Journeying Through Judges Chapters 1 and 2

Judges 1 and 2

After Joshua died the people of Israel had lost their Godly leader and so had to trust God completely for the way forward.  It wasn’t going to be easy for them.  Before Joshua they had Moses.  This was going to be their first time without a physical leader to guide them. 

In the first chapter we see that although they were in the land of Promise they still hadn’t possessed all of it. There were still enemies of God to be dealt with.   Remember last week I said that each of these people groups the ...ites... had been given chances to repent of their wicked ways but had not.

When we allow sin to occupy our life we get comfortable with it.  It eventually becomes normal and we don’t see it anymore.  God didn’t want the Israelites being comfortable with the Canaanites, Jebusites or any other ites.  It may seem harsh when we read of Adoni-Bezek losing his thumbs and big toes and yet we read of him doing this to seventy other kings.  Now he would be a worthless warrior and would be of no trouble to Israel anymore.  Difficult to function without your thumbs and your big toes.

It was a custom amongst the Romans who did not like military life to cut off their own thumbs so they wouldn’t be called into the Army.  Sometimes parents would do the same with their children so they didn’t have to go either (Clarke).

I want to read what Charles Spurgeon said of Acsah and how the requests give us a pattern of prayer.

i. She thought about what she wanted before she went to her father. Before you pray, know what you need before God. She came to God with a very definite request, that had been considered beforehand. "Think what you are going to ask before you begin to pray, and then pray like business men. This woman does not say to her father, 'Father, listen to me,' and then utter some pretty little oration about nothing; but she knows what she is going to ask for, and why she is going to ask it." (Spurgeon)

Some of us need to be more bold when we pray and to be specific.  Notice that she gets what she asks for.  Some of us are not getting what we want because we are not even asking.  Something to think about. 

It is interesting to note in 1:19 that Judah took possession of the hill country but they were unable to drive out the people from the lowlands because they had chariots.  Judah trusted God for one area of his promises but not another.  Were iron chariots a challenge for God….no.

The Israelites made a mistake when they forced the canaanites into forced labour.  As I said earlier we are not to compromise with sin.  Making decisions like this was going to cause a lot of problems for the tribes in the future.

One Pastor put it like this……

i. Essentially, the question is: what will we be satisfied with in our Christian life? For Israel, in Judges 1, they were satisfied with far less than what God wanted them to have, and far less than what God had provided for them.

ii. These Israelites didn't say "let's forsake God"; they simply decided that they would be satisfied with less. Once we satisfy ourselves with less than God's best for us, we will never be what God wants us to be.

David Guzik.

Chapter 2

We start this chapter with another history lesson from the Angel of the Lord (this is God appearing human form---- pre-incarnate Jesus).  He reminds the people of what He has done for them.  He gets into their business and asks them why they have disobeyed Him when they made a covenant to obey the Lord.  Confrontation is never fun but sometimes it is necessary just as in the case of the Israelites disobedience.  Disobedience comes at a price, there are consequences for sin.  I believe that at times I suffer the consequences of sin now because I didn’t deal with the problem when I was supposed to.  It doesn’t go away until we face it and deal with it.  We might be hard on the Israelites but we don’t have to look too far and see it going on in our own lives.

The Lord told the people that what he had promised in the past was now going to take place. 

i. But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall be that those whom you let remain shall be irritants in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall harass you in the land where you dwell. (Numbers 33:55)

The people wept for the consequences of their sin but we will see that their sin continues.  There is not a change in behaviour.  True repentance will show in our behaviour.  There should be a change.

There are some important lessons to be learned from the Israelites in v10ff.  There came a time whereby a generation grew up and didn’t know the Lord and didn’t know what he had done for Israel.  It is important as parents, Aunties,  caregivers that we talk of what the Lord has done for us with those coming behind us.  Reminding people of the goodness of God.  What are we passing onto the next generation?

The Israelites turned away from God and followed the gods of the people around them.  Baal was the god over the weather and nature for the canaanites.  This meant a lot in an agricutural society.  Then there was Ashtoreths.  This was the goddess of love, sex and fertility.  Baal and Ashteroth were not really gods at all and yet man had created them.  They wanted a god they could control or so they thought.

God is a jealous God which we read about in Joshua 24:19.  We are the bride of Christ.  It is Christ and His bride and He is not going to allow His bride to bring other lovers into the mix.  We look back in the old testament of people like David and Solomon having multiple wives.  It didn’t play out well. 

e. In the sight of the LORD: This implies that the sin was even more offensive to God. To give an extreme example, it is bad enough for a married person to commit adultery - but to commit adultery before the very eyes of one's spouse would be especially offensive. It is awesome to consider that all of our sin is done right before the eyes of God. (Guzik)

Who or what influences us today?  The canaanites and their lifestyle influences the Israelites greatly.  Back in Joshua 24 the Israelites were adamant that they would serve the Lord and now look where they are.  In a place of compromise and sinning blatantly against God and all they had agreed to.

God disciplines us because He loves us and desires for us to be repentant of our sin and to turn around and walk in fellowship with Him.  We are going to see a cycle over these next weeks of sin, bondage, deliverance, blessing and then straight back into sin again.  God is going to use specific people to deliver the Israelites.  They are called Judges (not as in a court of law) but more like a hero who God uses, in His mercy to save the people from themselves.

We sometimes need saved from ourselves.  However, because we sometimes think we know better God allows us what we want and we go through suffering and pain that really wasn’t necessary because  our hearts were set on things that were sinful.  We need to do heart checks now and again to see where our allegiance is….are we being faithful or unfaithful?