A Place Of Grace
9-6-26
  • What happens when people insist on doing what is right in their own eyes while living under the sovereignty of God?
    Judges 9–12 gives two simultaneous answers:
    Man's self-rule leads increasingly toward destruction.
    2. God's sovereign rule continues faithfully despite man's rebellion.

    WATCHING THE SPIRAL SPREAD

    We have already watched the cycle of Judges repeat: Sin → Oppression → Cry → Deliverance → Rest → Sin again.
    The cycle isn't merely repeating. The spiral is descending as we move forward:
    And the decline isn't localized.
    It moves across the land.
    It moves across generations.
    It moves through Israel's families.
    It moves into Israel's worship.
    And increasingly, it moves into the judges themselves…
    The people God raises up to deliver Israel are increasingly beginning to resemble the culture from which Israel needs deliverance.
    This prepares us for the statement the writer of Judges will eventually repeat:
    “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” — Judges 17:6; & Judges 21:25
    That statement doesn't appear yet in chapters 9–12, but… the condition it describes already shows this mindset.
    And this is important…
    Because Judges isn't simply showing us people intentionally choosing what they know is evil.
    It shows something perhaps more dangerous: People deciding for themselves what is good.
    Throughout these chapters we will see the tension between two things:
    Human autonomy: I determine what is right… self-governing
    Divine sovereignty: God remains Lord, fully in control regardless of what I determine.
    Israel increasingly lives as though the first is true while God continually demonstrates the second. And now Judges allows us to watch the consequences unfold…

    SIN SPREADS

    When We Reject God's Rule, We Begin Establishing Our Own
    Judges 9… This is where Abimelech (my father is king) is fascinating. At the end of Gideon's story, Israel says:
    And what does Gideon's son do?… He attempts to become king.
    The LORD will rule over you… (Gideon) becomes… I will rule over you. (Abimelech)
    Judges 9:1–6 gives us this progression of Abimelech:
    He appeals to family loyalty.
    He receives money from the temple of Baal-berith.
    He hires “worthless and reckless fellows.”
    He murders seventy brothers.
    And Shechem crowns him king.
    This is a man grasping for authority God never gave him. (NOT A JUDGE)
    Jotham's parable is such a powerful statement: Judges 9:7–15 — The Bramble King
    The olive tree says no.
    The fig tree says no.
    The vine says no.
    But the bramble says: I'll be your king.
    The bramble essentially says: Come take refuge in my shade—or I'll burn you.
    The irony is tremendous
    A bramble hardly provides shade
    But it burns exceptionally well
    And that's exactly what happens… The king they choose eventually consumes them.
    The principle: When we reject God's authority, we don't eliminate authority— … we replace it with our own.
    BUT WHERE IS GOD IN THE DISFUNCTION & CHAOS?
    We saw God's Unseen Hand in Judges 4–5
    Is God working in all of this chaos and disfunction?
    Judges 9:23 “God sent a spirit that stirred up trouble between Abimelech and the leading citizens of Shechem, and they revolted.”
    Judges 9:23 NASB95
    Then God sent an evil spirit between Abimelech and the men of Shechem; and the men of Shechem dealt treacherously with Abimelech,
    Judges 9:56 “In this way, God punished Abimelech for the evil he had done against his father by murdering his seventy brothers.”
    Judges 9:56 NASB95
    Thus God repaid the wickedness of Abimelech, which he had done to his father in killing his seventy brothers.
    Everyone in these chapters thinks they are controlling events…
    *** But God has never surrendered sovereignty… Man can reject God's rule, but man can never escape God's sovereignty.

