The Combined Reasoning Power of Job’s Three Friends Pt.2
- the Mystery of Suffering and Glory
JEREMIAH 20:14-18 (Introduction - Jeremiah was a prophet that had an unpopular ministry just like the ministry of William Branham was in this day, because Jeremiah prophesied the captivity and destruction of his nation by Babylon, and Brother Branham in this day prophesied the captivity of America by the Catholic Church (which is spiritual Babylon) and also its destruction by Russian atomic bombs, so both of their ministries were very unpopular – so listen to what Jeremiah is saying here because of his personal suffering by the rejection of the people)
14 ¶ Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed.
15 Cursed be the man who brought tidings to my father, saying, A man child is born unto thee; making him very glad.
16 And let that man be as the cities which the LORD overthrew, and repented not: and let him hear the cry in the morning, and the shouting at noontide;
17 Because he slew me not from the womb; or that my mother might have been my grave, and her womb to be always great with me.
(The womb was the world that you lived in before you came into this world – and many can die in that world also)
18 Wherefore came I forth out of the womb to see labour and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame?
Notice the question that Jeremiah is asking… Why couldn’t I have departed life while I was back in the world of my mother’s womb, why did I have to come from that world into this world that is so full of struggle and sorrow and suffering.
JAMES 5:10-11
10 Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction, and of patience.
11 Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.
In other words – you have seen the intent and purpose of what the Lord had intended the outcome to be in the end for Job’s life, because He is compassionate and full of tender mercy. This is why many people will curse God when troubles come into their lives, because they don’t know that God allows trouble with the intent to work it out in the end for a great blessing for you in order to show you his tender mercy and love.
The Combined Reasoning Power of Job’s Three Friends Pt.2
- the Mystery of Suffering and Glory
*God is the most misunderstood person in the universe, and this is because of his ways of dealing with us are so much higher than what our reasoning can ever understand.
**James called Job’s sufferings the tender mercy of God because His sufferings was the necessary pathway to bring Job into a greater glory, and Brother Branham in this day called the holocaust the tender hand of Jehovah – but to us these things look like great human disasters so much so that many people lost their faith in God during the second world war because they couldn’t understand how God could allow so much suffering.
*But when we get to the end of the story of Job, we find out that all the suffering that Job went through wasn’t worthy to be compared with the glory that he received at the end – and so this is the mystery of suffering and glory, because even though Job’s life had looked like a complete disaster and failure to the reasoning of man, the fact was that all of the suffering and trials in his life had only worked together for the good of Job’s great and everlasting glory at the end.
**So we see that the intent of God is to bring us into great glory, but the pathway to that glory must travel through the road of suffering for a season, so then this explains this life that we are traveling on. But Job didn’t understand this at the beginning, and so like Jeremiah he begins to curse the fact that he was ever born into this world.
JOB 3:1-3/11
1 ¶ After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his day. (His birthday)
2 And Job spake, and said,
3 Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the night in which it was said, There is a man child conceived.
So we see the same thing with Job of what we read in Jerimiah in our opening reading, “why was I born into a world where there is so much suffering”.
Maybe we could reason that if a person has a lot of happiness in their life, then we think that that was a good thing that they were born into this world because they had a happy and privileged trouble free life – so that was good for them, but if a person has a lot of suffering in their life, then maybe it would have been better for them not to have been born – and this kind of thinking is why some people commit suicide, because they don’t have the answer to this question of suffering and trials and the meaning of life.
JOB 3:11
11 ¶ Why died I not from the womb? why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly?
This is the same question that Jeremiah had.
“Why was I conceived, and if I was conceived then why didn’t I die in my mother’s womb, why was I not stillborn – it would have been better for me if I had not been born at all?”
**And so this is a common idea of man, and that is why many people when going through great times of trouble in their lives ask themselves this same question, and it is because they can only see themselves of their lives as being from their birth day until their death day, they have no understanding of their pre-existence, earthly journey, and eternal destination, they just see their lives from their birth day to their death day, and so they think that if that is the only purpose of life in that you suffer and struggle through life, and then you die, and then you’re buried, and then that is the end of it all, then maybe it would have been better if we were never born in the first place.
But then God asks Job this question that shocks him..
JOB 38:4
4 ¶ Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding. (Job knew nothing of his existence before he came into this world – so this was a new revelation to him, because if he was somewhere before he came into this world, then he knew that there would be another world to receive him after this world was over.)
**So we see that when Job was in this condition of great suffering and trial, that he wished that he had never been born, he wanted to bypassed this mortal life and go into the world of glory without having to suffer – but we want to see that there is a great mystery of suffering and then glory, because we know that your character is a victory and not a gift, and so we want to come to realise that it is in our greatest time of suffering that is the pathway of where our greatest future blessings come out from – this is the mystery of Suffering and Glory.
