Then God Answered

In the past two podcasts we've walked beside Job as he experienced unimaginable loss, wrestled with deep grief, and asked the questions so many of us have asked:

"God ... where were You?"

In this podcast, everything changes.

After chapters of silence, God finally speaks. (Job 38)

His answer isn't a simple explanation for suffering. It isn't a list of reasons. Instead, God reveals Himself, and that changes Job's perspective forever. It can change ours too.

Join us as we explore one of the most breathtaking passages in all of Scripture and discover why God's presence is a greater answer than our explanations.

Series: Where Were You? The Book of Job

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:00

Well, this week I started a new book. The book is called Delete That by the comedian John Crist. And I should probably confess something. It's an audiobook. Does that count as starting a new book? See, I didn't say reading a book. I said started a book. I choose my words very carefully. I know sometimes we're a little bit too hard on themselves. That's probably better than some other things that I could be doing. But the book was really insightful. I think it still counts. We make the rules when it comes to if a book counts or not, so I think audiobooks do count. I do like to read a real actual book every now and then as well, but trying to make good use of the time as I'm driving around town. John had an insightful take and has an insightful take at the lengths to which we go to present ourselves as better than we really are. Image protection. He said that he thrived, he lived in image protection for a long time. He also talks about posting comedy videos and what that was like for him, trying to gain traction, trying to figure out what worked, trying to figure out what got people's attention. And he said he's done this enough that he can usually tell within the first couple minutes after he uploads a video whether if it's going to take off or not, if it's going to accomplish what he wanted it to accomplish. He says the indication of something taking off and spreading, it isn't likes. It doesn't matter how many people like it. What matters is how many people share it. Because when somebody shares it, it goes to somebody else, and it goes to someone else, and it makes its way around. The power comes in the shares. That's when it begins to move, and that's when it gets traction and it starts to make a difference, and people start talking about it. And that got me to thinking more about the way that we communicate and the way that news and the way that informations and stories make their way around us now. Because you and I, we live and breathe and work in a world that rewards words that get attention. If people are paying attention, if people respond, if people interact, those are the things that we want to strive to do and be, or at least that's what we hear people saying. Everybody wants to have something to say. Everyone wants their opinion to be heard. We want to broadcast that so as many people as possible know who we are and what we stand for. And we want to be able to broadcast that, but there's a problem. In fact, there's a lot of problems that come with that, and you're probably thinking of a couple yourself. Something can spread everywhere. Virally, fast, still be wrong. Just because we hear it, just because it's repeated, just because it's shared, doesn't make it right. Just because somebody stands up and confidently declares something, that doesn't mean that it's true. A thousand shares or a million views doesn't mean that it's okay. And that brings us right into the heart of our story within this four-week study as we're going through this book in the Old Testament on this man named Job. Last week we left Job in a very dark place, where in week one we learned that he had everything but his life taken away from him, and yet he still chose to worship. But eventually he would still come and want to question God and ask God questions, and we found him in Job chapter 3 last week in a very dark place. But we also had this reminder that faith can bring and should bring our deepest pain to God. People of faith, if you're Christian or if you want to pursue faith and try to understand who God is and what God is about, we're to bring our deepest pain to God and allow Him to care for us in there. But we see what happens in this story in the book of Job is that God doesn't jump in and answer Job immediately. Has anybody ever experienced that? Yeah. Me too. When you ask God a question and you plead with God and you want desperately to hear from him and you're going, God, I will listen to whatever you have to say. And from where you sit or stand or kneel, the response feels like nothing. And then we have to determine, what are we going to do with that? How are we going to handle that silence? Living in a world like Job did where his friends were confidently speaking into the problems in his life and telling them how to fix that. Do you have any friends like that? Are you a friend like that? Where everybody always has something to say, and it's so important that you hear their opinion, but there is an important difference between confidence and correctness. Have you ever seen a four-year-old or a five-year-old wearing a Superman cape? Have you ever seen that four