A Sermon on Judges 2:16-3:6 has been lightly edited.
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If you have your Bibles, I do ask that you would turn with me to the Book of Judges. Today we are going to wrap up the introduction, if you will, of the Book of Judges, which covers from verse 1 of chapter 1 through the 6th verse of chapter 3, but we’re only going to read chapter 2, verse 16, through chapter 3, verse 6.
I do want to take a moment while you’re turning there. For the last few weeks that we have covered the Book of Judges, we have talked an awful lot about God’s discipline and about God’s judgment, and we will continue to talk about that again today and on throughout the Book of Judges.
I want us to always see God’s discipline and judgment in light of His grace, and so that will be the theme of our sermon today. As you see the title there, “The Cycle Begins with Grace,” but I also want us to consider something else. We’ve been talking about hardship that comes into our lives, and we’ve been talking about that hardship sometimes being God’s discipline upon us for idolatry and for sin. I want us to be aware that not every hardship that comes to the child of God is the discipline of God.
In Luke 13, the Tower of Siloam falls, and the disciples come to Jesus, and they say, “What did those people that died in that accident, what did they do to deserve God’s wrath and God’s punishment?” And Jesus says, “No, no, no, that’s not how we look at those things, but examine your own heart to make sure that there are not things that you need to repent of when you hear of these things.”
We can apply that to our own personal lives in thinking about the hardship and the suffering that does come to us just because we live in a broken world. Yes, hardship comes and we need to examine our lives and repent where we should repent, but sometimes hardship comes just because life’s hard.
Many of you have come to me over the years as I’ve asked you how you’re doing, and you’ve kind of sighed and you’ve kind of slumped your shoulders and you’d say, “You know what, it’s not easy getting old.” God’s not disciplining you by making you old. That’s just part of living in this fallen and broken world.
But at the same time, in those struggles that come from living in this world, we should throw ourselves confidently upon God’s throne. Let us see his grace and his strength through our weakness and let us find ourselves embracing his compassion, embracing his love and embracing his grace, even in the midst of our hardship and in our struggle. Not every hardship is a discipline, but it should lead us to flee to God’s throne, examining our hearts and finding our peace and our hope in him and in him alone.
So with that in mind, let us turn now our attention to Judges chapter two, beginning in verse 16.
“Then the Lord raised up judges who saved them out of the hand of those who plundered them. 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 commands of the Lord, and they did not do so. 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. 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 stop any of their practices or their stubborn ways. 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. I will no longer drive out before them any of the nations that Joshua left when he died. In order to test Israel by them, whether they take care, whether they will take care to walk in the way of the Lord as their fathers did or not. So the Lord left those nations, not driving them out quickly, and he did not give them into the hand of Joshua. Now, these are the nations that the Lord left to test Israel by them. That is, in all Israel who had not experienced all the wars of Canaan. It was only in order that the generation of the people of Israel might know war, to teach war to those who had not known it before. These are the nations, the five lords of the Philistines and all the Canaanites and the Sidonians and the Hibbites who lived on Mount Lebanon from Mount Baal Hermon as far as Lebo Hamath. They were there 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.So the people of Israel lived among the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hibbites and the Jebusites and their daughters. They took to themselves for wives and their own daughters. They gave to their sons as they served their gods.”
Let’s pray. To the great God above. We do ask that you would show us your goodness and glory. May we know your love and your grace through this passage. We also ask Lord that we would be convicted and humbled before you so that we might confess and repent and take a step or two further along that path toward holiness and sanctification, which you have placed us on. And by the power of the Holy Spirit, you keep us on. And Lord, we also would ask that you would change us. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
INTRODUCTION
So in this passage today that we’re looking at, chapter two, verse 16 through chapter three, verse six, we are wrapping up the author’s summary of the overarching cycle that we will see throughout the book of judges.
Each judge that we come to, whether it’s Othniel, Ehud or even Samson later on, we’ll see this cycle and bits and pieces of the cycle fall in or come back out as we go along. But there’s this overarching cycle. And when we typically study the cycle, including what I said last week, the cycle looks like when we typically study the cycle, we begin with Israel’s idolatry and their abandonment of God.
But that’s the wrong place to begin the cycle of the judges. I’m going to call it the cycle of the judges. It’s typically called by commentators the deuteronomistic cycle. But since I have such a hard time saying that word, we’re just going to call it the cycle of the judges as we go through.
