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This podcast is a production of Watermark Community Church in Dallas, Texas, USA. Watermark exists to be and make more fully devoted followers of Christ, looking to God's Word as our only authority, conscience and guide.
Good morning, Watermark family and friends. It is so good to be with you all this morning. If we have not met before, my name is Wes Butler, and I have the privilege of serving on our staff as the director of our care ministries here. I've had the amazing opportunity to be a part of this staff for the last 20-plus years, and I just want to say "thank you" to my Watermark family for the ways that my life has been shaped by yours, by your faithfulness, by your encouragement. I just want to tell you that I love you and I'm so excited to be able to be in this place to share God's Word with you.
Today, we want to start, like we do each and every week, by taking some time to pray. So I'm going to ask you now to bow your heads and close your eyes. I'm going to ask you to maybe put your hands out, palms up, in front of you for just a moment, and here's what I want to ask you to do in the quietness of your heart with your heads bowed and eyes closed. Imagine that thing you brought into this room.
It could be something as small as your plans for this holiday weekend or it could be something as enormous as a grief or sorrow you're walking through, whatever it might be, but just like, "Man, this is the thing that's on my mind." The Lord tells us to cast our cares on him because he cares for us. So, would you just pray and say, "God, would you take this from me for the next few moments that I might be able to hear from you more clearly?"
Then, would you ask him to, in its place, fill you with what it is he wants to say to you today, that he might nourish you by his Spirit? Then, would you pray for those whose hands are open next to you, that the Lord might fill _their_ hands and _their_ hearts as he sees fit, according to his will? Then, finally, would you pray for me, that God might use me as an instrument of his grace in your life today?
Father, we've just sung that all this is from you and to you and all for your glory. Lord, all that we will receive from you in these next few moments, we want to thank you, and, Lord, our humble ask is that you might fill us with exactly what we need. Would you block out the distractions we are tempted to pay attention to in this moment, and would you allow us to hear clearly from your Word your voice speaking to our hearts? Lord, would you heal us, would you restore us, would you renew the joy of our salvation…whatever it is you need to do in our hearts, we pray. We submit ourselves to you. In the powerful name of Jesus we pray, amen.
I want to take a moment to say, "Happy Memorial Day weekend." I want to take some time to acknowledge those who are in the room who, today, are remembering the life and legacy of someone you knew personally, someone who gave their life in the service of our country. I know some of you have lost spouses. Some of you have lost siblings or parents or even grandparents.
Then there are others of you who have served in our military, and you fought alongside of brothers and sisters who gave their lives in the service of this country. So, I just want to say thank you for _your_ sacrifice on this day that we acknowledge their sacrifice. Thank you so much.
When I think about Memorial Day, I think about my grandpa. Billy Graves (3:51) was his name. He fought in World War II, and by God's grace he survived that war. Here's a picture of him looking awfully handsome there. He served in the US Navy for three years, three months, and three days. He served aboard the USS Davis out in the Atlantic. He was a gunner on that ship.
I remember, as a child, being fascinated by wanting to understand more about what it was like to fight in the war and wanting to hear about his stories, yet I was, at the same time, grieved when I would hear things about how the thunderclaps of the West Texas thunderstorms in Lubbock, Texas, where he lived would oftentimes elicit some form of PTSD for him as he remembered the explosions he endured during that time. It grieved my heart that he had that experience.
He and my grandmother were often traveling the country to go to various reunions with the veterans of the USS Davis to spend time with the men he had served with and to remember the lives of those who had been lost. You see, just a few months after my grandfather ended his tour of duty, on April 24, 1945, the USS Davis was sunk by a German submarine, resulting in the loss of about 115 sailors, and many of those men were men my grandfather knew personally and would have called friends.
Now, my grandpa Billy was a great man. I loved him so much. He was a lot of fun to be around as a kid. He knew how to make kids laugh and just enjoy life with us, but he was also a pretty tenderhearted man. Anytime he would begin to recall his time in the military, it ultimately resulted in that catch in his throat and tears that would begin to well up in the corners of his eyes and sometimes stream down his face. So, I remember, as a child, learning my lesson, so to speak. Meaning, I was really uncomfortable with that.
I didn't quite know what to do with Grandpa when he started crying, because he was my fun grandpa, and all of a sudden he was really upset. So, oftentimes, I would just kind of find something else to do or I'd try to change the subject or I'd invite him to come outside and throw a ball with me or something else. I didn't want to see my grandpa struggling and suffering in that moment. Frankly, I probably just stopped talking to him at all about it, because I just didn't want to put myself in that uncomfortable situation.
