Week 22: Judges 2-4; 6-8; 13-16

The Lord is peace. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:55

Hi, welcome back to the Receivers Podcast. This week we're trying something a little bit fun, and I'm going to be recording in my dad's office, and I have this really cool mic, but it's going to be down here, so it won't be as loud. Sorry for the crash when it came down. But today we're going to be talking about judges and what that looks like, and we have some maps, and it's going to be really exciting and pretty high tech, if I do say. But if you're still just listening to it, that's fine. But maybe for the more virtual learners, we can have a fun little video. So, what is happening in the book of Judges? Where did we just leave off? So Joshua is dead. And now each tribe, after they've come in and fought, right? Um, or you know, in probably the cases they've assimilated a little bit, right? So they've both fought people and destroyed their cities and they've militarily and then they've also probably just assimilated and moved into this land. So there are still enemies living all around them. And each tribe gets their own piece of land, but they don't have a ruler. Like we talked about last week. Most of Israel is split into these smaller groups. So you basically live in your household, which is gonna be like two or up to two or three generations. So you might live with like your grandparents and your cousins, and like maybe your grandpa would be the head of that household, and that's really what your day-to-day is based on. You're all gonna live in a house. Um, archaeology points to the idea that you would actually live in like it was called a six-room house, or is it a four-room? Oh gosh, I can't remember. I think it's a six room, and that's kind of and everybody so everybody lived up on the top. Uh, there it was like a split level, and everybody lived on the top, and then the animals lived on the bottom in like the stable. So that's what most everyday Israelite was living at when they first moved. The reason we can tell this is because uh archaeology, like archaeologically, at the same time that the Israelites were moving in, we see this development of this house. And so people are like, okay, that is a I I guys, it's gonna bug me if I don't look it up. And I'm so embarrassed that I didn't know. So Israelite four-chamber house? Let's see what it says. Yeah, sorry, it's a four-room house, not a six. Six, no, four-chambered house, and so that's what you're gonna live in each. Meaning four rooms, basically on the bottom and then on the top. And that was a new development, it's not been seen before, so that's when we're like, okay, that's probably when the Israelites moved in. And most people were living that, like we said, with their grandparents or their parents, and that's kind of what you lived in. And then there was a group of those family units of those households, which would be known as a family clan, and they would also have a leader. And then a bunch of these family clans together would all be under the thing of a tribe. So, like a bunch of these family clans would make up Manasseh or Ephraim or Judah, etc. So this is what you were mostly looking like, looking like, and that's what every day kind of looked like. But because there were still enemies, sometimes you would need to fight them off militarily. They would either come and most of the time, what the stories are gonna be is that they are still um attacking them. The Philistines are going to be attacking them, um, the Amorites are going to be attacking them, and so they're getting all these men, and so sometimes you have to band together both as tribes and as the entire unit of Israel together. So that's what's happening in the book of Judges, is that the Israelites, um, because they didn't fully destroy everyone, even though that's what Joshua told us, it's a little bit of propaganda, there's still um, there are still non-Israelites in the land, and they are either threatening them spiritually, right? By like, oh, they worship this god, and Israelites will kind of assimilate that or take that into their own religion. And um, and then while they're also kind of, you know, mingling, they're also getting attacked militarily, and that's who these judges were. The judges are not the Supreme Court justice, okay? So don't think about it like that. What these people are are military leaders. They come up and they rise together either the tribe that they're a part of or all of Israel to go and attack, and they're strong, and they're saviors in that sense, right? And so I think from that you can get an idea of what the Israelites might have been thinking at the time of Jesus, right? That of the Messiah, the anointed one, he's gonna come save us, just like the judges did. The Spirit of the Lord comes upon them, meaning they're they feel called, they feel obligated to go and save the people from these military threats. And then a lot of times these judges, not always, these judges weren't always righteous in a religious sense, right? Sometimes they didn't. For example, when we read about Samson, we'll be like, oh, he actually wasn't that good of a guy. Interesting. But they still saved Israel and God still used them as a means to save Israel. So again, God using imperfect people to bring past the salvation of many. But then some of them were, and some of them were very spiritually close to the Lord and called the people away from idol worship. So before we get into the actual