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Beloved congregation of Christ,

The other day I heard something terrible about a former parishioner from
Canada. He and his wife have 13 children and a number of grandchildren. He’s
a teacher at one of our schools and until recently was serving as an elder in the
church. Last month he was diagnosed with advanced intestinal and liver
cancer.

As people often do under these circumstances, he started writing a blog. This

We were hopeful for a glimmer of good news this morning but didn't
receive any. The doctor [from PG] gently and clearly delivered our status
and the plan for treatment. He used some words and phrases that were
hard, not because they are medical jargon but because they give a sense
of finality and brevity. He used words like incurable, manage, control,
and palliative. The plan is to start chemo within the next two
weeks…When we asked the doctor about getting to a point where we
might beat the cancer back to the point where we could operate and
remove the cancer, he just shook his head. The cancer is considered
incurable and the chemo treatment plan is geared to quality of life for
my remaining time. We'll get started in the next week or two. The
doctor talked about 1 to 3 years expectancy, but that's a bit of a guess.
It will depend on how I respond to the chemo. It could be more...or
maybe not.

Sadly, that’s not an uncommon experience. Some of us have seen loved ones
go through something similar. Some of us can be expected to go through
something similar in the future. It’s not pleasant, but this is real life, also for us
as Christians.
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People respond to this kind of news in different ways. I’ve seen church
members respond with anger and bitterness. Confusion and disappointment.
Anxiety and worry. It’s not easy to hear that your life is coming to an end,
especially when you’re relatively young. You’ve still got dreams for the future
and then suddenly it’s all taken away.

But can a Christian still have hope in these circumstances? Is it possible to

We’ll consider the believer’s hope in relation to God’s:

1. Unknown plan
2. Known promises

At this point in the book of Job, there are a series of speeches. There are three
sets of speeches. In each of them, Job’s friends speak about his situation and
what they think is wrong with him. Then Job replies to each of his friends.

In chapter 13, Job is replying to his friend Zophar. Job’s reply to Zophar
actually begins back in chapter 12 and it’s going to go on into chapter 14. This
is one of his longer speeches. He has a lot to say in reply to Zophar.

That’s because of the hurtfulness of Zophar’s speech in chapter 11. Zophar put
words in Job’s mouth that he never spoke, words of pride. Zophar claimed to
know what God was thinking about Job – Job was clearly living in rebellion
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against God and that’s why God sent all these horrible afflictions on Job. Even
then, Job was still getting far less than what he deserved. Then towards the
end of his speech, Zophar latches on to a comment made earlier by Job.

In chapter 6, Job spoke of how he wished that God would fulfill his hope to die.
Job was tired of his suffering and he hoped it would be over. That comment
caught the attention of Zophar. He thought it needed to be addressed. Look
with me at the end of chapter 11, in verse 20. Zophar says here, “But the eyes
of the wicked will fail; all way of escape will be lost to them, and their hope is
to breathe their last.” The only hope the wicked have is for death, says Zophar.
Job’s hope is for death, so what does that mean about Job? Can you see how
Zophar is insinuating that Job is evil because he expressed a wish or hope to
die? The wicked hope to die. Job hopes to die. Therefore, Job is wicked. But
if Job repents, then he can have a real hope. If he turns away from the sin
which brought this suffering on him, then he can hope in God, he can “take
rest in security” as Zophar says in 11:18.

All this is important background for our passage in chapter 13. This context
tells us what led Job to make this powerful statement, “Though he slay me, I
will hope in him…” Zophar said that Job’s wish to die proved that he was
wicked. Here Job says, “Hold on, there’s quite a difference between wishing
for death because you’re suffering horribly and placing your ultimate hope in
God.” You can hope or wish for your suffering to end – that doesn’t mean
you’re wicked in the sense of being an unrepentant rebel against God. You can
also place your trusting expectation in God at the same time. Job is arguing
that Zophar’s reasoning about him is faulty. Job is arguing that he’s not an
unrepentant rebel against God. He still has hope in God.
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Job has hope even in the face of an uncertain future, even in the face of God’s
unknown plan for him. Job doesn’t know what’s going to happen to him. But
there is definitely the possibility of death. He says, “Though he slay me…” The
word “though” speaks of a possibility within God’s plan.

Yet it’s an unknown plan. Nobody has access to the mind of God to know what
he has decreed for the life and death of any given individual. Anyone who
claims to know for 100% what the plan is for your life is acting arrogantly.
There are things God has revealed in his Word and there are things God has
hidden. His plan, his providence in our lives is something we can only see in
the rear-view mirror. Or as one of the Puritans put it, providence is like
Hebrew, it can only be read backwards. You can only know what God has
planned after you’ve experienced it, after it’s in the past. Otherwise the plan
is unknown to us.

