I want to read this morning,
beginning with verse 7, and read through verse 11. Verse 7 through
11 of James chapter 5. Be patient, therefore, brethren,
unto the coming of the Lord. Behold the husbandman, for take
a look at the farmer. He waiteth for the precious fruit
of the earth. He plants his crop in the spring,
and he must wait. He must wait. He must be patient
and wait. He waits for the precious fruit
of the earth and hath long patience for it until he received the
early and the latter rain. Be ye also patient, establish
your hearts, for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. We're
to be patient because the Lord is coming back. The Lord Jesus
has not come back since he was here and was crucified and was
buried And God raised him from the dead, he ascended into heaven,
and he has not returned as of yet, but he is coming. He is coming back. Establish
your heart, for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. Grudge
not one against another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold,
the judge standeth before the door. Take, my brethren, the
prophets who have spoken in the name of the Lord for an example
of suffering, affliction, and of patience. The preachers that
have gone before, the old prophets in the Old Testament, the disciples,
apostles of our Lord Jesus, take them as an example of suffering,
affliction, and of patience. Behold, we count them blessed
which endure, which stay under the load and are patient unto
the end. Ye have heard of the patience
of Job. Ye have heard of the patience
of Job. Maybe you've heard more about
the patience of Job than you ever heard about his afflictions
and his trouble. I don't know. I've heard a lot
about his afflictions and his trouble. and I've heard of the
patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord, and have
seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and
of tender mercy." Certainly James is speaking to an enlightened
people here, people that have heard of the patience of Job,
and also those who have seen the end of the Lord in Job's
life. Let's pray. Father, in the name
of Jesus, give us a blessing now as we meditate upon the patience
of Job, and grant us all that we may be refreshed in heart,
and may our patience be not one inch shorter than our affliction. We ask it in Jesus' name, and
for his sake, amen. Well, I believe that as we begin
this message this morning, I believe we need to be reminded of what
we've heard because we are so prone to forget it. I believe
that Job's example of patience is an outstanding example, and
we need certainly to be reminded of this example. We need to meditate
upon what we've heard about old Job and his patience and our
memories must be refreshed. It would be profitable for us
if there were at this time we're called upon to recollect that
Job, when he undergone all the trials and experienced all the
trials in the purpose and plan of God for his life, that he
endured and stayed under the load and was patient until the
very end, until God received or revealed to him his tender
mercy and his pity and had mercy upon him and restored all that
was taken away and more. Now the inward sight into the
patience of Job, you know the story itself about Job and all
of his affliction, children can understand this story. but to be able to enter in onto
the deep mystery and enter into the blessed truth of his patience
and to understand how that one can wait upon the Lord until
the Lord reveals his hand and until the Lord is pleased to
deliver him only this can be experience by the Lord's enlightened
ones, by the Lord's disciples. I say you children can understand
the story. But to be enlightened, you must
be able to see the end of the Lord. You must be able to understand
that God has an end. in every affliction that he sends
into the life of his children. Now, I believe this morning that
this is a very precious truth, and I hope that in the providence
of God, we'll be able this morning to speak of it. Now, the reason
that we speak of this truth here is because in our pilgrimage,
we are going to be forced to gird up the loins of our minds
and recollect the examples of the Word of God that were given
in order to be able to endure ourselves and to stand up under
the loads that the Lord places upon our shoulder. And the virtue
here that we're called to exercise is that of patience. And to help
us to do it, we're reminded of the things that we've heard and
seen because this is a grace that is extremely difficult as
it is necessary. And you can see that in the context
when James is speaking to these brethren about the coming of
the Lord and how that it's necessary that we establish our hearts.
