Teaching Notes

TH1088: JOB

We saw last week, that as Elihu was finishing up his words against Job, a huge storm was forming in the distance. And Elihu drew some illustrations from this storm and related it to God. And as Elihu finishes we have come to the end of 35 chapters of man's best attempt to try and understand the ways and whys of God. And now for four chapters God is going to speak. And what is interesting in this section is that God does not give Job, or us, the ways or whys of what He is doing. In fact he asks Job a series of some 70 questions, and in the end, God's answer is far more important than us understanding the ways or whys of God.

Now as this storm approaches, as this whirlwind gets closer, God is going to speak as we begin our study this evening in Job chapter 38.

JOB 38

VERSES 1-2

1. Even though there was some truth in what Job and his friends had to say, there was also a lot spoken that came from human wisdom. They spoke of things they had no understanding, no knowledge of and yet they spoke with such conviction in their error.

VERSE 3

1. Job wanted to ask God some questions, but here we see God turn the tables and God will ask Job some questions. Why? I think to get Job re-focused. He has been looking and developing his ideas of God through life's situations instead of falling back on the truths of God. His picture of God was clouded over by life's circumstances and God is going to clear things up for Job.

VERSES 4-7

1. God is asking Job if he was around when the earth was created. The angels were and shouted for joy at what God had done. But Job was not around. When I read or listen to what evolutionists have to say regarding the formation of the world, they are speaking forth without knowledge. They were not around and yet they speak as if they were. And they form their ideas based on the assumption that there is no God and things just happen through a series of random processes. But by the time we finish listening to what God has to say to Job, we will see that He is actively involved in creation and everything that has taken place since that time.

2. Today we do know the measurement of the earth. It is 24,901.55 miles in circumference at the equator and its diameter is 7,926.41 miles at the equator. And yet we know so little as God is going to show us.

VERSES 8-11

1. God has set the boundaries for the waters without the help of Job. Again, God is trying to get Job to take his eyes off of the circumstances he finds himself in, and to look back to his creator, where true help and hope come from.

VERSES 12-15

1. Job was not around when God created the days.

VERSE 16

1. The ancients were not aware of the fresh water springs that are on the ocean floor, nor the channels and pathways located in the depth of the oceans, but God knew.

VERSES 17-18

1. In chapter 3 Job wanted death to come upon him for he saw death as a place of non-existence. And the Seventh-Day Adventist and the Jehovah Witnesses pick up on this and formulate the doctrine of soul sleep. Wrong! God rebukes Job for speaking about something he knows nothing about. If you want a clear picture of what death is, look at Luke chapter 16. In that section you will see that in death their is consciousness, feelings, for both the saved and unsaved. Only for the unsaved they will feel pain and suffering. No soul sleep!

VERSES 19-20

1. What happens to the darkness when the lights go on? God knows!

VERSES 21-23

1. God uses the elements of nature to bring about His will. Remember in Judges chapter 5 how Barak defeated the army of Sisera as God caused a torrential rainfall, causing their chariots to be stuck in the mud, and thus, they had to flee on foot. In Joshua chapter 10, God caused hailstones to fall from the sky destroying the Amorites. And in I Samuel chapter 7 God used thunder to confuse the Philistines, giving Israel the victory.

VERSE 24

1. We know today that light can be divided into the light spectrum, but how did they know this back then? God knew for He created the light!

VERSES 25-27

1. God is saying that He waters the wilderness causing the vegetation to grow.

VERSES 28-30

1. God is actively involved with every aspect of His creation. He did not just create life and watch what would happen as the deist believe.

VERSES 31-32

1. The Pleiades and Orion are winter constellations. The Great Bear or Arcturus is the fourth brightest star in the sky and is only some 36 light years away from us. Now that sounds pretty close but when you calculate out that light travels at 186,000 miles per second and in 1 year it would come to around 6 trillion miles, that makes it very far away. The sun is 864,000 miles in diameter and contains 335 quadrillion cubic miles of violently hot gases with a core temperature of 27 million degrees Fahrenheit. So if you are planning a trip to the sun, get your sun screen out! Now Arcturus is 30 times larger than our sun and 80 times brighter. And I love this, it travels at 250,000 miles per hour, and God is asking Job if he could guide this star. "Don't hit anything while your driving Job!"

