Sermon Tone Analysis

As we have mentioned in our sermon series, one of the major themes of the entire Bible is God’s sovereignty or providence over everything.

The sovereignty of God is the Lordship of God and refers to his control, authority, and relationship with creation.

The book of Genesis reveals the providence or sovereignty of God.

Everything happens according to God’s plan and his intentions.

From the very beginning the Bible reveals God as Faithful and True.

From the beginning of the book of Genesis God establishes His authority with the command that his will is to be obeyed.

Not only does Genesis unfold the sovereignty and authority of God, it also reveals Him as personal, gracious, and loving.

In Genesis, God establishes His covenant as the basis his relationship with sinners.

The sovereign Lord of all creation has promised to redeem us and establish us as His people through covenant.

At the end of Genesis Joseph told his brothers “You planned evil against me; God planned it for good to bring about the present result—the survival of many people.”

Genesis 50:20 (CSB) Genesis ends with the understanding that God is working all things together for the accomplishment of His plans and purposes.

And, we know through the NT that God works things out according to His plans in ways that are good for those who love him.

So, with the understanding that God can work out the evil intentions of men for the good of His people and His plans we come to the book of Job.

Job is likely the oldest book of the Bible.

Genesis deals with creation, but Job was written before the time of Moses, and Moses wrote the book of Genesis.

We don’t know who wrote the book of Job, but we do know that since his death is recorded in chapter 42 we know that Job didn’t write it.

Job was a real person who lived in the time of the Patriarchs.

What that means is that we believe that he lived before or during the same time period as Abraham and Isaac.

At the beginning of the book we find out that Job had lived long enough to have ten children who were all grown and had their own homes.

Then we find out at the end of the book of Job that he lived another 140 years and had ten more children, seeing up to four generations born, and became even more wealthy than before.

Because how long he lived, the absence of a reference to the law, and the fact his wealth was determined by his livestock and belongings we date the life of Job to around 2200-2100 BC.

The book of Job is one of the five wisdom books of the Bible.

Wisdom literature is personal and provides a way for us to understand God, our relationship with Him, and what practically we see what faithfulness and disobedience look like.

In particular we see the relationship between God and loss, suffering, or pain in our lives.

I believe that the book of Job provides much needed instruction and even correction to the circumstances of our country and the church today.

Many American Christians and church-goers are struggling to make sense of our current political, social, moral, and religious situation.

The steady and rapid decline in the morals and ethics of our country is cause for great concern.

The current threat to religious liberty is on the minds of many people in our church and our country.

And by threat to religious liberty I don’t mean whether or not every group has a right to worship, I mean something deeper and more foundational than the right to gather for worship.

The threat to religious liberty exists through the continued push to force Christians and others to go against their core values and beliefs and conform to the culture or the government.

Religious liberty means that the majority cannot impose or force its beliefs on others to the detriment of conscience.

You cannot compare the persecution of Christians in ISIS occupied territories of the Middle East with what Christians are facing in our country.

I think we have to be careful to call it persecution when there are brothers and sisters losing their lives in other parts of the world.

I do think it is safe to say that things have changed for Christians in America.

In today’s America, being Christian is different than it was 50 years ago.

I think it is safe to say that being Christian in America is incredibly different today than it was 25 years ago.

In a 2016 Time magazine article entitled Regular Christians are no longer welcome in American culture, Mary Eberstadt wrote, “We must also acknowledge that when some Americans citizens are fearful of expressing their religious views, something new has snaked its way into the village square.”

The loss of standing is different for Christians in our country.

The fact that being a Christian might have a negative financial, social, or political impact is new territory for most of the American church.

The experience of many Christians in our country has left them asking “what have we done wrong?”

Or “Why is this happening to us?”

The current state of affairs in our country has many people wondering how all this fits into God’s plan for them as individuals, our country, and the world.

The book of Job provides a setting and presents a message that you need, I need, Harrisburg needs, and the American church needs.

A quick glance at Christian news media and social media platforms reveals some common concerns about the state of the church today.

You see concerns over attendance, giving, online versus in-person, formal versus informal, music styles, etc.

You can even see or hear some of these same concerns by members of our church on any given week.