Interestingly, I actually think that discomfort I felt and was shaped by shapes much of the way our celebrations of Memorial Day weekend are here in our culture. I'm not quite sure what barbecues and trips to the lake or the beach have to do with the millions of men and women who have given their lives in the service of our country over the last 200-plus years, but I know it's a whole lot more fun to think about _those_ things than it is to spend an entire weekend reflecting on the loss of life that comes through the horrors of war.
I start with that because when it comes to dealing with sorrow and suffering in this life, my observation, frankly, is that we aren't much better at knowing what to do with it than I was as a child or how our culture tends to push the focus of suffering to the periphery on a weekend like this. Well, today, we are looking at the book of Job. We have been on this year of the Journey. If you're just joining us, welcome. We are so glad you're here. We have just finished reading through half of the book of Job.
It's an entire book, 42 chapters in total, that we're going to work through verse by verse. Just kidding. We're not going to do that. It's 42 chapters long, and it focuses on the life of one man whom God permitted to suffer to the degrees that most of us can only imagine, frankly. So, if you have your Bible, I want to invite you to open it up and turn to Job, chapter 1. I want to take some time to summarize that book really quickly, especially for those who might be in the room who are unfamiliar with it.
The majority of the action of this book takes place in the first two chapters. We're introduced to this man Job, who is described as a godly and blameless man who has ordered his life rightly in such a way that he is experiencing the blessings of a beautiful family, of the wealth of his possessions, and the high regard of the people around him. Not only that, but he's experiencing the blessing of fellowship with God, regularly praying and offering sacrifices that please the Lord. It's actually a pretty fantastic picture that, honestly, any one of us would love to have described of us.
We are then ushered into this mysterious heavenly courtroom where God, the Judge of all the earth, sits and gives audience to the accuser, Satan. God invites Satan to consider Job, and Satan, two different times, asks for permission to test the authenticity of Job's love for God and his personal integrity, confident that Job only loves God for his blessings. God grants him permission but with limitations. We're told that Satan destroys his possessions, his livelihood, his family, and his physical health, all while calling into question his reputation in the community.
We're told that Job passes the test and does not abandon God under the crushing weight of these tragedies, and then we see that three friends show up to grieve with him and over him, sitting silently for seven days. Then, after seven days, we're told Job opens his mouth to give voice to his sorrow and his questions. He's begging for an opportunity to plead his case before God, only to be met by the accusations of his three friends, telling him that, clearly, if this is happening to him, it's only because he has done something terribly wrong.
This goes on, largely, for about 36 chapters of Job. It's just a roller coaster of emotionally gut-wrenching honesty mixed with harsh, compassionless critiques from his friends. After all that, we are mercifully told that God begins to speak, calling Job to consider how small his view of God and the world actually is and inviting Job to see the wonder of who he is through the new and fresh eyes of his pain and sorrow.
The story ends with God rebuking Job's friends, ordering them to bring an offering to Job that he would sacrifice so he could pray for their forgiveness for what they have done to him. Then the whole story ends with God restoring the fortunes of Job, we're told, and blessing him in the latter days of his life more than his beginning.
Now, anytime we begin to open up God's Word, we want to understand who the original audience was and why this was written. Well, the book of Job, as many commentators have observed, was originally written to correct the false assumptions of the traditions of the day. It was written to invite the ancients of that time into a proper understanding of the hardships and of this broken world that was fractured in Genesis 3.
You see, suffering was all around them in ways that were unmistakable and inescapable, yet the traditions of the day tried to fit everything into this nice little category and told them that suffering comes to those who deserve it and blessing comes to the good and that you could actually insulate yourself from suffering by making sure your good outweighed your bad. This was actually kind of the precursor to the idea of karma that we know in _our_ society.
Now, for us today, obviously, suffering still exists. We know it. We see it all around us, just as much as it did then. Perhaps we are too sophisticated for the simplicity of the idea of karma, but my concern for us here at Watermark, and why I think it's so important for us to talk about this today, is we live in a day and age in which we have developed new strategies for insulating ourselves from suffering.
We have technologies and medicine and media and culture that deceive us into thinking we can avoid it for ourselves through our own good habits or respectable behavior or maybe really good parenting techniques or diet and exercise or going to see a professional counselor or some form of self-care. Now, all of those things are very good things. They're good things, but ultimately, if we are using them to insulate ourselves from suffering, we are living under a false assumption similar to the one Job and his friends lived under.
Not only that, but those who are suffering in our world are often hidden from us behind hospital walls, HIPAA regulations, nursing homes, or even the shuttered windows and privacy fences of our neighborhood. We have been lulled to sleep by the comforts afforded us by our day and age, and the discomfort and even incompetence we feel for knowing what to do when people are suffering around us reveals our own reliance on the gods of this age.
The reality is we can't escape the brokenness of this world. Jesus himself said, "In this world you will have trouble." So we know this isn't an _if_; this is a _when_. This _is_ going to happen to us. Just as the insulation in our homes only goes so far as we approach summertime here in Texas, the same is true for the things we try to insulate ourselves with against suffering. It only goes so far.
