Job’s Prayer Life and Ours.
Job 42:7-10
7 After the LORD had said these things to Job, he said to Eliphaz the Temanite, "I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. 8 So now take seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job and sacrifice a burnt offering for yourselves. My servant Job will pray for you, and I will accept his prayer and not deal with you according to your folly. You have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has." 9 So Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite did what the LORD told them; and the LORD accepted Job’s prayer. 10 After Job had prayed for his friends, the LORD made him prosperous again and gave him twice as much as he had before.
Someone calls the church and leaves a desperate message on the voice mail – will your church pray for us, we are having severe marital problems?
You’re in line at the bank and the teller asks you to pray for her, her mother is dying.
Did you ever wonder why people ask you to pray for them?
Can you remember the last time someone asked you to pray for them and you had every intention in the world of praying for them? Then your schedule got busy and you realize that you forgot to pray for them.
When you think of the great people of prayer in scripture whom do you think of?
Abraham?
Moses?
David?
Elijah?
Daniel?
The Apostle Paul?
Or what about great people of prayer in Christian history since Bible Times.
George Mueller?
Hudson Taylor?
John Hyde?
We probably don’t include Job, but God did.
God recognized Job to be a great man of prayer.
The Book of Job begins with him interceding for his children.
It ends with him interceding for his 3 friends.
Between the two incidents, Job endured intense suffering at the hands of Satan and unjust accusations from his 3 friends.
He had a lot of questions as we have seen over the past several weeks.
I was reading the last chapter of Job a few months ago as I was preparing this series of messages on Job’s Hard Questions and God challenged me in the area of prayer.
Here’s how God challenged me.
As I read that brief account of Job’s Prayer life – some questions came to my mind.
When God sees someone in need of prayer where does He send them?
Will he send them to you?
Is your prayer life such that God can trust you enough to send people in need of prayer your way?
That’s what was going on here with Job’s 3 friends.
They needed prayer so what did God do?
He sent them to nearest person of prayer - Job.
Job 42:8 Now therefore, take for yourselves seven bulls and seven rams, go to My servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering; and My servant Job shall pray for you. For I will accept him, lest I deal with you according to your folly; because you have not spoken of Me what is right, as My servant Job has.”
Why did God send them to Job? Because God recognized Job as a man of prayer.
This is implied in the description of his character in chapter 1.
Look at vv.1-3.
Job 1:1-3 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. 2 And seven sons and three daughters were born to him. 3 Also, his possessions were seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, five hundred female donkeys, and a very large household, so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the East.
When it comes to being a person of prayer character matters.
These verses tell us a number of things about the character of Job –
q He was a man.
q He was blameless.
q He was upright.
q He feared God.
q He shunned evil.
q He was a father.
q He was wealthy.
q He was a great man – One of the greatest that ever lived.
This was God’s estimate of his character. God’s estimate of a man’s character is always right.
God places a tremendous importance on the character of the person whom he would use as person of prayer. 1 Tim. 2:8 – we are to “lift up holy hands in prayer.”
Our status before God is important in being a person of prayer.
God refers to him as “MY servant Job,” 4 x’s in vv.7-8.
Job was a godly man who served God and feared God. Yet he was not exempt from suffering.
Knowing God, Serving God, and Loving God is not an exemption from Suffering. Job is exibit A of that truth in the OT. But suffering in this world doesn’t altar our status before God. He was “MY servant Job before his suffering, and he is still “My servant Job.”
In spite of his intense suffering, in spite of his questions, God still recognized him as “My servant Job.”
God said, “My servant Job will pray for you and I will accept his prayer.” This was Job’s standing and status before God.
Our status before God and our standing in Christ allows us the privilege to approach the throne of Grace in prayer.
What is our status before God and our standing in Christ as a believer?
q We have been washed and redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. The name and the blood of Jesus are our only claim before the throne of grace. We have access through the blood of Christ.
q We are in New Creatures in Christ.
q We are children of God.
q We are saints in Christ Jesus.
God had confidence that if he sent someone to Job in need of prayer that Job would pray for them.
E.M. Bounds that great writer on prayer wrote,
Almighty God knew his servant Job as a man of prayer, and he could afford to send these friends of Job to him to pray in order to carry out and fulfill his plans sand purposes.”
Does God recognize you as a person of prayer?
Watch to see the people he puts in your life that need prayer.
Here’s the Good News –“the Lord accepted Job’s prayer.” Look at v.9.
Job 42:9 So Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite did what the LORD told them; and the LORD accepted Job’s prayer.
Isn’t it great to know that God accepts our prayers.
ON what basis does God accept our prayers?
The text here is important – It literally reads that The Lord accepted Job.
Here’s the point – The Lord accepts us, then our prayers are accepted.
It is in Christ and only in Christ that we find acceptance before God.
No man comes to the Father except through Christ.
We are accepted in the beloved, the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Lord blesses us when we intercede for others. v.10.
Job 42:10And the LORD restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends. Indeed the LORD gave Job twice as much as he had before.
When we intercede God not only blesses those for whom we pray, he blesses us as well.
Note that it was after Job prayed for his friends that God restored his fortunes. God saw that Job’s sufferings had not caused him to become so self-absorbed that he could not pray for others. He prayed for others even while he was still grieving and suffering. He prayed for others before God changed his own situation. His difficulties and unanswered questions had not caused him to give up on God or prayer. Note also that he didn’t strike a bargain with God. God I’ll pray for these if you do this or that. No! Neither did Job look at the men that God was asking to pray for and say, “Nothing doing, these are the guys that have been falsely accusing me and heaping guilt trip on me.” Apparently it was out of a forgiving heart that Job was able to pray for his 3 friends. Job simply prayed for them and God heard, accepted, and answered Job’s prayer.
The apostle Paul modeled the same attitude even while He was in prison in Rome. His prison letters are filled with prayers for other believers.
Listen to what Paul writes to the church at Philippi in Phil. 1
PHP 1:9 And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, 10 so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ--to the glory and praise of God.
Here he is in prison and He’s praying for others. The reason he could do this is because His life was Christ –centered and others oriented in spite of his personal situation.
If we become self-centered God will not bless because if He blessed us he would become a co-dependant of our self-centeredness. God will not become a co-dependant of self-centeredness. It is completely contrary to His nature. God’s desire is that we be Christ centered and others oriented in spite of our personal situation.
Jesus prayed for others while he was on the cross. “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.”
What are you going to do the next time someone asked you to pray for them?
Realize first of all that it is not a coincidence, that God sent them to you.
They in some way recognize that you are a person of prayer.
That person that left the voice mail called back after about a year and thanked our church for praying for them. They testified that God did and miracle in their marriage. They also asked that we pray that God would work a miracle in their finances.
The lady at the bank – We did pray for her.
S.D. Gordon -
The greatest thing anyone can do for God and man is pray. It is not the only thing, but it is the chief thing. The great people of earth are the people who pray. I do not mean those who talk about prayer; nor those who say they believe in prayer; nor yet those who can explain about prayer; but I mean those people who take time to pray. - S. D. Gordon
Job was such a man. Will you be such a person that when God sees someone in need of prayer, he can send them to you.
q Other believers need our prayers.
q Your pastor needs your prayers.
q Missionaries need our prayers.
q Persecuted believers need our prayers.
q Our political leaders need our prayers.
q The Lost need our prayers.
When someone asks you to pray for them that’s God’s invitation to you to join Him in what He is doing in that persons life, to partner with Him in the accomplishing His purpose in the life of the person for whom you are praying.
“My servant __________ will pray for you, and I will accept _________ prayer.”
Can you put your name in the blanks?
