Transcript of Radio Show #398:
Book of Judges, Part 3
Continuing from last week, on our study in the Old Testament, with the book of Judges...

Radio Show...

This program continues on various series of different topics of Bible studies and theology such as end times, prophecies, Old Testament, New Testament, daily living, etc. as the subject matter comes up.

The e-book on End times, Prophecies and Revelation, answering the questions “where are we in the events of the end times?” and “Are we now in the tribulation?” is available on this web site, which you can find throughout the pages.

Opening Narrative

Hello and welcome to another exciting radio program today on end times and prophecies and scriptures to live by... which is all about old-time gospel and worship music, praying for needs and preaching the Word of God....

And remember this radio programs Virtual Church for the Spiritual Unchurched is broadcast every Sunday at 7 am and 7 pm pacific time... and if you unfortunately miss it for whatever reason at any time, you can hear the program any time after that for 4 weeks...at my web site TimingRevelation.com

And I did mention to you before that with this series begins the start of the 9th year of these radio programs Virtual Church for the Spiritual Unchurched.

So, we continue today, with the new series from the book of Joshua in the Old Testament, which is the book following Deuteronomy.

We will begin here right after this opening music, prayer and worship...

Prayer
Praise God Doxology
Worship music

Narrative 1

Alright so let's continue from where we left off last week....

We are now in chapter 3 of the book of Judges and we just read the story of the first judge, Othniel, God had raised to deliver Israel... where the last verse ends with “And the land had rest forty years. And Othniel the son of Kenaz died.

So we will pick up from verse 12 still in chapter 3 and read about the second judge God raised up after the 40 years of peace... here Ehud delivers Israel from Moab...

Chapter 3 of the book of Judges, verses 12 to 15

and I will read this in the New King James Bible...

12_” And the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord. So the Lord strengthened Eglon king of Moab against Israel, because they had done evil in the sight of the Lord.

13_”Then he gathered to himself the people of Ammon and Amalek, went and defeated Israel, and took possession of the City of Palms.

14 So the children of Israel served Eglon king of Moab eighteen years.

15 But when the children of Israel cried out to the Lord, the Lord raised up a deliverer for them: Ehud the son of Gera, the Benjamite...

and from here we read the story of how Ehud dealt with this terrible king, which is a long tale of secret plot to end the life of this king, which you can read on your own if you are interested...

So after that Ehud the judge killed the king, he called the people of Israel and told them to follow him... so we will pick again the story from here at

verse 27_”And it happened, when he arrived, that he blew the trumpet in the mountains of Ephraim, and the children of Israel went down with him from the mountains; and he led them.

v.28 Then he said to them, “Follow me, for the Lord has delivered your enemies the Moabites into your hand.” So they went down after him, seized the fords of the Jordan leading to Moab, and did not allow anyone to cross over.

29 And at that time they killed about ten thousand men of Moab, all stout men of valor; not a man escaped.

30 So Moab was subdued that day under the hand of Israel. And the land had rest for eighty years.

And after this we read about the next judge whom God raised to deliver them... and this one is covered by only one verse...

verse 31, it says: “ After him was Shamgar (Shamgair) the son of Anath, who killed six hundred men of the Philistines with an ox goad; and he also delivered Israel.

And here we are not told how long they would have peace until the next judge God raised up for them...

Station ID

Narrative # 2

Alright, let's continue on our Bible study or reading about the children of Israel and the Lord raising for them deliverers in times of troubles...

The next judge that we will read about here is Deborah along with Barak...

As we read before, these leaders served as military deliverers... but some also served as political leaders, and spiritual guides during the period between Joshua's death and the rise of the first kings... now we see here that Deborah was a prophetess and a judge... and was called along with Barak to serve as a military judge as well... so she held all three of these sacred offices...

So, chapter 4, let's read from verses 1 to 10:

v.1_”When Ehud was dead, the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord.

2 So the Lord sold them into the hand of Jabin king of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor. The commander of his army was Sisera, who dwelt in Harosheth Hagoyim.

3 And the children of Israel cried out to the Lord; for Jabin had nine hundred chariots of iron, and for twenty years he had harshly oppressed the children of Israel.

verse 4_”Now Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, was judging Israel at that time. (b.t.w.: Lapidoth' s name means “torches”.. So her husband's name was Torches... an interesting side note... I always like to took up the meaning of names in the Bible... and Deborah's name by the way, means “bee”.... I wonder why she was called a bee... and interestingly there was only one more woman in the Bible who was called Debora, and that is in the book of Genesis—she was Rebekah's nurse... anyway, let's continue with the judges...

verse 5 of chapter 4 of the book of Judges...
_”And she (Deborah) would sit under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the mountains of Ephraim. And the children of Israel came up to her for judgment.

