Job Ch. 41 | Bible Study by Rick Burgess | 12/3/25

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome into the Wednesday Bible Study. Hello, I'm Rick Burgess.
I'll be working through this lesson again today we are
in the Study of Job.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
We're getting toward the end.

Speaker 1 (00:10):
We've got today and then the next time we gather
Lord Willing, that'll be next week, we will finish the
Book of Job. If you want to go ahead and
turn where we are today, we're going to Job chapter
forty one. So if you've been tracking with us, you
know what's going on. If you missed any of the
Study of Job, you can always catch archives by going

(00:33):
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(00:55):
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(01:19):
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Speaker 2 (01:39):
We have six of those, forty weeks in length.

Speaker 1 (01:42):
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(02:03):
Alabama and Startvielle, Mississippi. And of course the tickets to
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(02:27):
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and certainly get that done before the price increase coming
at the first of the year. So let's go ahead
and turn to job chapter forty one. Let's open up
in a word of prayer, and let's jump into this

(02:48):
very very intriguing description of the one and only living
God of something that he has created and all the
different theories that go with it.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
Today we take on love.

Speaker 1 (03:00):
Wow. Thank you Lord for the opportunity to jump into
this again today. Lord, thank you for allowing yourself you know,
or to be, to be salt and found. You said,
if we seek you, we'll find you. Uh, And we
consider again today. You know there's such a chasm between
you the creator, and us the created. We are so

(03:24):
grateful that you came to us when we could not
come to you, took on human flesh and paid the
price for the sin that separated us from you, to
bring us back into your presence and to be considered
by you through the blood of your son as fully
righteous and meeting the standard and not lowering the standard.
The standard's perfection. And it's only found in your son, Jesus,

(03:48):
and your name. We pray Amen. I love Oswald Chambers.
I do you know I'm about to end another year
of going through his daily devotional. I should say his
wife's daily devotional. She put all his sermons together as
he died in his forties. But really, really incredible teacher.

(04:08):
And I was just reading this week and I thought
about Job when and I won't give you the whole
devotion for that day, but he said something that's pretty
pretty profound, but very simple. He said, one of the
things I don't understand about human beings is that somehow
we think that God should never bruise us, when God

(04:29):
himself bruised his own son, So so he can bruise
his son, but he better not bruise us. You know
that with hands off us. And so Job has been
you know, going through this, he's learning a lot. Next
week we're finally going to get to what he learned.
But today Job is going to be presented something else
that God created. Oh, there's so much discussion about this.

(04:55):
Some of it I'm going to disagree with and not
even say that it's And then other things I don't
I don't have as much confidence in. And I will
go ahead and tell you I'm afraid this will eventually
be another one of those things that we're gonna have
a great time with, but we're not gonna know to where.

Speaker 2 (05:13):
Actually in his presences.

Speaker 1 (05:14):
Go now, now, run this Leviathan thing by me. Uh
if we get a chance to sit down have a
cup of coffee with the Almighty, I don't know if
we will or not, And he may explain it to us,
he may not, or we may see Leviathan and go, oh, well,
look at that. Uh here in the New Heaven and
the New Earth. But we're gonna need some room for him.
Uh So, so let's talk about this. Here are the

(05:34):
different theories on lovethan now. First of all, you got
to understand, which I thought very interesting, behemoth we only
see here.

Speaker 2 (05:43):
In in Job Levithan.

Speaker 1 (05:46):
We see six times in the Old Testament in Isaiah,
which we'll talk about, uh in two different psalms. Uh
and uh So in of course here in Job and
Job's even mentioned Leviathan earlier in chapter three, verse eight.
So That makes him a little different than Behemoth, because
Leviathan seems to be mentioning mentioned more than as I

(06:10):
said once, it actually means the folded one. Now there's
two theories and one of whether it's actually well, there's
like a sub theory inside of theory. One theory is
this is all symbolic. This is not a creature. It's
all symbolic. It's God being poetic and all he's trying

(06:33):
to do is show job how incredible creation is compared
to him, and he's just overwhelming him with a visual
that is a mythical creature. It represents many creatures. It's
not an actual creature, and it's all symbolic. And that's
one point of view. There's another point of view which

(06:53):
I find pathetic, and that is this is a crocodile.
That's about is dumb. A theory is I think is
in here, and I'm gonna tell you why as we
get through it.

Speaker 2 (07:05):
This is not a crocodile.

Speaker 1 (07:07):
Uh. I find that silly and and I'm gonna go
ahead and tell you though before you go, you know,
rushing out telling people birds said it was silly. There's
some men that we would that we greatly respect that
have done incredible commentaries and they think it's a crocodile.

Speaker 2 (07:25):
And I was I was shocked by.

Speaker 1 (07:27):
That because because to me, the crocodile theory is is
run out of town so fast. Uh. And and and
we'll get to this because well I won't get into
that right now, but we'll we'll we'll talk about this.
So so that's the that's the two things. And then
of course there's the theory that is also possible.

Speaker 2 (07:47):
It's real. If it's real, what is it.

Speaker 1 (07:52):
Well, we're gonna walk through this and we're gonna see
some things that indicate something that we've seen throughout history.
You know, when you study his history, there's all kinds
of drawings of dragons. Dragons are big throughout world history.
Are they mythical? Was there a time that there was

(08:12):
a creature like this? God's going to describe something that
is an awful lot like a dragon. Uh. Some people say, well,
it's actually Satan. He's he's talking about Lucifer. He's talking
about the creation of Lucifer the angel, and he's showing
that to job. Maybe, but but we'll just kind of

(08:35):
walk through it and we'll see and and we'll take
God in his own words and and we can decide
which one we think. Now here's we don't need to
lose sight though of what is not for debate, and
that's what God's the point God's trying to make. So
I want to be sure that there's I don't have
any you know, guessing about that. But we we we

(08:56):
we have that Lovethon is going to be given three
times the space that Behemoth was given. And Behemoth at
one time he said, this is probably one of the
most mighty things I've ever created until we get to Leviathan.
Levithan is all have have you ever watched movies where
they've created some kind of creature in a movie and

(09:16):
they've given the creature so much invincibility you're like, no one,
no one can defeat this thing, and then all of
a sudden, somebody does like poke its eye out and
it dies, you know, and uh, but uh, but you're
gonna you're gonna hear a creature that seems to be
indestructible to human being. Human beings can't do anything with it,

(09:36):
which is one of the crocodile doesn't work. But anyway,
but we'll but we'll get into that. So it does
seem that it's Uh, there's a lot of many more
details about Leviathan than there is Behemoth.

