Sermon Tone Analysis

Welcome and Introduction:

Well good morning, Forest Glen! Good to be with you all again.

My name’s Dan Osborn and I serve as one of the Pastors at Park.

Like [HOST] said, we’re going to be continuing in our new series this morning through the book of Judges in the Old Testament.

The book of Judges is a messy.

If you were here last week, Brenton did a great job kicking us off in this series and even started to talk about some of problems we have with to book of Judges.

In fact a little of Children’s Bibles don’t even have stories from Judges!

But what we’re going to see week in and week out is actually a beautiful story of redemption as God refuses to give up on a people who consistantly give up on Him.

So if you’ve got a bible, would you open with me to and we’ll be looking at verses 12 through 30 this morning. .

It’s on page 202 if you have one of the house bibles.

PAUSE

PRAY

Introduction

May 2, 2002 marked a pivotal moment in modern cinematic history—a moment that gave birth to what is arguably the most successful eras of film.

Is anyone in here a big fan of personality tests?

Myers-Briggs?

StrengthsFind?

MCORE?

ENIOGRAM?

THINKING WAVE LENGTH?

Or what about you DISc profile?

The tests and survey’s on Facebook.

Slide of movie

How many of you are like Personality Test fiends?

Like you’ve taken all of them and love it?

You know what I’m talking about?

At Park we’ve got a couple folks on staff who are like super into these tests!

People ask me pretty often, ‘What’s your Myers-Briggs’?

Can I be honest with you for a moment…I hate those questions.

And it’s not because I don’t think personality tests are helpful or anything like that.

The problem is I just can’t EVER remember what I am!

I mean there’s a lot to remember!

Some of them have numbers some of them have letters…and I just get them mixed up.

So half the time, I’m just like, “I’m whatever one can’t really remember these things...”!

And again, don’t get me wrong.

These tools and personality test can be SUPER helpful for understanding who you are…what you’re gifted in…your strengths…

But when you really stop and think about it for a moment…there is a bit of a dark side to them.

On May 2, Spider-Man was released.

Because I think one of the questions we’re often left asking after taking one these …or even a couple of these tests…you know, once we know our strengths…the question we have is, ‘okay, but what do I do with my weaknesses, right?

We end up focusing on our strengths…and then doing what we can to work around our weaknesses...but why?

It’s because there’s actually this deeper uncertainty about our own weakness—and even this implicate fear of what happens if I don’t keep my weaknesses in check…what happens if people see where I’m weak…[EXPAND MAYBE]

Transition

And the reason this film was so important is not because it was very good…and had nothing to do with the story line…and if you were to go back and re-watch the movie it would probably seem over the top and out of touch with today’s world.

But what Spiderman did was show the film industry that people enjoyed Superhero movies.

And ultimately, what we’re going to today is this idea that God uses the weakness his people for His fame and their good.

And as we look through the story, well take some time to understand what that means.

What followed from this release was a slew of remakes, adaptations, and reinventions of familiar comic-book stories that most people were at least loosely familiar with.

Batman

The Incredible Hulk

So Let me pray, and then we’ll get started.

Superman

Iron Man

PRAY

PRAY

Captain America

Thor

Wonder Woman

Black Panther

In fact these kinds of movies have become so popular that betwen 2016 and 2020, there are at least 70 different movies, shows, and mini-series slated to show all focusing on Superheroes!

But I think that eventually begs the question: why are these kinds of movies so appealing?

And it’s not just to us…if you were to take a brief look the the history of stories—across the board—all cultures have their versions of Superheroes!

Why?

I think the reason is this.

We are acutely aware that something isn’t quite right with the world—or that at least somethings not quite right with humanity.

Context of Judges

Alright, let me give us a couple quick things to keep in mind as we make our way through the book of Judges.

What is a Judge?

First, What is a ‘Judge’?

This is an obvious question if we’re looking at the book of Judges…we need to understand what we’re talking about here!

When we use the title‘Judge’ today, we immediately think of a courtroom…a person making legal decisions…but that’s not what the bible is getting at with the word ‘Judge’.

Really, you need to think of something more like what you’d see in an old Western movie!

You gotta think:

John Wayne [SLIDE]

Clint Eastwood

Or if you’re too young to know what I’m talking about…think Bat-Man from the Dark Knight series [SLIDE]

These guys are really more like what the judges were.

If you go back and watch these movies and see some of these characters…yeah, technically they’re the good guys… They’re the ones calling the shots…they have the big win…but they’re not clean , right?

They’ve got some serious FLAWS…not always doing good things.

The World of the Judges

In fact, it might even be helpful to think of the

In fact, it might even be helpful to think of the time period of the Judges almost like the Wild West…if you want to keep going with that John Wayne/Clint Eastwood idea.

We’re told a number of times in the book that everybody is just doing whatever seems right to them.

It’s perfectly summed up in the last verse of the book, , “In those days there was no king in Israel.

Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.”

And over and over again, we’re told that God raises up a judge to be a deliverer or hero.

They aren’t always that good but God still uses them to bring about good for His people.

It’s messy.

It’s broken.

His people have serious weaknesses…His leaders have serious weaknesses…and again, it all begs the question, “How will God use the weakness of his people?”

In other words, the author is going back and retelling the people of God, ‘This is what the world looks like when God is not treated as King…when God is not seen as the hero.’

It’s a world of rugged individualism.

Cycle in Judges

The Second thing you want to keep in mind is this CYCLE in Judges.

When you follow the storyline of the WHOLE book, it is basically this big downward spiral.

Each judge is worse than the last.

Brenton/Steve touched on this last week.

Let me remind of what that cycle looks like.

It’s on the screen behind me [SLIDE].

Each story beings with Israel’s REBELLION against God.

In other words, they know what God has called them to do and how He’s called them to live, but they REJECT Him and start to follow the false gods of the nations around them.