Nevertheless, God wants you to see that there is a plan. This is crucially
important for us to understand. That’s the point God reinforces to us in what
we read from 2 Corinthians. There is always a plan. It’s a plan that involves
God’s glory and our ultimate well-being. That means that none of our suffering
is meaningless. Knowing that God has a plan, a purpose as “our outer self is
wasting away,” “we do not lose heart,” as it says in 2 Corinthians 4:16.
Knowing that God has a plan, a purpose as “our earthly home is destroyed,”
“we are always of good courage,” as it says in 2 Corinthians 5:6. Even though
we don’t know the details, we know there is a blueprint in God’s hands, a
blueprint that God has wisely prepared. It’s a blueprint for a building that will
magnify the glory and honour of God. That building is us. Therefore our
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suffering is never meaningless. Illness, even serious illness like cancer, is never
meaningless. Death is never meaningless. It all fits into God’s plan for us.

Job knows this. He knows that God’s unknown plan might include his death.
But you may have noticed how he doesn’t speak about death in the abstract.
Job doesn’t speak about death in a passive way. What I mean is that he
doesn’t say, “Though I might die, I will hope in God.” Instead, he says, “Though
he slay me…” Job speaks about death as something that God might do to him.
God might slay him. You might say that’s a dramatic way to speak about your
death. You might also question whether it’s true. If a loved one dies from a
disease like cancer, would you be correct to say that God slayed him, that God
killed him?

Well, in the Bible God does use that kind of language. God says about himself
in Deuteronomy 32:39, “I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal…” We may
not be comfortable with that kind of language, but Job is not wrong for using
it. When your heart stops beating, God is behind it. He has numbered your
days. And when your days are up, he calls you out of this world. God’s
providence, his plan, extends to your death. Job is quite right. At the end of
chapter 12, he speaks quite eloquently about God’s sovereign power over
everything. Job says that even the animals know this. He says in 12:9, “Who
among all these does not know that the hand of the LORD has done this?”
Unlike many people today, Job has a very acute understanding that God has
complete control of everything, including the moment we die.

It’s in relation to that truth that Job still expresses his hope in God: “Though
he slay me, I will hope in him…” Not knowing whether he will live or die, and
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faced with the possibility that it might be death, Job says that he will continue
to hope in God. He will continue to place his trust and expectation in God.

Before we look closer at the content of this hope, we should notice how this
fits into the challenge that Satan put to God at the beginning of this book. In
Job 1, Satan said that if Job had all his blessings taken away, he would curse
God. God allowed Satan to take away Job’s wealth and his children. But Job
didn’t curse God. In Job 2, Satan said that if Job had his health taken away, he
would curse God. God allowed Satan to take away Job’s health. But Job still
didn’t curse God. He definitely said some things he shouldn’t have, but Job
never forsook God. He never said, “I’ve had it with God, and I’m never
worshipping him again.” Job never said, “I’m turning my back on God, I’m
going to stop trusting in him.” This was a victory for God over Satan. That
victory is seen here in our text too. It was a crushing blow for Satan to hear
Job say about God, “Though he slay me, I will hope in him…” It meant that
even if Job’s life was taken away from him, he would never abandon his walk
with God. That glorified God by showing his victorious power over Satan.

Though Job sometimes wavered, sometimes struggled, here we see him in one
of his better moments, expressing hope in God. Now when we speak about
hope it’s easy to do that in a sort of theoretical way. But the Bible speaks
about hope in concrete ways. The hope of believers has content. In other
words, there’s stuff we’re hopeful about. There’s stuff about God that Job was
hopeful about.

In Job 13:15 there are specifically two things about God which give Job hope,
even with his uncertain future. Both of these things relate to God’s promises.
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These promises have been revealed to us in the Bible – so they can be known.
Believers know God’s promises and treasure them. These promises help get us
through.

The first thing about God that gives Job hope is his promise for the future. The
Bible speaks about the hope God gives to believers for the future, specifically
after we die. After we die, God promises to take us to himself immediately.
We have the promise of being in the blessed presence of our Saviour the
moment after we take our last breath. Our bodies will be laid in the grave, but
our souls will be with the One we love, our Lord Jesus. Our souls will be
rejoicing in heaven until the day of the resurrection. When Christ returns, our
bodies and souls will be reunited. Then we’ll live with our Saviour forever as
complete human beings. In the new creation, we’ll live with Christ body and
soul, in eternal perfect blessedness. This hope for the future was known by
Job too. In chapter 19, Job famously speaks about his hope of seeing God in
his flesh. Job knew that death wouldn’t be the end of the story for him. God
promised Job, just like he promises all believers, God promised that he had a
good place waiting for Job after he died.

Job only knew about that in an introductory kind of way. But in the New
Testament, God fills it out in more detail for us. You could think again of what
we read from 2 Corinthians. For the future, God promises us that since he
raised our Lord Jesus, he will also raise us from the dead. God promises us that
in the light of “the eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,” our
sufferings here are but a “light momentary affliction.” God promises us a
“house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” And all of that has been
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won for us by our Lord Jesus Christ. As it says in 2 Corinthians 1:20, “…all the
promises of God find their Yes in him,” in Christ.