A few weeks ago, I was visiting with one of our members at the hospital. She was there with their 1-year-old son who had just had open heart surgery. As we were talking, she told me that our friend Mandy Sisco, who serves on our staff here, had said, "All parents realize they aren't in control of their child's life at some point. You're just getting to learn that lesson early on."
That's what suffering does. Suffering shakes us out of our delusional dream that we are in control of our lives, and like Job, it gives us eyes to see. So, if trouble is this inevitable reality, why is it that we are seemingly so uncomfortable with it? I want you to lean in for a second and listen to Pastor Eugene Peterson. He once wrote this.
"It's an odd thing. Jesus wept. Job wept. David wept. Jeremiah wept. They did it openly. Their weeping became a matter of public record. Their weeping, sanctioned by inclusion in our Holy Scriptures, a continuing and reliable witness that weeping has an honored place in the life of faith.
But just try it yourself. Even, maybe especially, in church where these tear-soaked Scriptures are provided to shape our souls and form our behavior. Before you know it, a half dozen men and women surround you with handkerchiefs, murmuring reassurances, telling you that it is going to be all right, intent on helping you to 'get over it.'" I'm sure none of us have ever done that or experienced that.
He goes on and asks this. "Why are Christians, of all people, embarrassed by tears, uneasy in the presence of sorrow, unpracticed in the language of lament? It certainly is not a biblical heritage, for virtually all our ancestors in the faith were thoroughly 'acquainted with grief.' And our Savior was, as everyone knows, 'a Man of Sorrows.'"
Did you hear that? Church, we are not very good at this, and we have an opportunity, I believe, to grow. What Peterson was saying in that quote is that the Scriptures are full of the vocabulary of lament and brokenness, yet when was the last time you went to purchase a decorative pillow for your bedroom that quotes Job 30:17, where he says, **"The night racks my bones, and the pain that gnaws me takes no rest."** Anybody? Does anybody have that on their bed?
I'm just going to be honest. I'm a 47-year-old man, and last night at 3:00 a.m., when that charley horse hit my calf, I was like, "That's the pillow I need. I need that pillow in my bedroom." It's more appropriate and honest than "He gives to his beloved sleep." Wonderful sentiment. Not my experience, but it's a lovely sentiment.
TA has shared with us recently his prayer for Watermark in these days we're in, that God would wake us up from our slumber. I hope you've been encouraged and convicted and revived by the Scriptures as we've made our way through this Year of the Word. I believe the book of Job has been preserved for us as another wake-up call, to call the people of God to be agents of comfort, of sympathy, of compassion, and of steadfastness in a hurting and broken world. It's inviting us in to learn this language of lament.
Specifically, today, I want us to look at three important truths the book of Job awakens us to. The first is the truth of God's role in our suffering. What is God's role in our suffering? Job gives us a glimpse into that. Secondly, it's our role with the sufferers. What is our role, as the people of God, to a world around us that is broken and suffering? Finally, we want to look at the role suffering does play in our lives.
1\. _God's role in our suffering_. If you have your Bible, open it up to chapter 1 of Job. As I mentioned earlier, the opening prologue introduces us to Job and paints this glowing picture of a man who is blessed by God and is a blessing to all those around him, and then we read about this interaction between God and Satan. Pick up with me in verse 8.
**"And the Lord said to Satan, 'Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?' Then Satan answered the Lord and said, 'Does Job fear God for no reason? Have you not put a hedge around him and his house and all that he has, on every side?**
**You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face.' And the Lord said to Satan, 'Behold, all that he has is in your hand. Only against him do not stretch out your hand.' So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord."**
The narrative continues from this point on with this dramatic description of unspeakable loss of all that Job owns and all his livelihood. All of his children pass away. Then chapter 2 depicts, unmercifully, the same interchange between God and Satan where Satan says, "Hey, what if I go and attack his physical body?" God gives permission once again.
So, we're told of the arrival of painful sores from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head, followed by the counsel from the one family member who did survive, his wife, telling him just to curse God and die. See, these two fast-paced chapters illuminate some crucial and even scandalous revelations of the character of God and his role in suffering.
First, we see in this passage that _God knows us intimately_. God knew Job's character, and he knew the strength he possessed to stand up against Satan's attacks because he knew everything about Job and, frankly, because he had given everything _to_ Job that Job needed to weather the storm. You need to know that he knows you too. He knows what strength you possess, because it's not your strength; it's _his_ strength, and he has given it to you as a gift of his grace to sustain you through whatever this life may throw at you.
Secondly, we see that _God permits and even directs suffering our way_. Notice it was not Satan going to God and saying, "Hey, I'd like to talk to you about Job." It's actually God who takes Satan's hand in his face a little bit and is like, "Hey, have you looked over there? Look and see him. Have you considered my servant Job?"
