Judges chapter 21, please. Well, this will be our last study
in the book of Judges. Eleven months ago today, we started
this profitable study. As we come to this last chapter
in the book of Judges, we actually make our way to the time when
the Lord gives Judges to Israel. And as we've seen in the last
five chapters, historically, they take place at the beginning
of the time of the judges. And again, I will say that I
believe the book of Judges is arranged this way in order to
show us that in the end, when it's all said and done, without
a doubt, no earthly man can deliver and save God's people. In order
for any sinner to be saved from their personal sin, there's only
one who's capable, and we know who that is, the Lord Jesus Christ. Thou shalt call His name Jesus,
for He shall save His people from their sin. Neither is there
salvation in any other, for there is none other name under heaven
given among men, whereby we must be saved. salvation is of the
Lord, that being the Lord Jesus Christ. I never grow tired of
hearing those verses because it's the only hope that I, as
a sinner, have. Only the Lord Jesus, who came
in the world to save sinners, can provide for us a holy, righteous,
all that the holy, righteous God of justice requires. and
he requires perfection. The only way a sinner can be
delivered from the evil and disobedience of the time in which he or she
lives is to be delivered from the evil and the disobedience
within themselves. I've said this often, the Lord
in Genesis there looked down upon the men and women in the
world The thoughts of men and women's heart was on evil continually. It repented to God that He made
man upon the earth. But the reason there was evil
in the earth was because there was evil in man. And it's the
same today. Nothing has changed in the way
of sin. Now, during the time of these
final chapters, the people of Israel still not had completely
or totally possessed the promised land. And the reason being is
simple. They didn't believe that God
was able and would fight for them. And out of greed, they
let the nations of the Canaanites stay to collect money from them. And there's no doubt that it's
the love of money that's the root of all evil, the foundation
of all evil, not money itself, but the love of it. Now Israel
did precisely, this is what I want you to see. They did precisely
what God had said they would do in the book of Deuteronomy. Now I won't turn you there, but
I'm gonna read it to you. Deuteronomy chapter 31, verse
20. And this is what God said. For
when I shall have brought them into the land, which I swear
under their fathers, that floweth with milk and honey, and they
shall have eaten and filled themselves in wax and fat. Then will they
turn unto other gods and serve them and provoke me and break
my covenant." That's exactly what they did. That's what we've
seen all through this book. especially in these last five
chapters, which, as I said, took place before God actually sent
the judges. They begin to mix the worship
of God with the practicing of worshiping idols, and the same
thing always happens when that occurs. You can't combine truth
and error. You cannot blend oil and water. You cannot serve two masters. You'll love one and you'll hate
the other. You'll hold to one and despise
the other. The scripture's clear. The book
of Hebrews talks a great deal about those who seek to combine
the old covenant with the new covenant, and they're called
apostates, with whom there was no possibility for recovery.
This is serious, serious stuff, scary stuff. Those who toy with
the idea of mixing a little law and a little works and with the
grace of God in Christ only have to look to the book of Judges
to see that such practice is disastrous. And that's why we
study these Old Testament scriptures. Paul claims that those who do
have fallen from grace. A sad case of mankind's fallen
estate is that when they do these things, they're actually doing
that which is right in their own eyes. A way that seems right. The old covenant was never designed
to save sinners. It was designed to point sinners
to Christ. And the old covenant was a constant
and continuous reminder of sin. Every sacrifice, every ceremony,
and there were a lot of them, the 10 commandments, the eighth
Sabbath day, were repeated over and over and over again because
none of them could put away sin, not a single one. But in the
new covenant, our salvation is entirely dependent upon the perfect
obedience of the Lord Jesus, our blessed Savior. And there's
nothing for us to brag about. It was Christ's perfect obedience
that acquitted and saved his people from their sin by his
death on the cross. The wages of sin is death, we
know that. But Jesus paid it all, every
bit of it. The Old Covenant brought Israel
into idolatry. They began to trust in what they
did. That's easy to do, you know? And since God was too holy in
order for them to bring Him down on their level, they began to
manufacture their own little G-gods that they imagined to
be all together like themselves. Why do men and women do that?
