Intro and Recap
Last week, we explored what God works through the suffering we experience, realizing that at suffering’s deepest root is sin. Nonetheless, God will work what we suffer for our eternal good, just as He worked our salvation through His Son’s suffering on the cross (Romans 8:28, John 3:16). Through faith, then, the Christian approaches suffering in several ways:
- Suffering is the result of sin. Thus, suffering is a call for us to turn away from sin and look to the One who is the solution for our sin problem, Jesus, our Redeemer (John 5:1-14).
- Suffering helps humble us, letting us know we are not all-powerful. This helps keep us from relying ourselves for our status with God (2 Corinthians 12:1-7). Suffering is a way that God can display “His works” through someone. Thus, suffering is a way for the Christian to testify to the realness of his faith and his Savior. The context of suffering gives substance to the confession of his lips (John 9:2-3).
- Suffering shows what each of us deserves in eternity because sin is part of our lives. Thus, realizing what we deserve because of sin, suffering calls us to repent and look to Jesus as our Redeemer (Luke 13:1-5).
- Suffering points us to Christ’s suffering for our salvation. Even more, suffering points us to the resurrection of the body, when sin, suffering, and death in our physical bodies will be no more. As Christ suffered and then rose in body, so will we. Thus, suffering is a way to draw us through cross and death to resurrection! (1 Peter 4:12-13)
A Redeemer
Read Leviticus 25:23-28
- Discuss property rights in ancient Israel. Who owned the land?
- What was someone’s brother supposed to do if his brother became poor and had to sell land to survive?
- What did this do economically?
Read Leviticus 25:35-38
- What was someone’s brother supposed to do if his brother became destitute?
- Why?
- What did God want His people to see through this Old-Covenant law?
Read Leviticus 25:39
- What was a brother supposed to do if his brother became so poor that he had to sell himself into slavery to survive?
- Theologically, what did the Jublilee Year point someone to?
Job’s Redeemer—and Ours!
Read Job 9:1-3
Job then describes God in various ways. He concludes:
Read Job 9:30-35
- What does Job confess about his merit when it comes to his standing before God? (vs. 30-1)
- What does Job say that he needs between himself and God? (vs. 32-35)
Read Job 13:13-16
- Even if Job dies from his suffering, what will he continue to do in relation to God?
“godless”: Hebrew, chanaf, someone estranged from God.
- If someone is estranged from God, what does that mean for him? (remember this is poetry)
Read Job 14:1-4
- What does Job confess about the state of someone, even from birth?
- IF an infant was born clean (without sin), or if God did not hold someone’s sins against him during infancy, what would never happen to infants until they committed a sin, which they knew was a sin?
Read Job 14:7-13
- Comparing a person to a tree, what does Job say will happen to someone after death?
- When will the dead person “awake”?
- What is Job confessing?
Read Isaiah 11:1-5
- Why do we rise to life instead of death?
Read Job 16:18-21
- In his suffering (and powerful poetry), what does Job call out for his Redeemer to do?
- Who is our “son of man”? (The New Testament uses the phrase 88 times to refer to this person)
Read Job 19:23-24
- What does Job say about what he is going to say next?
Read Job 19:25
- What does Job confess about what will happen “at the last”?
Job 19:26-27
- How will Job experience the reality of his Redeemer?
Read 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
- What does Paul say in prose that Job said in poetry?
Prayer: Psalm 16
P: Protect me, O God, for I take refuge in You.
C: I say to the Lord, “You are my Lord. Apart from You, I have nothing good.”
P: [God speaking,] “As for the saints in the land,
C: they are the noble in whom is all my delight!” Psalm 16:1-3
P: I keep my eyes always on the Lord.
C: With Him at my right hand, I will not be shaken.
P: So my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices,
C: and my body will rest secure.
P: For You will not abandon me to the grave,
C: nor will you allow Your Faithful One to see decay.
P You make known to me the path of life; You fill me with joy in Your presence.
C: In Your right hand are eternal pleasures. Psalm 16:8-11
