DEVILS VOICE 2 OF 4

"Doth Job fear God for naught?"—Job 1:9.

I prefaced the previous message of this series by drawing attention to the fact that the devil is heard speaking three times, and three times only, in the course of the Biblical literature. The first occasion occupied our attention therein when in the garden he said to humanity, "Yea, hath God said?" That was the voice of Satan. Again we hear the voice of Satan, and interest­ingly enough perhaps having no very vital value, but the fact remains that again what he says takes the question form, the form that insinuates and suggests an idea to the mind of those to whom the question is addressed: "Doth Job fear God for naught?" It is a question.

We saw, I think, on that first occasion, when the speech of the devil is recorded, and the voice of Satan is heard in Genesis, his whole business was that of slandering God to man, attempting to break down man's confidence in God, suggesting that God was not good, that He was not severe, and that He was selfish. Now we have an entire change. We no longer hear the devil slandering God to man; but—amazing fact—we hear the devil slandering man to God. "Doth Job fear God for naught?"

It is important to remember concerning whom the question was asked—Job, a very remarkable per­sonality, about whom we know practically noth­ing, except what is revealed in the story and certain brief references to him found in the New Testament. The book is dateless. The book is region less. It may be objected that we are told distinctly that Job was a man of the land of Uz. Those are perfectly true things, but kindly tell me where Uz was. What do we know about Uz? There are references to Uz elsewhere, but there is no connection between this and those references. It was an unknown land, but therein dwelt this man named Job; and we know a good deal about him, both in the opening declaration of the writer of the book and the actual words of God which repeat the statements made about him in the opening sentences. NOTE: UZ (uhz) Personal and place name perhaps meaning, "replacement." 1. Unspecified territory, most likely in Haran south of Damascus (Jer. 25:20) or else between Edom and northern Arabia (Job 1:1; Lam. 4:21).

What do we read? He "was perfect and up­right." He was a man who "feared God, and eschewed evil." It is a wonderful description which might occupy our whole attention dur­ing our study of the subject. I leave it with you. Notice only this: "perfect and upright," that is, morally blameless, which does not mean sinless­ness necessarily, but moral blamelessness. Then that remarkable declaration following, he "feared God, and eschewed evil," that is, turned aside from it, declined it whenever it approached him. Why? He feared God, and consequently there are the secrets of his life. He feared God and eschewed evil; and the results were that it could be written of him that he was perfect, and that he was upright, that he was characterized by moral blamelessness.

Now it is a very interesting story, because probably he was a man entirely outside the Hebrew nation. I do not think he belonged to the Hebrew nation. It is interesting to go through the book, and we do not find those speakers, Eli­phaz, Bildad, Zophar, and Elihu using the great Hebrew word for God, Jehovah. The writer does, in opening his story, once use the name, and once in the course of the book the great name passes the lips of Job; but the book is not distinctively Hebrew. In my judgment this man was not a Hebrew at all. That makes the story all the more interesting and arresting. He was outside, as Melchisedec was. He was not a Jew, was not a Hebrew. He was outside the He­brew economy when he met with Abraham. He was high priest, he was king of Salem, and of righteousness; but he was not in the Hebrew economy. It is interesting to get these illustra­tions of the fact that God had these people out­side those known as the people of the covenant, the Hebrew people. In New Testament times, Peter said, God is no respecter of persons, but in every nation he that fears God and eschews evil is accepted of Him.

We must stop here and see this man. He be­lieved in God, and he was a man who not only believed in Him intellectually, but believed in Him with submission to Him of his own personality. He feared God, and that belief in God and fear of God revealed to this man not only the true nature of evil, he eschewed it, he refused it. Whenever his soul was assaulted by evil he declined to listen to its voice, or attend to its suggestions. See this man, against whom the assaults of evil were directed. Of that man, of such a man the devil said to God, "Doth Job fear God for naught?" He was a man victorious over evil, therefore the object of Satan's enmity, of him, and Satan said, "Doth Job fear God for naught?" That was the suggestion made to God.

