inLWNK8_VvU

Okay. Tonight we will be in the book of Job, starting in chapter one. Before I begin in earnest, though, I will insert another tidbit, a plug, if you will, for Route 66. If you're not familiar, during the school year, we have over at the Baptist Student Ministry, formerly the BSU, which is on that north great row over there by campus.

Every morning from 6 to 7:30, we dedicate time to go through the Bible. And starting on the 16th, we reboot that for the semester, and we are starting in the book of Job, and I will be leading that study. If you are part of that, by the way, you're going to hear just a little bit of this twice.

So, oh well. But for the rest of you, this I have gone on the record a number of times saying this is my favorite book of the Bible. I say that without reservation. Now, if you want to know the full in-depth understanding of why you have to come to Route 66, but I'm going to give you just a Little taste of it tonight, why I enjoy this book.

And we're going to look, we're going to kind of look at a number of places throughout the book, but focusing in on chapter 1, verses 1 through 5. So without any further belaborment, let's go into reading God's Word. Job chapter 1, the first 5 verses. There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job.

And that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and shunned evil. And seven sons and three daughters were born to him. Also, his possessions were 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, 500 female donkeys, and a very large household, so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the East.

And his sons would go and feast in their houses, each on his appointed day, and would send and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. So it was, when the days of feasting had run their course, that Job would send and sanctify them, and he would rise early in the morning and offer burnt offerings according to the number of them all.

For Job said, It may be that my sons have sinned and cursed God in their hearts. Thus Job did regularly. And so opens the book. And one of the first tasks, if you take on a whole book and trying to understand it, is what is the theme, what is the overall...

Pastor Tom uses the phrase, and I like it a lot, the curtain rod on which the curtain hangs, through which you can understand the entirety of the book. How can I understand this book? And there's many different ways. It answers, and it's one of the reasons I like it so much.

It answers virtually any question you have. It's somewhere in the book. It may not be exhaustive, but some portion of this book is going to touch just about anything you could come up with. So coming up with a centralized theme is a little bit difficult. There are a number of things I could say, a number of questions, practical life issues that this book is going to address and answer.

But if I'm just going off of the way, it starts. If I'm just looking at this introduction, there once was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job. This is a book answering the question, who is Job? It's going to go on throughout this whole book.

And you see, God has a particular interest in this man, and because of that, Satan has a particular interest in this man. And we are going to watch this man for quite some time, seeing how he lives life and how he reacts to his circumstances, watching a man named Job.

Now, if that is the question, who is Job? These first five verses give us the standard answer you might give for any introduction to anybody. The standard introduction you might give when you first meet somebody. Hello, my name is Matthew Jones. I'm from Texas. I'm a family man.

I've got four kids, and this is what I do for a living, and this is, you know, a little bit of my background. Pretty standard, just how we all tend to speak of ourselves. This is how it starts with this man. Interestingly enough, however, as soon as it builds this introduction, it's going to go right about the business of destroying everything about that introduction.

It introduces who this man is and then undoes everything categorically. One of the interesting features of this book is that it is poetry. It is an epic poem, if you will, but it is poetry nonetheless in its form. So you have to pay close attention to the form.

And it's going to set out in these verses: this is who the man is. And then in equal measure, but then he wasn't. And that's tonight what I want to look at. Who is Job? And then what happens? We're going to do this on five categories. The first is in verse one, right off the bat.

A man in the land of Uz. Now, a little bit of background here. Uz is both a place and a person's name. You've seen in the genealogies, there's some debate on exactly where Uz is or was. Jeremiah 25, 20 also mentions it. In any case, it is east of modern-day Israel.

It could be further north or further south. I tend to think it is further south than what we would see as Edom, more or less. Can't say that with absolute certainty, but I think Jeremiah 25, 20 being a prime example, can give that. As our understanding. Now, that's a mixed land.

You see it in the Jeremiah reference. But we also know from historical record in general, there was no single large empire that would have encompassed this land. You had kingdoms. You had several kings and smaller city-states and collections of cities in this area. But Job, notably, is not a nomad.

He is settled where he is. He is from the land of Uz, and he doesn't just wander around this general geographic. This is more in line with the idea of a nation, a state. It may not have been an empire, but it was a nation. We can see this, despite the fact that he had huge herds, which would have encompassed enormous tracts of land, he nonetheless has houses.

