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                            God of the Monsters

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By David Wilkerson
February 18, 1991
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          Let me introduce you to the most troubled, distressed,
          despairing believer of all time. He was a righteous,
          God-loving man - yet when sorrow and trouble
          overwhelmed him, he sounded like an atheist!

          At the height of his suffering he said: "If I had
          called, and he had answered me; yet would I not believe
          that he hearkened unto my voice. For he breaketh me a
          tempest, and multiplieth my wounds without cause" (Job
          9:16-17).

          You probably have guessed by now - I'm talking about
          Job! He is the man who lost everything - his family,
          his wealth, his goodwill, his health, his hope!

          I don't think many today can imagine such suffering.
          All of Job's calamities came suddenly, so that in the
          midst of fierce sorrow he cursed the day he was born:
          "Why died I not from the womb? Why did I not give up
          the ghost when I came out of the belly?" (3:11).

          "Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and
          life unto the bitter in soul; which long for death, but
          it cometh not?" (3:20-21).

          In Job 9-10 you hear the despairing language of a holy
          man who could not understand why God was allowing him
          to suffer so. Even the worst of sinners have not dared
          to speak so harshly of God's treatment of them.

          Job said, "He will not suffer me to take my breath, but
          filleth me with bitterness" (9:18) - meaning, "God
          doesn't even give me time to breathe between my bitter
          trials. Life has become nothing but trouble, suffering,
          grief and pain."

          "God, why are you contending with me? Are you going to
          let me be destroyed? You have poured me out like milk
          and curdled me like cheese. Life is slipping away so
          fast, like a swift ship sailing by. Before I die I
          would like a little joy, instead of all this deep
          gloom, with one trouble following another."

          Finally, in deep despair, Job uttered a very harsh
          statement - the worst of all his complaints and
          hopeless words: "He will laugh at the trial of the
          innocent" (9:23).

          In so many words Job was saying: "It doesn't pay to be
          holy or walk uprightly. God treats the wicked and the
          pure the same way - they both suffer. So why labor to
          be upright? I was a praying man, loving God with all my
          heart. I was repentant, raising my children in the fear
          of the Lord. I was just and honest. I was kind and
          compassionate, caring for the poor and clothing the
          naked - and look what happened to me.

          "My life is all sorrows, troubles, hardships - nothing
          else. No one really cares - there is no one able to
          advise me. I don't have an intercessor!

          "Let God take His rod off my back! Let Him stop
          terrifying me! I'm truly scared. All this is
          overwhelming! If God is at work, I don't see it."

          "Lo, he goeth by and I see him not: he passeth on also,
          but I perceive him not" (9:11).

          Over and over Job cried out, "If I have sin, what is
          it? Where am I going wrong? How have I grieved God? I
          don't even know what to say to the Lord anymore. And
          even if my prayers did get through, I don't think He'd
          answer.

          "Worst of all, I can't shake off one haunting thought:
          I feel as if through my sufferings and trials, heaven
          is mocking me. My life is a joke and God is mocking me
          in my sorrows!"

          I believe Job represents the last-day believer who is
          undergoing great testing and trial, enduring manifold
          troubles. I also believe that, in the days just ahead,
          multitudes of God-fearing, holy believers will go into
          this same fire - the furnace of Job!

          I don't know if we've already entered that time. But I
          do know we are in a time of trouble beyond all
          comprehension - a time the likes of which the world has
          never seen.

          Already many wonderful, righteous Christians have lost
          their jobs or have been out of work for weeks or
          months. Some have lost nearly everything. Like Job,
          they have been stripped bare. Many are on the brink of
          poverty. And many of them are saying that, in all their
          lifetime, they have never faced such hardship!

          Many are suffering in other ways. Marriages are being
          tested. Families are experiencing great heartache.
          Trouble is piling upon trouble.

          As you look into the future, it may scare you. All you
          can see is uncertainty, fear, crisis - and your heart
          cries out, "What am I going to do? Why is all this
          happening to those of us who have been so faithful to
          God? Why doesn't God intervene and stop it all?"

          Beloved, what happened to Job has happened to this
          generation! You can see it all around us! We have lost
          our young ones to drugs, alcohol, sex, rebellion and
          the insanity of the hour. Our national and personal
          wealth is vanishing. Our health is declining. We look
          around and find ourselves on the ash heap of despair!

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                We Who Love Jesus Are Not Immune to The Hour
              of Trouble That is Coming Soon Upon the Earth!

