Good morning. We're going to
be in the book of Judges this morning, chapter one. If you'd
like to turn with me there in your Bibles, Judges chapter one. Let's go to the Lord in prayer
and ask his blessings. Our merciful Heavenly Father,
we rejoice in being able to declare in song how great thou art. But there is a part of us that
grieves and longs to know truly how great thou art. Lord, we
know in part what a glorious day it'll be. when we see you
as you are and be made like you and worship you as we ought. We pray that you would forgive
us of our sin this morning for Christ's sake, that you would
bless us with the gift of faith, that you would give us eyes to
see, that you would enable us to set our affections on Christ. and to rest the hope of our salvation
in his glorious person and in his accomplished work of redemption. Thank you for your word. Lord,
we would be lost and undone and without any hope had you not
spoken to us by your word. We ask, Lord, that you would
attend these written words with your Holy Spirit and speak them
effectually to our hearts. For we ask it in Christ's name,
amen. You have your Bibles open to
Judges chapter one. I've titled this message, Who
Shall Go Up For Us? The book of Judges covers that
history of Israel between Joshua and the time of the kings when
the Lord raised up Saul and then of course David and the lineage
of kings that comes after that. And so during this 400 year period
of time between Joshua and King Saul, about 1400 to 1000 BC,
the children of Israel are living in the promised land, but they
have not eradicated the Canaanites from the land, as the Lord had
commanded them to do. And so the Canaanites were living
among them, and they among them. And there was a constant a constant
conflict to their soul. And the children of Israel would
find themselves often being greatly influenced by the Canaanites.
And the Lord would put them in bondage to the Canaanites. And
then they would cry out to the Lord for deliverance from the
Canaanites. And the Lord would raise up a
judge to lead them. and give them deliverance and
give them peace for a period of time until the cycle started
again. And it's typical of our lives
here in this world. We live among the Canaanites
and we are often influenced by them and we are often brought
under the the persecution or the troubles
that this world causes our souls. And we find ourselves, like the
children of Israel, crying out, You're going to have to raise
up someone to lead us. You're going to have to deliver
us. The word Canaan or Canaanite means zealous or persistent. And it's a picture of all the
things that are enemies to our souls and enemies to God. That's a picture of the devil
himself. It's a picture of the godless
system of this world. It's a picture of death and hell. It's a picture of sin. It's a
picture of our old nature, our old man that is ever with us,
our greatest enemy of all. And so the Canaanites have not
been eradicated from our lives, have they? As long as we're in
this world, we're going to be in conflict with Canaan, the
spirit warring against the flesh and the flesh against the spirit
so that we cannot be what we ought. But in those times, we
find ourselves like the children of Israel crying out, Lord, you're
going to have to raise someone up. You're going to have to deliver
me. You're going to have to save
me. I'll be overwhelmed and overcome by Canaan if you don't. And so we see these judges as
a type of Christ, each one of them. We'll look at the 14 judges. It starts with a man by the name
of Othnial and ends with Eli, and there's 14 of them, and each
one of them in a different way. pictures our deliverer, the Lord
Jesus Christ. But even before the first judge,
Ophniol, is raised up in the first two verses of Judges chapter
one, now after the death of Joshua, and we know who Joshua represents. Joshua is a picture of Christ.
Moses could not lead the children of Israel into the promised land.
Moses is a picture of the law. The Lord had to raise up Joshua,
and only two from that whole generation of Israelites in the
wilderness entered into the promised land, Joshua and Caleb. Caleb being a faithful dog. Caleb being a picture of the
church. Joshua, Jehovah saves. It's the same name as it's translated
Jesus in the New Testament. And so Joshua is a picture of
Christ and Caleb is a picture of the church. And now Christ
has gone to glory. We're sort of reminded here in
this passage about the disciples when they realized that the Lord
was speaking at his departure. And they said, Lord, what are
we going to do if you're going to leave us? And the Lord said, I'm not
going to leave you comfortless. I'm going to send you the Holy
Spirit. And he's going to guide you into
all truth. And he's going to point you to
me. And he's going to take those things of mine and reveal them
unto you. And so we have You know, nothing's
changed. We're right back where the children
of Israel were 1,400 years ago. And the Lord has given us in
his word these wonderful types to encourage us and to show us
that he hasn't changed. The world really hasn't changed.
