Judges chapter 11. Judges chapter 11. We're going
to be in Judges chapter 11, and I'd like to begin reading with
verse 30. Judges chapter 11 and verse 30.
And we dealt a little bit with this last time, but I'd like
to read it just to keep the context. There was a vow vowed. It tells
us in Judges chapter 11, verse 30. And Jephthah vowed a vow
unto the Lord. and said, if thou shalt without
fail deliver the children of Ammon into my hands, then it
shall be that whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house
to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon,
shall surely be the Lord's, and I will offer it up for a burnt
offering. So Jephthah passed over unto
the children of Ammon to fight against them, and the Lord delivered
them into his hands. And he smote them from Aror,
Aror, even till thou come to Minis, even twenty cities unto
the plain of the vineyards, in a very great slaughter. Thus
the children of Ammon were subdued before the children of Israel. And Jephthah came to Mizpah unto
his house, and behold his daughter came out to meet him with timbrels
and with dances, and she was his only child. Beside her he
had neither son nor daughter, and it came to pass, when he
saw her, that he rent his clothes, and said, Alas, my daughter,
thou hast brought me very low, and thou art one of them that
trouble me, for I have opened my mouth unto the Lord, and I
cannot go back. And she said unto him, My father,
if thou hast opened thy mouth unto the Lord, do to me according
to that which hath proceeded out of thy mouth, forasmuch as
the Lord hath taken vengeance for thee on thine enemies, even
the children of Ammon. And she said unto her father,
Let this thing be done for me. Let me alone two months, that
I may go up and down in the mountains and bewail my virginity, I and
my fellows. And he said, go. And he sent
her away for two months, and she went into her companions
and bewailed her virginity upon the mountains. And it came to
pass at the end of the two months that she returned unto her father,
who did with her according to his vow, which he had vowed,
and she knew no man, and it was a custom in Israel. that the
daughters of Israel went yearly to lament the daughter of Jetha,
the Gideonite, four days a year. Thus we have the concluding verses
of chapter 11. Now, I appreciated something
I read. Brother Tim James wrote this,
and I appreciated it a lot with regard to this section of scripture.
It appears the Lord is deliberately vague I appreciate that. Concerning exactly how the vow
was to be carried out. The Lord, he said he just appears
deliberately vague on this. With regards to this closing
words of this 11th chapter of Judges, it is a blessing to run
into words like that. Now we're going to deal with
this section of scripture and hopefully we'll come to a conclusion
And, you know, some of my friends are for it, some of my friends
are against it, and I'm with my friends. You read the commentaries
on this section of Scripture and you're going to be about
split down the middle on what they say about it. And I think
that is very indicative of the situation that we have, that
the Lord was specifically vague on this. Now, we find that He
uses the word mystery several times in the Scripture. When
we get to the deep relationship between a husband and wife, the
Apostle Paul says, behold, I show you a mystery. We can't understand
all of it until we're there, but there is a relationship. There are some similarities between
a husband and wife and the relationship between Christ and his church.
Now, Christ and his church is a perfect relationship. The relationship
between a husband and wife is marred by the fall. That's all
we can say. All right, let's look here in
verse 39. It says in Judges 11, verse 39,
we do know this, that it came to pass at the end of two months
that she returned unto her father, who did with her according to
his vow, or he did her to his vow, which he had vowed, and
she knew no man, and it was the custom of Israel. We also know
that Jephthah vowed a vow. Now, we looked last time that
sometimes that may have not been the best thing in his interest,
but we also find out that there are so many other things that
happen in other people's lives in the Old Testament as well
as the New Testament, that their decision at the time probably
wasn't in their best interest, but God alone is able to take
those situations and turn them into good. He alone can do that. It was not the best situation
that Moses went out and killed an Egyptian. But as a result
of it, Moses is removed from the Egyptians and 80 years later,
he comes to lead Israel out of Egypt. It probably was not in
David's best interest that he did what he did. But we also
find as a result of that, Solomon is born and Solomon is in direct
lines with Jesus of Nazareth. We just can go through the scriptures
and find these apparent paradoxes, and yet the Lord is able to fulfill
what he says and shares with us in Romans chapter 8 and verse
28. And we know that all things work
together for the good of them that love God to those who are
the called according to his purpose. Now we are not going to be able
to see all that. We don't see all the good. We
can just trust the Lord that it is good. And that's what he
brings out. Jephthah already had been promised
victory. And yet, let us, let me say,
we would never do, let's never say that we would never do what
he did. I promise God and already know
that we have the victory. Turn with me, if you would, to
the book of Hebrews chapter 13. What a comfort this is to the
church that even though Jethro, and it's amazing to me that Jethro,
even going through all of this, is mentioned many, many years
later in the book of Hebrews chapter 11. If there was ever
a time that he could have been removed from that, it was over
those centuries. And yet the Holy Spirit moved
upon the writer of Hebrews to incorporate, put his name there
in that list. In the book of Hebrews chapter
13, if you'd turn there with me. Hebrews chapter 13, and there
in verse 5, we read these words that are so comforting to the
church and are comforting, no doubt, to Jethfeh in what happened
to him as he comes to the close, he comes home, he finds out what
he's done, he's opened his mouth to the Lord. That's full of a
lot of thought. And she brings that up too. Hebrews
chapter 13 and verse 5, it says this, let your conversation Let your conversation be without
covetousness and be content with such things as you have. For
he has said, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. Now I'm
so thankful as we look at Peter in the New Testament when he
betrayed the Lord, not betrayed him, but lied about him. And the Lord
was with him even in that, and after it was over with, he came
to him and be in peace. I am thankful that when Paul
came to him and says, Peter, you cannot do this. You cannot
spend time with the Gentiles until the Jews come around, and
then you flee over to the Jews. You can't do that. We find, I
believe, no doubt, that Peter saw the value of that correction
And then he was not doing that anymore. He saw the value of
the church. He saw the value of Jews and
Gentiles in the church. So the Lord never leaves nor
forsakes his people, even in that contradiction of our own
mind, as we find with Jephthah. And there's another passage of
scripture that I want to read, and that's found in the book
of Romans, chapter eight and verse one. Romans chapter eight
and verse one. Did Jephthah have to suffer? Did he have to pay? Was he in
debt to the Lord because of what he did? We bring this subject
up from time to time. Was Jephthah going to be held
accountable for what he said and what he did? Now, if he was
and is, then Jesus Christ did not take care of all his sin.