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          I would be lying if I told you that Christians will see
          sorrow, trouble, unemployment and depression on all
          sides - but will themselves remain safe within a cozy
          cocoon of health and wealth. No! The Bible says God
          causes the rain to fall on both the just and the
          unjust! (Matthew 5:45).

          Job was holy - yet he suffered! And just as God brought
          Job out of his affliction, so He will bring us out as
          well. But we too will go through the fire!

          I hear this same message from pulpits across the
          nation. It is being proclaimed by men whom God is
          raising up as true prophetic voices, and they are
          preparing His people for what is coming.

          Hundreds of ministers are meeting to pray in different
          cities, and the same confession is heard: "Never have
          so many been so deeply tested. In the past few months
          something has been unleashed in the land. Satan has
          come like a flood, and now every Christian marriage is
          being powerfully tested - ours included! A flood of
          trouble, hardship, deep sorrow and suffering has
          befallen the godly."

          You see, Satan was Job's troubler - and he is your
          troubler right now! Could it be that he has stood again
          before God and issued a great accusation against the
          last-day church? Might he have challenged God, "It is
          the last hour, true, but You have no true church! You
          have no spotless bride! They are not wise virgins - in
          fact, most of them are asleep!

          Look at them - materialistic, self-centered, grasping
          for riches and the good life. Listen to their teachers
          telling them they need not suffer - that all things are
          theirs for the asking!

          "Take down Your wall of protection, God! Let me put
          them to the test. You won't even have a holy remnant
          left! I'll take away their employment. I'll smite them
          with sorrows. I'll pour out on them a spirit of fear
          and despondency. I'll flood them with temptations. I'll
          bring them to poverty. You will see this last, pampered
          generation fold - they will crumble and quit! There are
          no Jobs in this church. They are spiritual wimps!"

          Beloved, this is why the Scripture says, "Woe to the
          inhabiters of the earth and sea! For the devil is come
          down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth
          that he hath but a short time" (Revelation 12:12).

          Some of you, in the midst of your trial, already have
          adopted the despairing language of Job. You have
          searched your heart - and you can find no sin worthy of
          severe chastisement. You are absolutely unable to
          figure out why God has allowed you to be plunged into
          the pit of despair!

          Your heart cries out, "God, what did I do wrong? If
          there is sin in me, name it, expose it! I don't
          understand why this calamity fell on me in a time I
          loved you most - when my walk was holy, my heart pure,
          my spirit longing after You! It seems like the closer I
          drew to You, the deeper I fell into trouble and the
          more sorrows came!

          We just don't realize how important it is to God that
          we trust Him through all the floods of trouble that
          come upon us from hell! You see, the devil can't touch
          you or test you unless God first lets down the wall and
          allows it.

          I believe that wall is coming down now for all of us -
          and we're being tested and tried, as the prophets
          declared. The Bible says that in these last days God is
          going to put us through a purifying test.

          But this was not the counsel Job heard! While Job was
          in his deepest despair, he was swamped by critics
          posing as counselors! They came to him saying, "I have
          a word for you from the Lord!"

          Behind all their "concerned advice" was this one lie:
          "Job, all this has come upon you because of sin. God is
          angry with you! There is some hidden sin in your life -
          now get it out!"

          But God told Job, "They are counselors of vanity. Don't
          listen to a word they've spoken. It's all foolishness."

          I have two warnings - one for those who are suffering,
          and one for those who aren't but know a dear brother or
          sister who is.

          Maybe you have a Christian friend who's unemployed with
          no job in sight. Or sudden calamity strikes his home.
          Or he seems to have problem after problem, popping up
          out of nowhere.

          When you see such a one discouraged by a trial, don't
          sit there and judge him. Put your arms around him and
          tell him, "I love you and I care for you!" Weep with
          him who weeps, grieve with him who grieves! That's the
          counsel of the Word of God!

          It is a wicked thing to misrepresent God to those who
          are suffering! Don't add to your brother's sorrows!
          Lift his burden - bear with him - weep with him - share
          his sorrow. Pray that God will give you His heart of
          compassion and sympathy - because you might be next!

          You who are suffering and are in a furnace of testing -
          remember that Job was a holy man. He was pure - he had
          not sinned. God allowed those calamities to fall on
          him! If someone comes to you and says, "There's hidden
          sin in your life - repent!", just smile, walk off and
          forget about it.

          I'm not talking about the counsel of praying people who
          are ordained of God and have the compassion of Jesus
          Christ. They will come to you with the comforting,
          encouraging, edifying Word of God. Receive that which
          edifies your soul!