And we look at our world and we think, you know, it's evolving
and things are changing. No, people are the same and the
things of the world are the same. We're right where the children
of Israel were 3,400 years ago. So Joshua has ascended into glory. And our Joshua is seated at the
right hand of the majesty on high. And he has sent his spirit. And in his spirit, with his spirit,
he reveals Christ as our continual deliverer from Canaan. You know,
the question, do you need to be delivered from Canaan? Does,
you know, if the Lord's given you any hope of salvation, you
realize that Canaan is your enemy. Everything about Canaanites is
zealously opposed and persistently opposed to the things of God. That's the world we live in,
isn't it? That's the body, the flesh that we live in. And so
nothing's changed. We cry with the children of Israel,
Lord, who shall go up for us? Who's going to deliver us from
the body of this death? And Romans chapter eight, verse
one, thanks be to God through Christ Jesus, we are free. There
is now therefore no condemnation. to them that are in Christ Jesus.
Might the Lord be pleased to reveal Christ to us. Look at
again, now after the death of Joshua, it came to pass that
the children of Israel asked the Lord saying, who shall go
up for us against the Canaanites first to fight against them?
Lord, we're sheep. We need a shepherd. Oh yeah,
we're soldiers, but we need a commander. We need someone to lead us. We
can't do this on our own. Lord, you're gonna have to raise
up someone like Joshua to deliver us from these Canaanites. And the Lord said, now this is
before the first judge is not mentioned till chapter three.
So this is before the Lord raises up the first judge and he says
to them, Judah, Judah. And just as the judges represent
the Lord Jesus Christ in every way, in so many ways, so does
Judah. The Lord Jesus is called the
lion of the tribe of Judah. And so the Lord said, Judah shall
go up. Behold, I have delivered the
land into his hand. This is the tribe of Judah, one
of the 12 tribes of Israel. And Judah's name translated means
praise. And there's no question here
that Judah is a picture of Christ. Lord, who shall go up for us?
Lord, if you don't go with us, if you don't help us, we'll be
consumed. Lord, we don't have what it takes
to deal with the Canaanites. Lord, help us. Go up for us.
And here's our God's promise. I've delivered the land into
his hand. He has power over the Canaanites. He's conquered the
Canaanites. He's conquered death. He's conquered
hell. He's put away sin. Oh, he's ascended into glory.
He's my praise. That's what Judah translated
means, praise. He's my praise. Turn back with
me to Exodus chapter 33. This is the cry that God's people
always have. Lord, who shall go up for us?
We can't. We can't deal with this. Moses,
you would think, after all that he had been through, would have
had the ability to lead the children of Israel, but he knew that it
was beyond his capacity to deal with all the things that would
happen in the wilderness, which is also a picture of this world
in which we live. And so look what Moses says in
Exodus chapter 33. We'll begin reading at verse
12. And Moses said unto the Lord,
see thou sayest unto me, bring up this people and thou hast
not let me know whom thou will send with me. Yet thou has said,
I know thee by name. And thou has also found grace
in my sight. Lord, you've spoken and you've
told me that you know me. and that I have found grace in
thy sight, but who's gonna go with me? Who's gonna help me?
Now, therefore, I pray thee, if I found grace in thy sight,
show me now thy way that I might know thee, that I might find
grace in thy sight, and consider that this nation is thy people.
Lord, this nation is, I can't lead them. They're your people. You're gonna have to, you're
gonna have to do this. And God said to Moses in verse
14, my presence shall go with thee and I will give thee rest. Same thing the Lord said to Abraham,
I am thy shield and thine exceeding great reward. Same thing the
Lord said to his disciples, I will never leave thee nor forsake
thee. I'm in you and you're in me. Oh, his, his commitment to his
church and to his people has never failed. It's never waned. And he said unto him, if thy presence
go not with me, carry us not up from hence. Lord, if you're
not, if you're not going to go with me, just, just let me sit
right here. I don't want to go. I don't want
to take another step. If you're not going to go with me. No man with any sense of his
responsibility has ever gotten into the pulpit without being
aware of this. Lord, if you don't go with me,
don't let me get up there. Lord, if you don't go with me
into this world, just don't let me do anything. Whatever I do,
Lord, you're going to have to go with me. Verse 16, for wherein
shall it be known here that I and thy people have found grace in
thy sight? Is it not in that thou goest with us? So shall
we be separated, I and thy people, from all the people that are
upon the face of the earth? Lord, isn't this the thing that
makes us to differ from all other peoples of the earth, that you're
with us? That's what makes God's people
to differ. There's really not much difference
in any other way, except that the Lord's with them.