story, um, in the chapters that are laid apart on the Come Follow Me This Week, we get um stories about how they were kind of dealing with the idolatry and what that looked like. So that's what's happening in Judges 2 through 4. So Israel begins to be disobedient because of the people that are around them. And again, I think a lot of times we blame Israel for this, but we can't because there's also so many things that were very similar to their own, and that they took um and assimilated into their culture, which ultimately be uh was really good. So um the the Canaanites, for example, or the Philistines, um, all had gods that are quite similar. So um uh in verse, uh sorry, in chapter two, verse 11, they did that was evil in the sight of the Lord and served the Baals. That literally means the Lords. Baal was a god, a Canaanite god, who had many similarities to Jehovah in some ways, right? Um He was a storm god and a divine warrior, right? So he fought for them just the way that God, uh, that the Jehovah had been fighting for the Israelites. Um and so, and the storm god, right? Like he causes storms to happen, as did Jehovah. And so there's a lot of similarities, and also they may have understood Jehovah a little bit better as they're being introduced to these gods, but a lot of times this led them away from actually worshiping Jehovah, right? They're like, well, Baal's similar enough to our god that maybe they're the same. No, so that's Baal, and then we have Astartes, right? Or um um Asherah is also what it could be known as. And so what was Astarte or Asherah were these feminine gods? These were the female gods, um, most of the time married to another god, Baal, um, or El, El, who was the head gods, Baal, who was his son, right? So we can kind of see the similarities in our own um Latter-day Saint belief today. We're like, okay, El Elohim, right? His son, Jehovah. We're like, okay, I'm there. So you can see how, like, you could get conflated and you could be like, well, it's basically the same thing. But it was the fact that they forgot about Jehovah, right? They forgot about who was the one who was actually saving them. And at the time, too, in ancient Near East, it would be a lot like, well, there's a god of a land. So a god wasn't necessarily a god over everything in the world, they were the god of the land. Now they could be the storm god of the land, they could be the head god of the land, right? But they were just a god of the land. But that was what was so unique about Israelite um religion, especially once the exile happens, is that they're not, he's just not, he's not a god of a land, he's a god of a people. They are a people, they're not just a land. In fact, in another archaeological find, um, an Egyptian stella at this time, we get um uh we get the Egyptian stella at the time that actually has the people of Israel. It does not say the land of Israel, it says the people, the tr the the group of people of Israel. And so that's important too, because we get we know that they were a people and that God was a god of a people rather than of the land, and that makes him super unique. Now back to Asherah. Who was Asherah? Ashera, like I said, a feminine god married to one to one of the main gods, um a consort is what they call, but basically just means marriage, and you would worship her by um putting up sticks, and maybe these sticks had carvings on them, but what you would do is you would perform um promiscuous acts in front of these sticks, um kind of putting forth fertility. She was a fertility goddess, right? And so, and at a time, and we'll learn about this later, you know, and we've already learned about this in Genesis, being fertile is valuable. It keeps you have somebody to add to your economy, right? Of the household that you're living in, but you also that's how you're remembered, and so it was very important that you had kids, that your tribe had kids, that your large group that you were a part of had kids, that your animals had kids, because that means you have prosperity, right? So there's a lot, so that's why Asher was so important. Um, but the problem with that is that it led people away from worshiping the true God by and performing acts that were not good in God's eyes. And so um, that is why the Lord was so worried about them assimil assimilating into this group of people because it was pretty close to their own religion, right? But they started doing things that were not good in the sight of God, and he you know, and um there's this idea that that God was punishing them for it. Um, and I think the reality is that there's probably just a he can't, he they're not following the covenant, and so they don't get all the blessings of the covenant, right? But God, in his infinite mercy, and because he's made a covenant with them, keeps sending them saviors, right? These judges to save them both from the physical enemy that's coming and the spiritual enemy that's coming, so that they can remember that the Lord their God is their God, right? Jehovah is the one God that they should be worshiping. And so, yes, that's what basically two to through through four is that there were a lot of nations still there and they were pushing up against the Israelites, right? They were they were making them uh sin in a lot of different ways. Um, and right, but but as like the uh Kumfalmi says, the Lord forgives us as often as we repent throughout judges. The entire story of judges is that the Lord keeps sending somebody to save them, he