Welcome to "Sabbath School Study Hour." We are so glad that you have joined us to study God's Word together. As you know, we are in the book of job, and enjoying a study and learning about job's relationship with Christ, and how it applies to us today. Before we get started in our lesson study, pierre van der westhuizen is from south africa, and he has been traveling around the United States doing concerts for the last 14 months. And he's going home this Wednesday, so he is here to bless us with his music. This morning, he will be singing for us "how lovely are thy dwellings.
" Pierre van der westhuizen: God is good all the time. God is good. Happy to be with you today. Thank you, michelle. [Music] ♪ how lovely are thy dwellings, ♪ ♪ o Lord of hosts.
♪ ♪ My soul longeth, yea fainteth, for the courts of the Lord. ♪ ♪ My heart and my flesh cry out to the living God. ♪ ♪ Yea, the sparrow hath found her a house, ♪ ♪ and the swallow a nest where she may lay her young. ♪ ♪ Even thine altars, even thine altars, ♪ ♪ o Lord of hosts, my king and my God. ♪ ♪ O Lord of hosts, hear my prayer.
♪ ♪ I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God ♪ ♪ than to dwell in the tents of wickedness. ♪ ♪ For a day in thy court is better than 1,000. ♪ ♪ How lovely art thou dwellings, o Lord of hosts. ♪ ♪ My soul longeth, yea fainteth, for the courts of the Lord. ♪ ♪ My heart and my flesh cry out fot the living God.
♪ ♪ Yea, the sparrow hath found her a house, ♪ ♪ and the swallow a nest where she may lay her young. ♪ ♪ Even thine altars, even thine altars, ♪ ♪ oh Lord, my God, my king and my God. ♪ [Music] jolyne: thank you so much, pierre. That was beautiful. Let's pray.
Our Father in Heaven, we humbly come before you this morning, and we thank you so much for the opportunity to freely worship you, to open our Bibles that so often we take for granted. Just bless us today, Lord. Open our ears to hear what you have to say through us through Pastor Doug. Help us to take the words that we hear, apply them to our lives, that we can be shining lights for you and do our part to finish your work so that you can come soon and take us home. We look forward to that day.
We long for that day. Lord, please just keep us ready and prepared. I pray these things in your name, Jesus, amen. At this time, our study will be brought to us by Pastor Doug. Doug Batchelor: thank you, jolyne and our musicians.
Thank you, pierre, that was beautiful. Appreciate that. Morning to our class. How is everybody? We're continuing our study on the book of job. And today's lesson is going to be lesson number three.
Does job fear God for naught? I want to take a moment just to greet those who are some of our extended Sabbath school class that are watching from around the world. I was in--where was I this last week? I forget. No, I was in louisville, Kentucky, and drove across Indiana, was at 3abn, and just visiting with our friends there because they air this program, of course, on 3abn, as well as hope channel and Amazing Facts tv, and a few other networks. And so, it was fun to meet some of our extended class. They said, "oh, we study with you every week.
" And so, I just like to always--i say, "next time, I'll greet you." And want to tell you thank you so much. We have a memory verse in our lesson today. And the memory verse is from the book of job 2, verse 10. Job 2:10, this is the new king James version. If you want to read it right out of your lesson, do it with me, you ready? "But he said to her, 'you speak as one of the foolish women speaks.
Shall we indeed accept good from God? Shall we not accept adversity?' In all this job did not sin with his lips." And so this, of course, is that time when this second wave of temptations and trials comes to job. So, the lesson today is dealing with a number of themes that are still based on the first two chapters, this wave of attacks that comes. And under the first section, it talks about job, God's servant. It's interesting it says there's a man--there was a man in the land of uz who feared the Lord. And God refers to him as his servant.
Now, when the devil comes before the Lord, and the devil says, "I've come from walking to and fro on the earth, and up and down in the earth," and God says, "it's not yours. I know you're pacing the world as though it's your territory, but have you considered my servant job?" And don't we all want God to look down on earth and say, "have you considered my servant doug?" Or my servant insert your name there, that he sees us as his servants. Everybody serves somebody. How do you know whose servant you are? Who do you obey? Romans chapter 6, whoever you obey, that's whose servant you are. And if we love and follow and obey God, we're his servants.
And job, he obeyed God. And you can look here, and Jesus gives us this principle of servanthood in Luke 22:25. He said, "the Kings of the gentiles exercise Lordship over them, and they exercise authority upon them, are called benefactors. But you will not be so. But he that is greatest among you, let him be as the younger, and he that is chief among you as him that does serve.
