Welcome to our service for Sunday the 14^th of July 2024

Our Sunday morning service at Clevedon is at 10 am. Join us in person or watch the live stream on our YouTube channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxBzxjBb3xU8ra2NHwvD_9A(The service can also be viewed at any time afterwards.)

14:7 "For there is hope for a tree, if it is cut down, that it will sprout again, and that its shoots will not cease.
8 Though its root grows old in the earth, and its stump dies in the ground,
9 yet at the scent of water it will bud and put forth branches like a young plant.
10 But mortals die, and are laid low; humans expire, and where are they?
11 As waters fail from a lake, and a river wastes away and dries up,
12 so mortals lie down and do not rise again; until the heavens are no more, they will not awake or be roused out of their sleep.
13 O that you would hide me in Sheol, that you would conceal me until your wrath is past, that you would appoint me a set time, and remember me!
14 If mortals die, will they live again? All the days of my service I would wait until my release should come.
15 You would call, and I would answer you; you would long for the work of your hands.

19:23 "O that my words were written down! O that they were inscribed in a book!
24 O that with an iron pen and with lead they were engraved on a rock forever!
25 For I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth;
26 and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God,
27 whom I shall see on my side, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me!"

Has anyone ever been in denial about something?

Strange noises from the car, or a bit of extra water coming into the boat – and just hoping it would go away.

According to Scripture, there is something deep within us that would rather deny than deal with the reality of a situation. Paul talked about this a lot;

He said words to the effect that we know what is right, but we keep denying, sinning, doing, and thinking the wrong thing.

But this phenomenon of denial seems deeply embedded in us and often is very controversial. Just think of where we each stand on global warming, the impact of vaccines, and the apparent lack of honest conversation with those in power about their suitability to lead. Can anyone take Trump or Biden aside and have that conversation?

Sometimes those questions, conflicts, those difficult conversations can seem too much, all too difficult to listen to, and perplexing – a bit like the Book of Job.

So the Book of Job, as difficult as it is, is in many ways the book for this time. It tells of a lot of bad things coming to Job. The remarkable thing about Job is there is no denial, no cover-up. Everything is out there.

The questions asked throughout the book are questions like:

Is it possible to have genuine faith in a world where we can't deny that a lot of quite bad things happen – to people, to communities, to nations? Or even to ourselves?

In the Gospel of John, we are told that the light comes into the world and the darkness has never overcome (or understood) it.

So the Book of Job, which predates the Gospel of John by perhaps 500 years, asks that question: Is it possible to acknowledge both the darkness of this world and the light of God?

At the start of this book, Job, who had prosperity like none other, is stripped of his fortune and family and cast into suffering and despair.

There he answers the big question – can you have faith in God in a world where bad things happen - with a “yes.” There is a faith that holds onto both the darkness and the light, a genuine faith, the sort of faith we might actually need in this world of viruses, shootings, war, and questions about who is in control.

Job says ''yes," there is a faith like that. And with that yes, we are invited into the rest of the book to explore what that faith might look like.

A couple of weeks ago I spoke about Job allowing for a time of lament.

We discover in Scripture that when we come face to face with the suffering of this world, the result is lament. Not to hide away from the sorrow which lurks within us when confronted with such pain, but to acknowledge it, express it, live in it.

And we find in the Book of Job, and again and again through to Jesus, that there is given this time for lament. Remember how Jesus wept over Jerusalem.

Wept over the death of Lazarus.  

We can read how Job would cry, ‘Let the day perish in which I was born.’

We might see sorrow as a sign of weakness, and I guess we all hear a great deal of encouragement to stay positive.

There is that catchy song which I like, ‘Accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative, don’t settle for Mr. in between.’

But sometimes things are really tough, simply being told to stay positive doesn’t help that much. Maybe we just don’t like the idea that there needs to be times to pause and to lament.

So we find in Job a faith that does not just acknowledge the darkness in our world; it does not solely lament, but it also acknowledges God. It calls on God and ultimately finds a way to trust and hope, even with words of lament still ringing in the air. For this faith to be genuine, and honest, it must come to terms with the darkness. And in order for it to be faith, it must hold onto the light.

