The Hero We Need

Lead Vocalist (Joel)

Welcome & Announcements (Sterling)

Good morning family!

Ask guests to fill out connect card

3 announcements:

1) Walk 4 Life, May 11 in Newport News Park

Registration starts at 830 that morning and the event starts at 930

For more information, or to get pledge forms and envelopes head to the CareNet table (behind the partitions) after the service

2) Muffins with Mom, May 12 at 9AM

For Mother's Day PBC Kids will be hosting a special event with moms before Sunday school in the chapel.

3) Big Bro/Sis Reveal

If you or your little ones are a part of the Big Bro/Sis program meet in the chapel immediately after service

Now please take a moment of silence to prepare your heart for worship.

Call to Worship (Psalm 106:40-48)

Prayer of Praise (Christine Zalameda)

O Worship the King

All Praise to Him

Prayer of Confession (Chris Steinberg), Failure to love God’s Word

Assurance of Pardon (Isaiah 12:1-2)

Rock of Ages

He Will Hold Me Fast

Scripture Reading (Judges 6:1-10)

You can find it on page 242 in the black Bibles

Pastoral Prayer (Sterling)

Prayer for PBC—Right understanding of evangelism

Prayer for sister church—Seaford Baptist (Michael Howard)

Prayer for US—Governor Youngkin

Prayer for the world—Samoa

Pray for the sermon

SERMON

START TIMER!!!

What happens when you try to create a manmade utopia in a fallen world?

Can we actually achieve paradise by eliminating any negative circumstances?

Or will our best efforts lead to something that looks more like hell than heaven?

In the 1960s a man named John Calhoun set out to answer those questions.

But just to be safe, he conducted his experiments on mice.

His experiment was called “Universe 25,” but it is more popularly known as Mouse Utopia.

SHOW MOUSE UTOPIA IMAGE

He created a wonderful place for mice to live, with open areas and corridors, little stairs, platforms and rooms.

He made sure the mice would not want for anything. They had endless, bountiful food and easy access to water.

No predators were allowed in Mouse Utopia, and the bedding was constantly refreshed to provide the ideal nesting environment for baby mice.

At first, there were no surprises.

The experiment began in July 1968 with eight albino mice.

After a year the population had skyrocketed to 620 mice.

But Calhoun noticed something at about day 315.

The male mice started acting dejected and disinterested. Eventually they got violent and started attacking each other.

The female mice started abandoning their young. Some even began to attack their own babies.

The violence soon reached Tarantino-levels as some of the mice began to kill and eat each other, despite having all the food they could possible want.

Some of the mice, which Calhoun called “the beautiful ones,” became so obsessed with grooming themselves that they lost all interest in the opposite sex.

Despite having ample room and food for thousands more mice, the population eventually peaked at 2,200.

And by the spring of 1973, the population dropped all the way down to zero.

The mice in Mouse Utopia were extinct. [1]

What happened?

The mice had everything they could want. All the space they needed, all the food and water, and no threats.

But maybe that was part of the problem.

Maybe, in a fallen world, challenging circumstances are necessary to help us grow.

Just maybe one of the worst things that can happen to life on a fallen planet is to remove every challenging circumstance from our lives.

The original environment of Mouse Utopia sounds a lot like some of our vacations, doesn’t it?

You’ve got space, companionship, food, drink, and people waiting on you hand and foot.

But when we begin to think that’s the way everyday life should be, we’re in trouble.

When we cry out to God expecting Him to provide everything we want whenever we want it, when we expect immediate deliverance from all our unpleasant circumstances, we don’t really know what we’re asking for.

Thankfully we serve a God who cares more about the state of our hearts than our circumstances.

That’s the lesson we learn from our text this morning in....

Judges 6:1-10

Please turn their in your Bibles if you’re not there already.

The period of the judges came after the death of Joshua, but before the monarchy in Israel.

It’s a period in Israel’s history much like our own day, marked by increasing moral decline.

God has raised up Othniel, Ehud, Shamgar, and Deborah to rescue His people. But every time, after the leaders die, the people return to their sin.

In Judges 6 the cycle is repeating itself yet again, but this time instead of sending a rescuer right away God does something else.

Instead of immediately delivering His people from their painful circumstances, instead of creating some sort of challenge-free utopian environment for His people, God wants to show them what He truly values.

The Big Idea I hope to communicate, with God’s help, this morning is that God cares more about changing your heart than your circumstances.

We’re going to see that idea developed through Five scenes in this story. We’ll see...

