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Needed: Mothers in Israel

2 Samuel 20:18–19 NKJV

18 So she spoke, saying, “They used to talk in former times, saying, ‘They shall surely seek guidance at Abel,’ and so they would end disputes. 19 I am among the peaceable and faithful in Israel. You seek to destroy a city and a mother in Israel. Why would you swallow up the inheritance of the Lord?”

The phrase a mother in Israel occurs twice in the OT, here and Judges 5:7. The title is given as one of honor, respect and prominence.

During David’s reign, Sheba had called for all the men of Israel to go home and refuse to serve.

Judah in the south, remained loyal to David.

But when he sent his new commander, Amasa to gather and reorganize the men of Judah, he wasn’t able to do it in the alloted time and David realized that his support was slipping even at home.

David knew what had to be done.

So he sent Joab and the men who were available to pursue Sheba and to put down the rebellion.

Sheba fled to the northernmost city in Israel. Joab caught up and besieged the city.

Then:

2 Samuel 20:15–22 NKJV

15 Then they came and besieged him in Abel of Beth Maachah; and they cast up a siege mound against the city, and it stood by the rampart. And all the people who were with Joab battered the wall to throw it down. 16 Then a wise woman cried out from the city, “Hear, hear! Please say to Joab, ‘Come nearby, that I may speak with you.’ ” 17 When he had come near to her, the woman said, “Are you Joab?” He answered, “I am.” Then she said to him, “Hear the words of your maidservant.” And he answered, “I am listening.” 18 So she spoke, saying, “They used to talk in former times, saying, ‘They shall surely seek guidance at Abel,’ and so they would end disputes. 19 I am among the peaceable and faithful in Israel. You seek to destroy a city and a mother in Israel. Why would you swallow up the inheritance of the Lord?” 20 And Joab answered and said, “Far be it, far be it from me, that I should swallow up or destroy! 21 That is not so. But a man from the mountains of Ephraim, Sheba the son of Bichri by name, has raised his hand against the king, against David. Deliver him only, and I will depart from the city.” So the woman said to Joab, “Watch, his head will be thrown to you over the wall.” 22 Then the woman in her wisdom went to all the people. And they cut off the head of Sheba the son of Bichri, and threw it out to Joab. Then he blew a trumpet, and they withdrew from the city, every man to his tent. So Joab returned to the king at Jerusalem.

1. Mothers in Israel Display Humility

“I am among the peaceable and faithful in Israel”

Proverbs 15:33 NKJV

33 The fear of the Lord is the instruction of wisdom, And before honor is humility.

James 4:10 NKJV

10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.

The Preacher’s Notebook: The Collected Quotes, Illustrations, and Prayers of John Stott Humility and Sanity

“Is it not of great significance that humility and reason returned to Nebuchadnezzar together? ‘At the same time,’ added the humbled king, ‘my reason returned unto me.’ The King’s pride was to him a kind of insanity which drove him at last into the fields to dwell with the beasts. While he saw himself large and God small he was insane; sanity returned only as he began to see God as all and himself as nothing.”

SOURCE: A. W. Tozer, The Divine Conquest (Oliphants, 1950), 51–52.

I am certain that we will find out in eternity that a significant percentage of the population in heaven will have gotten there, in a major part, because of their mothers.

Syro-Phoenician Woman’s Humility

Mark 7:25–30 NKJV

25 For a woman whose young daughter had an unclean spirit heard about Him, and she came and fell at His feet. 26 The woman was a Greek, a Syro-Phoenician by birth, and she kept asking Him to cast the demon out of her daughter. 27 But Jesus said to her, “Let the children be filled first, for it is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.” 28 And she answered and said to Him, “Yes, Lord, yet even the little dogs under the table eat from the children’s crumbs.” 29 Then He said to her, “For this saying go your way; the demon has gone out of your daughter.” 30 And when she had come to her house, she found the demon gone out, and her daughter lying on the bed.

2. Mothers in Israel are Peacemakers

“I am among the peaceable and faithful in Israel”

A heritage of trusted judgement

2 Samuel 20:18 NKJV

18 So she spoke, saying, “They used to talk in former times, saying, ‘They shall surely seek guidance at Abel,’ and so they would end disputes.

A settler of disputes (Sibling rivalry…)

Matthew 5:9 NKJV

9 Blessed are the peacemakers, For they shall be called sons of God.

If a mother grows as her children grow....

The May 13, 2012, edition of the Deseret News contained an Op-Ed piece that read:

In November 1861, the writer Julia Ward Howe and her husband visited the cold, barricaded capitol of Washington, D.C. They met Abraham Lincoln at the White House, and in the afternoon, Howe toured the army camps surrounding the city.

That night she sat up in bed, put pen to paper and wrote, "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord / He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored."

