Sunday, September 13 · Kenwood Baptist Church
Job: Where Is My Father?
Job is a righteous man who loses everything in a single day, and his name itself asks the question the whole book carries: where is my father? The sermon opens the book by showing that the first question it asks is not why the righteous suffer, but whether we serve God for his gifts or for God himself.
The passages
There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job. That man was blameless and upright, and one who feared God, and turned away from evil. There were born to him seven sons and three daughters. His possessions also were seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, five hundred female donkeys, and a very great household; so that this man was the greatest of all the children of the east. His sons went and held a feast in the house of each one on his birthday; and they sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with them. It was so, when the days of their feasting had run their course, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all. For Job said, “It may be that my sons have sinned, and renounced God in their hearts.” Job did so continually.
Job 1:1–5
Now on the day when God’s sons came to present themselves before Yahweh, Satan also came among them. Yahweh said to Satan, “Where have you come from?” Then Satan answered Yahweh, and said, “From going back and forth on the earth, and from walking up and down in it.” Yahweh said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant, Job? For there is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God, and turns away from evil.” Then Satan answered Yahweh, and said, “Does Job fear God for nothing? Haven’t you made a hedge around him, and around his house, and around all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land. But stretch out your hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will renounce you to your face.” Yahweh said to Satan, “Behold, all that he has is in your power. Only on himself don’t stretch out your hand.” So Satan went out from the presence of Yahweh.
Job 1:6–12
It fell on a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house, that a messenger came to Job, and said, “The oxen were plowing, and the donkeys feeding beside them, and the Sabeans attacked, and took them away. Yes, they have killed the servants with the edge of the sword, and I alone have escaped to tell you.” While he was still speaking, another also came and said, “The fire of God has fallen from the sky, and has burned up the sheep and the servants, and consumed them, and I alone have escaped to tell you.” While he was still speaking, another also came and said, “The Chaldeans made three bands, and swept down on the camels, and have taken them away, yes, and killed the servants with the edge of the sword; and I alone have escaped to tell you.” While he was still speaking, there came also another, and said, “Your sons and your daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house, and behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and struck the four corners of the house, and it fell on the young men, and they are dead. I alone have escaped to tell you.” Then Job arose, and tore his robe, and shaved his head, and fell down on the ground, and worshiped. He said, “Naked I came out of my mother’s womb, and naked will I return there. Yahweh gave, and Yahweh has taken away. Blessed be Yahweh’s name.” In all this, Job didn’t sin, nor charge God with wrongdoing.
Job 1:13–22
Go deeper
Do I love God for who he is, or for what he gives me?
The accuser puts his finger on the thing nobody wants to say out loud: maybe Job is only faithful because the fence around his life is holding. Take the blessings away, he says, and we will see what is actually underneath. Job answers him, and the answer costs him everything he had.
Then Satan answered Yahweh, and said, “Does Job fear God for nothing? Haven’t you made a hedge around him, and around his house, and around all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land. But stretch out your hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will renounce you to your face.”
Job 1:9–11
Satan answered Yahweh, and said, “Skin for skin. Yes, all that a man has he will give for his life. But stretch out your hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will renounce you to your face.” Yahweh said to Satan, “Behold, he is in your hand. Only spare his life.”
Job 2:4–6
Then Job arose, and tore his robe, and shaved his head, and fell down on the ground, and worshiped. He said, “Naked I came out of my mother’s womb, and naked will I return there. Yahweh gave, and Yahweh has taken away. Blessed be Yahweh’s name.”
Job 1:20–21
“Don’t lay up treasures for yourselves on the earth, where moth and rust consume, and where thieves break through and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consume, and where thieves don’t break through and steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Matthew 6:19–21
Is it okay to ask God why this is happening to me?
Job never knows what happened in heaven. He has no explanation for the day his life collapsed, and he opens his mouth anyway. Chapter 3 is his cry of distress, and the book lets it stand in the middle of scripture without correcting it.
After this Job opened his mouth, and cursed the day of his birth. Job answered: “Let the day perish in which I was born, the night which said, ‘There is a boy conceived.’
Job 3:1–3
For the thing which I fear comes on me, that which I am afraid of comes to me. I am not at ease, neither am I quiet, neither do I have rest; but trouble comes.”
Job 3:25–26
How long, Yahweh? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart every day? How long shall my enemy triumph over me?
Psalms 13:1–2
Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time, casting all your worries on him, because he cares for you.
1 Peter 5:6–7
How do I sit with someone who is hurting without making it worse?
Job has three friends who show up with answers, and by the end of the book God says they did not speak about him rightly. They are not villains. They are what most of us become when someone we love is suffering and we cannot stand the silence.
Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that had come on him, they each came from his own place: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite; and they made an appointment together to come to sympathize with him and to comfort him. When they lifted up their eyes from a distance, and didn’t recognize him, they raised their voices, and wept; and they each tore his robe, and sprinkled dust on their heads toward the sky. So they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very great.
Job 2:11–13
“I have heard many such things. You are all miserable comforters! Shall vain words have an end? Or what provokes you that you answer? I also could speak as you do. If your soul were in my soul’s place, I could join words together against you, and shake my head at you, but I would strengthen you with my mouth. The solace of my lips would relieve you.
Job 16:2–5
It was so, that after Yahweh had spoken these words to Job, Yahweh said to Eliphaz the Temanite, “My wrath is kindled against you, and against your two friends; for you have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job has. Now therefore, take to yourselves seven bulls and seven rams, and go to my servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering; and my servant Job shall pray for you, for I will accept him, that I not deal with you according to your folly. For you have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job has.” So Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went and did what Yahweh commanded them, and Yahweh accepted Job.
Job 42:7–9
Rejoice with those who rejoice. Weep with those who weep. Be of the same mind one toward another. Don’t set your mind on high things, but associate with the humble. Don’t be wise in your own conceits.
Romans 12:15–16
Where is God when I cannot see him in my suffering?
Job keeps asking for God to appear, and for most of the book God does not. The scene in heaven is the one thing Job never gets to see, and the reader does. The sermon ends on that light on Job's face from a distance, and on the promise that God is holding him together when he cannot tell.
“If I go east, he is not there. If I go west, I can’t find him. He works to the north, but I can’t see him. He turns south, but I can’t catch a glimpse of him. But he knows the way that I take. When he has tried me, I will come out like gold.
Job 23:8–10
Then Yahweh answered Job out of the whirlwind, “Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man, for I will question you, then you answer me! “Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Declare, if you have understanding.
Job 38:1–4
I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you. Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.”
Job 42:5–6
…looking to Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising its shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him who has endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, that you don’t grow weary, fainting in your souls.
Hebrews 12:2–3