    SIN DISTORTS

    When We Determine What Is Right, We Eventually Redefine God
    Judges 10–11… we move quickly through Tola and Jair… Judges 10:1–5 gives us 45 years in five verses.
    And don't miss what that says about sovereignty:
    God's sovereign work isn't always spectacular. Sometimes God quietly preserves His people for decades.
    Then everything falls apart again.
    Judges 10:6 Look at the list of gods…
    Baals… Ashtaroth…
    Gods of Aram, Sidon, Moab, Ammon, Philistines!!!
    It's almost as though Israel is saying: We'll worship anyone except Yahweh.
    Judges 10:7 says: “The anger of the LORD burned against Israel…”
    God hands them over to the consequences of their rebellion
    And eventually they cry: “We have sinned against You…” — Judges 10:10
    But God's initial response is startling.
    Judges 10:13–14 ““Yet you have forsaken Me and served other gods; therefore I will no longer deliver you. “Go and cry out to the gods which you have chosen; let them deliver you in the time of your distress.””
    Judges 10:13–14 NASB95
    “Yet you have forsaken Me and served other gods; therefore I will no longer deliver you. “Go and cry out to the gods which you have chosen; let them deliver you in the time of your distress.”
    Autonomy eventually exposes itself… The gods we create are never big enough to save us.
    Look at this beautiful statement in Judges 10:16 “So they put away the foreign gods from among them and served the Lord; and He could bear the misery of Israel no longer.”
    Judges 10:16 NASB95
    So they put away the foreign gods from among them and served the Lord; and He could bear the misery of Israel no longer.
    Here is your sovereign God:
    Holy enough to discipline.
    Righteous enough to confront sin.
    Compassionate enough to be moved by their misery.

    THE GOD BOX — JEPHTHAH

    Jephthah represents another stage in the deterioration (or distortion)… He knows about Yahweh.
    His response to the Ammonite king in Judges 11:12–28 demonstrates considerable knowledge of Israel's history.
    He knows what God has done
    But knowing God's history isn't necessarily the same as understanding God's character.
    Notice the order: Judges 11:29
    Judges 11:29 NASB95
    Now the Spirit of the Lord came upon Jephthah, so that he passed through Gilead and Manasseh; then he passed through Mizpah of Gilead, and from Mizpah of Gilead he went on to the sons of Ammon.
    “Now the Spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah…” God has already acted.
    Then: Judges 11:30
    Judges 11:30 NASB95
    Jephthah made a vow to the Lord and said, “If You will indeed give the sons of Ammon into my hand,
    “Jephthah made a vow to the LORD…” Jephthah bargains with God!
    God, if You give me victory, then I'll give You…
    REMEMBER THE GOD BOX???
    Jephthah has made God small enough in his thinking that he believes God can be manipulated.
    And worse yet: He's doing it while sounding spiritual.
    That is a significant development in Judges.
    Earlier Israel was abandoning God for idols.
    Now we're seeing something subtler: They can use God's name while still doing what is right in their own eyes.
    That brings this painfully close to us doesn't it?
    Sometimes rebellion says:
    “I don't need God.”
    But sometimes rebellion sounds much more spiritual:
    “God, here's what I've decided to do—now I need You to bless it.”
    That's still autonomy… We've just baptized it with religious language.

    SIN DESTROYS

    What Begins in Our Eyes Eventually Ends in Death
    Look at what (Autonomy) self-rule has produced…
    Gideon's sons — murdered.
    Shechem — destroyed.
    Abimelech — dead.
    Jephthah's daughter — tragedy.
    Ephraim against Gilead.
    42,000 Ephraimites dead!!!
    Earlier in Judges, Israel was fighting its enemies.
    By Judges 12: Israel is killing Israel.
    That is the spiral downward:
    Everyone thinks they have a reason.
    Everyone believes they're justified.
    Everyone has their own understanding of what is right.
    James 1:14–15 gives us the progression: “But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.”
    James 1:14–15 NASB95
    But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.
    Desire → Sin → Death.
    Romans 6:23: gives us the conclusion: “For the wages of sin is death…”
    Romans 6:23 NASB95
    For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
    Judges 9–12 puts pictures to what Romans and James put into words.
    Sin has a destination… and it is Death.

