Safety

I am missionary Richard Yerby in Japan, and I'm most privileged today to again greet you from Japan in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, the name that is above all names, hallelujah. My website content is mostly Bible teaching, both written and some of my sermons also in audio. I heartily invite you to read and to listen to what I write and speak.

That URL is Christisall.us. Separate those three words with two hyphens. Christ hyphen is hyphen all dot us. I would greatly appreciate you telling your friends and acquaintances about my website.

Now, I continue where I left off last week, preaching about the man-named sermon on my website under Radio Sermons Audio 2025-1 titled Consider Job. I now pick up at Job chapter 2, reading verse 4, and Satan answered the Lord and said, skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life. Satan knows that is so true of many believers, but God proved the old devil wrong in thinking that perfect and upright Job was like that.

No wonder God was so proud of Job, and God our Creator wants to be just as proud of you and me. So let us right now call on God to help us be just like Job, so that our lives also will make a liar out of the devil and also make our God just as proud of us as it was of Job. Almighty God, that is what I want my life to be, a life that thou canst brag on and glory over.

I want my life to be one that will make a liar out of the devil, when to thee he accuses me of not being perfect and upright before thee. By thy unlimited power, please make my life into such a one. Please strengthen me to withstand any trials and hardships that thou mayest put me through to prove my uprightness to the devil and his followers.

I pray this also for Brother Richard. Please grant all this for him too, I pray. Amen.

Next, come Job's three friends to comfort him, but such miserable comforters they turn out to be. I'm going to read Job chapter 2, verses 11 through 13. Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that was come upon him, they came every one from his own place, I'm skipping a little, for they had made an appointment together to come to mourn with him and to comfort him.

And when they lifted up their eyes afar off and knew him not, they lifted up their voice and wept, and they rent every one his mantle and sprinkled dust upon their heads toward heaven. So they sat down with him upon the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spake a word unto him, for they saw that his grief was very great. End of the reading of that scripture.

What a surprise sight afflicted Job was to these three men. They come there to speak soothing words of comfort to Job, but they are so shocked and taken aback by his condition that none of the three men can speak a single word for an entire week. All they are able to do is to just sit there on the ground and look at him in awe for seven long days and nights.

That's a long time. And when they do begin to speak, their words are so wrong and inappropriate, missing the mark so terribly that Job finally exclaims to them on a head in chapter 16 verse 2, Miserable comforters are ye all. I now read in chapter 3 verse 1. After this opened Job his mouth and cursed his day.

Here Job is regretting and lamenting lamenting his very existence. In verse 3 he says, Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the night in which it was said, There is a man child conceived. Verse 11 he says, Why died I not from the womb? Why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly? Job had known great prosperity, good health, a large family, a rich and most fruitful life, and apparently for many years.

But now all that is behind him. Overnight it has evaporated, and now he is so miserable that he is cursing his very existence. Job now wishes that he had never been conceived.

Having been conceived he wishes he had died at birth and had never known life. We cannot fathom the extent of the suffering that God allowed Job to go through simply because Job loved God more than anyone else did. There may come a time in your life when God will do something similar to you.

Consider that possibility now as we consider Job, and don't be caught off guard if God chooses to put you to a similar test. Cry out to your Maker to help you to stand steadfast and strong in any such severe testing. Pray, Almighty Lord Jehovah God, I cry out to Thee to please help me to glorify Thee in times of severe trials and testings, just as Thy servant Job did.

Amen. Amen. Much further along in chapter 23 verse 10, Job gloriously declares this wonderful victory, but he knoweth the way that I take.

When he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. My friend, do you get excited over that declaration? I certainly do. The all-knowing God knew beforehand the way that steadfast Job would take when God allowed Satan to put Job to such a harsh test.

And Job's own faith in the Rock of Ages is so firm and solid that Job himself can truthfully proclaim, when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. What great glory God received from this believer made of pure gold, purified in a fiery furnace of the fires of affliction. So, rejoice in the Lord, he makes no mistake.

He knows every heartache that his children face. And when I am tried and crucified, I shall come forth as gold. Amen.

Similarly to the way Job's steadfastness blesses me, I am also blessed by you listeners steadfastly enduring the sound of my singing. Oh, the daily fullness of the joy of the Lord is ever so blessed. Thank you, precious Jesus.

Back to my sermon now. And almighty God created you for the same purpose, for you to glorify him by coming forth as gold. Each and every time God tries you, and each and every time that he allows the devil to just turn your life upside down with the worst havoc and disasters, miseries, suffering, and grief imaginable.

