Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayerful attention to Job chapter 7, reading for
our text the first part of verse 1, a question, Job's question,
is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? Job chapter 7 and verse 1. Job is in great affliction in
Providence. Satan had been permitted to greatly
affect him, his family, his goods, and all that he had. Many bereavements,
many losses of his children, his loved ones. And then he was
afflicted himself with boils from the crown of his head to
the sole of his feet. And then he had the trial with
his wife, cursed God and die, not submissive. to the Lord's
hand and then his friends that came first to sympathise with
him but in the end they were saying that as this trial goes
on and on surely there must be some reason and some cause in
Job and in his life. why these things had come. And
yet we are told again and again at the opening chapters that
God said to Satan that thou movest me against him without a cause. Job of course was a sinner, but
he had not done those things for which these trials were coming
upon him. It's the same when our Lord was
accosted concerning the man that had been born blind. The scribes,
the Pharisees, they said, who has sinned, this man or his parents,
that he was born blind? The idea was that there must
be something terrible that they had done in their lives, or that
he had done, or perhaps something that in his former life, and
he was a reason why, that he had been born as he had. the strange ideas that the Jews
had at that time. And yet the Lord said, this man
had not sinned nor his parents, but that the power of God might
be shown in him. Doesn't mean to say that he wasn't
a sinner. He was a sinner and he must die
one day. But there was not those specific
things in his life. It is something that is very
common with men and with the Lord's people, that when they
see tribulation or the Lord's hand upon a people, their immediate
thought is, is something that they have done. Immediate thought
is, if there have been things done, it is because they were
done wrong. This is the reason why these
things have come. And so this added to Job's trial
and to his burden. And in the midst of this, he
is desiring, he's looking to be relieved, to be delivered,
but he's not going to take his own life. He's not going to shorten
his days in that way, a solemn reality for many today with no
hope and seek to take their own life. Of course, all ordered
by God, the solemn words of our Lord to Judas Iscariot, was that
he should go to his own place, that he was appointed. Judas
Iscariot took his own life, no hope, just in despair. And yet
it had been foretold that he should do that. We should always
seek to preserve our lives and look after our bodies and do
all we can that their lives be prolonged. And Job had a right
spirit in this. In our text and the context here,
he is picturing like a hireling, like a man that is working for
his wages. He is toiling in the grounds
and in the heat of the day, and he looks for the reward of his
work. And it is not wrong for him to
look for that time when his day's labours are finished and he can
lay down and sleep and have rest after his And so he says, Is there not
an appointed time to man upon earth? Are not his days also
like the days of an Highling? As the servant earnestly desireth
the shadow, and as an Highling looketh for the reward of his
work, so am I. Made to possess months of vanity
and wearisome nights are appointed to me. I always think of this portion
as regards my own mother when she was dying, and she was blind
and dying of cancer, and for weeks or so before she died,
to her the night and the day were alike, they were all the
same, but the nights were marked. She didn't have the attention
of her family around her as much as in the day. and it was all
quiet around her, and she often said of those wearisome nights,
and the last hymn that we are to sing this morning, Infinite
Day Excludes the Night and Pleasures Banish Pain, was beautifully
brought to my mind after she'd passed away and after I'd had
that good hope of her. Thought of this, word wearisome
nights are appointed me. Yes, while here below, but in
heaven, infinite day excludes the night, and pleasures banish
pain." And of course it was so with our dear late brother Michael
Waghorn. In his many afflictions in the
latter months of his life, though for many days, he struggled various
cancers, and afflictions, and hospital visits, and operations,
and these things very varying, very debilitating. And yet Job
here, he goes on to say in the portion that we read in Job 14,
oh, that thou wouldst hide me in
the grave, that thou wouldst keep me secret until I wroth
be overpassed, that thou wouldst appoint me a set time and remember
me. And he says, all the days of
my appointed time will I wait till my change come. Job was
very mindful that of his affliction there was an appointed time.
