Judges 10-12
Notes
Transcript
Groups - Think of a deal you have made with a sibling or friend - (you wash up - I’ll clean your shoes!) Don’t tell dad and I’ll…
In todays passage there are 4 deals made - but most of them are bad ones!
We often make deals with God - and so we’re going to see that that’s also normally a bad idea!
But before the deals we learn an important lesson:
1 - You can’t fake repentance!
1 - You can’t fake repentance!
Judges has the repeated cycle of
SLIDE cycle
God's people serving God,
doing evil,
being punished,
crying out to God
and God saving them
And the Israelites are at it again…
6a
But this time the evil is worse than it’s been before..
6b
Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord. They served the Baals and the Ashtoreths, and the gods of Aram, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites and the gods of the Philistines.
Any false god they could find, they
would worship.
Any god but the God who has saved them
so many times before!
And this time, God is really angry,
that same cycle we see over and over
And because the Israelites forsook the Lord and no longer served him, he became angry with them. He sold them into the hands of the Philistines and the Ammonites, who that year shattered and crushed them. For eighteen years they oppressed all the Israelites on the east side of the Jordan in Gilead, the land of the Amorites. The Ammonites also crossed the Jordan to fight against Judah, Benjamin and Ephraim; Israel was in great distress.
Again - evil, Again – oppression and
punishment.
But remember the next part of the
cycle.
SLIDE - cycle
God's people cry out Him. Save us!
After all that's why God oppresses them,
so that they come back to him.
Then the Israelites cried out to the Lord, ‘We have sinned against you, forsaking our God and serving the Baals.’
What a relief to us as we read this dreadful oppression
and sin going on.
Finally we have reached the part of the cycle were
they
cry out to God and he sends them a saviour, a judge
to free them.
Phew!
Lets read God's gracious and loving answer.
The Lord replied, ‘When the Egyptians, the Amorites, the Ammonites, the Philistines, the Sidonians, the Amalekites and the Maonites oppressed you and you cried to me for help, did I not save you from their hands? But you have forsaken me and served other gods, so I will no longer save you. Go and cry out to the gods you have chosen. Let them save you when you are in trouble!’
I don't
think they, any more than us,
would
have expected that answer.
What can
they possibly do! This is
desperate.
Where is
that God who when things get really bad,
longs for
our cry, and pulls his people out of despair?
And
perhaps we feel like that sometimes.
We'll
just keep on pushing the door of sin,
keep on
doing evil in the eyes of the Lord,
keep on
doing things our own way,
worshipping
the idols of money and popularity and
fashion. - ourselevs!
And if all that fails then we'll come back to
God.
It’s God’s job to
Rescue
us.
Well I hope
this section of scripture worries us.
I hope it
makes us sit up straight and consider our lives, consider our sin.
Father,
Lord, my life is now desperate, help me.
And the
Lord says “No, go and look for help from your own god's.
Your
money, your fashion, your popularity - yourself!
I've
saved you once to many!”
The
Israelites must have been terrified.
What do
they do?
What do
we do?
There is
only one answer that makes sense.
It's to
stop pretending to cry out to God,
and to
start living our cry out to God.
Look at
their first cry again
Then the Israelites cried out to the Lord, ‘We have sinned against you, forsaking our God and serving the Baals.’
We have forsaken God and served the Baals!
Not even close to an accurate repentance!
6 They served the
Baals and the Ashtoreths, and the gods of Aram, the gods of Sidon, the gods of
Moab, the gods of the Ammonites and the gods of the Philistines.
So God's refused and told them to go
back to their own gods for help.
And then look what they did
But the Israelites said to the Lord, ‘We have sinned. Do with us whatever you think best, but please rescue us now.’ Then they got rid of the foreign gods among them and served the Lord. And he could bear Israel’s misery no longer.
They stopped pretending to cry out,
And truly lay their lives before God.
This is true repentance - giving up everything we love and instead giving ourselves fully to God!
Not empty words - but living change.
Whoever we are - we all face punishment and
judgement from God for the sin we do.
We can't offer a half-hearted repentance and keep
our lives to ourselves and expect God to save us.
We must lay our whole life before him.
At the foot of the cross where the ultimate rescuer
Jesus offers life, forgiveness and joy.
How much of our lives have we given to Christ,
just the Baals,
just Sunday,
just out language,
just our time?
Or every single part?
And when we truly repent - God always saves!
For us through Jesus,
For the Israelites another judge - or leaders warrior: Jephthah
Described as a mighty warrior,
from a very
complicated background.
The son of a
prostitute.
He's bullied by his brothers and so he leaves home.
But now the trouble has brewed, there's a fight to
be won,
who else to call but the mighty warrior.
And so begin 4 deals:
Deal 1: Jephthah and the Elders
Deal 1: Jephthah and the Elders
The elders of Israel promise to make Jephthah their leader,
if he comes to fight for them.
So Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made him head and commander over them. And he repeated all his words before the Lord in Mizpah.
Jephthah starts well
He expresses his trust in God and is prepared
to fulfil his duty.
and the next deal is also a good idea…
Deal 2: Jephthah and Enemy King
Deal 2: Jephthah and Enemy King
Despite being a mighty warrior he begins his
campaign with discussion.
Have a look what he says to the enemy King:
‘Now since the Lord, the God of Israel, has driven the Amorites out before his people Israel, what right have you to take it over? Will you not take what your god Chemosh gives you? Likewise, whatever the Lord our God has given us, we will possess.
Jephthah remembers God and reminds even God’s enemies that God is in charge!
I wonder
how often we forget the control God has over important decisions in our own lives.
He allows our lungs to draw in breath.
And yet
we forget him when we think about how to behave at school or home.
Jephthah did not.
But unfortunately God’s enemies don’t listen:
The king of Ammon, however, paid no attention to the message Jephthah sent him.
So you
could say it was a ‘no deal.‘
But
that's the best deal we get in this
passage, it's rapidly down hill from here.
Following
his no deal with the enemy, lets see what happened.
Then the Spirit of the Lord came on Jephthah. He crossed Gilead and Manasseh, passed through Mizpah of Gilead, and from there he advanced against the Ammonites. And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord: ‘If you give the Ammonites into my hands, whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.’
Deal 3: Jephthah and God
Deal 3: Jephthah and God
let’s face it - it’s pretty weird deal!
If God helps him win the battle - he’s sacrifice - kill for God
- whatever comes out his house when he gets home!
Maybe his favourite chicken is normally the first out the door!?
But it’a a bit crazy - because surely a person will be the first to greet him!
Despite the faith he had in God,
Jephthah had a failure in his faith.
He didn't
think God would help him without a big gesture!
He though God needed Him - so made a deal!
It’s going to be a big mistake!
And this is the deal we need to learn from!
God does not need us to make deals with him in order for God to save us!
He will do it becasue he loves us -and because He is a good God!
Look what happnes because of the Deal with God..
Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the Lord gave them into his hands. He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon. When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of tambourines! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter. When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, ‘Oh no, my daughter! You have brought me down and I am devastated. I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break.’
What a disaster!
When we think we can save ourselevs by making deals with God - nothing good will come of it.
God is you save me I’ll always obey you! - Bad idea - we’ll never obey God perfectly!
Much better to just rely on God’s love - truely repent, and trust Him.
He’s already promised to save His people!
For us he’s made a deal that we have not side to keep!
He’s given us the
perfect judge,
whose life is marked by humility, perfection, love and
sacrificial forgiveness.
Jesus is our saviour -
He’s died for our sin - no deal required from us!
He’s rescued us from his judgment - no deal required from us!
and Jephthah now needs a saviour to die in place of his daughter!
I'm
sure some of us have make deals with God..
Please
God, heal my friend and I'll stop doing this sin or that.
Please
God, help me pass that exam at school and I'll be nice to my parents.
But every-time we do that, we have a failure of faith.
God will do His good will in all things without us making him a deal.
We can pray and ask him about all these hard things without making deals we
can’t, shouldn’t or wont keep!
Much better just to trust God’s promises
Pray for what we need,
Repent fully when we sin,
and enjoy our saviour Jesus.
The last
deal is between
Deal 4: Jephthah and His Daughter
Deal 4: Jephthah and His Daughter
where he
agrees to give her 2 months of mourning
with her friends, before her death.
But grant me this one request,’ she said. ‘Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.’
His daughter life is over, she’ll never marry and carry on her line.
Jephthah kills his own daughter - showing just how dangerous sin is!
He makes a sinful deal with God and then sins again my murdering!
2 wrongs don't
make a right.
Sin leads
to sin which leads to sin.
You would think God wouldn’t forgive Jephthah!
Perhaps we think sometimes that God wont forgive us for things we have done!
but 1000 years later - Jephthah is named in the NT -
as a man who was a hero of the faith!
And what more shall I say? I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson and Jephthah, about David and Samuel and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised;
Jephthah
made a deal with God that cost him his daughters life!
On a sliding
scale that's pretty bad!!
But the
NT doesn't remember him for that,
it
remembers him for his great faith in God!
A faith
that allowed God to save Israel through him
and he
received his reward in heaven.
Most
certainly he'd have learnt from his mistakes,
most
certainly that memory would be with him for his life.
But most
certainly God did not condemn him to hell
for those
actions.
Jesus
paid the price of those actions,
and
Jephthah's faith saved him.
Just as he will save us if we truly repent and have faith in Jesus.
Truly Repent and Make No Deals!
Truly Repent and Make No Deals!
PRAY