For who is greater, he that sits at the dinner table, or he that serves? Is it not he that sitteth at meat? But I am among you as he that serves." Christ said, "look, I have come among you as a servant, and I'm your example." Now, Karen and I were reading on our way to church this morning. We were reading Colossians chapter 1 and part of chapter 2. And it says that in Christ, all the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily. Jesus said, "if you have seen me, you have seen The Father." Jesus came, he said, as one that serves. He cared about people's practical needs.
He was concerned about when they were hungry, and when they were tired. And you know, he got down and washed the disciples' feet. But all the fullness of God was in Jesus. Is God a servant? God spends all his time ministering. It says, "he opens his hand and satisfies the desire of every living thing.
" God spends his life, his time, giving. He's providing, he's sustaining all the time. Jesus came to show us what The Father is like. Now, why do we serve God? This is the big challenge that the devil made. You know, you look back there in job, and job says to the Lord--I'm sorry, the devil says to the Lord, "does job serve God for naught, for nothing? Why is he serving you?" Why do we serve the Lord? You know, we talked about this at church, oh, a few months back, wifim.
Anyone remember what wifim is? Wifim, w-i-f-i-m, what's in it for me? So many people, when they are evaluating a decision, they think wifim. "How will this affect me?" But with the Lord, it's always, "how will it affect others?" What are the great commands? What did Jesus say--how do you summarize the great commands? Thou shalt love the Lord with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. And what's the second part? Love your neighbor. Do either of those include you until you get to the very end? Love your neighbor as yourself. So, it starts out with the Lord, it ends with yourself.
But most of the world has the equation inside out and upside down. We are first concerned with what's in it for me. Jesus cane to say, "love others. Give to others. Love the Lord, and make that the priority.
" And so, the devil said, "oh, he's just like other people. He's just doing it because of what's in it for him. The reason he serves you is because you bless him and you protect him. It's all about what's in it for me." Now, is there some truth to the devil's accusation that there are some people, we used to call them rice Christians? You ever heard that expression before? I think it came out of the missionary days in china, where if you gave free rice to the people, they'd be a Christian. And it's like when Jesus multiplied the bread, they were all ready to follow him when they multiplied the bread.
Today, there's another term. We call it prosperity preachers. And they tell people if you serve God, if you have faith in God, you will be healthy, wealthy, and wise. So, the reason to serve God is for your health, wealth, and wisdom. Is that the right reason? Now, is there some truth to the idea that God blesses those who serve him? Yeah.
Does God also protect people? Let's look at some verses that first bear this out. And by the way, I want to read job 1:10. This is the devil's accusation. "Have you not made a hedge about him, and about his household, and about all that he has? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land." Generally speaking, not always, but generally speaking, it is true God will bless his people. It doesn't mean that bad people don't receive blessings because God sends blessings on the just and the unjust.
And it doesn't mean that bad things don't happen to good people, as good and bad comes to everybody. But generally speaking, the Lord has a lot of promised blessings. Let me ask you, what are some of the blessings? Can you think of any offhand? If you pay your tithe, what's the blessing? "I will open for you the windows of heaven, and pour out a blessing that you'll not have room enough to receive it. I'll rebuke the devourer for your sake." There's a blessing promised. Does God keep that promise? So, do you find that theoretically, statistically, people who are faithful tithe payers are blessed? Is that right? If God keeps His Word.
What are the other promises and blessings that God offers to his people? "I was young, and I am now old, but hath not seen the righteous forsaken or his seed begging bread." Does God provide--seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these other things will be added to you. Meaning what shall I eat, what shall I drink, what will I wear? If you seek first God's kingdom, does he seem to provide for our daily needs? If he does for the birds and the flowers, right? So, he promises provision. Can you name some other blessings? Honor your father and mother, that your days may be long on the land that the Lord your God gives you. So, does he promise that if you honor your fathers and mothers, you'll maybe have a longer life? I think I mentioned once before it can be demonstrated statistically that some of the longest living people in the world are the japanese, and they also have a very high regard for their elders. Even though japan is a largely atheistic country, they still get the blessing of their days are long on the land.
Someone else--i heard a couple of others. What are some of the typical--what's in it for you if you serve the Lord in this life? Is it wrong to ever think that? I mean, should we feel selfish if we're wondering what do we get if we serve the Lord? Peter said, Matthew 19:27, Peter said, "Lord, we've left everything and followed you. What will we have?" Wifim. Peter said to the Lord, "what's in it for me? What do I get?" You know, Jesus said, "no man has left father or mother, or houses or lands for my sake and the Gospels but he'll have a hundredfold more in this life with persecution." So, is it generally true that God blesses his people? It is. Let's look at some other verses on that.
Someone's going to read for me in just a moment 2 Kings 6:17. You have that, alberto? I'll read psalm 91, you all know this, verse 11 and 12. "For he will give his angels charge over you, to keep thee in all thy ways. And they will bear you up in their hands, lest you dash your foot against a stone." They're guarding you so you don't even slip and crush your foot. I went kayaking--no, rafting this last week with a number of the Amazing Facts employees and their families.