Speaker 2 (09:48):
Uh. It's temperament, its habits. Uh. The bottom line.

Speaker 1 (09:53):
That we need to take away today is that God
has created things that can easily overwhelm humans. He is
the source of such overwhelming power. And I will tell
you one thing he wants to make crystal clear with Leviathan.
You're not going to go out with you fishing hook
and you fishing rod and bring him in there is

(10:14):
we'll definitely see a lot of water. This is some
sort of sea creature. It certainly spends time in water.
So we'll go to forty one. Let's look at verse one.
We've just come out of Behemoth. And then God says, oh,
by the way, I'm gonna move off Behemoth, And I
want to ask you something else. Job, can you draw
out Leviathan with a fish hook? Are pressed down his

(10:37):
tongue with a cord? I got to laughing so hard
because my daddy, you know, even though he was a
well respected Hall of Fame football coach, I think everybody
thinks that my siblings and I we grew up immersed
in football culture. It certainly was part of our life.
But honestly, if all of us were to say, but

(10:58):
what did you spend the most time doing with your dad,
it wasn't football. The most time we spent with dad
was fishing and hunting. He loved that. That was his escape,
That's what he loved. And so I started laughing. And
of course my granddaddy also was a big fisherman, not
as much of a hunter's dad, but a big fisherman.
So I'm very familiar with these things that he's talking about.

(11:22):
The first verse says, let me ask you this. I'm
gonna show you, levi Athan. You think you could get
you some sort of fishing arrangement. Throw a hook in him,
bring him in and put him on your stringer. You
know you used to catch fishing with the old days,
we just had a stringer. You'd run it through his
gills and run him down that stringer and keep it
out there in the water until you left. He said,
you're gonna take love athen and bring him in and

(11:43):
put him on a stringer. Can you put a rope
in his nose?

Speaker 2 (11:48):
This is verse two.

Speaker 1 (11:48):
Now our pierce his jaw with a hook. This is
all fishing analogies. You think you can go out and
you think you can just go in there and bring
in Levithan. And then he goes to three. Will he
may please to you? Will he speak to you soft words?
So let me ask you this, job, are you just
so intimidating to Leviathan that he's gonna beg you for mercy,

(12:11):
that he's gonna he's gonna just try so hard not
to upset you job.

Speaker 2 (12:15):
Leviathon is scared of job.

Speaker 1 (12:17):
And he's gonna start trying to make deals with you
for you not to hook him, put him on your
stringer and bring him in. And really you're gonna see
also today, which I love. And we've talked about this
throughout many of our studies. Remember this, If God created
us and we have a sense of humor, just like
everything else, a sense of humor can be used in
a great way, or it could be used in a

(12:39):
bad way, just like everything that God gave us. You know,
our adversary also has an alternative plan. But so think
about this, where did this sense of humor come from? Well, obviously,
if we have been given a created being a sense
of humor, wouldn't you think that came from the Creator.
I'm gonna tell you there's things in this where God

(13:00):
is having fun. I mean, he's using humor on how
absurd this is because remember the whole, the foundation of
all this is that a human being has the audacity
to look at God and say, I don't think you
know what you're doing. I don't know what you're doing,

(13:21):
I don't know why you're doing it, And I question
what you're doing and what God is trying to show
job and to show us that there, guys, you think
you can take on the Creator, you can't even take
on creation. You can't even stand up against a storm.
You can't stand up against disease, you can't stand up

(13:43):
against beast. Do you realize all these things I created
and you can't withstand created things? And you're going to
question the Creator. I'm more powerful than these things. Let
me show you how far away you are from me.
You can't even take on the things I've created. Anybody

(14:04):
ever feel overwhelmed by creation? Like we've already done these analogies.
He's already put this on his resume. You ever felt
helpless when the storm's rolling in? Is there anything you
can really do other than just take cover and hope.
I remember knowing that. And this is not a happy thing.
But these were redeemed people. Okay, so they weren't like

(14:27):
being punished or whatever. But I have someone that I
know indirectly and he and my brother knows them even better.
But I know them and sadly, in one of the
big tornado outbreaks where we live, those of you don't
know where in the Deep South in Alabama, so tornadoes
and we're not like the folks out west that can
see them a long way off. We not only have tornadoes,

(14:49):
but we have terrain where you can't even see them.
I mean, we got so many trees and hills and
we can't see one far off, like if you were
in Oklahoma or something like that. Uh. They literally come
out of nowhere. And so they did exactly what they
were told to do. Uh. They they took cover, They
took cover, took cover where they were supposed to. But

(15:13):
an F four slash F five hit their house directly.
Let me tell you, it don't matter how much cover
you take. The sheer force of it killed them instantly.
And they prepared. They had everything you could possibly have
as a human being. For you not to be injured
by a tornado. But if the force of an F
four F five hits your house, you can sit in

(15:37):
the bath of and put a helmet on all you
want to. Uh, it's over and and so God is saying,
so y'all can't even withstand that? Do you realize that
tornado is nothing to me? I would take it with
my finger and toss it. I'm the creator of that
kind of force. I created Leviathon. I created behemoth. You
think you can take these things on, Well, if you