Sometimes when I go into the homes and the old people's homes
and we see those that you might say lingering on for many, many
years in utter dependence upon others round about them. And
you wonder why, why the Lord keeps them here, especially when
they have a good hope beyond the grave. But it is an appointed
time, and they have a witness in their weakness, in their pains,
a witness just like Job here in the present dispensation of
God, God's appointments for them, whether affliction or weakness
or trial or providential distresses or afflictions, whatever it is,
that we are to wait our appointed time. We are to know that there
is an appointed time. So I want to look this morning,
I want to If the Lord will that it be an improvement to us in
the face of death yet again, an empty seat again in the house
of God and those that we've been with so, and with Michael so
often, several times a week and with him in the hospitals and
in the homes and in his own home. and the times over the years,
the six years or so he's been with us here, and that we've
had that fellowship in his home, in our home, and in the house
of God here. The first thing I want to do
is to answer The question that Job asked, I want to look at
this first, there's several points so I won't give them out beforehand. But Job asked this question,
he says, is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? It's interesting in the margin
it says all warfare and the time below is a warfare. We fight the good fight of faith
and we are to be in that appointed time and it is a warfare. But really the question, it is
an implied answer that there is, and yet these scriptures,
they do set forth very clearly that there is an appointment. And of course if there is an
appointment, then there is an appointer, and that is not ourselves,
it is God himself, our maker and our creator. We would remember
that when we were created in Adam, Adam having not sinned
at first, all God's creation was perfect and good and there
was no death, there was no restriction to the time that he would spend
upon earth. We do know, of course, that the
fall was foreknown and appointed of God itself. But Adam, in his
innocency, he did not have any set days, any limitation of those
days, and no sickness, nothing attended with the curse or with
corruption all that we have and all that we suffer here below
including that there is an appointed time that we do not live forever
here below is all because of sin and we are to remember that
we are sinners and we need to know God's remedy for sin we
need to know his great salvation Death is ever a present reminder
of us that we are under the curse and that we must die. I often
have thought and thought again with Michael's passing. When my mother passed away, my
father prayed that the Lord would receive her spirit. When my father
passed away, then I prayed the same as he breathed his last. and the same again when Michael
breathed his last. One day it shall be that I shall
breathe my last, the same as I saw my father who had prayed
at my mother's deathbed breathe his last. Very often we put this
off, we do not think and lay to heart that one day that we
also must die. Well, when Adam sinned and death
entered into the world as a sentence and as God's fulfilling his word,
in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. The man
then lived many, many years. In those first chapters in Genesis,
we read a list of many that lived over 900 years. and after each
one of them it was and he died. As time went on, especially after
the flood, those years were greatly limited. We have with Abraham
175 years, we have Jacob much less, 137, and with Joseph 110,
and the Lord has in The Book of Psalms, we read in
Psalm 90. The setting of what we often
refer to or have in mind today is a prayer of Moses, the man
of God. He says in verse 9, for all our
days are passed away in thy wrath, We spend our years as a tale
that is told. The days of our years are threescore
years and ten, And if by reason of strength they be fourscore
years, Yet is their strength labour and sorrow, For it is
soon cut off and we fly away. We know, of course, that there
are many that are cut off in childhood. They don't live beyond
many years. And, of course, the millions
that are murdered in the womb by abortion. But we have others
that are able to live longer. Michael was 91. And we have those
in the pilgrim home, one there that is 106. and those in Bethesda, there's
several of them there that we visited this week that are over
a hundred. And yet God has appointed a time
that is the general time in the strength of man. He has given
that strength three score years and ten. God has appointed that
time when our Lord told the parable of the rich man The rich man
that had many fields, and he had great blessing upon his harvest,
and he said, what shall I do? Where shall I bestow all my goods? And he said, I'll pull down my
barns, I'll build greater, and I'll say, and I'll have my rest,
and relax, and have a good life. The Lord said to him, thou fool,
this night shall thy soul be required of thee? And then, who
shall those things be that thou hast provided for?" What if that
was the case with us? If the Lord were to say to us
this night, thy soul would be required of thee. Our Lord speaking in that way
implies this, that He knew when that appointed time would be.