Remember way back in the time of Moses, he was the one who set up judges at the recommendation of his father in law, and the Lord of course, to deal with the issues that came up within the people and families of Israel, etc.... so this is where that position came from...

Ok let's continues....

again verse 5 of chapter 4:
_”And she (Deborah) would sit under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the mountains of Ephraim. And the children of Israel came up to her for judgment.

verse 6_ ”Then she sent and called for Barak the son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali, and said to him, “Has not the Lord God of Israel commanded, ‘Go and deploy troops at Mount Tabor; take with you ten thousand men of the sons of Naphtali and of the sons of Zebulun;

7 and against you I will deploy Sisera, the commander of Jabin’s army, with his chariots and his multitude at the River Kishon; and I will deliver him into your hand’?”

Now there are a lot of conversations taking place about the fact of Deborah being a woman whom God would call...

well, actually God did not call her specifically... He called Barak and then told Deborah He had called him... read chapter 6 again:

”Then she sent and called for Barak the son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali, and said to him, “Has not the Lord God of Israel commanded, ‘Go and deploy troops at Mount Tabor; take with you ten thousand men of the sons of Naphtali and of the sons of Zebulun;

“did'nt God command to go and deploy troops at Mount Tabor; take with you ten thousand men of the sons of Naphtali and of the sons of Zebulun?...

so there it is clear as anything...

8_”And Barak said to her, “If you will go with me, then I will go; but if you will not go with me, I will not go!”

So it it also clear that we see Barak being afraid or hesitant to go...

9_”So she said to him, “I will surely go with you; nevertheless there will be no glory for you in the journey you are taking, for the Lord will sell Sisera into the hand of a woman.” Then Deborah arose and went with Barak to Kedesh”.

Very interesting...

and v. 10_”And Barak called Zebulun and Naphtali to Kedesh; he went up with ten thousand men under his command, and Deborah went up with him.

And on top of that, we see here that Barak was the commander of this great pursuit...

And, again here also, we will skip a few verses on the wild military actions taking place which involves a lot of other peoples, places and king, including the story of Sisera who possessed 900 chariots of iron...

but Deborah told Barak let's go up because the Lord has delivered Sisera into your hand -- (verse 14)...

Then again we read a whole interlinking tale of military plots and schemes that you can read on your own from verses 11 to 22 which takes us to the death of Sisera...

ending with the closing verses 23 and 24:

“So on that day God subdued Jabin king of Canaan in the presence of the children of Israel. And the hand of the children of Israel grew stronger and stronger against Jabin king of Canaan, until they had destroyed Jabin king of Canaan.

And after this, in chapter 5,

we read of the Song of Deborah and Barak”, which again I would encourage you to read on your own from verse 1 to verse 31... so it's quite a long passage.

The last verse, 31 reads: “Thus let all Your enemies perish, O Lord! But let those who love Him be like the sun When it comes out in full strength.” (From Psalm 92:9)

And the last line of chapter 5 ends with:
“And the land had rest forty years”

Music Interlude

Narrative #3

Alright, so let's continue with the book of Judges, now in chapter 6, and we will read about Gideon, the judge God raised next to deliver His people Israel...

So another 40 years had passed on and we are told that Israel has fallen again in disobedience to God's commandments... let's read that...

verses 1 to 10 of chapter 6 of the book of Judges...

v. 1_”Then the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord. So the Lord delivered them into the hand of Midian for seven years,

2 and the hand of Midian prevailed against Israel. Because of the Midianites, the children of Israel made for themselves the dens, the caves, and the strongholds which are in the mountains.

So there is a pattern on how the people of God would get into trouble with enemies... first after being delivered, there would be a time of peace.... but then they would begin again to disobey the Lord's commandments... and God would take His hands off from protection, and things would get worse until they could no longer live under the enemies' oppression...

the only thing they could do at this point, again, would be to call and cry out unto the Lord for His help... and again God would faithfully bring them another judge to get them out of their man-made mess...

so let's continue about the oppression of the Midianites...

v.3_”So it was, whenever Israel had sown (as in swing seeds), Midianites would come up; also Amalekites and the people of the East would come up against them.

