The First Testimony that was Recorded of a Believer Repenting

The First Testimony that was Recorded of a Believer Repenting By Paris Reidhead* Will you turn, please, to Job, Chapter 42. Job, 42nd Chapter, and I would like to read most of the chapter. I think that you will find that it is an exciting portion. Incidentally, Job is the oldest book in the Bible. Did you know that? As far as we know, it is the first one that was written, and that is the reason why I have chosen to call this Testimony of the First Believer that Repented, or The First Testimony that was Recorded of a Believer Repenting: “Then Job answered the LORD, and said, I know that thou canst do every thing, and that no thought can be withholden from thee. 3Who is he that hideth counsel without knowledge? therefore have I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not. 4Hear, I beseech thee, and I will speak: I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me. 5I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. 6Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes. 7And it was so, that after the Lord had spoken these words unto Job, the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, My wrath is kindled against thee, and against thy two friends: for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath. 8Therefore take unto you now seven bullocks and seven rams, and go to my servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offerings; and my servant Job shall pray for you: for him will I accept: lest I deal with you after your folly, in that ye have not spoken of me the thing which is right, like my servant Job. 9So Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went, and did according as the Lord commanded them: the Lord also accepted Job. 10And the Lord turned the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends: also the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. 11Then came there unto him all his brethren, and all his sisters, and all they that had been of his acquaintance before, and did eat bread with him in his house: and they bemoaned him, and comforted him over all the evil that the Lord had brought upon him: every man also gave him a piece of money, and every one an earring of gold. 12So the Lord blessed the latter end of Job more that his beginning: for he had fourteen thousand sheep, and six thousand camels, and a thousand yoke of oxen, and a thousand she asses. 13He had also seven sons and three daughters. 14And he called the name of the first, Jemima; and the name of the second, Kezia; and the name of the third, Kerenhappuch. 15And in all the land were no women found so fair as the daughters of Job: and their father gave them inheritance among their brethren. 16After this lived Job an hundred and forty years, and saw his sons, and his sons’ sons, even four generations. 17So Job died, being old and full of days.” (Job 42:1-17) I believe the reason that the book of Job is in the Bible is because it is the testimony that answers the lie of Satan. Satan’s argument was this to God: Man is bad, incurably bad, under the sentence of death, and impossible to be reclaimed and changed. And God’s answer was that Satan lied. You see Satan’s purpose was to defeat the purpose of God. As I said this morning. God wanted a people for Himself. A people that would love Him, and serve Him, and seek Him, a people that He might bless. And Satan’s argument was that man, incurably bad, was simply beyond the reach of anything even God might do. And so we have here this first book that answers that question: Is man too bad to be redeemed? Is he hopeless? God’s answer was an unqualified, No. Satan’s argument was, Even Job will curse You if You touch his possessions. He serves You because You have made him rich. Even Job will laugh at you and mock you if you touch his body. He served because You have made him well. And God’s answer was, No. You are wrong. I have done something in Job’s heart that has completely changed him, that has totally transformed him. I have made him a new creation, and all that might touch his possessions, and all that might happen to his body is not going to change him because what has taken place now is a new thing. This is the basic argument of the book of Job: The redeemability of man, the changeability of man, and God in His grace, in His supernatural power, in His boundless, limitless love, is able to do something for a man that will enable that man to stand under any test and in any circumstance. It is set forth clearly in the Word. If you read it, you discover that the three would-be friends of Job came to him in his plight, and gave different arguments, trying to explain what had happened. And none of them knew the answer. None of them knew what had happened, or why it had happened. They all said, This is because you have sinned, Job. And that wasn’t the case. It wasn’t because Job had sinned, that he was sick and had lost his family and his possessions. It was because God was doing something in Job that couldn’t otherwise be done, and He was showing something through Job that couldn’t otherwise be shown. And it is in your experience, when you have had God perform this supernatural work upon your life that you realize that you have not been saved simply to make you rich, or prosperous, or successful. This is not the purpose