Insight for Living

Pastor Chuck Swindoll: We all have our unguarded moments. We all have times when we reach the end of our tether, when the clouds of doom seem greater than the sun of tomorrow, and our view is blocked, and out gushes how we really feel.

Guest (Male): Can a person of deep faith fall into deep depression? Can someone who genuinely loves God reach a place so dark they can't find their way out? Chuck Swindoll says yes. And he says the church has too often been the last place to make that confession.

Today, on Insight for Living, Chuck brings this difficult journey home with the word of grace for anyone who's ever screamed at the sky and wondered if God was listening. The answer may surprise you. He not only listens, God can handle everything you say. Chuck begins with prayer.

Pastor Chuck Swindoll: Thank you for the reminder that your book is true.

That when you paint your servants, you paint them warts and all. You do not hide from us their depression, their doubts, their grief, even days so dark that some wish they had never been born.

And so today, while in the midst of this study of a troubled, heartbroken, grieving life, this day I pray that you will minister in a deep way to some who are in that kind of place at this time in their lives.

You would bring a sense of comfort and remind that there isn't any pit so deep but that you are deeper still.

Thank you for the place of quietness we enjoy here, freedom from the interruption of the enemy or the adversary.

Thank you for brave men and women who fight for our cause in places that are hard to pronounce, and in locations marked by terror and danger.

Take care of them and watch over them, and because of them give us protection, sustain our liberty.

Ours is a dark world, one that's fallen and lost its way.

And rather than being smug and complacent in it, give us a passion for those who can't find their way home.

Give us a sweet understanding of such a miserable situation that we might be for them a light in their darkness and hope in their hurt and a rescue from their valley.

Thank you for the sheer pleasure of the worship of you, our Triune God. Find favor in the giving from motive to action as we continue our worship in Jesus' name. And everyone said, Amen.

Guest (Male): You're listening to Insight for Living. To dig deeper into Job's story, be sure to purchase a copy of our Searching the Scriptures Bible Study workbook by going to insight.org/offer. Chuck titled today's message, The Mournful Wail of a Miserable Man.

Pastor Chuck Swindoll: Now, I need to warn you ahead of time as we turn to the third chapter. This will not be a pleasant sermon. This is not easy preaching.

I don't know of a person on earth that has ever said, "Job 3 is their favorite chapter in the Bible." I don't know of anyone who has ever memorized a verse out of Job 3.

It's one of those chapters you get to and you find yourself saying, "Well, let's see what else there is in the book of Job. Surely there's something." Unless, unless you have known the black hole of depression yourself.

And you read not with shock, but you read nodding with understanding, because you've been there.

Here the scabs are pulled from the sores, and the pus of reality runs down Job's life. But the wonderful plan of God is wonderful from his perspective, not yours and mine.

In fact, you say as you go to bed at night, "Naked I came from my mother's womb, naked I shall return. The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord." And you are the one who says to your mate, "Shall we not accept good from God and also not accept adversity as well?" And in all this you don't sin with your lips.

The same man who wrote that in chapters one and chapter two, wrote this in chapter three, and don't you doubt it. The same man.

And we don't want him to write what he writes in chapter three because it doesn't seem like he's really walking with God.

I mean, he has the audacity to say at the end, "I am not at ease, I am not quiet, I am not at rest. I am in turmoil."

And we are given entrance into a slice of Job's life that is as real as more testimonies who fill this room than any of us would ever believe.

Even the godly can be depressed. But Job is hung out here for all to see.

We all have our unguarded moments. We all have times when we reach the end of our tether, when the clouds of doom seem greater than the sun of tomorrow, and our view is blocked, and out gushes how we really feel.

And thankfully no one is there to hear.

But with Job, there were three friends who sat and stared and heard every word and began to put together their thoughts so they could set him straight as soon as they got a chance to talk. How tragic.

Allow me a couple of somewhat technical comments as we get underway. May I? At this point in the Hebrew text, poetry begins.

