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As we come to look into God’s word, I always remind my own heart and those I address that there is an indispensable principle of Bible study, and that is total reliance on God’s Holy Spirit. The Bible is His book; He inspired and now He wants to breath on it again and unveil the Lord Jesus to our hearts.
I’ve got a couple of verses. James 5:11, “You’ve heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord’s dealings; the Lord is full of compassion and is merciful.” So, all Job went through, but at the end he arrived. Sometimes along the way it looked like he wasn’t going to make it, but we’ve seen the end of the Lord. Philippians 1:6, “I’m confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.” Very simply, you are going to arrive, also; it doesn’t matter how bumpy the road gets, you’re going to arrive. Psalm 37:28, just another way to say it, “The Lord will not forsake His own; they are preserved forever.” Isn’t that a great verse! The Lord will not forsake His Godly one, His saints; they are preserved forever.
With that in mind, let’s just commit our time to the Lord. Heavenly Father, we thank You so much for our Lord Jesus, for the indwelling life of God to point us again to Him. Lord, we know that there is no possibility of beholding the Lord apart from Your miracle to open the eyes of our heart, of our Spirit and of our understanding. We give this session to You, and we thank You in advance that You’re going to meet us where we are and take us where You would have us. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Welcome again. I think you know, but this will be our final study in the book of Job, and actually until we meet again. I’ve got quite a schedule ahead of me. Lord willing, we can meet again after Labor Day, and I’ll keep you posted as to the times on that.
In every lesson in our quick study of the book of Job, I attempted to point you to the Lord Jesus Christ. I remind you that the great question that the book of Job raises and answers is not, as many think, “Why do the Godly suffer?” That’s not the question of this book. The question of this book is, “Is God enough, is El Shaddi enough by Himself, is He enough when the hedge comes down?” Of course, the book answers without hesitate, “Yes, He’s enough.” If I’m stripped of every blessing, if I have broken health, and I have no money, no wealth and I have no ministry, and even if it touches my family, and I’d even lose, as Job did, the sense of God’s presence, is it still well with my soul? Is it still well with your soul? Is Jesus enough Himself alone?
You remember in the book of Job the test that the Lord challenged Satan, “Have you considered my servant, Job?” Satan had a double insinuation. His insinuation against Job is that he’s only in it for the blessing; he’s in it for the gifts; he’s in it for the money, “You gave him a wonderful hedge and that’s why he’s in it; it’s worth while to serve the Lord because you get a rich dowry if you serve the Lord.” That’s what Satan said about Job.
Then, Satan also made an insinuation about God, and he said, “You are not wonderful enough in yourself; You are not worthy by Yourself apart from Your gifts. If you do not give gifts, no one will trust You. If You do not give gifts, no one would love You and obey You and adore You and worship You. You have to give gifts. If You are not a glorified Satan Claus or a patron saint, a purveyor of gifts, then nobody is going to serve You.” Job 1:10, “Have You not made a hedge about him and his house and all that he has on every side? You’ve blessed the work of his hands; his possessions have increased in the land. But put forth Your hand now and touch all He has, and he will surely curse You to Your face.” Well, the history and the book of Job show how wrong Satan was on both counts. By God’s grace Job was brought to the place where El Shaddi was exclusively enough, and that’s all that he needed.
When we left off, we were discussing Job’s testimony. Job 40:4, “Behold, I’m insignificant. What can I reply to You? I lay my hand on my mouth.” Job 40:5&6, “I’ve heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You. Therefore, I retract and I repent in dust and ashes.” When we closed last time, I was calling attention to the expression when Job said, “I repent.” What did he mean when he said, “I repent?” Because the Hebrew word is not the same word that’s used over and over and over again, over 100 times; when somebody repents, they turn from sin and turn to the Lord. That’s not the word Job used. There’s another Hebrew word and it’s used for the Lord. It says that God repented. He didn’t turn from sin as He has no sin. When God repented, He changed His mind, but it’s more regret; God repented that He made man; He was sorry and He regretted that He made man. That’s the word that’s used for Job. 1 Samuel 15:29 in the KJV, “The glory of Israel will not lie or change His mind; He’s not a man, that He should change His mind. And also, the strength of Israel will not lie or repent; He is not a man that He should repent.” That’s repent in the sense of turning from sin, but this means grief, sorrow, and regret.