(16:00):
can't take them on, you certainly can't take me on.
And that's the greater point in all this, regardless of
what Leviathan really is or isn't. For he continues with
the humor. God says to Job, looking at the mighty Leviathan,
will he make a covenant with you to take him
for your servant forever? So is he so intimidated by you? Job,

(16:23):
he's gonna become your pet. You're gonna see him double
down on the pet. Here is he gonna make a
It's gonna cut a deal with you and say, I'll
tell you what, if you wan't kill me, Job, I'll
become your slave. And you know it's interesting. You'll see
here in a minute some of the things that Job
would understand here and some of the Hebrew that's being
used here is that in those days, one of the

(16:44):
markers for you to become a servant. And you'll see
this later if you were. And it's weird because it's
so common now, but in the slave culture many times
to show ownership of slave that they would pierce their
ears and it would be a piercing of some kind
that would show that I belong to someone else. And
he's saying, you're gonna get you can get him to
do this for you. Let let it get you, get

(17:04):
his little ears pierced for you, and become your servant
and just beg you for mercy. And then look at
this five Will you play with him as with a
bird or you put him on the leash for your girls?
Now interesting here because some commentators we're going to now
see he says girls. Here is he talking about Job's daughters.
He actually isn't. The word that's being used here is

(17:26):
not representing daughters. So this is not God going back
to the earthly death of his children here. He just
really means he's using light when you see this around.
You saw girls walking around. They'd go down to these
different markets. They buy themselves a little pet, bird or
something on the leash, a little pet. They take it around,
and he saying, well, LEVI finds nothing to you. Job.
Won't you just take him? Make him a pet, take

(17:47):
him down there to the market. Won't you put him
on the leash? Let little girls take him around walking
around like a little pet. Do you see the humor
that God is using? And then he talks about the
market here in six? Will traders bargain over him? They
divide him up among the merchants. Can you just say
I got a Levithon for sale and get you a
little cardboard box like you do a little box of puppies.

(18:09):
And in this case he says birds, a little cage
for birds. And you're gonna go down to the market
where we all do trading. You just gonna hold Lethon
and just trade for him. See if you can't get
somebody to buy him from you? See this is all absurd,
and he's making and job is having to hear this
from God. We get into seven. Can you fill his
skin with harpoons or his head with fishing spears? Bottom

(18:33):
line is he's indestructible. Can you harpoon levithon? Can you
toss a spear at his head? Let's go to verse eight,
lay your hands on him. Remember the battle, you want
to do it again. So when you when you look
at this, you start thinking, all right, So now he's

(18:56):
gonna start talking about how indestructible he is. What what
did what did we find in other parts of scripture
about Leviathan? What what did Isaiah say about him? Who
promised us the coming Messiah? And so many things? This
is some of the things that makes people wonder, is
this satan? Is is this something that that both represents

(19:20):
the world, the flesh and the devil. Here's what Isaiah
said about redemption of Israel. Look at this in chapter
twenty seven and verse one. And that day the Lord
with his herd and great and strong sword will punish Leviathan,
the fleeing serpent, Leviathan the twisting serpent, and he will

(19:43):
lay the dragon that is in the sea. Now hang
on to that visual because you're going to see that
develop is God goes along.

Speaker 2 (19:52):
Now that's from Isaiah. Okay, And and so.

Speaker 1 (19:58):
This is going to become a visual here because it
looks like Isaiah says, it's a dragon that's in the sea.
And he's talking about there's a day coming when God
is going to destroy Levithan. And then here now we're
talking about verse eight. You lay your hands on him,
you'll remember that battle.

Speaker 2 (20:18):
You won't do it again.

Speaker 1 (20:18):
Let's just say this, Job, if you go after Levithan
and you were to survive it, you might survive it, okay,
but let me tell you this, if you live, you'll regret.

Speaker 2 (20:28):
The decision to ever have tried it. You wish you
hadn't done that.

Speaker 1 (20:34):
And now I don't know how many of you you know,
I might have tangled with something and you look back
and go, I tell you one thing, I've.

Speaker 2 (20:40):
Survived it, but I sure wish i'd never done it.
I won't ever do that again.

Speaker 1 (20:44):
Uh. And that's what he's saying would happen if Job
decided to take on Levithan.

Speaker 2 (20:49):
Look at nine.

Speaker 1 (20:50):
Behold, the hope of a man is false. He has
laid low even at the sight of him. This is
one of those things that I think about this and
something as silly as as athletics. I was talking with
someone who had the We talked about a foe that

(21:13):
they faced all the time, a championship team, and they
were always winning.

Speaker 2 (21:17):
He said, we never could beat them, never, and.

Speaker 1 (21:22):
Every year, he said, we would just get so fired
up in pre season he goes, and we'd be like,
this is the year, this is the year we're gonna
beat them. He said, we would just be I mean,
in pregame, there's no doubt we're gonna beat them, he said.
Then their dress room door would open, he goes, and
they would start walking out in single file line, and

(21:42):
he said, we ain't even kicked off, and we go
we ain't never gonna beat them. There they are again,
and they looked indestructible, as they always do. We ain't
never beat them, and we ain't gonna beat them. And
so he says, this is what happens to most men
when they see even if they were thinking about it,
he said, the very sight of him would would take

(22:07):
away any hope that they have. It would be vanquished
just at the very sight of him. That's how intimidating
he is. Job Verse ten. No one is so fierce
that he dares to stir him up. Who then is
he who can stand before me? And that's the focal

(22:29):
point of this entire speech. He's going to go on
because God's really good at making his point. But I
want you to look, if you want to know what
all this is about, it doesn't matter what Levithan is.
You know, we may not know that till we know everything. Okay,
there's gonna be a strong case before we've done that.

