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Job 41:1 Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook? or his tongue with a cord which thou lettest down?
Job 41:2 Canst thou put an hook into his nose? or bore his jaw through with a thorn?
Job 41:3 Will he make many supplications unto thee? will he speak soft words unto thee?
Job 41:4 Will he make a covenant with thee? wilt thou take him for a servant for ever?
Job 41:5 Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?
Job 41:6 Shall the companions make a banquet of him? shall they part him among the merchants?
Job 41:7 Canst thou fill his skin with barbed irons? or his head with fish spears?
Job 41:8 Lay thine hand upon him, remember the battle, do no more.
Job 41:9 Behold, the hope of him is in vain: shall not one be cast down even at the sight of him?
Job 41:10 None is so fierce that dare stir him up: who then is able to stand before me?

Introduction

In our previous study the Lord told us this concerning the behemoth which is within us:

Job 40:19 He is the chief of the ways of God: he that made him can make his sword to approach unto him.

“He that made him can make His sword approach unto him” is all contrasted with Job’s and our inability to save ourselves as the Lord made clear to us in the previous chapter:

Job 40:9 Hast thou an arm like God? or canst thou thunder with a voice like him?
Job 40:10 Deck thyself now with majesty and excellency; and array thyself with glory and beauty.
Job 40:11 Cast abroad the rage of thy wrath: and behold every one that is proud, and abase him.
Job 40:12 Look on every one that is proud, and bring him low; and tread down the wicked in their place.
Job 40:13 Hide them in the dust together; and bind their faces in secret.
Job 40:14 Then will I also confess unto thee that thine own right hand can save thee.

God’s point to us through His fiery words to Job is being made in words which were graphic and clear in that day. At that time behemoth, a beast with a tail like a cedar, five times the size of the largest elephants of today, was still alive on this earth, and had never been harnessed by any man. The point the Lord is making is that we are dealing with powers which are far greater than we have any ability to control, but “He that made [ behemoth] can make His sword to approach unto him” means that there are things which are controlled only by our Maker. We were told that behemoth, the largest land dwelling beast that has ever been, was made with mankind:

Job 40:15 Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an ox.

So behemoth is a beast which was created on the sixth day. He is beyond mankind’s ability to harness or to put a bit in his mouth. Yet he is not carnivorous so he is at home with beasts of every sort, just like a huge elephant at a watering hole with lions and crocodiles. Even an elephant’s young are safe among all other beasts for fear of its parents. Nature photographers have filmed young elephants and young hippos, walking among huge crocodiles, oblivious to the danger they would be in if their parents were not near. They have also filmed a young hippo being devoured by crocodiles when it strays too far from its mother. Such is the life of a beast. The survival of the young depends upon the proximity of its parents. When it strays away from its parents, it is devoured by the carnivores which are always nearby.
God’s point is that what men cannot control, God is controlling and is “work[ ing] after the counsel of His own will” (Eph 1:11).
In this 41st chapter we are dealing with another even more powerful beast than behemoth. Leviathan is a sea creature. This means that he was created on the 5th day, the day before the creation of mankind, and the day on which the fowls of the heavens were created.

Gen 1:20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.
Gen 1:21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.
Gen 1:23 And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

This beast is even stronger than behemoth in the scope of his power. This beast does not live on the land, and is pictured as the zenith of that with which mankind is incapable of doing war. This creature is called leviathan, and the Lord warns us of the strength of this creature against which we have no power at all of ourselves. Serpents do not eat dust, but we, in type, are all actually the dust which is given the serpent for his food:

Gen 3:14 And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life:

Just as the dry land is made to come up out of the deep seas, so we are told, the beast rises up out of the sea:

Rev 13:1 And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.