When God uses that word, what Job was saying is not, “I repent of this sin and that sin or some other sin,” but, “I regret by seeing You, I regret that I did not see myself earlier. I feel me so sorry that it took me so long.” Jeremiah 26:13, describes God’s repentance, “Now, therefore, mend your ways, your needs, and obey the voice of the Lord your God; the Lord will change His mind about the misfortune which He has pronounced against you.” So, Job repented; he was sorry, Job 4:4, now he says, “I am insignificant.” That was his repentance, not, “I lied, not I charged God with fault, but that I am insignificant.” Job’s eyes now, God has become everything, and he has become nothing.
When we left off in our last study, I showed you the human impossibility of proud Job being made humble. Only the revelation of Christ could bring him to this place, “Now I see You, and therefore I repent.” Only the revelation of God can show me that I am insignificant and show you that you are insignificant. As I showed you, God names a bunch of things that Job surely had no power to do, like control the galaxies and control the weather, and control nature and provide for every living thing and control the ocean and its boundaries, and all that kind of thing.
But then he came to a climax. He said, “Job, you know you can’t do those things but I’m going to tell you something else you can’t do. Job 42:12, “Look on everyone who is proud. Humble him, and tread down the wicked where they stand and hide them in the dust together and bind them in hidden places.” Now listen to this; this is what God says, “Then I also will confess to you that your own right hand can save you. If you can make a proud man humble, then you can save yourself.” And Job was a proud man, and Job had to admit, “I can’t do it; I’m just so Job-centered.” As soon as God said that He gave the story of Behemoth and said, “Try to control him, and Levithan and try to control him.” I showed you last time that I think Behemoth just represents the flesh and Leviathan represents the enemy, Satan. “Can you make a proud man humble? Let’s see if you can control the flesh. You can’t do it. Let’s see if you control Satan. You can’t do it. Until then, you need a miracle,” and that’s the miracle that God gave.
Job 42:2, “Job said, ‘I know Thou can do all things; no purpose of Yours can be thwarted.” Back to verses 5&6, “I’ve heard of You by the hearing of the ear; now my eye sees You. Therefore, I retract and repent in dust and ashes.” That’s review and that’s where we left off.
This morning I want to bring our meditations to a close, and here’s what I’d like to look at. I’d like to show you Job’s life after God opened his eyes, and after he said, “Now, my eye sees Thee,” and after he repented of not seeing who he was earlier and regretted that. I’m going to call this section “The Enlarged Blessing” because Job is going to have a double blessing. Then, Lord willing, we’ll clinch the message of Job as we close and hopefully the Lord will bring us back again in the Fall.
Let’s begin to look at the enlarged blessing. Job 42:10, “The Lord restored the fortunes of Job when he prayed for his friends, and the Lord increased all that Job had two-fold. Don’t read that expression, “The Lord increased everything two-fold,” la, la, la. The NASB said, “The Lord restored his fortunes.” KJV says, “The Lord turned the captivity of Job.” Actually, the American Standard is closer to the original.
Let me call attention to verse 17, “Job died an old man full of days.” In the added blessing, he got one hundred and forty extra years after his trial. But it says that he died an old man, and full of days. It wasn’t only a long life of many days, but, verse 16, “After this, Job lived a hundred and forty years, saw his sons, grandsons, four generations.” His many days were full days; he died full of days, not just how many days but everyone of those days was blessed, and everyone of those days was full, full of full days. Seeing the Lord by faith when the Lord shows Himself to you and to me, that enlarged blessing belongs to us. It meant fullness for Job. You don’t begin to see fullness until you see the Lord. By the hearing of the ear you aren’t going know fullness; you’ve got to see Him with the seeing of the eye. That’s a miracle, and then you’ll have fullness.