And now with Job, we come to a point of waiting. And our reading opens with the words,

"For there is hope for a tree, if it is cut down, that it will sprout again, and that its shoots will not cease.”

I am sure you have noticed this, but driving around this part of Auckland, there is a great deal of waiting involved. I was moaning to someone last week about having just missed the green out here and having to stop and wait 1 minute and 22 seconds for thelight to change. She said,

"What is your problem? It was only 1 minutes and 22 seconds." In other words, was the entire world holding its breath because of your 1 minute and 22 second delay?

Waiting isn’t necessarily bad, is it? In the midst of his lament, Job searches for some glimmer of light but can find none. He looks for light in the example of a small branch sprouting from the dead stump of a tree. He wonders if he could perhaps just wait it out, wait out the suffering.

And then, almost out of nowhere, he finds something. It isn’t a lot of light, just a small bit in an unlikely place. It might not even be hope, but something that resembles it, something that might just get him by.

Out of nowhere, Job proclaims: “I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth.” I know that my Redeemer lives.

The Redeemer was a very specific role in ancient Israel. The job of the Redeemer was to restore the rights of another.

“I know that my redeemer lives,” Job proclaims with such unexpected energy. His hope, or the closest thing he has to it, comes in the idea of a Redeemer, one who will restore him, one who will bring him back. "I know that my Redeemer lives."

But why? How? How do you know this, Job? Why on earth would you believe there is a Redeemer for you? Everyone is gone, or has turned on you, or has died! Even God seems to have turned on you. So who do you have in mind here? "I know that my Redeemer lives." Really? Who?

We don’t know. As Christians, we say that our redeemer is Jesus. But Job didn’t know who the redeemer was. Maybe he didn’t have someone in mind at all. Maybe this is just Job’s refusal to let go of the light. Maybe, in the midst of such darkness, he is expressing his own rejection of the idea that the darkness has consumed everything forever. Maybe what’s more important than Job proclaiming a redeemer is that he shouts it out into the dark.

In fact, we find similar surprising events in our Scriptures. A woman called Ruth. Ruth refused to let go. Despite all evidence to the contrary. Despite having absolutely no logical reason for doing so, Ruth decides to go out into this field hoping someone will save her, and redeem her – a foreign widow. The idea is absurd. But off she goes. Ruth refuses to let go of the light.

What possible future is there as we look and see a man from Nazareth hanging on a cross outside the gates of Jerusalem? How can anything come from that?

Sometimes faith is a living, breathing confidence, the sort of thing that cannot be shaken. But other times, faith is simply a rejection of the idea that all is darkness.

And here we have to pause for a moment and think of those who, for no obvious reason, have simply refused to give up hope. We think of our

Christian brothers and sisters in China who will walk out on a Sunday and stand in the rubble of their demolished church and worship God, knowing that every move they make is filed and recorded and their faces stored on some sort of terrible database.

And we think today about those doctors and nurses who, while still grieving the death of so many of their colleagues, walk into a diseased medical ward in a damaged hospital in Gaza to care for the suffering.

And we think today of those in our lives who, against all advice and evidence, do not give up caring, hoping, praying for a child, a teenager, a parent, or someone who may have let them down a hundred times before.

Throughout this book, Job acknowledges the sorrow within him. He acknowledges the darkness that has consumed him.

We can do that too; we can lament. But we can also join Job in refusing to leave it at that. Maybe this strange sort of faith is just enough to keep us going.

So we join Job in proclaiming, “I know that my Redeemer lives.” Waiting, willing for a voice to reply from the other side.

Whatever situation Job is in, whatever situation we are in, there is still an unfinished story to be told in his life and ours. The boat might be leaking, there might be pains we need to sort out, or we may have dug ourselves into a hole over arguments that have led to division when we know how important it is to find unity and reconciliation.

The power we find in Job is honesty. And from that honesty, we discover this little spark of light and hope.

We affirm even in tough times, even in times of conflict, even in times of denial, that the God we discover revealed in Jesus never denies us, never gives up on us.

A story where we discover, with Job, that our Redeemer does live. AMEN