I hadn't been river rafting in years. We went down a section of the American river, about a 4-hour trip, 3 rafts, had about 20 of us. And I felt pretty confident, even though we were going through some number three rapids, I had nothing to fear because I kayaked for years. I've gone through a number of six rapids. If you know what that is, that's the highest, most difficult level of rapids.
A hundred feet after launching the kayak, it hit a rock and I fell over. I was so embarrassed. I made it through the rapids fine, but I fell over before we even got out of kindergarten. And the raft started kind of going over me, and I thought, "oh, this is it. My life is flashing before me.
" But you know what? I got back in the boat even though I got tumbled around a little bit, didn't get hurt. I thought, "thank you, Lord. That could have really hurt." In the water, you know, between the raft and the rock, and getting bounced around a little bit. And God's got angels watching us all the time. Go ahead, read for us 2 Kings 6:17.
Male: "and Elisha prayed and said, 'Lord, I pray open his eyes, that he may see.' Then the Lord opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw. And behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha." Doug: you remember the story. the King of assyria wanted to capture Elisha the prophet because he was like God's secret weapon for the King of Israel. And he sent an army to surround the little town of dothan. Dothan is this little town in a valley, and it means wells.
And he's there with his servant. His servant wakes up, and he looks, and in the morning, they see the glittering armor of all these soldiers and army, horses surrounding the little town. And the servant is panic stricken, and Elisha said, "don't be afraid. Lord, open his eyes." Elisha wasn't afraid because he knew that the angel of the Lord encamps roundabout those that fear him. See, Elisha read David.
Elisha comes after David. And the eyes of the servant are opened, and suddenly he sees there is an army of God and his angels that surrounds the army of syria. Does the Lord put a hedge about his people? He does. And then I'll read you psalm 34:7, "the angel of the Lord encamps roundabout those that fear him, and delivers them." Now, these are just a few, but there are other Scriptures in the Bible that share this principle that God does protect. So, was the devil's accusation at least partially true? Yeah, there's always the--the devil is a master of mixing some truth.
He says, "you've hedged him in." And God, basically God is saying, "well, I am blessing and protecting job." Because as soon as God withdraws that protection, oh, the devil comes in, he's able to do all kinds of things to job. And so, the book of job is a sobering reminder that except for God's grace and his hedge, we would be going through what job went through. Now, some of us have gone through parts of what job went through. Some of us have been sick, maybe not as bad as job, or at least not as much physical pain. Some of us have experienced financial loss.
Job lost everything. Some of us have lost loved ones. Job lost all of his children. And imagine having all those things happen one after the other. I mean, and then you lose your health.
It's like you're just, "what's the point of living?" At that time. And then you have to ask yourself, "how much is God protecting me?" Now, God protected job, and he was a righteous man. I don't know, is there anyone here that's going to claim to have the righteousness of job? It says, "though these three were in the land, Daniel, job, and Noah, they will deliver neither son nor daughter." Job is up there with the greatest righteous people in the Bible. And yet, job went through trials, so do we have a right to complain when we go through trials? God protects us even though we're not as faithful as job because God is good, amen? All right, then you go to the next section, it's called skin for skin. And this brings us back to the devil's other accusation.
Turn to the book of job and you'll see that here in I believe chapter 2. Job chapter 2, "and again there was a day when The Sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and satan also came among them to present himself before the Lord. And the Lord said to satan, 'where did you come from?' 'From going to and fro on the earth, and walking back and forth on it.' And the Lord said to satan, 'have you considered my servant job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and an upright man who fears God and shuns evil. And he still holds fast his integrity." Now, you remember what his wife said to him? "Do you still retain your integrity?" "Although you incited me against him to destroy him without cause." The devil is the accuser of the brethren, and he wants God to destroy job. And God is saying, "you know, I took everything he had away.
He lost all his family. And he said, 'blessed is the name of the Lord.'" And satan said, "skin for skin." Now, this has always--this phrase has been something of a mystery to the commentators. What did the devil mean by that, skin for skin? "Yea, all that a man has he will give for his life." It almost sounds like it's, you know, a trade. And he's saying, "oh, someone else's life for their life, skin for skin." You've heard the expression "by the skin of your teeth"? That actually comes from the book of job, I believe. Oh no, no, that's from Psalms, I take that back.
No, skin of the teeth, I think that is from job. At your wit's end is from Psalms. There's some of these expressions that we use are in the Bible. Anyway, and so he's basically saying that we are all wired, humans are wired with this natural desire for self-preservation. How many atheists do you know that want to stay alive even though they don't believe life has a purpose? Isn't that interesting? Not all, I mean, there's some, I suppose, that commit suicide.
