Each month at the men’s fellowship a topic has been assigned for the speaker to address. We have received what has to be the most absurdly large topic known to man. This subject has infinite boundaries which mankind has been trying to wrap its finite mind around for all time. No one has ever mastered knowledge of it and very few have ever gotten close enough to see it. The subject they assigned me was God. Speak about God. When I first heard that this was my subject I naturally thought of how ludicrous it was to try and speak on such a very large subject. How could I possibly speak to you about God and not go in fifteen hundred directions. He is all loving, all powerful, all merciful, and all encompassing in every scope of the imagination. Then I remembered Job and the struggles he faced. After possibly having to deal with the agony of his children dying and the physical pain he bore for years, God finally answers Job in the last few chapters of the book. God decides he is going to make a point.
Before we get too far let’s review a little bit about Job. During the time of Job’s struggle, he get’s fed up with all the problems and troubles that have bombarded his life. In chapter 30, we find where Job begins blatantly speaking to God about his affliction and questioning God’s goodness by letting it occur. Listen to Job 30:16. “And now my soul is poured out within me; Days of affliction seized me. At night it pierces my bones within me, and my gnawing pains take no rest. By a great force my garment is distorted; it binds me about as the collar of my coat. He has cast me into the mire, and I have become like dust and ashes. I cry out to You for help, but You do not answer me; I stand up, and You turn Your attention against me. You have become cruel to me; with the might of Your hand You persecute me.” After such a long time of living such a hard life, Job now speaks out against God’s choices in how he should live. Doesn’t this sound a little familiar? When life gets rough, we get to crying really quick. I am not sure we face half of what Job did but when the electricity goes off and doesn’t come right back on or our car breaks down we get pretty worried. The more we worry; the more we doubt that everything will be fine. The more we doubt; the less we trust God until finally we start blaming Him for our problems. This is but the first step for Job.
The next thing we find Job doing is asserting that he had done nothing wrong. Job claims to have done absolutely nothing to deserve his current situation. Job 31:5 “If I have walked with falsehood and my foot has hastened after deceit let Him weigh me with accurate scales and let God know my integrity. If my step has turned from the way, or y heart follow my eyes, or if any spot has stuck to my hands, let me sow and another eat, and let my crops be uprooted.” You would have to be pretty confident in yourself to say something like this. “Let God know my integrity!” Job must have been absolutely sure he didn’t have a single sin in his life to make such a disclaimer. After he had lamented over the problems he had faced, he then speaks of how much he doesn’t deserve the “punishment” he is receiving. “God, I haven’t done anything to deserve this. Take it away.” God, I haven’t done anything to deserve my car breaking down and my roof getting a leak. I haven’t done anything to deserve my wife being so angry. I haven’t done anything to deserve getting that speeding ticket. I haven’t done anything to deserve… you fill in the blank. I have been a good boy God. I have come to church, gave my tithe, and not looked at dirty pictures, or even thought a dirty thought. I have been good and don’t deserve punishment.
This is the condition of Job when God finally decides to speak on His own behalf.
God has listened to Job and even his friends speak very unwisely about how the infinite God works. They have spoken foolishly about subjects they do not know; even Job. Now God will give his answer which spans from chapter 38 through 41. We will read just the first few verses to get a taste. “Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said, ‘Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Now gird up your loins like a man and I will ask you and you instruct Me! Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding. Who set its measurements? Since you know. Or who stretched the line on it? On what were its bases sunk? Or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?”
God threw His TKO punch right from the beginning. God might as well have said, “You explain to me all the mysteries of the universe and then I will answer your questions and do your commands.” God says he is bigger than everyone and everything. He has to be to have created it all. One man once said, “To be God, He must be the greatest of all things.” God must be and is greater than anything in the entire universe. He is greater than any sermon could ever cover. He is greater than your life and mine. He is greater than any nation on the planet. We understand that Job suffered and that we also struggle through some parts of life but we seem to forget that God has a plan that is greater than us and that he is using that struggle to strengthen us for upcoming trials.
We can deal with this information in three ways. We have a choice of how much we allow God to do in our lives. The box comes in three sizes; small, medium, and impossible.
Small Box – Santa God!
Guys like a challenge; especially when no one else can seem to do it and they think they can. So I have a challenge for you. Does anyone want to volunteer? I want you to take this rock and fit it into this box. (Wait until done). Very good. That was simple enough wasn’t it. Just grab the rock however you feel, shove it in the box, and close the lid. No problem whatsoever. I just wish my subject today was just as easy to summarize and put in a nice little package. It would be very easy to explain how great He is then. Turn over to Exodus 16. God has just led the people out of the land of Egypt after producing the 10 plagues of Egypt and parting the Reed Sea. God has removed their enemies and provided everything for them including water. (Read v.2 -7) God had done so many miracles and yet the people of Israel felt as though they had been betrayed and left for dead. They had JUST seen the miracles God had performed and yet complained because they weren’t being fed as they thought they should have been fed.
This seems exactly like the pervading thoughts held by many great and scholarly men in today’s higher education system. “A young boy traveling by airplane to visit his grandparents sat beside a man who happened to be a seminary professor. The boy was reading a Sunday school take-home paper when the professor thought he would have some fun with the lad. "Young man," said the professor, "If you can tell me something God can do, “I’ll give you a big, shiny apple." The boy thought for a moment and then replied, "Mister, if you can tell me something God can’t do, I’ll give you a whole barrel of apples!" -- Today in the Word, April, 1989, p. 43.