And we see in other parts of the book that he sat at the gates of a city which was nearby. He was settled, and he had his own home country, much like we do. He was a citizen, so to speak. And as a citizen, not only a citizen, but the principal citizen, they had protections.

The role of any nation is To or should be to protect its people. And most nations, fairly or unfairly, most would say unfairly, but simply a fact, the more prominent members seem to get more prominent protections. In fact, I dare say, if there was any citizen in this land who would have been protected, it would have been Job.

He was not only of the land, just incidentally, but he was probably the defining member of, and the society largely built around him. However, this is how he introduces himself. He's from the land of Uz, but notice it's immediately undone. In chapter 1, verses 13 to 15. Now there was a day when his sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother's house.

And a messenger came to Job and said, The oxen were plowing and the donkeys feeding beside them. When the Sabaeans raided them and took them away, indeed they have killed the servants with the edge of the sword, and I alone have escaped to tell you. While he was still speaking, another also came and said, The fire of the Lord fell from heaven, burned up the sheep and the servants, and consumed them.

I alone have escaped to tell you. While he was still speaking, another also came and said, The Chaldeans formed three bands, raided the camels. And took them away, yes, and killed the servants with the edge of the sword. I alone have escaped to tell you. If you're not familiar with the book of Job, the part I skipped between our text and these is that Satan is going to be trying Job to see if he'll curse God.

And one of the ways he does this is through these people, the Sabaeans and the Chaldeans. Now, I told you a little bit about us very shortly. The Sabaeans or the people of Sheba, the same as the queen of Sheba. And the Chaldeans, so the Sabaeans, first of all, they're from South Arabia, the southwest portion of Arabia.

The Chaldeans are from the east and the eastern Levant. These are not nations, these are people groups. They tended towards certain geographic areas, but generally speaking, it's better to think of them as peoples. And both of them, nomadic raiders. Opposed to nations, if you will. Raiders of nations.

Chaldeans, by the way, if you would like to know more about them, them, the Chaldeans are the base people group from whom the Assyrians and Babylonians would come. And if you'd like a description which describes what kind of people they were, go read the book of Habakkuk. In short, not very nice people.

So he claims nationality and citizenship in us, and these other peoples come in and destroy everything he's got. His nation has failed in its number one task for its number one citizen to protect him. They did not do anything to prevent this from happening. They have failed him.

Allow me to immediately draw application for us. You see, I am an American. I am very glad to be an American, and I have a great appreciation for this nation, our history. However, I am not first and foremost an American. That is not the identity that I place above everything else.

If I were to suddenly stop being an American, I would not stop being Matthew Jones. If suddenly some other nation were to take over, all of our best efforts notwithstanding, I wouldn't suddenly crumble and be unable to continue. Many of us, again, great nation founded on great principles.

But many of us have tended to put that above everything else. What if it ended tomorrow? Or, more likely, it continues, but not as we have always known it. And I suggest to you, if you haven't been paying attention, that's very much the case. I would point you to primary example, COVID.

Real life examples, how this nation has handled it, the attack that we saw on the church and the people of the church. The churches that were prevented from meeting, fortunately, not this church, but many churches across the nation. People, not necessarily here, but in Canada, in great numbers, and I believe a few here, I could be mistaken, thrown in jail.

As part of the military, we had tens of thousands of applications put in for excusal from the vaccine. While it was the military's prerogative, and don't get me wrong on that, they have the ability not to grant excusals from that, they chose to advertise, and I was part of receiving the applications to get out of those vaccines, and yet, after making a big to-do and doing a lot of PR over their granting of exemptions, then went on to deny every single one of them, tens of thousands.

And you can take it from me as one who handled those. Some of them were from people who had been excused from other vaccines as a matter of religious course. So, no, it wasn't people that just up and decided. These were people who lived life consistently. It may or may not have touched you, but I think it was a warning.

Someday, things perhaps more serious than just COVID and just the things that we have seen recently may come. And it may not be people you're reading about, it may not be people that you're loosely associated with, it might be you and me directly, personally, who suddenly the nation turns on you.

And then the nation you have identified your whole life with as an American stands. Standing for the United States, perhaps serving in many different capacities, no longer is there to protect you. What happens to your identity then? Who are you? How will you introduce yourself? It doesn't stop there.

Next, verse 2. Seven sons and three daughters, children, a family. He's introduced as a family man. Two things I'd like to bring up on this and who Job was. First of all, he was a man with a secure legacy, a secure legacy. Having seven sons meant that no matter what happened, his name, and perhaps more importantly, everything that he had accrued would continue for the support of his wife and some of the others in his family.