But I know a lot of atheists that are very tenacious for life. They call it survival of the fittest. And I always think, well, if you think there's no God and there's no purpose, why do you want to survive? Why do we have this desire to continue existing? And why do we naturally jump out of the way of an oncoming car? Why are we wired to do everything to try to preserve our life? If your fingers are burning, why not let them just burn? We're predisposed to protect ourselves, to nourish ourselves, to feed ourselves, to save ourselves. And God is basically saying, "job's lost everything and job lost everyone, but he's still in good health. When his life is at risk, he'll curse you.
" Skin for skin, a man will give everything to save his skin. That's pretty much what the devil's accusing, right? And so, he says, "all right, I'm going to let him into your hands, but do not touch his life." Now, why is the devil attacking job? Is the devil's battle really with job, or is it with God? Job is just a pawn. Why does the devil tempt you and i? Because he just hates humans? Well, he does hate humans, but why? What did we ever do to bother the devil? I don't remember ever having a personal dispute with the devil, and he's out to destroy me. It's because he knows God loves you. The devil resents that man was given dominion of the world, so he took that dominion because satan lost his leadership in the universe.
And man was given leadership of the world. And I think the devil also resents that he cannot create life, and man was given the ability, like God, to procreate in our own image, as God made man in his own image. So, and then he sees how much God loves us. And if you want to hurt your enemy, hurt what they love. And the devil hates us because he hates God, and he knows God loves us.
And so, really this is about hurting God and proving God wrong. And what good is it to prove that to God unless there's an audience? Who's watching? See what I'm saying? If you're ever going to be vindicated for being right, what good is vindication if nobody knows? I suppose there might be some self-satisfaction. But if you've been accused publically, and finally you're vindicated and the public doesn't know you're vindicated, that would kind of defeat a lot of it, right? And so, there's an audience in all of these things. He comes to present himself before the Lord, this heavenly gathering. You can look, for instance, in Hebrews 12:1, "we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin that does so easily ensnare us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before.
" We're surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. Who are these--who's the cloud of witnesses that's mentioned there in Hebrews chapter 12? First of all, you read in Hebrews 11, it talks about all of the great faithful. And Paul is saying, "look, we've got this cloud of witnesses through history." But is that the only cloud of witnesses? I don't know how many people are here this morning. It changes from the start of Sabbath school until the end of Sabbath school. But if I were to look out and do an evangelist count--well, if I'm doing an evangelistic count, there's thousands of people here.
But if I was to do a realistic account, maybe 150, 200 people. Is that about right? What do you think, pastor Luke? A hundred? You don't turn around. So, how many are in the room, 150, 200? Or are there beings in the room that you don't see? Yeah, I'm not talking about kidney beans and pinto beans. I'm talking about angelic beings. There's a lot that--and how many angels fell? We don't know the number, but we know the percentage.
It says about a third. Satan was cast out, and he drew a third of the stars with his tail, and cast them to the earth. About a third of these angels fell, which is good. That means there's about two good angels for every bad angel. But they're not just out there in heaven at these meetings.
They're here on earth. These are ministering spirits. When the eyes of Elisha's servant were opened, he saw the armies of God. And so, God has his angels. When Jacob's eyes were opened in vision, what did he see? Angels of God ascending and descending on this heavenly escalator.
And so, there are angels around. You read in 1 Corinthians 4:9, "for I think that God has set us, the apostles, last, as it were appointed to death, for we are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men." A spectacle, being watched by angels and men. We're not alone in this. There's a stadium all the time beholding the things that are happening here on earth. Now, someone's going to read for me again that verse in job 2:4 and 5 in just a moment.
You'll have that hafdis. I also want you to look at Daniel 7, verse 10. This is a picture of that great judgment. It says, "a fiery stream issued and came forth from before him. Thousands of thousands ministered to him, ,000 times 10,000 stood before him, and the judgment was set, and the books were opened.
" Now, there was a day when The Sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord. How many of them were there? Doesn't say in the text. I think sometimes, we picture--well, Revelation says he's got 24 elders around his throne. Maybe there were 24 of them, and lucifer showed up. Or maybe that meeting in heaven is more like what we read in Daniel 7, where it says 10,000 times 10,000 stood before him, thousands of thousands ministered to him.
These are the ministering spirits. And the ones who stand before him, they could be The Sons of God. I mean, you think about these big heavenly gatherings. We don't know how many there were. If these are the leaders of unfallen worlds, how many unfallen worlds are there? For you and i, it's probably almost infinite, I mean, just from what we know about space.
We can't even comprehend the vastness of space. And so, it's a big universe out there. All right, let's go back, we're going to return to that thought about skin for skin for just a moment. Why don't you read that for us? Female: so, satan answered the Lord and said, 'skin for skin. Yes, all that a man has, he will give for his life.