or five-year-old get on the back of the couch and confidently declare that I can fly, I'm gonna take off off of this couch. Have you ever actually seen a four-year-old fly for long? No, they probably jumped off something higher than they should have, and you didn't get there quite in time. But that kid believes with all that they can that they are Superman and they can fly. But gravity applies to them just like it does to everyone else. But see, you can be supremely confident about something, about an ability, about something that is very deep down in who you believe that you are and be absolutely dead wrong. Being very confident and being very wrong often coexists in the same space. And that is where we find ourselves in a lot of trouble, and that is where we see some trouble continuing to brew in this biblical story of Job, this real man who lived, and these events happened, and the Bible recorded them for us, and Job's friends, as we've talked over the last couple weeks, they show up and they begin pretty well because they showed up and they just kept their mouths shut and said that nobody talked for a week. They just sat in the ashes in the mourning, in the defeat, in the upset, in the emptiness, in the brokenness, in the weeping with their friend Job, and they didn't feel that they had to interject their opinions. When Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar hear what happened, they show up and they comfort their friend. And then they mess it up by speaking. Has anybody ever done that? Anybody ever messed up a situation or a place that you were in by opening your mouth and inserting your opinion because you had the answer that everybody needed to hear? LFS speaks and basically says to Job, Job, I think I know how the world works. Innocent people don't suffer like you're suffering. And if you believe like I believe, the innocent people don't suffer at the level to which you are suffering. He lost all of his possessions. He lost his sons and his daughters and he lost his health. LFS says, Job, if you were innocent, this wouldn't have happened to you. So clearly, there's something wrong with you. Why don't you quit hiding that from us? There has to be a reason. Now there's some truth to what Eliphaz has to say generally. Scripture does teach that our actions, what we do in life, does have consequences, but it also teaches us that God is just and is faithful. The problem is that Eliphaz takes a true principle and turns it into an explanation that God never gave him about what was happening to his dear friend Job. Then Job's other friend Bildad speaks up, and he's even a little bit more direct, and his basic argument is this: he says, God doesn't get things wrong. If you're suffering like this, God must be correcting something in your life. Seek after God, repent of the wrong that you have done, and if you're really pure and upright, then God will restore you. Bildad believed that to be true because that is the way that he operated in his life. Now God is just, and repentance does matter for us, but Bildad wrongly assumes that he had the answer as to why his friend was suffering so greatly. Then the third friend steps in and speaks, and Zophar, I'm sure you have friends named Bildad and Zophar and Eliphaz, right? We all do. Zophar might be the harshest of the three, and he essentially tells Job, You think that you've been treated unfairly? Well, it could be worse. Let me tell you what happened to me. We've experienced that with people before. Yeah, you're having a hard time in life, but let me tell you a story about this, how it could be worse. Why don't you just look on the bright side? Imagine sitting in the ashes and grieving your children and having lost almost everything and your body covered in stores, and somebody tells you, you know what it could be worse. When we are hurting, we rarely see and think clearly. But we have been in moments in our life where if someone had the audacity to come before us and say, Well, you know it could be worse. It took everything but the Holy Spirit of God in us, not to punch them in the throat. Job's friends, I think that they mean well, but sometimes just because we mean well doesn't mean that it comes out right. Just because we are intending to help when we're speaking based on our opinion and not an opinion that comes from somebody that actually knows what's going on, it makes a big difference. Eliphaz has his explanation, Bildad has his explanation, Zophar has his explanation, and every time Job responds for what he believes to be true, and everybody keeps talking. Can you imagine living in a world where everybody just kept talking constantly all the time? That's where the book of Proverbs gives us a warning, and I love the way the New Living Translation puts it. It says, Too much talking leads to sin. Be sensible and keep your mouth shut. I guess I have to stop preaching now. Jesus himself even says, as it's recorded in Matthew chapter 19, he says that we will give an account for every careless word that we choose to speak. Words matter. Words especially matter when the words that come out of our mouth we associate them to God, or even to be so bold as to say they came from God. You see, there's a great danger in speaking with certainty where God has not spoken. There is an enormous danger in speaking with certainty for things