(22:49):
It's a dragon. Is it a dragon that actually lived?
Is it a mythical dragon? I don't really see how
mythical image is gonna make this point. God's told about
things he's created, not things he's made up. Are things
he's used as analogies. That hasn't been part of this
resume at all, this resume till we get to Behemoth

(23:11):
and Levithan. That's why I disagree with some of the commentaries.
He hasn't been symbolic yet, so he is also go symbolic.

Speaker 2 (23:18):
Here at the end.

Speaker 1 (23:20):
It sounds like to me he's listing things that he's
created that job could plainly see either in his time
on Earth or a time he missed, or you know,
whatever the case may be. He seems to be showing
him actual created things, not analogies, not symbols. But anyway,

(23:40):
I'm just trying to This is Calhoun County commentary, so
take it for what it's worth. But here, this is
this is the focal point. No one is so fierce
job humans that they would dare to go against levi Athon.
You wouldn't dare do that, and you're gonna go against me?

(24:01):
Think about that. Would you look at Leviathan and say,
I wouldn't touch that with a ten foot pole. So
you have fear of what I've created, but you got
no fear of me who created it. By the way,
we can all take a note on that. I promise
you if that door opened up and I don't have

(24:23):
this planned, would won't be one of the greatest teaching
visuals of all time. But if I were to open
that door and something that's just in our world, okay,
if I opened up that door and just let a
wolf in here, a wolf, everybody in here would go bonkers.

(24:46):
And if that thing all of a sudden, no offense
took out, gym right here, took key out, and then
all of a sudden he goes down and he starts
to get we'd all be I mean, I you know,
this is where we find out who would throw each
other in front of them, you know, to save themselves.
Of course, you know I'm the teacher, so of course
i'd have to leave because I have to teach next
week all of the rest of you. But anyway, you

(25:08):
know that's my service to you to be sure I
can teach you again next week. But I'm talking about
if we let anything up. You know, a lion in here,
a wolf, you know, which is not as intimidating as
a line, A bear came in here freaking have it,
we'd be terrified. Yet God visits with us every week.
We're not afraid of him, and he created all these things.

(25:31):
These animals are nothing to him. We're terrified of his creation,
but we're not terrified of the Creator. And that's exactly.
And you're saying, well, what are you talking about, Rick,
We don't do this kind of stuff. I mean, Job's
just saying he he doesn't agree with God's tactics.

Speaker 2 (25:48):
Right now, We we did, We didn't.

Speaker 1 (25:50):
We you've talked. We know about suffering. You know, we
wouldn't question that. But yet we look around at the
world we live in, and God has a clear definition
of marriage. And you know what we say to the Creator,
we think we could have done better than that. We'll
we'll interpret our own version of that. He's created gender.
We've rejected that he's created sexual purity. We want no

(26:14):
part of that. That w one hurt a little closer,
didn't it. Everybody was saying, I don't have a gender problem.
I don't. I don't have a redefinition of marriage problem.
And he hates fornication too. Yeah, he hates porn. He
hates anything that corrupts how he designed intimacy.

Speaker 2 (26:34):
And you know what we do.

Speaker 1 (26:34):
We stand in front of him and say we think
we got a better way to do it, and we're
not afraid of you. We'll do it right in front
of you.

Speaker 2 (26:43):
I told you.

Speaker 1 (26:44):
Look, I've been guilty of all this too. This's not me,
I'm I'm talking about us. I'm not talking about you,
but I will tell you and to see the whole
this kind of stuff gets on us and the lack
of fear. And I've seen it firsthand counseling people. I've
seen it in my own life. I mean I have
sat down and looked in the eyes of men that

(27:05):
were committing adultery, fornication, you name it, and just making
sure that they understood as I had to understand you
are doing this to God. And I've seen him weep,
I've seen him cry, I've seen him well, and I
have gone home to my wife and said, went great today,

(27:28):
I think he got it. This guy's going to change,
and him go right back to her.

Speaker 2 (27:37):
After knowing what he was doing.

Speaker 1 (27:40):
Because his flesh was so strong and his love of
sin so mighty, he was more afraid of not satisfying
his flesh than he was the judgment of God. So
be careful when you start saying that we don't tell
the Creator that we're not afraid of him. I've spent

(28:03):
too much of my life acting like I wasn't afraid
of him, and I was a fool and and.

Speaker 2 (28:11):
God forbid.

Speaker 1 (28:14):
That we make the same foolish decision, especially after we
know better. And he says to job in ten, you
sure about this job? You can't control creation, and you
can stand before me and question the Creator verse eleven,

(28:35):
who has first given to me that I should repay him.
Whatever is under the whole heaven is mine. I own
it all. Joe, what what bargaining chip do you have
with me? Are you going to come here and bargain
with me that that what do you have to bring me?
Remember that, you know, I know that we've talked about

(28:58):
in here uncomfortably for some people. You got to be
real careful with some messages that flow around right now
in places called church. And you've got to be real
careful if you start hearing theology build and it's always subtle.
Anything needs to build in a praise and worship song
or in a message somebody that somehow God should be

(29:21):
thrilled with us. You hear sometimes it's almost like wait, manute,
are y'all saying God's worshiping me? Well, he wants you
to have your best life? Now? Where is that? In scripture?

Speaker 2 (29:37):
He says he is the life, he is the way.

Speaker 1 (29:43):
He says that that that the true life is found
only in me. That is your best life. You know
that that he's he's he's running after us. He's frantically
coming after us. What I see is come near to
God and He'll come near to you. That's right out

(30:04):
of the scripture. I see seek me and you will
find me. Now do I see him saying I won't
give up on you. I've paid the price, of course, absolutely,
But do I think that God is wringing his hands, saying, boy,
I tell you I got to go run down Rick today.
I'm just enambored with him. And I will tell you

(30:26):
this too. Don't ever have the audacity. There's something that
God has assigned you to do, and maybe he's enabled
you to do it well, and somehow you start thinking
this thing can't win without me. God can't get this
done without me. Good night, look at me, because let
me tell you something. And we've had a long talk
about this in some inner circles over the last couple

(30:48):
of weeks. He's very clear he will not share his
glory with anyone. He is he is worthy of worship
or not. Nothing wrong with encouraging, nothing wrong with patent
and some on the back saying, man, I appreciate that
man speaking from experience. That feels good. We need to
encourage people, but.

