The Book of Job
Book of Job, 49
Believer Tested By Trials
Job 23:8-10
Pastor’s Opening
JOB, as we noticed in our reading, was at that time in very deep distress. I commend this fact to the notice of any here who are very sorely tried. You may be the people of God, and yet be in a terrible plight, for Job was a true servant of the Most High, yet he sat down among the ashes, and scraped himself with a potsherd because he was covered with sore boils, and, at the same time, he was reduced to absolute poverty. The path of sorrow has been trodden by thousands of holy feet; you are not the first one who could sit down, and say, “I am the man that hath seen affliction.” You were not the first tried one, you are not the only one, and you will not be the last one.
Scripture Citation and Verse(s)
Job 23:8-10
“ Behold, I go forward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him: on the left hand, where he doth work, but I cannot behold him: he hideth himself on the right hand, that I cannot see him: but he knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.”
Main Theme(s)
I. First, then, notice JOB’S DESIRE IN THE TIME OF HIS TROUBLE.
II. The brightness of the first part of my subject will help to make the second portion all the darker. We are now to consider JOB S DISTRESS, — the agony of a true child of God who cannot find his Father.
III. Now, lastly, I want to speak, for a little while, concerning THE TRIED BELIEVER S CONSOLATION. It is a very sweet consolation: “He knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.”