    GOD REMAINS

    Human Rebellion Never Dethrones Divine Sovereignty
    Consider what God has been doing while everyone else has been doing what is right in their own eyes:
    Chapter 9 — God judges.
    “Thus God repaid the wickedness of Abimelech…” — 9:56
    Chapter 10 — God preserves.
    Tola and Jair give Israel decades of stability. — 10:1-5
    Chapter 10 — God disciplines.
    “The anger of the LORD burned against Israel…” — 10:7
    Chapter 10 — God has compassion.
    “He could bear the misery of Israel no longer.” — 10:16
    Chapter 11 — God empowers.
    “The Spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah…” — 11:29
    Chapter 11 — God delivers.
    “The LORD gave them into his hand.” — 11:32
    Chapter 12 — God continues preserving.
    Ibzan… Elon… Abdon…
    The narrator barely tells us anything about them.
    But God continues working!
    Back in Judges 4–5 we talked about God's unseen hand.
    We watched Him work through people, armies, weather, and even the Kishon River.
    But Judges 9–12 asks us a harder question: Is God's unseen hand still working when everything seems to be falling apart?
    And the answer is: YES!!!
    God was sovereign when the river rose.
    God was sovereign when Gideon's 300 stood against thousands.
    And God is still sovereign when His people are making a complete mess of everything.
    God's sovereignty does not mean everything that happens is good. It means that nothing that does happen can dethrone God or prevent Him from accomplishing His purposes.

    BEFORE WE POINT AT ISRAEL

    Now I would use what you've written about us looking at Israel and thinking, “How foolish!”
    We read Judges and wonder:
    How could they keep doing this?
    Didn't they remember?
    Why didn't they just listen to God?
    But Remember we are watching:
    Different generations.
    Different geographical locations.
    Different leaders.
    Different cultural influences.
    Different pressures.
    Different circumstances.
    All across several centuries.
    And every generation keeps facing the same fundamental question: Who gets to determine what is right?
    And that's where Judges stops being ancient history.… Because we face exactly the same question.
    Is RIGHT determined by:
    My feelings?
    My experience?
    My culture?
    My desires?
    My circumstances?
    What everybody around me says?
    Or… Has God spoken?
    The words in Joshua 24:15 “Choose for yourselves today whom you will serve…” challenged not only the people standing there that day, but every generation we see in Judges, and it still holds true for this generation here today!
    Because ultimately the issue isn't merely:
    Will I make good choices?…
    The deeper question is:
    Who is God, and will I choose to submit to Him?
    Human autonomy says: “I will determine what is right.”
    Faith says: “God has determined what is right, and I will trust Him.”
    … And even when man refuses to submit:
    God does not surrender His throne.
    God does not abandon His purposes.
    God remains righteous.
    God remains compassionate.
    God remains faithful.
    God remains sovereign.
    Man rebels. Sin spreads. Death follows. God remains.
    We looked at the scripture declaring: “For the wages of sin is death…” — Romans 6:23
    Romans 6:23 NASB95
    For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
    Judges has shown us that reality of sin over and over again.
    Sin spreads. Sin distorts. Sin destroys. Sin brings death...
    But Romans 6:23 doesn't end with death: “…but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
    And that brings us to this table. In our misery and lost state in sin, God had mercy on us and sent His Son Jesus Christ.
    God remained faithful… to send a Messiah, Jesus Christ
    The bread reminds us of a body given.
    The cup reminds us of blood shed.
    And at the cross, the consequence of sin that we have seen throughout Judges—death—was placed upon the One who had no sin of His own.

      • Judges 9:23NASB95

      • Judges 9:56NASB95

      • Judges 10:13–14NASB95

      • Judges 10:16NASB95

      • Judges 11:29NASB95

      • Judges 11:30NASB95

      • James 1:14–15NASB95

      • Romans 6:23NASB95

      • Romans 6:23NASB95

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