keeps sending them judges. And the Lord keeps and has always sent us our Savior Jesus Christ, He is there to help us, to protect us, to save us from our own sins and the temptations that we fall into. He is there. And um, it goes into two verses 19. And in 2.19 it says, sorry, let me find it, but whenever the judge died, they would relapse and behave worse than their ancestors. Okay, so fair, right? They don't have a leader, it's hard. You need leaders, they would follow other gods, serving them and bowing down to them. They would not drop any of their practices in their stubborn ways. And how often does that apply to us? I mean, I know that applies to me in my sinning that I do, right? And I turn to other things instead of my savior for comfort, right? I turn to my phone, I turn to social media, I turn to, I don't know, exercise, I turn to all these various things, thinking that it will help me find peace and happiness. But reality, the reality is that it is only through Jesus Christ that we can be saved, right? It's not through the influencers online, it's not even through our church leaders who are imperfect, right? The judges, but it's who they represent, which is Jesus Christ, that we can be saved. And um, as we make the right choices, the Lord can bless us more. And that's why his commandments are not rules, right? But they're they're layouts for how we can, how he can bless us more, how God is is can bless us more as we follow those commandments. And as if we don't follow them, a lot of times the natural consequences come upon us. And the Lord, not that the consequences are higher than God, right? That's not what I want to say. It's not like, well, God understands that these are these higher laws that are higher than him. No, it's just that God has laid out his guidelines because he knows everything. He knows he's so powerful that he knows everything that will lead us to having a successful life. And maybe not successful in the way of prosperity, right? Like maybe we won't have the most money or maybe and bad things will happen to us and we'll go through hardships in this life, but in the end, we will gain our eternal land of promise, which is the celestial kingdom with Jesus Christ. And so let's not let the other distractions, right? Our own external gods that are similar, right, to our own God take us away from the true God, which is Jehovah. And that's what we get here. And then we get in verse 4, we get the start, chapter 4, we get the story of Deborah. Now, Deborah Devorah means bee. And she's so cool because she's one of the first she's the first woman, and truly um not one of the only women, but one of the few women in the New Testament who is described as a prophetess. What does this mean? Well, we know scripturally that being a prophet actually just means that you are strong in the testimony of Jesus Christ and that you bear uh testimony of him. It doesn't necessarily mean that you prophesy, but you prophesy about Christ and you are firm in the faith with him, right? And so that's what Deborah is. She is this savior, she's this person of wisdom that that that Barack looks to. Something that is interesting in the book of Judges, and as you do your own reading this week, I invite you to look at it, is the complimentary nature that a ton of these judges have with the opposite sex, which is super interesting, I think, because we get the story of the male God and the female God, and how they're leading the children of Israel away from Jehovah. But in here we see how men and women work together in order to bring to pass the salvation of Israel. We get this story here, right? Deborah and Barak. Now, um, yeah, like I said, Dereba Deborah means bee, and that's just kind of a fun name. Right? And then Barak, let me look up really fast what it means. Barak, meaning. I mean, I think it means blessed, but yeah, to bless. Okay, that's what I thought. It means he's blessed, right? So he's a blessed guy. And he's this military leader, but he still is looking to Deborah. He's like, I need help. These um uh, you know, these people, our enemies are going of Canaan, right? And Hazor and Sisera. Sisera is coming and they're they're gonna destroy us. What should we do? And so she goes up, right? She was judging Israel, right? She was she's a mother in Israel. And what does it mean to mother? This takes us back to um a concept in Hebrew, which is that every noun is actually attached to a verb. So every being, you are something because you do something, right? And so it's not just that biologically she's a mother, which she could have been, we don't know, but it's that she's actively mothering Israel. She's helping them grow, she's leading them, she's guiding them, she's counseling Barak, right? She goes with him and she stands by him. So that's what it means to be a mother in Zion in the scriptures. It's not necessarily to be a physical mother, even though that is a blessing that will one day be given to everybody who desires it. But it's also about mothering people, right? And fathering people and being that doing what that person would do. So that's what Deborah is doing here, right? So she says, the Lord, the God of Israel, commands you and and gives you these specific commandments about how he's gonna fight Sisera, right? But Barak says, If you will go with me, I will go. He trusts Deborah so much, right? So this is where we see that, like that uh male and female connection, right? I if you will not go, I will not go. I trust, I need you