For I know that my Redeemer lives,
and at the last he will stand upon the earth. – Job 19:25 ESV
Redeemed from what?
Scripture records that Job is a righteous man. Can you say that? Most assuredly, I cannot.
A great and powerful leader loves God and does everything right, yet the Lord permits Satan to test him. He has everything a man could ever want, but then the Lord takes it away. Job loses everything except his life.
And how does he respond?
Job cries out to the Lord to be saved from miseries which have come to him in the flesh of this life (and his miseries are many). Yet hear Job’s assurance of judgement by a just God.
19:25 וַאֲנִי יָדַעְתִּי גֹּאֲלִי חָי וְאַחֲרֹון עַל־עָפָר יָקֽוּם׃
19:26 וְאַחַר עֹורִֽי נִקְּפוּ־זֹאת וּמִבְּשָׂרִי אֶֽחֱזֶה אֱלֹֽוהַּ׃
And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: – Job 19:26 KJV
Though he dies he will see God his Redeemer, face to face. In a word: resurrection. Judgment, face to face judgment by God!
Our return to dust
The Lord’s original curse against man does not dissuade Job from hope of seeing his Redeemer on the day of his judgment. Job repents before God acknowledging that he knows that he is dust.
Do you? Have you acknowledged before God that you are only dust?
By the sweat of your face
you shall eat bread,
till you return to the ground,
for out of it you were taken;
for you are dust,
and to dust you shall return.” – Genesis 3:19
Redeemers
What is a Redeemer? (It’s certainly another important concept this world has relegated to triteness, as in ‘redeeming coupons.’)
Redeem – to buy or pay off, buy back, recover, exchange or convert (as in the blood of an animal for sin or money for a sacrificial animal), to discharge or fulfill a promise or a debt, to make amends for (some wrong), obtain release by a payment, restoration; theology: to deliver from sin and its consequences by means of a sacrifice offered for the sinner.
Job was a righteous man, yet he knew he would face his redeemer after his death. Have you had enough to have cried out to your Redeemer?
Earlier in this series I referred to Joseph as a redeemer not only Israel, but also of Egypt by saving them from famine. Joseph was purchased and no ransom was paid for his release. With God’s help Joseph paid for his own redemption.
Many look to Moses as a redeemer of the Hebrews, saving them from slavery. Moses had been born into slavery under imminent threat of death, but the Lord rescued the Hebrew boy into the household of Pharaoh. He escaped when discovered buy returned when called by the Lord. Moses freed the Hebrews from slavery under Pharaoh. The Lord used Moses to save His covenant people, but Moses did not pay a ransom for their return.
The Lord saves David and other later kings of Israel and Judah. In fact, it is always the LORD who intervenes in these and other rescues of mankind. Even Noah had been rescued by God.
From Noah, Abraham, Jacob and Joseph before the Law, to Moses, David and kings after the Law you will read of sacrifices made to the Lord. All of these faithful men recognized their own need for a Redeemer for their sins.
If you have never considered your own need for a Redeemer, you may want to weigh the significance of its antonym as it could apply to your soul at the Judgment without a Redeemer:
- abandon.
Strong currents of these last days
Have you plead to the Lord for mercy? ‘Oh Lord, do not abandon me.’
Though requirements of the Law placed severe penalties upon those disobedient to the Lord, Moses assured the faithful:
“Be strong and courageous; don’t be terrified or afraid of them. For the LORD your God is the one who will go with you; he will not leave you or abandon you.” – Deuteronomy 31:6
In Psalm 16, David offers an assurance similar to to that of Job:
10 For you will not abandon me to Sheol;
you will not allow your faithful one to see decay.
God warned Adam and Eve that on the day they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that they would surely die. Adam died. So did Eve and their sons, daughters and descendants, except the family of Noah.
So did Eve and their sons, daughters and descendants, except the family of Noah. And all mankind from Adam until now has sinned, every one of us.
Surely we will also die; then as Job said, we will be resurrected to the Judgment.
LORD, the hope of Israel,
all who abandon you
will be put to shame.
All who turn away from me
will be written in the dirt,
for they have abandoned
the LORD, the fountain of living water. – Jeremiah 17:13
A Redeemer and Judge
Our Redeemer was before Eden and was in Eden. He IS a river of righteousness, pure waters springing forth which refresh the soul and give life to dust.
John 1:2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 All things were created through him… 3:5 Jesus answered, “Truly I tell you, unless someone is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 Whatever is born of the flesh is flesh, and whatever is born of the Spirit is spirit.
John 4:13 Jesus said, “Everyone who drinks from this water will get thirsty again. 14 But whoever drinks from the water that I will give him will never get thirsty again. In fact, the water I will give him will become a well of water springing up in him for eternal life.”
John 5:24 “Truly I tell you, anyone who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not come under judgment but has passed from death to life.
25 “Truly I tell you, an hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live… a time is coming when all who are in the graves will hear his voice 29 and come out—those who have done good things, to the resurrection of life, but those who have done wicked things, to the resurrection of condemnation.
Christ Jesus! He IS our Redemption, for He has sacrificed His own blood as payment for our sins. Jesus the Son of Man sacrificed His life as payment for mine. He IS the river of life, springing forth from before Eden and cleansing our sins.
Beloved brother of dust and sister of sin, will you plea to our Redeemer for His great mercy?
Then he showed me the river of the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the city’s main street. The tree of life was on each side of the river…
Revelation 22:
Perhaps in these last days one might ask, who wants to hear from the Lord? Yet even now, as in the days of the Prophets and fall of Jerusalem, ‘We won’t.’
“Come, make us a god who will go before us because this Moses, the man who brought us up from the land of Egypt—we don’t know what has happened to him!”