because we're in a world that's no friend of grace to help us
on to God, and we have, you know, a very difficult time in waiting,
in waiting upon the Lord. It's contrary to our depraved
natures to wait upon the Lord. And when we do wait for a season,
oftentimes we're found murmuring and complaining against God's
hand. Now, beloved, any murmuring and
complaining in your heart against the Lord is you have no real
reason to do so. You have no cause for it, and
it is sin to murmur and complain against the hand of the Lord
and not wait patiently for the Lord to work out His purpose
in your life. The voice of wisdom says be patient. Be patient. Be patient. It is
a very high attainment. It's no child's play to be dumb
as the sheep before her shears, and to lie still while the shears
is taking away all that which warms and comforts us. It is no child's play. Beloved,
in this world we experience many, many losses and bereavements,
many, many difficulties which we have not an explanation for. And we must see that to be patient
is indeed a very high attainment. The mute Christian, Charles Spurgeon
said, under the afflicting rod is no everyday personage. I like what he had to say about
that. The mute Christian. You know what the mute button
is on the television. You know, it'd be wonderful,
wouldn't it, that when we were under affliction and pressure
and under the rod, if we just had a little button we could
push to, that our mouths be stopped, that we not say anything, that
we wouldn't just, you know, be wrangling with the Lord and disputing
with God and arguing with the Lord, that we would just mute
ourselves. And I believe that's extremely
necessary, that we learn how to mute ourselves. In the light
of the tragedy the other night, with the airplane over and off
the coast of New York, Long Island, there's a lot of people asking
a lot of questions. And they wonder about it, they
wonder what to say. And preachers have been dumbfounded
not knowing what to say. I like what one old, old rabbi
had to say. He said, probably the best thing
we could do is join hands and shut our mouths. That would be
the best thing to do. Just join hands and shut our
mouths. And beloved, a lot of times,
that's about all we can do. Just wait and be patient. And there's nothing to say. We
must just wait and be patient until we understand the will
of God. The mute Christian, let me read
it again, under the rod. The afflicting lot of God is
no everyday personage. You don't find too many people
who mute themselves and just be quiet before God and wait
out to see what his purpose is in the very difficulties we have. It is the Holy Ghost that is
ever patient under our provocations who calls on us to be patient. Think of that. It is Jesus, the
unmurmuring sacrifice, who charges us to be patient. It is the long-suffering
Father who bids us to be patient. Now, first of all this morning,
we're bidden to be patient. And I'd like to say of that,
that this is not an unheard of virtue. It is not an unheard
of virtue to be patient, because ye have heard of the patience
of Job. So it's not unheard of. Somebody
says, oh, I know that's a high attainment. Oh, I know it's an
unusual thing to find any Christian that's patient. And that's content,
I know it is, but it's not unheard of. And that's what I want to
impress upon you, first of all this morning, that it's not unheard
of. And so don't go around saying,
well I think it's just unheard of. No it isn't. No, it isn't.
You have heard of the patience of Job. You never heard of anybody
else that was patient. Job was patient. The patience
of Job, and I want you to get what I have to say. I won't keep
you long, but do listen carefully. I believe that it'll be a blessing
and a help to you. The patience of Job was the patience
of a man like ourselves. He was imperfect and he was full
of infirmity as all of us are. I want you to hear me. Listen
to me. It was a man like myself who
said the Lord gave and the Lord took away, takes away, blessed
be the name of the Lord. It was a man of flesh and blood,
such as mine, who said, shall we receive good at the hand of
the Lord, and not evil? And shall we receive, listen,
yes it was a man, I'm telling you, of like passions with myself,
who said, though he slay me, yet will I trust him. And we've
heard of the patience of the Lord Jesus Christ, and we've
despaired. because we felt we could never
measure up to the patience of the God-man, the Lord Jesus Christ,
He that was as much God as He was man, as much man as He was
God, 100% God, 100% man. We never could measure up to
Him, but beloved, we've heard of the patience of one who was
altogether such as we are, we have heard of the patience of
Job. That is the patience of a greatly
tried man. We've heard that he was patient.
