Insight for Living

Guest (Male): Some truths you can only learn in the hard places. Absolute trust in God is one of them. If life has always gone smoothly, surrendering control can feel impossible. But those who've walked through the fire, well, they often come out holding on to something the rest of us are still wrestling with. Today on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindoll continues the final message in our study of Job, and shows us how the deepest trials can lead us to the deepest trust. Chuck titled his message "What Job Teaches Us About Our God," and we begin with prayer.

Pastor Chuck Swindoll: Our Father, we have often turned to You in times of need. We turn to You today in a few extra moments of praise. We have given You our songs of praise today. We have acknowledged Your character. You are immortal, invisible, the only wise God. You are because of Your transcendent yet invisible presence. You are over all our lives and in all our ways, and You, like none other, watch over Your own and care for us with an infinite care that is beyond our imagination.

You never slumber, You never take a nap, You never sleep. You're never preoccupied. Your mind is never on something other than each one of Your children. And yet through You and Your precious Son, all things in this universe hang together. The affairs and the events of our lives do not concern You in the sense of troubling You. You watch over every one of them better than we could. You never have a day off, You are never absent, You are never without compassion, goodness, and grace.

How can we help but praise Your name, our Father? We've had great dads, but never a Father like You. We have seen the work of good fathers, but never one who works like You. We have known powerful and strong fathers, but never one who is all-powerful. We have known brilliant dads, but we have never known one who is omniscient, knowing all.

And so it is only appropriate, our Father, that we bow before You, thanking You for Your Word, not a mark of which will be taken away or removed throughout time and eternity. As the heavens are high above the earth, so is Your way higher than our ways, and Your thoughts above our thoughts. As the rain comes down and the snow from heaven and doesn't return, but waters the earth and makes it bring forth and bud, even so shall Your Word be that goes forth from Your mouth. It shall accomplish the purpose for which You sent it, and it will never return empty and void of purpose.

And so our Father, we bow before You. We bow before Your Word. We thank You for those men and women who wear the uniform of our country and of our allies' country. Thank You for their presence in places we will never be and in situations we will never find ourselves. Thank You for each one. Some teach, some fight, all are in training. Some are on the ships of the sea, some are in the vessels of the air, some are in caves and dens of the earth, some are in lonely and desolate places, some in the midst of bustling cities, but they're in Your hand. For there is no way to remove ourselves from Your presence.

So we praise Your name. We give to You today because You're deserving of all that we have. You own it all. And out of Your provisions, we have the privilege, we have the joy of giving as You have taught us to give: faithfully and joyfully and generously. Our Father, we praise Your Spirit for His work as You enlighten and guide us through His presence. Thank You for His convicting ministry that has brought all of us to a saving understanding, we who have come to Christ, and His work of convicting among those even in our midst who've not yet met the Savior.

But most of all, as You have instructed us, we hail Your Son's name. We hail His presence, we hail His perfection, we hail His work finished on the cross. And now we hail Your power. May the Son's power be preeminent in our minds, our Father, as we give to You and as we focus on Him. In His powerful name we pray. And all God's people 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 "What Job Teaches Us About Our God."

Pastor Chuck Swindoll: Some of you struggle with absolute sovereignty. It's probably because you have not faced a cataclysmic experience. Christians who go through what I would call a cataclysmic test have little trouble ultimately with grasping and embracing God's absolute sovereignty. I'll show you an example. Turn ahead to the book of Daniel. Chapter four is a story of a man who is full of himself. He's the king of Babylon, which would be much like the land of Iraq today. You can make your own analogies, but Nebuchadnezzar is his name.

He believed he was responsible for the kingdom as it was, for the buildings as they had been built, for the gardens as they stood, for the beauty of the waterfalls, for the wonderful pools that had been dug, for the water that flowed, for the people that lived, for all of life as it appeared in the land of Babylon, and he said so. Nebuchadnezzar saw himself as all-sovereign, and he said so. Toward the end of the chapter, verse 29, after an encounter with Daniel, who prophesied this would happen, Nebuchadnezzar, 12 months later, was walking on the roof, chapter 4, verse 29, he was walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon.

He's observing all of this kingdom that his eye can see, and the king reflected and said—now feel the arrogance as it drips out of verse 30—"Is this not Babylon the great, which I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?" While the word was in the king's mouth, a voice came from heaven saying, "King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is declared: sovereignty has been removed from you." It doesn't stop there. The voice continues: "You will be driven away from mankind and your dwelling place will be with the beasts of the field. You will be given grass to eat like cattle and seven periods of time will pass over you until you recognize—let me say it again—until you recognize that the Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it, that is sovereignty, on whomever He wishes."

Immediately—remember God's purposes are never cut off, never thwarted—immediately after the voice came from heaven, judgment fell. The word concerning Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled. He was driven away from mankind, began eating grass like cattle, his body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair had grown like eagles' feathers and his nails like birds' claws. Pause and imagine that. The man who walked on the roof of the palace is now grazing in the field outside the walls of the palace for seven years, I take it.

His hair grows long, of course, and his nails curl and twist like birds' claws. He is insane. He once had his faculties, he once was able to speak the words. I read no words that he spoke. He's eating like a beast in the field. He's grazing, he's living in the elements of the land. He is nothing, nothing because the sovereign God of heaven said, "That's enough." Curtains. And he's there all that period of time. I call that a cataclysmic experience.