Do you have a category for that, that God might look at the Enemy of your soul and say, "Hey, have you considered this person?" But we see in this narrative that it _is_ God who permits and even directs suffering our way. The suffering we experience in this life is firmly under the control and guidance of the plans and purposes of God.
Thirdly, we see that _God is sovereignly in control of Satan and the limits of suffering_. The Reformer, Martin Luther, once said the Devil is God's devil. In other words, the Devil, Satan, has no power unless God permits him. This story depicts the absolute subservience and ineptitude of the Devil. He is a weak dog, and he isn't permitted to take one step beyond the boundary God has put in place.
These three realities reveal this, then, about God's role in suffering: _God permits, regulates, and restricts suffering in the lives of those he loves based on his intimate knowledge of us_. This means there is not one trial you have ever faced or will face in this life that came about because God was on vacation or was asleep at the wheel or was taking a long nap. No, he is actually the ultimate cause and controller.
This is why Job says in verse 21 of chapter 1, **"Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord."** Then, again, in Job 2:10, we see Job at the end of his physical sufferings that were coming on him, saying, **"Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?"**
Now, it's important for us to notice… If you have an ESV, you might look down in the footnotes of your ESV, and you'll see that word _evil_ is better translated as _disaster_. Job is saying, "Shall we receive good things from God and not the disaster that he allows as well?" See, this was not a category mistake on Job's part. It wasn't a case of mistaken identity, like, "Oh, no, Job. You should have known this was Satan." No, he was saying, "Hey, look. This is God who has allowed this and permitted it, and I'm going to continue to worship him."
Just to drive this point home, the writer of Job, at the end of chapter 1, in verse 22, says, **"In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong."** So, if this is true, if God is the permitter, the regulator, and the restrictor of suffering, what are the implications of this truth for us? I believe there are two primary and very important implications for us.
First, _because God is the permitter, regulator, and restrictor of our suffering, our confusion, our questions, and our doubts should be directed to him_. This is actually known as _lament_. When we take our confusion, our questions, and our doubts, and we go and say, "Lord, I'd like to talk with you about these things," it's actually an ancient practice that has been preserved for us in the Scriptures.
Mark Vroegop wrote an excellent book on lament entitled _Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy_ in which he defines _lament_ simply as a prayer in pain that leads to trust. That's what we see here in Job. He is just praying to God in pain. He's talking to his friends, but he's also talking directly to God and leveling some big questions and even, at times, accusations against him.
The Scriptures are full of the people of God giving voice to their questions with honesty and gut-wrenching emotions, like Job. The book of Psalms, this songbook we're about to read through in this Year of the Word, has preserved for us 150 songs that the ancient Israelites would have sung, and a full third of those, 50 of those, are categorized as songs of lament. One of my favorite ones I'd love for us to read is Psalm 13.
It's a psalm of David, where he writes and says, **"How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day? How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?"** Maybe some of you are listening to those words and picturing the old cartoons where the lightning bolt strikes down on the character as he begins to say things. God doesn't do that.
David goes on and says, **"Consider and answer me, O Lord my God; light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death, lest my enemy say, 'I have prevailed over him,' lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken. But I have trusted…"** Here it is. This is where that prayer in pain turns to trust. **"But I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation. I will sing to the Lord, because he has dealt bountifully with me."**
I love what Michael Card says in his book _A Sacred Sorrow_ where he simply says, "Lament is not a path _to_ worship, but the path _of_ worship." What does he mean by that? What he means is that oftentimes, when we take our complaints, our fears, our doubts, and our confusion and direct them to the Lord, that in and of itself is an act of worship.
It is us looking to God and saying, "God, I'm asking you this because I believe that you are God. I believe you are in control, and I believe you are the one who can do anything about this, so I'm coming to you with my big questions. I'm not grumbling on the side. I'm not just pulling my friends over here and talking to them. I'm talking to _you_, God, because I believe you can do something about it." I believe God is honored when we do, which is why the laments are preserved for us in the Scriptures. It is a vocabulary that he invites us into.
So, my prayer for us, as a church, is that during this Year of the Word, and maybe specifically as we make our way through the Psalms, we can learn the spiritual language of lament and rightly apply it to our personal prayer lives, to our conversations in our Community Groups, and even to our corporate gatherings here at church. So, we see that because God is the permitter, regulator, and restrictor of our suffering, we can come to him with our laments.
Secondly, _because he is the permitter, regulator, and restrictor of suffering, we can take comfort in knowing that our suffering is planned and purposed by an all-loving, all-wise God_. See, brothers and sisters, there is no comfort in living in a world and having a belief that things just happen without any rhyme or reason. There's no comfort in that.