to come. I trust in your testimony of God and your ability to communicate with him so much. And I love that because I think even though these they're not married, I think that we can see an example, and I'm not married, so I guess I'm just giving unsolicited marriage advice. You're welcome. But I think this can work in a lot of different relationships, which is it needs to be a give and a go and a being together with faith in God, and that's what they're doing. And so she says, I will surely go with you. And in uh in Hebrew, that is just like in going, I will go, right? So it's a double emphasis, I will go with you. Nevertheless, and she gives him this prophecy, right? Uh, the Lord will actually not save you, it will not basically save Israel by you, but by the hand of a woman. So she gives this prophecy, which is super um interesting and beautiful because it ends up being true, right? But Deborah has a faith in God that Barack trusts in. And I love that because women can have this faith that can bless the community. So can men. And as we work together, that is ultimately how God will bring to pass his salvation through Jesus Christ, is as we all work together in the kingdom. Okay, so then Sisera runs away, right? Barack's fighting him, he runs away, and he he's now in the desert lands. And as he's here, he runs into a girl named Jael, but Yael, right? Yael is kind of how uh we would interpret it, and that literally just means Jehovah is God, right? Yael. And Ya meaning Yahweh, El meaning God. So Jehovah is God. So she's seemingly a believer of um Jehovah. We don't know for sure, right? But she is still celebrated in Judaism today as one of the best women. There are so many Jewish girls named Yael, and it is because of this story. So Yael, so Sister comes into her tent, and she's like nomadic, right? So she's living in the desert, and we've talked about this idea of hospitality, right? So he runs and he's like, Hey, will you give me a water to drink? And she's like, Yep, gonna get you some water. But she also knows that he's fighting Israel. He knows she knows that he's maybe not the best of men. So, you know, she so she gives him a skin of milk. So she gives him more, right? She gives him more. She's showing that hospitality. She gives him more than water. And he covered him and she said, but like, maybe this is also trickery. We talked about the women in Israel in the scriptures kind of having this form of like extra wisdom or like trickery, right? In order to save. Maybe this is partially because they didn't have a lot of social power other than this, right? But that's what she's doing here. So she she does that, she gives him some milk, and he's like, Oh, you know what? Just don't tell anybody that I'm here. And oh, but she's like, he's like, you know what, I'm a little tired. So he's like, she's like, Yeah, you know what? I'm gonna give you a blanket. Oh, and she gave him some milk, so now he's extra tired. He goes to sleep, okay? And she takes a peg from the tent and graphic warning, says skip ahead if you and she puts the nail through his head and she kills him. And people celebrate Yael in this. They're like, Yes, this queen, she's acting, she's saving Israel. She is the savior in the story, right? We have three people in the story acting to save Israel. So it comes from a group of people, right? But also from the most unexpected person, right? A woman of the tent saves Israel. And there's also this element, right, that she's kind of taking back her power, um, that she's taking the power, right? She's the one who's killing, she's the one who's um putting it through the, you know. Yeah, anyway. She and then she says, Look, I did it, and they're they're already saved. So they're saying that God did it through her. So God can work. Through any type of person to bring to pass his glory. Maybe not even somebody who is necessarily in the covenant at this time. And that's an important mem uh lesson for all of us, which is maybe God is not going to use the people that we expect to bring to pass his miracles. It can be any of us. We all can contribute, right? Whether we're a Deborah with our faith and our pushing and our support, whether we're a Barak with like action, or whether we're Yael with I don't want to say trickery, but maybe a little bit more, you know, intellect and we're just in the right place at the right time. And so then we get the song of Deborah in chapter five. This is once again one of the oldest forms of Hebrew that there is. And they're just like, bless the Lord, right? I will make melody to the Lord, the Lord of Israel. Just so be such beautiful things here, right? Um and that's when in verse 7 it mentions Deborah as a as a mother in Israel, right? Um and it sings about, you know, awake, awake, Deborah, awake, utter a song, arise, Barak, lead away your captives. So I love that, right? We're celebrating both the women and the men in this. Um then, right, and so it just talks about, and then there's a lot of language too about the Lord being a mighty warrior. Just as Sisera, the mighty warrior, was destroyed, he was destroyed by God. It also talks about Yael and how her name, you know, will be well known. Most blessed be Yael, the wife of Heber of the Kenite, right? Um, and so there's just this concept of like, so perish all your enemies, O Lord. May your friends be like the sun as it rises in its might. And so it's just like, as you're connected to the Lord Jehovah, you will always win, right? And that is true in