They cannot manipulate God, but they can manipulate one who's
just like them. And that's exactly what men and
women have done today. These things they have done and
God has kept silent. But he said, the day is soon
coming when he, God, will reprove them and set things in order
before their eyes. Oh, it's a fearful thing to fall
into the hands of the living God. Well, with that somewhat
lengthy introduction, let's look at this last chapter together.
Verse one, Judges 21. Now the men of Israel had sworn
an Ispah, saying, there shall not any of us give his daughter
unto Benjamin to watch. Last time, in chapter 20, we
saw that 600 men of Israel Benjamin, the tribe of Benjamin
had escaped and God spared them, verse 47 of Judges 20. And after slaughtering nearly
the whole entire population of the tribe of Benjamin, the men
of Israel seemed to realize that they've gone too far. God had
allowed them to attack the Benjamites in Gibeah, but he had never instructed
them to wipe them out entirely. And they had gone above and beyond,
and as we often say, to once again do what was right in their
own lives. Now with 600 men left, the women and children had been
destroyed, and the tribe would quickly die out, just 600 men
left. And so unless wives could be
found for them, they couldn't repopulate. So the Israelites
had vowed to God that they would not give their daughters as wives
to the Benjamites. And for them to marry a Canaanite
woman was not allowed by God. They were in idolatry, but they
were still religious. So what was Israel gonna do? Well, always what's right in
their own eyes. Look at verse two, and the people
came to the house of God and abode there till even before
God and lifted up their voices and wept sore and said, oh Lord
God of Israel. Now look at this. Why has this
come to pass in Israel? that there should be today one
tribe lacking in Israel. Are you kidding me? Because you
killed them all. All of them but 600 men. That's
why, that's why, that's why this has come to pass in Israel. And
they cried out to God as if it was His responsibility and cause
that the tribe of Benjamin was on the edge of extinction. They
question, the question here that they ask is absolutely ridiculous.
Why has this come to pass? It was their vengeance against
the Benjamites, the reason that it had come to pass. God just
let them do what they wanted to do. Once again, I don't want
God to let me do what I wanna do. God, deliver me from what
I wanna do. Deliver me from my will. Ultimately,
the depravity of man always blames God. The woman that thou gavest
me. It's your fault, God. You gave
that woman to me. That's why I did what I did. The serpent, Lord, in your garden,
if you hadn't put him there. And I suppose, I think Moses'
brother Aaron had the best one, the best excuse, or the saddest
and worst. You remember what his excuse
was when Moses confronted him about the golden calf? His defense
was, and I said unto them, whosoever hath any gold, let him break
it off. So they gave it to me, and I cast it into the fire,
and out came this calf, just popped out of the fire. And we
often ask the same stupid question. Lord, why has this, why has it
come to this? Why, why, why, why? And we don't
have to look far to see that we ourselves are the reason.
Verse four, it came to pass in the morrow that the people rose
early and built there an altar and offered burnt offerings and
peace offerings. And the children of Israel said,
who is there among all the tribes of Israel that came not up at
the congregation unto the Lord, For they had made a great oath
concerning him that came not up to the Lord to misbe saying
he shall surely be put to death. And the children of Israel repented
them for Benjamin their brother and said, there is one tribe
cut off from Israel this day. How shall we do for wives for
them that remain seeing we have sworn by the Lord that we will
not give them our daughters to wives? And they said, what one
is there of the tribes of Israel that came not up to Mizpah to
the Lord? There was a group of folks that
didn't come up to help them when they wiped out the Benjamite.
And behold, there came none to the camp from Jabesh Gilead to
the assembly. For the people were numbered,
and behold, that there were none of the inhabitants of Jabesh
Gilead there. And the congregation sent thither
12,000 men of the Valianites and commanded them saying, go
and smite the inhabitants of Jabash-Gilead with the edge of
the swords with the women and the children." Now, note here,
Israel winds up doing here the very thing that they killed the
Benjamites for doing to the Levites concubine, which started this
whole thing. You know, it's no doubt true
that what we judge others for, we too are guilty of ourselves. If not outwardly, inwardly. Now
I'm talking to me, but that's why we should never judge any
man or any woman, yet we still do. And if not outwardly, if
not verbally, We do inwardly, we don't say it, we think it.