Now Job could not have displayed, he could not have exhibited patience
if he had not endured trial. The only way that Job could have
patience so that we could hear of it is that he had great affliction
and trial in his life. And he could not have displayed
a patience whose fame rains down through the ages, till we even
have heard of it, if he had not known extraordinary affliction. Reflect then, if you will, upon
this. He was tried in his estate. He was tried, first of all, in
his estate. All of his wealth was taken away. Two or three servants were left
only to bring him the evil tidings They said, I only, and escaped
alone to tell thee. His children, his flocks, and
his herds were all gone. This princely man of us sat upon
a dunghill, and none was so kind as to do him reverence. Here
we have, do you not see this man tried in his estate? Now listen to me, beloved. Do
you not see that estates fail? They fail. Whatever it is that
you have is your possessions. They fail, and you eventually
must find your portion. Eventually you must bottom on
God as your portion. And the sooner you come to that,
the better off you are. Old Job was tried in his estate. Now you've heard of the patience
of Job also under personal affliction. Somebody said, that an individual
can deal with the afflictions and bear with the afflictions
of other people very easily. But when it touches us, when
it touches us, when it touches our bone, when it touches our
flesh, trial assumes a different form altogether. And we have
need of unusual patience whenever the trial we're called upon to
bear is not our brother's trial, not our sister's trial, but it's
our trial. I mean when the trial comes home
to our house, When it comes under our roof, when we must deal with
it personally, then, beloved, then is when we need the unusual
patience of Job. From the crown of his head to
the sole of his foot, Job was covered with irritating boils. Not only did he have this personal
fleshly affliction, but he also had mental distress. He had distress that was brought
upon him by the conduct of his wife and his three friends. They grieved him, she grieved
him, when she tempted him to curse God and die. And however her words may be
translated, She spoke like a foolish woman, and her husband needed
some consolation, but she heaped abuse upon him with her mouth. You can abuse somebody as much
with your mouth as you can with a stick, and we need to understand
that. We need to understand that this
man went through emotional, he went through mental distress.
by the fact that those around him, which should have been comforters
and those administering some consolation, they ended up bringing
distress upon his mind. And those miserable comforters,
they added so much misery. They were cold-blooded mortals,
and they rubbed salt in his wounds. They cast dust, as it were, in
his eyes. They fretted him with arguments,
and they worried him with accusations. They were a great mental distress
to this poor brother in this time. Their tender mercies were
cruel, however well-intentioned they were meant to be. They were
cruel comforters. Now woe to the man As one old
preacher said, who in his midnight hour is hooted at by such owls
as these. Woe unto the man that has these
miserable comforters in the hour when he needs to be strengthened
and needs a blessing. Job was the hero of patience. He sinned not. while others were
causing him all of this distress. You have heard of the patience
of Job. Now, Job was in all respects,
and I want you to understand what I'm saying, he was undergoing
real trouble. Real trouble. You know, we sometimes
hear people speak flippantly of death, and we hear them speak
flippantly of the troubles and the afflictions that other people
have. But a long time ago, I heard a fellow talking about death.
And he said that any of you that believe that death is just nothing,
and that it doesn't really mean much, he said, I recommend that
you go to the cemetery, and that you walk slowly through the cemetery,
and you will discover that death is real. It's real. There's trouble in this world.
You might not have it, but there's trouble in this world. Job had
trouble, and it was real trouble. real trouble so don't be so flippant
and don't be so quick to as it were to slander those around
you who have real trouble you bear with them and be patient
with them because they have trouble that's come from the hand of
the Lord. Joke was no mere hysterical inventor
of imaginary problems and trouble. Now we've met a few people like
that who imagined that they had lots of trouble. Who just imagined
that the sky was falling. But beloved Job was no inventor,
hysterical inventor of imaginary evil. He was no fanciful, his
were no fanciful losses nor minor calamities. They were not minor. Listen to me. He had not lost
one child out of a huge family. He lost his whole family. And
not only that, but he had not only lost a few thousand out
of a vast fortune, but he was brought to sad bereavement, to
abject poverty and terrible torment of body and mind. But despite
it all, beloved, ye have heard of the patience of Job." Now,
we have heard of his patience, and what a mercy it is to have
heard of a man, and to know that one of our own race passed through
this furnace, heated seven times, as it were, and yet he was not
consumed, yet he was patient. The patience of Job was the patience
of a man who endured right up to the very end. There was no
breakdown, he said, but he knoweth the way that I take. And when
he hath tried me, I'll come forth as gold. And so, beloved, he
endured right up to the end. And he's become a great powerful
good in the lives of God's children. You have heard, the ages have
heard, heaven has heard, hell has even heard. of the patience
of Job, what God has done for one of our own race in that that
he enabled him to endure and to be patient. Now then, the
second thing, and really I only have two points to my sermon
this morning. First of all, we talked about
the fact that this was not an unheard of blessing or an unheard
of virtue. Secondly, I want to say it's
not an unreasonable Virtue to be patient. It's not unreasonable
in the light of some truth Let me give you some of these truths
that will help you. We've seen in Job's story if
we regarded it, right Number one that the Lord was in it all
the Lord was in it all so all of the bereavement all of the
Abject poverty and losses All that he experienced, and we made
note of the fact that it was real, not imaginary. All of this, let me say it to
you very carefully, the Lord was in it all. Job said, the
Lord gives and the Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name
of the Lord. Now, beloved, it's not an unreasonable
virtue for you to be patient if you know that the Lord is
in it all. He's in every bit of it. And
there's nothing that happens in the lives of his children
that the Lord is not in. Now the devil is not the sole
actor in the story of our lives. And we need to remember that.