But, the problem with those concerns is that they don’t require a move of the Holy Spirit to turn them around.

You can get more people to attend a church without focusing on Jesus, there are churches that do it all the time.

You can get people to give more to the church without focusing on the kingdom of God, there are churches that do it all the time.

You can get people to dress up or dress down without focusing on the work of the Spirit in the church, churches do it all the time.

You can argue over styles of worship and use different styles of worship without ever considering what the Bible says about it, churches do it all the time.

I would point out that for most people and churches these issues only serve to distract from the real issue facing the church today.

The real issues in the church won’t be fixed with more people, more money, better camera angles, nicer clothes, or a different set of instruments on the platform.

The issues facing the American church are gospel-centered issues that can only be resolved by the power of the gospel and the work of the Holy Spirit.

Instead of addressing the surface level issues that have plagued generation after generation of Christian or church-goer…

The book of Job presents us with the opportunity to evaluate the genuineness of our faith and love for God.

Job begins with one of the most dramatic scenes in the Old Testament.

Look with me at Job 1:1–10 (CSB), “There was a man in the country of Uz named Job.

He was a man of complete integrity, who feared God and turned away from evil. 2 He had seven sons and three daughters.

3 His estate included seven thousand sheep and goats, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, five hundred female donkeys, and a very large number of servants.

Job was the greatest man among all the people of the east.

4 His sons used to take turns having banquets at their homes.

They would send an invitation to their three sisters to eat and drink with them.

5 Whenever a round of banqueting was over, Job would send for his children and purify them, rising early in the morning to offer burnt offerings for all of them.

For Job thought, “Perhaps my children have sinned, having cursed God in their hearts.”

This was Job’s regular practice.

6 One day the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them.

7 The Lord asked Satan, “Where have you come from?” “From roaming through the earth,” Satan answered him, “and walking around on it.”

8 Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job?

No one else on earth is like him, a man of perfect integrity, who fears God and turns away from evil.” 9 Satan answered the Lord, “Does Job fear God for nothing? 10 Haven’t you placed a hedge around him, his household, and everything he owns?

You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land.””

When Satan says in verse 9, “Does Job fear God for nothing?”

I can’t help but think about us.

Have we loved God and been committed to Christianity because of the benefit that it was for our personal lives?

Has the American church loved God and practiced its faith because of the increase of our possessions and standing in the land?

Satan accuses Job of only loving God for the secondary benefits and blessings that come from obeying God.

He argues that once obeying God or being faithful to God does’t bring the secondary or worldly blessings that Job will abandon his integrity and faith.

Could Satan make the same argument for us?

For you?

With each passing decade our country has become more and more sexually immoral.

And, as the sexual revolution has unfolded in our country many professing Christians have recanted their strong biblical values in favor of fitting and maintaining the status quo of our culture.

As the culture around us becomes increasingly hostile toward biblical truth we find ourselves asking each other and the Lord why?

Why is this happening to us?

We find ourselves asking what should we do?

How should we respond to the struggle, discomfort, and or suffering that we may face as Christians?

Not only does Job help us to think through the current cultural moment, the book of Job presents us with the opportunity to learn how to understand or interpret any or all suffering that we experience in this life.

Many people struggle to see how we can learn anything from suffering, but through the book of Job God reveals that our discomfort or suffering can happen for more than one reason.

The book of Job helps us learn to stop and ask, “Am I going through these circumstances because I have sinned or because God is growing me spiritually?”

Let’s take a look at these two options and how we should respond to each one:

What do I do if I am being tested so I will mature in my faith?

First, I feel the need to point out that the book of Job presumes a mature and solid faith.

Job is mature in his faith and because of that He is faithful in the way that He lives for God.

Remember God pointed Job out to Satan, not the other way around.

Because the book of Job presumes a mature faith I think it takes faith to understand and make sense of how Job responds to God and the suffering he endures.

Faith is, “Believing that God is who he says he is and that he will do all that he has promised.”

- Andy Stanley

Hebrews 11:1–2 (ESV), “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

2 For by it the people of old received their commendation.”

Job receives his commendation from God based on his faith.

Job 1:8 (ESV), 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?”