But stretch out your hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will surely curse you to your face.'" Doug: first of all, who is it that ends up touching his bone and his hand? Satan says to the Lord, "you stretch out your hand, and you touch him." Is it God who does it, or is it satan who does it? God then says, "I'm putting what he has in your hands, but don't take his life." In other words, you ever heard the expression "within an inch of his life"? He was tortured within an inch of his life. That means he was just at the border of expiring physically. And so satan, he had to probably measure and back off his torture every now and then when he said, "oh, he's almost dead." You hear every now and then about people who are in some concentration camp, where they're being tortured by some cruel enemy. And they don't want to kill them because they might want them for ransom. They might want them to trade with other prisoners, but they've got information, so they torture them within an inch of their life.
And they got to be careful not to kill them because that might defeat the purpose. And so, this is what the devil was doing. How much can I torture job so that he gives up his faith? But I don't want him to die right away. You know, I think it shocked the devil when Jesus on the cross said, "father, into your hands I commend my spirit," he breathed his last, and he died. I think he died sooner than the devil expected.
Pilate did not believe he had died so quickly because he had just tried him that morning, and a crucifixion victim would often last for days. But Jesus didn't die from the whipping and the torturing. The Romans had developed crucifixion to extract the maximum amount of suffering they could from a victim. They didn't want them to die right away. They wanted to make him--torture him.
And this is what the devil was doing to job. By the way, and it'll come up later, and you've heard me say it, job is a type of Christ. And it seems like he's a virtually sinless person, though he did sin, but he's a type of somebody who is righteous. Look at the difference between job and adam. Adam is surrounded with blessings, and health, and paradise, and he denies God.
Job is plagued on every side, has everything taken away, he's suffering physically, and he retains his integrity. He obeys God. All right, skin for skin. I was thinking of a few examples in the Bible where people sold out to save their lives. The devil's saying, "job is going to sell out on you, God, to save his life.
" How many of you remember in the book of Judges, when I think it was the people of dan were trying to capture a city, and they're taking the promised land, and they see this one man out there trying to find the secret entrance to the city? And when the spies saw a man coming out of the city," I think it's the city of luz, "they said to him, 'please show us the entrance to the city, and we will show you mercy.' So, he showed them the entrance of the city, and they struck the city with the edge of the sword, but they let the man and his family go." They basically said, "you're dead unless you sell out your city." To save his life, he sold out all of his neighbors to save his family and his life. Not the first time that's happened in history, right? Then you read in 1 Samuel 30, verse 15 the amalekites had captured David's family and the families of his mighty men. And it says, while they're to hunt and figure out where the amalekites are, and rescue their family, they find this Egyptian servant that had been abandoned by the raiding party. And David says to him, "can you take me to this troop?" To the soldiers. He said, "swear to me by God that you will neither kill me or deliver me into the hands of my master, and I will take you down to this troop.
" Evidently, they made that promise because he took him down to the army, and they killed all the amalekites, or most of them. And he was ready to make a deal to do what? Skin for skin, save his life. Is there going to be a time in the last days where we may be tempted with the same test? What does it say regarding those who do not bear the Mark of the beast? They can't buy or sell, which implies what? Credit card at the mall will be of no use. Yeah, we're not--we're not thinking about just not being able to keep up with the latest fashions, though that may be torture for some. But I mean, cannot buy or sell, for me it's a little deeper than that.
I'm thinking we can't buy or sell anything. No gas for your car, no food for your refrigerator. Maybe you don't pay your water bill, they cut off the water. It could get pretty--you could be in strait places if you can't buy or sell. And you'll be thinking, "skin for skin.
All that a man has, he'll sell to save himself." And if that doesn't work for God's people, not being able to buy or sell, what's the final--what's the final law? Those who don't receive the Mark of the beast should be killed. Well, it doesn't get a lot more serious than that. But what did Jesus say about if you're tortured or killed for your faith? Fear not them that can punish, torture, kill the body, but they can't hurt your soul. Don't fear those who can torture your body. Fear rather those who can destroy.
If you're the one who can destroy soul and body in hell, which is who? God. He's got your eternity. So, to get temporary relief, we might be tempted to sell out, skin for skin. But Christians need to have the courage of job. And even though he was suffering incredible physical pain, he would not deny God.
He retained his integrity. I remember reading that--you know, there's a book, it's not--it's not a happy reading, but it's an interesting book. You ever heard of the book called "fox's book of martyrs"? You can download it for free and read it. It's an old book. It's a history of the martyrs of the Christian church up through the reformation, written by a guy named fox.