Equally, there's no comfort in a world in which there are equally powerful forces at work and evil inflicting suffering upon us and that they're just in this cosmic battle with God. No, no, no. Where we find and draw comfort in the midst of our sufferings is in knowing that the forces of evil and the brokenness of creation around us is completely in the wise and purposeful hands of the Lord.
One of my spiritual heroes is Elisabeth Elliot whose husband Jim was martyred by the people they were trying to reach with the gospel in the Amazon. She once wrote this: "We are not adrift in chaos. \[…\] Every time that things have seemingly fallen apart in my life, I have gone back to those things that do not change. \[…\] He loves me. I am not at the mercy of chance." Brothers and sisters, neither are you. He loves you. This should bring us comfort, even in the midst of the unknowns, the doubts, and the confusion, that we know he is in control.
2\. _Our role with the suffering_. Unfortunately for Job, we are told that this lesson is taught largely through the mistakes of his three friends, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. Again, look back with me at Job, this time in chapter 2, beginning in verse 11.
**"Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came each from his own place, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite. They made an appointment together to come to show him sympathy and comfort him. And when they saw him from a distance, they did not recognize him. And they raised their voices and wept, and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads toward heaven. And they sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his suffering was very great."**
Now, oftentimes, when Job's friends are discussed in church circles like this, we look at this moment right here as their one and only highlight reel. These guys actually showed up. They showed up for their friend. They sat with him in sorrow. They said nothing for seven days. Then we go on to lampoon them for opening their mouths in eight separate speeches. Job actually assesses their helpfulness by calling them _miserable comforters_.
Then he says this in Job 13:4-5: **"As for you, you whitewash with lies; worthless physicians are you all. Oh that you would keep silent, and it would be your wisdom!"** Now, just a sidenote for our Community Groups here. If someone in your Community Group is being unhelpful to you, I don't necessarily recommend this becoming a memory verse that you throw at them. Okay? Probably not Job's finest moment, but it was honest.
So, here's the question we want to ask: Is it true that their greatest triumph was saying nothing and their greatest mistake was saying anything? Is that it? I actually don't believe so. I love what commentator Christopher Ash says. He says, "The Bible hints that what they do—tearing clothes, throwing dust on the head, taking seven days—is precisely what one would do in mourning with a corpse. \[…\] It may be that their silence is not so much a silence of sympathy as a silence of bankruptcy: they are silent because they have nothing to say. Their friend is as good as dead."
Get this. He basically says, "In our culture, it is as if they call for the hearse and sit by Job with the coffin open and ready, and it is actually Job who is forced to break the silence." So, considering this, perhaps other than showing up, there really was not much else these friends did that was redeeming in Job's life.
This is further confirmed at the end of the book of Job, in Job 42:7, when God speaks, and he looks at Eliphaz, one of the friends, and says, **"My anger burns against you and against your two friends, for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has."** Now, that's not to say there are not some very true and even profound things the friends say.
If you were to look in my Bible that I've read through the book of Job in, you would see several verses underlined within the speeches of the friends because, frankly, they're saying things that are true. We don't have time to dive into all of their specific words, but if you were to go and study all of these speeches, I believe there are three overarching mistakes we see play out in their lives that we can learn from as we consider _our_ role in caring for the suffering around us.
First, the three friends speak _about_ God without speaking _to_ God. They just are constantly going, "Hey, here's what I think God is like." Over and over again, they're drawing these conclusions and assumptions about God rather than speaking to God and seeking out his wisdom, rather than going to his Word and saying, "What does God's Word have to say about this, and how should it inform the way I do those things?"
Secondly, they share partial truths and untimely moments. This is the thing that makes false teaching so destructive. It contains parts of the truth while neglecting and even denying the fullness of truth. One commentator said it's just as important to pay attention to what Job's friends do _not_ say as it is to pay attention to what they _do_ say. These partial truths and untimely moments are really painful and unhelpful.
Finally, the third mistake we see here is that their motives are more self-serving than sympathetic of Job. What was happening with these friends was they were like, "Man, I live in a world where I believe that if I do good things, good things will come, and if I avoid bad things, I'll avoid bad things." All of a sudden, they're seeing their friend, who they understood to be a righteous and blameless man, suffering, and they're like, "Look. To make me feel better, I've got to convince him and everyone else around me he must deserve it."
At the end of the day, they were not concerned about Job's well-being; they were concerned about themselves. They lacked sympathy in this moment. So, what then can we learn from their mistakes about our role when members of our Community Group are facing financial hardship and job loss or neighbors are grieving the death of a loved one or a coworker is enduring long seasons of anxiety and depression?
As I have the privilege of sitting with people in our church who are suffering, it's not uncommon for me to hear from them how lonely and isolated they feel in the midst of their grief, because they feel like people avoid them or are scared to reach out or to ask questions about how they're doing.