Let me home again on Job 42:10, “The Lord increased all Job had two-fold.” Now, we see that literally. Job 42:12&13, “The Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning. He had 14,000 sheep, 6,000 camels, 1,000 yoke of oxen, 1,000 female donkeys, 7 sons, three daughters. If you compare that to Job 1:2&3 you’ll see that everything mentioned is double. You may ask about verse 2 of chapter 1. It begins that he had 7 sons and 3 daughters, and then in Job 42:13, it says that he had 7 sons and 3 daughters. You might say that isn’t doubled; that’s the same. It looks like it’s the same, but it really it is double, because he never lost the first ten; they went to heaven. He still has the first ten, and now he’s given 10 more. Everything was doubled.
Some people ask, “How old was Job when he went through this trial?” The Bible doesn’t give you a verse and doesn’t spell it out. It’s only a guess but some think Job was seventy years old when he went through this. It’s because he got one hundred and forty years after, and that’s two times seventy. So, people think that maybe he was seventy, and then God doubled his age, as well.
I believe that God intends that those who study this record of Job and the double blessing should automatically in their mind, even though it wasn’t mentioned at the time, think about the firstborn. Long before the Law of the firstborn and double blessing, long before the institution of the first born, more than six hundred years before, God demonstrated the double blessing before He gave it a name, before He gave it a title, before He called it “the firstborn”. Deuteronomy 21:17, “You shall acknowledge the firstborn, the son of the unloved, by giving him a double portion of all that he had. That’s the beginning of his strength; to him belongs the right of the firstborn.” So, we begin to read about the right of the firstborn, and even if a man has more than one wife, and the first wife is unloved, if she gives birth to the firstborn, that’s the firstborn.
The firstborn, the double inheritance is only a picture; it is not the reality. God gives pictures and spiritual realities. If you get the picture and you miss the reality, I feel bad for you. If I get only the picture and miss the reality, shame on me. The picture is designed to put the spiritual reality on display for everyone to see it. If the picture does not properly display the reality, what does God do? The answer is that He scratches the picture. He’s not going to elect pictures, and so He’ll just scrap the picture. I want you to be patient with me, if you would, because as we come to the end of Job and the double blessing and the message of the firstborn, I think this is vital to understand God’s heart, the end of the Lord. So, I’m going to do a little donkey work on the firstborn, and if you’ll bear with me.
So precious is the principle that is illustrated by the firstborn, that God said, “One picture is not enough; I’m going to give two. No, I’m going to give three. No, I’m going to give four.” And He gives four pictures to carry the same principle. He didn’t change the principle, the spiritual reality. He wants people to see that, and so He gave us four different pictures. Let me just mention them, and then home in on the big one, the firstborn. Exodus 13:2, “Sanctify to Me every firstborn, the first offspring of every womb among the sons of Israel, both of man and beast; it belongs to Me.” That’s the first picture; the firstborn of man and beast. Here is the second picture, Deuteronomy 18:4, “You shall give Him the first fruits of your grain, your new wine, your oil and the first shearing of the sheep.” That’s the second picture; the first fruit from your garden, the crops. Exodus 20:8-10, the third picture, “Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it holy; six days you’ll labor and do all your work. The seventh day is a Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or female servant, your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you.” The seventh day was a picture. Then, finally, Deuteronomy 12:5&6, “There you shall bring your burnt offering, your sacrifice, your tithe.” I’m talking about the tithe. The firstborn, man and beast; the first fruits from your garden; the Sabbath Day and the tithe; they all contain the same spiritual reality and they all have this in common; in every case it’s a spiritual metonymy. That’s a part for the whole. I think the clearest metonymy in the New Testament is when it says, “The feet of those who carried out your husband, are going to carry you out.” You know if you went to the door and just saw feet, you know what that means. That’s a part for the whole. When it says, “The feet of those that carried him out,” it’s the people; it’s the same thing.