Just as there is a symbiotic relationship between the death of the first Adam and the birth of the last Adam, so also there is a symbiotic relationship between the dry land and the sea and between the creatures of both. We have a New Testament parallel to behemoth and leviathan which we will discuss after we have been made aware of the strength of this creature whose powers are beyond even the power of behemoth. We should have a much deeper appreciation of the fact that we are told that the beast of Rev 13 “rise[ s] up out of the sea” after this study. There is a very strong connection to our behemoth beast, which is at home in the waters and on dry land, and leviathan, who is a creature which lives exclusively in the sea, in a realm beyond our influence and certainly beyond our control.
The first question the Lord asks us indicates just how helpless we are against the power of this creature:

Job 41:1 Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook? or his tongue with a cord which thou lettest down?
Job 41:2 Canst thou put an hook into his nose? or bore his jaw through with a thorn?

When we, as Job did, think that we are able of ourselves to instruct God, we are demonstrating just how little we know of the realm of the spirit. If we cannot even control leviathan, what would lead us to think we can instruct and direct leviathan’s Maker?
This word ‘leviathan’ is a contraction of the two words ‘levi’ and ‘than’. Here is Strong’s definition of this word:
H3882
לויתן
livyâthân
liv- yaw- thawn’
From H3867; a wreathed animal, that is, a serpent (especially the crocodile or some other large sea monster); figuratively the constellation of the dragon; also as a symbol of Babylon: – leviathan, mourning. When we look at 3867 this is what we find:
H3867
לוה
lâvâh
law- vaw’
A primitive root; properly to twine, that is, (by implication) to unite, to remain; also to borrow (as a form of obligation) or (causatively) to lend: – abide with, borrow (- er), cleave, join (self), lend (- er).
So the root meaning of this word is “to twine, to unite”. If indeed we borrow from another or if we lend to another, we are entwined with and untied to that person in some since of obligation. This is true in both a positive and a negative sense. We are told to lend expecting nothing in return, but we are also told that the borrower will be the servant of the lender.

Deu 15:6 For the LORD thy God blesseth thee, as he promised thee: and thou shalt lend unto many nations, but thou shalt not borrow; and thou shalt reign over many nations, but they shall not reign over thee.
Pro 22:7 The rich ruleth over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender.

The way this word is used demonstrates that it means that there is a very close relationship between two people or two things. In the case of leviathan, it is the closeness of his impenetrable scales.

Job 41:15 His scales are his pride, shut up together as with a close seal.
Job 41:16 One is so near to another, that no air can come between them.

The last half of this word comes from the first part of the Hebrew word for dragon, thanniyn. Here is what the Gill commentary reveals about this name leviathan:

“… Leviathan” is a compound word of the Hebrew word ‘than’ the first syllable of “thanni”, rendered either a whale, or a dragon, or a serpent, and of the Hebrew word “levi”, which signifies conjunction, from the close joining of its scales, Job 41:15; the patriarch Levi had his name from the same word; see Gen 29:34;”

As Gill points out Gen 29:34 uses this same word, ‘lavah’ which is the root of the word ‘leviathan’:

Gen 29:34 And she conceived again, and bare a son; and said, Now this time will my husband be joined [ H3867, lavah, entwined, joined] unto me, because I have born him three sons: therefore was his name called Levi.

The Hebrew word ‘livyaÌ‚thaÌ‚n’, translated as leviathan’ is found in the Old Testament a total of six times. Here are all those entries:
H3882
לויתן
livyâthân
Total KJV Occurrences: 6
leviathan, 5
Job_41:1, Psa_74:14, Psa_104:26, Isa_27:1 (2)
mourning, 1
Job_3:8
It occurs six times, and of those six entries, five are translated as ‘leviathan’, and one is translated as ‘mourning’. To understand what God is telling us, we need to look at these few entries, and ask our heavenly Father to open our eyes to what He is telling us about ourselves.
The first time this word appears in scripture is in Job 3 verse 8 which is the only time it is translated as “mourning”.

Job 3:7 Lo, let that night [ of Job’s birth] be solitary, let no joyful voice come therein. Job 3:8 Let them curse it that curse the day, who are ready to raise up their mourning [ Hebrew, livyathan].