our lives. I don't know if that's temporarily that we will always win over our preferable enemies, right? But I know that eternally we will always win as we turn to Jesus Christ. And then we come into chapter six. And in chapter six, the Midianites are coming and they're oppressing. So where are the Midianites from? This is where we pull out our map. So let me pull out my map. So here we go. I'm gonna share my screen. But if you're just listening, I'll describe it. So this is just more of a visual, you know, impact for those who want to. But if you don't want to, you know, see it, then that's fine. I'll also post it on my Instagram. But here, this is a bad one. But here we have all of the land of Israel. So Manasseh's up here, Napali and Asher, right? And so this is kind of what it's looking like at the time. Each group is split off into its own land. And the Midianites actually live down here, they actually live south of the land of Edom. If you remember, Moses' wife was a Midianite, so we think of from that land, right? But they're coming up here, and they will actually end up here in Manasseh and Issachar and Zebulon. They're gonna end up right here. I will show you. Um They're gonna end up near the Sea of Galilee, and they're gonna come up here, and this is where Gideon will fight. Okay, they're gonna fight all along this way. So this is just a visual map um that you can refer back to as you're doing your own reading if you need that. I highly recommend looking at maps if you're a visual person, because it can help you kind of imagine exactly what's happening. If you don't care and you're just reading these names and you're like, that's great, that's totally fine. But that is just my uh that's just an example. So, now we'll get into the story. So the Midianites, they come in, they're coming up from the north. Again, they have some sort of ancestral connection to the Israelites, right? Moses. So maybe that's why they can come in and were originally friends. But anyway, they're oppressing the the Israelites, and so the Lord calls Gideon. Now, Gideon means warrior, but Gideon actually receives two names in this, but the Lord plays on his name, the angel of the Lord rather, in chapter 6 in verse 12, when he says, The Lord is with you, you mighty warrior. So meaning you have this call from the Lord. This is interesting because when Jesus Christ claims to be the Messiah in his in early in his life when he's in Nazareth, the beginning of his ministry, he reads from Isaiah, which is the spirit of the Lord is upon me, right? And so it's kind of this idea, he's kind of calling himself back to this tradition of people who were called by the Lord to save people. So that's what Gideon is here. And he said, and then, and I love this such an honest question from Gideon, right? But sir, if the Lord is with us, then why all has this happened for us? And I have felt this so many times in my life, right? And where are all his wonderful deeds that our ancestors were counting for us? Like, you've done so many wonderful things for our ancestors. Where is that true in our life? Like, I haven't seen that. Okay, such a great point. And he's like, actually, by your hand, I'm going to do it, right? And then he's like, My clan, by the way, Gideon, he's like, by the way, my clan is the is the smallest in Manasseh. Let's go back to that map really quick, right? He's like, My clan is the smallest, meaning my family clan is the smallest in Manasseh. How and Manasseh, right, is pretty big, but it's not even the biggest. It does have double land, right? But it it so, right? But he's like, okay, uh yes, I'm fairly from a fairly big, I'm from a big tribe, but I'm from a small family clan. How am I supposed to, you know, do this? And the Lord's like, you know what? I have found uh, you know, I will be with you. It doesn't matter. I'm gonna be with you. And so then Gideon asks for a sign. And there's a question in the come follow me about okay, is it okay that Gideon asked for this sign? I thought we weren't supposed to ask for signs. And I have this wonderful quote from Dominate Jokes, which is signs should not be given for conversion, but they can be there to confirm conversion. And so Gideon probably believed, but he just needed a ref uh a reconfirmation of the fact that the Lord was going to be with him. Like, okay, can you show me so that I can know, so that I can go and I can act, right? It's not like a, it's a let me, let me, let me be reaffirmed in this. And that's what ends up happening. And so, and Gideon says, Help me, oh God, for I have seen the Lord, I've seen the angel of the Lord of God face to face. And there's all of these things, right? If these men are called, they see God face to face. God is not far away from them, but they see him, he is with them, he is their comforter, and he calls them, he is with Israel, just like he can be with all of us. We may not see him face to face until we see him again after his second coming or when we pass away, but we will see him and he is with us. And so then Gideon built an altar where he saw face to face, right? He's doing his Jacob. He's doing Jacob, right? He's kind of being like one of the ancestors, and he says, the Lord is peace. So the Lord has brought him peace, and he's going to go. And but first, one of his first things that Gideon does is he destroys all the temples to Baal. He's had such a conversion with the Lord. The Lord has called him, has shown him who he is. He knows that the Lord is peace. So he