Or I'll hear, on the other end of the spectrum, how anxious they are about going to meet with their Community Group or to talk with other Christians because they fear having to feel the onslaught of unsolicited advice of what they need to do differently or who they need to call or what book or podcast they should check out or even what Watermark ministry they should consider jumping into.
See, too often in our culture, people in suffering can feel like a problem to be solved rather than a person to be soothed. Instead, if we are to avoid the mistakes and learn from the mistakes of the friends, here's what we see our role, as Christians, is with those who suffer. _Our role in the lives of the suffering is to show up with humility, wisdom from above, and discernment from the Spirit_. Practically speaking, what does this look like? Well, I think there are three things for us to see here.
First, we want to speak with God on their behalf before we speak on God's behalf to them. Rather than saying, "Hey, I'd like to tell you what I think God says," just take some time to pray with them, to pray _for_ them, to take them and their situation before the Lord and say, "Lord, we need your help here."
Secondly, we should be people who ask for God's wisdom on what to say, when to say it, and how to say it long before we begin to give our advice and thoughts about the situation, that we would go to the Lord and say, "Lord, would you give me wisdom?" James 1:5 says, **"If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him."**
So, before you start offering potential resources or solutions or quoting your favorite Bible verses, remember that in doing so you're actually representing the Lord himself, and that you would approach it with humility and even with fear and trembling, that we would rightly represent the Lord to those who are hurting.
Finally, that we would lead with sympathy and self-sacrifice. You need to know that some of the most powerful words I have experienced in times of sorrow and grief, for me, have been when friends have come alongside of me and said, "I am so sorry. That must be so incredibly painful." There is a healing that washes over our souls when others acknowledge our pain, acknowledge our suffering. So resist the urge to make their suffering about you. "Maybe they'll think I'm the best friend who has all the good advice." You don't need that. They need you to encourage them and to have sympathy.
So, we've seen that Job awakens us to God's role in suffering (namely, that he permits, regulates, and restricts suffering in the lives of those he loves), and we've seen that our role with the suffering world around us is to show up with humility, wisdom from above, and discernment from the Spirit.
3\. _The role suffering plays in our lives_. I want to encourage you to turn all the way to the end of the book of Job, chapter 42. After 36 chapters of lament from Job and unhelpful responses from his friends, God mercifully begins to speak out of the whirlwind in chapter 38. All of Job's questions for God and the poor counsel of his friends result in this flurry of questions that God has for Job, questions that are intended to help Job consider that there is far more going on in this world than Job could possibly begin to comprehend.
A couple of weeks ago, Chris Sherrod shared this quote from John Piper where he says, "God is always doing 10,000 things in your life, and you may be aware of three of them." Piper actually goes on to expound on that quote, saying, "Not only may you see a tiny fraction of what God is doing in your life; the part you do see may make no sense to you." This is important for us to keep in mind when we consider the role of suffering in our lives.
The reality is we don't have time today to unpack all of the facets of the diamond of suffering, but there _is_ a moment in the book of Job that gives us a glimpse into what I believe is God's overarching purpose in our suffering, and it happens right there in Job 42:5 where Job, in response to God, simply says, **"I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you…"** I believe the role of suffering in our lives, as God intends it, is not that we would know the _why_ of suffering but that we would see and know the person of God.
In all of God's speeches, I believe what he ultimately is saying to Job is, "Job, you're asking the wrong question. You've been asking _why_, and I want to encourage you to ask _who_." See, God allows suffering to draw us into his wisdom, his instruction, his presence, his correction, his grace, his comfort, his kindness, his goodness, his peace, his mercy, his riches, and his love.
His greatest desire for all of us is, ultimately, as TA has encouraged us over these last couple of weeks, that we wouldn't settle for a long-distance relationship with God but that, as James 4:8 says, we would draw near to God, and he will draw near to us. See, God often uses suffering to close the gap in a long-distance relationship. He wants to close that gap.
Joni Eareckson Tada, who's the leader of a global ministry that was birthed out of the tragedy that left her a quadriplegic at the age of 16, has built her entire ministry around this truth, where she just says, "Sometimes God allows what he hates to accomplish what he loves." God does not love suffering. He doesn't love to bring suffering into your life, but he loves _you_, and he wants what is best for you.
One of the things he loves most is intimate, abiding fellowship with you, experiencing his presence, not from a distance, not just hearing about it with your ear, but seeing him with your eyes. Now, some of you might be hearing this and thinking, "Well, Wes, that sounds great, but I'm not necessarily in a place of suffering personally. How can _I_ see and experience God too?" You guys ask great questions. That was a really good one.