The second thing about God that gives Job hope is his promise for the present.
Job is convinced of his innocence. He knows that he had been living like a
believer. That doesn’t mean that he was sinless. But it does mean that he was
trusting in God’s promises and responding to God’s promises with a godly life.
He had never abandoned God, he hadn’t cursed God. He wasn’t living like a
rebel against him, but trying to live in a holy way. Job took God seriously in his
life, in all his life. He wasn’t like those who compartmentalize their lives and
keep God out of certain parts. Job wasn’t like those who let God have the
religious compartment, but keep him out of, say, the entertainment or
recreation compartments. No, instead, like Proverbs says, Job acknowledged
God in all his ways.

Therefore Job believed he could confidently say, “Yet I will argue my ways to
his face.” That’s a bold statement, no doubt. But if Job’s ways were the ways
of a believer, if Job’s ways were the ways of someone who acknowledges God,
then there’d be some warrant for that kind of confidence. There’d also be
warrant for the hope that God will listen. If Job were to make his case before
God, God would hear him out. Job’s hope, his trustful expectation, is that God
is a listening God. He listens now, he listens in the present.

There is one problem with Job’s position here though. It’s not a little problem.
The problem is with the word “argue.” Job wants to argue with God. This
word in the Hebrew is a courtroom word. Someone is making a case in the
courtroom against someone. In this case, Job is contending with God, trying to
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show that God is in the wrong for the way he’s treating him. Job has been
upright and he’s being treated like he’s wicked. God is mistreating him and Job
is going to prove it. That word “argue” has to be seen as an arrogant word.

This is another example of irony in the book of Job. Job says he going to argue
his ways, his uprightness before God. But by arguing his ways, by taking this
approach, he actually demonstrates that he isn’t as upright as he thinks he is.
Job is taking the role of a prosecutor and this isn’t consistent with his claim to
be a godly man. A believer ought never to think that he can arrogantly argue
against God and second-guess his ways.

This is especially true in our day, after the coming of our Lord Jesus. Compare
our Saviour’s approach to suffering to that of Job. Jesus perfectly fulfilled the
first part of Job 13:15. Even as he was on the cross facing not just the
possibility of death, but its certainty, our Saviour continued to hope in God. He
continued praying to God even as he was dying. But what about the second
part of Job 13:15? On the cross, do we see an argumentative Jesus? If anyone
had a right to argue his own uprightness and righteousness, it was Jesus. But
he turned his back on that right in order to take our sins upon his shoulders.
He bore all our sins on the cross. Loved ones, that includes any and every time
we’ve been argumentative with God about his ways in our lives. As long as we
place our hope in Christ, those sins are completely covered in the sight of God.

So, if we’re united to Christ with his Holy Spirit, if we’re in Christ, that brings
this text into our lives in a sharper, more defined way. In Christ, we have God’s
promises for the future, eternal life and the hope of the resurrection. But if
we’re in Christ, we’d also forsake Job’s stance in the second part of verse 15. If
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we’re in Christ, we’d see Job’s stance as sinful and wrong. We can’t stand like
prosecutors against God. That’s arrogant. However, God does invite us to
pray to him. We can humbly bring him our questions and struggles. Think
again of Christ on the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
Asking “why” is not sinful. But asserting or implying that you’re right and God
is wrong is sinful.

God tells us to call upon him. He wants his children to pray to him, also when
they’re facing an uncertain future. And God gives his promise that he will
listen. Believing in Christ we can have that sure hope. God is going to listen to
us when we bring our cares before him. Our Father’s ear is inclined towards
us. Because we have Christ as our Saviour, his heart is warm towards us. So,
brothers and sisters, no matter what the future holds, you can indeed have
hope.

Loved ones, you can have hope despite the worst-case diagnosis from the
doctor, or whatever other difficult thing may come your way. God blesses us
through Christ with that hope. He puts that hope in us with his Holy Spirit and
strengthens that hope with his Word. My former parishioner from Canada
ended his blog post with these words: “Hug each other. Hug your kids. And
hold on to our amazing God. He is good, all the time.” That’s how you put
God’s Word into practice, “Though he slay me, I will hope in him…” AMEN.

PRAYER

Almighty God and Heavenly Father,

We worship you as the sovereign and all-wise God. Our lives are in your wise hands. We
don’t know the future. We don’t know your plans for us in detail. But we know you. We
know that you are good and loving and kind. You are faithful and caring. We know what
you promise us in your Word. In Christ you promise us the hope of eternal life and the
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resurrection from the dead. Thank you for that comforting promise. In Christ you also
promise to be our God and to hear us when we cry to you with our doubts and struggles.
Thank you for that promise too. Please work with your Holy Spirit in each of our hearts so
that we do have hope, even when we’re faced with uncertainties and questions in our lives.
Help us to look to Jesus Christ our Saviour and to live in him with hope and expectation.
Please work in us a deeper humility and a greater willingness to submit to you in all things.
We want to live for your praise and glory, Father. Help us with your Holy Spirit to do that.
Help us with your Holy Spirit to be able to echo the words of Job, that even if your plan
involves our death, we would still hope in you.