**So we must realise that it is the tender loving hand of Jehovah that is leading us in life, and his tender hand will often lead us into suffering so that He can bring us out into glory at the end, like what Brother Branham said about what the Holocaust was to the Jews, because it forced them to gathered back to their homeland, and now look at the blessing and prosperity that the nation of Israel is going through right now, plus all those Jews who lost their lives in the Holocaust are now under the altar of the 5th seal waiting for their white robes which will be their new bodies at the great white throne judgement – this is what the bible teaches.
THE.THIRD.EXODUS_ JEFF.IN V-2 N-21 SUNDAY_ 63-0630M
44 Heavenly Father, we--we by faith look towards the future. I'm looking now, by faith, towards a coming something, Lord, upon the earth, that's going to draw Thy people together. When we see the denominational churches so pinning down and getting so different, it's really pushing the people out; just as it was in Egypt, a pharaoh rising, who knew not Joseph. (This world has almost completely forgotten the truth of the bible – they don’t know Christ, because we have leaders today that don’t know Joseph/Christ)
45 As it was in Germany, and--and up into Russia, and Italy, the people raised up Josephes, Hitler and Stalin, Mussolini, who hated the Jew. They had to go back to their homeland. God, You got ways of doing things, that we don't understand. And You pressed them. No home in Germany; everything taken away from them. Also, in Italy, Russia, no place to go. And they were sent back to their homeland, just to fulfill the Word.
46 Oh, the loving hand of God! How, sometimes, it looks cruel, the way that people suffer, but it, still, it's the tender hand of Jehovah, leading His little children.
47 Now I pray, God, as I see the day. That, the denomination is pressing the believers, excommunicating them, saying, that, "Their name must be upon their book, or they're lost. Have nothing to do with the other group." It's only the tender hand of Jehovah, leading them to the Tree of Life.
**If we would only realise that our biggest trials in life (of what we think are our greatest disasters and disappointments and times of suffering) is only the tender loving hand of Jehovah leading us so that He might usher us into a far more exceedingly great glory at the end.
*All the trials of Joseph only mounted up for his glory at the end – a far greater glory than what was worthy to be compared to the trials.
*Jesus death on the cross looked like the biggest disaster of all for those of his followers who were looking for Him to become the King of Israel at that time, but it was the very thing that brought on the greatest victory and glory of all because the redemptive price was fully paid so that man could be restored back to what he had fallen from in Eden.
**This is why ALL THINGS work together for the GOOD to those who love the Lord and are called according to His purpose.
**So the greater the suffering in life is for the purpose of a greater glory that is to follow that suffering (this is the mystery of suffering and glory), and this is what the book of Job is showing us, because everybody wants the glory, but very few people know that it is suffering that proceeds glory.
So when you understand this, then it helps you to change your attitude toward the trails of life.
**From last week we saw how these wise men of Job’s three friends were from different backgrounds and natures (one was a sensationalist, one was a traditionalist, and one was an intellectualist) yet they had combined their reasoning power together and had come up with the same convincing conclusion about Job’s sufferings was because of him being a secret sinner, and this idea became a very strong reasoning argument so much so that it began to influence the people around them who knew Job.
*So then all the people of Job’s community were influenced by the combined reasoning power of these three friends of Job – they were like politicians that had all the reasonable answers that sounded so good but rarely ever worked.
*And so many people had become convinced that these three men of Job’s friends were right in their conclusion concerning Job, and so this had had great influence on Job’s family and community of how they thought about Job, because they had become convinced that all of this trouble that had come on their family and community was actually Job’s fault, so much so that even the little children of the community began to despised him.
JOB 19:14-18
14 My kinsfolk have failed, and my familiar friends have forgotten me.
15 They that dwell in mine house, and my maids, count me for a stranger: I am an alien in their sight.
16 I called my servant, and he gave me no answer; I intreated him with my mouth.
17 My breath is strange to my wife, though I intreated for the children's sake of mine own body.
18 Yea, young children despised me; I arose, and they spake against me.
*So we know from our studies that this was the third stage of Job’s sufferings and trial which was to be falsely accused and rejected by his friends and family and community, and he was having to bare all this rejection and character assassination on top of the first two catastrophic blows that Satan had given him in CH:1 and CH:2.
**But we as the readers of the book of Job know right from the beginning of the story of what Job and his three friends didn’t know - we know that the reasoning of these three friends of Job was actually completely wrong, because the book of Job gives the reader both sides of the story at the same time, so that we are able to see that what was being decided in heaven is then being played out in Job’s life on earth.
***And so we realise that our life’s temporal journey on earth cannot be any different to this, in that we can only see our own side of the story of our own lives of what our lives look like to our own reasoning – and so this book of Job is showing us a mystery concerning the misfortunes and disappointments that we encounter in our lives also – that there is another side to the story of the events of our lives that we can and will never understand by the human reasoning of man.