Notice that I said the role of suffering is in _our_ lives. You see, brothers and sisters, this Christian life is a group project. It's a team sport. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 12:26, **"If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together."** See, we're not only drawn into intimate experience of God through our own suffering; we are drawn into his presence through the testimony of the faithful suffering of others.
I really do believe that I have the best job on staff here at Watermark because I have this front-row seat to witnessing the strength of God on display in the lives of those who are suffering. It means I see him sustaining them, healing them, comforting them, and strengthening people in moments where the circumstances they're going through would say they should be absolutely wiped out and crushed. My faith is strengthened literally every day, and my affections for the Lord are stirred when I see the ways the faithful people of God are enduring suffering.
Friends like my friend Paula Veal who lost her dad to Parkinson's a few years ago and now leads in our GriefShare ministry and creates resources for our church to help our members come alongside of the suffering and the grieving.
Friends like LK and Ben Ortiz who faithfully endure the trials and challenges of chronic, debilitating diseases with more joy and hope than almost anyone I know. Oftentimes, after service, you can see LK out here in her wheelchair holding court with people who just want to be close to her and experience her encouraging words.
I think about my friend Randy Marshall who, in the face of stage 4 prostate cancer, continues to love and serve our legacy ministry to the senior adults of our church and reminds me regularly that we are all immortal until God is through with us.
I think about my friends Kyle and Liz Johnson who endured a five-year journey through infertility, were blessed with their miracle baby, and then found out, at the age of 3, that he has a rare genetic disorder with no cure that will likely require lifelong care. I marvel at their strength as they love their son and advocate passionately for his needs.
I think about my friends Hugh and Amy Stephenson who have endured for many years the sorrows of family chaos and longing for the salvation of and reconciliation with their children. I stand in awe of God as I watch them faithfully love and shepherd other families through our Prodigal ministry.
I think of my friend Gaby Duke who has faithfully endured the progression of degenerative hearing loss that ultimately resulted in deafness and who courageously leads our ministry to the deaf and hard of hearing community here at Watermark.
I think of my friend Rachel Duncan who endured a violent sexual assault and courageously faced her perpetrator, both to bring him to justice and to extend grace and forgiveness and hold out the hope of the gospel to him.
I think about my friend Kelly Maxwell (42:25) who has faithfully honored her covenant promises of "In sickness and in health" as she has cared for her husband Doug in the slow and agonizing decline of early-onset dementia and Alzheimer's.
I think of my friends Allen and Amanda Hankins who I have watched endure a year of uncertainty and unmet expectations for their newborn son, loudly proclaiming their gratitude for the preservation of Dawson's life _and_ of Amanda's and facing the physical challenges they know are ahead of him with gratitude and joy that has encouraged the hearts of hundreds of their friends and family.
I think about my friend Trisha Walker who injured her back in 2016 and has found no relief from chronic pain following multiple surgeries and procedures. In spite of all of that, she has offered to be a part of leading my daughter's small group for these last four years and just told me recently, "I continue to learn how deep the love of God is for me and what it looks like to praise him in this storm." I could go on and on and on and on.
Brothers and sisters, if you are not marveling at the strength of God, let me encourage you to draw near to those who are suffering, and you will see his power on display in their lives. So, in light of this, here are some applications for us.
First, that we would push through our discomfort and uneasiness and go toward the suffering. Mister Rogers was once asked by parents what they should say to their children when there's a national tragedy or a natural disaster, and he said, "Look for the helpers." When the world starts looking for the helpers, will they find the people of God? Will they find the people of Watermark going to where the suffering are?
Secondly, I just want to encourage you. Don't keep suffering to yourself. As followers of Jesus, when you are walking through a trial and make the decision to endure it quietly and privately, you're actually robbing us as the church. You're robbing us of the opportunity to experience more of the person and presence of God, to be able to say, like Job, "I see him now."
So, my encouragement to you is that you would share with your Community Group and reach out to your community director. Go to [watermark.org/prayer](https://www.watermark.org/prayer) and fill out a prayer request and let us, as a church family, know how we can pray for you. Do you want to know God more intimately? Do you want to experience him? Do what Jesus did. Go to the suffering. Endure suffering yourself. Listen to those who are suffering. Pray for them. Help them. Encourage them. Lament with them.
As we close, I want to acknowledge this. As I mentioned earlier, God has a purpose in our suffering, but you also need to know that the Devil, the Enemy of your soul, has a purpose for it as well. Satan believed the only thing that was keeping Job tethered to the Lord was how he had blessed him and his possessions and increased his success. Satan thought that if God would just allow Job to suffer, it would prove that Job only loved God for his stuff and not for God himself.
All of us in this room are, frankly, in one of three places in relation to suffering. We are either being prepared for seasons of suffering, we are _in_ a season of suffering, or we are just coming out of a season of suffering. Satan, the Accuser of your soul, wants to accomplish his purposes in your life when suffering comes. He wants you to despair. He wants you to believe the lie that God wouldn't allow this if he really loved you. He wants to prove to God that your love is only for his blessings and not for himself.