Speaker 2 (31:09):
When we start elevating.

Speaker 1 (31:10):
I'm always leery of any church I go to they
talk more about their pastor than they do God, you know,
and they start talking about he did this, and he
did that, and he did this and he did that.

Speaker 2 (31:24):
Nothing wrong with.

Speaker 1 (31:24):
Liking you, pastor, but don't worship him because God's not
gonna share his glory with him, and anything that pastor
does well came from God.

Speaker 2 (31:33):
God's on display, not that person.

Speaker 1 (31:37):
So now we go to twelve, as God says that
if Joe wanted to in eleven, you want to present
your claim if you dare, But remember I'm over all creation.
And you know what God saying in verse eleven. Don't
you ever forget who you're dealing with now twelve, I

(32:00):
will not keep silence concerning his limbs, or his mighty strength,
or his goodly framed You.

Speaker 2 (32:06):
Know what God said.

Speaker 1 (32:06):
I know I've gone over here and talked about something else.
Don't think I forgotten about Leviathan. I'm coming back to him,
and I'm not done talking about him. I'm gonna keep
on about Leviathan. I got more to say about him.

Speaker 2 (32:17):
Thirteen.

Speaker 1 (32:17):
Who can strip off his outer garment? Who would come
near him with a bridle? This is hilarious. Now he's
moving on to the can you questions to job, which
God seems to really enjoy. He said, you know, he's
got a pretty tough hide. It would be impossible if
you take your bridle and run over to him. He
has an untamable temper, So I would caution you Job,

(32:39):
if you're gonna take your bridle and decide you're gonna
ride the Leviathon, you're gonna break him.

Speaker 2 (32:45):
And then he goes on.

Speaker 1 (32:46):
He says, fourteen, who can open the doors of his
face around his teeth is terror? You know he's taking
a look at He's showing the teeth of Leviathan. And
you know he's saying to Job, you think you can
take those teeth on. So you probably think there's some
way to get close enough to him somehow. You think

(33:07):
his mouth might be a place he's susceptible. You want
to you take something, throw it down there on his
throat or something. So, Job, I want to get you
a look here. If you'll look, these teeth are terrifying.
Would you even approach that mouth? Now?

Speaker 2 (33:23):
See this is where some of you crocodile people start.
But we got a problem.

Speaker 1 (33:29):
I've seen a crocodile and an alligator be brought under
control with duct tape.

Speaker 2 (33:36):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (33:37):
I've seen a big fat guy jump on his back,
hold his mouth shut, and somebody puts duct tape on
it and he's over.

Speaker 2 (33:46):
He's harmless.

Speaker 1 (33:48):
That's not levi Athan. You think you're gonna duct tape
Leviathan or jump on his back.

Speaker 2 (33:54):
How about this.

Speaker 1 (33:55):
You may be saying, Rick, Rick, that's future man, job's
living in a time. Maybe that wasn't possible. I'm sorry,
that's not going to stand up either. Did some research
on that. You know what they found in bodies that
they found alligators and crocodiles that were on the nile
that the Egyptians had killed. Guess what they found inside
of them hooks. Even the Egyptians could get them under control.

(34:19):
Love Athan's is presented as something that cannot be controlled.
The Egyptians controlled the crocodiles, they called them, they killed them,
They were able to conquer them. So this is not
a crocodile.

Speaker 2 (34:32):
It can't be right.

Speaker 1 (34:34):
I mean, I've gone to shows and watch people get
alligators and crocodiles under control. I mean, I'm sitting in
the bleachers eating popcorn. Okay, I guarantee you.

Speaker 2 (34:45):
If you win.

Speaker 1 (34:45):
If the irv Irwin family, i mean, you know, decided
that they're going to continue with their daddy's legacy and
they're going to say, come see our show today, we
will tame levi Athan. I'm telling you that it would
be a show not to miss. But I'd like to
watch it on TV because I don't want to be there,
you know, because this thing is indestructible.

Speaker 2 (35:03):
Do you all agree with me? It can't be a crocodile.

Speaker 1 (35:05):
It just can't, because we have been able to conquer them,
and apparently human beings have been able to conquer them
for a long time. Are they scary, yeah, are they devastating, sure?
But can they be conquered by humans? Yes? And apparently,
as I said, for a very very long time. So
I do not. I will not accept crocodile. Now, if

(35:25):
I get there and God says it was a crocodile,
I'll say, okay, I just that sounds like I don't
know I missed that, but I just don't think it is.
So he goes on and he keeps moving, and he says,
in thirteen, I mean sorry. In fifteen, his back is
made of rows of shields. Shut up closely, as with

(35:47):
the seal.

Speaker 2 (35:47):
You can see this.

Speaker 1 (35:48):
This is where I think it's more in that dinosaur world.
It's got back rows of shields and there's no soft spot.
What he's saying is, you know, even if you're looking
for a place, he'd be susceptible. You're not gonna find it.
The way he's designed that you can't even get into there.
There is no soft spot sixteen. One is so near
to the other no air can come between them. He's

(36:10):
talking about him being air tight or water tight. There
is nowhere to penetrate him with some spear or javelin
which you'll talk about here in a minute. And he
says that they are joined one to another, they clasp
each other and cannot be separated. He's continuing with this,
you can't penetrate it. This is These details also are

(36:33):
another reason I just don't think it's a mythical creature.
I don't know why you would spend so much time
in so many details on a mythical symbolic creature. It's
not necessary, you know, we'd say it's terrifying. We got it.
But he's getting down to exactly how the different not scales,
because it's not true scales.