This is the chapter where Job is mourning the day of his birth immediately after losing his family, and all of his possessions, and then being stricken with boils from his head to his feet. “Their mourning” is ‘their leviathan’, meaning ‘Let them raise up their union’ with the word ‘mourning’ being understood. The word translated as ‘mourning’ is actually ‘leviathan’.
The next entry is found here is this first verse of Job 41 which we are now examining, and the next entry is this verse in Psalms:

Psa 74:13 Thou didst divide the sea by thy strength: thou brakest the heads of the dragons in the waters.
Psa 74:14 Thou brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces, and gavest him to be meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness.

The last half of the word ‘leviathan’, is the Hebrew word ‘thanni’ or ‘tanniym’ and this word appears in the Old Testament 27 times one of which is right here in Psa 74:13 where it is translated as ‘dragon’. ‘Dragons’ is the most common translation of this word, but the others, with the exception of the translation as ‘whale’, are all very similar:
Here are all the appearances of this word in the Old Testament:

H8577
×ªÖ¼× Ö¼×™× / תּנּין
tannı̂yn / tannı̂ym
Total KJV Occurrences: 27
dragons, 15
Deu_32:33, Job_30:29, Psa_44:19, Psa_74:13, Psa_148:7, Isa_13:22, Isa_34:13, Isa_35:7, Isa_43:20, Jer_9:11, Jer_10:22, Jer_14:6, Jer_49:33, Jer_51:37, Mic_1:8
dragon, 6
Psa_91:13 (2), Isa_27:1, Isa_51:9, Jer_51:34, Eze_29:3
serpent, 2
Exo_7:9-10 (2)
monsters, 1
Lam_4:3
serpents, 1
Exo_7:12
whale, 1
Job_7:12 (2)
whales, 1
Gen_1:21

Clearly ‘tanniym’ means ‘dragon’ or ‘serpent’, and as the Lord’s description of leviathan demonstrates, it has nothing to do with a whale, which is not a serpent with scales, nor is it a dragon.
Verse 14 of Psa 74 says: “Thou brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces, and gavest him to be meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness”. When did the Lord do this? It was Joshua speaking to “the people inhabiting the wilderness”, who spoke these words to those people:

Num 14:6 And Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, which were of them that searched the land, rent their clothes:
Num 14:7 And they spake unto all the company of the children of Israel, saying, The land, which we passed through to search it, is an exceeding good land.
Num 14:8 If the LORD delight in us, then he will bring us into this land, and give it us; a land which floweth with milk and honey.
Num 14:9 Only rebel not ye against the LORD, neither fear ye the people of the land; for they are bread for us: their defence is departed from them, and the LORD is with us: fear them not.

So the point the Lord is making with Job is that without Christ, Job and we are helpless against leviathan. But with Christ, we can do all things, including making leviathan and his children “meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness”. It is by fighting against “the people of the land” that God “breaks the heads of leviathan and gives him to be meat to the people in the wilderness” who have been called out of Babylon, which is ‘spiritual Sodom and Egypt’. Of ourselves we are completely helpless against “the people of the land” because “the people of the land” are the old man, the sons of their father, the devil, by birth. It is only “Christ in us” who by fighting against them, strengthens that “new man” so we can honestly say that “they are bread for us”.

Rev 11:8 And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.
Rev 12:9 And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.

The next entry for the word leviathan is Psa 104:26. Here is that verse with the preceding two verses to give us a sense of who leviathan is, and where leviathan dwells.

Psa 104:24 O LORD, how manifold are thy works! in wisdom hast thou made them all: the earth is full of thy riches.
Psa 104:25 So is this great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping innumerable, both small and great beasts.
Psa 104:26 There go the ships: there is that leviathan, whom thou hast made to play therein.

This great and wide sea” is often used as a type of this world within us with all of its many beasts which rule us. Here is this same type as it is used in Psa 107:

Psa 107:23 They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters;
Psa 107:24 These see the works of the LORD, and his wonders in the deep.
Psa 107:25 For he commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof
Psa 107:26 They mount up to the heaven, they go down again to the depths: their soul is melted because of trouble.
Psa 107:27 They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wits’ end.
Psa 107:28 Then they cry unto the LORD in their trouble, and he bringeth them out of their distresses.
Psa 107:29 He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still.
Psa 107:30 Then are they glad because they be quiet; so he bringeth them unto their desired haven.
Psa 107:31 Oh that men would praise the LORD for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!