4 Then they would encamp against them and destroy the produce of the earth as far as Gaza, and leave no sustenance for Israel, neither sheep nor ox nor donkey.

5 For they would come up with their livestock and their tents, coming in as numerous as locusts; both they and their camels were without number; and they would enter the land to destroy it.

6 So Israel was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites, and the children of Israel cried out to the Lord.

So here it is... they cried out to the Lord again and again... but all they had to do is obey the commandments of the Lord, which by the way was given to them back in the book of Exodus... the 10 commandments...

... remember,

2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.

3 “You shall have no other gods before Me.

4 “You shall not make for yourself a carved image... etc...

you can read them in Exodus 20...

I mean it's not that hard... it's all for the good of the people...

but they just simpley couldn't get right...

and you know, it still holds today.... yes Jesus died on the cross to save us by grace and mercy.... but that was not a license to sin and disobey God's pure and holy way of living...

but we are still the same today and we will pay dearly for our disobedience also... as peoples and countries... it's all in the Word of God... we need to read it – ALL of it....

let's continue...

v. 7_”And it came to pass, when the children of Israel cried out to the Lord because of the Midianites,

8 that the Lord sent a prophet to the children of Israel, who said to them, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘I brought you up from Egypt and brought you out of the house of bondage;

9 and I delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of all who oppressed you, and drove them out before you and gave you their land.

10 Also I said to you, “I am the Lord your God; do not fear the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell.” But you have not obeyed My voice.’ ”

So again the cycle of deliverance, disobedience and judgment is repeated... this time the oppression came from the Midianites. And it was more severe than the previous ones up to now... not only was this from the Midianites but the Amalikites had joined in also...

... the extent of this covered areas from the north down to the south in the territory of the Philistines, according to the writings in the Liberty Bible Commentary...

...the devastation from the enemies who literally rushed in like grasshoppers upon their agricultural produce, covering the land and devouring everything in their path... it was really bad... no wonder the children of Israel called upon the Lord for deliverance...

In the meantime, God was dealing with the next judge in line to be the one to deliver His people from the vicious enemies... like Deborah, he too was a prophet of God...

and we will have to leave it here to be continued next week, because we are out of time... and there's quite a bit to cover here on down to the appointed time of this next judge of God.

Music Interlude...

Closing Narrative…

Oh how wonderful to appreciate what Jesus has done in our lives to save us from sin by Grace... and how He continues to keep us by His on-going and unlimited Grace...

...that wonderful Grace that comes into our life the moment that we receive Him as for who He is -- the Saviour of mankind and of every individual like you and me personally...

... and this Jesus the Son of God who came to give His life for you and me is the same Jesus who's life we've been reading about in these series of programs right now, and who's death on the cross we will see as we go through the gospel story to where He gave Himself as the sacrificial Lamb of God that took the sin of the world...

...but right now, the question is:

...do you know this Jesus that we're talking about? If you don't know the Lord...

...Just say this prayer, “Lord come into my heart, come into my life, I turn to you right now and ask for forgiveness, I repent of my sins and receive your work on the cross... I receive your gospel as it was delivered through your blood shed on the cross in my place, and I thank you, Amen...

The Blessing

Before I dismiss the service today, I want to read to you the Blessing that was read to the people of God in Numbers 6:24-26 which is the benediction from God to you today:

“The Lord bless thee, and keep thee: The Lord make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee: The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace."

I hope and pray that you will come back next Sunday at SpiritFM.ca, 7 am and 7 pm pacific time. And if you want to hear the service again at any time, you can go to my website at TimingRevelation.com, and click on the Radio Shows navigational tab along the left side. The replays are available there for five weeks, then they are transcribed into articles as new radio shows are put up.

I encourage you to go to your Bible and read further on the scriptures that were given throughout the program today. And if you like these programs and you've been blessed, call or write the station and let them know... if you said the prayer and have accepted the Lord or you've been healed or touched in some way by the Holy Spirit, write to me on the contact form of this web site...

...and this web site is also where you will find the Free Offer of the “Christian Growth and Maturity Chart” that I talked to you about in the last weeks... you will see the graphic on any page called “Get your free CGM Chart”, click on it and it will take you to a page that will tell you about it and how you can subscribe to my newsletter to get your free copy of the Chart sent to you.

Until next week, Maranatha, the Lord is coming, very soon. Goodbye and Blessing.

/DMH

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Blessings,