of God’s grace. When I read messages by men who imply that the primary reason for being a Christian is because it is good for business, or because it helps one his social success, or because it enables one to achieve the goals he has set for himself, I recognize that however pious it may be it is not Christian. God has not set Himself in His task now to make us prosperous, but He has set Himself to make us like Christ. And the reason why a person comes to Christ is that something might be done by God in him that causes God to get glory out of his life. And the reason why God allows difficulties to come into our lives, for they do come into the lives of all of us, is that there are two things that He wishes to have happen. First, these circumstances are sovereignly ordered of God, to be tools or instruments to shape us in the likeness of Christ. And this is the reason why He has ordered that “in every thing we must give thanks,” because He has said it so clearly, “all things work together for good to them that love God, to them that are the called according to His purpose.” (I The. 5:18) “For whom He did foreknow, He did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son.” (Rom. 8:28,29) And “all things work together for good” only if understood to be tools to make us like Christ. Now, when you have been born of God, you want to be like Christ. It’s the deep desire of your heart to be like Christ; the cry of your spirit is to be like Jesus. Thus when something unexpected and difficult and painful comes into your life, if you truly know the God of the Bible and understand His purpose, then you can look into His face and say, Thank you, Father. Thank you. “In every thing give thanks” is His order, His commandment, because it contributes to the end, everything does, of making us like the Lord Jesus. And this is the first reason why He allowed problems and difficulties to come into the life of Job. He wanted to do something for Job. Job, as blessed as he was, was not blessed to the degree that God wanted to bless him. Job, enriched as he was, didn’t have all God wanted him to have. But before God could do anything more for Job, He had to do something in Job. And thus, the only way He could do in him what needed to be done, was to take away all the props on which he leaned, all the crutches by which he walked, and all the things which might have in any wise riveted his eyes to time and sense. And God cut him loose, completely loose. From his children, by taking them in death. And interestingly enough, you notice that when there were twice as many camels and oxen, there were only seven boys and three girls. Do you know why? Because Job had not lost the others. They had just gone on ahead. So he really had twice as many children. The camels that had been slain were slain; but the children were just transported. So God didn’t need to give him 14 boys and 6 girls, He just gave him seven boys and 3 daughters. He had the others. They were just on ahead. They had changed residence, but they had not lost their being. And so it is that we see that God wanted to do something for Job, but before He could He had to do something it in him. The second thing He wanted to do was to have a testimony. And this, I believe, is one reason why you may expect in your life to have problems arise. For there are people around you that have similar problems. You see, if God were to take His children out of all the stream of human life and existence, and put us on a plateau, so that we were not touched by the breezes to blow to blight the crops of others, and the hail that falls to crush the grain of others, and the fire that comes to destroy the barns of others. If God were to so isolate us, then people could truly say, It pays to serve the Lord. But you see when God allows your barn to burn, when He allows your crop to be hailed down, when He allows sickness to come to your life, when He allows the common experiences of men to come to you, then He is enabling you to have a witness to your fellows, of whom you are still a part, by the grace that He gives you in allowing you to pass through these waters triumphantly. And thus it is that Job was to have a witness, not only to men, but also to the realms of darkness. And there is an interesting statement in the book of Ephesians testifying that in the ages to come He might show forth something to principalities in through His church. And I believe that what God is doing today in your life is an exhibition to the powers of darkness, to the demons of the pit, that when God redeems His redemption is real. And it behooves you thus to realize that you are not only being observed by your fellow men in pilgrimage with you, and you are not only being observed by the company of the redeemed that look over the parapet of glory and would cheer you on to victory, but you are also being observed by the demons of darkness, and are thus having a witness by your triumphant life, if such it is, to the grace of God. And God would have that witness through you. But having said this, and given some explanation for the reason for pain, let’s examine what Job has to say concerning himself as we find it here in the 42nd Chapter. “Then Job answered the Lord,” (You do well to read carefully, even tonight if you have the time and energy, what God said to Job and what he answered