In the prologue, chapters one and two are written in prose, just as they appear in your Bible in a narrative form. As you would pick up a novel to read it, that's prose. As you would read a newspaper article, that's prose. It reads just like a book.

But when you get to chapter three in the Hebrew, you begin to read poetry, and it appears in meter. It appears as poetry.

And that runs all the way through chapter 42, verse 6. So the greater part of this book is poetry. That's why the book falls in the category of the poetry section of the Bible. It is mainly poetry.

Now the second little technical comment. Job's outburst, get this, is not prompted mainly because of physical suffering. It's prompted because he's lost touch with God.

It's a major difference.

He is miserable because he's lost his best friend.

How close he had been with God when he got married to Mrs. Job. How happy their relationship was, meaning his and God's, as the first of the few children were conceived and as the babies were born and as the seven boys and three girls filled their home with laughter. How near God seemed to him and as the business grew and the caravans multiplied, and the profit began to come in and as he was blessed with the joy of prosperity.

And as he and God walked together in the cool of the evening, how close God was until that day everything broke loose. Everything broke loose.

And he lost camp, he lost livestock, he lost all of the animals, he lost home, he lost all 10 children, and he lost his health. And worst of all, the heavens were brass.

And God no longer walked with him in the cool of the evening.

And God no longer came alongside to say, "My son, let me explain what this is all about. The devil came and he dared me to do," and I want you to know I'm trusting that you'll he knew none of that. You and I know all of that.

He's never read the first two chapters of Job. He's just living out the result of the chapters.

And he's reached the end of his rope.

This is the day you slam the door shut. This is the day you say to those even close to you, "Leave me alone."

This is the day in his life when he cannot find his friend, his heavenly Father.

One man writes, "The third chapter of Job must be one of the most depressing chapters in the Bible." While some might be as depressed as Job was and use these verses to give vent to their feelings, few sermons are made from this chapter. Few verses are claimed as promises. And few are remembered for the warmth of their sentiment.

It is the lowest of several low points in the book.

Afterward, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth.

Because you have patiently sat through my opening comments, you're not quite as shocked as the novice would be who reads this and says, "Aha, there you go. Satan said he would curse God. Now he does it." Wait, wait, wait.

It may be poetry, but let's read it accurately. He doesn't curse God.

He curses the day of his birth. There's a difference. There's a difference.

To say, "Why was I ever born?" is much different than saying, "I no longer believe in you, God."

It's saying, "I am so totally and completely alone, I regret that I ever drew breath. In fact, I regret that I was ever conceived in the womb of my mother."

Verses 1 to 10 he regrets his birth. Verses 11 to 19 he wished he'd been born dead. Verses 20 through 26, he longs to die. End of sermon.

As I said earlier, if you weren't depressed when you started with me, you will be when I finish.

Just pause and remember the aftershock of what is included in the word, chapter 3, verse 1, "afterward." Afterward.

Sitting at the city dump, head shaved, wife wringing her hands, three friends sitting seven days and seven nights, staring, not saying a word, chapter 2, verse 13. Seeing the pain was very great after loss of all the children. And everything he held dear and ability to make a living with sores running and scabs pulling loose from those sores. After that, he opened his mouth and out came, "I wish I had never been born."

And that's not all he said.

If you like marking your Bibles, you will have a field day with the words "let" and "may" in verses 3 through 9.

They appear over and over again. These are called jussives, J-U-S-S-I-V-E, in the Hebrew. I call them wish verbs. They are wish verbs. May this happen, may that happen. Let this happen, let that happen.

Let these things happen. And while I'm at it, let this and let that. It's poetry, folks. It's poetry.

"Let the day perish," verse 4. "May the day be darkness. Let God above care not for it," verse 5. "Let darkness and black gloom claim it. Let a cloud settle on it. Let the blackness of the day terrify it." Verse 6. "Let it not rejoice among the days of the year. Let it not come into the number of the months. Take it out of the calendar. Forget my birthday. Let that night be barren. Let no joyful shout enter it. Let those curse it who cursed the day." Verse 9. "Let the stars of its twilight be darkened. Let all that happen."

