- In chapter one, we start out with the death of Joshua and what happened among the tribes in the next stages of clearing out of the land. It ends with the failures and the reasons in chapter 2:1-5
- Now 2:6 starts out with a flashback, which is also a summary of the end of the book of Joshua and the first chapter of Judges. In fact, this whole chapter is both a summary of where they started and how they lived over the next 200 plus years
- What is the author trying to do with these opening verses?
- Show how and why they failed
- What is his argument?
- The next generation, second generation believers, did not truly know what God had done for Israel. They only knew the stories
- Good spiritual leadership died. Why is that important? Good spiritual leadership is willing to ask hard questions and challenge your life. If you stay away from spiritual authority, it is because you are not willing to have your life challenged. We need people who will hold us accountable. Without that type of leadership, it is easy to fall into patterns of sin
- The people didn't really know God. Why is that important? Without a relationship, it is not faith but just a set of rules (religion). And rules will not carry you though in life
- APPLICATION: Who is a spiritual authority in your life? Do you have someone that you would trust to call your actions into questions? Or do you avoid having that type of leadership involved in your life?
- APPLICATION: Do you have a growing relationship with God, or is God only a set of rules?
- The result for these second generation believers who only knew the stories, who had know spiritual authority, and who saw faith as a set of rules and not a relationship with God, is … what?
- They left God
- They did what the people around them did. What do we call this?
- They fitted in. They accepted the culture. They talk like them, swore like them, lived like them
- What is today's religion and idols?
- Agnosticism or anything goes, but also atheism
- Sex, entertainment, materialism, whatever makes one happy
- What are other characteristics of this culture?
- Language, coarseness
- Sexual innuendos
- Incivility, cool to be rude or sarcastic
- Cynicism
- How do you think God views his children living like this culture?
- Heb 12:7-11 (NIV) Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father? 8 If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. 9 Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! 10 Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. 11 No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.
- Heb 12:25-26, 28-29 (NIV) See to it that you do not refuse him who speaks. If they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, how much less will we, if we turn away from him who warns us from heaven?... 28 Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, 29 for our "God is a consuming fire."
- APPLICATION: Not all suffering is God's discipline, but God will use suffering to discipline or to get your attention. We need to praying:
- Ps 139:23-24 (NIV) Search me, O God, and know my heart; // test me and know my anxious thoughts. // 24 See if there is any offensive way in me, // and lead me in the way everlasting.
- So when the people were in great distress because of their sins, what did God do and why?
- He raised up leaders, judges
- I think there were two roles for these judges but because they were imperfect, not all of them did a very good job
- One, they were to save Israel physically by defeating their enemies
- Two, they were to save Israel spiritually by guiding them spiritually, by being an example of a man or woman who only worshiped God, not the heathen culture
- The judges were not effective. Some of it has to do with the judges, but what is the other reason?
- The people were too stubborn
- The people did not want to give up their evil practices and stubborn ways
- THEY LOVED THEIR SIN MORE THAN THEY LOVED GOD
- The lie in the above statement is that loving God is much more satisfying
- APPLICATION: Who are our spiritual leaders and how should we be responding to them?
- Heb 13:7 (NIV) Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.
- Heb 13:17 (NIV) Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They keep watch over you as men who must give an account. Obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no advantage to you.
- Two reasons are given for life being hard and both are true, what does it say?
- The nations were there to test the people because they had failed to be obedient (verses 2:20-23 and 3:4)
- For those who did not know warfare, the testing was to give them battle experience (verses 3:1-3) -- Red Flag (RF) example: Most pilots in Vietnam were killed in the first ten missions. RF was to created to give them the first ten missions in a controlled environment
- So, while this might seem contradictory, the fact that both reasons are given in the same paragraph means that both reasons are true
- So, because of disobedience, God uses their circumstances to test their faith
- And, God uses their circumstances to teach them warfare
- Why is it necessary to learn warfare if God is your protection?
- Because, when God works in our life, we have to act as well
- We are not compliant puppets
- We have a responsibility to choose, take the first step, and follow through on our actions
- God's responsibility is the results, but that does not mean will lay down on our couch eating chips and watching TV
- APPLICATION: Are you partnering with God? Are you in one of two extremes? 1) God does it all and I don't have to do anything or 2) I have to work hard at it to be successful. The answer lies at both extremes. I need to do my darnedest and I need to trust God completely, and give him the praise
Judges 2:6–10 (ESV) —
6 When Joshua dismissed the people, the people of Israel went
each to his inheritance to take possession of the land. 7 And the people served the Lord all
the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who
had seen all the great work that the Lord had done for Israel. 8 And Joshua the son of Nun, the
servant of the Lord, died at the age of 110 years. 9 And they buried him within the
boundaries of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of
Ephraim, north of the mountain of Gaash. 10 And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers.
And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the
work that he had done for Israel.
Judges 2:11–19 (ESV) —
11 And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord
and served the Baals. 12 And they abandoned the Lord, the God of their
fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt. They went after other
gods, from among the gods of the peoples who were around them, and bowed down
to them. And they provoked the Lord to anger. 13 They
abandoned the Lord and served the Baals and the Ashtaroth. 14 So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he gave them
over to plunderers, who plundered them. And he sold them into the hand of
their surrounding enemies, so that they could no longer withstand their
enemies. 15 Whenever they marched out, the hand of the Lord was
against them for harm, as the Lord had warned, and as the Lord had sworn to
them. And they were in terrible distress.
16 Then the Lord raised up judges, who saved them out of the hand of
those who plundered them. 17 Yet they did not listen to
their judges, for they whored after other gods and bowed down to them. They
soon turned aside from the way in which their fathers had walked, who had
obeyed the commandments of the Lord, and they did not do so. 18 Whenever the Lord raised up judges for them, the Lord was with the
judge, and he saved them from the hand of their enemies all the days of the
judge. For the Lord was moved to pity by their groaning because of those who
afflicted and oppressed them. 19 But whenever the judge died,
they turned back and were more corrupt than their fathers, going after other
gods, serving them and bowing down to them. They did not drop any of their
practices or their stubborn ways.
Judges 2:20–3:6 (ESV) —
20 So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he said,
“Because this people have transgressed my covenant that I commanded their
fathers and have not obeyed my voice, 21 I will no longer
drive out before them any of the nations that Joshua left when he died, 22 in order to test Israel by them, whether they will take care to walk
in the way of the Lord as their fathers did, or not.” 23 So the Lord left those nations, not driving them out quickly, and he
did not give them into the hand of Joshua.
3:1 Now these are the nations that the Lord left, to test Israel by them,
that is, all in Israel who had not experienced all the wars in Canaan. 2 It was only in order that the generations of the people of Israel
might know war, to teach war to those who had not known it before. 3 These are the nations: the five lords of the Philistines and all the
Canaanites and the Sidonians and the Hivites who lived on Mount Lebanon, from
Mount Baal-hermon as far as Lebo-hamath. 4 They were for the
testing of Israel, to know whether Israel would obey the commandments of the
Lord, which he commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses. 5 So the people of Israel lived among the Canaanites, the Hittites, the
Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. 6 And their daughters they took to themselves for wives, and their own
daughters they gave to their sons, and they served their gods.
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