Her lyrics, set to music, became the "Battle Hymn of the Republic," the anthem of the Northern armies, giving a moral imperative and holy overtones to the bitter and bloody civil war they fought.

Howe cherished her song all her life. But it is a testament to the complexities of war and human nature that the same woman who penned lines about the "terrible swift sword" of justice would later write a declaration condemning the "sword of murder" and calling for peace.

In 1870, prompted by her despair over what she had seen of men — sons — killing the sons of other mothers, Howe issued a Mother's Day Proclamation, a call for an international day to celebrate peace and motherhood.

"Arise, then, women of this day! / Arise all women who have hearts," it began.

Further down it read, "Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn / All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience."

Howe called for the women of the world "to bewail and commemorate the dead. / Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means / Whereby the great human family can live in peace."

Honor mothers, the great peacemakers of the world

By Deseret News May 13, 2012, 12:00am MDT

https://www.deseret.com/2012/5/13/20412452/honor-mothers-the-great-peacemakers-of-the-world

3. Mothers in Israel are Faithful

“I am among the peaceable and faithful in Israel”

In a time of unfaithfulness hers stood out

Many deserting the Army of the Lord

AWOL in Israel

Timothy’s Genuine Faith

2 Timothy 1:5 NKJV

5 when I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am persuaded is in you also.

4. Mother’s In Israel Teach Wisdom

“Then the woman in her wisdom went to all the people....” v22

A. She protects the inheritance of the Lord

2 Samuel 20:19 NKJV

19 I am among the peaceable and faithful in Israel. You seek to destroy a city and a mother in Israel. Why would you swallow up the inheritance of the Lord?”

Her pleaful question stirred something in the heart of Joab:

2 Samuel 20:20 NKJV

20 And Joab answered and said, “Far be it, far be it from me, that I should swallow up or destroy!

Joab’s explanation:

2 Samuel 20:21–22 NKJV

21 That is not so. But a man from the mountains of Ephraim, Sheba the son of Bichri by name, has raised his hand against the king, against David. Deliver him only, and I will depart from the city.” So the woman said to Joab, “Watch, his head will be thrown to you over the wall.” 22 Then the woman in her wisdom went to all the people. And they cut off the head of Sheba the son of Bichri, and threw it out to Joab. Then he blew a trumpet, and they withdrew from the city, every man to his tent. So Joab returned to the king at Jerusalem.

Promises

Prophetic Words

B. A few chapters earlier - Another wise woman:

2 Samuel 14:2 NKJV

2 And Joab sent to Tekoa and brought from there a wise woman, and said to her, “Please pretend to be a mourner, and put on mourning apparel; do not anoint yourself with oil, but act like a woman who has been mourning a long time for the dead.

Joab gives her some instructions and send her to seek an audience with King David. David was estranged from his son Absalom. This “Wise woman of Tekoa, tells David a story much like Nathan the prophet did when confronting David about his sin with Bathsheba. She tells him a story that stirs his sense of righteousness and then point out his hypocrisy in seeking to right the wrong in her story but not in his own family. She then says:

2 Samuel 14:14 NKJV

14 For we will surely die and become like water spilled on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again. Yet God does not take away a life; but He devises means, so that His banished ones are not expelled from Him.

2 Samuel 14:14 NLT

14 All of us must die eventually. Our lives are like water spilled out on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again. But God does not just sweep life away; instead, he devises ways to bring us back when we have been separated from him.

Deborah (Devorah; “honeybee”)

A Judge over Israel who led the Israelite army to victory over the Canaanites.

Israel had been oppressed by King Jabin of Canaan for 20 years (Judg 4:2-3)

First introduced in:

Judges 4:4–5 NKJV

4 Now Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, was judging Israel at that time. 5 And she would sit under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the mountains of Ephraim. And the children of Israel came up to her for judgment.

Depicted also as a:

A. Wise woman

B. Peacemaker - (Arbitrating disputes a judge in Israel)

But In Addition Deborah is a:

In Judges 5 - (The Song of Deborah)

This section begins with calls to worship....

A brief historical review follow the call to worship.

C. A Prophetess

(Along with Huldah (2 Kigns 22:14) one of only two Israelite women given this distinction in the OT)

“Wife of Lappidoth”

The Lexham Bible Dictionary Deborah the Judge

In Judges 4:4, Deborah is described as “לַפִּידוֹת אֵשֶׁת (lappidoth esheth),” which can mean either “wife of Lappidoth,” or literally, “woman of torches.”

Fiery woman

Some have even posited that Lappidoth was a nickname for Barak. But that doesn’t make much sense since

D. A Military advisor and leader (Later in the chapter)

Galatians 4:26 NKJV

26 but the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all.