But often when we look at the cycle of judges, we do begin with with what we’ve read here, missing part of what we read here, but beginning with the idolatry and the rebellion and the turning of their back upon God that Israel does throughout this. But I hope today that we will see as we consider not only this, but we look forward to a little bit of what we studied in Sunday school today, even a thousand years from now in the history of Israel when they are committing the exact same sins. I hope that we will see that the cycle actually begins with the grace of God.
I want us to see that as we consider what God does for Israel throughout the book of Judges, but also how Israel responds to what God does for them.
WHAT GOD DOES FOR ISRAEL
So first, what does God do for Israel? Well, he does three things, according to this passage, for the nation of Israel.
And the first is there in verse 16. But before we read that, let’s step back to verse 15 real quick.
“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. Then the Lord raised up judges who saved them out of the hand of those who plundered them…”
What does the author tell us that happens between those last two words of verse 15: “Terrible distress” And the first words of verse 16: “Then the Lord raised up judges who saved them?” What happened between those two verses? Nothing. Nothing happened between the terrible distress that the Israelites brought upon themselves because of their sin and rebellion and the action of God to save them out of the hands of those who brought that terrible distress upon them.
And it’s that “nothing” that signals to us that there is something other than what the Israelites could do that would cause God to enter the action and the activity of saving the Israelites. And what is that thing? Well, it tells us down in verse 18.
“For the Lord was moved to pity by their groaning because of those who afflicted and oppressed them.”
Now, what was that groaning? Well, we’ll see it. We’ll see it show up a little bit later as cried out to the Lord throughout the rest of the book of Judges. But literally that word “groaning” there means those who whine and complain when they hurt. So what did Israel do in order to obligate God to save them? Absolutely nothing.
It was his pity. It was his desire to comfort them. It was his desire to keep the promises that he had made to them, even though they were being unfaithful. That caused God to act.
And that is what God does. The first thing God does to act out of grace for the Israelites is he provides rescue for them, even though they have gotten themselves into their own trouble. How does he provide rescue for them? He calls and empowers men to be military leaders to lead them in military victory against the nations who had oppressed them and then gives them a period of rest.
God acts in grace to raise up these men. We’ll see Othniel. We’ll see Ehud. We’ll see Barak and Deborah. We’ll see several others, Gideon and Jephthah. And each of these men is a little bit less righteous, a little bit less moral than the one before him.
Until if we were to compare Othniel and Samson, we would see two very different people when it comes to their willingness to follow God’s commands and to walk in the path that the fathers had walked in. As we’re reminded here again, but God raises up these men. He calls them and then he puts his Spirit upon them so that they can lead the Israelites from faith or from oppression, excuse me, to rest.
What a glorious picture of our own salvation. What do we do to help with our salvation? About as much as the Israelites did to deserve God’s rescue. Ephesians chapter two, beginning in verse one, says
“You were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience…But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ – by grace, you have been saved – and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Jesus Christ. So that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”
As we look through the book of Judges, as we study each of these judges, we will see something that we don’t expect. What we expect to see, what we expect to be told is live like these judges, be like these men. Let God call you, let God empower you and let God use you like he used these men. But if we truly think about it, as we truly study the book of Judges, we will see that you and I cannot be like these men.
We are not the one who is called to bring rescue and rest to the people of God. We are the rebellious people of God who need rescue and rest. And God raised up judges for the Israelites and for you and me, he raised up our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Sent him to provide the righteousness and the redemption necessary for us to be moved from dead in our trespasses and sins to alive in Christ who are the beautiful, beloved children of God. We are Israel and our great judge has been sent and raised up for our salvation, not because of anything we did.
One theologian says, you’ve heard me quote this before; one theologian says the only thing we bring to the table of our salvation is the sin that makes it necessary. And yet God in his grace sent Jesus to provide rescue and rest for us so that we might have freedom from our own terrible distress, that terrible distress of sin in our life.
And so the first thing that God does for Israel as an act of grace is he raises up judges. He brings them salvation simply because of his compassion, simply because of his love, simply because of his grace and mercy.
The second thing that God does for Israelite as an act of grace is he tests them. Now you might be asking me, Ike, why is testing an act of grace? Well, testing in this context reveals the heart. It is to put somebody or something in a difficult situation, in a hardship so that the heart is revealed.
Now, does God need Israel’s heart revealed? No, he doesn’t need it. He’s omniscient. He knows all things. He knows their heart. But who does need to see their heart revealed? The Israelites do.
They need to see where they fall short of those commands that their fathers walked in. They need to see where when the going gets tough, they turn to other gods rather than the one true God above. What they need is their heart exposed.
They need to see that they turn to the wrong place when things are difficult. And they need to see that those false gods will fail them every time.