Him.) “I know that Thou canst do everything and that no thought can be withholden from Thee.” This is a clear recognition of God’s supremacy. Now it gives Job the first glimpse out of the morass into which he has fallen. For it is true that he not only was sitting on the ash heap, scraping his boils, but he was under the circumstances. And you may not have boils, but my friend, when we get under the circumstances, or we are under the problems and under the difficulties, instead of where God intended us to be. We share the misery of Job. And so it was that here he had lost his children, he had lost his buildings, his home, his possessions, his flocks, his herd, and even the sympathy of his wife, for she had come to him finally and said, Why don’t you get it over with. “Curse God and die.” (Job 2:9) No reason for going on in your miserable existence. And this is no little problem for this man who searches his heart and said, “I do not know where I have sinned so severely as to make this a just requiting for my deed.” And he was seeking to defend himself. Now he has the first insight into the fact that God is on the throne, that God is supreme. I wonder if the problem that you face in your life with its difficulties and needs, and it would be pure folly for me to imply that your life is not filled with needs. In fact, I would go so far as to say this, that everyone listening to me has a problem in their lives so enormous, so immense, that only the risen Christ is enough to meet it. And I recognize that and you recognize it. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why New Yorkers are so distant. Have you ever noticed, sitting on the subway, the people across from you can stare right at you and never see you? Now don’t tell me that they can’t see you. They do. In fact, if you will admit that you are a tourist, and that you don’t know your way around the city, and go up to the store keeper, and say, Mr., I have just come from Kokomo, Indiana, and I’ve got to get to so and so, he’ll do perhaps with you as he did with me when I first arrived, when downtown. He said, Here, let me lock the door. And he took the key off of his string, and through the bolt in the door, and he walked with me so that he could point out the place I was going, and I wouldn’t get lost in the process. Now the only reason he did it was because I was not going to bother him tomorrow. He was willing to be nice today, but he didn’t want to get involved. And it is true that the reason why most New Yorkers look through you and don’t see you is that they have so many problems, and so many difficulties, and so many heartaches that there are so many people in New York, that if they ever started to talk to anybody they would never cease talking to people, and after all they have enough problems. They do not need anybody else’s to weigh them down. And so they will look right at you and not see you, because they just don’t want to become involved. It isn’t that they don’t see you; it is that they can’t become involved in your need. And so it is that we see that the Spirit of God would have us recognize that we each have problems of Jobian proportions. There are problems in your life, there are needs in your mind, in your body, in your spirit, with your family that are enormous. We recognize this. But someone has well said that, Sir, your God is too small, as an answer to a Christian. And the problem of Job was aggravated by the fact that up until this time his God was too small. Perhaps one of the things that Job needed to see was that God was who He is. Is this not the implication of the verse in Hebrews 11 that says, “Him that cometh to God must believe that He is;” that He is what? (Heb. 11:6) That He is what He says He is, that He is all the Book reveals concerning Him. If you see God as He is, then you haven’t too great difficulty with the problems that you are facing. This is the reason why the Psalmist said, “Magnify the Name of the Lord.” (Psa. 34:3) As you exalt Him, magnify Him, dwell upon His Name and attributes, God fills the horizon of your heart, and your problem shrinks just in proportion as you see God to be what He is. Now this was Job’s difficulty. He was so close that all he could see was ashes and boils. All he could see were funerals and loss of sheep and servants and the wife that had turned upon him. He was in the midst and under the circumstances. But Oh, how wonderful it is that the light breaks, that clouds part, God has spoken, God’s Word has done its work, and finally Job answers God and says, “I know that Thou canst do everything.” Have you seen God in His sovereignty? Have you seen Him sitting upon the throne reigning in majesty? Have you seen Him with all authority in Heaven and earth in those hands that once in weakness were nailed to the Cross? Can you say of the one that is exalted to His right hand to be a Prince and a Savior, “I know Thou, Lord Jesus, canst do everything and that no thought can be withholden from Thee.” The first step into something more than the shallowest of Christian lives is going to come when God begins to be God in your life. I think that every Christian ought to read, if no other treatise on the subject, they ought to read the splendid new volume from the pen of Dr. Tozer1, The Knowledge of the Holy. And if you will read and meditate upon