Right now, while the sun is shining brightly upon you, purpose in your heart that with almighty God's help, you will always come forth as gold out of the fiery furnace, no matter how severe and how hot the trial may be. Pray, Lord God, I want to do that. When thou tries me, I want to come forth as gold, just as Job did.

I do not have the power within myself to do that myself. So I beg thee by thy power, please enable me to do that. I now fully open my heart to thee, for thee to work freely in my life to perfect total obedience of my life to thee and to thy word.

Please work mightily to perfect that obedience within my being. I only pray, Lord Jesus. Amen.

All the way through verse 24 of chapter 3, Job cries out regret and lamentation over his very existence. Now please look carefully at the next verse, verse 25. For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is coming to me.

What Job is talking about here is disaster. Job got wiped out. He lost almost everything except his physical life.

And Job is saying here that he had feared the possibility of that happening. In the same way you and I harbor certain fears in the back of our minds as we go through life. What if I lose my job and cannot find another one? What if I lose my health and can no longer work and support the family? What if I or my wife gets cancer? What if one of the children is crippled or paralyzed for life in an accident? What if the house burns down, destroying all our possessions? Possibly we do not think so much on those things when we are young, but as the years grow on us, these kind of fears tend to grow also.

And Job is saying during all those years of wonderful prosperity, I considered and feared the possibility of something like this happening. And sure enough, now it has finally come. And I believe that Job's secret of being perfect and upright before God is revealed in the next verse, verse 26 of chapter three.

I was not in safety, neither had I rest, neither was I quiet, yet trouble came. Back about 1980, I was on my knees reading slowly through this passage when the Holy Ghost seemed to stop me at this verse. I never stopped on it before.

I wondered why Job would mention these three things in relation to the fact that trouble yet came his way. I was puzzled about the connection, but it seemed like there was an important lesson to be learned here. So for days, I read over this, meditating and praying about it.

Till weeks later, it seemed that I came to understand what Job is saying in this verse. I believe what Job is telling us here is, even though I was behaving myself as best I knew how before God, still God allowed all this trouble to come my way. It would be like you working a job for an employer day in and day out.

You go to work on time. You stay on the job late at times. You do not steal things from your workplace.

You work hard every day, giving your employer a good day of labor. By the day's wage, he pays you. You get along well with fellow workers.

You are one of the best employees he has. You do a good job for a number of years. Then the time comes when he has to cut back and lay off a few employees.

And when he does, you are the first one to get the ax. You would go home shaking your head, dumbfounded. I was the best worker he had.

So why was I the first one to get laid off? And such is what Job is saying here. I was behaving myself as best I knew how before God, but still he let such horrible trouble come to a soul who was perfect and upright in the sight of Almighty God. And when I came to understand that, I saw these three things that Job considered most important in his walk with God.

Now don't forget who is talking to us here. This is Job. This is the man whom God calls himself, whom God himself called perfect and upright.

One of the godless persons who has ever walked the face of this earth. We're not just stopping the first person we meet on the street and asking him, what do you think you have to do to be most pleasing to God? But rather we are talking to Job, the one who is most definitely, definitely no, because he was the closest to God. In coming to understand all that, I saw what Job's three top priorities in following and pleasing God.

And I believe it was those three things that made Job the spiritual giant that he was. I believe those three priorities are what made him perfect and upright. I also believe that if you will make those just as important in your life as Job did, that it will make you just as great in God's sight as Job was.

And in this wicked, sinful world that is soon to have God's pin-up wrath rain down upon it in judgment, God greatly desires that there be many believers on this earth who are like Job was. Strong soldiers of the cross who will let their lights shine ever so brightly in this old, sin-sick, dark world, who will endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ, and thus wise show everyone around them what true holiness, righteousness, and spirituality is all about. I want to be like Job.

I pray that you do also. May God up in heaven help all us Christian believers to be like Job. Let's pray to him.

Father in heaven, I do want to be like Job. I want to learn exactly what made him perfect and upright. So please teach me.

I want to put those things into practice in my life. And then I want to teach those things to other people also. Please enable me to do that.

I open my heart to all of God's truth that is contained in this holy Bible. So I call on thee, almighty God, my creator, and my soon coming judge to be my teacher. Please teach me exactly what made Job perfect and upright.

Please teach me and help me to be perfect and upright just as Job was. I pray this for all human souls presently on the face of this earth. Please teach and help brother Richard to be perfect and upright.