An unsurprising relapse,

An unrelenting rival,

An unconvincing repentance,

An unexpected response,

And an unfinished rebuke.

But before we dive in, I want you to take a moment and answer a simple question: What circumstance in your life do you wish God would change?

Maybe it’s a physical challenge. Chronic pain. Arthritis. A weak immune system. Cancer.

Maybe it’s a financial difficulty. Too many bills. Dwindling savings. Mounting debt.

Maybe it’s a relationship. A rebellious child. A distant spouse. A demanding friend.

What circumstance in your life do you wish God would change?

Once you’ve got that circumstance in your mind, I want to challenge you to pray something with me.

Would you pray something like this: “Lord, help me to want what you want. Help me to care most about what you care about. Help me to care more about my heart than my circumstances. Help me to joyfully receive whatever you have for me so that I may be whoever you want me to be.”

In fact, let’s pray that together right now...

PRAY

God cares more about changing your heart than your circumstances.

We begin to see that in scene one...

1) An Unsurprising RELAPSE (1a)

By this point in the book of Judges, we are not surprised to learn that, once again, God’s people have relapsed into idolatry.

Judges 6:1—The people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord…

Verse 1 doesn’t explicitly mention idolatry, but verse 10 does.

Israel has, once again, returned to the evil of idolatry. Once again they have turned their affections to other gods.

But before you shake your head at the stupidity of these people, remember what idolatry is.

The definition of idolatry we’ve been using throughout this series comes from...

John Piper—Anything in the world that successfully competes with our love for God is an idol. [2]

According to google, there are over 600 million products for sale on Amazon. Any one of those items could be somebody’s idol.

And don’t forget the countless other things that compete with our love for God, which Amazon cannot sell. Things like friends, a girlfriend/boyfriend, a spouse, children, fame, sex, comfort, peace, order, and more.

That’s why Martin Luther used to say that we never break any commandments unless we break the first commandment, “have no other gods before Me.” You will not dishonor your parents, steal, lie, lust, or hate unless you first have given your allegiance over to some other God!!!

What is competing with your love for God?

I know I’ve asked that question before in this series, but if God’s people in Judges continually return to the vomit of idolatry we probably do too.

Here’s a few diagnostic questions to help you uncover your idols...

Who or what do I make sacrifices for?

Who or what is most important to me?

If I could have any thing or experience I wanted, what would that be?

Who or what makes me the most happy?

What is the one person or thing I could not live without?

What do I spend my money on?

Who or what do I devote my spare time to? [3]

The answers to those questions just may be your idols.

Even if you struggle to see your idols, God does not.

Notice verse 1 says they did evil “in the sight of the Lord.”

You may be able to successfully hide your idols from everybody in this room, but you cannot hide them from the Lord.

If God sees our idolatry, and if He cares more about changing our hearts than our circumstances, we shouldn’t be surprised when He works like a surgeon to cut the cancerous idols out of our hearts.

And that’s what He begins to do in scene two...

2) An Unrelenting RIVAL (1b-5)

Judges 6:1b–5—…and the Lord gave them into the hand of Midian seven years. And the hand of Midian overpowered Israel, and because of Midian the people of Israel made for themselves the dens that are in the mountains and the caves and the strongholds. For whenever the Israelites planted crops, the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the East would come up against them. They would encamp against them and devour the produce of the land, as far as Gaza, and leave no sustenance in Israel and no sheep or ox or donkey. For they would come up with their livestock and their tents; they would come like locusts in number—both they and their camels could not be counted—so that they laid waste the land as they came in.

The Midianites are like Calvera in The Magnificent Seven, El Guapo in The Three Amigos, or Hopper in A Bug’s Life.

They are bloodthirsty parasites who oppress God’s people.

They devour their crops, steal their livestock, and devastate their land.

They were like a swarm of locusts without number, devouring everything in their path.

In many ways this is the worst oppression yet.

Instead of driving out their enemies, God’s people are now driven from their homes and living in caves.

Next week we’ll meet Gideon, threshing wheat in a winepress so he can hide it from the Midianites.

This is such a devastating oppression, it’s shocking that the Israelites were able to survive for seven years!

Perhaps you’re wondering why God would allow such carnage.

Aren’t these supposed to be God’s covenant people?

Proverbs 3:11–12—My son, do not despise the Lord’s discipline or be weary of His reproof, for the Lord reproves him whom He loves, as a father the son in whom he delights.

Because God cares more about changing our hearts than our circumstances, He will sometimes discipline His people.

That discipline is not rooted in anger or hatred, but in love.