In every case it’s a portion representing the whole. The first born represents the whole family. The first born of the sheep represents the whole flock, and of the goats, and of the cattle, and so on, the whole herd. Just so, the first fruits represent the whole garden; it’s not just the first fruits. God doesn’t need the first fruits; that’s representating the whole harvest, everything. And the Sabbath Day, one day out of seven, represents every day; God has his heart on the part for the whole. So, the tithe represents the whole bank account, everything you own, all possessions.
Some people have the idea that God was showing favoritism. My firstborn son said, “Boy, I’m glad I’m firstborn; I get double everything.” Well, I’m not good at math but two times zero is zero. He could get double of everything. The point is that God didn’t regard the first child as more precious than the others. That first child represented the others. God didn’t regard the firstborn lamb and the firstborn goat and the firstborn cow any more precious than the rest of the herd or the flock. The corn, the wheat, the barley, the first fruit was just a picture of the entire garden. Just so, that Sabbath Day represents… God didn’t like the Sabbath Day any more than He likes Sunday through Friday. God’s heart is on the whole. Romans 14:5&6, “One person regards one day above another, and another regards everyday alike; each person must be fully convinced in his own mind. He who observes the day, observes it for the Lord. He who eats, does so for the Lord, for he gives thanks to God. He who eats not, from the Lord he does not eat and gives thanks to God.”
Colossians 2:16, “Therefore, no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink, in respect to a festival, a new moon or a Sabbath Day, things that are but a mere shadow of what is to come; the substance belongs to Christ.” It’s the same for the tithe. The Lord doesn’t need 10%; He wants everything. 10% is an objective test on my life. If I have a struggle giving the 10%, why should I say, “Everything belongs to the Lord.”? If I have a trouble giving one day completely over to the Lord in worship, can I honestly say, “I’m surrendered.” The part represents the whole, the whole family, the whole farm, all of the crops that you own, your whole bank account; everything belongs to the Lord, and every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year, our testimony is, “It belongs to the Lord.” Total surrender, that’s the principle of the tithe. Psalm 24:1, “The earth is the Lord’s and all it contains, the world and those who dwell in it.”
The picture is designed to magnify the principle. I’m going to focus now only on the firstborn, since that’s what we’re talking about; Job received double. For Job to go from “hearing of the ear” to the “seeing of the eye”, forty-two chapters in the middle, that is an advance, and that maturity to go from this to that takes you to the truth of the firstborn. You’ve got to be mature in order to get to the truth of the firstborn. That double blessing is the climax of this whole story.
I told you that God was not showing favoritism. The purpose of the firstborn, the whole picture is this, God put the most, the best, the highest… The firstborn not only had the most material possessions, but kingship came through the firstborn, and the priesthood came through the firstborn, and authority came through the firstborn. The firstborn was blessed; he had the most and the best and the highest. Why did God do that? It’s because that’s how God does about everybody. So, He dumped His blessing on one, so the whole family could see, “Oh, that’s how God feels about me. Look at the blessing of the firstborn; that’s God’s heart concerning everybody.”