There is an appointed time. Hezekiah, when he was sick and
sick unto death, he sought the Lord. The Lord had mercy. And the Lord said, I've added
unto thy years 15 years. The Lord could do that. He appoints
a time and he gives extension of time. The psalmist in Psalm 39, he
prays in this way, Behold, O Lord, make me to know mine end and
the measure of my days, what it is that I may know how frail
I am. Behold, thou hast made my days
as an hand breath, hand breath, that's all. and mine age is as
nothing before thee. Verily every man at his best
state is altogether vanity sealer." There's pause. We think on those
things. We read concerning Israel or
Jacob. And the scripture says that the
time came that Israel must die. And with you and I, The time
will come that we must die. And we're told in scripture that
no man hath power over the spirit in that day to retain the spirit. When the Lord takes that spirit,
he takes it. A man cannot retain it. He can
fight death. He can try with all his might
as it were not to, but he must die. The Lord said to Peter, when
thou art old, another shall gird thee and carry thee whither thou
wouldst not. And we have this, that he spake
these words signifying by what death that Peter should glorify
God. The Lord not only knew his days,
he knew how he would die. He told Peter that. But very
few are told that. John the Baptist was not told
when his days should end, nor that they should be through being
beheaded in the prison at the behest of a wicked woman. But
those times were appointed. It is not chance. It is not in man's hand. It's
in God's hand. The Hebrew children standing
before Nebuchadnezzar knew that. And they knew that God was able
to deliver them out of his hand. But if not, then they'd have
him know that they would not serve his idols. They would not
bow down to them. They knew there was one above
Nebuchadnezzar. one who had appointed the days
of their life and numbered them. Job, he asked this question,
is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? Yes, there is an appointed time
to man upon the earth. on to then think secondly of
some contrasts. Right the way through scripture
there are contrasts. Contrast, if you have a piece
of white paper and you put something white on it, you can't see it
very well. If you put a bit of coal dust
on it, you can see it very well because there is a stark contrast. And right through the Word of
God, especially the parables, our Lord always used contrast. He had the wheat, but not just
the wheat, but the tares. He had five wise virgins, but
then he also had five foolish ones to contrast with. He had those that were hearers
of the word that brought forth fruit. And the one that brought
forth fruit was contrasted with three others that did not. When
he spoke of the way of prayer, he didn't just speak of the public
and God be merciful to me a sinner as being the right way to pray,
but he contrasted it with the Pharisee who stood and prayed
thus with himself, and thank God that he was not like other
men, even like that publican, and told God all his good works
and deeds. We have the contrast in the parable
of the man that built his house upon the rock and one on the
sand. It wasn't just one, it was both.
But it was an illustration and that parable spoke the difference
between one that hears the word and does the word and one that
hears the word and does not do the word. All the time there
is a contrast. And so with our text, with our
subject before us here, there is a contrast. There's a contrast
between time and eternity. Days, a time, an appointed time
to man upon earth. But what is on the other side,
when he is not on earth, when he is not in time? Eternity. Eternity, there is no end to
that. We cannot understand eternity
We cannot grasp, we find it frightening when there is something without
an end. If we were to go into space and
we kept on going and we got to the end of one galaxy and went
to the next and to the next, all of our ideas here below is
that somewhere we would get to the end. But then once there
was an end, what was there further beyond that? and our minds can't
comprehend it at all. There must be an end to us because
we are in time, we're made for time, and we cannot grasp eternity. And yet it is where we shall
spend the rest of our existence. And it is in this time state
shortened by God from the 900 years or so before the flood,
shortened right down to 70, and sometimes very much shorter.