Brother and sisters, could it be that the suffering you’re enduring is the discipline of God?

We have to be careful here, because not all suffering is a form of discipline.

Think of the story in John 9 where the disciples see a blind man and they ask Jesus, “Why is this guy blind? Was it because he sinned was it his parents?”

Do you remember how Jesus responded? He said, “neither. This man was born blind so that the works of God might be displayed in him.”

My guess is that most Western Christians have swung the pendulum to the opposite extreme as Jesus’ disciples. They saw all suffering as a form of discipline, where we almost never see suffering as a form of discipline.

But why does God discipline His people?!?

Hebrews 12:11—For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

Yes, God sometimes sends suffering as the consequences of sin.

But God’s goal is not to make you suffer. God’s goal in all suffering—whether its discipline or not—is to make us holy.

Because God cares more about changing your heart than your circumstances.

So when we suffer, at the very least we ought to ask ourselves “what is God trying to teach me through this?”

What we dare not do is try to manipulate God in some way to get our suffering to end.

Unfortunately that’s what the Israelites do in scene three...

3) An Unconvincing REPENTANCE (6)

Judges 6:6—And Israel was brought very low because of Midian. And the people of Israel cried out for help to the Lord.

This is not the first time we’ve seen that word “cried out.” It’s used thirteen times in the book of Judges.

We need to remember that this word doesn’t imply repentance. The word in Hebrew simply means to cry out in anguish. [4]

It’s a yelp for help, nothing more.

It’s what you do when you stub your toe, or hit your thumb with a hammer, or slip and fall.

And you don’t need to know anything about the Hebrew language to know that God’s people haven’t truly repented.

When God finally sends Gideon to rescue His people from the Midianites, they’re still worshiping false gods.

In fact, Gideon’s family has a couple of idols in their backyard.

And before the Gideon cycle is over, God’s people are worshiping another idol of Gideon’s making!

These are not repentant people!

So what does real repentance look like?

In his classic work, The Doctrine of Repentance, a 17th century Puritan pastor named Thomas Watson defined repentance this way:

Repentance is a grace of God’s Spirit whereby a sinner is inwardly humbled and visibly reformed. [5]

Notice, Watson says that true repentance is “a grace of God’s Spirit.” We cannot manufacture repentance. It is a gift worked in us by the Holy Spirit.

And it leads the sinner to be “inwardly humbled.” The repentant person is no longer the center of their universe.

But since it’s impossible to see someone’s heart to tell if it’s humble or proud, Watson wisely adds that the sinner is “visibly reformed.” When we truly repent there is a clear, obvious difference that others can see.

Watson then goes on to list Six Ingredients of True Repentance: [6]

1. Sight of sin

You have not truly repented of your sin if you do not see your sin.

If you don’t remember it, or if you don’t think it’s sinful, than you cannot repent. So you must take great pains to see all of your sin if you’re going to truly repent.

This is one reason why it’s so important to have a church family. To have people that you can ask, “Tell me the sin you see in my life.”

All of us sometimes need someone to help pull the splinters out of our eyes.

2. Sorrow for sin

You have not truly repented of your sin if you’re not sorrowful about your sin.

I’m not talking about being sorry that you got caught. Or sorry that your sin has consequences. This is genuine sorrow over your sin itself.

3. Confession of sin

You have not truly repented of your sin if you do not confess your sin.

This means you must confess your sin against God. Not “God I’m sorry for all my sins,” but specific confession for specific sins

And you also must confess your sins specifically to those people you’ve sinned against.

Confession is a bit like folding clothes in a large family. Each piece of laundry has to be folded individually and put in a pile for each person so it can be put where it belongs. In the same way, you have to sort through your sin, and confess it individually to each person you’ve sinned against.

4. Shame for sin

You have not truly repented of your sin if you are not ashamed of your sin.

If you’re struggling to feel shame over your sin, consider this: Watson says our sin is worse than even the demons.

The demons never sinned against Christ’s blood. Jesus died for us, but He didn’t die for them.

The demons never sinned against God’s patience. As soon as they sinned, they were forever damned. But God is patient with us. Yet we continue to sin.

The demons never sinned against good examples. They were the first examples. We have countless examples that we ignore whenever we plunge headlong into some sin.

5. Hatred for sin

You have not truly repented of you do not hate your sin.

6. Turning from sin

You have not truly repented of you continue in your sin.

All this is really important, because it’s possible to look repentant without being repentant.

On the night Jesus was betrayed, there were two men weeping: Peter and Judas.