The older man thought he would have a bit of fun by giving a simple but seemingly sarcastic request to the child. To his amazement, the child answers with quite a good answer. The people of Israel and even this man lived with a God who fit in the small box of their expectations; kind of like a “Santa God.” He gives us what we want but beyond that doesn’t do a whole lot. He comes when we please sometimes but not as often as we would like. He never allows any real problems to occur in our life and when a real problem does come up we complain and get upset at him. He shouldn’t allow any problems. No coal should ever come in our stockings. He should shower us with all the blessings we can possibly receive and then some. He should take care of everything for me with little or no devotion to Him. He fits in my little box of expectations. This is my God. He gives me cars and relationships but requires nothing of me. He gives me a wife and children but doesn’t require me to set an example for them. This God gives everything and takes nothing. Some people choose the small box; the Santa God.
Medium Box – Firefighter God!
Another box exists and it is just a bit larger than the last one. This box can hold a bit more and people want to put more into it. This is the medium box. I need another volunteer to help me out. Now I would like you to stuff in this box all of this paper in this big pile. Shove it shut and tape it closed. Do it quickly now, we wouldn’t want it to get out of control. Jonah reminds me of this box. Turn to the book of Jonah if you will. You probably know the story. Jonah had run away and actually gone in the opposite direction of the city of Nineveh. He boards a boat and keeps running. The boat hits a terrible storm and finally they decide God is against them. They must find who has disobeyed God. Jonah finally admits to running from God and is finally thrown overboard. God then sends a large fish to swallow him. Listen to the prayer he prays while in the fish’s belly. “I called out of my distress to the Lord, and He answered me. I cried for help from the depth of Sheol; for you had cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the current engulfed me. All your breakers and billows passed over me.” Jonah was desperate for someone to come and save him. Jonah begged God to rescue him.
Soon the whale would puke Jonah back onto the shore and Jonah would preach to the people of Nineveh. They would turn from their wicked ways and he would get upset. Jonah then begins to complain about it. “Please Lord, was not this what I said while I was still in my own country? Therefore in order to forestall this I fled to Tarshish, for I knew that You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in loving-kindness, and one who relents concerning calamity.” Jonah had just received compassion and yet he was now complaining. Soon God would raise a plant to give him shade and when the plant withers Jonah will again complain about the mercies of the Lord. Every time he faced a difficult situation he cried to God, but when times got good He took advantage of them without giving any credit to God.
Jonah’s God was more like a firefighter than God. Every time a problem occurred that seemed beyond his control, he would call on God to fix it. “Come put out the flames of my trouble because I cannot handle it.” Once the fire’s out, he goes on his merry little way. That’s the nature of the medium box. This is the version of God that will fix all our problems. He is available and ready to repair every part of our lives and ask nothing in return. He will shove all the paper in the box and remove the mess. The Firefighter God will fix every problem. Maybe you have found yourself in this boat. When everything is going just fine you never pray or thank God for His blessings but when trouble comes he is the first to hear your cries for help. A God who only works as a firefighter is a small and weak God indeed. He is only worth something when trouble comes.
Impossible Box – God of the Universe!
One final box exists called the impossible box. This box cannot be defined or measured. I need one final volunteer. I would like you to take eternity and set it in the heart of every one here and then I would like you to answer every prayer spoken for the next five minutes. After you finish that, I would like you to read and know every heart here and then answer them with a peace beyond all understanding. The word that comes to my mind and maybe yours is impossible. “That’s Impossible.” Just read through the scriptures and you will find this box with this God inside; the God who raised Lazarus from the dead after he had been in the tomb for four days, who healed the blind, made the lame walk, made the deaf to hear, and a God who saved mankind. He is a God of the “impossible.” Jesus told the Pharisees “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” When they kill Jesus, He claims he will come back within three days. Impossible! Read John 20! All they found was an empty tomb with Jesus’ linens folded up in it. It is possible because my God is the master of the impossible. In my box lives the God of the universe! He cannot be contained or controlled. He can go far beyond my expectations and do more with a widow’s mite than I could with a million dollars.
At a small meeting of ministers, a praise session was called into order and one young man said that we should praise God for ministry and a veteran spoke up that he was just new to the ministry. Let me tell you that the veteran in that story had forgotten the amazing power of God and had down graded him to the medium or small box. Yes, ministry has its struggles and hardships. Yes, it is very stressful and breaks your heart many times but being a servant of God is incredibly rewarding unless your God only fixes fires. As ministers, we have the greatest job in the entire universe and yet probably the most excruciating painful one as well. Even a minister can downsize his god.
God had an answer for Job to explain who he was. God is the God of all creation. He is all-powerful, all loving, all holy, all joyful, and all kind. We see him more clearly in the dark because he is the light. We see him in our trials and difficulties because we look for Him. Yet, when life gets good, we lose sight of the light. We put God back in his box. God only belongs in one, the impossible box, because he cannot be contained! Let me ask you this question: How big is your God? How big is he? Can he fit in the little box to be used how you see fit? Or maybe he fits in the medium size box for all your firefighting needs? Hopefully the God you know is of the impossible kind; a God who cannot be defined and cannot be understood, a God who is beyond our finite minds.
Maybe you don’t know God and His son Jesus Christ. Maybe you need to know God more fully because he has such a small box in your life. Now is the time to change your life and put your faith in a God that can do the impossible. My God can do the impossible. My God gives me eternal life. My God forgives my sins. What can your God do?
