I See It Now

Welcome to Gateway Churches Podcast.

Wherever you're tuning in from, we hope you're encouraged by today's message.

Really, really excited to be here and just been kind of praying through this week what contribution I was supposed to make.

And there's something I kind of want to want to share as we settle into the beginning of a new year.

There's something I want to talk to us about from a life, from the life of a gentleman named Job.

And so I want to read just a few verses from Job's story found in Job 42, beginning at verse 1.

I'm going to be reading this from the New International Version.

And it says, Then Job replied to the Lord, I know that you can do all things.

No purpose of yours can be thwarted.

You asked, Who is this that obscures my plans without knowledge?

Listen to Job, family.

He says, Surely I spoke of things I did not understand.

Things too wonderful for me to know.

You said, Listen now, and I will speak, I will question you, and you will answer me.

Verse 5.

My ears had heard of you.

But now my eyes have seen you.

I want to talk from this subject in our time together, family.

I see it now.

I see it now.

One of my favorite thought leaders is a Danish and a Danish philosopher and theologian, Soren Kierkegaard.

And he's credited with this quote.

He says, life is lived forward, but it's only understood backwards.

He seems to be suggesting that there are some things we experience in our present that won't make sense to us until we get into our future.

And I want to pause for the cause, even in my introduction, and ask you a question for your reflection.

Can you look back to certain seasons and situations in your life where you prematurely labeled some things and you called it one thing when you were in the middle of it, and called it another thing once you got on the other side of it?

You may have called it a burden when you got in the middle of it, but you called it a blessing when you got on the other side of it.

He seems to be suggesting that if a person is going to live life the way the creator intended, they must learn, they must develop the skill of embracing ambiguity.

They've got to learn how to live with the tension of wanting to know and not knowing.

Not just because of its content, but I think Job is so profound because of its placement.

See, it's situated in a section of the Bible known as wisdom literature.

And so these series of books in the Bible known as wisdom literature are intended to impart wisdom to the godly.

And so this book, which details an experience in Job's life, exists to provide me and you some wisdom on how to endure Job-like seasons.

And I know this is the beginning of the year, and we are anticipating an amazing year.

We're believing for Ephesians 3.20.

For God to do exceedingly, abundantly above all we ask or think.

And I believe faith takes personal possession of God's promises.

It says Paul wasn't just talking to them, Paul was talking to me.

That this year in my life, God's going to do exceedingly and abundantly above all we ask or think.

I believe that, but just in case January or February or March or April or May or June or July or August or September or October or November or December.

Just in case in one of these months you have a Job-like experience.

I believe Job's life is, watch this, is an indication of how we can use these principles as education that will give us some preparation for Job-like seasons.

Darius, what's the Job-like season?

They are unexpected, undeserved.

Seasons of adversity that we have to endure without explanations.

Unexpected, undeserved.

Seasons of adversity that we have to endure without explanation.

I think it's I think this is the most profound part of Job's story that's rarely talked about, and that is God never gave him a reason.

He had to endure without explanation.

We're introduced to Job in Job chapter 1 with these words in the land of us there lived a man whose name was Job, and he was blameless and upright, and he feared God and shunned evil.

Job 1 · chapter mention

And the text says that one day God's having an audience with angels, and Satan is standing in line with the rest of the angels.

He gets to God and he says, What's up, God?

God says, What's up, Satan?

So God asked Satan, he said, What you been doing?

Satan said nothing, chilling.

Uh I just been to Southlake, Prosper, Plano, Dallas, Capel, Jacksonville, Phoenix.

Just trying to see whose life I can disrupt and destroy.

Now it would seem to me that God would respond to Satan in a way that would suggest Satan shouldn't be doing something like that.

But when Satan says what he's trying to do, God makes a recommendation.

God says, have you considered my servant Job?

Now this is confusing for me because chapter one, verse one makes it clear that Job was a blameless and an upright man.

He feared God and he shunned evil and God recommends him.

I'm like Jesus.

There's some other people on the list that I think.

I got, I'm not, I'm just saying I know a few people.

He says, have you considered my servant Joe?

My initial interpretation of this would suggest, man, does God care about Joe?

But as I did more reflection, my interpretation evolved.

To man, God thinks really highly of Joe.

Because it's one thing to be able to trust him with influence.

It's another, it's one thing to be able to trust him with affluence.

It's another thing to be able to trust him with adversity.

What do you mean here?

This recommendation is a revelation simply of one of the ways God wants to use Job.

And at the beginning of this year, I believe many of us want God not just to do for us some things he's never done before, but we want God to do some things through us that he's never done before.

We want to be used, but this is what I've learned about believers and their desire to be used.

When we tell God I want to be used, we really mean I want you to use my gifts.

I've got some acquired skill that I've acquired over the years.

I want you to use that.