Why did God dump such privilege and authority on him? It’s because He wanted to display Himself through the firstborn. God wasn’t in bondage to the picture. Let me give you a couple of illustrations. Exodus 4, what was the firstborn mentioned? Exodus 4:22, “You shall say to pharaoh, ‘Thus says the Lord, Israel is My son, my firstborn. So, I said to you, “Let My son go, that He may serve Me. You’ve refused to let him go, therefore, I will kill your son, your firstborn.”” Don’t just read that la, la, la. God set aside Israel as the firstborn, so that He could dump on Israel all of His blessing, so that the gentile world could look at Israel and see how much God loved them. That was God’s intention, but Israel as a picture, they blew it. Remember the golden calf? God through Moses drew a line on the sand and said, “Who is on the Lord’s side? Let him step over that line.” Do you remember who stepped over? The whole tribe of Levi stepped over that line. Now, listen to Numbers 3:12, “Now behold, I’ve taken the Levites from among the sons of Israel instead of every firstborn. The first issue from among the sons of Israel, the Levites shall be mine.” So, God set aside Israel as the firstborn and now the Levites are His firstborn and to put on display, to manifest God’s heart. So, when they went into the inheritance into the land, Deuteronomy 18:2, “They shall have no inheritance among their countrymen; the Lord is their inheritance, as He promised.” That’s what’s on display. You don’t have an inheritance; you have Me and I’m the inheritance, said God. Numbers 18:20, “Then the Lord said to Aaron, ‘You shall have no inheritance in their land, nor own any portion among them. I am your portion and inheritance.” That’s His new firstborn, to put Christ on display for all the world to see.
Well, the firstborn Israel failed, and after a while guess what happened? The tribe of Levy failed, too. If the literal firstborn failed, God scrapped the picture. Another illustration; 1 Chronicles 5, “The sons of Reuben, the firstborn of Israel, for he was firstborn, but because he defiled his father’s bed, his birthright was given to the sons of Joseph, the sons of Israel. He’s not enrolled in the genealogies according to the birthright. Though Judah prevailed over his brothers and from him came the leader, yet the birthright belonged to Joseph.” Reuben was the firstborn, literally; he should have the birthright. How did the 11th son get it? It’s because Joseph was God’s illustration of what the birthright was to picture. That’s the whole point of it.
So, when Levi fails, we need another picture. Who is going to be firstborn now? There was a prophecy. Oh, I love it! Matthew 89:27, “I shall also make Him, Messiah, My firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth.” Is anybody going to put on display the heart of God and manifest how God feels about everybody? Oh, it’s Messiah. I’m not going to develop it now, but Colossians 1:15, “He’s the firstborn of all creation.” Colossians 1:18 and Revelation 1:5, “He’s the firstborn from the dead.” I’m not going to develop it now but Romans 8:29, “He’s the firstborn among many brethren.” Hebrews 1:6, “When He again brings the firstborn into the world, He says, ‘Let all the angels of God listen.” So, Christ became the firstborn; He became the demonstration to carry in His Person for thirty-three and a half years He put His Father on display. He was the firstborn. You could look at Christ, our substitute, and see how He thinks about you, how He thinks about me.
Christ died, rose and ascended; is there any firstborn left? Hebrews 12:13, “You’ve come to Mt. Zion, the city of the Living God, heavenly Jerusalem, myriads of angels, to the general assembly to the church of the firstborn.” The church is now the firstborn; we ARE the privileged ones to have the most, the best, the highest; God blesses us. He dumps everything on us, so we can put it on display and manifest to the world. Psalm 67:7, “God blesses us, that all the ends of the earth may fear Him.” What if you fail as His firstborn? He will set you aside so quickly, and He’s going to get a remnant heart, somebody who will manifest Christ. So, He sets aside those that fail in the picture. The picture is not the reality.
The reality is that God wants everybody to know His heart toward them, and He puts it on display in the firstborn, illustrated by the double blessing. So, as I said, the firstborn is actually a stage of maturity; you have to grow into that from “hearing of the ear” to the “seeing Him with the eye”. I think Galatians 4 describes both the hearing of the ear and the seeing with the eye, under the “adoption of sons”. I think the “adoption of sons” is the firstborn; it’s coming into that maturity. Galatians 4:1&2, “I say as long as the heir is a child, he does not differ at all from a slave, although he is owner of everything. He’s under guardians and managers until the date set by the Father.” So, in his immaturity he has it all, he owns it all, he’s an heir, but he hasn’t cashed in on it. Galatians 4:6&7, “Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your heart, crying, ‘Abba, Father.’ Therefore, you are no longer a slave (there’s the maturity), but a son; if a son, an heir through God.” Verse 25, “Now that faith has come, we’re no longer under a tutor; you are all sons of God through faith in Christ.” Now that God has opened your eyes, now you can be that firstborn, that vehicle to manifest that fullness of the Lord.