For goodness sake, Job, what is it? It is depression.

I want none of this thing called life and interestingly, suicide never enters his mind.

Never an attempt, never a word about it, never a warning against it was so foreign to the life of the faithful.

I thought it was interesting while working through this wail to see what he said in verse 3. Not only does he regret the day of his birth, he even regrets the conception.

"Let the day perish on which I was born," and in good poetic fashion, he returns even further, "and the night, let it perish when they said a boy is conceived."

In a day of easy abortion, isn't it interesting that he does not call the conception of the fetus a tissue. Or a mass of protoplasm. He calls it a boy. Because life begins at conception. As soon as the sperm enters the egg, you have a life, a life.

And in those days it was it was applauded by those in the patriarch era, "A boy, a boy! We have a boy!" "How wonderful." "No, no, no, don't say that," says Job at this age and stage of his life. "May that day be dark."

Obliterate it. Get rid of it.

There's another part of this that sort of fascinates me. When I get down in the middle of the blackness of all of this, I come across verse 8.

"Let those who let those curse it who cursed the day." By the way, that means Job is probably not very experienced in cursing, so he offers those who curse well to to pick up the the day of his birth and you take over, "who are prepared, look closely, to rouse Leviathan."

Now, I would say you've rarely used the word Leviathan in the last year or two of your life. What in the world is Leviathan?

Read in your Webster's dictionary this definition, "a sea monster represented as an adversary." But it goes further back than that.

More specifically, Leviathan was a seven-headed sea monster of ancient Near Eastern mythology.

In the Ugaritic literature of Canaan and Phoenicia in ancient days, eclipses were caused by Leviathans coming out of the sea, swallowing the sun or the moon, and therefore causing darkness to be cast on this earth as Leviathan was aroused from sleep in the sea, and he swallowed up the sun or the moon.

You say, "What?" And I say, "Poetry." See, that's a great way to handle this, isn't it? It's poetry.

No, it's even more than poetry, it's mythology. And if you travel to Turkey or if you travel to Greece and you have an individual who is a native of that land and you are guided on a tour, you will hear more mythology than you will hear theology.

The mythology is the whole basis of the gods of that land. And in ancient patriarchal days, it was still it was still a part of that of that custom or of that literature. And he picks up the thought and says, "While I'm at it, let Leviathan swallow up the sun of the day. Make it dark."

Does Job believe in mythology? No, anymore than you or I believe in Santa Claus. When Christmas comes, we may refer to something as prompting Santa to do this or that. It's not that we believe in him.

Last Christmas, I got a card from a good friend of mine, Paul Sailhammer. He said, "I just came across this." He said, "We go through four stages with Santa." He said. "First of all, we believe in him, and second, we don't believe in him. And third, we are him. And then fourth, we look like him." That's the four stages of Santa.

And we joke about Santa, and we we have fun with the myth of that. So, Job, not having fun, but referring to to this ancient creature who will return again in the in the poetry of this text, not here, but later.

And while lamenting that he did not perish at conception and grieving that he lived to see the day of his birth. Please notice another interesting comment made in verse 11.

Having said, "Why did I not die at birth, come forth from the womb and expire? Why did the knees receive me? Why the breasts that I should suck?"

The latter we understand, the nursing of the mother, as Job's mother nursed him. But the knees. How curious.

Some say that it has reference to the passing of the child as the mother births the infant. It passes if you will, through the knees. But this says "receive." It could be a reference to the mother placing the infant on her knees as she prepares to begin the nursing.

It probably better refers to the patriarchal process of a father being given the infant shortly after birth. The child was placed on the knees of the father, and he would there give it the family's blessing.

If you ever saw the television documentary Roots, you will remember the child being held by the father as he holds the child up before God and gives him to the Lord if you will, in their ancient custom in Africa. In this case, a father would be given the infant and he would bless the child as the infant was placed on the knees.

And Job says, "Why was I ever so blessed?" "Why did those knees ever receive me?" "Why wasn't it a corpse that they held in their hands?"