Both men had committed heinous sins against the Son of God.

Both men experienced severe, crippling guilt over their sin.

Both men looked repentant. But only one man was.

A few decades later the Apostle Paul wrote about the two types of sorrow that were visible that night...

2 Corinthians 7:10—… godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.

When you find yourself hurting after your sin has been exposed, it is wise to evaluate your sorrow. Is my sorrow a godly grief that produces repentance, or is it a worldly grief that produces death?

But how do I know which is which?

In his commentary on Judges, Tim Keller says there are two main differences between worldly sorrow and godly sorrow...

First, “worldly” sorrow or regret does not produce any real change, while repentance does. Why? Regret is sorrow over the consequences of a sin, but not over the sin itself. If there had been no consequences, there would have been no sorrow. There is no sorrow over the sin for what it is in itself, for how it grieves God and violates our relationship with him. The focus is all horizontal—“worldly”—and not at all vertical—concerned about how it affects relationship with God. Therefore, as soon as the consequences go away, the behavior comes back. The heart has not become disgusted with the sin itself, so the sin remains rooted.

If you’re only sorry about the consequences of sin, and not the sin itself, you will return to that sin once the consequences go away.

That’s exactly what the Israelites do all throughout the book of Judges!

Is that what you’re doing, friend?

Keller continues...

Second, “worldly” sorrow stays regretful, while repentance removes all regret about the past. Why? Real repentance comes to focus on the only real, permanent result of sin—the “loss” of the LORD. Repentance always makes us more able to accept and “move past” the things that happened. When we realize that God has forgiven us and we haven’t “lost” him, we feel that earthly results are rather small in comparison. We say: I deserved far worse than what happened. The real punishment fell on Jesus, and will never come to me. After real repentance and restoration to God, we do not hate ourselves, and we do not hate our lives. . . . Regret is all about “us”: how I am being hurt, how my life is ruined, how my heart is breaking; but repentance is all about God: how he has been grieved, how his nature as Creator and Redeemer is being trampled on, how his repeated saving actions are being trivialized and used manipulatively. [7]

Being “very low” like the Israelites in verse 6 is not in itself a sign of repentance.

If sadness alone was a sign of repentance, than sinners in hell would be the most repentant people in the universe!

But sinners in hell are NOT repentant.

And neither are you, unless you are truly sorry over your sin, and not merely the consequences of your sin.

If you need to talk with someone about this our pastors are ready and willing to talk with you.

ASK ELDERS TO RAISE HANDS

Because God cares more about changing your heart than your circumstances, He wants you have godly sorrow and not just worldly sorrow. He wants you to repent.

And that’s why He responds as He does in scene four...

4) An Unexpected RESPONSE (7-8a)

Remember the Judges cycle we’ve talked about several times in this series?

SHOW JUDGES CYCLE IMAGE

First, God’s people commit idolatry.

Then, God disciplines them, leading to oppression by their enemies.

Then God’s people eventually cry out for help.

Then God hears their cries and brings delivers them by sending a judge to rescue them.

But that cycle looks a bit different this time.

Yes, God will eventually send a hero to rescue His people from Midian.

But first, He’s going to send them someone else...

Judges 6:7–8a—When the people of Israel cried out to the Lord on account of the Midianites, the Lord sent a prophet to the people of Israel.

Imagine you’re driving on the highway somewhere and your vehicle breaks down. No big deal. You call for roadside assistance. The receptionist answers and says, “Absolutely, we’ll send someone right away!” You wait for a few minutes, until you see a truck pull up behind you. But instead of a mechanic or a tow truck, out walks a preacher. He pulls a little makeshift pulpit out of the truck bed, opens his Bible, and starts to preach a sermon. How would you feel?

Perhaps that’s a bit how God’s people felt when they pray for a hero and God sends a prophet.

But this isn’t the hero they deserve. It’s the hero they need.

In this unexpected response, we learn a lot about what God truly values.

God cares more about changing your heart than your circumstances,

A change of scenery cannot change the human heart. But the Word of God can!

Hebrews 4:12–13—For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from His sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.

When God gives you His Word, He isn’t given you scraps. He’s giving you a feast!

This means that the life of the local church is incredibly important.

When we gather and God’s Word is preached, this is not some minor thing. It is THE thing that God uses to change His people!

Theologian Michael Horton puts it this way: “God’s word does not merely impart information; it actually creates life. It’s not only descriptive; it’s effective too. God speaking is God acting.” [8]

PBC, let’s fight to be Bible people! Not just people who care about the Word of God being preached on Sunday. But people who know God’s Word well enough to speak it to one another when we’re sinning and suffering.

