October 11, 2026

JOB: IS LIFE UPSIDE DOWN? KNOW YOUR REDEEMER LIVES!

October 11, 2026

Senior Pastor Jonathan Falwell

We resume our series on Job this morning as we remember his journey so far: we saw him suffering after he lost most of his possessions, his children, and his health. Three friends came to sit with him in his grief, willing to help him find the reason God would remove his former life of joy for heartrending tragedy. They believed sin to be the only plausible explanation. Job had lived his life surrendered to God’s principles, fully committed to God, and he did not believe sin was the reason. In Job 1:8, God had, in fact, pronounced Job ‘blameless’. Job endured his friends’ harsh words, longing to know what happened to his life. In 19:25, he framed words that have resonated through millennia: “I know that my redeemer lives!” Would that all people would know He does.

Focal Passages: Job 1-19. 

Absolute Despair:

  • Read Job 3:3, 11. How do the grief and shock of the (seemingly) rapid events leave Job feeling? Have negative or out-of-control circumstances ever left you feeling as Job felt? Which part of his pain do you identify with most?
  • If everything would crash around you, how would you respond? When a Christian has a past that has caused terrible pain, why is it so easy to let Satan bring it up—even when it’s been confessed to God and forgotten by Him? If you have a friend in a tragic circumstance, do you offer words of comfort or quiet stillness, or do you stay away?
  • Do you know in your heart that Psalm 139 was written to remind everyone that they have been placed in this world by God for a purpose? Does this apply to all people, or only those who turn to God?
  • If you can share, what has been the lowest moment of your life? How did you handle the pain?

Emotionally Destroyed:

  • Read Job 7:6-7. Can you understand why Job is emotionally destroyed? Have you ever lived without hope? Job doesn’t grasp how his life changed so quickly; have you ever been there? Can you empathize with him when he grieves, ‘My eye will never again see anything good’ (vs. 7)?
  • Is there a difference between being destroyed emotionally rather than physically? Why is it so easy to lose hope that things will ever get better?
  • Why can you learn more lessons when in the fire than when things are going great? Does anyone know the truth of saplings and young trees in storms? (The roots go deeper into the ground, tenaciously trying to hold the young tree—thereby creating a strong trunk).

Forever Abandoned:

  • Read Job 16:2. What does Job have to say about his friends and their harsh words? Did they think they were ‘just trying to be helpful’? Why were they of no help at all? Would it have been better if they had stayed quiet?
  • What made the difference when they were sitting with him in silence for the first week, and then voicing their speculations?

Divinely Dismissed:

  • Read Job 16:8-14. Job now focuses his frustration on God. He does not ‘curse’ Him, as his wife in 2:9 suggested, but he accuses Him of instigating his suffering. Is this the ‘normal’ next step?
  • What accusations does he make against God? Are these pretty vicious? How does he see himself, as God’s target?
  • In verse 11, is Job rather close to the real truth? In verse 19, what is Job still holding on to? Is God the witness he is speaking of? Do you see Christ, the mediator, as your witness in heaven (1 Tim. 2:5)?

His friends’ responses:

  • Read Job 4:7. Eliphaz: Why did he consider Job guilty of sin, even though neither he nor Job knew of any that would be this significant? Read 5:17; what does Eliphaz want Job to acknowledge?
  • Read Job 8:3-4. Bildad: What is Bildad accusing him of? Not only Job, but who else does he hold guilty?
  • Read 11:2-6. Zophar: What are some of the most denigrating comments Zophar makes about Job? If someone said these things to you, would you be ready to ‘fight’?

Close:

There are times in everyone’s life when things have gone so wrong that a silent cry resounds, as it did in Job 7:7, when he exclaims, “I will never see anything good again!” It is too bad one can’t have a photograph of life at some later time. Think of Job’s life. He had lost nearly everything (we will assume he has the same wife, since Scripture is silent and speculation is not wise). Had he had a photograph of twenty or thirty years after this tragedy, he would have been pictured with herds of livestock that took hundreds or thousands of acres for pasture. But the main focus would have been on the people: Job and his wife, with seven strapping sons, and three beautiful daughters (none other in all the land were as beautiful as Job’s daughters, 42:15). He would have looked closely and realized these were not his first children, but a second group—and you could be sure he would have scrutinized them to see if they looked like him, he was so astounded! But we don’t have photographs of things that haven’t happened. What we do have is the Word of God, which promises us again and again that He will always be with us, that He is good, and that He loves us more than we can imagine.

By Sandy Day
October 11, 2026

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