A Faithful Father

A Faithful Father - Job 1 - 6/17/18

Turn with me this morning to the Old Testament, the book of Job, right before the book of Psalms. We’ll start out in chapter 1 - Job 1. You remember the story: God & Satan have a discussion about Job - Job is a righteous man who fears and serves God. In the words of Ben Franklin, Job is healthy, wealthy, and wise. I don’t know if he went early to bed and early to rise - but he had great blessing from God. And as a result, Satan tries to get him to turn from following God, and so Satan takes away his lands, flocks, herds, family, even his health, leaving him only a nagging wife who is a constant thorn in his side. His three closest friends come to cheer him up, and in the process tell him he has sinned and simply needs to confess and get his life right with God.

We often look to the book of Job as teaching us a lesson about dealing with trials. And it does. But it teaches us many other lessons as well. The book of Job teaches us about the faithfulness of God, the battle of the spiritual realm, the nature of suffering, and the certainty of criticism. But one more trial Job faces in life - and it is an area that he succeeds in - is being a good father. This is Father’s Day and today we want to look at Job as an example for fathers everywhere.

Throughout the scriptures we see many examples of BAD fathers who set an example for us to avoid: David’s sons were rapists, liars, murderers, and treasonous brats who attempted to take over his kingdom - but that’s because David failed as a father - he never corrected his sons’ evil ways. Eli’s sons were so wicked that God put them to death - and Eli tried to confront his sons, but they refused to listen to him. Jacob played favorites and saw his family torn apart by jealousy. And Timothy had an absent father. So the bible gives us many examples to avoid, but good fathers are much harder to find. And so today we will look at one good example of a godly father: Job.

So today we celebrate our fathers. While as a nation we have celebrated our mother’s sacrifice and investment in our lives for nearly one hundred years, fathers did not get their official recognition until President Lyndon Johnson declared the third Sunday in June as an official holiday in 1966. Six years later, the day was made a permanent national holiday when President Richard Nixon signed it into law in 1972

And so ever since as a nation we set aside time to celebrate fathers. A little boy was asked the difference between Father’s Day and Mother’s Day and replied, “They are about the same…except you don’t have to spend nearly as much money on Father’s Day.” Well, I don’t know what you are going to spend on Father’s Day, but whatever amount you spend, make sure it comes from the heart!

As we look at Job, we will see that he is a man who lives and loves from the heart. Let’s look at his example as we begin reading in Job 1:1 - In the land of Uz there lived a man whose name was Job. This man was blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil. He had 7 sons and 3 daughters, and he owned 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen and 500 donkeys, and had a large number of servants. He was the greatest man among all the people of the East. His sons used to take turns holding feasts in their homes, and they would invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. When a period of feasting had run its course, Job would send and have them purified. Early in the morning he would sacrifice a burnt offering for each of them, thinking, “Perhaps my children have sinned and cursed God in their hearts.” This was Job’s regular custom. Let’s pray - PRAY

Today we look at the example of Job. He is a good example for us to follow. Here’s how The Message translates these first verses: Job was a man who lived in Uz. He was honest inside and out, a man of his word, who was totally devoted to God and hated evil with a passion. He had seven sons and three daughters. He was also very wealthy—seven thousand head of sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred teams of oxen, five hundred donkeys, and a huge staff of servants—the most influential man in all the East! [The Message]

So the first thing we see about Job is