that God has not spoken. That is why we want to do our very best as the church. If the Bible says and it teaches something, we want to talk about that and teach it. And if the Bible leaves something open, if the Bible is silent on an issue, then may or be our opinion doesn't need to be as strong as we think that it should be. Where the Bible speaks, we should speak. Where the Bible isn't as strong, well, we can leave that open. We do this too. Something terrible happens and we want to explain it. We want to have answers. We want to know why. And sometimes instead of being willing to admit that we don't know, we reach for an answer because uncertainty makes us uncomfortable. We don't like it. We'll say things like, God must have done this because. Or maybe God is trying to teach you. Or this happened because they didn't. Sometimes the most faithful and honest and true words that we can say when people are suffering is we can say, you know what? I don't know. I wish I had a better answer for that. Now, just because you or I don't know, that doesn't mean that God doesn't know. In fact, if we knew everything that God knew, he wouldn't be a very big God, would he? If God didn't know things beyond our understanding, if God didn't have a perspective that is bigger and higher and better than ours, he wouldn't be a God that was worth serving. We need to understand and respect the difference between God and what he knows and what we know. But what we do learn from this story is that God's voice should humble our certainty. Certainly, whether the Bible is expressedly clear when God is speaking to us and when he has spoken, we can speak with great confidence in that matter because God, who has told us what is true and what always will be true, we can speak with great certainty there, but God's voice should humble our certainty. When we're speaking very confidently, we always need to check that with what God has told us in his word, because God will not contradict or go against himself. There are times that we absolutely should speak definitively and clearly and with certainty, but we need to make sure that that is rooted in the truth that God has gave us and not our own opinion, not our own preference. This conversation among Job and his friends gets even more heated. Job insists that his friends' explanation don't fit his life. He knows that he hasn't committed some hidden sin that explains the destruction of his family and everything that he owned. His friends become increasingly convinced that Job's refusal to admit his wrongdoing proves that at least one of them has to be right. Job becomes increasingly frustrated with them, and they argue while Job is sitting in the ashes, and then someone else speaks, this younger man, who, out of respect to those that were older than them, he let them speak first. And this other man, this fourth voice that will come into speak into the conversation, is this young man named Elihu. Elihu, by the time he comes to speak, he explains he has waited because he respected the age of the people around him that were speaking, and he respected generally the wisdom that came from those that had more experience than he did, but by the time he speaks, he's angry. And Elihu is angry with all of him. He's angry with Job, and he's angry with all of Job's friends. He takes issue with Job because Job has focused so much on defending himself that he's begun speaking as if God owed Job an explanation. Elihu is also angry with these three friends because they condemn Job without ever having the right answer. And Elihu speaks, and when he speaks, he speaks for a while. He addresses the friends and he addresses Job. And then Elihu changes his perspective and he changes his tone and he changes the focus of his words. His words now become focused on God and the greatness of God. He talks about thunder and he talks about storms and he talks about the voice of God and he talks about mighty power on display. He talks about a God whose works are beyond our understanding. And as a lie who speaks, you can almost feel the weather changing. You can feel the temperament in the room shifting. Then we reach Job chapter 38, 37 chapters of grief and loss and arguments and explanations and questions and defenses and human words, and it's then we finally read that the Lord answers Job. And let's not miss that this happens after Elihu shifts his focus to God and he proclaims the majesty of the Lord. And it is then that God inserts the truth and his voice into this argument that has gone on for 38 chapters. Job 38, and then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind, the storm. Job answered, God answered Job out of the whirlwind, and he said, Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Everybody's been talking. But now it's God's turn to speak about what is true. And God begins with a question: Who dares darken my presence with words without knowledge? Who is speaking before me uninformed as if you're going to teach me something? Who created everything by the power of my voice, God said. And you're gonna come before me and teach me something? That is a devastating sentence. Who is speaking with words without knowledge? Everybody online, right? That's what we would say. This describes so much of what is happening in this book, and if we're willing to admit it, it describes more