The book of Job awakens us to one more piece of incredible news. Right in the middle of Job's emotional roller coaster conversation with his friends, he boldly declares in Job 19:25-27, **"For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me!"**
Brothers and sisters, what do those verses do in your heart right now? Do you want to see God? The book of Job points us to a better Job where we can see him as he is. His name is Jesus. He's the Serpent crusher who, unlike Job, was not caught off guard by or oblivious to the reason for the suffering he would endure. He's the Son of God.
In submission to the purposes of the Father, he volunteered, like my grandfather raised his hand right after Pearl Harbor and said, "I'll go in…" He volunteered to leave all of the blessings of heaven, all of the riches of heaven, and endure the suffering of this broken world in order that he might redeem this broken world and the people God loves who are suffering in it.
For the joy that was set before him of our salvation, he endured the cross. He despised the shame of it all, and he is now seated at the right hand of the Father in heaven until that time comes (and it _is_ coming, brothers and sisters) when he will, at last, stand upon the earth again to wipe away every tear from every eye and to bring an end to all pain, sickness, and suffering.
I know that in this room today there are many who are hurting and suffering, and you maybe don't feel like you have the strength to hold on. You feel many of the things Job felt and expressed, but you feel yourself being tempted to abandon the Lord and pull even farther away from him rather than being drawn to him. I want you to know this. There is good news for you. The mighty hand of Jesus, the Serpent crusher, is extended to you, and he is inviting you to take his hand, because once you do, he will never let you go.
This makes me think of when we first adopted our youngest son Malachi from Ethiopia. Sixteen years ago today, my wife and I were on a plane on our way to Ethiopia to bring him home. We did that. June 1 was the day we landed back here in the States. Just a few weeks after that, we went to Galveston to my sister's wedding. We were really excited, frankly, to take him to the beach. I know some of you are thinking that's not a real beach. I understand. It's Galveston. But it was _his_ beach.
So, we went down to the beach, and I remember saying to him that day… He was 18 months old and still didn't speak English. I remember saying to him that day, "Hey, Malachi, make sure you hold on tightly to Daddy's hand." As we walked out into the waters of the ocean and the waves started coming, here's the truth: He didn't understand that instruction.
He didn't understand the importance of it, and frankly, he didn't have the strength to hold on tightly enough to my hand to keep him from being knocked down and torn away by the waves, but his father did. See, it wasn't _his_ grip on my fingers that was holding him; it was _my_ grip on his hand. The same is true for you today. If you will trust the hand of your Father, _he_ is the one who will hold you. He is the one who holds us fast.
I'm going to invite members of our Care Team to come down front right now and fill up here in the front of the stage. As they do, here's my invitation to you. In a moment, we're going to sing a song that says we believe that God is sovereign over us in the midst of our suffering, in the midst of our trials.
Perhaps you're in that place where you are feeling overwhelmed by the weight of this world. Would you come down as we sing this song? Don't wait. Come on down. Just take one of these brothers or sisters by the hand and ask them to pray for you, that we might call on God and reach out to him and take your burdens before the Lord.
Some of you are here today, and frankly, you've never even taken the hand of the Lord before, that invitation of our Redeemer who lives and who will stand on this earth again. He is offering for you to enter into a relationship with him where you can be certain of your eternity and of the eternal rewards. So, would you come down, take their hands, and just say, "I'd love to know that Jesus. I'd love to take his hand for the first time." We would love the opportunity to do that.
Brothers and sisters, we know that many in our church family here are suffering and hurting. We want you to know that we see you, we love you, and we're inviting you to make sure we know so we can come alongside of you. Let me pray for us now.
Father in heaven, thank you that you are the sovereign God, that you see us in the midst of all of our hurt and anguish and sorrow and, God, that you are not far from it but rather that you draw near to us in the midst of it. Father, would you help us? For those who are in this room who are in one of those seasons, Lord, would you help them to trust it to be true?
Would you protect them from the lies of the Enemy who would say that there's a God who doesn't love them, doesn't care about them, that they would know there's nothing that could be farther from the truth and they would run to you, as the Redeemer, the Savior, the Healer, and the Comforter that you are. God, we believe that you are the God of all comfort and that in all of our suffering, you meet us right where we are to offer us what we cannot achieve for ourselves.
Jesus, we thank you that you willingly entered into our suffering. You willingly endured the suffering of the cross so that we might have life, so that we might experience your resurrection in our lives on a daily basis. God, we pray that you might be glorified in these moments that follow, Lord, that your people would be comforted and encouraged. We pray this, Lord, for your glory and for the good of your people, amen.