VERSES 33-34

1. Job could not make it rain, but God can and does.

VERSES 35-38

1. God is in control. What a comfort that is when life seems to be spinning out of control.

VERSES 39-41

1. God provides food for the various animals, even those that Job would not go near. As Jesus said in Luke 12:24 "Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap, which have neither storehouse nor barn; and God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds?"

JOB 39

VERSES 1-4

1. Again God points to nature and how the animals give birth without the knowledge of Job, but God is aware. The mountain goat maybe the Nubian Ibex who does hide when they give birth and even today very few have seen the birth of an Ibex.

VERSES 5-8

1. The onager is a wild donkey, and God is saying He cares for all of them. It is as the Psalmist said in Psalm 50:10-11 "For every beast of the forest is Mine, And the cattle on a thousand hills. I know all the birds of the mountains, And the wild beasts of the field are Mine."

VERSES 9-12

1. This wild ox could be the Auroch which became extinct in 1627. This creature refused to be domesticated. It was fierce and it was huge, just a little smaller than an elephant. And God is saying to Job, "If you can't stand before My creation, if you can't handle him, how can you stand before Me?"

VERSES 13-18

1. The ostrich can stand 7 to 8 feet tall, weighing up to 300 pounds and is able to run at speeds of 40 mph. And yet, I hate to be blunt, but they are stupid. They will walk over their eggs and crush them. They think by hiding their heads in the sand their enemy will not see them. Why do they do these things? Because God did not give them wisdom. So when you see an ostrich with that dumb look on their face, you will know that they are not just faking it!

VERSES 19-25

1. The horse was made for battle, it seems to enjoy a good fight.

VERSE 26

1. Not only the hawk, but the migration of birds is a interesting subject. Some birds fly south for the winter months - pretty smart if you ask me. The Golden Plover travels some 8,000 miles from the Hudson Bay region, and winters in Argentina. The Barn Swallow migrates a distance of 9,000 miles from Northern Canada to Argentina. The Arctic Tern migrates a distance of 14,000 miles traveling from pole to pole and back. And even in storms they can travel without getting lost. That is pretty good considering I can get lost on a sunny day using a map. How do they know where to go? God has programmed this into their minds.

VERSES 27-30

1. God speaks of the eagle making its nest high up and being able to see its prey from great distances.

JOB 40

VERSES 1-2

1. Job was coming against God in what he did not understand. It did not make Job's actions right, nor does it make our actions right when we contend against God. Job is now going to answer God, not in pride, but in brokeness.

VERSES 3-5

1. Job had much to say before, when his eyes were focused on his situation. But now that God has his attention, and his eyes are focused upon God, he has very little to say. He rightly recognized his error and he saw himself in the light of God and now he is ready to listen to God. It is as Proverbs 10:19 says "In the multitude of words sin is not lacking, But he who restrains his lips is wise."

VERSES 6-8

1. Job did try to make himself right and thus God was wrong. Job did not feel he deserved what God was doing to him. We see that today. People do not want to be responsible for their own actions. Many even blame God for their actions, like homosexuals, and-so-on.

VERSES 9-14

1. God is telling Job, if he could do all these things, then he can save himself. Obviously Job could not do any of those things, and he could not save himself, just as we can't save ourselves. As Peter said in Acts 4:12 "Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved."

VERSES 15-24

1. My Bible has a footnote saying that this Behemoth, its "identity [is] unknown". Some may translate it as being a elephant, rhinoceros, water buffalo, or hippopotamus, which are all wrong, and I will show you why. First of all this creature lived with man, was created with man. It was a land animal that also lived in the water, the marsh. It was also a herbivore or ate grass. It was also a massive creature that had a tail like a cedar tree. Now knowing that and what the tails of the various animals we mentioned are like, they can all be excluded. Now I do think we can know what this animal is, and I think it is a dinosaur.

Now I can't say this with 100% accuracy, but it seems from the description that is given that the Behemoth was either a Brachiosaurus or a Apatosaurs. And yes man and dinosaurs did live together, there was not 65 million years between them as evolutionists say. In the Paluxy River Valley, near Glen Rose Texas, we have dinosaur footprints side-by-side with human footprints. The Dallas Crime Lab Forensic Department came to the conclusion that the human footprints were indeed human, without a doubt.

Now you may think that my explanation for Behemoth is wild, wait to you hear what this creature known as Leviathan is all about in chapter 41.