Oh, how much we need to remember. I was talking to a brother the
other day on the phone And he was talking about his job. He
lives out in West Virginia, and how shaky things were in the
gas company where that he works. And he'd been there a long time.
And he said, there's going to be a lot of major changes. And
I don't know how things are going to be with me, how things are
going to end up with me. But he said, I'm certain of one thing. He
said, these people over here at the Hope Gas Company think
they're running things, but they don't really run it. It's God
that will determine what happens to me. It's the Lord that will
determine it. And so I had to say amen to that
because the devil is not the sole actor in the story of our
lives. God has something else in mind
for his people. The Lord was ruling and overruling
and he was not just present as a mere spectator, just watching
what was going on. No, the Lord was master of the
situation, and he had not turned the reins over to the devil,
and every step that the enemy took was only by the express
permission from the throne of heaven. He allowed him to strip
his servant, but he set the limit only upon himself. Put not forth
thine hand, saith the Lord. The dog of hell is allowed to
snap, he's allowed to snarl, but his chain is not removed.
The collar of omnipotent restraint is on the devil still to this
hour, to this day. Remember, God is in your sorrows. And God is ruling even to a desired
end, checking it that it should go no further than according
to His will, and you neither have suffered nor in the future
will suffer any more than He in His infinite love permits
you to suffer. Now, beloved, patience is something that is not unheard of, and it certainly
is attainable if we believe, number one, that God is in our
situation. And the next thing we need to
believe is that the Lord was blessing Job by all of his tribulations,
that it was the Lord blessing him, not cursing him. The Lord
was blessing him. Now we see that the Lord in mercy
brought him out of it all with unspeakable advantage. Read,
when you go home today or when you have opportunity, Job chapter
42. Read Job 42, and you'll see that
the Lord brought him out with unspeakable advantage. He who
tested him with one hand was supporting him all the time with
the other hand. The Lord was blessing him. Whatever
Satan intend was in tempting Job, God had an end that compassed,
that was over and above that of the destroyer. God was ruling
in this situation. And from the first loss, which
happened among those oxen, to the last taunt of these three
friends, there was never a question in heaven. As to the ultimate
issue of this situation, never a question. Did you get what
I said? From the loss of the first oxen
to the last taunt of his three friends, there was never, it
was never a question. as to the ultimate issue of the
situation, how it would all come out. God already knew how it
would all come out. He knew what he was going to
do. Such is the case with all of God's poor afflicted family. The issue, God knows how it's
going to come out. He already has settled the situation.
He knows exactly. And so you can well afford to
be patient. the Lord knows how it's going
to work out. Now, we may be patient under
trial, for the Lord sends these trials, and He's ruling in all
their circumstances, and He's blessing us by them, and He is
waiting to end them at the appointed time, and He has pledged to bring
us through, and shall we not submit ourselves to Him, and
be subject to the Father of spirits, and bring him glory as we endure
the trials that God has placed upon our lives? Now, Job's life
might have ended before the trial did, but it didn't. It didn't. Well, why? Well, if Job had perfect
knowledge of all things and could have had his choice, would he
have not chosen rather to endure the trial, bring glory to God,
and see the outcome that he would have had to just hang himself
or go out and shoot himself? Wouldn't he have wanted to see
the end of the Lord in the matter? Well, we would have never heard
of his patience if he'd been like a lot of people that I've
heard of in this world, just said, well, we'll just end it
all. We'll just end it all. We can't wait, and we're not
gonna wait. We're not gonna wait on the Lord.