Or maybe it's just me, I don't know. But the Lord Jesus said,
judge not, that you be not judged. Condemn not, and you shall not
be condemned. Forgive, and you shall be forgiven.
And this is why we must be kind one to another, tenderhearted,
forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath
forgiven you. We're all guilty of the very
things that we judge others over. Verse 11, and this is the thing
that you should do. You shall utterly destroy every
male and every woman that hath lain by man. And they found among
the inhabitants of Jabash-Gilead 400 young virgins that had known
no man by line with any male, and they brought them into the
camp to Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan. And the whole
congregation sent some to speak to the children of Benjamin that
were in the rock, and to call peaceably unto them. And Benjamin
came again at that time, and they gave them wives, which they
had saved the life of the women of Jabesh-Gilead, and yet so
they sufficed them not, and the people repented them for Benjamin,
because the Lord had made a breach in the tribes of Israel." As
we read a moment ago, those of Jabesh-Gilead had refused to
join in their campaign against those who had done this injustice
to the Levites concubine. So 12,000 of them invade, and slaughtered the whole city
with the exception of 400 versions which they here delivered to
the Benjamite. That still left them 200 short
of the 600 needed. And I find this quite sad and
disturbing because we see another picture of ourselves by nature.
Israel here repented. They were sorry, it says in verse
15, they repented. but not for what they had done
to the tribe of Benjamin or what they had just done to those here
at Jabesh Gilead. That's not why they were repenting.
They were not sorry or repentant for all their killing. They were
sorry that they had destroyed all the Benjamites' women and
had not saved more of the daughters of Jabesh-Gilead. They weren't
sorry for the taking of lives. They were sorry that they hadn't
saved and spared more so that their work would be fitting.
Oh, we're still 200 short. They were sorry about that. Now they have to deal with that
issue. So Israel, this is God's people,
hatches another deceitful and deceptive plan whereby they can
give the remaining Benjamin men their brides and still honor
their oath. You know, they said, we ain't
giving our daughters up, and we've got to honor our oath.
We'd be cursed if we break our oath. So now they organized another
scheme, whereby the Benjamin men would kidnap the remainder
of the virgins from their own tribes. You know, it'd be like
if we had a tribe, and let's say we were a tribe, And I said,
OK, well, I have a daughter, but I can't give her to you.
But you can kidnap her. And then that way, I can't be
blamed. I didn't break my oath. Boy,
this is just the nature of man. Handling this issue this way,
they wouldn't be guilty of the oath that they had made in not
giving their daughters to the Benjamites to marry. Men is going to find a way to
get around the law by getting someone else to do their dirty
work for them. So they can place the blame on someone else and
say, well, I didn't do that. And this is the mark of the legalist,
touch not, taste not, handle not. But it didn't say anywhere
in the scriptures, get someone else to do it for you. the tribe of Benjamin to its
former state, making sure that all 12 of the tribes were intact,
seemed like an honorable cause and something worthwhile. But
usurping the law to do so only caused them to go deeper into
idolatry. No effort of the flesh can ever
produce a profitable spiritual result. That which is born of
the flesh is flesh. That's all it'll ever be. And
that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. Paul said in Romans
8, for they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the
flesh, but they that are after the Spirit, the things of the
Spirit, for to be carnally, fleshly minded is death, but to be spiritually
minded is life and peace, because the carnal, fleshly mind is enmity
You remember what that word means? Hostile. It's hostile against
God. It's not subject to the law of
God. Neither indeed can be. If God
doesn't give us a new heart and a new mind, it'll never be, it'll
never think of the things of God, do anything spiritually
profitable. So then that they that are in
the flesh cannot please God. Israel slaughtered a whole city
of Israel, their own people, when they could have simply repented
of their foolish oath. and agreed to allow their daughters
to marry the men of the tribe of Benjamin. Don't you think
that would have been better? Lord, we're sorry. We were just
so foolish when we made that oath. We don't want our brethren,
the Benjamites, to go extinct. We messed up. Forgive us and help us with this. But no, they slaughter a whole
city. Verse 16, then the elders of
the congregation said, how shall we do for wives for them that
remain? We stood with 200 short. What are we going to do now?