That's what makes them to differ. And the Lord said unto Moses,
I will do this thing also that thou hast spoken, for thou hast
found grace in my sight, for I know thee by name. Here's the
reason why I'm gonna go with you. Grace. Grace. It's not because I'm looking
at your life and I'm seeing something in your life that deserves my
presence or that I'm going to reward you for whatever. No, it's all going to be of grace.
Unmerited, demerited favor. That's what it is. And he said, I beseech thee,
Lord, show me thy glory. All that Moses had seen, He had
seen the plagues in Egypt. He had seen the death angel come
through. He had seen the dividing of the Red Sea. He had seen the
mountain quake. He had seen the water come from
the rock. He had seen the pillar of fire
by night and the cloud by day. He had seen all these demonstration.
Well, before all of that, he saw the burning bush, a picture
of Christ himself being burned by the wrath of God and yet not
consumed. God had spoken to him audibly
and in so many other ways. And now he says, Lord, show me
thy glory. In verse 19, and he said, I will
make all my goodness pass before thee. That's going to be my glory.
Someone asked me recently, he said, why do bad things happen
to good people? I said, with two problems with
that question. Number one, there's no such thing as good people.
And number two, nothing ever bad has ever happened to any
of God's people. Nothing bad has ever happened
to any of God's people. You think about it. I will cause
my goodness to pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name
of the Lord before thee, and I will be gracious unto whom
I will be gracious, and I will have mercy upon whom I shall
show mercy. Oh, mercy and grace. It's all His, isn't it? Hardened whom I harden, have
mercy upon whom I will have mercy. And he said, thou canst not see
my face, for there shall no man see me and live. And the Lord
said, behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon
a rock. Moses, now remember, is asking
the Lord to show him his glory. And here's what we're asking,
Lord, show me your glory. Show me that you're with me.
Show me that your promises are true and faithful. Lord, I need
to know. I'm living among a people and
a person that in this world, Lord, I need you to be with me. And the Lord said, there's a
place, there is a place near unto me, and it's a rock. And
look at verse 22, and it shall come to pass while my glory passes
by that I will put thee in a cleft of the rock and I will cover
thee with my hand while I pass by. Now you know who that rock
is. That's the eternal rock of ages.
That's the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the foundation stone for
the church on which God builds his church. and his people. He said, I'm going to put you
in Christ. I'm going to put you in the cleft of that rock. And
I will take away my hand and thou mightest see my back parts,
but my face thou shall not see. Now, what is the back part of
God? That's where God has been. What
is the front part of God? That's where God's going. We
want the assurance of the Lord being with us by him somehow
showing us what's to come. Isn't that true? You know, we wanna know future
events. We wanna know everything's gonna
be okay in the future. And that's our comfort that God's
with us. And the Lord said, no. No, the
comfort that I'm with you is that I've revealed my back parts
to you. I've enabled you to look back in time, back in time to
Calvary's cross, and I've enabled you to believe that what I accomplished
on Calvary's cross was successful to save you. You've got no place
else to go but my sacrificial offering to the Father of myself
for your sins. And so we look back to the cross,
we look back to the backside of God to find the hope of him
being with us. We look back even farther than
that, don't we? We look back into the very covenant
of grace before time ever began, in eternity past, and we see
that God made a promise to his son, to elect a people. We see that the son made a promise
to his father to redeem them and the Holy Spirit made a promise
to the father and the son to regenerate them. And the hope
of our salvation is not based on our promises to God, but the
promises that he made to himself. Salvation truly is of the Lord.
