirit that this is accomplished.

VERSES 21-23

1. For Job, it didn't seem to matter if you were good or evil, because God destroys both equally. In fact, it seems that Job sees God getting some kind of perverse pleasure in destroying people, especially the innocent. What is happening outwardly in our lives can give us a warped perspective of God, like Job was developing. That is why we are told in II Corinthians 5:7 "For we walk by faith, not by sight." You see, God is working inwardly, building up the inner man. As Paul said in Ephesians 3:14-19 "For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height; to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God." God is deepening our faith, showing us more and more of His love and care for us, and He is doing it through various trials. Thus, don't look at the outward circumstances to draw your picture of God, look at His Word and see what He is doing in your life.

VERSE 24

1. Job clearly knows the greatness of God, His power, but He is struggling with the goodness of God. He is struggling because he sees the innocent suffer, including himself, which he can't understand and his friends are not helping one bit.

VERSES 25-31

1. Notice Job's conclusion here. If he is going to be punished, even though he is innocent, and even if he was guilty and repented before God, then why should he repent in the first place?

VERSES 32-33

1. Notice the problem for Job. How can he go into heaven, to go before God, to God's court, and plead his case? He is a man and there is no one that can bridge that gap, no mediator. A sad state for Job, and yet for us Paul tells us in I Timothy 2:5 "For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus." And in Hebrews 7:25 we read "Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them." There is no one else that can bridge that gap, no priest, no man, not even Mary, only Jesus Christ who, being God, made Himself flesh to die for our sins in order to bring us to God. That is what I Peter 3:18 says. "For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit."

VERSES 34-35

1. Job sees God as a cruel task master with His rod of discipline ready to strike anyone at His will, and Job is terrified of Him. Notice, as Job's picture of God gets more clouded, it is going to be harder for him to truly love God - for how can you love a cruel task master?

JOB 10

VERSE 1

1. Job is going to speak from his heart and whatever comes out, comes out. He is not going to hold anything back.

VERSES 2-3

1. Job has the same distorted view of God that Asaph developed in Psalm 73. They both see the wicked prosper and yet they are struggling. He saw the death of the wicked being easy, painless. No trouble seemed to come upon their life and they are parading around boasting of the things they have. And Asaph saw how the wicked were blessed and said "But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled; My steps had nearly slipped. For I was envious of the boastful, When I saw the prosperity of the wicked." Psalm 73:2-3. For Asaph his hands were clean and yet he was still struggling, and he almost fell. The thing that helped him get the right perspective of things was when he went in to the sanctuary of God, he was fellowshipping with God, for it was then that God gave him a new perspective of the situation. He said "Until I went into the sanctuary of God; Then I understood their end." Psalm 73:17. Job had the same problem. He saw himself as good, and that he is the work of God's hands, and yet it seems that God despised him and loved the wicked. Wrong perspective - God loves us all for Romans 5:8 says "But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Not everyone appropriates that into their lives, but Christ died for us all, when we all were sinners!

VERSES 4-9

1. Job continues to plead his case before God. And Job now speaks of his own frailty, that God has created him out of the dust of the earth. Like a master potter, God has formed Job, and He has formed us, but these bodies of flesh will return to the dust of the earth. As Psalm 103:14 says "For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust." But for Job, he sees God make him on the potters wheel and then smash him down once again.

2. One other point that should be made here is that we all are made from the dust of the earth and we all will return to the dust of the earth. That should remove any false ideas of us being the spiritual elite, don't make yourself bigger than you are. Dust is a good perspective of ourselves and it is only the master potter that can take that dust and form it into something of honor, not because of us, but because of Him!

VERSES 10-17

1. Job sees himself trapped. No matter what he does before God it won't be good enough and he will be judged. If Job is good, God will judge him, if he is wicked, God is right there ready to judge him. Notice that as Job's focus of God is messed up, he becomes more emotionally distraught and he gets more confused about God and His character. How can we counter those difficulties? Paul tells us in Philippians 4:6-7 "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus." You see, God will guard your emotions and your thoughts, helping you to keep a proper perspective of the situation, all he asks is that you bring your requests to Him.

VERSE 18

1. Job now says to God that if He is only going to torture him, why did He even allow him to be born?

VERSES 19-21a

1. Job has had it, he can't take it any more. So he cries out to God, asking God to leave him alone, to give him a break and let him try to enjoy the short time he has left. Notice now that God is the enemy towards Job.

VERSES 21b-22

1. Job is overwhelmed in this trial because he doesn't understand why this is happening to him. Understand that as you go through difficult times you won't always know why. Because of that you have to fall back on what you know of God. Not only that He is all powerful, but that He is a God of love. He is a God of goodness and He wants what is best for our life. God was teaching Job, as He teaches us, to walk by faith and not by sight, so that our faith, like Job's faith, can grow. It is not always easy, but it is necessary. Listen to what Paul said to the church in Thessalonica on how their faith was growing. He said in II Thessalonians 1:3-5 "We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is fitting, because your faith grows exceedingly, and the love of every one of you all abounds toward each other, so that we ourselves boast of you among the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that you endure, which is manifest evidence of the righteous judgment of God, that you may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you also suffer."

2. As Job concludes his words, his third friend, Zophar begins to speak and argue against Job's claims of innocence before God.