Now remember, when the Lord boasted to Satan about Job, Job had not yet seen God by the “seeing of the eye”, by the revelation; it was all theology. He had the information, and faith comes by hearing, so he expressed faith, “Though He slay me, I’m going to trust Him. God gave and God has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.” He obeyed, but he didn’t see the Lord until Job 42.
Here’s my question, “What comes between Job 1 and Job 42? The answer is a shaking, a dismantling of the hedge. What was true in the whole book of Job is true in principle now. We can know the Lord by the hearing of the ear, but God might have to do more than trim our hedge. He’s going to bring us to the place where we see that the Lord is enough, even if the hedge is removed. So, don’t be surprised in your life if God is bringing you into intimacy and into union and advancing you to the firstborn, don’t be surprised if you have to pray what David prayed, Psalm 119:67, “Before I was afflicted, I went astray; now I keep Your word.” Psalm 119:71, “It’s good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.”
Job is the extreme illustration, the whole hedge came down, but the principle remains, and to get to maturity you are not going to escape suffering. You are not going to escape affliction. God is going to progressively deal with your hedge until you come to the place, “All I want is the Lord. There’s nothing in heaven that I want except Him, and nothing on earth I want except Him.” To come to that place, God is going to deal with your hedge, and he’s going to deal with my hedge. To think that we can escape that is to miss the main message of Job. The main message of Job is to bring me from the “hearing of the ear” to the “seeing of God with the eye”, to bring me from the faith that comes by hearing to being a firstborn and putting on display the reality that El Shaddai is enough, even when the hedge comes down. That’s a mighty work of God. I think all of us are probably still in the process of being dealt with by the Lord, so that we can come to that place.
I want to enlarge on verse 10, the Lord increased all Job had two-fold. The double blessing, literally, happened to Job, but that all becomes a picture. I like this idea that Job died in fullness and in a very general way, figuratively speaking, why does God allow suffering in your life? It’s to bring you into fullness, to bring me into fullness, so that we will know Him in all of His intimacy.
When I first began the study of Job, I said it didn’t answer to the question, “Why do the Godly suffer?” But in a sense, it does. Here is the answer, “The Godly suffer, that they might come to know God as El Shaddai.” That’s why they suffer; that’s why you suffer, and that’s why I suffer.
I’m going to look at James 5:11 as we get ready to wrap it up. This is the only New Testament reference to Job, “We count those blessed who have endured. You’ve heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord’s dealing, that the Lord is full of compassion and is merciful.” For years I was using the KJV and it mentions the patience of Job. You’ve probably heard that expression; you heard about the patience of Job. NASB properly translates it “the endurance”. When you go through the record of Job, you don’t see really a pattern of patience in Job’s life. He’s not expressing a lot of patience. If there was any patience, it would have to be the fruit of the Spirit of love, joy and patience, because there was none in Job. But endurance is the right word. He endured to the end. God brought him through. He arrived safely.
I think some of you are familiar with the flower that the Calvinist use to describe their doctrines, the tulip. Anyway, forget all the letters, but the last letter is “P” and they call that the perseverance of the saints. I know what they mean by that, but I like to change the word to the “preservation of the saints”. We’re going to arrive, but it’s not because we’re persevering; it’s because God is keeping us; He’s the One that’s going to keep us. Matthew 10:22 says, “He that endures to the end shall be saved.” That’s not a condition of salvation; that’s a description of the one who is saved. The one who is saved loves the Lord, loves the Bible, endures to the end; it’s a description; it’s not a condition. So, the Lord is the One that brings us. “You’ve heard the endurance of Job, and have seen the outcomes of the Lord’s dealing.” Again, the KJV says, “You’ve seen the end of the Lord.” When I read the book, I thought I’d seen the end of Job. In a sense, you do see the end of Job, but it’s a different end than I would expect. It’s correctly translated, “The outcome of the Lord’s dealing; the end God has in view.” Things don’t just come into your life arbitrarily. God has a plan; God has something in mind, and ultimately, of course, it’s to see El Shaddi as more than enough.