And he just--he was a historian that chronicled, he gathered all of the records and the Chronicles he could of what the martyrs went through, going all the way back to the Christians thrown to the lions. And boy, I'll tell you, it'll really challenge you. A lot of them went through incredible suffering, and they would not deny their faith. Some of the martyrs that were burned for their faith, one of them begged that they would add dry wood to the fire because he was burning too slowly. And he said, "please speed it up.
" I mean, it's terrible to think that a person--but he wouldn't deny his faith. Of course, at that point--some of them, when they were being tortured, not by fire--during the inquisition, they would torture people with tortures I won't even say on television, just awful things. And they'd torture and say, "renounce your beliefs." And when the torture was so intense, they'd say, "okay, I renounce it, I renounce it, I renounce it." And they said, "okay, not you got to sign here that you renounce it." And they'd say, "oh no, I don't renounce my beliefs. That wasn't me. That was my flesh crying out.
" And so, then they'd start torturing them again, they'd say, "okay, I renounce it." They said, "oh, sign here." "No, I can't sign, I don't believe it." They said, "when I'm in extreme pain, I'll say anything, skin for skin. But it's not me, it's the flesh." I always thought that was interesting, they had this one individual that they kept torturing them, and then they'd try and get him to sign. Once they stopped the torture, they said, "I'm not signing." They said, "I can't control what I'm saying when you're tearing my skin off. I'll say anything." So you know, just the record of what people went through for their faith. And job, even though he suffered just intense agony, would not deny his faith.
All right, let's keep going here. Got to get onto something a little happier. Blessed be the name of the Lord. And after job goes through this--now, you notice in chapter 1, when he lost everything, he shaved his head, tore his clothes. He sat down, said, "naked I came from my mother's womb.
Naked I will return there. the Lord has given; the Lord has taken away. Blessed is the name of the Lord." I remember hearing once about a farmer that he used to always tell other people in town, "you know, my crop's not my crop. It's God's crop." And they said, "you know, you're always talking about God's crop." And a drought came through, and then some grasshoppers, and just ate up his field. And some of his atheist neighbors were saying, "well, wilbur, what happened to your crop? I thought you said it was God's crop.
And if it was God's crop, how come he didn't protect it?" And wilbur answered, he said, "well, look, if God wants to feed his grasshoppers his corn, that's his business. It's his crop." So, no matter what, he said, "blessed is the name of the Lord. Naked I came into the world; naked I go out. the Lord gave; the Lord taken away. It's up to him.
" It's hard to have that kind of faith sometimes. Psalm 113, verse 1 through 3. By the way, where you find the phrase "blessed be the name of the Lord," you don't find that often in the Bible, but here's one of the places. Psalm 113, verse 1 to 3, "praise the Lord. Praise, o servants of the Lord, praise the name of the Lord.
Blessed be the name of the Lord." There's that phrase. "From this time forth and forevermore." It makes you wonder if David is quoting job. "From the rising of the sun to its going down, the Lord's name is to be praised." And so, you know, we complain when we're surrounded with blessings. Job praised to God when he was surrounded with cursing. Isn't that interesting? I don't know about you, but I'll admit that I can sometimes gripe and complain, even though you stand back and you think, "wow, there's a lot of things to be thankful for.
" But one little thing goes wrong, I could be blessed on every side, but like I get a flat tire, oh, the whole day is ruined, you know? All you got to do is air it up. And then you look at other people and they are happy, and they're going through terrible trials. Sometimes, I'm so ashamed. Here I complain surrounded with blessings, and job praises God surrounded with cursing. Does the Bible say give thanks to God in all things? "In all circumstances, from one end of the earth to the other, let the name of the Lord be praised.
" And someone's going to read for me in just a moment Matthew 15:8, okay? But I'm going to read--it says here when hezekiah found out that the Babylonians were going to take everything away because he was bragging about his stuff, he said, "the word of the Lord is good." Even though he heard that it was a pronouncement, he said, "the word of the Lord is good." But then he was thinking in his heart, "at least there will be peace and truth in my days." And so, he was still just thinking about himself. Now, when--and this is a difficult passage. When job's wife heard that after not only losing all of his stuff, but losing his health, he still said, "shall we receive good from the hand of the Lord and not evil? Good and bad comes to everybody," she had reached her snapping point. And she said, "do you still retain your integrity? Curse God and die." Now, can we understand the exasperation of job's wife? Yeah. I mean, she's lost--what mother would not be devastated having lost all of your possessions, all of your children, and your husband's health? I mean, the husband was often the principle source of the work in the fields, and you could be left destitute.
And so, you can understand her being that way. But job said to her, "'you speak as one of the foolish women. What, shall we receive good at the hand of the Lord? And shall we not receive evil?' In all this, job did not sin with his lips." Now, I just want to make something clear. When it says he did not sin with his lips, what does that mean? With His Words, right? But where do Your Words come from? Out of the abundance the heart, the mouth or the lips speak. You remember when Isaiah saw the Lord, he says, "woe is me, I am undone because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips.