And it's in this time that what is done determines where we shall
spend eternity, how we shall spend eternity. What a contrast. Time and eternity,
such A difference that is between those two. Man goeth unto his long home. The mourners go about the streets. Do we consider eternity? Do we consider the contrast,
the difference between the two of them? The hand breadth of
time. Thinking of this and coming down
to the end as well. There's a contrast between strength
and weakness. How easy it is when we have our
youth, when we have our health and our strength, to think that
we would just go on and on and we can cope with any situation. But then when you see weakness,
and I see it again and again, I see it in the pilgrim Bethesda
homes, I see men and women there that I've seen in the prime of
life, I've seen them strong in ministry or ministering, and
now I see them helpless and weak depending on others for care,
weak not only in body but also in mind. And I remember them
and I think how they were, how they once were, and how easy
we can deceive ourselves and think, well, it shall always
be, we shall always have strength and health. It's a great blessing
if the Lord sanctifies weakness and sickness and affliction and
so that we realise that this body is slowly being brought
down. In the closing chapters of Ecclesiastes,
we have in chapter 12, the picture of old age, or not just old age,
but when the body is starting to go down and He says, in the day when the
keepers of the house shall tremble. That's our hands, they tremble. The strong man, they bow themselves
down. You see a sign on the side of
the road, old people. And what is it? It's a picture
of someone with a stick and they're bending down. And the grinders
cease because they are few. Our teeth start to I remember
coming back from the dentist once, and the dentist had given
me a quote for several thousand pounds to replace one of my teeth
with an implant. I couldn't afford that. I didn't
want to spend that money. And as I was coming home, I thought
of this chapter. God has always appointed that
our bodies should be slowly taken down, and part of that we lose
our teeth. And it is a reminder. However
old we are, these things start to happen. We start to have to
have hearing aids and glasses. All of these things are covered
in this 12th chapter of Ecclesiastes. Then shall the dust return to
the earth as it was, and the spirit return to God who gave
it. That is what death is. The spirit
returning to God that gave it, but God in mercy has given us
reminders of it. Dear friends, think of this.
Every infirmity you have is a reminder that your body is mortal and
one day must go to the grave. It's a reminder to us. We're to listen to that. It's
like when we first start to get these things happen, first start
to have glasses or hearing aids, it's just like a knock, one knock. But then as time goes on, that
knocking gets louder and louder. If God would say to us louder
and louder, soul, art thou prepared? Art thou ready? This body, this
tabernacle is being taken down. It's slowly being brought down.
to the grave, are you ready for that? These are God's kind reminders,
sometimes things in providence as well, as a thorn in the nest,
to make us look and awaken and shake us up from here below. What are we doing? We're making,
as it were, our homes, our nests, and everything here below, and
we're forgetting about what is beyond the grave. I see it so
often, so much attention for this life, and even sometimes
so much attention to preparing with funeral plans, or pensions,
or things for our funeral, and yet the soul is utterly neglected. is not regarded or not thought
of at all. What a contrast, time and eternity,
preparing for time, preparing for things here, making our nest
here. And eternity, our soul, what
time do we spend concerning our soul? What time do we spend in
prayer and in the word and amongst the people of God? with whom
we hope to be forever in eternity with. Paul says to the Thessalonians
that the word came unto them, not in word only, but in power. Demonstration of the spirit and
of power, he became followers of the Lord and of us. Another contrast is that God
knows and we do not. He mentioned John the Baptist
and when you think of Jacob, he didn't know that his son Joseph
was in Egypt and alive all those years. God knew. God knows and
we do not. What a contrast that that is.
How small is our knowledge, how little that we know. And you've
got to read Psalm 139 and or later on with the book of
Job, when the Lord starts to speak to Job directly, and Elihu
first, this is the theme. Look at the heavens, look at
the creation, all these things. Do you know about these? Do you
know the balancing of the clouds? Do you understand these things?
I do, you don't. It's all designed so that man
is humbled, is brought low, You realise his real place before
almighty God, before he gets to the judgement throne, before
he enters eternity, before it is too late. And then there's the contrast
that time is in God's hand and not in ours. How often we like
to manage things, just to think it is in our hand. And we are
in control, but God is in control. And it is in His hand, not in
our hands. Throughout the Word of God, there
are contrasts as well between the righteous and the wicked,
between their end, God's people's end, and the end of others. The
Book of Psalms begins with such a contrast. Sometimes it does
not appear. And it is a trouble to the people
of God, as in Psalm 73, where it said, with the wicked there
are no bands in their death, they are not in trouble as other
men are. And what we've got to remember
is that with God's people, of all people, they know the worth
of their soul, They know what death is, separation of body
and soul. They know there is a judgment.
