If you want to become a good hockey player, you’ll want to spend time watching elite players like Sydney Crosby. If you want to become a great artist, you’ll want to study the works of Van Goh and Rembrandt. Where should you turn though if you want to figure out how best to survive life’s challenges? You could pick up a book about a holocaust survivor or someone who lived through the Great Depression, but we have a better resource than that. We have the Bible. This book not only tells us how to survive life’s challenges, it helps us make some sense of the suffering that we may have to endure. In the pages of Scripture there is perhaps no greater survivor than Job. As we take a look at his life this morning we’ll learn how to survive life’s challenges as we consider Satan’s goal, and as we consider God’s control.
We’re not really sure when Job lived though it may have been about the same time as Abraham, 4,000 years ago. Job seemed to make his home on the southeast border of what is today Israel. We do know that he was a believer in the one true God. He was also rich and well respected. Everything Job touched seemed to turn to gold. Job’s family life was good too. His ten adult children enjoyed spending time together and were a source of pride for their father.
That all changed, however, when Satan came into God’s presence one day. We don’t know why God allowed this or why God would initiate a conversation with this fallen angel, but he did. After hearing Satan say that he had come from roaming the earth God said to him: “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil” (Job 1:8). Note well that it was NOT Satan who brought up Job as a conversation piece; God did! God sounds like a proud general who says to the commander of the opposing army: “Have you seen the fort we’ve built on our border? Pretty impressive eh?”
If God was trying to get a rise out of Satan, he succeeded. In fact the question was probably designed for that very reason so that we would get a glimpse of what Satan is really all about. When Satan made his debut on the pages of Scripture, he acted like a friend and confidant to Adam and Eve when he suggested that eating the forbidden fruit would give them greater happiness, not bring death and sorrow. But here in Job’s case there is no pretense. Satan clearly cared nothing for Job. Listen to what he said. “Does Job fear God for nothing? 10Have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has? You have blessed the work of his hands, so that his flocks and herds are spread throughout the land. 11 But stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face” (Job 1:9-11).
Friends, if Satan and God were to have a conversation about you, how would that conversation play out? Who would talk about you like a proud father? Not Satan. His goal is to demean and dehumanize you. Satan hates that you are God’s crown of creation. Think of that next time he comes calling and tempts you to do something you know to be wrong. Why listen to him? He may act like your friend, but he’s not. His goal is to destroy your relationship with God because he knows that this will extinguish your chance for eternal happiness, as surely as a puff of air will extinguish a burning candle.
But would God really speak about you the way he spoke about Job? Would he brag about your goodness and how you always turn away from evil? You know God would be lying if he said that about you…or would he? You see this is the amazing truth which only the Bible offers. When God looks at you, he sees his Son Jesus about whom he said: “This is my Son whom I love. With him I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17). We’re certain God sees us this way because the Apostle Paul said that in baptism we have been clothed with Christ (Galatians 3:27). All your sins are hidden by Jesus, and all of his goodness is what God sees when he looks at you. That’s why God accepts you as a favored child.
It’s this relationship, however, that Satan wants to destroy, and what chance do we have against him? Well, listen to how the conversation between God and Satan continued. God said to the Devil, “Very well, then, everything [Job] has is in your hands, but on the man himself do not lay a finger” (Job 1:12). How can we survive life’s challenges when we have a powerful enemy in the person of Satan? We can survive because we have an even more powerful friend in God who sets clear boundaries that Satan cannot cross.
Of course those boundaries may not be where we would like them to be. Look at what happened to Job. Satan went out from God’s presence to make Job’s life miserable and in one day Job lost all his oxen and donkeys, his sheep, and all his camels. They were either destroyed or captured in separate raids and disasters. In spite of his diversified investments, Job suddenly found himself a poor man. The lesson here is that we ought not think that we can somehow escape life’s challenges if we’re wise with our investments and smart about what we eat. The truth is if Satan wants to take it all from us, and if God allows him to do so, there’s nothing we can do to prevent that.
But note well what Satan’s goal was with Job. He wasn’t just trying to make him dirt poor and miserable; he was trying to get this believer to curse God. That’s always Satan’s goal. So the worst thing that can happen to us is not bankruptcy. Unbelievers may see that as the end of the world, but we will not. The worst that can happen is that we lose our faith and trust in God’s control.
Of course there are many unbelievers who will say that as long as they have health and family, they wouldn’t panic if they lost all their worldly possessions. Well, listen to what Satan did next to Job. After Job had received the reports about the lost livestock, a servant ran in to tell him that a violent storm had struck the house where Job’s ten children were gathered and they had all died when the structure collapsed. Amazingly no expletive escapes Job’s mouth – only words of praise for his God. Job said: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away; may the name of the LORD be praised” (Job 1:21).
How do you explain Job’s reaction? Was he in shock and mumbled what he knew he was supposed to say as a believer but didn’t really mean it? No. Consider how Job expressed his grief: he tore his clothes and shaved his head as the people of his day did when they were really sad. It was only after that Job spoke those words of praise. In other words, he had time to think about his situation and the conclusion he came to was that every blessing he had enjoyed had been a gift from God. And if God wanted take it away, that was his right to do so. Job’s role in life was simply to continue praising this God even if he didn’t always understand his ways.
Job’s reaction is so amazing that it’s easy to think that we could never react like he did. But we actually have an advantage over Job in the matter. We know about the behind-the-scenes conversation between God and Satan that prompted Job’s misery. We know that Satan can make life miserable for us, and God may allow him to do so but only up to a point, for God will always remain in control. That’s most clear in the case of Jesus. Satan must have cheered when Jesus died on the cross. God’s Son was dead! But this was part of God’s plan to free us from Satan’s grasp forever. Through Jesus’ death our sins are forgiven and therefore no longer does Satan have anything on us. He can accuse us of our sins until he’s blue in the face, but Jesus will keep pointing to the red blood he shed in our place – blood which has washed away our sentence of damnation away as surely as a pressure washer will blast the grime off the side of your house.
Although we are dearly loved children of God we will still have to suffer in life. One reason for this is explained well by one of Job’s friends who said that God opens the ear by adversity (Job 36:15). Like a fire alarm piercing the midnight silence, adversity will grab our attention and it ought to lead us to ask: “What am I doing here? What’s life all about anyway? It’s not going to last forever. So what’s next? And how do I prepare for it?” The Bible has the answer to all of those questions. Life is about praising and glorifying the God who made and put us here. But this God also wants us to take us from this world so that we may live with him forever without the violence of sin intruding on life and tearing families and friendships apart. Job believed that this was God’s plan for him too and he expressed his confidence with those well-known words: “I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth. 26 And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God” (Job 19:25, 26). Because Jesus, our Redeemer does indeed live, with his help and grace we too will survive life’s challenges with the confidence that Job expressed. Amen.
SERMON NOTES
List at least three facts about Job.
How did Satan’s conversation with God about Job reveal that evil angel’s true colors?
God spoke highly of Job proclaiming him to be upright and a man who always shunned evil. How does baptism give you the confidence that God says the same things about you?
In one day Job lost his wealth. And this in spite of having diversified investments to guard against such a calamity! What warning does this give us today about our attitude towards wealth?
When Job suffered, he didn’t curse God but continued to praise him. How was this possible? What will help us make a confession like Job’s when we suffer?