Job now sees that goal, that God allowed all that He did to bring him into intimate relationship and to put on display for all the world to see, the blessing, the double blessing of the firstborn. At the end of Job, we can say without clearing our throat and without hesitation, Job says, “El Shaddai is enough, more than enough, even when the hedge comes down.”
God used that double blessing not only to bless Job, the blessing to the sufferer, but blessing through the sufferer. I think Job is about the same distance from the cross on the other side as we are on this side, two thousand years. So, it’s about four thousand years since Job lived, and he’s still blessing. You talk about blessing through! Here we are able to get a blessing because of what God allowed Job to go through, but not only us down the road from Job, but those in his day. I told you that Job moved from immaturity to maturity. Well, part of the maturity, and you know, you can recite it, we’re priests; all Christians are priests after the order of Melchizedek. But we’re priests, and Job became a priest. Job 42:8, “Now, therefore, take for yourself seven bulls, seven rams and go to my servant Job, and offer up a burnt offering for yourselves; my servant, Job, will pray for you. I’ll accept him, that I might do to you according to your folly.” We don’t begin to know the priesthood of believers until we see the Lord with the “seeing of the eye”, by revelation. Then we become the firstborn; then we put Him on display; then we become priests. Job 42:10, “The Lord restored the fortunes of Job when he prayed for his friends.” An enlarged blessing for the sufferer and through the sufferer, but through the sufferer, and we’ll close with this.
What is the greatest blessing that came through Job? The answer is that Job ministered to the heart of the Lord; Job ministered to God. God lets us in behind the scenes right at the beginning, and the Lord is proving something to Satan, that people are not in it just for the gifts, and that He’s worthy apart from any gifts. He’s going to prove that. Job has no clue what’s going on in his life until God takes him to the end, the end of the Lord, and now he sees Him, and he proved it. When Job proved to Satan and all mankind forever that El Shaddai is enough even when the hedge comes down, Job ministered to the heart of God; he ministered to the Lord.
Suppose you went through a suffering or I went through a suffering, a season in my life, and no one ever heard of it; no one ever saw your response to it, no one was ever made aware of it, and nobody came to give you comfort and nobody knew about what you went through, is that a waste? The answer is, “No, brothers and sisters in Christ; you have ministered to the heart of God. I have ministered to the heart of God.” All of this is for Him. Job 23:13, “He’s unique; who can turn it? What a soul desires, He does; He performs what is appointed for me. Many such decrees are within.” Job 42:2, “I know you can do all things; no purpose of Yours can be thwarted.”
The book ends with the sovereignty of God, and not just some hard, cold doctrine of theology, not some creedal statement, but a resting place. God is sovereign and you can rest on that. Don’t let Satan take that away from by saying, “Yeah, what about free will and what about man’s responsibility?” When I come to a portion on man’s responsibility, I’ll believe that with all my heart, too, but right now nothing can thwart the Lord, and I’m going to rest on His sovereignty. By the grace of God, Job was brought to maturity, and he became the firstborn and demonstrated El Shaddi is enough and more than enough even if the hedge come down.
Our Father, we thank You for the book of Job, not what we think it might mean, but everything You’ve inspired it to mean. We are asking You to work that in our lives and in our hearts. Thank You, Lord, for the measure of light that You’ve given us. Take us forward. Lord, we want to be your firstborn; we want to display for all the world to see, we want them to look at us and know how You will look at them. Thank You that You can work this because we claim it in Jesus’ name. Amen.