They know they are sinners. They know what they deserve.
Whereas the wicked, very often, they've shut their ears and shut
their eyes. And they go on blissfully in
ignorance, as Bunyan portrays his ignorance in Pilgrim's Progress,
just vainly hoping all will be well and all will be right. They're
not living in reality. They're not living by faith.
They're not living in the Word of God. There is a blissful ignorance
and total denial of the facts that are staring them really
in the face, but they don't see. May we never be like that. May the Lord deliver us from
being like that. May we truly ask ourselves, do
we really know what our souls are and what eternity is and
what is before us and what account we must give of our lives and
of our souls. I want to then think of our appointed
time in the page of history. We read in Deuteronomy Under
the blessings, as thy days, so shall thy strength be. And sometimes, of course, we
rightly apply it to whatever is our appointed time, our appointed
days, that God will give us strength equal to our day. But it also applies to our days. We are warned not to compare
and say, why are these days not like the former days? And of
course, we think of Bible times and the way they fought their
wars was with bows and arrows and spears and swords. And they
used horses for transport. How different than today. When
we have nuclear wars, we have ways of destroying people from
miles and miles away, and are great destructions. Not only
firearms, but missiles and all sorts of things. We live in a
very, very different world today. And yet, the Lord knows these
things. He's appointed these times. In
the scriptures we are told that in the last days knowledge shall
increase, and it has. And there shall be men going
to and fro, and we do. We get in aeroplanes and fly
from one place to another. All these things are foretold.
The Lord knows them all. And our time is appointed. We
might think that our days are harder and more difficult, but
they are not. If we were to go back to the
days of our forefathers, we'd see trials there that we never
imagined or never could enter into. They couldn't enter into
ours. Our electronic age, our age when
instead of physical labor, we have much more mental labor.
And yet our appointed time, God has appointed what page of history
we should occupy when our lives should begin and when they should
end. Some of those who are 100 years
of age, they could think back what a change has been in their
lives, what differences have happened in their lives. And those of us that are younger,
we knew those times before there was ever computers or anything
electronic like that. And we've seen that change. But
these things are in the Lord's hand, and we should then seek
to use our time rightly. I want to think of this in our
last point, our use of our time. We shouldn't be thinking that,
well, there are things in our day that somehow make it that
the Word of God is not relevant, all that is so more difficult
for us to serve the Lord or to seek the Lord. Never has there
been the Word of God more available to man. Sometimes it has struck me in
looking at things on the YouTube and you see something that is
a message of salvation, a message for a soul, and there might be
a few hundred people that have looked at that. You get something
else and there'll be millions that look at it. You get something
that speaks of the clear gospel, just a few hundred. There's one
man that speaks about coming back from death and his experience. He doesn't speak of our Lord
Jesus, he doesn't speak of the gospel. He doesn't speak according
to the word of God, but it's something men are interested
in, and well over 18 million have looked at that. People,
we are spiritual, and they're interested in things beyond the
grave. Interested, even in eternity,
the spiritual realm. But when it comes to the Lord
Jesus Christ and the truth and the word of God, they're not
interested. Dear friends, never fall for
that trap. If you and I care for our souls,
then we'll seek salvation in the one and only way that God
hath appointed, and that is through the one name given among men,
whereby we must be saved. Man is so fallen He will choose
anything but God's way, anything but the Gospel, anything but
the Word of God. And yet the Gospel is free and
is declared through all the earth. Salvation through the Lord Jesus
Christ. Come unto me all ye that labour
and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Come ye to the waters. They are
freely given, freely set forth, but man has no need of it. Dear friend, if you have need
of it, if you have that need of salvation, your soul weighs
upon you, the eternity weighs upon you, your sins weigh upon
you, then may you in mercy seek unto the
God of salvation, unto your Creator, my Creator, the only name given
among men whereby we must be saved. It is a great blessing
to feel our need of salvation, the reality of our soul, and
it is a great blessing to have been pointed to the Word of God
and to know the Word of God and to have been shepherded that
here are the words of eternal life. This is what we seek after. Have we that aim and that desire
to know the Lord Jesus Christ, to know His salvation? There
are very few upon this earth that the Lord in sovereign mercy
has brought them to feel their sinnership, their inability,
their dependence upon the Lord. and to be brought to seek salvation
in his own appointed way by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Our
Lord came to this world. His time was appointed, foretold
4,000 years before he came. And when he came, then he suffered
in the place of his people. He lived a perfect life, sinless
and full of obedience to his Father, wished he not that I
must be about my father's business. Then he laid down his life freely. I lay it down of myself. No man take of it from me. I
lay it down that I might take it again. This commandment have
I received from my father. And he laid down his life for
the sheep and suffered and bled for his people to put away their
sin and rose again the third day for their justification.