Let’s prioritize Sunday School and discipleship groups where we can dig even deeper into God’s Word.

Let’s keep reading good Christian books.

Let’s continue teaching God’s Word to our children.

Let’s not be embarrassed to talk about the sermon with one another after it’s preached.

Let’s not be afraid to speak God’s Word to one another.

If we really believe God’s Word is what changes hearts, than God’s Word needs to saturate every aspect of our life together.

Because God cares more about changing your heart than your circumstances, He gives His people His Word.

And we’ll see what God says to His people in scene five...

5) An Unfinished REBUKE (8b-10)

The author of Judges has recorded this unnamed prophet’s sermon for us in...

Judges 6:8b–10—And [the prophet] said to them, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: I led you up from Egypt and brought you out of the house of slavery. And I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the hand of all who oppressed you, and drove them out before you and gave you their land. And I said to you, ‘I am the Lord your God; you shall not fear the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.’ But you have not obeyed my voice.

If you were creating an outline for this sermon it might be something like this...

Verses 8-9 tell us What God did.

He rescued them from slavery in Egypt.

He delivered them from their oppressors.

He gave them the Promised Land.

Verse 10a tells us What God said.

Don’t fear the gods of the Amorites.

In other words, “don’t give a rip about them! Don’t live for anything other than Me!”

Verse 10b tell us What God’s people did.

They disobeyed God.

That’s it! No attention-grabbing introduction. No powerful conclusion. No application. No illustrations. Three simple points, the end.

Some of you might be thinking, “I wish I could go to that guy’s church!”

But I think the point of this sermon is that it’s incomplete. It’s a rebuke of God’s people, but it’s unfinished!

If you've ever read the prophets in Scripture, you would expect one of two conclusions to this simple sermon.

One possible conclusion might begin with the word THEREFORE.

"You have not obeyed my voice, THEREFORE I will no longer rescue you.”

"You have not obeyed my voice, THEREFORE I will destroy you forever.”

"You have not obeyed my voice, THEREFORE I will no longer be your God.”

Aren’t you glad the sermon doesn’t end like that?

The other possible conclusion might begin with the word NEVERTHELESS.

"You have not obeyed my voice, NEVERTHELESS I will rescue you.”

"You have not obeyed my voice, NEVERTHELESS I will keep my covenant with you forever.”

"You have not obeyed my voice, NEVERTHELESS I am still your God.”

I’m sure all of us would love it if the sermon ended like that! But it doesn’t.

The prophet does not end his sermon by confirming our greatest fears, but neither does he end by confirming our greatest hopes.

It’s almost as if the prophet is inviting us to look beyond the sermon.

What’s beyond the sermon? Where do you go when verse 10 is a cliffhanger?

You go to verse 11.

Judges 6:11—Now the angel of the Lord came...

Remember, when the Old Testament refers to “the angel of the Lord” it’s almost always a reference to God Himself.

And that is certainly the case here, because verse 14 confirms that this is the LORD, Yahweh Himself, speaking to Gideon.

So the prophet’s sermon ends with an unfinished rebuke, and the very next words in Judges tell us about a God who comes to His people.

A God who comes to His people BEFORE they repent.

A God who comes to His people while they were still enemies.

A God who left the only real utopia—the glories of heaven—to endure hell on earth so that we could be saved.

I wonder if John Calhoun ever thought about ways to save the mice in his Mouse Utopia.

They were in a perfect world. They had everything they needed, but they were still falling apart.

Surely he would’ve realized that the only way to save the mice was from the inside.

And yet, IF there was some way for John Calhoun to become a mouse so he could convince the other mice to live in peace with one another, do you think he would have done it?

Even if he was a bit of a mad scientist, I’m confident he wouldn’t do it. Nobody would.

Nobody would dream of giving up the glories of humanity to save all the mice in the world!

And yet the distance between God and humanity is infinitely greater than the distance between humans and mice.

Both humans and mice are created things. Both humans and mice are finite creatures.

But God? He is eternal! He is infinite!

Yet the Bible tells us that Jesus....

Philippians 2:6–11—....though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Jesus didn’t just become one of us. He came TO DIE.

EXPLAIN THE GOSPEL

Unbeliever: repent and believe!

Believer: BECAUSE you believe Jesus did this for you, you can trust that His ways are perfect, no matter your circumstances.

Prayer of Thanksgiving

And Can It Be

Benediction (1 Thess. 5:23-24)