I've got some spiritual gifts, I want you to use those.

When we say use me, what we really mean very often is God, use my gifts.

But that's not the only way God uses people.

There are times he uses our gifts, and then there are times he uses our lives.

I love it when he uses my gifts.

I don't know about that other part.

Because when he uses my life, it may mean that he allows me to stay in a tomb four days.

And instead of immediately leaving where he is and get to Bethany and help and prevent me from experiencing a sickness that's going to be unto death, that he stays there and lets me stay in that tomb four days, allows an audience to get around so that they can see what he can do as it relates to resurrecting a life by using mine.

And I am telling you in 2022, God wants to use you.

Not just your gifts, you, not just your talents, you, not just your acquired skill, you.

And when he uses you, he gets the glory out of using you in a way that far exceeds any and everything else.

He didn't do this because he didn't care about Job.

He did this because he thought so highly of Job.

He says, Have you considered my servant Job?

But listen to Satan's response.

Satan says, Yes, I have.

But he says this in chapter 1, verse 10, have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has?

Watch this, wait a minute.

Have you considered my servant Job?

Yes, but have you not put a hedge around him, his household and everything he has?

Have you considered my servant Job?

Yes.

But have you not put a hedge around him, his household and everything he has?

Have you considered my servant Job?

Yes.

But have you not put a hedge around him, his household and everything he has?

God didn't mention the hedge.

Satan did.

So my question is how does Satan know that there's a hedge around Job, his household, and everything he has, unless Satan had tried to get to Job earlier and he couldn't.

And tried to get to his household earlier and he couldn't.

And tried to get to other things he had and possessed and he couldn't.

I want to tell you something, family.

I think there are times where we are complaining about the trouble that did get through, that we fail to remember and thank God for the trouble that didn't get through.

That there are things that God protected us from that we have no idea about.

So this is what Satan does.

Satan says, okay.

Anybody would be committed to you if you're blessing them like that.

He says, let me just bother them a little bit.

He's gonna break his commitment.

He's gonna lose his integrity.

He's gonna curse you to your face.

God says, okay, do what you must, but don't touch him.

Notice what happens.

Satan leaves, and this is what the text says happens.

Ox, Job's ox and donkeys, that's his assets, are seized by a group called Sabians.

Then another messenger comes and says, Your sheep and now your servants have been burned by fire.

Then another messenger comes and says, Your children have been taken away by some natural disaster, some windstorm.

I want you to notice what happens now.

They come one after the other after the other.

It is strategic, but it's also sequential.

One thing after the other after the other.

When you read the story, it is as if one messenger couldn't get finished telling bad news before another messenger comes and gives more bad news.

And then another messenger comes and gives more bad news.

I want you to see the strategic nature of this because it's a picture and a pattern of the way the enemy attempts to work from time to time.

And that is strategically and sequentially, where he's sending these little issues, one after the other after the other, attempting to do to us what Delilah did to Samson.

Wear us down, take our strength so that we're weak when the Philistines come.

See, some issues the enemy's not trying to use to take us down, he's trying to use them to wear us down.

And I want to know am I talking to anybody that has ever been at a point in your life where you felt like if it's not one thing, it's another.

Issue after issue after issue after issue.

But the Bible says in the midst of all of this, Job did not curse God with his words.

So in chapter two, Satan comes back before God and he engages in another conversation with him.

Now, this is interesting to me because I feel like there's a question we need to try to answer.

If you took my children, if you took my cattle, if you took my sheep, if you took my servants, why are you back?

You're back.

Because even though you took a lot, you still didn't get what you were really after.

And this is why some of you have the enemy frustrated.

He's confused, he's flabbergasted because he can't understand how after everything he has thrown at you, he still has not been able to get what he really wanted.

See, he didn't want the sheep, he didn't want the servant, he didn't want the assets, he didn't want the children, he wanted Job's commitment.

And he went through all those other things in an attempt to get to the main thing.

And your presence here tonight, your presence online, your presence at all of the other locations is upsetting the adversary because he'd rather you be doing anything else but being in the house of God tonight.

But you realize and you recognize, like Job, that I can't turn my back on the only one that eternally has my back.

And so instead of having a pity party on the first night of the first conference, we're going to have a praise party to pause for the pause, and thank God.

I can't control what else you take, but you will not take my devotion and my adoration for my God.

What is that for?

And so this next season, this next season of suffering for Job is one where it actually gets personal.

Where he himself begins to deal with physical affliction.

And I believe his wife begins to suffer from caregiver fatigue.

Don't judge her.

Don't judge her.

Is what she said insensitive?

Very.

Is that something, even if she felt it that she should have kept to herself?

Absolutely.

Did the enemy plant that thought in her mind?

100%, because the words that she used were the words that Satan used when he was talking to God about what job would about what Job would do.