The social programs we have come to enjoy in this nation, whatever you may think of them, we benefit from them. And those did not always exist in every culture. If you wanted, legacy was not just about a good name. And this is important. We forget sometimes how important this might be.

In order to Secure safety for his family members, he had to have men legally to whom he could pass his property so that through that property there would be financial backing to protect those he loved. Because of his sons, he was able to ensure that everyone he loved would be safe financially, would be safe and secure, that they would be well taken care of with or without him.

He did not have to be there. Through his seven sons, he had ensured not just his name, his line, but safety. Not only that, he wasn't just a father biologically, but he was a loving father. If you look in verse four and five, first of all, he was a father who set a good example.

In verse four, and there's some who would suggest there's something nefarious in verse four. I don't see reason for that. Instead, he had children who loved each other, who got along, and presumably through his example, were able to live life as a family the way a family should, not with division, not with infighting, not with squabbling, but instead with genuine love.

And the only Thing that can be drawn from that is that it is indicative of a great father who lived the talk, who walked it and showed it and taught it to his children. And if that's ever in doubt, verse 5 makes it clear. He was a loving father who is willing to sacrifice, these are adult children, and yet he is willing to sacrifice his own in order to sacrifice for them and to protect them on a religious front, to pray for them, to intercede for them.

In short, he loved them and cared about their well-being. They weren't just his children. He wasn't just a father. He was a good father. And yet, look with me, chapter 1, verse 19. And suddenly a great wind came from across the wilderness and struck the four corners of the house, and it fell on the young people, and they are dead.

I alone have escaped to tell you. All of his children gone. Like that, immediately. A lot of us, if you are like me, you are very strongly tempted to put your identity in family. You put your identity in children. Not all of you know, some of you may.

My middle name. My middle name is Earl. I am the third generation Earl. My son, my firstborn, is also an Earl. He is the fourth generation Earl. Jones is a great name. There's a lot of us, but sure, it's a great name. But I didn't choose the name Jones, nor did any of my family.

I chose the name Earl. I enjoy that name, and I passed it down to my kids. I enjoy my family, and that's one of the blessings that I have enjoyed personally as a close-knit family. I identify and put special energy and effort into trying to live up to my father and my grandfather and their examples so that I won't be the generation who failed, so that I won't be the generation in which this cohesiveness we have as a family is suddenly ripped apart.

I identify as a father. But what happens if they are taken from me? Twenty-five percent If the statistics I looked up are to be trusted, 25% of newly empty nesters will end in divorce. This is after the first five years, the newlywed phase. This is the second largest group of divorcees in America.

If you survive the first few years, it's after the kids leave that marriages will fail. Why? Well, there's many, perhaps, reasons, and there's many things that could go into that, but the most oftenly considered thought is that they are hanging on for the children because they identify with the children, and once they're gone, they lose that sense of purpose and that identity.

You see, we can't draw who we are as people from our children. They are important, they are a calling, but they are not who you are. That is not our identity as people. Job is introduced as a father, but then he has that stripped away from him almost immediately after we meet him.

What would you do? Next, verse 3. His possessions. Now, I didn't, I did a long time ago, but in preparing for tonight, I didn't do the math, but according to one source, if you added up these animals at today's prices, just the market price to buy these animals, it would be somewhere in the vicinity of $200 million.

But you can't just have the animals. See, if you're going to watch and care and tend to these animals, you're going to have to have land, equipment. We've already seen an indication of the houses. That's all, you know, houses for his kids. It doesn't mention any other houses, but it's 10 houses.

And all of the servants who were taking care of it, you would have easily, by some estimates, be pushing into the tens of billions of dollars. And I thought about it tonight. I would like to go back now and do a comparison to Abraham. Abraham would have been a rough, by my estimation, again, some discussion on the matter, but by my estimation, a rough contemporary.

And if you look at his life and the land that he was Requiring to keep up with his animals. And you look at Lot, and they had to split ways because the land couldn't support them and the the abundance of animals that they have had. So the the amount of land just would have been absolutely tremendous.

And even if the land was much more fertile then than it is now, uh if if you look now uh at uh especially this part of the world and how sparse the vegetation is, uh unbelievable amount of land. And in any case, if you look at tens of billions of dollars, that would put him, by today's money, into the top fifty, if not the top twenty, wealthiest individuals on earth.