devotional exposition of our God in certain of His attributes, until somehow all the mists are cleared away and the clouds have moved, and God begins to appear to be God in your heart and in your life, I think you are going to find something of what Job saw, “I know that Thou canst do everything.” And it is after all, Him that cometh to God must believe that He is everything He says is. And how are you going to know what He is until you have studied what He is, and have found out what He is. Job had finally let the truth concerning the majesty of God, and the eternity of God, and the omnipresence of God, and the omnipotence of God come from the theological tomes, if such he had, off the pages and into his heart. Have you seen God? Have the eyes of your heart been opened to see Him in His supremacy? See Him upon His throne? See Him reigning and ruling? I trust you do. Is your God big enough? The first Wednesday that I was here to speak after having accepted the call to the church, in June, middle Wednesday of June, 1956, I related something that from time to time I have shared again with you. But perhaps there is someone to whom this has not come, and others of you that have forgotten it. But one of the most impressive things that happened to me in my days of deputation work was the editing of film for a fellow missionary. And when I saw on the screen in front of me that which had been painted on the bow of a boat. It was from Lagos, Nigeria, where the fishing fleet would beach their boats. And apparently the man was a Christian. He had gone out when there was not a cloud in the sky. Storms had arisen that threatened his life. He prayed, and he was brought safely back to his family. He had gone out, needing fish to sell in the market, and apparently not one left in the sea, he would drop his nets and pray, and God sent the fish to his nets. And he would come home with that which would succor and sustain his family. And so he had written his testimony on the bow of his boat that all who saw his boat might know him and that for which he stood. That particular day I was in great need, and so as I looked at the film, flashing past on the screen, I stopped the projector, reversed it, and gazed until the meaning reached my heart. Do you know what that humble, Nigerian fisherman had painted on the bow of his little boat, four words, they are the words that Job was finally beginning to understand, words that changed his life. Simple words, one syllable words, and yet if you would write them in the front of your Bible tonight and meditate upon them in the days to come, until the truth gripped you, as it did the Nigerian fisherman, your life would never be the same. Do you know what they are? Here they are. Four little words, Let God be God. Now you can’t keep Him from being God in Heaven. He is. But when our Lord went to Nazareth, He could do no mighty works because of their unbelief. They wouldn’t let Him be God in Nazareth. And Job would not let God be God in his need. Hear it again: Let God be God. Who is He? “I know that Thou canst do everything, that no thought can be withholden from Thee.” God hears our words, God is present in our acts, and God knows our thoughts. His omnipotence, His omnipresence, His omissions set forth in this little statement. But notice something else. He humbly acknowledges his own ignorance and sin. Are you prepared to do that? If you have not been letting God be God, that is what you ought to do. “Who is He that hideth counsel without knowledge? Therefore have I uttered that I understood not, things to wonderful for me, which I knew not.” Have you done that? Have you complained against the Lord? You know Job did. Have you murmured against His dealings? Job did. Have you indulged in the luxury that no mortal can afford of self-pity? Job did. Well I have and you have. Have these things come to you? They have to me. Have they to you? Oh, that somehow the Spirit of God would enable you to take the same attitude that Job took, as he acknowledges that he utters that which he understood not, “things too wonderful for him which he could not comprehend.” This is sin, you know. The sin of murmuring, for instance, was the reason why God sent serpents into the camp of Israel. They complained because they didn’t have meat, and they murmured against the leadership of Moses. And I wonder if many times there aren’t experiences that God has to allow to come in, because He has discovered that there are thoughts of murmuring, even though they have not come to the surface. You know, you aren’t really what you have been doing. You are what you are going to do when things don’t go the way you want them to, when things become difficult and hard; when everything is just sailing along nicely, when the wind is behind you 1 Aiden Wilson Tozer (1897-1963) Pastor and Author. Christian and Missionary Alliance and you are going full sail, it is awfully easy for you to be happy and to rejoice, and to be a cheerful, fulfilled person. But you know, when the wind turns, and it seems to blow you in just the direction you don’t want to go, when the waves rise, when everything is in opposition to the set of your sails and the fix of your rudder, and the chart you must follow. Then it is when you begin to realize the kind of a person you are. And since God understood the thoughts of Job, He