Throughout scripture, in the Old and New Testaments, the waves of the sea are used of the holy spirit to typify the storms of life. Christ calmed the winds and the waves of the sea. He has promised to make us “fishers of men”, and we are told that our beast “rise[ s] up out of the sea”. All of this lets us know that when the Lord is speaking of leviathan, it is to let us know that we are up against much more than we, of ourselves, are able to control or overcome. We are actually up against the very power He had just unleashed upon Job. We are up against Satan himself and all his angels.
The last entry in scripture of this word ‘leviathan’ is Isa 27:1. But we must read the verses preceding this verse to get the message which the Lord is giving us concerning leviathan. The subject under discussion is the resurrection of the dead. It is at the resurrection of the dead that leviathan is defeated and fed to us.

Isa 26:19 Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead. Isa 26:20 Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast.
Isa 26:21 For, behold, the LORD cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain.

Those who “hide [ themselves] as it were for a moment, until the indignation be overpast” are only those who, like Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and all of God’s prophets, have already endured God’s wrath upon the old man within them at the hands of those who become food for them. God uses the unbelief of others as His sword against our own flesh. Here is how He reveals this to us:

Rom 11:30 For as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief:

So it is at the resurrection of the dead, both when we are redeemed in down payment form as well as at the “redemption of the purchased possession”, that leviathan is destroyed and made to be food for us. It is in this context that we read our last entry for this word ‘leviathan’.

Isa 27:1 In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.

“That day” being the day “my dead body shall they arise”, it is the day of “the redemption of the purchased possession”, the day of the resurrection of the dead, when the destruction of the devil begins:

Eph 1:13 In whom [ Christ] ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,
Eph 1:14 Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.
Heb 2:14 Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil;

Here is what we need to realize about “the power” which has been granted leviathan over the flesh of us all until Christ comes to dwell within us:

Rom 7:17 Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Rom 7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
Rom 7:19 For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
Rom 7:20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Rom 7:21 I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
Rom 7:22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
Rom 7:23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.
Rom 7:24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
Rom 7:25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

What Paul calls “the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus”, is contrasted to the “law of sin and death” the power which is given to the adversary:

Rom 8:2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.
Eph 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
Heb 2:14 Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil;

Many are those who think they wrestle only against their own flesh and blood. Many deny that there is any struggle involved. In such a state we are devoured by leviathan and are “swallowed up by the earth”, both being the type and shadow of the total darkness and spiritual death into which such unsuspecting brothers have fallen and now dwell.

Rev 16:10 And the fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast; and his kingdom was full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues for pain,
Rev 16:11 And blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, and repented not of their deeds.

This is exactly what Job, a type and shadow of all of us, has done. Job knows God is sovereign, but not until God shows Job how He went about destroying the old Job. God’s revelation concerning leviathan demonstrates that Job had no idea that God was using Satan as God’s hand to bring all this evil upon Job, the type of each of us. Job, in that capacity, thought he could show God how mistaken God was in treating Job as God’s enemy:

Job 16:9 He [ God] teareth me in his wrath, who hateth me: he gnasheth upon me with his teeth; mine enemy sharpeneth his eyes upon me.
1Co 10:11 Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples [ Greek, tupos, types]: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.
1Pe 5:8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:

So our Lord instructs us concerning this great sea serpent:

Job 41:3 Will he make many supplications unto thee? will he speak soft words unto thee?

Leviathan is a merciless slave master “seeking [ only] whom he may devour”. He will spiritually starve us to death and bring us to eating with swine, and then he will laugh in our faces:

Luk 15:14 And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want.
Luk 15:15 And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country; and he sent him into his fields to feed swine.
Luk 15:16 And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat: and no man gave unto him.
Luk 15:17 And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!