The wife said, curse God and die.

And when Satan's talking to God about what how Job would respond to affliction, he's saying, He's gonna curse you and die.

But let's not judge her.

Because she's a woman who's grieving.

All her children, gone.

The help she had, the servants, gone.

So while she would have normally had people to help her care for Joe, she had to do it all herself.

Money's running low.

So she's grievous.

She's got financial pressure.

And she's thrust into a role.

She's never been thrust in before.

I want to pause because I know with all that are watching at all the locations and online.

There are some Job's wives that I'm speaking to right now.

Where you've been you you've been thrust into a season where you're living with and living through things that you never imagined.

She's under this pressure.

And it makes her say things.

So you got Job who you're trying to take care of.

Children that you're grieving from.

Assets that have been dissipated.

Future is uncertain.

And her pain starts talking.

You don't have to answer me, it's just a question for your reflection.

But have you ever been under so much pressure that your pain started talking?

And you said things and thought about it and reflected on it and came back around and apologized and said, you know what?

That wasn't me.

And you're right, it wasn't you, it was pain talking.

Notice what happens, family.

This impacts Job in the different type of way.

So he's dealing with this, and then all of a sudden, good friends start giving him bad advice.

So he gets so frustrated.

Let's not sanitize this story.

He managed this in an amazing way.

But his humanity is revealed in the story.

He gets so frustrated.

He begins to inadvertently project that frustration on God.

And God says nothing for 38 chapters.

And God's silent.

For 38 chapters, God's silent.

And in chapter 38, when God finally makes a decision to say something, family, this is what he says.

He says to Job, Brace yourself like a man.

Since you're questioning me, I'm a question you.

He says, You want me to answer you?

You will answer me.

He says, Since you know so much, where were you when I laid the earth's foundation?

Tell me if you understand who marked off its dimensions.

Surely you know.

Who stretched a measuring line across it?

On what were its footings set?

Who laid its cornerstone while in the morning, while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy.

This is what he's doing.

He's not insulting Job.

He's not suggesting that Job is unreasonable.

What he is trying to get Job to see is I have a higher level of reasoning.

He's trying to get Job to see that I know some things you don't know.

And I'm doing some things that I'm not letting you in on.

And just because this doesn't make sense now, and just because this doesn't make sense to you, doesn't mean I'm not gonna make sense out of this.

Give me a little time, and you'll see I'm faithful to my word.

And I'll give you beauty for your ashes, I'll turn your morning into dancing.

I'll give you the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.

If you sow in tears, you will reap in joy.

Job, don't give up on me yet.

Don't mislabel your season yet.

Give me a little more time because life is lived forward, but only understood.

Backwards.

After God gets through talking to Job.

This is what Job says in chapter 42.

He says, I know you can do all things.

No purpose of yours can be thwarted.

You ask, Who is this that obscures my players without knowledge?

Listen to what he says.

Surely I spoke of things I didn't understand.

Things too wonderful for me to know.

You said, Listen now, and I will speak.

I will question you and you will answer me.

My ears had heard of you.

But now my eyes see you.

I thought I knew you before this.

But this adversity has been an introduction to another side of you, God, that I didn't know existed.

That you were using this not just to show me me, but you were using this to show me you.

That there are some things that I've learned about you.

I want you to catch this.

Because Job's activity is a powerful picture of how you and I should manage these seasons.

Because even in Job experiencing restoration, God never gave him an explanation.

So, Darius, what do I do when I find myself in Job-like situations?

These unexpected, undeserved seasons of adversity for which there are no explanations.

If I happen to run into this in 2022, what practically will I do?

This is what Job did.

Job teaches us instead of consuming and cons consuming ourselves and being concerned with what we don't know, which is why am I in this?

Why did God allow this to happen?

How long am I gonna be in this?

When is God gonna get me out of it?

Why did it happen to someone else?

Instead of being consumed with and concerned with what we don't know, I've got to lean on what I do know.

And I do know he's faithful.

I do know he's good.

I do know we think may endure for a night, but joy is gonna come in the morning.

I do know that the weapon may form, but it will not prosper.

I do know that he'll take what the enemy meant for evil and turn it around for my good.

I do know I'm more than a conqueror through Christ Jesus.

I do know that a thousand is a bummer by my side, and ten thousand by my right hand, but it will not come mind me.

I know that the Lord is a strong tower and the righteous run in, and they are safe.

I do know that when the enemy comes in like a flood, the spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against it.

Instead of being consumed, concerned with what I don't know, the way I manage those seasons is by leaning into what I do know.

You're in a series right now, and this series you're in is not called the shepherd.

It's called the Good Shepherd.

He's a good shepherd.

So there are three things, if I can give these to you really quickly, everybody okay?

What kind of message is this at the first conference?

I don't know whether to cry or cry.