Speaker 2 (36:53):
But you know what I'm talking about. You've seen reptiles
and the way.

Speaker 1 (36:56):
They have these plates, and he's saying, look, they're so
stacked together on him, there's no place to even get
anything to stick in. It's like armor is all over him.
Now here's where things get real interesting, I mean real interesting.
I even have in my notes on eighteen and nineteen
and on, I mean I wrote that, what are we

(37:19):
talking about here? His sneezings flash forth light, and his
eyes are like the eyelids of the dawn. His eyes
are red like the rising sun. Look at nineteen. Out
of his mouth go flaming torches, sparks of fire leap forth.

(37:42):
Are we talking about the fire breathing dragon? Here? You
see them throughout world history. They seem to be depicted
quite a bit where they hear at one time? Is
this something mythical? Is this something that actually was here?
I don't know what to tell you. Don't think that
the original language is gonna make this any better, the

(38:03):
original language still talking about fire coming out of his mouth.

Speaker 2 (38:08):
I don't know what to tell you. That's just what
God said.

Speaker 1 (38:11):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (38:12):
And then he goes on to say this.

Speaker 1 (38:13):
He says, out of his nostrils come forth smoke as
from a boiling pot and burning rushes. Again, it sounds
it sounds a lot like a dragon. That that that's
what it sounds like, and it seems to be a
menacing force. So now let's go to twenty one his

(38:36):
breath kindles coals, and a flame comes forth from his mouth.
Now let me see if let me gets a psalm psalm.
I think it's eighteen. So let's let's let me look
at this because this is something that we have to

(38:58):
understand right here, because this this picture that is being
shown right now. I'm going to Psalm eighteen and I'm
gonna look at verses eight and nine. Smoke went up
from his nostrils, and devouring fire from his mouth. Glowing
coals flamed forth from him. He bowed the heavens and

(39:19):
came down. Thick darkness was under his feet. So when
you look at this, what is the Psalmis talking about?
This is David who wrote this one. He is saying
that he called upon the Lord. Look at verse six,
to my God, I cried for help from his temple.

(39:40):
He heard my voice, and my cry reached his ears.

Speaker 2 (39:43):
Talking about God.

Speaker 1 (39:45):
Then the earth rilled and rocked, and the foundations also
of the mountains trembled and quaked because God was angry.

Speaker 2 (39:53):
Now we get to eight.

Speaker 1 (39:54):
Smoke went up from his nostrils, devouring fire from his mouth,
Glowing cold flamed forth from him. Well, levi Athan, certainly
isn't God. But these are things that apparently David had
visions of God looking like. So is it possible that

(40:17):
God the Creator is showing that some of his characteristics
and power he's certainly put in creation, because we've seen
that too. So Job is no match for Leviathan. But
notice the theme, and you'll see it in the other places,
in some psalms where it talks about Leviathan.

Speaker 2 (40:40):
What you see here is Job. This may be a
big deal for you, but it's nothing to me. I
control Levithan.

Speaker 1 (40:48):
You can't. I created him. I control him, I can
devour him. I have power over him. Once again, this
is the running theme. Is I created all there is?
I am above creation. I am over creation. If you
think creation is strong and overwhelming, you need to realize

(41:12):
that me to creator in order to be the one
who created it. I am more powerful than what I created.
And look how overwhelming what I created is. And look
at your place human being in the middle of all this.
It is interesting, isn't it? It is interesting. It's one
of the things that Scripture says. Even the angels kind

(41:32):
of tilt their head about what is this redemption thing
with God and these humans? They really seem kind of pathetic.
I mean, there's some things that we've done that show
that God gave brilliance to humans. Don't misunderstand me. He
is on display in human beings too. I mean that's
one of the things when I when if you ever

(41:53):
get to the point, like if you hear someone that
can really really sing.

Speaker 2 (41:58):
That always just is worshipful to me.

Speaker 1 (42:00):
And it's always sad when someone who's so gifted takes
those gifts and goes away from God with them, because
there's just something beautiful of worship to watch a human
use the incredible talent that is showing us our creator
bring glory to him, not to themselves, just to see

(42:20):
what God can do. Even an incredible athlete to be
able to say, man, look at God on display. You
know someone who's a brilliant scientist, that is. Can you
imagine the person who says, I think I can take
the heart out, I think I can repair it and
put it back in. I mean, can you imagine being
there for that pitch? You'll be like, what, But God

(42:43):
enabled human beings to figure that kind of stuff out.

Speaker 2 (42:46):
Go into the moon. For those of you that don't question.

Speaker 1 (42:49):
That, we went and and you know, and just the
incredible advancements that we've seen human beings make. But that's
not to glorify the brilliance of human beings. It's to
show the creation and the creator how wonderful he is.

Speaker 2 (43:03):
And when we miss that.

Speaker 1 (43:05):
But even with all that he's enabled human beings to do,
He's saying, but you couldn't take on levi athen, you
can't take on the things I've created.

Speaker 2 (43:15):
How about this?

Speaker 1 (43:17):
Without me, you can't really take on anything. Think about
Jesus talking about that in John fifteen. What do you say,
Apart from me, you can do nothing. So this is
the lesson that Job is being taught. And he's using
this as something for Job to get the message.

Speaker 2 (43:36):
It's a visual.

Speaker 1 (43:38):
You know you ever seen people get up and say,
let me show you a vision. Oh I love a visual. Well,
here's a good one. Twenty two in his neck abide
strength and terror dances before him. That's quite an analogy
from God that there's so much strength at his neck.
And how about this Dismay literally dances before him the

(43:59):
most terrifying thing you can think of. Job would stand
before Leviathan and dance in front of it. If it
would please Levithan the most thing. Do you think of terror?
This guy sees as dancing. Twenty three The folds of
his flesh stick together, firmly cast on him and immovable.