One can hardly ponder this alone without see­ing the blasphemy of it, that he should dare to make any suggestion to God about a man; but he did. That was the man, the type of man, about whom he asked this question. There are two things in the article here to occupy our attention: first, the dark and sinister foreground of Satan; and then the luminous background of God. The man is there. I see his soul constituting a battle­ground, and the opponents are Satan and God. Satan is here talking to God about a man, slan­dering him; and God is seen, understanding, and answering.

That is all; those are the two things very briefly. First of all, the dark foreground. Satan is seen revealed in his speech to God in this in­troductory question, and in all he said afterwards. We see this remarkable fact, that he admits the goodness of God to that man. He does not only admit it, he declares it. He has seen it. He has been watching. God said to him, "Hast thou considered?" Yes, he had considered him, and he had seen as he had watched this man, the great­est man of the East, who feared God and es­chewed evil—he had seen that God was caring for him; and he owns it, he declares it. That is a very arresting fact. He saw the hedge about Job. He saw the blessing resting upon the work of Job's hands. He saw the increase of Job's sub­stance. He haw Job was surrounded by prosper­ity of the most remarkable kind; and he saw it all as coming to Job from God. "Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath, on every side? Thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his sub­stance is increased in the land." Yes, he saw the goodness of God, and admitted it.

Then he slandered the man, and he did it in the very simple way revealed, which is, nevertheless, a profound revelation. He declared that the goodness of God was the reason of Job's fidelity. You have been good to him; that is why he is faithful to You; that is why he lives this life of moral uprightness and religious relationship. He simply does it because You have been good to him. That was the devil's account of man, of a trusting soul, of a God-fearing man. He said, Let that cease, let those things by which Thou hast surrounded him be destroyed, and his fidelity will cease. In other words, the devil declared that selfishness is the inspiration of life and religion. That is what the devil said to God about this man.

Of course the lie is obbious. The outcome of relation to God is blessing. God had blessed Job, but the relation was not the result of the blessing. He did not fear God and obey Him and eschew evil because He had blessed him; but because he feared God and eschewed evil, God blessed him. There is a difference between those two things. It is a question of cause and effect. There was the effect, God had blessed him abundantly; but the reason for fear antedated the reception of His blessings, and continued through it. That is what evil never understands about faith, about men and women of faith. This great story of the Old Testament has been set to many a modern song. Suffer me a simple illustration. There is a dear old body in a village, going regularly to church, and some cynics say she goes because they give away blankets at Christmas! The same thing, the same damnable philosophy, the same lying declaration. We have heard about "rice Christians" in China. That is exactly what we are confronted with here, the devil's false esti­mate, I will not say of humanity, but of human­ity living by faith in God.

It was a revelation of ignorance. Oh, the longer I live, the more I think the devil is the biggest fool in the universe of God! You say to me he seems to be pretty clever. Many fools are clever, but they remain fools! He is a fool, an utter lunatic. There are lines some of my friends have often heard quoted from John Milton's Paradise Lost. He puts into the mouth of Luci­fer speech which harmonizes with all the revela­tion of the Bible. Here is the story of the fall of Lucifer, son of the morning, the innermost secret of it all, the action of the devil that produced his own fall, and inspires him through the ages. Here are Milton's words, attributed to Satan,

"To reign is worth ambition, though in hell; Better to reign in hell, than serve in heaven."

I submit to you there are no lines in literature, with which I am familiar that more reveal the heart and essence of sin than that. I started by saying he was a fool and a lunatic. There is no truth in what he says. He does not reign in hell. God reigns in hell, and over hell, employing all its myrmidons at times for the carrying out of His far-flung plans and purpose; but He reigns.

Very well, says God, in effect, go ahead, do what you like. Deal with the things that mark My goodness. Take away his property. Go ahead. Try it out, only there is a limit. On him­self thou shalt not lay thine hand. And the devil goes out—oh, the drama of it—and he does all he can do. He destroys the cattle and the children. He brings desolation, but he cannot touch Job.