Please help him to be without error and void of vain glory as he teaches others about the one true God, our creator. Heavenly Father, please grant these things. I humbly pray in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and for Jesus Christ's precious namesake.

Amen. I will now start preaching on safety. I was not in safety is the first thing Job thought of when he considered that he was behaving himself as best he knew how before almighty God, his creator.

What has happened to the giants of the Christian faith nowadays? The believers who were brave, the ones who had courage, the ones who were not too yellow to fight the enemy tooth and nail, the ones who were not afraid to stand for right against the devil and his crowd, no matter what it costs them. Even if it costs them their lives, Job's first priority in serving his Lord was that his own personal safety was of no consideration at all. I believe that is the number one thing that made him great in God's sight.

Think on that, my friend. When a human soul trusts in Christ in sincere repentance of his sins, at that time by God's power, he is born again and becomes a child of God. He is saved from hell and is on his way to heaven.

Salvation is free to the truly repentant soul who trust in Christ, the savior of the world. Ephesians chapter 2 verses 8 and 9, for by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.

The believer in Christ is saved on two good works. The very next verse, verse 10, tells us, for we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them. God desires that the believer perform many good works in the name of Jesus Christ after he gets saved.

The Holy Bible teaches us those good works. The Holy Spirit guides each individual Christian into the specific work that God has ordained for him or her personally. Please pray, Heavenly Father, please help me to diligently read thy word daily, to learn the many good works that thou hast ordained for me personally, and by thy grace, please help me to do all of these.

Help Brother Richard also, please, and all other Christians to do this also. Amen. A believer can choose to do little or nothing for God after he or she gets saved and go to heaven by God's saving grace, saved as by fire.

They might even get there quicker that way, God ceasing to tolerate their poor testimony on earth and taking them home to heaven early. God desires all Christian believers to fight as spiritual warriors against the devil and the forces of evil. The greatest war going on in the universe is the war between good and evil, between God and the devil, and God desires that all his children actively fight in this war.

As best I can discern, God has an all-volunteer army. He doesn't draft believers into it and then force them to fight. And as I look around at Christianity, it appears that there are many believers who never become soldiers of the cross.

They never fight for the Lord. They don't witness. They don't fish for men and win souls.

They don't cry out against the ocean of sin and evil around them. They do little or nothing that will matter for all eternity. Therefore, they will be disgracefully ashamed when God judges them.

There will be eternal loss for them because they did not fight in the battle for God and right, and they will have the blood of many lost sinners on their hands because they failed to warn those sinners of their approaching punishment in hell. Our Lord is a man of war. He tells us in Exodus chapter 15, verse 3, this captain of God's spiritual army desires that each of his children become a good soldier in his army.

And a prominent characteristic of a good soldier is that he is not concerned about his own safety. For several years, I was a leader of soldiers, an officer in an earthly army, and in the Marine Corps officers basic school at Quantico, Virginia. They taught us second lieutenants that our number one priority in peacetime is the safety of our men.

Second to that is the accomplishment of our mission. In training, you don't purposely get men hurt or wounded. However, in actual combat, they taught us that those two priorities get reversed.

Top priority is to accomplish your mission. Second to that is the safety of your men. And if it is necessary to sacrifice the safety of your men to accomplish your mission, then you do it.

Of course you do it. You will use your men as cannon fodder if need be to take that hill, to storm that beach, to gain a victory or to win the war. That's true of any war.

And in World War II, our nation sacrificed the lives of tens of thousands of our young men, the pride of our nation, on the battlefields of Europe and on the sand and coral of those many deadly beaches in the Pacific to conquer that demonic Nazi force in Europe and to stop that pagan murdering force of evil coming out of Japan. And if a soldier is only concerned about his own safety when he gets into battle, then he is not worth anything as a soldier. And this same principle applies to us if we're going to be valuable in doing spiritual warfare in God's army.

We must not, we cannot be concerned about our own safety. We must be willing to completely ignore it and if necessary to give our physical lives for the cause of Christ. We must be like Job.

I was not in safety. May God help each of us believers to declare I care not for my own safety. I exist to work the work that my heavenly father hath ordained for me.

No matter how dangerous it is, my physical life belongs to my God. He can do anything with it that he desires. He may take it anytime he wants to.

When it comes to doing God's will, my personal safety is of no importance to me. If and when you and I reach that point, God will be just as proud of us as he was of Job. Oh, to be like Job.

I was not in safety. My time is up for today. God bless you and be with you.

I hope to meet with you again the same appointed time next week, Lord willing. God is so good to us. Praise his holy, blessed, great name.