wants to get rid of everything that doesn't show that it is Jehovah, right, who is peace. And I think that is true in our life, in my life, especially. Sometimes I try to get through the Lord through my own means. And then as I go through, and as I have more and I less like that. I it's not that I try to get through the Lord through my own means, it's that I try to overcome things without the Lord. I'm like, I know I can get closer to God if I, you know, am trying to be more pure and more careful about what I consume. But I try to do that by myself. But what I actually find is that the more I'm converted to the Lord, the more those things kind of get put in the background, and the more I want to do good things rather than just not do bad things. And I think that's what we can see here. Gideon is so converted, right? He's such a warrior in the Lord that he gets rid of all the other temptations for the people around him. And so then Gideon, um, he destroys the altar of Baal to the point that his name then also becomes Jeru Baal, which um can literally mean let me find out what it's saying in the uh in the sorry, in the SBL Bible, it says that it literally um can mean like uh Baal is thrown down. And let me see one other thing that it can mean. Sorry. It literally can also mean let Baal contend against him, or Baal will contend. So he's he's fighting against Baal. What a great name to be known as he's a warrior, he's fighting against Baal. But that only comes after he's had this conversion through Jehovah. So then Gideon goes throughout the land of uh, you know, in the valley, and he says, Hey guys, whoever wants to come fight against these people, come. And so they do, and they're coming, and but there's too many. He's the Lord's like, no, you know what? With all these many people, no wonder you win. I actually want you to get a smaller group of people. So they he puts them through this test, and it ends up only being 300 people. That's not enough. That's not that many people. They had 14,000, I believe, and now they only have 300. But I think the Lord wanted to show forth his hand. And I think that's sometimes why the Lord also uses small means to bring to pass great things, because then we know that it's truly because of him and not from our own means. And that's what the Lord is wanting to show here by his calling a smaller group, is he's like, I want to show that it is me that is doing it. And sometimes he uses unconventional and seemingly impossible ways. But it happens, and they follow Gideon and all these things, and then the people shout as they're blowing their trumpets, sword for the Lord and for Gideon. So both the Lord and Gideon are these warriors who are saving them, right? And so then again, we can still see how the idea of Baal as the warrior god is actually helping them to understand the Lord more. But the so the Lord I is more mad though, he's like, but I'm not Baal. I can be like Baal, but I'm better than him. In fact, I am the only God. Do not worship Baal, worship me. I can be just like him, if not better. I can overcome the people who are worshiping him. And so Gideon then goes up to all these people and asks them for help and they reject it. And so then eventually he comes back and gets his revenge. Okay, so maybe he's not the most perfect person, right? But he's also saying, hey, if you didn't help me, you know, there's also um they're breaking the kind of covenantal trust that they have, right? Um, and so that's I think an element that we can see here. It may be hard for us who don't live in this sort of covenantal alliance politically, that we're like, oh shh, that seems a little bit harsh. And it is, but also they're living under a covenantal law and they have they're under the same thing as Israelites. And if they're not gonna help him, then there needs to maybe be consequences, right? And so maybe we can look at it like that, even though it might be hard. And so then Gideon at the end, they've they've rummaged all of these Midianites, and they each get a little, a little ring around their uh their ear, an earring, and they each take a gold earring, and Gideon makes it and he makes it into an ephod. An ephod was we talked about it, it's like a breastplate that could be used for divination to um kind of gain the will of God. It can be used for worship of God, um, but the problem is that the people start to worship it instead of God. And um that can be a problem, I think, in all of our lives. An example to me that I thought of this week as I thought about the worship of the Ephod was the concept of garments. And are we worshiping the garment? Meaning, do we think that the power itself actually comes from the garment? Or do we realize that it has the garment represents taking upon ourselves the name of Jesus Christ, that it is the covenant and the power that comes from Jesus Christ, not the physical garment that brings us salvation and power and strength and comfort, right? That it's just a representation of Jesus, it is not actually the garment that saves us. So I think that's all something. And there might be other things in our lives that we worship instead of Jesus, even though with our attentions we're trying to worship God. And I think that's also an element here. These people are trying to worship God, but maybe sometimes they're getting so focused on the object that led to salvation and not the person itself, meaning God, the physical act of God and serving other people. Okay, then we get this final example