Seeing the women are destroyed out of Benjamin, we killed all
them. We only found 400 virgins. We're
still 200 short. And they said, there must be
an inheritance for them that be escaped of Benjamin, that
a tribe be not destroyed out of Israel. How be it? We may
not give them wives of our own daughters. For the children of
Israel have sworn, saying, cursed be he that giveth a wife to Benjamin.
Then said they, behold, there's a feast of the Lord in Shiloh,
yearly in a place which is on the north side of Bethel, on
the east side of the highway that goeth up from Bethel to
Shechem and on the south of Lebanon. Therefore they commanded the
children of Benjamin, saying, go and lie in wait in the vineyards,
go to this feast, and see and behold, if the daughters of Shiloh
come out to dance and dances, then come ye out of the vineyards
and catch you every one his wife. of the daughters of Shiloh, and
go to the land of Benjamin. And it shall be when their fathers
or their brethren come up to us to complain, that we will
say unto them, be favorable unto them for our sakes, because we
reserve not to each man his wife in the war, for ye did not give
unto them at this time that you should be guilty. They were kidnapped. You're not guilty of the oath
that you made. We're not guilty. Nobody's guilty
here. And so the children of Benjamin
did so, verse 23, and took them wives according to their number
of them that danced, whom they caught and they went and returned
unto their inheritance and repaired the cities and dwelt in them. And the children of Israel departed
thence at that time, every man to his tribe and to his family. And they went out from thence,
every man to his inheritance. The tribe of Benjamin take their
new wives, they return to their homes, they rebuild the city,
and they carry on as usual in their idolatry. Fallen men and
women in sin don't change much, not unless God divinely intervenes. Most of the time, it's business
as usual. You see, sin is what we are.
It's very easy for us to sin, to live in sin. Now, the story
we just read of how Israel restored the Benjamites, as I see it,
would be considered by most to be a moral and an honorable thing. Well, they made a lot of mistakes,
people say, but, you know, they tried to do what was right in
the end. And it was an honorable thing
what they did. No, it wasn't. How ridiculous. I know that God allowed them
to nearly destroy the Benjanites, but it was their immorality that
did so. They were guilty and responsible.
And there's nothing moral about it, you know. So to close the
study of judges, I want us to quickly summarize the things
that men and women do that brings about idolatry. You know, idolatry
is still prevalent today, very much so. And you don't have to
worship Buddha or Muhammad or one of the Hindu gods or whatever
to commit idolatry. It's going on at the first church.
It's going on everywhere. And the first thing is no doubt
this supposed morality that we just read about. Listen, morality
among depraved sinners is a farce. It is no such thing. No such
thing. Well, you know, he's a moral
man. Now, maybe compared to you, maybe compared to me, but not
compared to God. Matter of fact, the word moral
or the word morality is not found in the scriptures, not one time.
You won't find the word moral or morality at all in the word
of God. Man's imagined morality causes
them to travel down the highway of idolatry. Every time. And it's somewhat ironic that
the book of Judges ends with those familiar words found throughout
the book. You know what they are? You've
heard them a lot. Verse 25, look at it. We again read, in those
days, there was no king in Israel, and every man did that which
was right in his own eyes. And they still are today. unless
God intervenes. Men's moral efforts are not the
means of deliverance. This is not the end of Israel's
idolatry. They sent judge after judge,
12 of them total. Each time the Lord sent a judge,
the judge delivered them out of their trouble. The judge died. What happened then? They went
right back into their idolatry, thinking that they were doing
what was right. And it continued on and on after
this. Secondly, God-given faith that
saves and the righteousness of God that's imputed in Christ
alone to us, is invisible to the eye. The scripture is very
clear that just shall live by faith. Believers, we walk by
faith, not by sight. A hope that is seen is not hope
at all. Christ in us is the hope of glory.
The only evidence of salvation given in the scriptures is faith
in Jesus Christ and Him alone. Let me read 2 Corinthians 4,
18. Well, we look not at the things which are seen, but at
the things which are not seen, for the things which are seen
are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.