“Husks that… swine… eat” is that to which the holy spirit likens the lies of leviathan. One of his very effective lies is that he doesn’t even exist, and that Satan is nothing more than our own flesh. When we deny the dark side of the cloud by the Red Sea, it is just a matter of time before we also deny the bright side of that same cloud, and we find that we have lost all faith, and begin to condemn our own Maker. If we repent and return to our heavenly Father He will rush to us and take us back as His Son who was dead, as a lost sheep and as His prodigal Son:

Luk 15:17 And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!
Luk 15:18 I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee,
Luk 15:19 And am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.
Luk 15:20 And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.
Luk 15:21 And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.
Luk 15:22 But the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet:
Luk 15:23 And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat, and be merry:
Luk 15:24 For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry.

Leviathan has no such compassion. He is not interested in saving. His purpose is our destruction, and he has been given “the power of death”. God wants us to know that there is a realm of the spirit, intent upon our destruction, with which we are contending, and over which we have no power of ourselves. When we finally come to understand this truth we cry out with the apostle:

Rom 7:24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? [“Him that has the power of death, that is the devil” Heb 2:14]
Rom 7:25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

The Lord does not ask questions which are not relevant to our human condition. So He poses these questions for us:

Job 41:4 Will he make a covenant with thee? wilt thou take him for a servant for ever?
Job 41:5 Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?

We are all tempted to do just that. We are all tempted to make a covenant with him who has the power of death as if we could somehow escape death. This is who we are:

Isa 28:14 Wherefore hear the word of the LORD, ye scornful men, that rule this people which is in Jerusalem.
Isa 28:15 Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us: for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves:
Isa 28:16 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste.
Isa 28:17 Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet: and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding place.
Isa 28:18 And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then ye shall be trodden down by it.
Isa 28:19 From the time that it goeth forth it shall take you: for morning by morning shall it pass over, by day and by night: and it shall be a vexation only to understand the report.
Isa 28:20 For the bed is shorter than that a man can stretch himself on it: and the covering narrower than that he can wrap himself in it.
Isa 28:21 For the LORD shall rise up as in mount Perazim, he shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon, that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pass his act, his strange act.
Isa 28:22 Now therefore be ye not mockers, lest your bands be made strong: for I have heard from the Lord GOD of hosts a consumption, even determined upon the whole earth.

The “consumption of the whole earth” is what Job and each of us must experience. It is better to lose our lives in this age, present our bodies as a living sacrifice, die daily and be crucified with Christ, and have all of that behind us in this age. In other words, it is better to die now to our flesh, and be in the first resurrection of the dead, than to fail to do so now and be in the second death and the second resurrection of the dead.

Ecc 7:1 A good name is better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of one’s birth.
Mat 10:39 He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.
Joh 12:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.

The way of the cross is the good news of the kingdom of God working within us to destroy our old first man Adam, but this is utter foolishness to our old first man Adam. It was utter foolishness to Job, the type of us. Job was not restored to God’s good graces until he had been granted to repent of thinking he could make a covenant with death, and thereby avoid the consumption which is determined upon the whole earth.
Satan’s efforts paid off with Job, and they pay off with all of us at first, but Christ refused that offer because He knew that a covenant with Satan was worthless:

Mat 4:8 Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them;
Mat 4:9 And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.
Mat 4:10 Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.
Mat 4:11 Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.

“Angels came and ministered unto Him” means this was not an easy trial even for the Son of God. Satan was offering Christ a way to avoid the pain of the cross. He could not offer Christ life because he has no life to offer. He might postpone death, but death is certain for all flesh, simply because it misses the mark of being the spiritual body where the spirit of Christ dwells. Is the postponing of the death of our old man worth the cost, when we end up dying anyway? That is what the scriptures call “a covenant with death” which does nothing more than postpone the inevitable at best, and guarantees double the trials in the end:

Rev 18:6 Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double.