JOB 41

VERSES 1-5

1. God is asking Job if he would bring this creature home as a pet and play with it? I don't think so! Again, my Bible says that this Leviathan was "a large creature, identity unknown". Some of your Bibles may say that he is a crocodile or even a whale, but as we will see, that does not fit with what is spoken of this creature.

VERSES 6-11

1. If Job can't stand against this creature then how can he stand against God who created this creature? He can't!

VERSES 12-21

1. Here is the key to who Leviathan is. Besides having lots of teeth and scales like armor, he has something that separates him from any creature that is living today. This creature is able to breath fire out of his mouth. Thus, Leviathan most likely is a fire breathing dragon that lives in the sea. Now for some of you that is hard to believe. But do you believe that there is a creature that can defend itself by sending forth s stream of noxious spray that shoots forth at the boiling point of water, leaving its predator gasping behind? This creature is known as the bombardier beetle. We also have fireflies, electric eels and-so-on, that if someone had to try and explain them, they may find it hard to believe.

And I don't think that all dinosaurs are extinct. Some have survived the cataclysmic changes that took place after the flood. Many make fun of the Loch Ness Monster that has been reported for the last 1,400 years with over 3,000 sightings. Back in 1977, off the coast of New Zealand, a Japanese fishing crew hauled into their boat a creature that was 30 feet long with a husky neck some 5 feet long, weighing some 4,000 pounds. This dead creature that they studied and took pictures of looks very much like a dinosaur known as the Plesiosaur's. And this creature looks very similar to the Loch Ness monster. The only problem is that this creature was suppose to be extinct some 65 million years ago. But it seems that some are still alive today!

So I believe that Leviathan was a fire breathing dragon that lived in water.

VERSES 22-34

1. Now the last verse of this chapter the wording changes and it seems that the dragon that God is speaking of is the dragon found in the book of Revelation, Satan! "And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great, fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems on his heads. His tail drew a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth...And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him." Revelation 12:3-4, 7-9.

JOB 42

VERSES 1-6

1. Job recognizes his error, that he spoke without knowledge. And he now sees God in the correct light, which places him in the right light. You see, it is one thing to hear God but quite another thing to encounter God. It was this encounter that Job had with God that caused him to see himself as a sinner and he repented of his sin. Remember Isaiah's encounter with God - it lead to the following response by Isaiah "...'Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, The LORD of hosts.'" Isaiah 6:5.

VERSES 7-8

1. These guys did not represent God correctly and God held them accountable for their actions. They reduced God to a cause-and-effect God, and took away His sovereignty. We too must represent God correctly in all we do and all we say- we are His representatives.

VERSE 9

1. In the Hebrew, the word "accepted" can be translated "lifted up". Job was down, depressed, discouraged, and God lifted Job's head, causing Job to look into the eyes of God. The end result, as we will see, is joy and hope returning to Job. As Psalm 3:3 says "But You, O LORD, are a shield for me, My glory and the One who lifts up my head."

VERSE 10

1. When did God bless or restore Job? When he prayed for his friends who blasted him. Why did God do it that way? I think Job had some bitterness, some anger towards his friends as we have seen. But to pray for them he had to let go of that bitterness. God wants to bless us, but what are we holding onto? What bitterness, or anger, or whatever is causing God's blessings from being bestowed upon us?

VERSE 11

1. Talk about your fair weather friends and relatives. After Job is restored, they come to his side. But when he sat upon the dung hill they could not be found. Many Christians do the same. They are not willing to be around during the difficult times but when the blessings flow, it seems that they come out of the woodwork. May we be there in good and bad times to just be a friend to those around us. Galatians 6:1-5 says "Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. But let each one examine his own work, and then he will have rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another. For each one shall bear his own load."

VERSE 12

1. When you compare this with chapter 1 you will find that Job was blessed with twice as many animals.

VERSE 13

1. It seems that he only has the same number of children, but the reality is he has twice as many, for 7 sons and 3 daughters are with the Lord.

VERSE 14

1. Now Jemimah became a very famous aunt - AUNT JEMIMAH!

VERSE 15

1. Job treated his daughters with the same kindness that he treated his sons with.

VERSES 16-17

1. Job's trials began when he was around 70 years old, thus he lived to be 210 years old.

2. What was the answer to Job's question? God never does answer it but He gives him something even more important. He gave Himself to Job. You see, if we can rest totally in God, trust in Him and what He is doing in our life, then it really doesn't matter what comes upon us. We don't need to know the ways and whys of God, for we can rest in Him if we trust in Him! That is what Job found out.