knew that there was in Job a murmuring heart, and a complaining heart. He knew there were things in Job’s life that weren’t satisfactory. And God didn’t just deal with what He saw. He dealt with what was there. He doesn’t look on the outward appearance. He looks on the heart. And it may just be, you see, that you have not seen some of the things that are in your life until difficulties arose. And then you discover that there could be a root of unbelief, and there can be bitterness, and there can be despair and grief, and dark depression. And there can be an unwillingness to walk out in obedience to the Lord. And God knew this, and so in order that you might know what He knows, He allowed the circumstances to come. I think you will never understand why the Lord did what He did with Peter on the night which he was betrayed until you understand how much He loved Peter. Do you know how much the Lord loved Peter? You see the Lord Jesus saw in Peter what Peter didn’t see. Peter saw loyalty, Peter saw devotion, Peter saw sincerity, and the Lord saw deception, and instability, and so He said, Peter, Satan has accused you before the Father in a sense. “Satan has desired to sift thee as wheat, and show up what you are. But I have prayed for you. I have prayed for you.” (Luke 22:31,32) But you see, as much as the Lord loved Peter, He couldn’t do for Peter what Peter needed done until Peter saw what he needed done. And so Peter’s heart was like a nut, a butter nut, a hickory nut, or something else that is hard and difficult. All the Lord’s words didn’t get to him. But what the Lord Jesus was willing to do, you see, was to become the anvil. And the little girl’s pointed finger became the hammer. And poor Peter got in between. And so the little girl began to hammer on Peter, and underneath was the Lord Jesus, and every time she hit him with that pointed finger, Peter winced. But right underneath was the Lord. And the third time she hit him, it broke, and Peter said with cursing, “I never knew Him.” And the Lord looked at him, because the cock crew, and all of a sudden Peter, seeing the look of the Lord, could see the need of his heart. And he went away and wept. (Luke 22:54-62) Now I wonder how many times, my dear, the Lord Jesus has loved you and loved me enough to become the anvil that the circumstances could be the hammer that on Him we could be broken to discover our need, because He wanted to meet it. And so, instead of murmuring and complaining, and finding fault with our wonderful Lord, Job acknowledges that this is his sin, sin of ignorance, sin of murmuring, sin of rebellion against God’s dealing, and he breaks before God, “I have uttered that which I understood not, things too wonderful for me, which I knew not. Hear I beseech Thee, and I will speak, I will demand of Thee, and declare Thou unto me, Lord.” I am passed the point of telling Thee. Now I want to listen. Now I want to learn. I have an earnest desire for Divine illumination. “I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear but now mine eye seeth Thee.” Do you have today, because of the fact that you have discovered that He is all that He is, and that you don’t know what you ought to know, that there has been ignorance, and unbelief and murmuring, and other things which have kept God from fulfilling His purpose, do you have Job’s desire for illumination? I assure you of this. You have no more light tonight than you want. I said last week, You are no holier, I am no holier, than I want to be. You have no more light than you want. You have no more insight than you want. You have just as much light from the pages of the Word, and from the Spirit of God, as you want, because when you come to Job’s place where you say, Lord, I don’t know, teach me, then He will teach you. And Job came to the place where he said, “Hear, I beseech Thee, and I will speak: I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me. I have heard of thee, by the hearing of the ear.” Now hearsay is not vision. I ask you to read the Knowledge of the Holy, by Dr. Tozer, but I would assume of course that simply because you have read it doesn’t assume that you feel that you have seen Him as He is set forth. The writer had to in some degree. Certainly not in full degree that He is depicted, for he would be the first to say that he has but seen with the faintness of the first glow of morning rather than with the full night of noon. But you see hearsay is not vision. I have told you in the past of my experience in 1949, coming back from the Mission Field, and having spiritual inventory down there at Southern Baptist Seminary down there in Louisville, and going through my life, from ‘49 to ‘32, and discover that the last real thing that had ever happened to me, happened the day I had been born of God. And from that time on, I had been gathering words and phrases and teachings and doctrines, and had assumed that if I could intellectually comprehend them that I could certainly claim to have experienced them. It’s a hard thing to discover that hearsay is not vision, and that because you have heard does not mean that you have experienced. But, of course, hearsay may lead to vision. It is when you hear someone testify to what the Lord has done and is doing, that your heart is stirred with hunger. Just this week at Prayer Conference, a dear brother