For mine eyes have seen the Lord of hosts." Most people, they're not sincere with their speech, or they're not clean and pure with their speech, but job would not say anything that was wrong because his heart was right. Go ahead, read for us please Matthew 15, verse 8. Male: "these people draw near to me with their mouth, and honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from me." Doug: yeah, so sometimes even people will, with their lips, they'll say they love the Lord, and they'll say pious, spiritual things, but they're not sincere. Job was sincere in his heart and in His Words. Now, when it says job did not sin with his lips, does it say and job was sinless? Huh? How many sinless people have lived? One on earth.
I mean, of course God and unfallen beings are sinless. But that one is Jesus. All others have sinned. You can read, of course, in Romans 3:12, "they have all turned aside. They have become unprofitable.
There is none who does good, no not one." Romans 3:23, "for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." Galatians 3:22, "but the Scripture has confirmed all under sin, that the promise of faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe." So, all have sinned, including job. Matter of fact, in the book of job, it says in chapter 5, verse 7, job 5:7, "yet a man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward." Now, is there ever a good excuse for sin? I don't know if any of you are planning on having children that haven't had them yet, but what do you think the odds are if you do have children that they will sin? How many think there's a 100% chance that if you have a child and they live long enough, they will sin? And you're still going to do it. Would you still have them? And people say, "why did God make adam and eve if he knew they might sin?" You're going to do the same thing, right? You're admitting that you're going to have kids. Some of you have had kids that have really gotten into trouble, and you're thinking, "well, now if I had to think of it over--" so, there's something about, you know, just we are prone towards sin. Mark 10:18, Jesus said, "why do you call me good? There is none good but one, and that is God.
" Only God is good. You know, one of the things I love about the book of job is that the reason job is so inspirational to us is because he was able to witness through trials. Suppose there was a story in the Bible that said, "there was a faithful and upright man who loved God and hated evil. And he had 5,000 oxen, and 5,000 donkeys, and 10,000 camels, and billions in gold. He's a nice guy, next chapter.
Let's talk about Esther." If the only thing it said about job is there was a blessed, wealthy man, would the story of job be in the Bible? You know why the story of job is in the Bible? Because he went through incredible trials, and he was faithful. When are we the strongest witness, when God saves us from trial or through trial? You know why the Exodus is such a great story? Because God saved a nation through trial. Why is Joseph a great story? Because Joseph is saved through trial. The Bible says it is through tribulation we enter the Kingdom of God. And so, do we want to pray, "Lord, save me from all trouble"? Or should we be saying, "Lord, help me be faithful should I go through trouble"? How many of you know that if you continue living, you're probably going to have some problems? I don't look forward to it, but it's probably going to happen, and I just want to say, "Lord, help me be faithful when the--" you ever think of looking at a problem as an opportunity? An opportunity to witness, an opportunity to grow.
How many of you want opportunities? How many of you want problems? Nobody--the people who said, "I want opportunities," didn't put their hands up when I said, "do you want problems?" But those problems are opportunities to witness. All right, now in what job's wife said we also need to look at. And the lesson addresses this, it's called job's wife. Someone's going to read for me Luke 17:2. You'll have that, John? When somebody is going through a trial, do we ever want to say anything to discourage them further? Philippians 4:11 to 13, "not that I speak in regard to need, for I have learned in whatever state I am to be content.
I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound. Everywhere and in all things, I have learned both to be full and hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." We may go through all kinds of trials, but we don't want to be the source of discouraging or increasing anybody else's trials. Go ahead and read the next verse for us, Luke 17:2. Male: Luke 17:2, "it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones.
" Doug: Jesus is telling us take heed what you do. Don't do anything that is going to cause someone to stumble. Now, when he says these little ones, not only does he mean let's be good, encouraging, optimistic examples for children, but some are little in the faith. Some are children in the faith. And boy, I'll tell you, it's frightening when you think--I've sometimes seen people who are new, they make mistakes, they're learning how to be Christians.
And some who have been in the church for years are very harsh in their treatment and their judgment of them. We need to be as positive and encouraging--how does Jesus feel about it if we discourage people who are already down? We ought to speak words of encouragement, words of hope, words that are positive. Thessalonians 5:11, "therefore comfort." And that Greek word there, comfort, is really literally the word "encourage." "Therefore encourage each other, edify, build up each other, just as you were doing." Paul always says, "do these things, as I'm sure you are doing." Corinthians 8:12, "but when you sin so against the brethren and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ." Now, is that serious business? If we sin against each other by hurting a person's conscience or by discouraging person, you sin against Christ. Didn't Jesus say, "in as much as you've done it to the least of these, you've done it to me"? And so, we need to encourage each other. We need to speak words of optimism, words of faith.