Tim Keller in one of his sermons compared two musicians. The first is John Coltrane, the great jazz saxophonist of the 20th century. John Coltrane lived for his music until 1957.
And in 1957, John Coltrane became a Christian. And in some of his interviews and some of his writings, John Coltrane talks about how he used to live for the music, but once he understood his relationship with God and how Jesus had reconciled that, he could see his music as a tool not to fill him, but as a tool to glorify God. And it allowed him so much freedom within his music as he saw his music as something he used to glorify God.
Compare that with Madonna. Now, I know, comparing Madonna and John Coltrane, some of you are thinking, “Ike, you’re kind of crazy here.” We’re not comparing music styles, we’re not comparing music, we’re comparing motivation here. In a Vogue magazine interview several years ago, Madonna was asked about her music and why she always sought to push the boundaries with her music. And she said, music was a way for me to feel special. Music was a way for me to overcome the mediocrity of my life.
And I had to keep doing it over and over and over again because that feeling of specialness only lasted for so long. And then I was overwhelmed once again by my mediocrity. John Coltrane made his music to honor and glorify God. Madonna made her music to fill her, to comfort herself in order to make herself feel special. Like Rocky tells Adrian before the big fight in Rocky, I gotta go the distance so that I know I’m not a bum.
We turn to the gods of this world, to the false gods of this world, to know that we’re not a bum. To make ourselves feel special in the light of the mediocrity of this world, where the specialness of knowing that God, our Savior, has made us his child through the work of Christ is there for the child of God. We turn to the things of this world to numb ourselves to the things of this world, and they will fail us every single time.
And so God brings hardship, God brings the testing in order to reveal our hearts to us, in order to show us where we pursue false gods and where we should repent and pursue the one true God who will take those pains, who will take the hardships, who will take the joys of this life, and make them glorious through the work of his Son.
And so the Lord rescues, the Lord saves the Israelites, the Lord tests the Israelites. But as we’ve seen over and over again, the Lord actually also disciplines the Israelites.
It says in verse 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, I will no longer drive out before them any of the nations that Joshua left when he died.”
The truth of the matter is God’s anger is real, God’s hatred of sin is real. We don’t like to think about this, because when you and I think about anger, we think about our own anger.
And if we’re honest for ourselves, most of the time our anger is petty and vindictive. It might be directed at the right thing, but we use it the wrong way. God’s anger is not petty, God’s anger is not vindictive.
For the child of God, God’s anger is expressed in discipline that is designed to bring you back to fellowship with him, to bring you back to reconciliation and repentance.
For the unbeliever, the anger, the discipline, the judgment of God in this life is designed to bring you to repentance, is designed to motivate you and to push you to rest and to rely upon him and upon him alone. But in the next life, it will be an exercise of God’s infinite and eternal justice. And he will be glorified by the expression of that wrath and that anger.
So what does God do for his people? Well, he rescues them. He tests them and he disciplines them. And remember, this is all motivated by God’s grace, by God’s compassion, by God’s pity, by God’s love.
ISRAEL’S RESPONSE TO GOD’S GRACE
So how do the Israelites react to God’s grace, to God’s compassion, to God’s pity and to God’s love? Well, they do it in two different ways.
The first is, the author puts it bluntly, they whore after other gods. They prostitute themselves to the gods of the Canaanites. You know what, honestly, I get uncomfortable reading words like this sometimes as we go through the Bible. I remember one time I was reading through the book of, a chapter out of the book of Lamentations and over and over again, it’s like five, it felt like 100,000 times, so it’s probably only about five.
It says in the book of Lamentations that Israels whored after other gods. And I remember at the time, there was a sweet little old lady sitting right over there, just looked at me with shock in her eyes. So I have a hard time reading these words, but it gets across the nature of our sin and idolatry.
How does God present the relationship between himself and Israel throughout scriptures? There’s the relationship of king and subjects. There’s the relationship of shepherd and sheep. But oftentimes, it is the picture of husband and wife.
Think about the book of Hosea, at least the first half of the book of Hosea. God comes to Hosea and he says, “Hosea, go marry Gomer. Go marry this woman that I have set apart for you.”
So Hosea goes and he gathers Gomer to himself and he marries her, except she won’t give up her previous line of work. What was Gomer’s previous line of work? She was a prostitute, but she won’t give that up. She continues to leave the house and go out and sell herself.
At one point, Hosea has to go and rescue her because the people she has sold herself to have beaten her. At another time, Hosea has to take a year’s worth of income and purchase her because she has ended up on the slave block for sale to the highest bidder. And God says that is a picture of the relationship between me and my people.