It does not end there. He went back there, the liar, the fool; under Divine permission of God he goes back and tries again. Job is still true. Touch him, says the devil. You would not let me touch him; but let me touch him, and he will curse You. All right, go ahead, but there is a limit to that. Observe the limit, says God. And he went out and tried, and failed.

That is the devil's estimate of humanity living by faith. It is not of humanity generally; but here is a man who feared God and eschewed evil, and lived by faith. Of him the devil said, This is all he is doing it for; and the whole majestic movement of the drama proves that he was a fool and a lunatic. God compelled him to work out his own evil purposes, and so permitted this man to endure suffering and to co-operate with God in giving the lie to Satan's lie. That is the dark and sinister foreground. When he came with the sons of God, and presented himself before the Throne of the Most High, God said, "Hast thou considered?" A tremendous word that—"consid­ered." It does not mean seen, or glanced at. Have you taken time to be watching him? Oh yes, he had been watching him. "Hast thou con­sidered?" He had considered, and he had considered very fully, but not accurately or ade­quately. He had not seen the deepest movement of the soul's trust in God, and he said, It is all for what he can get. That is the attitude of evil towards men and women of faith everywhere.

But I turn for a few concluding moments to the other side, the bright and glorious background of the story, that is, God. Mark it well if I put it in a brief sentence. If Satan has deceived men about God, and he did; he cannot deceive God about man. He has lied in the presence of humanity, and humanity has listened to his lie, and has fallen and wandered, and brought upon itself all the cycles of history, devastation and misery and wrong. We are in the midst of it today, all because humanity has listened to the devil's thought about God. But he cannot de­ceive God. He can make his suggestion in the Divine presence. Words are in my mind, from the New Testament, "The Lord knoweth them that are his." It does not merely mean their names are inscribed in a great roll; but He knows all about them, the deepest thing about them. If the devil has considered, God knows. That goes be­yond all the consideration of the intellect, the eternal knowledge of God. "The Lord knoweth them that are his." (Num. 16:6; 2 Tim. 2:19)

What a wonderful word Isaiah 57:15 utters, with its infinite sweep, and its personal finality. Let me quote it to you. "For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, (and) with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones." God's two dwelling-places: eternity and the soul of the trusting man. God knows His servant Job. The devil could not deceive Him. God may, and He does, call men of faith—He called upon Job—to pass through affliction in the interest of truth; but all such affliction is under His control. Satan is always limited, and Job said later on, in the midst of his appalling situation, "When he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold." That was the language of the soul who knew God, who was able to look upon all the disasters that could come to him, and see the fires were God's action, trying; and he said, "I shall come forth as gold." (Job 23:10)

So from this second occasion when we hear the voice of Satan, we become conscious of its real meaning. The devil's estimate of man is that of man as fallen, degraded humanity. He does not take account of the fact that this man who does belong to a sinning race has listened to his slander upon God, yet believes in God. Satan does not take into account the fact that there are deeper depths. It may be true of a man without faith, that such a man may be a flatterer, may be religious for what he can get out of it. It is a mistaken evil estimate of the man of faith; and it is never true of the man who realizes himself in relationship with God. Yes, we know He puts the hedge round about us. He confers blessings unqualified upon us, so that we have turned the thought into an almost doggerel verse, which is nevertheless full of meaning.

"Count your many blessings, name them one by one." I like singing it, although we cannot do it. The Bible tells you, you cannot do it. They are too many. But in recognition of the fact we are surrounded; but we are not following Him because of His blessings. Nay, rather, with the man in a later chapter, this very man Job, "Though he slay me, yet will I wait for him"; and with another man of a later time,

"For though the fig tree shall not blossom,

Neither shall fruit be in the vines;

The labor of the olive shall fail,

And the fields shall yield no meat;

The flock shall be cut off from the fold,

And there shall be no herd in the stalls;

Yet will I rejoice in the Lord,

I will joy in the God of my salvation." (Hab. 3:17-18)

So let us understand the devices of Satan. We see them to be absolutely false, a lie in both cases. Yet on the basis of those lies infinite ruin has been done, and is being done. But as for us, our sure trust is in God.