of this judge, and this judge is Samson, and he is a complicated guy. Why? Because at first he seems to be righteous, but he's actually not. Samson doesn't do anything seemingly that is right in the eyes of the Lord, and yet the Lord uses him to save Israel. And why is that? Number one, because the Lord called him, and he always calls imperfect people, and so that can give us maybe a little bit of comfort, which is just because we make mistakes doesn't mean that the Lord will not help us to help other people, but also um that um the reality is that Samson did not end up himself being saved because of his pride. He lost his connection that he had to God because of his pride, and be um and so he did break the covenant, um, and ultimately some consequences came with that. He lost the gift that God gave him, and so this is what happens. Samson is his mom was having a trouble having kids, a classic Israelite story, right? And so it's setting Samson up as this as this w um person called of God to do something, right? And the angel tells them to him and his wife, right? They tell, they tell the man and his wife, right? So again, we get this connection of a married couple or men and woman working together to bring to pass this um salvation, right? They the angel appears to both uh the husband and wife and says, Your son is going to be a Nazirite. Now, if we don't remember what happens, and we learned this in Leviticus, is that a Nazirite was a child who from birth was dedicated to God, meaning the he was basically designated as a priest or set apart to go serve God. They would abstain from wine, they would not be able to touch dead people or dead bodies, um, and that was to, and they were supposed to serve the Lord, and they were supposed to be set apart for the Lord. They also wouldn't cut their hair. It's thought that maybe John the Baptist um could have been a Nazirite, as well as um as his parents had problems conceiving, but it's not fully known, right? So it's a Nazirite, not uh not a Nazirite, a Nazirite. Nazirite would be from somebody from Nazareth, right? But so Samson is born and he is set apart. But even in verse 14, we see that Samson is breaking ideas of the covenant. He marries somebody outside of the covenant, he touches a dead carcass and eats um, you know, honey from this dead animal. He is kind of greedy and is like, I'm smart, I'm gonna set forth a riddle so that people can bring me garments, you know, uh like you know, can bring me clothes. It's like, okay, Samson, maybe, you know, okay, you, okay, Samson, right? Like, kind of seems a little selfish, and it was, right? Even the the very um act of him doing these things, all of those things are against the covenant that he made, right? But then the people trick him even more, and it says that the spirit of the Lord rushed on him. And this is the the way that come follow me. Explains it, and I love it, which is he was just given a gift from the Lord. Um, it wasn't his hair that actually had magical powers or him, but the Lord gave him this gift of strength, and so he was able to complete all these tasks, even though he wasn't perfect, and that brings me comfort, right? Like, oh, even if I'm not perfect and I go against my covenants sometimes, the Lord will forgive me and bring me back, right? And still give me strength. And then he marries Delilah, and she again was a Philistine and tricked him into or was sh sorry, she was a prostitute, um, which is oh no, sorry. There's just another woman that he fell in love with as a prostitute. Okay, see, so he's not necessarily doing all the right things. And then he fell in love with a woman whose name was Delilah. Okay, right. So then the Philistines come again and they're like, okay, we need you to figure out his weakness. She goes in multiple times to trick him. She he keeps telling her things, and eventually, you know, she seduces him enough, I guess you could say, or just because the fact that they're married, he's like, Okay, I'll tell you it's actually my hair. She cuts it off in the middle of the night, and he loses his strength. Again, he'd already broken his covenant so many times that it's not necessarily just the fact that his hair was cut, like it's not his hair that gave him strength, which is sometimes what we say, right? But it's just the reality that he had continued to break the covenant that he had with God, and that was the final symbol of that. And eventually, you know, he they parade him around and they make him a prisoner, but and they're going to sacrifice to their lord, Dagon, and praise him, and they're gonna make him entertain us, and then Samson called upon the Lord, right? He had made all these mistakes, he had broken the covenant with the Lord, but he still said, Dear uh Lord God, right? Remember me and strengthen me only this once, right? Will you just help me one more time, God, that I may pay back the Philistines? And they've made him blind, right? And so then he made me the two pillars, he was gains his strength, and he dies along with the rest of them. And the come follow me again. I love what it says, which is this is probably due to the fact that the Lord wanted to show his power against to the people, right? To the Philistines, against the the Dagon, right? The king, the god. It was kind of like the serpent god, anyway, just interesting. But he wanted to show forth his power that he had against the people of Dagon. And so that is why that happened, right? That's why Samson was able to receive his