We have all been warned that we will do so, but just like self- righteous Job, we think we are above denying our Lord. If we are given to be that “blessed and holy… few”, then we are granted to repent in this age:

Mat 26:31 Then saith Jesus unto them, All ye shall be offended because of me this night: for it is written, I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered abroad.
Mat 26:32 But after I am risen again, I will go before you into Galilee.
Mat 26:33 Peter answered and said unto him, Though all men shall be offended because of thee, yet will I never be offended.
Mat 26:34 Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, That this night, before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice.
Mat 26:35 Peter said unto him, Though I should die with thee, yet will I not deny thee. Likewise also said all the disciples.

“This night” is the symbol of that time in our own lives when we too, deny our Lord, whether it is through overt sin or the sin of self- righteousness, with which Job struggled, and which is the most insidious of sins.
Whatever is the sin in our own “night” we learn that we are no match of the spiritual leviathan with whom we are contending as “spiritual wickedness in [ our] heavens”.
Here it is again:

Eph 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, spiritual wickedness in high places

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We do well to know with whom we are contending, and to deal wisely with the adversary as did our Lord. We are completely out of our league when we are on our own, as the Lord’s questions continue to demonstrate:

Job 41:6 Shall the companions make a banquet of him? shall they part him among the merchants?
Job 41:7 Canst thou fill his skin with barbed irons? or his head with fish spears?

The adversary is beyond any power we might have even when we are in league with our “companions”. The answer is that we cannot fill his skin with barbed iron, or his head with fish spears. We have no power over leviathan of ourselves, even in union with our companions.

Job 41:8 Lay thine hand upon him, remember the battle, do no more.
Job 41:9 Behold, the hope of him is in vain: shall not one be cast down even at the sight of him?
Job 41:10 None is so fierce that dare stir him up: who then is able to stand before me?

Here is a lesson for all who believe that Satan is nothing more than the flesh of mankind. Here is how even the archangel Michael has to deal with mankind’s worst enemy:

Jdg 1:9 Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee.

What God has shown us through Job is the power which He has granted to Satan over all flesh. He has in effect given us a type and shadow of the fact that if we cannot even restrain Satan, who has just destroyed Job’s children and all of his possessions, and has smitten Job with boils from his head to his feet, and has sent lying false witnesses against Job’s character, “who then is able to stand before me?”
That is the lesson God is giving us through the strength of leviathan. Even archangels treat leviathan with regard for who he is:

2Pe 2:11 Whereas angels, which are greater in power and might, bring not railing accusation against them before the Lord.

Let us not be so foolish as to think like Job, that we are in a position to instruct leviathan’s Maker.

Job 41:10 None is so fierce that dare stir him up: who then is able to stand before me?

We are helpless against the flesh over which leviathan have been given power. While we are helpless of ourselves, we will do well to ask for a deeper understanding and greater appreciation of this awesome Truth:

Php 4:13 I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.

Next week, if the Lord permits we will be instructed more in what we need to know about this, our accuser.

Job 41:10 None is so fierce that dare stir him up: who then is able to stand before me?
Job 41:11 Who hath prevented me, that I should repay him? whatsoever is under the whole heaven is mine.
Job 41:12 I will not conceal his parts, nor his power, nor his comely proportion.
Job 41:13 Who can discover the face of his garment? or who can come to him with his double bridle?
Job 41:14 Who can open the doors of his face? his teeth are terrible round about.
Job 41:15 His scales are his pride, shut up together as with a close seal.
Job 41:16 One is so near to another, that no air can come between them.
Job 41:17 They are joined one to another, they stick together, that they cannot be sundered.
Job 41:18 By his neesings a light doth shine, and his eyes are like the eyelids of the morning.
Job 41:19 Out of his mouth go burning lamps, and sparks of fire leap out.
Job 41:20 Out of his nostrils goeth smoke, as out of a seething pot or caldron.
Job 41:21 His breath kindleth coals, and a flame goeth out of his mouth.
Job 41:22 In his neck remaineth strength, and sorrow is turned into joy before him.
Job 41:23 The flakes of his flesh are joined together: they are firm in themselves; they cannot be moved.