There's how I know that God's with me. He's enabled me to look
back and hang all the hopes of my salvation on the back parts
of God. the back parts of God. I have
no idea where he's gonna lead me tomorrow, and you don't either. But the comfort that we have
is that he will lead us and that he will be as faithful tomorrow
as he was yesterday. That's the comfort, that's the
hope that we have of looking back, that our God will be as
faithful tomorrow as he was yesterday. Notice in our text in Judges
chapter one that the children of Israel said, who shall go
for us? They didn't say, who's going
to help us? Who's going to assist us? Who's gonna go for us? The Lord Jesus Christ went for
his people to the cross. He suffered the full wrath of
God's justice for the sins of all of his people. He fought
the devil for us. He put away sin for us. He ascended, who shall go up
for us? He ascended into glory and is seated at the right hand
of God as our advocate, as our substitute. He's our surety, seated. God
said, sit down here at my right hand until I make thine enemies
thy footstool. Who shall go up for us? Not Lord, what are you gonna
do to help me? What are you gonna do to assist me? What are you
gonna do to come along beside and bolster my strength? No, when we were yet without
strength, Christ died for the ungodly. We've got to be completely
without strength in order for him to be all our strength, amen? Who shall go up for us? Judah. Judah shall go. For I've given the land unto
him. Turn back with me to Genesis chapter 43. Genesis chapter 43. Jacob is pronouncing blessings
on his sons. And I want you to notice the
blessing that he gives to Judah. Genesis chapter 43 verse eight. And Judah said, I'm sorry, that's
Genesis, where is the passage where Jacob is pronouncing Well,
look, you're there in Genesis chapter 43. This is actually
where Judah is promising to be the surety for Benjamin. You
remember when Jacob didn't want to send Benjamin down to Egypt
in fear that he would lose him just as he had lost Simeon and
just as he thought he had lost Joseph? And Judah steps up. And here Judah is clearly a picture
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And Judah said unto Israel, his
father, to Jacob, send the lad with me and we will arise and
go that we may live and not die, both we and thou and also all
our little ones. And I will be surety for him. I will guarantee you that I'll
bring him back. Judah is making a promise to
his father to be surety He's going to be my only concern. And my every concern will be
to take care of Benjamin and bring him back to you safely.
I will be surety for him. Of my hand shall thou require
him. If I bring him not unto thee
and set him before thee, then let me bear the blame forever. Now that's the Lord Jesus Christ
speaking to his father. And Benjamin is the church. And
the Lord Jesus Christ stands before his heavenly father and
says, I'll be surety for them. I'll bring them back, every single
one of them. And if I don't, you hold me to
blame. You think there's any chance
that the father is blaming the son for not having accomplished
the salvation of his people? No, no. Here's a picture of Judah. And you remember in Revelation
chapter five, when John is weeping because he sees the Lord holding
a book. is sealed with seven seals, and
no man or angel could be found to open the book. And John knows
if the book's not open, no one can be saved. And he weeps bitterly,
and an angel comes and says, weep not, weep not, for the Lion
of the tribe of Judah, he hath prevailed, and he is able to
open the book. And the book was given to the
lion of the tribe of Judah, the Lord Jesus Christ. And he opens
the book. You see this, when God said to
the children of Israel, they cried, Lord, who's going to go
up for us? Who's going to deliver us from these Canaanites? You've left us in this world,
Lord. Are you going to be with us? Like Moses said, are you
going to be with us? Yeah, I'm going to be with you.
I'm going to be with you in Christ. I'm gonna hide you in the cleft
of the rock. I'm gonna give you saving faith to look back to
what I've done at Calvary's cross and in the covenant of grace,
and you're gonna base the hope of your future salvation on my
faithfulness in the past. That's what our Lord's saying. Now I'm gonna send Judah. Look at, I think maybe this is
a Genesis chapter 44. Look at verse 32. And for thy servant became sure,
this is David. I mean, this is Judah now speaking
to Joseph and he's pleading with Joseph. And he's saying, he's
saying, thy servant, Judah, has become surety for the lad unto
my father, saying, if I bring him not unto thee, then I shall
bear the blame of my father forever. Now, therefore, I pray thee,
let thy servant abide instead of the lad, a bondman to my Lord,
and let the lad go up with his brethren. Judah is willing to
lay down his life for the safety of Benjamin. Is that not exactly
what the Lord Jesus did? Judah, I've given the land into
his hand. He's the one that's going to
deliver you. And he's going to be surety for
you. When the tabernacle was being
built, Judah was the one who provided the wise master builder
for the tabernacle. He's the man of war here. He's
the one who built the tabernacle of the gospel and the church.