**That is why you could combine the reasoning power of the 100 smartest men in the world, and they would not be able to explain your life by all their reasoning power combined, but there is another side of the story of your life that God knows about that one day will be revealed to you also as it was to Job.
JOB 33:9-11
9 I am clean without transgression, I am innocent; neither is there iniquity in me.
10 Behold, he findeth occasions against me, he counteth me for his enemy, (Job is saying that he is innocent and yet God is finding occasions against him, and that God is treating him like his enemy. Job has a wrong concept of God in relation to himself. Job doesn’t understand the reason of the trial and of his suffering, that it was to bring him into a greater glory at the end and that this was the tender hand of God’s intent for him)
11 He putteth my feet in the stocks, he marketh all my paths.
**Job is wrongly charging God concerning his circumstances of life.
That is why when Elihu finally speaks; he takes up this issue with Job's claim of innocence while charging God with counting him as His enemy.
***So as we study on in the book of Job, it is clear that no one knew the other side of the story of what was going on in heaven between God and Satan, not until the book of Job is written as the first book of the bible, and only then could everyone see the both sides of the story – so God had kept it a secret until the end, but then after the suffering was over, then he had made the mystery of what had taken place in heaven known.
**So this is showing us that the best of our human reasoning will never understand the purpose of all the troubles and trials that we go through in life while we are going through them – and we will never be able to reason it out by our human minds, but it will take God to open the mystery of it and reveal to us what the other side of the story is at the end.
***So to summarize - if these wise men of Job’s three friends couldn’t reason out the purpose for Job’s sufferings, and Job misunderstood it himself and accused God falsely of how God was dealing with him, then this is showing us that you and I will never be able to reason out and understand the things that God will allow to happen in our lives until it is revealed by God at the end of the road.
JOB 1:13
13 ¶ And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house:
We spent quite a bit of time on this verse last week showing how that Satan was a very experienced strategist, and how that he was very careful in the way he planned the events of Job’s disasters so that it would have the maximum overwhelming effect possible on Job.
*Satan had carefully designed every detail of his attack and had been preparing it for weeks before the day arrived of this gathering of the family of Job’s children (who would be celebrating together).
*Notice how that it was at the time when the family had gathered together – and we are also living in a time of a great gathering time of when a message has gathered the family of the bride together also.
**Satan had organised four events for that day that would be carried out with precision timing.
- First there was the Sabean raider.
- Then there was the supernatural fire of God that came down from heaven and burned up and consumed all the sheep and the servants
- Then there was the Chaldeans that steeled all of Job’s camels and slayed his servants with the edge of the sword
- Then there was the tornado that smote the house where all his children were.
**And in each case there was one servant that lived to tell it to Job and as each servant came and told Job of one disaster, the next servant would run up with the news of the next disaster.
*So this showing us a revelation of the incredible organisation skills of the disasters in peoples live of what Satan and his angels are capable of accomplishing.
*So we can see how these fallen angles who were gifted by God were using their God given talents to try to destroy man’s relationship with God by doing all they could of what was in their power to get Job to curse God to his Face and break off his fellowship with God because it was fellowship with man that God wanted from the beginning.
*So we know that these four disasters in Job’s life also affected many other people, and this is why when the rumours were spread around that these 3 friends of Job had agreed that God was punishing Job because of some secret sin, then we can only imagine the negative attitudes of all these people in the community that had lost their sons and fathers and loved ones that used to work for Job as his herdsman – and so this was the heavy burden of false accusation that Job had to bear even though he was completely innocent.
***So there was a deep in Job that was squeezed out under this level of immense pressure – this was what God could see that was deep down on the inside of Job of what Satan could not see.
I.KNOW_ JEFF.IN EASTER.MESSAGE.BOOK SUNDAY_ 60-0417S
36 It's those crucial hours that press us on to those sacred sands. It was in the Bible. And remember, no matter how great the distress is, Satan cannot take your life until God has finished with you. There is nothing can happen to you unless God permits it. There is no evil can come unless God permits it. And it's for your good He's working that.
Let's think, there when the floods came to destroy the world, it could not destroy Noah. Noah could not be destroyed, because that God had a work for him to do.
41 Satan could not take them. He could not drown Noah in the flood, until the purpose of God had been finished. He could not burn up the Hebrew children until the purpose of God had been finished. He could not kill Job with boils and troubles until the purpose of God had been finished. Neither could the lions eat Daniel until God's purpose had been finished. Neither could death and old age take Abraham until the purpose of God had been finished. And neither can it take you, or can it take me until the purpose of God of our life is finished. So we gather from their consolation.
43 And why does God let troubles come? God harnesses trouble, puts bits in its mouth, and makes it obey Him, and those troubles bring us into a closer fellowship with God.