Dealing with Discouragement
Job Sermon Series, Part 4
Introduction (Job Slide)
- After Job’s worst day ever, Satan challenges God to stop protecting Job
-- Satan proclaims that Job’s saving comes from the charge: “Skin for skin!”
-- The meaning of this is: Job will do anything to save his own life!
- God allows Satan to inflict Job, and the pain is nearly unbearable (re: boils)
-- Even Job’s wife tells him to “Curse God and die”
-- But his response is to rebuke her and proclaim (don’t miss this):
-- “Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?” (expound)
- Job’s confidence in God is remarkable, it is a mark of spiritual maturity
-- APP: We ought to get a hold of this also: God is the provider of everything!
- Big Idea: God allows Job to be tested again, but Job STILL remains faithful.
-- For us: When we see God at work, sometimes no words are necessary
-- Sometimes, there is nothing we need to do but focus on God’s grace
-- Often, our best option is to sit and rely on what God has said to us
- Today … we see Job begin to speak on his current condition
-- Imp to observe: It isn’t all sunshine and roses for Job (re: 7 days silence)
-- Stick with me through this, and at the end I promise we will learn from it
- Read Job 3:1-26
- Pray
Point 1 – Job Weeps
- Job is in such a state he begins to wish he had never been born (v1)
-- He does not curse God in this; but he regrets that he ever entered the world
- He actually says, through the burden of his heart, what he feels (v2)
-- May the day that he was born, be forgotten about in history
-- Literally: He wishes he was in a non-existent state; the day never happened
-- Even the announcement that “a boy is born” he wishes never occurred
-- APP: Job is in complete desperation due to his condition
-Going even further, his hope is that day would turn to darkness (v4)
-- His wish is that even the night of his birth be eliminated from the calendar
-- So much so, that it may not even be recorded in the history books
-- APP: Instead of joy at that announcement, let it barren/empty/void of life (v7-8)
- He curses this day because of the pain it would one day bring (v10)
-- Had that day failed to ever exist, he would not be in this state today
-- His pain would be gone, and he would not know sorrow like this
- TRANS: His sorrow then turns into a deep cry for help
Point 2 – Job Wails
- Job asks (anyone) a question that truly has no answer to it (v11)
-- Says, “Why did I not perish at birth, and die as I came from the womb?”
-- APP: Since the day of his birth DID occur, why wasn’t he stillborn?
- Even more, he asks why did he have anyone that cared about him? (v12)
-- He wonders why his mother had even bother to sustain his life
-- If she had abandoned him, he would be free of this and at rest
-- Consider: Surely, this would be better than the current state he was in
- APP: To him, death would be the great equalizer and it would be better
-- He would be in a place of comfort, instead of the life of torment (v13)
- Interesting: Job confesses that he would be at rest, peace … with who?
-- With God! (IMP) His faith is still secure, but his heart is crushed
-- He imagines himself in a magnificent tomb, at peace forever (v15)
- To him, being stillborn would be a far better life than he has today (v16)
-- His yearning is to be, “an infant who never saw the light of day”
-- CRY: “Oh God, why can’t I be where even the weary are at rest?”
- To Job, death would a place of rest (v19)
--He sees himself as a small person because of his adversity; broken
-- In his final resting place, he would be “freed from his master” (pain)
- TRANS: Surely, for distress of this type … death would be best!
Point 3 – Job’s Distress
- His sorrow now reaches a crescendo of wailing and woe (v20)
-- “Why is light given to those in misery, life to the bitter of soul?”
-- He is wondering aloud why God would allow him to continue to live?
-- Why would he be made to continue suffering in this present state?
- His heart wants to die, to be no more, to be forgotten (v21-22)
-- APP: But even in his pursuit, he cannot die … God will not allow it
- Why would he continue to live when there’s nothing good out there (v23)?
-- Why was God protecting him, why would he be “hedged in”?
-- Interesting Ref: Ch. 1, Satan uses this same phrase to describe Job
-- Job now asks: “Why would I have been protected to now suffer like this?”
- Even food does not look appealing to Job in his state (v24)
-- His physical and emotional depression would not allow him to even eat
- Then, he cries out, “What I feared has come upon me” (v25)
-- Also, “What I dreaded has happened to me”
-- APP: His anxiety has led to a growing panic in his heart
-- He has lost everything that he loved, everything that he had
- (v26) “I have no peace, no quietness; I have no rest, but only turmoil.”
-- Bottom line: At this point, Job is a devastated man … a man without hope
- TRANS: Ask: What can we learn from this?
Point 4 – Learning to deal with discouragement
- FACT: Discouragement is very real … it happens to all of us
-- Even for the most resilient in the faith, we can suffer like this
-- So, when these trials come – how can we deal with them?
1) Realize that anyone can become discouraged
-- Job definitely wore the marks of one who was in utter ruin
-- His discouragement is obvious, and very painful to anyone observing
- Spiritually stable man had: anger, depression, bitterness, cynicism, hopelessness
-- APP: If Job could be this full of sorrow, so can we, at ANY time of our life
2) Understand that we can all suffer on many levels at the same time
-- Job suffered four different levels at the same time:
-- Physically (the pain he had); Intellectually (why is this happening to me)
-- Emotionally (no peace in his heart); and Spiritually (where is God in this)
-- APP: We too can go through dark trials like this; even at the same time
3) Discouragement can cause us to lose perspective
- Job had lost a perspective of God, and who He is, and what He has done
-- He overreacted; complained; he was irrational; he lost sound judgment
-- Job had emotionally disconnected from God; He felt all was lost
- For you and me … we must combat against this (IMP again, know who we fight)
-- Our battle is NOT against God – it is never against Him – but our enemy
- The antidote is to trust God for everything we need
-- Possessing hope is not a catch phrase … but how we focus on God’s promise
-- HUGE: We are to believe that He will care for us – to have faith in Him
- Jesus said in Matthew 6:26, “Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?”
Big Idea: Our dependency must be on God!
- The dependency we should have in God ought to never end
-- We are called to hold onto His promises … to have trust in who He is!
- If we fall into a state like we see in Job, the hole becomes that much deeper
-- Our charge is to focus on Christ, to focus on the hope He brings us
-- If we will see ourselves, our tendencies, in Job, we can combat the enemy
- Be encouraged that Jesus has already provided a way for you
-- Do not allow yourself to fall into the trap of thinking all is lost – it isn’t!
- Pray
References: Holman OT Commentary, Job