handed me a little booklet. He said, What do you think of this? And I gave him my impression and opinion. He said, You know, reading this booklet has stirred my heart with great hunger. And then for the first time, though I’ve known him for years, he said, You know, I have come to the place where I’m hungry for God. I want God more than anything else. I don’t want to miss anything God has for me. And it was the reading, the hearsay that stirred his heart with hunger. And it was the fact that Job has heard with the hearing of the ear, that inclined him to seek with the seeing of the eye of his heart. And so that, whereas you can’t assume that because you have heard you see, you can also come to the place that, having heard, you seek to see, and seek to know. But you see, whereas he knew there was much more in God for him than he had ever had before, he realized that there were problems in the way. And so here you find the first recorded instance of a believer repenting. “Wherefore, I abhor myself and repent in dust and ashes.” We have been trying to establish for you in this series of messages the meaning of repentance, that it means that on the basis of facts presented, information secured, and verities and truths observed, that there has to be a change, a change of attitude, a change of mind and a change of action. Now Job had walked in the light of what he knew, he walked in the light of what he had been taught, and God had confidence enough in him to allow him to be exposed to this tremendous pressure. He had confidence enough in you to allow you to undergo some of the experiences through which you have passed. He must have loved some of you, because He has allowed you to have such excruciating experiences in the course of your life. And this is in one sense a great honor, that God has trusted you that you were able to bear that which He would allow to come into your life for His lovely purpose. But you see, with all of us, there is so much more than we have experienced up till now. And so, God had to deal with inner problems. Job’s outer life was impeccable. He sat there for months and allowed his friends to pick him to pieces and he had a conscience void of offence toward God and toward man as far as his outward life was concerned. And so it was that he couldn’t take blame for crimes he’d committed, the kind that were attributed to him, and he could defend himself. He hadn’t done this, and he hadn’t done that, he hadn’t done the other. He wasn’t what they said he was... The innuendos they cast, the suggestions they made found no response in his heart. He wasn’t as bad as they said he was. He was worse. He was not as bad as they said he was. But you see what he lacked was the vision of the Lord. And when he saw the Lord, he saw himself. Up until that time all he was doing was meeting the arguments of his friends, so called. As someone said about himself, You know, with friends like mine, I don’t need enemies. I would say the same thing is true of Job. With friends like Jobs, he doesn’t need enemies. They take care of that to suffice. With friends like his, sitting there, accusing him, trying to find some reason for what has happened, Job can answer, You are wrong, you are wrong, you are wrong. But now something has happened. Now he has seen Him with the eyes. “He has heard of Him with the hearing of the ears,” but he said, “Now mine eyes seeth Thee.” And you know it is in the light of seeing Him that real brokenness comes. We can measure ourselves by ourselves, and judge ourselves among ourselves and pass muster, and pass test. But it is when we see Him. And somehow, the infinite holiness of our wonderful Lord falls upon us. As John on that day, the Lord’s Day, on the Island of Patmos, in the Spirit, said he saw “One like unto the Son of Man, standing in the midst of the candlesticks, His head as white as wool, His eyes like a flame of fire, His face glowing as the sunshine, His feet as burning brass, out of His mouth a two-edged sword.” (Rev. 13-16) And John said, “When I saw Him, I fell on my face as dead.” (Rev. 1:17) Have you seen the Lord? Have you seen Him? Then you have come with Job to this place that you abhor yourself, the little meanness, the little pettiness, the little things that no one could find out, no one knew about. This is repentance in the Christian. It isn’t measured by the conduct that is set up for membership in the church. This is necessary. It isn’t by the standards of separation that evangelicals observe. This is necessary and good. That which God shows us is the heart, and attitudes, and tendencies and traits of mind and disposition. And it then when we see Him, we abhor ourselves, and change our mind about our sufficiency, and about our ability, and about ourselves. Have you seen Him? You say, Oh, I’d be overwhelmed if I saw Him as Job did. Yes, you would. You would be overwhelmed John was overwhelmed. But my friend, isn’t it wonderful to be overwhelmed by Someone so infinitely worthy as the Son of God? Is this a trouble to be overwhelmed by Him, and to allow the Lord Jesus just to let the search light of His Own holiness and loveliness pierce into your heart until the deepest depths that you have covered are exposed. Job was on the ground of blessing now. Job was seeing things. He doesn’t enumerate them, because they would be different