          Yet if God is trying to say something to you, keep your
          heart open. He will show you. Listen to the strivings
          of the Holy Ghost - and be sure to keep your soul in
          faith and your hopes alive. Jesus endured great
          temptations and sufferings - yet He was without sin!

          If God does send someone with a word for you, it will
          confirm what He has already spoken to your heart. And
          you'll bow down and say, "Thank God! That confirms what
          is in my heart! You've encouraged me that God has heard
          me!

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             Job Got a Powerful Revelation of God That He Never
            Could Have Received Had He Not Been Brought So Low!

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          Your present suffering will end up producing one of two
          things in you: either an eternal hardness and spirit of
          unbelief that can't be broken - or a glorious vision of
          God's control over everything concerning you!

          You see, in the midst of all his suffering, Job
          discovered that despite all his knowledge of God, he
          really didn't know Him! He confessed, "I have heard of
          thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eyes seeth
          thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and
          ashes" (Job 42:5-6).

          Job was at least seventy years old at this time, and he
          had been hearing God all his life. His counselor
          friends had preached to him of the depths and mysteries
          of God. They had taught him about the consolations of
          God, the holiness of God, the character and nature of
          God, the wrath of God. They spoke of the massiveness of
          His power, His wisdom, His terror!

          Job had spent a lifetime praising God and worshipping
          at an altar erected to Him. He no doubt had sung of
          God's might and power. But in a mind-boggling crisis,
          he did not see God at all! God became a vague
          theological term - a series of sermons, a dead word, a
          knowledge that had no life or power. Job had heard with
          his ears - but the eye of his heart had not seen God!

          This is what God had to bring to the surface in Job.
          You see, God wants more than holy men kneeling at an
          altar, prostrate before Him, singing and extolling His
          praises. God wants a believer who can see Him in all he
          goes through - not a God of the dead letter of the
          book, but a God who is all-knowing, ever near, one who
          has everything under control!

          Sadly, many Christians today have built their house of
          faith on the sands of ease and goodness. And when the
          storms of trial come, they will be blown away.

          I see Christians being blown apart already in these
          last days. They don't understand the testings and
          trials of the Lord. They believe that, because they've
          sought after God with all their heart, loved Him and
          longed after Him, they should be entitled to prosperity
          and a painless existence - that every prayer should be
          answered immediately with no trials at all.

          The Bible says, "Many are the afflictions of the
          righteous: but the Lord delivereth him out of them all"
          (Psalm 34:19). God doesn't keep you from afflictions -
          He delivers you out of them!

          That's what God did for Job. In the middle of a
          whirlwind (which represents trial and affliction), God
          appeared to Job to show him how to rise above his
          troubles. And He did this by making Job look into the
          face of two awesome monsters - the mighty hippopotamus
          and the serpent-like crocodile: "Behold now behemoth
          [hippopotamus]" (Job 40:15). "Canst thou draw out
          leviathan [crocodile]?" (41:1).

          Why would God begin His revelation by having Job
          consider these two incredible, massive, awesome
          monsters?

          First, he poses this problem to Job: "Here comes the
          hippopotamus. What are you going to do - wrestle him
          down? Sweet-talk him?"

          "And behold the crocodile. Can you put a rope in his
          nose? Play with him, tame him like a pet? Bind him in
          your own power? Are you going to pry open his jaws and
          expose his teeth? He has a heart of stone, he has no
          mercy."

          "He is king over all the sons of pride" (41:34 NAS).

          This was more than a lecture about the strength and
          ferociousness of two massive monsters. God was saying
          something to Job about life's monsters! And He was
          telling him, "If you try to fight these two monsters,
          you'll never forget the battle!"

          The hippo and crocodile represent the overwhelming,
          monstrous problems rampaging in Job's life! The hippo
          tramples down everything in sight. He is a problem too
          big to handle. How do you wrestle down a hippo? do you
          lasso him or bribe him with a bushel of corn? No - you
          are no match for him. Only the Lord knows how to stop a
          hippo!

          The crocodile represents the demonic teeth that the
          devil flashes at you. He is ferocious! No person can
          strip him of his armor using mere human strength. Only
          God can win the battle!

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                      Job Had His Ears Tuned to God -
                       But His Eyes on the Monsters!

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          You talk about monsters? Job had them like no one I've
          ever known. He had no source of income, no loved ones
          even to mourn with him. This man was at rock bottom.

          But God was saying to Job - and to all who will hear -
          "Face the truth about the monsters in your life. You
          can't handle them - I'm the only one who can!"