Yours will not be that dramatic, though you may go through deep, deep battles. Emotionally, you may go off the end. Physically, you may have what we call in our language a breakdown. Both may occur. You may lose so much of what you had and counted on. You will go through whatever it takes for you to understand what Nebuchadnezzar realized. Now watch what happened. Verse 34: "At the end of that period, I, Nebuchadnezzar." What does that tell you? He picked up the pen, or he asked Daniel, maybe, "May I write this part since it's my part of the journal? Can I write what happened to me? I know better than you or anyone. I, Nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven, and my reason returned to me."

Pause right there. He's in the field. He looks up from the grass. And by the grace of God, he sees what he had never seen before in his life. I looked up. My reason returned to me. I blessed the Most High and praised and honored Him who lives forever. Now in my Bible it turns to a meter. It's as if he's writing a poem or a song as he lifts his praise, singing praises to His name, lifting his voice in glory of the One who has full control over his life and all things around him, and he describes the God of heaven: "His dominion is an everlasting dominion, His kingdom endures from generation to generation."

Verse 35 is one of my all-time favorite verses in the Bible. I have several of them, but this is one of them. "All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing. He does according to His will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth. No one can ward off His hand"—that's another way of saying thwart—"No one can stop Him, no one can restrain Him, no one can ward off His hand or say to Him, 'What have You done?'" At that time, my reason returned to me.

Back to Job 42. As I say, I repeat, that's what I would call cataclysmic. Job has not been insane, but he has come through a maddening period of loss and humiliation, grief, and disease. He has been leveled to the place of a homeless man, having been the greatest of the man in the East, of the men in the East. Having gone through it, Job is now beginning to realize, even without his questions answered, he is at the mercy of his great God who does all things well. And even though He may not explain Himself in His actions, he knows he can trust his God.

Which brings us to a third: God's plans are beyond our understanding and too deep to explain. God's plans are beyond our understanding and too deep to explain. See how Job puts it in verse 3: "I have declared that which I did not understand, things too wonderful for me which I did not know." That took some humility to say that. "Hear now, and I will speak. I will ask you." If you ask me to give you the core message of the book of Job, I'd give you chapter 42 and verse 3: coming to an understanding that God's plans are beyond our understanding and too deep to explain.

Now let me pause and shock some of you with a statement. That'll wake you up. There are times we are just downright disappointed with God. We are just disappointed. I mean, after all, we have done this or we have done that, and God has revealed Himself as good and fair and compassionate and loving. And look at what has happened in light of this. In the book *Disappointment with God*, we read: I can think of several helpful things God could have said: Job, I'm truly sorry about what's happened. You've endured many unfair trials on my behalf, and I'm proud of you. You don't know what this means to me and even to the universe.

A few brief compliments, a dose of compassion, or at the least, a brief explanation of what transpired behind the curtain in the unseen world. Any of these would have given Job some solace. God says nothing of the kind. His reply, in fact, consists of more questions than answers. Sidestepping 35 chapters' worth of debates on the problem of pain, He plunges instead into a magnificent verbal tour of the natural world. He seems to guide Job through a private gallery of His favorite works, lingering with pride over dioramas of mountain goats, wild donkeys, ostriches, and eagles, speaking as if astonished by His own creations.

The beauty of the poetry at the end of Job rivals anything in world literature. Even as I marvel at God's dazzling portrayal of the natural world, however, a sense of bewilderment steals in. Of all moments, why did God choose this one to give Job a course in wilderness appreciation? Are these words relevant? Stay with him. In his book *Wishful Thinking*, Frederick Buechner sums up God's speech: God doesn't explain, He explodes. He asks Job who he thinks he is, anyway. He says that to try to explain the kind of things Job wants explained would be like trying to explain Einstein to a littleneck clam. God doesn't reveal His grand design. He reveals Himself.

The message behind the splendid poetry boils down to this: until you know a little more about running the physical universe, Job, don't tell Me how to run the moral universe. "Why are You treating me so unfairly, God?" Job has whined throughout the book. "Put Yourself in my place." "No!" God thunders in reply. "You put yourself in My place. Until you can offer lessons on how to make the sun come up each day, or where to scatter lightning bolts, or how to design a hippopotamus, don't judge how I run the world. Just shut up and listen."

The impact of God's speech is almost as amazing as the speech itself. Although God never answers question one about Job's predicament, the blast from the storm flattens Job. He repents in dust and ashes, and every trace of disappointment with God is swept away. Maybe God doesn't explain Himself because knowing and understanding His way may not help us that much. Does knowing why really help us all that much? Is the pain decreased by knowing the cause?

In a world filled with catastrophes, random shootings of cowardly snipers, crashing big planes into tall buildings, deliberately poisoning elderly people at rest homes, serial rapists and murderers, mothers who kill their kids, African famines, priests who molest innocent little boys, preachers who are fraudulent and phony, CEOs who take unfair advantage of their employees—hey, how could God even permit that? Would it help to know why? Would it change the wrong?

I'll go a step further: maybe because we're incapable of comprehending His answers. Since He lives in a world that is higher than ours and in a realm beyond our realm, ours being tactile and limited by space and time and the elements about us, physical elements like gravity, limitations of our ability mentally—remember, remember, we cannot apply our simplistic rules of life on planet earth to the God of the heavens, nor should we.

What bothers us is that He doesn't act like we think He ought to act. He doesn't do what our father would have done, who loved us and would have given himself for... where was He when this happened? He was at the same place He was when the Savior was lifted up on the cross to die. He was there all the time as the process was running its course. And the most disillusioned people on the planet at that time were the followers of Jesus called the disciples, wondering how in the world they could have believed in a hoax. Because from their little neck clam perspective, life didn't make sense. You know what Job sees? Job sees God. He doesn't see answers. He doesn't need answers. He has now gotten a glimpse of the Almighty, and that's sufficient.

Still troubled? Number four: only through God—