in Job than in you. Job might’ve seen some things that you wouldn’t see, and so it doesn’t tell us what it is he abhors. He just says, He abhors himself. He has gotten a glimpse, you see, of the root of the trouble. We so frequently say, O Lord, you know I have this, as I have said, this critical mind. And so we are trying to deal with the mind, the censorious spirit, trying to deal with the spirit, this sarcastic tongue. We are still picking. But then when we get a glimpse of Him, it isn’t to find something, because exposures come in the presence of the Lord, and it’s me, I abhor myself. “I know that in me and my flesh there is no good thing.” (Rom. 7:18) You see, beloved, the Spirit of God wants us to see what we are so that we can see what He is. And your appreciation of the Lord Jesus Christ tonight is in direct proportion to the revelation you have had of yourself. Now have you come to the place that you can say, I abhor myself, me. You say, This is self-abnegation; this is destructive to human personality. Oh no. This is releasing to human personality, because it teaches you that God loved you when He knew the worst about you. He simply wants you to see what He has seen, so that He can be everything you need; because until you see what you are, you don’t really need what He offers. And if you see that in yourself “there is no good thing,” then you can change your mind. Now this is it. This is the repentance of the believer. When he changes his mind about his adequacy. Up until that time he has said, Lord, help me not to be critical, not to be censorious, not to be sarcastic, not to be this, and not to be that, and I will make good for you. But when this is what Job has seen comes, he has gone far passed the problems to the Person, and he said, Lord, I need something more than just help in this problem and that problem. I need something more than just escape from this difficulty and that need. Now he is on the grounds where he can understand. It is not set forth here in fullness, but he has changed his mind about his adequacy. And oh, this is what Paul did. This is what he testifies to. I, I am crucified with Christ. Sounds like Job, doesn’t it? Nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. The Cross has gone right through Saul of Tarsus, right through his heart, right through his adequacy, right through his competency, right through everything that he would bring, and he said, I can’t. And then he turned right around quickly and said, But Lord Jesus, you can. Now You be to me everything I need. Wisdom? “Christ crucified is made unto us wisdom.” (I Cor. 1:30) Righteousness? Sanctification? Redemption? Yes. All He is everything. This is what God’s purpose was. I think this is what He wanted to show Job, and all the Jobs of history, that Job couldn’t. You can’t. I can’t. But He can. And He wants to, and if we will but let Him He will. And this is the area of repentance, when you change your mind about your own adequacy. This is the repentance of the believer, when he has changed his mind about himself, when he has come to the place where he knows he can’t, but the Lord Jesus can. Now, what is your problem? What is your difficulty? You come to me and say, Oh, if I could just... Wait a minute. It is deeper than that. If I could have... Wait a minute. It is more than that. It isn’t just that, it’s everything. But you see, what’ve we been saying to you? Do you want God to meet you? All right. There are three things you have to do. You have to deal honestly and frankly with all known sin, completely break, and confess it, instantly, now, tonight. You have to surrender everything to Jesus Christ. Now if you don’t do that, there is no further light, there is no further illumination, there is no further truth. There is a road block. You have erected a road block in your pilgrimage with God. If you don’t deal with known sin, if you do not surrender that which God demands, then He cannot show you anything beneath or beyond. But so many that have been coming in these days have as they have dealt with the items, been taken by the Spirit of God passed the item of their need to the root of their need, and seen the glorious deliverance in the Lord Jesus. The repentance of the believer is when he changes his mind about his own adequacy, and realizes that only Christ is enough, but Christ is enough. And He is willing to be all that you need. Now what are we going to do? You say, Oh isn’t that nice? Job did the very same thing that the Pastor is asking us to do... In the 20th century. He did it in the first book in the Bible. Isn’t that interesting? There has been so little change in the eternal principles of God’s dealing. And so you have an item of truth that you can take home and munch upon. But do you know something, it has not affected you until you make up your mind right now before you leave, I am going to do what Job did. I have seen God, I’ve seen myself. I am going to deal with all sin tonight. I am going to surrender everything to the Lord tonight. I am going to ask God to show me myself tonight. And I know that this is going to be the means of victory, leading me out and into all the wonders of God’s grace. Are you prepared to meet Him now? He is prepared to meet you. Are you prepared to meet Him now? Let us bow our heads together in prayer. With our heads