By any estimation, any way you cut it, there are no goodies he would have been deprived of. We look at King Solomon, we look at Ecclesiastes, and what he has to say there about what he was able to do if he and when he set his mind to it.

Anything Job wanted, he could have. But notice, again, as I already read, verse 13 through 17, categorically, every line of verse 3, he loses it. The sheep, the camels, the oxen, the donkeys. Animal for animal, categorically one at a time, he loses all of it. Every single one.

Definitively gone. And that's where his wealth was. There was no central bank. His wealth was in his possessions. His possessions were gone. Now, perhaps nobody in here is a billionaire. I know one of y'all is hiding it really well. But I dare say all of us struggle on the issue of stuff.

I was telling some people this morning, my granddaddy just moved into an assisted living. He moved, he was a CEO. He lived frugally, but he had the means. He moved from a 6,000-square-foot house into approximately a 600-square-foot house, the place. Purging that house, and most of it, obviously he got rid of it.

There was amazing heartache. Again, the family was not fighting, but trying to secure and protect the family heirlooms, the family records, the family, you name it, all the things that had been important to. Him, but not just him, the whole family. And not all of us had places to put it, but it's just hard to let go of some of those memories because everything is tied to memories.

It's like I was mentioning, he was living in that house for about 30 years. And I have only limited memories of any other place. And in that 30 years, he'd never redecorated it. It was always the same, consistent. So every hallway, in my mind, I can walk that entire house and see every single thing and where it went and where it goes.

Even if you're not captivated by money and excesses of wealth, I dare say that we tend to have things that are hard to imagine life without. Things, stuff that it's hard to imagine life without. And it becomes our identity. I'll break the thought for just a second. I can't help myself because my thought goes to Madame Blueberry here.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, talk to me afterwards. All right. So. Veggie Tales, Madam Blueberry. By the way, there's a song in that Veggie Tales that's like stuff, Mark. And I heard, believe it or not, I think it was Amazon, some kind of jingle they just came out with about stuff.

And it was almost the same song to a different tune. But we're captivated in this nation with stuff. It is easy and quick. We could lose all of it. Whether you have a lot or you have a little, think of that thing or those things to which you are attached.

What happens when you lose it? Also in verse 3, and closely associated with wealth is greatness. He is the greatest of all the people of the East. I think that every word of Scripture is there for a reason. It didn't say he was extremely wealthy, and then turn around and say, again, he was extremely wealthy.

Yes, this is tied and related to his wealth, but this is different from his wealth. You see, as a wealthy individual, he associated with the wealthy, with the kings, with people of power. In Job 29, verse 7, Job seemingly sat as a judge or an administrator of governments.

In that same chapter, 29, verse 21 through 25, Job was also. Considered an intellectual. Funny, by the way, how famous people who can be dumb as rocks are considered intellectual just because they're famous. But that's another topic. Anyway, he was the intellectual kingpin. Everyone got their cues from Job.

He was given deference by all. And yet, in chapter 30, verse 1, he describes how now instead, having been in the seat of power and influence, now he is laughed at, ridiculed, and disdained. Not only that, but he is disdained by the humblest of society, the meanest of people.

He has no influence whatsoever. Not only did he lose his possessions, not only did he lose his family, not only did his nation abandon him in time of need, but his nation and his people and the surrounding peoples abandoned him in his influence. They ridiculed him. They mocked him.

Now, I don't know about you, but it is very difficult for me to sit by patiently, nicely, and smile at somebody who's Mocking me to my face. I try. God tells me to turn the other cheek, but it is difficult because I have this thing. It's called a sense of pride, which, oddly enough, comes before a fall.

And we all have this thing called pride. And we all get just a little bit ruffled when people begin to belittle us with little passe remarks, with little cutting words. And you know, I don't have to be king of the world or on top of it all, but I like to get my dues.

And you mean they're talking about me behind my back? You mean to tell me they're they're saying this? You mean to tell me that they had the gall to come out and say that to my face? What happens when suddenly everybody treats you like an absolute idiot? Is your identity in the respect that people give you?

Because I have some bad news for you. If you're a Christian, you're going to be mocked. And unfortunately, what's more, it shouldn't be this way. No doubt. But because we are all humans in this room, there's times when, as brothers and sisters, we'll fail each other too. What's going to happen when that respect that you have garnered over years of service is stripped from you and people are talking about you and your reputation is in tatters, maybe unfairly, over something you didn't even do.