It says, "you sin against Christ, wherefore if meat makes my brother offend," he's talking about if I'm eating food that's offered to an idol. "If it offends my brother, I will eat no flesh while the world stands," for the rest of the world, "lest I make my brother offend." You got to be careful about things that might offend others. Then obedience unto death is the last section. Says, "God--in all this, job did not sin or charge God with wrong." First of all, we've all sinned. John 1:10, "if we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and His Word is not in us.
But when we know the truth and we surrender to God," he wants us to obey the truth. And the Bible tells us in Philippians chapter 2, verse 5, "let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in the appearance of a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross." Shadrach, meshach, and abednego, were they obedient to the point of death? Daniel and the lion's den, was he obedient to the point of death? The apostles, when they stood before the sanhedrin and they said, "we ought to obey God rather than men," were they obedient to the point of death? And so, who was it that said, "if a man doesn't have a cause for which he is willing to die, he is not fit to live"? We need to have something we believe in, and say, "I'm willing to lay down my life." TRuth is worth dying for. Did you ever think about that? 'Cause Jesus is the truth, and he is worth dying for, amen? Well, we are out of time for today's lesson. Boy, the book of job, it's the--it's real business, amen? And we have an offer we'd like to tell you about.
You've probably heard it mentioned already, but in case you missed the beginning, it's called "satan's confusing counterfeits." And just ask for offer number 191 when you call. The number, again, is ... That's ... And we'll send you this free book. Read it, please, and share it.
You'll find it very encouraging. God bless you till we get to study His Word together again next week. [Music] doug: what can be more irresistible than a kitten? These guys might look cute now, but some of their ancestors have grown into man eaters. We're here in a lion park in south africa now, where we can view these creatures in relative safety. But there's a reason they're known as the King of beasts.
So, what is it that people find so enchanting and frightening about lions? Is it their speed, their claws, their sharp teeth, or all of the above? It might also be some of the stories about man eating lions, like in 1898 right here in africa, they were building a bridge over the tsavo river in kenya, and two brother lions terrorized the construction process, eating 135 workers. Did you know lions are mentioned in the Bible over 100 times? And you can find them all the way from Genesis to Revelation. It's usually in reference to their ferocity and how dangerous they are. Of course, Samson killed a lion with his bare hands, and David killed a lion. There are man eating lions in the Bible.
The way that they punished criminals was by throwing him in the lion's den. And early Christians were even fed to lions. But amazingly, as the Bible mentions, not all lions are to be feared. There have been a few friendly lions in history. For example, in the 1950s, a couple, george and margaret westborough, who lived up at a ranch near seattle, Washington adopted an abandoned lion cub.
They named it little tyke because they felt sorry for it. But they discovered as they tried to feed her, she refused to eat any meat at all. They were concerned, thinking there was no hope for this little lioness to survive, and everybody told them the same because we know in the wild, lions survive on almost an entirely meat diet. Then someone showed the westborough that verse in the Bible that talks about in heaven, the animals are vegetarians, and the lion will eat straw like the ox. That encouraged them, and so they began to feed little tyke a purely vegetarian diet.
Not only did she survive, she thrived, growing into a lion that was over 352 pounds, and over 10 feet long. In fact, zoologists that examined little tyke when she was full grown said they have never seen such a perfect specimen of a lioness in their life, a pure vegetarian. You know, when we hear incredible stories about that of little tyke, it reminds us that God's original plan was to make a world of total peace. It describes it here in the Bible in Isaiah chapter 11, verse 6, "the wolf also will dwell with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the young goat. The calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child will lead them.
" Nothing is going to hurt and destroy in the new heavens and the new earth that God is going to create. Wouldn't you like to live in a kingdom where there's perfect peace, where there's no more death, or killing, or pain? God says that he wants you in that kingdom. The lamb of God made it possible for you to have an encounter with the lion of the tribe of judah. Wouldn't you like to meet him today? [Music] male announcer: can't get enough "Amazing Facts" Bible study? You don't have to wait until next week to enjoy more truth-filled programming. Visit the "Amazing Facts" media library at aftv.
org. At aftv.org, you can enjoy video and audio presentations, as well as printed material, all free of charge, hours a day, 7 days a week, right from your computer or mobile device. Visit aftv.org. Announcer: in 6 days, God created the heavens and the earth. For thousands of years, man has worshipped God on the seventh day of the week.
Now, each week, millions of people worship on the first day. What happened? Why did God create a day of rest? Does it really matter what day we worship? Who is behind this great shift? Discover the truth behind God's law and how it was changed. Visit Sabbathtruth.com. [Music] ...