(44:20):
We're seeing an indestructible creature here. You know, even some
animals or creatures might have a soft spot. Leviathan does
not appear to have any. He's immovable. You can't stop him.
Twenty four His heart, his heart as stone hard as
the lower Millstone. Commentary disagrees a little bit here. Some

(44:42):
are saying, is he talking about the attitude of the creature.

Speaker 2 (44:46):
He's heartless? He'll destroy everybody?

Speaker 1 (44:49):
Maybe, but more likely, since he's talking about him being indestructible,
I think what's more plausible is that even if you
thought you could get a spear in there somewhere, because
most of us, I just did it this past weekend.
And I will tell you I love our culture in
the South. So we killed some deer this past weekend.

(45:10):
And where do we try to shoot them? We try
to shoot them through the heart because it kills them instantly,
and there's an area on the deer that you're supposed
to aim for that will collapse their lungs and burst
their heart and they die instantly. They don't suffer, and
then you take them into the processor. I go into
the processor only in my sweet home Alabama, steak. Would
you see this?

Speaker 2 (45:31):
I walk in the processor.

Speaker 1 (45:32):
There deer hanging everywhere, okay, and there is a female
in full camo standing there, just blood and stuff all around.

Speaker 2 (45:41):
Her where they're processing these deer.

Speaker 1 (45:43):
And she shouts to the hanging deer to the men
that are processing them and says, any of them still
got a heart intact? And the guy said, yeah, this
one over here does. She said, cut that out for me.
I'm taking that home with me.

Speaker 2 (45:56):
I love deep the heart of them.

Speaker 1 (45:57):
And I thought to myself, you don't hear that anywhere
but to Alabama, you know what, I thought. Even our
women are eating the hearts out of the deer, you know.
And then she looks at me, she goes, you don't
eat the heart. I said, no, I usually don't know.

Speaker 2 (46:10):
And we'll let me cook it for you.

Speaker 1 (46:11):
You'll eat it, I said, you know what, I think
I'm good. There's so many, so many other things on
the deer that are so tasty. I think I'll stick
with that tender loin. But I appreciate that, thank you.
But so what he's saying is, even if you thought
you could get a kill shot on Leviathan, his heart
is so powerful and hard it would just his heart
would just deflect it. So it could be one of

(46:32):
those two. I think the latter, probably because that seems
to be what he's describing. But I'll take it as
attitude too. That's not too bad. He's heartless, he's destructive.

Speaker 2 (46:40):
Twenty five.

Speaker 1 (46:41):
When he raises himself up, the mighty are afraid at
the crashing.

Speaker 2 (46:45):
They are beside themselves.

Speaker 1 (46:47):
Now hang on to this. Now we're getting into the
water a little bit, he says. The mighty hunters people
who go out, and I mean that's what some people
also said. Well, this is a whal.

Speaker 2 (47:00):
I'm sorry. We've harpooned whales. We've killed them too.

Speaker 1 (47:04):
Okay, there's been plenty of mighty hunters that have gone
out long ago and went out and taken on a whale.
Now they're incredible and unbelievable, the largest ones their size,
but they've been harpooned, they've been brought in.

Speaker 2 (47:18):
Okay, so not a whale.

Speaker 1 (47:20):
But he's saying, if you went out to harpoon him,
you would have your hands full, and even the most
mighty of the hunters would not dare go after him,
because once they see him crashing around in the sea,
they don't want anything to do with him. Now look
at this twenty six. Though the sword reaches him, it
does not avail nor the spear, the dart, or the javelin.

(47:42):
He gives you a lot of things here. A sword's
not gonna hurt him. A spear's not gonna hurt him.
A dart's not gonna hurt him. The javelin's not gonna
hurt it. Look at this, he says, here he is
twenty seven. He counts iron job as straw, and bronze
is rotten wood. You can't get him with even some
precious metals. You could have the most incredible spear, the
most incredible javelin. It could be made of iron, It

(48:05):
could be made of bronze. It would hit him like
an old, rotten piece of wood, shattering into pieces. Or
how about this iron is like straw hitting him, indestructible.

Speaker 2 (48:17):
Twenty eight.

Speaker 1 (48:18):
The arrow cannot make him flee for him. Sling stones
are turned to stubble. It is interesting that God, after
all these, he says, even if you decided for some
reason you're gonna pull a goliathe move on him. You're
gonna take the sling out and hit him at the
right spot with that rock. It's gonna be just like stubble.
Your arrows they're a joke, he said. They don't make

(48:39):
him flee. He's not even afraid of them. And then
you're gonna try to club him to death. Look at
twenty nine clubs are counted as stubble. He laughs at
the rattle of javelins. Thirty His underparts are like sharp
post herds. He spreads himself like threshing sledge on the mire.
So he's really really creating a visual here of this

(49:01):
very very intimidating creature. And when you look at some
of the stuff that he's saying, he's talking about the
weapons won't won't hurt him. He's talking about his underbelly.
It leaves a trail. That's what he's talking about.

Speaker 2 (49:16):
In thirty.

Speaker 1 (49:16):
Here, his underparts are like sharp post herds. Have you
ever seen like an alligator or something that moves and
you can see where it is in the mud. He said,
this thing is so big and so strong, he said,
if you saw him slide through an area, sa he
came through a little mud right here, it would look
like somebody that brought a tractor through here. It would
have like somebody just came in here and and and

(49:37):
and came through here with the biggest blade of all that.
He stirs up when he comes through. Look at thirty one.
He makes the deep boil like a pot. He makes
the sea like a pot of ointment. He agitates the
entire pool or any body of water around him. Can

(49:58):
you imagine the sheer size? Can you see the water
stirring up around this incredible creature? He said, Even the
sea looks like a pot of ointment compared to him.
How he's stirring the water up behind him, He leaves
a shining wake. One would think the deep to be
white haired.