Is your identity in what people think about you? Lastly, verse 5. He was a spiritual leader. He did not do the bare minimum. He sacrificed when it was unnecessary. That's the idea in verse 5. This was not normal sacrifices. This was not part of the rituals that were called for.

In fact, in Yags, we've been talking about the Mosaic law this morning. We talked about the temple and expectations there. This is before any of that law was given. At least that's the indications. And yet, he acted out of love for God, not by the letter of the law.

He wasn't doing what he had to do, he was not checking the box. He was sacrificing out of love for God. Above and beyond, when he did not have to, he demonstrated what it means to be a faithful follower of Christ through his actions. He was a spiritual leader.

Now, when his wife speaks to him in chapter 2, verses 9 and 10, I'll just read it. His wife said to him, Do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die. But he said to her, You speak as one of the foolish women speaks. Shall we indeed accept good from God, and shall we not accept adversity?

In all this, Job did not sin with his lips. Perhaps there's some semblance of leadership still left there. You can debate that idea. You'll note that she came to him. But I'll point you, not but a few verses later, to chapter 3, verse 3. Some beginning, I should say, a long section of some of the most poignant wording of suffering ever penned.

May the day perish on which I was born, and the night in which it was said a male child is conceived. This man was done. He was done. Devastated, cracked, broken, destroyed in every sense, utterly broken. He is not leading anyone anymore. He is sitting in an ash heap silently for seven days, after which he spends the remainder of this book until the last little bit bemoaning his condition and little else.

The man is not a spiritual leader at this point in his life. He is just surviving and barely that. You see, any role, there's no service left. He's not serving God or church. He is not doing anything. Any role he had in spiritual service is done with. What about us?

Is our identity what we do for the church? Is our ident and hear that emphasis there? Is our identity what we do for the church? Because, brothers and sisters, just like everything else, that can also be taken away very quickly. Those are the five things: his nation, his children, his wealth, his greatness, and his position of spiritual leadership.

Who then is Job? We got the introduction, chapter 1, first five verses. This is Job. And then he loses all of it. Well, not quite, because if you are perceptive, you'll note that I skipped over just a little bit. Look back at the very beginning with me again.

First chapter, verse 1. There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and that man was blameless and upright, and one who feared God and shunned evil. Well, perhaps he lost that too. Let's look. Let's consider. Look at verse 8, chapter 1. Then the Lord said to Satan, Have you considered my servant Job that there is none like him on the earth?

A blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil. Well, okay, but that's not the end of the matter, is it? No. Look at chapter 2, verse 3. He just lost all his stuff. Satan's about to try to attack the man himself. And then here we have in verse 3: then the Lord said to Satan, have you?

You considered my servant Job? That there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil. And that's not the end of the story either. There's a phrase in this book, Who is this? Who is this? You see it given in chapter 38, verse 2, and chapter 42, verse 3.

The first, God is questioning Job. He says, Who is this? Speaking of Job. In 42, verse 3, Job responds, You asked, and here is my answer. And he gives it. I'm not going to focus on that. I would encourage you to go back and look at it. Because then God responds in 42, 8 through 10.

In a way, you can almost miss it if you're not paying close attention. 42, verses 8 through 10, and again, I will not read it, but you'll notice twice. He says in verse 8, my servant Job, in verse 9, for the Lord has accepted Job. Who is Job?

Job. Job is a servant who fears God. And Job is a servant who is accepted by God. This whole book, at the beginning, I said there's many ways you could look at understanding this book. This whole book is one man, Job, and understanding who he is and how he lives.

And throughout this entire book, he is tried. And at the end of it, after being tried, he is a man who fears God and is accepted by God. Then and only then, not before, he gets back all the other tangential things, all the other stuff. Blessings, no doubt.

Wonderful things, no doubt, but that's not who he is. He is only defined by one thing. That's his relationship with God Almighty. So I ask you, everyone in here tonight, who are you? Let us all ask that. Who am I? Am I stuff, things, relationships with people and influence and whatnot?

Or am I a beloved of God? Almighty. Let's pray. Dear Lord, I pray that we will find our identity in you. I pray that our being, our everything will be entirely captivated, wrapped up, and encapsulated by your identity and our relationship to you. That nothing else will creep in and take away who we are.

I pray that at the end of the day, we will realize this, know who we are, and stand firm, that we will fear you and know our acceptance by you as a saving God. And I thank you for that. In Jesus' name, amen.