Well, we can see We can see, I thought about this,
about the camels, and the sheep, and the servants of old Job,
and the children of old Job. Now, beloved, we can see these
things anytime, but the patience of Job you don't see very often. And Job lost all of this, but
there was one thing that was on display, his patience. His patience was on display. And there's a lot of things that
you may have lost and that you would like to have back this
morning. But you can see those things.
Maybe later on you can look around you and see those things. But
there's one thing that cannot be witnessed, looked upon, and
seen, your life, other than patience. You can't, there's no other way.
What you can do is show patience under your trial and under your
affliction. Now, whether that makes sense
or not, I don't know. Sometimes I wonder whether I'm making sense
or not. I like to say that patience is
a rare sight. And it was pitiful of the Lord
to permit these sharp trials to come upon Job for his good. There was more tender mercy in
subjecting him to the trials than there would have been if
he had screened him from them. more of the tender mercy of the
Lord. And because it would have been false pity on God's part
to have permitted this good man to die in his nest, true pity
put a thorn into the flesh of Job in order that God might show
to generations to come that this was not an unheard of virtue.
that patience could be had by God's people when they reviewed
the truth and saw that the Lord was in them all and that God
was controlling them all and that the Lord would bring them
to a good and happy end. Now Job by his trials and the
grace of God was lifted up into the highest position of usefulness.
All the ages, can you think of this? All the ages have had this
man for their teacher. What a blessing. Brothers and
sisters, we do not know who will be blessed by our pains, who
will be blessed by our trials, who will be blessed as we experience
bereavements in this world by the crosses we have to bear if
we have patience under them. We do not know who will be blessed
by it. Old Job blessed. Many he's been a teacher of many
down through the years. If we're to comfort God's family,
we must first be afflicted. It's kind of like the fellow
said, not even God can deliver a man who is not in trouble.
If you would be comforted by God, If you would be patient,
you must endure these afflictions. Tribulation, and I thought this
was a very good statement, I wrote it down. Tribulation will make
our wheat fit to be bread for the saints. Isn't that good?
Tribulation will make our wheat to be fit bread for the saints. Job makes a good comforter and
preacher of patience. Nobody turns to Bildad and to
Eliphaz and to Zophar who were miserable comforters because
they had never been miserable themselves. And therefore they
didn't know about how to comfort somebody that was miserable.
They didn't have the ability to do that. Let us remember that
affliction will not bless us or others if it be impatiently
born. We must bear patiently our affliction. If we rebel against God's dispensation,
we turn his medicine into poison, and we increase our griefs by
refusing to endure them. It was, I believe it was Sharnock
that said, to lengthen my patience is the best way to shorten my
troubles. You lengthen your patience, you
shorten your troubles. Patience to the soul is as bread
to the body. We eat bread with everything,
do we not? So we must hope with patience,
pray in patience, love with patience, and whatever good thing we do,
let it be done in patience. Mercy hath a heaven and justice
a hell to display itself to eternity. But patience has only a short-lived
earth. upon which to display itself. Well, you've heard of the patience
of Job, so imitate it. You've seen the end of the Lord
with old Job, so rejoice in it. He is very pitiful. The Lord
is very pitiful. The Hebrew of that is the Lord
has many bowels. The Lord has a great heart. A great heart. A big heart. The Lord is of tender mercy. The Lord will bring you out. You can afford to be patient. You must be patient and wait
upon the Lord. He will, He will bring you out. He's very pitiful and of tender
mercy, yield yourself to Him. And may the Lord be pleased to
plant in everyone of us the pearl of this patience, the patience
of Job. Father, in the name of Jesus,
we thank you for such an example as we've had in old Job. And we thank you for that 42nd
chapter of Job, wherein you revealed yourself that you turned the
captivity of Job and you restored unto him all that he had, his
children and all. You restored all. and we thank thee and we praise
you for your mercy in teaching such lessons as these to our
hearts. Give us the grace of what we
heard this morning, and may we all, our Father, be privileged
and blessed to see the end of the Lord in our situations. And may we, our Father, be able
to rejoice and praise you as we see in a real meaningful way
you bring us out of our trials. In Jesus' dear name we ask, Amen.