Job 1

Dr. David Jeremiah was preaching this morning on the book of Job, and he recounted the conversation that went on between God and Satan.

Scripture: Job 1:6-12:


Observations:

The scripture gives a view of what's going on in heaven. The angelic beings are presenting themselves before God Almighty, and He demands from them an accounting - and Satan is among them. In V7 the Lord asks Satan where he's been to which he gives a very general answer (and an almost smug one too). From the context of the conversation, it seems like God reveals Satan's true business - and the fact that nothing is hidden from God's eyes, even in wicked Satan - with His question about Job, and if Satan had been considering him.

Of course Satan had considered Job, and he had considered him a great deal from what is revealed in Satan's answer to God. The Devil is the accuser of the brethren, and he had attacked Job from every side he could (V10a); he loathed Job's worship of the Lord and accused him of falsehood (and implied that God had been blind to it, therefore accusing God of being naive and calling into question His sovereignty - which ironically God was putting on display by revealing Satan's true intentions) (V9); he loathed God's blessing and reward on Job's life (V10b) - he was a roaring lion who desired to devour Job and all he had. But he could not see that Job's heart belonged to the Lord God, and thought that Job's worship was a result of God's blessing on Job's life.

God's character and Job's integrity are exonerated in V20-22, in that Job's response to his suffering is to worship God and to praise Him. Job is filled with anguish (he tears his robe and shaves his head), a real anguish over great loss - so he's not ignoring the pain. Instead he meets it head-on in the only proper way - he worships God who allowed the affliction (which Job knows, as he says that it is God who gives and takes away). Job doesn't even consider that he has done anything to warrant this affliction, nor does he consider that Satan might have done it - he praises God for giving and taking away. Job worships the Sovereign God whose prerogative it is to give whatever He pleases to whomever He pleases, and take it away without explanation or warning - and he says "God you are good! What You do is good!"

Application:

Job's heart was centered on worship to the Lord, which we are privied to in the opening verses of the book - that God considered him to be a righteous man, and we see that heart dedicated to sacrifice and prayer not only for himself but for his kids too. In these opening verses, I see the outer working of an inner working of God in Job's life that I long for.

I remember a man once told me that when his newborn son was looking to be on his deathbed that he looked to this book and, like Job, although the pain of loosing his son was very real, he decided that he would worship the Lord God because He is God and not for what God did for him. Amen.

That's what I want to be my application point for this section of Scripture, as well as in light of the whole of Scripture. I want to know my God and Lord Jesus Christ, not just know about Him. I've heard it said that what we learn about God is the means to the end of KNOWING Him, and elsewhere that what good is it if I know Greek and Hebrew but don't know Him. I want to know and worship Him in the way He has prescribed (in spirit and in truth) because He is God and He is worthy.

I also don't want to forget that Satan will pursue and assail me, but that he is limited by the Lord God - so that in Christ Jesus I can withstand all temptations, and I can walk by the Spirit of God and not by my flesh.