And he's the wise master builder. And he's the man of war seen
in Joshua, in Judges chapter one, who went to conquer. And he conquers not only our
enemies, but he conquers us. He conquers us and he makes us
willing servants to bow before him. Genesis chapter 49. Here's the
passage I was looking for a moment ago. Genesis chapter 49. Look with me there. This is Jacob blessing Judah
in verse eight of Genesis chapter 49. Judah, thou art he whom thy
brethren shall praise. Thy hand shall be in the neck
of thine enemies and thy father's children shall bow before thee. Judah is a lion's wealth. That's a young lion. From the
prey, my son, thou art gone up. He stooped down, he couched as
a lion. He didn't grab his prey and run
into a cave somewhere and hide to eat it in fear that someone
might steal it from him. No, he conquered his prey in
the open and he stooped down without fear. And he destroyed
death and hell as an old lion, who shall rise him up? Oh, how
confident he is. This is the Judah. Go back with
me. Go back with me to our text. After the death of Joshua, our
Lord has ascended into glory. He's left us here among the Canaanites
and even with Canaanites in us. And we're torn between the Lord
and this fleshly world and this fleshly life. We find ourselves
just like the children of Israel, Lord, who's going to go up for
us? Who's going to deliver us? And
the Lord said, Judah's gonna do it. He's gonna conquer your
enemies and he's gonna conquer you. For I have given the land into
his hand. Now, our Lord came into this
world, physically speaking, through the tribe of Judah. Joseph and Mary were both of
the descendants of Judah. Turn with me to Hebrews chapter
7. Hebrews chapter 7. The Old Testament priesthood
was according to the tribe of Levi. And here our Lord is comparing
the old covenant to the new. And he says in verse 11 of Hebrews
chapter seven, if therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood,
for under it, the people received the law, what further need was
there that another priest should arise after the order of Melchizedek
and not be called after the order of Aaron? Now, Aaron and Moses
were of the tribe of Levi. And our Lord's saying he's raised
up a different tribe to be our priest. We're not under that
old Levitical priesthood anymore. For the priesthood being changed,
there is made of necessity a change also of the law. For he of whom
these things are spoken pertaineth to another tribe of which no
man gave attendance at the altar. So this Old Testament Levitical
tribe, only the Levites were allowed to go to the altar and
make sacrifice. If you weren't a Levite, you
didn't go into the tabernacle. And now our Lord is saying, another
priesthood has been raised up. For it is evident that the Lord
Jesus Christ sprang out of Judah, of which tribe Moses spake nothing
concerning the priesthood. And it is yet far more evident,
for that after the similitude of Melchizedek, there riseth
another priest, who is made not after the law of carnal commandments,
but after the power of an endless life." You remember who Melchizedek
was? He was that priest that Abraham
paid tithes to. He was the priest of righteousness
and the priest of Salem, and he was a pre-incarnate appearance
of none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. Without mother, without
father, without descent, he was there. Abraham paid tithes to
him, and then he left. And now our Lord is telling us,
oh no, we have a new priesthood now. Not according to carnal
commandments, but according to everlasting life. For this priest,
this priest is Judah. He's the one that would deliver
his people from Canaan. Look at verse 21, for these priests
were made without an oath, but this with an oath by him that
said unto him, the Lord swear and will not repent. Thou art
a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. This is the oath
of the covenant of grace. This is the promise of God that
he made to his son, Judah. This is. By the way, Judah is the same
name that we get the word Jew from, and it means praise. And he gets all the praise, and
he gets all the glory for having delivered his people when they
cry out to him. The Lord puts that cry in our
hearts. And then he says, Judah, Judah'll do it. I've given the
land to him. Chapter eight, verse one, now
the things which we have spoken, this is the sum. We have such
a high priest who is set at the right hand of the throne of the
majesty in the heavens, a minister of the sanctuary and of the true
tabernacle, which the Lord pitched and not man. Oh, brethren, nothing's really
changed, has it? Our Lord has given us so many
types and pictures of himself. And here we have in the book
of Judges, our very life and our very hope. I've given the
land to Judah. Look to him. Judah went to war. You read the rest of the chapter.
Judah went to war against the Canaanites and he delivered the
children of Israel from their oppression. Amen. What a savior. All right, let's
take a break.