          I can imagine the little light suddenly clicking on in
          Job's head: "These monsters - huge, over-whelming,
          fearful - are my troubles! And I'll never be able to
          wrestle them down!"

          "I've been sitting on this ash heap trying to figure
          out why God has permitted these monstrous problems to
          attack me - and how I can fight them and chase them
          away. I've forgotten that my God can do everything!"

          Scripture says, "Then Job answered the Lord, and said,
          I know that Thou canst do all things, and that no
          purpose of Thine can be thwarted" (Job 42:1-2, NAS).

          Suddenly Job saw clearly: "God is all-powerful. My life
          is not out of order. God does have a plan behind all my
          suffering. He is standing over me, sword in hand, to
          deliver me at the moment He sees fit. No man or monster
          can change His mind or affect His plan. My God will
          have His way!

          "I can't stand up against the hippo or the crocodile.
          But I'm going to stand still and see the salvation of
          the Lord!"

          Dear saint, what is your monster? Maybe you've been
          trying to wrestle him down, but he's tossed you away
          with a flick of his powerful tail. God is saying to
          you, "Get your eyes off this monster. You can't harpoon
          him, you can't fight him - he's too big for you. Let me
          handle the monsters! They do my bidding. They all yield
          to My Word and respond to My sword!

          Believe me, I've faced my monsters. Years ago, after
          walking the streets of New York City - worn out, broken
          in soul and body - I got mononucleosis. I ended up in
          the hospital for six weeks and developed a growth in my
          throat. I couldn't drink or swallow and sometimes I
          couldn't even catch my breath.

          My weight soon fell to less than 115 pounds. I couldn't
          travel, and before long all our money quickly dried up.
          It looked like the end of Teen Challenge. The crocodile
          was baring his teeth!

          So I lay flat on my back in the hospital, a little
          irritated at God. People came in to visit me, but they
          only made me more nervous. And more than three
          counselors came in to give me a "word from the Lord"
          that only depressed me.

          But I remember the night I said in desperation, "Lord,
          I give up, I can't fight it. It's all yours - I'm just
          going to trust You. I have to ask just one thing of
          You. If you want the doors of Teen Challenge to close,
          that's Your business. But, please, God - get this thing
          out of my throat!"

          Within an hour I coughed up a fleshy growth the size of
          a large walnut. And in that amount of time, I was well
          again!

          I left the hospital in a day or two and so got my
          strength back. And I discovered that while I was gone,
          Teen Challenge survived. I don't know how the Lord did
          it - it certainly wasn't through a miraculous $10,000
          check. But while I was ill, the staff began to trust
          the Lord instead of looking to me. And that's what God
          was trying to accomplish!

          Beloved, your troubles are not unforeseen, accidents!
          No matter what you are going through, no matter how
          deep your hurt, God is right on target and right on
          time in fighting your monsters!

          You may think the devil came in and interrupted God's
          plan for your life, saying, "Let me at him!" No -
          that's not the case! It doesn't matter if you did
          something stupid or careless. If you have repented, the
          Lord can harness everything meant for evil and turn it
          around for good.

          Don't look back. Don't focus on your past mistakes. Get
          your eyes off the monsters! He promised to restore to
          you all the years the cankerworm has eaten. But this
          word must be more than a sermon to you - it must become
          your life and hope!

          Encourage yourself with these words: "My God can do
          anything. He has not forgotten me. No one can change
          His plans. No matter how bad things look, God has
          everything under control!"

          You may ask, "Am I ever going to get out of this fiery
          trial? Will there be a happy ending - or will my
          suffering continue until Jesus comes? Will I ever
          rejoice again?

          Here's God's answer to you:
          "Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen
          the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful and
          of tender mercy" (James 5:11).

          "And the Lord returned the captivity of Job, when he
          prayed for his friends: also the Lord gave Job twice as
          much as he had before" (Job 42:10).

          You may never double what you had monetarily. But you
          will possess something much greater. You will have a
          true heart-knowledge that God is in control of your
          life. You'll never again fear the devil. You'll never
          again fear any adversary or hardship - because you will
          have come through, seated in high places with Christ
          Jesus, more than a conqueror!

          To me, that's true wealth: more than a conqueror in
          Christ Jesus!

          You may know God by hearing of Him - that's good.
          That's where faith comes from. But God wants to give
          you an absolute trust that He has a plan for your life,
          and that His eternal purpose cannot be thwarted by any
          demon in hell or any monster that appears in your path.
          God is going to have His way!

          Your God is the God of the monsters!

          ---
          Used with permission granted by World Challenge, P. O.
          Box 260, Lindale, TX 75771, USA.

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