I am the faithful husband who rescues and redeems time and time again. And they are the unfaithful wife who sells themselves to the lowest bidder. And so when we chase after other gods, gods other than the one who has saved us, the one who has rescued us, the one who tests us, and yes, the one who disciplines us, we are prostituting ourselves to those gods.
And they don’t just kind of stay at the same level. This selling themselves to the gods of the Canaanites, it says here that each generation was more corrupt than the next.
We talk about this cycle of judges. God rescues and gives rest. Israel rebels and goes under oppression. Groans and cries and whines, sometimes cries out, and then God rescues and gives rest.
And we think about it as a circle. We think about it as a cycle. But one thing we’ll see as we go through the book of Judges is that it’s a spiral. The same territory, but deeper and deeper every time until when we get to chapter 17 through 21, Israel is described in the same words that God used to describe Sodom and Gomorrah in verse, excuse me, in Genesis chapter 19.
Now you want to talk about grace here. Let’s just stop for just a moment. We want to talk about grace. In the Hebrew Bible, after Judges 21, 1 Samuel 1 appears. Think about that.
Israel, at the time that Samuel is born, looks more like Sodom and Gomorrah than they do the people of God. And yet, what does Samuel do? He brings about the king who was the man after God’s own heart. You want to talk about grace? Did they deserve David? Absolutely not.
And yet God had promised back when Jacob was in Egypt, God had promised that the tribe of Judah would have the scepter and that salvation and glory for Israel would come from the tribe of Judah. And here they are in the midst of their cesspool of sin. And God provides David.
And you and I, when we are in the cesspool of our own sin, God provided Jesus so that we might have salvation. We talked about in Sunday school today that when Israel had been sent off into exile and they came back during the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, they were actually doing the same sins that we’re going to look at now.
We’ve looked at them whoring themselves out after other gods, but the other thing they did to show their disdain to God for His grace and His love, verse six of chapter three,
“And their daughters, they took themselves for wives and their own daughters, they gave to their sons and they served their gods.”
Not only did they not kick the people out of the land, not only did they not expel the people and keep them separate from themselves, they ended up intermarrying with the people of the land.
Bruce, I found it interesting. I was looking through. There were eight nations listed in Ezra that they had intermarried with. Five of them are right here in chapter three of the book of Judges. They did not learn their lesson here.
They don’t learn it later. They need somebody greater than them to come and to provide reconciliation, and so God ends up sending Jesus. But what’s wrong with intermarrying, you might ask? Well, let’s look at this on a big picture.
How do we determine what is right and wrong within the government and the rulership of the church? Do we approach the scriptures and study the scriptures and interpret the scriptures to see what God says he wants done in his church? Or do we go out and see what the culture says?
A lot of people go and look at what the culture says and say, “Well, you know, things are different now than they were back then, and we live in the 21st century, so we have to change what the Bible says in order to live our life.” But what happens with that? You begin to compromise on one thing, and then you give up another thing, and you give up another thing, and you give up another thing, and ultimately, you don’t look like the church anymore. You don’t look like God’s people.
When we invite the world into the church to set our agenda, to set our truth, we sacrifice the truth of the scripture. And that’s what they were doing here. They were intermarrying.
They were not only worshiping the gods, but they were bringing the gods into the home. They were bringing the gods into their daily life. And Daniel Bloch says it this way. He says,
“Peaceful coexistence leads to cohabitation and alliance with the world, which in turn leads to taking on the religious notions of the world. This is the rule. Occasions when the influence is in the reverse direction are the exception.”
Now, this intermarrying is not a racial thing. We know Rahab converted to worshiping the God of the Israelites, and she was brought into the community. Ruth, which we’ll study after the book of Judges, embraced the God of Israel and then married into the community.
This is a religious thing. When we bring unbelievers in and we give the world power within the church, we lose the truth, and we lose the church.
CONCLUSION
So the cycle begins with grace.
God acts on behalf of Israel. He does so not because they earned His grace, but because He was moved by grace and love to rescue the Israelites. Their cycle began with grace.
Your salvation cycle began with grace, and it ends with grace as well.
Let’s pray. Father God above, we do thank you for the many blessings that you give to us, and we thank you that even when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Please change us by the knowledge that grace is at work day in and day out. We pray this in Jesus’ name, amen.
As you go this week, take this blessing from God upon you:
“Grace and peace be yours in abundance through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.”
He who testifies to these things says, yes, I am coming soon.
Amen, come Lord Jesus.
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