and the blessing of spiritual life is to be given eyes to see,
a heart to perceive, God's provision in the Lord Jesus Christ. The
hymn writer says, Thou, O Christ, art all I want, all in all in
Thee I find. Another hymn writer says, I could
from all things parted be, but never, never, Lord, from Thee.
Our time here, redeeming the time, should be living to the
honour and glory of God and seeking the Lord for His salvation. What a solemn thing for sinners
to be virtually shunning the Lord's provision, ignoring it,
ridiculing it, living their lives as if it didn't exist, or as
if they didn't need it. What a solemn thing to be so
despising that work of our Lord even unto death, to suffer, bleed,
and die. But what a blessed thing if we
value it, we don't despise it, we seek it, we want an interest
in it. Our prayers, our desires, our
longings, our Lord speak unto my soul that thou art my salvation. I think of the beautiful words
in in Romans 8, the words of those
that desire the way of salvation and to seek after, no, Romans
10, those who seek not to by their own works attain heaven,
but confess the Lord Jesus Christ, the word of faith, If thou shalt
confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine
heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be
saved. For with the heart man believeth
unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made
unto salvation. For the scripture saith, Whoso
believeth on him shall never be ashamed. Whosoever shall call
upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. It's a great blessing
that we have heard. It goes on later, hearing and
calling upon Him whom they have believed. And if the Lord has
blessed us in that way, then may we really realize such a
blessing that of the countless millions of this world, Many
have no desire to know anything of the things of God. Others,
they have a name to live and have fashioned themselves out
of religion, sometimes even in the name of Christ. That's all
in their hand and all in their power and all on their terms. May we be poor sinners that come
on God's terms, come begging as the publican did for mercy
and seeking his grace and seeking an interest in his precious sin-atoning
blood, resting solely upon his work, his blood. When I see the
blood, I will pass over you. How are we spending our time?
How are we wasting our time? How are we living our lives?
May the death of one be the life of another, or the awakening
or stirring up of another, and leave us not to be settled upon
our leaves and drifting on unto a never-ending eternity. May
our last end truly be like the righteous. Balaam prayed that,
but solemnly his life was not with the righteous, it was against
the righteous. The Lord deliver us from praying
or thinking even the same thing. We want the end of God's people,
but we don't want to live their lives, and we're not carefully
watching, praying over, and looking at our lives, examining them
with the Word of God. Is there not an appointed time
to man upon earth? Yes, there is, for me, for you. How are we using that appointed
time, and how will it be? when that appointment which you
and I must take, we can't ignore it, the appointment with death,
the appointment with our maker and creator, how will it be then
with us? May the Lord bless this word
and bless this time and make it that we are found, a prepared
people, a people ready, those five wise, virgins who had oil
in their vessels with their lamps. They didn't just have the lamp
of profession, they truly had the Christ of God with them as
well. The Lord add his blessing. Amen.