You know, Micah, remember Micah? Just a couple of chapters back,
he manufactured his own little G-gods that he could see and
he could handle and he could touch them. And he was like,
oh, this is my little idol. I just love my little idol. And
it sounds ridiculous, but it's true. Men and women do the same
thing today. You can't prove your faith by
outward signs. Men and women, they like to wear
crosses. Oh, did you see my cross? My
grandmother gave me this cross. They wear crosses around their
necks, in their ears, tattoos of crosses. Folks put the most ridiculous
things on T-shirts. Jesus and, you know, you've seen them. They'll hang
the Ten Commandments on their walls in their churches, on billboards,
even in their yards. Not long ago, I seen one of those
like realtor signs, you know, and had 10 commandments on it.
And I thought to myself, I wonder how many he kept, you know, they
put it in his yard. I wonder how many of them he's
kept. I'm not going to put 10 commandments in my yard because
it condemns me. I can't keep them. And it's all to give a show of
piety and righteousness. The only way to be righteous
is by the death of Jesus Christ, by His righteousness being imputed
to us. If Christ has been made to be
righteousness to you, then you'll neither need nor desire anything
that you can touch or see to do. In fact, the child of God
will find those things detestable and nothing less than idols. The true believer will disdain,
disallow, and disown everything that others use to prove their
righteousness. Thirdly, idolatry is manifested
when those who Supposed to speak for God, supposedly
speak for God, become hirelings. And the point I'm making here
is that idolatry is common in churches today. Just like Micah's
priest, remember him? Nothing but a hireling looking
for a better job. a promotion, a bigger church,
a bigger paycheck. And when a so-called preacher
and pastor is reduced to the ways of men and hire themselves
out to the highest bidder, and we've got a lot of that going
on. They'll compromise their message for fear of loss of employment. I've heard men say, oh, I believe
like you believe. I believe in election, and I
believe in predestination, and I believe in a sovereign God,
but I can't preach that at my church. Well, they'd fire me
in a heartbeat. I'd be without a job. Well, that's
all it is to you. It's just a job, if that's the
case. My, my, Lord help us. People look at small assemblies
like ours and say, there can't be anything with that small group.
That view couldn't be right. You know, there's power in numbers.
Not that many people could be wrong. You got a big church that's
full. Not that many people can be wrong. Well, that's not what
the Lord said. Christ said, enter ye in at the
straight gate, for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that
leads to destruction, and many there be. which go in their head,
because straight is the gate, and narrow is the way that leadeth
unto life, and few there be that find." Somebody was calling me
tomorrow and said, how many did you have at church last night?
I said, a few, a few, just a few. Few there be that find it. Though idolatry is complex, it
travels under a thousand names, and it's easy to detect. We can
make idols out of anything and everything. If anything is added
to the righteousness of Christ as our only acceptance before
God, it becomes idolatry. If any morality that we think
we have is mixed with the work of Christ in any way. And it causes us to trust in
anything that would rival the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ.
It's absolutely nothing but idolatry. Whatever you put before Christ,
doesn't matter who or what it is. If it's your children, your
grandchildren, your wife, your husband, your job, whatever it
is that the Lord Jesus takes a back seat to, or a second chair
to. You know, in music, they have
the best player's first chair, and then the next best player's
the second chair, and then right on down, third chair, fourth
chair. But if Christ has to take a second chair to anything else,
then what's in the first chair is an idol. And these aren't my words, they're
the Lord's words. Matthew 10, 37, he that loveth
father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And he that
loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he
that taketh not his cross, and followeth me is not worthy of
me. In Matthew 22, verse 37, thou
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy
soul and with all thy mind. This is the first and the great
commandment. Lord didn't stop there. Luke
14, 26, if any man come to me and hate me, And we know that
that doesn't mean hate the way most think it does. It means
if any man prefer or puts or makes something else a priority
before me, whether it be his father, his mother, his wife,
his children, his brother, his sisters, it doesn't matter. Yea,
in his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. We looked at it a couple of weeks
ago, we know it's so. Seek ye first, first the kingdom
of God. Whatever comes before the Lord
is an idol and it's idolatry. So what do I say about that?
Lord, keep our eyes on Christ. Keep our minds, our hearts on
the Lord Jesus. To look anywhere else is to perish
in idolatry. And that's the lesson of the
book of Judges. There is a true judge and a deliverer. One who saves. One who's capable. One who is willing. And you know
who it is. It's the Lord Jesus Christ.