of our lives than we would probably care to admit. We speak confidently about people's stories to which we don't know. We speak confidently about motives that we cannot see. We speak confidently about what God must be doing and about what God must not be doing because our culture rewards certainty. Certainty gets attention, it sounds strong, it gets shared. Rarely does humility go viral and take off and get the attention that it is due. But God speaks, and when God speaks, his voice humbles our certainty. We need to always make sure that we check what we believe and what we say against what God has said. And when God steps in and he answers Job, this is the moment that Job had been waiting for. For God to chime in and set all his friends straight, to tell them what was really going on, to tell all his friends that they're all wrong and Job is right, and probably all the friends are thinking the same thing. God just step in and have Job own up to the mistake that he made. It can't be that bad if he would just admit it and he can move on, and life would shift. They all wanted to desperately understand why all of this happened, and God is the only one who ultimately knows. But he doesn't begin with an explanation. He begins with a question, verse 4 of Job 38. He says, Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding, who determined its measurements, surely you know, or who stretched out the line upon it, upon whose bases were they sunk, or who laid the cornerstone. Job, why don't you go ahead and tell me? Where were you when I created all of these things? In our life. That could justify what we were doing, or what we were saying. Job, where were you? When I created everything out of nothing. Job, where were you when I created this creation and it was good? And then I created man and woman in my image, and then it was very good. Job, where were you when all of that happened? Job spent chapter after chapter asking God questions, and now it is God's time to ask Job the questions. He goes on to say, Job, you know what? I'll dress for action like a man. Time to put on your big boy pants. We're gonna have a real adult conversation right now, and we're gonna talk this out right now and get to the answer in this moment. And that's exactly what God does because Job's suffering is real. Job's grief is real. His worship in chapter 2 is real, his questions are real, but his perspective is really limited. And he cannot see what God is doing and what God is offering. Job knows what happens to him, but only God knows what Job can't see. God's voice steps in and it will humble the certainty that we have. And suddenly this question shifts back to Job. This question that he had been asking God, where were you when all of these things happened? Now that question is sharply turned back to Job. And he has to answer this question where God turns to him. Says, Job, where were you when I did all of these things? Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Job is the one demanding an explanation from God, and now it is God speaking directly to Job and says, Job, why don't you tell me what you think is right? And sometimes, as we see in the life of Job, before God intervenes to change our circumstances, he needs to change the way that we see them. The people who come and serve, and there's different people that make up our band that come up here and they do a fantastic job leading us in worship. Maybe my second favorite worship band is this group called Ghost Ship. And they wrote a song based on Job 38. And I want you to sit and to listen to the power of God's response to Job. Because the question isn't, you know, God, what were you doing? The question is God asking us, where were we? God reminding us that He is the one who is holding everything all along. And what we're going to hear together is this question of Job 38 presented to us. God asking Job, Job, where were you? Pay careful attention to his word.

SPEAKER_00 23:05

Everything is dying and broken. Why do I see nothing but subl? God, I'm asking, could this be your plan? Sin is taking hold of this whole land. Will you not say anything else to me? He said, Where were you the day that I measured? Sunk the banks and stretched the line over all the earth and carved out its corner stone. Where were you the day that I spoke and told the sun to split the night open? Call the morning dawn with this light to show Who shut in the ocean with stone doors? Mark the reach of tides on those new shores on the day the waves rolls and first row. Have you seen the springs of that great sea? Walk the cabinet, car in the black tea, through the gates of darkness there on its floor. Have you seen the army? I hold snow and hell like that for the times of trouble and for extra. Things too wonderful for me, although I had no right to ask.

SPEAKER_01 27:12

God gave Job a better picture of who God is and what God is doing. When you will allow him, God wants to step in and to shift your perspective. Not to dismiss the pain that you are dealing with, not to get rid of the suffering necessarily, but so that you can see things and recognize that God understands things in ways that you never will. God reminds us of who he is and how big he is. And just how much he has love and care and concern and compassion for us. God wants to answer us, even though he doesn't always.