REALLY?

Job 5:17 (KJV)

Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth: therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Almighty:

I wonder if, in the six thousand year history of mankind, there has ever been a time when people were unhappier than they are right now?

• The depravity
• The decadence
• The debauchery

That exists right now rivals, if it doesn’t exceed the days of Genghis Khan or Attila the Hun.

• We may have warmer homes
• We might have more comfortable surroundings

But we are not happier people.

Just last week, seven police officers were killed in seven days.

• Alcoholism and
• Drug abuse

are devastating families.

A church with an addictions program similar to ours just asked us to pray for a family whose daughter had been clean of heroine for nine months.

She had a baby and seemed like she was on the right track. But taking care of the baby made it difficult to continue attending the classes at church.

In no time she was using again and died of an overdose, leaving behind two children.

Two 15 year old girls were shot to death at a school Friday; the last report I heard the police seemed to believe it was a double suicide.

Even the most successful Americans have to see the dark cloud hanging over our country when we have a national debt in excess of 19 trillion dollars.

Nobody believes we can ever pay that debt off and

Everybody knows that sooner or later the government has to crash under its weight.

People are depressed in our day like no other time in recorded history.

The mental health industry is growing in leaps and bounds and

If you aren’t depressed, just watch the commercials on TV describing depression and you will get depressed.

It’s not just that that times are difficult for some and ominous for others.

People are unhappy.

And the word unhappy is an appropriate one to describe it.

The word happiness, in its purest sense, means to be level or straight.

That means that happiness is directly connected to morality.

The farther we depart from the morality of God, the less happy we, as human beings become.

We are pursuing happiness this year, as we find it described in the Bible and we come now to a passage that says,

Job 5:17 (KJV)

Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth: …

As I read this passage and began to think on it, the thought that came to my mind was, “Really?”

At least, in anticipation for preaching it crossed my mind that someone in church today, upon hearing this verse would ask, “Really? You’re going to try to tell me that I will be happier if the Lord corrects me?”

That is what the Bible says and I want to try to be faithful to preach the Bible.

I want to begin by answering the question,

I. IS THE STORY OF JOB IMPORTANT TO ME?

This is a passage of Scripture that is thought to be the oldest in the Bible – the first piece of the Bible that was written.

It describes a man whose life has almost no semblance of ours

• He lived in a different part of the world than we do
• He lived in a different culture than we do
• He lived in a different time of religion than we do

This was before Christianity, even before the Mosaic religion of the Jews.

There was no Bible for him to read – he knew what he knew about God because it had been handed down to him from his fathers and his fathers’ fathers.

There was no organized religion

• No church
• No Tabernacle
• No Temple

And then the guy is rich;

Filthy, stinking rich.

• He doesn’t have to get up to an alarm clock every morning.
• He doesn’t have a boss breathing down his throat every day
• He doesn’t have house payments, grocery bills or kids sports activities to pay for.

So tell me, does anything that happens to Job apply to me?

And I am going to give you this answer,

2 Timothy 3:16 (KJV)

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

Yes.

According to the Word of God, “All Scripture”, including the book of Job not only applies to you and to me, but it is profitable for you and me.

But in order to get the most profit from it we must do as Paul told Timothy and,

2 Timothy 2:15 (KJV)

Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

So I want to spend the next few minutes giving you a short, 

II. INTRODUCTION TO THE PASSAGE

Job 5:17 (KJV)

Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth: therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Almighty:

As I said, the book of Job is thought to be the oldest book of the Bible.

Job lived at about the same time as Abram in about the same place, before he was called to go to the Promised Land.

• Job was a wealthy and influential man
• He was also a godly and righteous one

Then God allowed Satan to test him.

After losing 

• All of his animals
• All of his wealth
• All of his children and almost
• All of his health

We find Job sitting in a heap of ashes, using broken pottery to scrap the boils and sores that covered his body.

There is no way to overstate the deplorable condition Job found himself in.

Even his wife told him to, “Curse God and die.”

We also find that Job has a set of friends who come to console him but choose to chide him instead.

Remember Job’s famous words, “Miserable comforters are ye all”?

His friends entered into a series of, may I call them, rants against Job.

The gist of every one of them is the same:

“You must be hiding from us some sin or else God wouldn’t let you go through all of this.”

That is the most logical and religious conclusion and man can ever come up with.