I want you to learn from Job three things I see he did here in the text that we should do if we have a Job-like season.

Here's the first one.

First thing I see that Joe that Job did is he wept.

When you read the story, you see he wept.

Weeping here, not literally meaning crying, but weeping referring to grieving.

He was honest about his loss.

He grieved it.

Listen to me.

Faith doesn't deny reality, faith believes God to change it.

He grieved.

See, I can't reap in joy if I'm not willing to sow in tears.

To acknowledge, to bring to God the frustration, to bring to God the pain, to bring to God the loss, to bring to God the disappointment.

One of my favorite books of the Bible family is Psalms.

And it's not because of the profundity of the book.

It's because of the authenticity.

Some of my favorite Psalms, y'all would probably laugh at.

Some of my favorite Psalms are when David is so vulnerable and authentic.

I'm reading what he's saying, saying to myself, I cannot believe he said that to God.

But how we talk to him says a lot about how we see him.

And David's vulnerability and transparency is an indication that he saw God as a non-judgmental loving figure.

And since you know the thoughts, my thoughts from afar off, you know the sentiments of my heart, you have no problem with me expressing what you already know.

He wept.

He acknowledged that it hurt.

The second thing he did, this is a tough one.

He wept.

Second thing he did is he did some weeding out.

Because he had some friends.

He had some friends who were well intended but very misguided.

And I am not in any way saying that these people were bad people.

I am saying this.

That sometimes it takes certain seasons for certain people to actually reveal that y'all's season is up.

Did you hear what I just said?

You're like, no, I'm confused.

I'm very confused.

Sometimes it takes certain seasons.

Certain seasons.

To reveal and expose that y'all season.

He had to do some weeding.

And finally, last but not least, here's the third thing I see.

He wept.

He had to do some weeding out.

And the third thing is he worshiped.

Now I'm kind of like, the way I'm wired is like I need things to make sense.

And I know like I know we should worship.

And I know it's important.

I know it's a spiritual discipline.

But for me, I was wondering what's the relevance of worship here in Job's story.

Until I was reminded of this psalm in Psalms chapter 8, verse 2.

Psalms 8:2

It says, Through the praise of children and infants, you have established a stronghold against your enemies to silence the foe and the avenger.

I said, wait a minute.

Through the praise of infants and children.

So God says, You've used praise to establish a stronghold against the enemies and silence the foe and the avenger.

When I looked at this, I said, worship then is not just a spiritual discipline, it's an act of spiritual warfare.

Because the text says that worship establishes a stronghold, a fence, a fortress.

That when that fence and that fortress is there, some things that would get in can't get in.

Because worship requires mindfulness.

It requires us emptying our mind of those things that are not God and filling our mind with those things that are God.

So the foe and the avenger, the negative voices, the voices of condemnation and the voices of doubt, and the voices of worry, and the voices of discouragement, the voices that tell us we can't and will not make it, are voices that become silent when we begin to worship God because it establishes a stronghold that pushes back darkness and pushes back doubt.

And I know it's the first night, but I want somebody in this room to start building a stronghold right now and saying this year doubt will not consume me.

Discouragement will not consume me.

I'm done because worship establishes a stronghold.

This is what I put in my notes.

Worry establishes bad strongholds.

Worship establishes good ones.

That silence the foe and the avenger.

You know, I grew up in Mississippi.

And it's kind of like the Bible belt in some sense.

And when I went to New Jersey and were serving people there, Pastor Robert, I kept seeing, it amazed me, I kept seeing people defect from the faith.

Like I couldn't understand how people would be in God's house, serving God faithfully.

And then all of a sudden there would be this sometimes animosity toward God or just apathy about God.

I'm not on fire like I used to be.

More often than not, they were defecting because of some difficulty.

A tragedy happened and they could not fathom how could something like this happen to somebody like me when all I've tried to do is be good to a good God.

And I said, if the gospel is not a gospel of avoidance, but a gospel of overcoming, it is imperative that we make sure that God's people's roots are deep enough so that when the winds of adversity blow, they've got the tools that they need to be like a palm tree to bend and not break.

And that will be you in 2022.

I don't know what wind's going to blow, but just in case it does, may you be like the palm tree.

You will bend, but you will not break.

In Jesus' name.

Let's pray together.

Father, I pray that you would do for us what you did for Job.

That you would open our eyes to see, give us a perspective that we did not have before.

We thank you for this first night of the first conference.

And we stand confident, assured that no matter what may come our way, in 2022, we will make it through because we've got you.

I pray as a result of what you're doing in our heart and in our lives, may it be said of us as it was said of the early church.

These are they that have turned the world upside down.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

Thanks for joining us today.

If you'd like to connect with us, text Connect to 71010 or visit gatewaypeople.com.

We hope you have a great week.