And then with the thought of becoming a corpse, ghoulish as it sounds, he turns to the blessing of that as he describes heaven. 13 through 19. Look closely.

"For now," meaning had I died, "I would have been laid down and been quiet. I would have slept then and I would have been at rest." "I would have been alongside kings and counselors and princes," verse 15, "who had gold and filling their houses with silver."

Verse 17, "There the wicked cease from raging." That's true in heaven. "There the weary are at rest. Prisoners are at ease. They do not hear the voice of the taskmaster. The small and the great are there, and the slave is free from his master."

It's a beautiful picture of peace and solemnity and ease. And he said, "Oh, that could have been my lot." "But I lived." "And I've lost it all."

And as a result, verse 24, he takes us to his everyday experience. "My groaning comes at the sight of my food. My cries pour out like water."

When someone served him a simple meal, he groaned. The Hebrew word means to shriek. "Take it away. I have no interest in anything to eat."

The man along with the suffering of the sickness is now starving. And his cries come like water poured out. He speaks of his fears in verse 25 and his dread, "The things I dreaded have fallen upon me."

This may have reference to those days when he was prosperous and and life was good and he in unguarded moments wondered if they would remain that. And my worst fears have been realized, and now dread has fallen upon me.

"I am not at ease. I am not quiet. I am not at rest. I am full of turmoil." End of speech.

His friends are nearby, staring him down, analyzing him from their vantage point of good health and beginning their sermons if you will, as they will soon rebuke him because he's getting what he deserves, if you can imagine.

Did you in years past happen to see The Elephant Man? I think many of us did. Wonderful film.

A film not for children, but a film with an adult theme about a man who struggled with a disease that result in a deforming and defacing of his of his person.

And the head is enlarged and a thick callous-like skin replaces the smooth skin that that we have, and he he looks like a, if you will, a sideshow freak. But he is a great man deep inside.

And he's treated like a like a man who's escaped from the circus. And there's a tragic scene where he's running from the crowd as cameras are flashing and people are grabbing at him and he finds his way to a railway station and races down steps to get away and finally winds up in the latrine, the soiled place of this public station. And they pour into that place and they're flashing their cameras. And and right at the at at the the zenith of the film, he he struggles to get the words out, "I am a human being!"

You can hear a pin drop in the theater. I hear Job at that level, the end. Oh, God! Where are you?

Guest (Male): I am a human being. Four words from a forgotten film. Yet they echo the cry of every soul who has ever felt invisible in their suffering. Job's anguish wasn't weakness. It was the raw, unfiltered voice of a man crying out from the depths of his humanity. "Oh, God, where are you?"

Chuck Swindoll will bring this moving study to its conclusion next time on Insight for Living. It's titled The Mournful Wail of a Miserable Man.

Meanwhile, we invite you to explore the resources that Chuck has prepared to accompany this series. Here at Insight for Living, we provide companion resources for every study Chuck presents, and this series is no different.

For instance, Chuck wrote a practical book that pairs naturally with his study. The book is titled Finding God When the World's On Fire. It's available right now at insight.org/donate.

You know, suffering has a way of stripping away every answer we thought we had. The tidy theology, the confident prayers, the assumption that faith means being spared from pain. Job discovered something better than easy answers. He discovered a God who shows up in the dark, and so can you.

Chuck Swindoll's book, Finding God When the World's On Fire, is an honest, scripture-packed companion for anyone whose faith is being tested by real life. Tested by loss, by illness, by uncertainty, by a world that refuses to settle down.

Chuck doesn't pretend the hard things aren't hard. He just shows us that God is bigger than all of it. We'd love to put this book into your hands. If you contact Insight for Living with a contribution today, we'll send it to you with our gratitude and our prayers.

You can request the book Finding God When the World's On Fire when you go to insight.org/donate. Or call us at 800-772-8888. Here's our contact information one more time: just go to insight.org/donate, or call 800-772-8888.

What do you do with grief that's too big for words? I'm Bill Meyer. Join us when Chuck Swindoll offers hope for the hopeless, Tuesday on Insight for Living.