strength again. And because he prayed, and I feel like that's a little moment of repentance. I think he says, Hey, you know what? Just this one time, you know. And he says, Let me repay them for my own two eyes. So it's like, okay, is this selfish? It's hard to know, right? But the Lord saw fit maybe again to teach the Philistines a lesson, which is I am more powerful than Dagon. And something that's interesting in the SBL Bible is that it points out that Samson a lot of times was using his eyes in the wrong way. He looked upon a Philistine woman and was pleased with her, right? And liked her. He saw the lion and the dead lion and went unto it. So he keeps doing these things with his eyes that actually lead him to sin. And so his eyes being blind actually kind of brings him back to Christ, which is just kind of an interesting symbol. Another thing, just a quick tidbit that I thought was fun. In chapter 15 of Judges, um, it mentions Lehi a lot. And that is probably where the name Lehi comes from in the Book of Mormon, and it means jawbone. And so when Samson takes the jawbone of the donkey and uses it to kill, that's literally a play on the name Lehi. So just kind of a fun, a fun thing, right? And so that is the story of everything that's in the Come Follow Me this week. And it just points out that the, you know, the Lord, we can inspire others as we have faith in the Lord, and he strengthens us as we keep our covenants. As we don't, sometimes that strength might go away. Sometimes it will stay because part of our covenant is that the Lord will forgive us, but we may lose our attachment to the Lord if we don't turn to him. But ultimately, he wants everybody to turn to him, and he may use imperfect people to bring a pass it bring to pass those things. The final reality of, and the judges is supposed to be set forth as this time of pure chaos, because the people were not following God, and because they didn't have a king. Um, remember that a lot of these texts, too, were kind of set up for the idea that we need a king to help us. Um and so that's what this, you know, at the end of Judges, which is not in the come follow me reading, but I think it's an important part, is that it says, Um, and this is the literally the last sentence of the book of Judges, is sorry, let me pull it up really fast. In those days, there was No king in Israel, all the people did what was right in their own eyes. So everyone is not following a leader of God, right? But they are instead going after the pleasures of their own hearts, and that can lead to chaos. If there's no one, if people are not following God, whether it's by a king or some other leader or by Jesus Christ or of their own volition, then that can lead to chaos. And that's ultimately what's happening. Even as the judges come and save them, the people still default fall into chaos because they keep not turning to the Lord, they keep forgetting him. And ultimately this is shown with a kind of reversal of what happened at the beginning, where a woman, you know, saves Israel through killing a man. And in this final story, and again, this is maybe uh no, it's not maybe, it is for sure. This is a trigger warning for some pretty heavy topics. So if you want to miss this story, that's fine. I'll talk to you next week. But the final book of uh the final story in Judges is that a woman is sexually assaulted by a group of people in Benjamin, um, similar to what happened in Sodom and Gomorrah, in which a group of men come and are supposed to be hospitable to her in this land, and her husband's supposed to maybe not let them do that. Um, but he leaves his wife to them, and they sexually assault her, and she ends up dying because of that. And then her body is unfortunately cut up and given to all of the land. It's truly the most heinous story in all of the Bible. They're sent out and saying, look what the tribe of Benjamin did, and now everyone's fighting. But even in the Bible, it says, Let's talk about it, let's think about it, let's consider it because of how horrible this thing that was done. This is one of the most heinous things that has been done since we've less left Egypt. How have we fallen this far? And that's when they think about, you know, oh, it's because we don't have God in our lives. And that is what happens when we when people don't follow God, when society leaves God, is that it ultimately leads to chaos, right? There's this breakdown of this organization that God made in the creation, right? It's a breakdown of the creation back into this chaos of people who are not following God, and it can lead to horrible, horrible things. And it's a warning to the people of Israel. And I think it's a learning, uh, it's a warning to each of us, which is for any of these horrible things that can happen. We need to think about it. We need to consider what we can do to be better in our own lives, how we can help better serve people and root out those evil things from our hearts and from society as a whole. I know that as we do that, as we turn to Jesus Christ, who is our ultimate judge and savior, that we can do this. Um, I know that as we turn to him, he is our warrior who will fight for us against all kinds of enemies that there may be, um, and that he fights and wants to show everybody that he is God, and that he is as giddy and says, the Lord of peace, and he can bring peace into our lives even in a chaotic world. And um, I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. Talk to you next week. Bye.