bowed and our eyes closed, I want you to meditate for a moment. Has God allowed circumstances to come into your life which have exposed you to yourself? You didn’t realize how critical of people you could be. You didn’t realize how selfish you could be. You didn’t realize, did you? Now you do. God loved you enough to let you just break yourself open on His heart. What are you going to do about it? You’ve seen. Are you going to go away and forget what manner of man you have seen? What manner of person you are? I trust not. Job saw and he did something about it. And God tonight is pleading with you to do something about it, and He is asking you right now to judge yourself to be what He has said you were, what He has shown you are, — critical, self-pitying, bitter. Oh, a hundred things that aren’t nice. Are you prepared tonight to take sides with God against yourself and say, Yes, Yes this is my need. And the devil will come to you and say, What will people think of you? O my dear, who are you concerned about losing, people or the Lord? He is waiting to meet you and to bless you. Become honest now. Hasn’t God spoken to you? Don’t you want deliverance tonight? You can, you ought to meet Him now. You simply add to your guilt not to. Tonight is the night. Now is the time. We are going to give you an opportunity to mind God. Right now while we wait in prayer, I want you to stand, and by your standing say, I am going to deal with everything God has shown me. I am going to utterly break before Him. I am going to confess and forsake everything I know to be grieving to Him. I am going to surrender all I am and have to Him tonight. I want Him to meet me tonight. Would you stand right where you are, now. Right in your place? Thank God. Yes, I thank... Praise the Lord. Just remain standing, please. Would you join, has God spoken to your heart? Would you? You know your need. Mind Him right now. Don’t wait. Don’t linger. Now. Right now. Quickly. Yes. I am going to break I am going to deal with everything He has shown me, everything that I have seen. Stand, and by your standing indicate the purpose of your heart to go with Job into all that God has for you. Right now. We will just wait a moment. You know your need. You know your failure. You know, that which God counts sin. You have been planning sometime. You would like to go somewhere where you aren’t known so that you could do it and wouldn’t be embarrassed, ashamed. “Ashamed of Thee, can it be a mortal man.2” Oh come, heart, burdened and weary. Mind Him now. Right now. Thank you, Yes, yes. What of you? Two are standing. What of you? What of you? What of you? If you were to do what you ought to do would you stand? Then do what you ought to do now. Meet Him now. Don’t wait. Don’t linger. Meet Him now. God bless you, yes. What of you? Are you prepared to break with sin, with all sin, utterly bend and bow before Him, completely meet Him on His terms? Just one moment while we linger, waiting for you perhaps. God bless you, Yes. So glad you have minded God. Are there others? Willing to deal with all sin, complete surrender, utter abandonment of everything to Jesus Christ. Just stand, and by your standing break before the Lord. “I have heard of Thee with the hearing of the ear, but how mine eye seeth Thee, and I abhor myself and repent in sackcloth and ashes.” I have changed my mind about Job, said He, Come now. Dear friends, if you were to have the last night on earth, would you mind Him. I am not trying to frighten you. I am trying to bring you up against your need and you heart. What would you do if you knew that tomorrow you would awake in His presence? You ought to live every moment in the light of seeing Him the next moment. Mind the Lord. Now I am going to ask that you that are on your feet and standing, just slip out and go to the back aisle, and into Wilson Chapel, and I am asking the deacons and deaconesses that help me to come. The elders and the deaconesses to come and help me, to just slip out, go to the back of the church and into the place of prayer. Just slip out and go to the back of the church and into the place of prayer. Gentlemen, will you go. Brethren, will you go. Now what of you? What of you? I wish that I could believe that everyone here has met the Lord as He has indicated He must be met. I wonder if there are those that would say, Pray for me. Just put your hand up, and by your upraised hand say, Pray for me. Thank you. Yes, God bless you. Yes, I see it, Thank you. Yes, yes, yes. All over. Now we are going to stand and be dismissed in prayer. The young people are going to go the College and Career group. We are going to ask that the Spirit of God will just seal to our hearts the purpose and the intent of this service for everyone present. I am going to ask Donald Moreland our Youth Secretary to lead us in the closing prayer and the benediction. Shall we stand. * Reference such as: Delivered at The Gospel Tabernacle Church, New York City on Sunday Evening, September 16, 1962 by Paris W. Reidhead, Pastor. 2 “Jesus, and Shall it Ever Be” By Joseph Griss, 1765. Music by Henry K. Oliver, 1832. ©PRBTMI 1962

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The First Testimony that was Recorded of a Believer Repenting

Paris Reidhead

Paris Reidhead (1919 - 1992)

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