Speaker 2 (50:15):
There's so much of it.

Speaker 1 (50:16):
You can't even see now where there's so much white
water being stirred up with his incredible size and his
incredible strength.

Speaker 2 (50:24):
That job.

Speaker 1 (50:25):
You would look down and go where what happened to
the sea. It looks like all of it's white now.
He's stirred up so much white water.

Speaker 2 (50:34):
On earth.

Speaker 1 (50:34):
There's none, there's not his like he's a creature without fear. Hey, Job,
there's nothing on earth to equal of athen Who do
you think he's also including in that list, including you?
Thirty four? He sees everything that is high. He is

(50:58):
king over the sons of Pride. He has an exalted
view of himself. Job. He gazes on the other created creatures.
He sees himself king of them all. Hey, Job, do
you have control over all these things I've given you?

(51:22):
You can't control any of the things I presented, and
you certainly can't control Behemoth, and you can't control Leviathan.
But I can't. I can control all these things. You know.
I told you that Leviathan was mentioned, you know, six

(51:44):
times in the Old Testament, two of them and Job.
But Isaiah, we've already listened to what he has to say.
But I want to go to Psalms to close, because
it's also mentioned in more than one Psalm seventy four
or fourteen. Levithan is not specifically talked about. But the

(52:05):
key of what Job is being taught is it says
in seventy four verse fourteen. Yeah, that's it. It says
you crushed the heads of Levithan. You gave him as
food for the creatures of the wilderness. Now look up

(52:29):
at twelve. Who's he talking about? Yet, God, my king,
is from old working salvation in the midst of the earth.
You God, divided the sea by your might. You broke
the heads of the sea monsters on the waters. They
get thirteen and then fourteen. You crushed the heads of Levithan.
You gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.

(52:54):
Interesting this is in the Psalmister saying, even by the
time these are written, the Psalmist knows about Leviathan.

Speaker 2 (53:07):
Did he learn it from the book of Job.

Speaker 1 (53:09):
Maybe he certainly was aware of it, But he makes
the point that Job needs to learn Levithann to you, Lord,
you could divide him up and feed him to the
rest of creation. He's nothing compared to you. Go to
psimn one O four some one O four twenty six.

(53:31):
This is what makes him a little unique. We don't
see other parts of the Bible talking about Behemoth, but
we do Levithan verse twenty six, Psalm one O four.
There go the ships and Levithan, which you formed to
play in it talking about the sea. Look at twenty five.

(53:53):
Here is the sea great and wide, which teams with creatures,
innumerable living things, both small and great. There go the
ships and Leviathan, which you formed to play in it.
I just think it's a creature. I because unlike Behemoth,

(54:14):
we've got other scriptures referring to this, and never once
is it referred to as something symbolic, something mythical. It's
referred to as a creature. They're even saying it was
in the sea, but that's really not the point. It's interesting,

(54:36):
and I will I think, after the time I've spent
studying it, I'm going to land that it is a creature.
I don't know when it was here, but I know
that God put it in his resume, and he put
it in his resume last.

Speaker 2 (54:53):
And you could see him.

Speaker 1 (54:53):
Building all the way when he was talking about and
the very last thing he talks about is Leviathan. I
think for us, if you want to go symbolic, it's
certainly okay for us to take it and make it
symbolic now since we don't have this creature thankfully around anymore,

(55:14):
but in everyone's life, and I've seen it up close
and personal, and I know a lot of you have
to you either faced Leviathan in your life and with
something representing something that was insurmountable. I can't I can't
defeat this, but God can. Some of you are facing

(55:39):
Leviathan in your life right now. There's something that you
think I can't defeat this. You're right, so stop and
just remember that God can. And then I got news
for some of you. There's a Leviathan waiting on you,
and it's coming and it's going to be insurmountable, more

(56:04):
than you can handle. Remember that whatever it is, God
is greater. God is stronger. God has never left control
of the situation. And from someone who has been foolish
enough to go into the ring and fight to exhaustion,

(56:28):
where I'm laying there on the mat, breathing, sighing, sobbing,
saying I can't beat it, God so lovingly just stands
there in my corner and says, are you ready for
me to try? Why don't you just give it to me?
Have you exhausted yourself trying to do it your way,

(56:52):
trying to defeat it your way? Understand it's insurmountable to you,
but not to me. Let's pray Lord, thank you for today,
thank you for the wonderful, wonderful reminder of who you are.
I don't have any idea what Lebithan is. Lord, I'm

(57:16):
just looking at your description, and that's good enough for me.
It is something that human beings have no chance against.
And you're just reminding job and reminding us of our
place in the world. Do you deem us of value? Yes,
the Redemption story tells us that. But are we greater

(57:37):
than the creation? We are not, and we certainly aren't
greater than you. Thank you for the reminder today of
your greatness, greater than anything that creation has ever produced.
We will stop being in awe of the creation and

(57:59):
forget give us for worshiping creation. As we have developed
our own religion, and it's been going on since the fall.
May we be maybe not as impressed with creation, and
maybe today we are in all of the Creator, and
maybe we'll stop making much of creation and much of ourselves,

(58:23):
and maybe we should make much of you. Forgive us
for the times that we've made much of everything but you.
As we become less, you become more. As creation in
its fallen state is just you showing us what you
can do. But even what we see before us now

(58:44):
within the most beautiful animal, the most beautiful sunset, the
most beautiful, breathtaking view. This is all your throwaway. We
can't even comprehend what this was like before the fall,
and we anxiously await the day. As Paul tells us

(59:04):
in The Romans chapter eight, that even the fallen earth
is groaning for you to make it right. And our
hope remains in that day, that it will come when
you make everything right. And remembering today that only you

(59:25):
can do it, we can. In your name, we pray amen.
Thank you, guys,