It’s the one that we all fall back on when we say something like, “What have I done to deserve this?”

Interspersed in these rants by Job’s friends are some very profound nuggets.

They remind me of a plaque I once saw at one of my aunt’s homes.

The plaque contained a number of quotes and quips written by Norman Vincent Peale of “The Power of Positive Thinking” fame.

• They sound great
• Some of them are even based on the Bible
• But they are not all altogether true

That means you have to pay close attention whenever you read the book of Job because: 

• You might run across a verse that sounds really good
• You might want to base some hope upon it
• You might want to claim it as a promise from God

But when you study to show yourself approved unto God and rightly divide the Word of truth, you find out that it’s not really a promise from God at all – it is merely the musings of Job’s religious but wrong friends.

Job 5:17

Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth: therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Almighty:

Does not come from Job’s mouth or God’s mouth.

These are the words of Job’s friend named Eliphaz the Temanite.

My first impression then might have been, “Good, I didn’t want to believe it anyway.”

“How could a person be happy when he is corrected by the Lord?”

Wait a minute.

Eliphaz has some backup on this one.

• Not one, 
• Not two 
• But three 

Bible penman reference, quote and confirm that this is God’s truth.

Solomon, the wisest man who has ever lived is the first

Proverbs 3:11-12 (KJV)

My son, despise not the chastening of the LORD; neither be weary of his correction:

For whom the LORD loveth he correcteth; even as a father the son in whom he delighteth.

James, the pastor of the church in Jerusalem seconds the motion and writes,

James 1:12 (KJV)

Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.

Not exactly word for word, but the same truth; happiness comes from enduring temptation.

Then the Apostle Paul chimes in an expands the lesson,

Hebrews 12:5-11 (KJV)

And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him:

For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.

If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?

But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.

Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?

For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness.

Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.

Paul tells me three things:

A. That the Job passage is “sanctioned by God”.

B. Happiness and grief are compatible emotions.

C. Happiness and righteousness are complimentary concepts.

That brings me back to our passage and the question,

III. REALLY? HAPPY IS THE MAN WHOM GOD CORRECTETH?

Job 5:17 (KJV)

Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth: therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Almighty:

Remember two things we have learned so far:

• That happiness originally meant, “to be level and straight” and
• The product of chastening is “the peaceable fruit of righteousness”

When God chastens us, He corrects our course so that it is straight.

When God corrects us He adjusts our life to bring us back to level.

I read the testimony this week of a noted Christian author and speaker, Josh McDowell.

As I understand it, McDowell began his spiritual quest as a skeptic while he was in college.

McDowell and I would not agree on some things, but both of us would agree that God’s corrections in our lives changed us for the better.

McDowell asks in one article, “Have you ever found yourself saying ‘I hate life.’”?

His personal testimony begins, “I longed to be happy. I wanted to be one of the happiest people in the entire world. I also desired meaning in life. I was looking for answers to the questions:

• "Who am I?"
• "Why in the world am I here?"
• "Where am I going?"

More than that, I also longed to be free. I wanted to be one of the freest people in the whole world. Freedom to me was not simply doing what you want to do -- anyone can do that. Freedom, for me, meant having the power to do what you know you ought to do. Most people know what they ought to do but don't have the power to do it. So I started looking for answers.”

Several years after McDowell became a Christian a history professor challenged him to name some way in which his life had been changed since getting saved.

He said, first, he wasn’t restless any more. 

Before his salvation he always had to be occupied. He always needed someone around.

After coming to Jesus Christ he had peace in his life.

He said secondly that he wasn’t angry anymore. 

Before his salvation he wrestled with a bad temper.

He said a third change was that he wasn’t hateful anymore. 

He had struggled with hatred, especially of his father. God turned his hatred for his dad into love.

• Restlessness 
• Anger and 
• Hatred

Sounds to me like God corrected his life from unhappy to happy.

Conclusion

Are you unhappy?

The straight answer is that unhappiness is the direct result of not being right with God.

• It might be that you are not saved

Or…

• It might be that you refuse to obey what God’s Word teaches
• It might be that you resist the exhortation of the believers God has given you in His church

I can promise you this,

Happiness will come and then grow as you submit to the correction of God and your life adjusts to honor and obey the Bible.

Unhappiness will continue to be your lot as long as you live in ignorance of His Word or rebellion against His correction.