And if Jesus Christ took care of all his sin, even in that
nonsense he did, just like we do, we find here in Romans chapter
eight and verse 28, there is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus. There is therefore now, this
present time, when Jephthah spoke those words, And he is a faithful
judge of the Lord brought out in the book of Hebrews chapter
11 that There was no condemnation in that. God was not going to
penalize him. God was not going to beat him.
God was not going to bring him up to the authorities. He's not
going to, at that great day when we stand before him, well, you're
going to have to spend some time over on this side because of
what you did. Now, I can't understand a God
that can do that, but I'm thankful for the God that can do that.
I don't understand a God that has absolute no condemnation
for all that we say and do that is so wrong. And yet by the covenant
of grace, he has promised that there will be no condemnation
to them that are in Christ in this life or the life to come.
Even in the foolish things that we do, the foolish things that
Jethfe did. that Moses did, that David did, that Solomon did,
that Peter did, all of those things, there is therefore now
no condemnation to them that are in Christ. Now, we are caused
to bow our knee and ask for forgiveness, but He is not going to forgive
us because we ask. We're forgiven because He went
to the cross. We're just reminded of what we
are. We're worms. We're human, we
have the fall of the nature and all that. So when we come and
ask for forgiveness, we're not asking God, oh Lord, if you don't
forgive me, I'm going to be in trouble. We're just being thankful
that we have access and that we will. We're forgiven and that
can be given to us right now. I can know that I'm forgiven
in Christ Jesus. So these verses, I'm sure, were
verses or thoughts that were a blessing to Jephthah there
in the Old Testament. He did something. I think he
admitted later he was very foolish about what he did. He already
had the victory. God had already promised that.
And then he makes a statement like this. It's almost as if
he wanted to bargain with God. He wanted to have... A sacrifice, like is described
here, is to deal with sin. That's what it was in the Old
Testament. This burnt offering was a sacrifice to deal with
sin, and the priest took care of it. Now, it would be much
better if he said, I will bring a peace offering. That means
I already am at peace with you. And I've done some foolish things.
So those things just come out. Turn with me, if you would, to
the book of Ecclesiastes. We read this last week, but I
think it is worth reading again as we look here at this subject
that's brought up here in the book of Judges. The Book of Judges,
and there are some things that are quite vague about this, just
like so often we find in other places in the scripture. This
afternoon I was in a Bible study and going through the book of
Isaiah. And you know, I had to say, as when we went through
there, there is a lot of desert in Isaiah. There's chapters,
verses of scripture that speak of the judgment that God's going
to bring on those folks, and then once in a while we run into
an oasis. I mean, it talks about that branch
out of Judah, what he's going to do, how he has a remnant and
all those things. What a blessing that is to us
to read that. But there's a lot of words there
that are so, they're just, it's desert. It describes the fall. All right, here in the book of
Ecclesiastes chapter five, we read these words, chapter five,
verse two. Lord, help me. Lord, just help me. I have to
be thankful. Up to this point today, I've
done better than I used to do. I'm thankful for some restraint. I'm thankful that he restrains
me. Sometimes I'm privileged to get to think about something
before I speak. And I wish I could have done
that all my life, but It's past. So God helped me today and tomorrow
to think about what I'm going to say. Now, I have to say this. My friend up there in Kent, Washington,
birthday tomorrow, Brother Duane, helped me with that a lot because
he let me say it out loud. before I said it to the people
I intended to, and he would say, I don't think that's gonna be
very good. So he helped me to look at that. Ecclesiastes chapter
five, verse two, it says this. Be not rash with thy mouth, and
let not thine heart be hasty to utter anything before the
Lord, for God is in heaven. Just remember this. I remember
hearing a story about a guy that went through a great flood, Jamestown
flood. Sometime I'd like to read a book
about that Jamestown flood. He went through that and he was
killed in it and he's standing before Peter and he just can't
wait to get in and talk about the experience of the Jamestown
flood. Well, Peter says, just remember Noah's here. So just remember, Noah's here.
Wait, sometimes, be not rash with Alma. God is in heaven and
thou upon earth, therefore let thy words be few. For a dream
cometh through the multitude of business and a fool's voice
is known by a multitude of words. When thou vowest a vow unto God,
defer not to pay. Pay it, for he hath no pleasure
in fools. Pay that which thou hast vowed.
So we're gonna find out that in some capacity, Jephthah paid
his vow. Let us move on here. We see that
Jephthah's daughter, going back to the book of Judges, we see that Jephthah's daughter
is in complete agreement with her dad. What's it tell us there? Let me get over there. Judges,
the battery in my electronic device was dead, so here we are. Judges chapter 11, verse 36. And she said unto him, my father,
if thou hast opened thy mouth unto the Lord, due to me according
to that which has proceeded out of thy mouth for as much as the
Lord has taken vengeance for thee of my enemies upon the children
of Ammon. So she is in complete agreement
with what has been said over here, with what Jephthah has
said, her father has said, and she has no problem with it. You
know, as we think about that, we find out, as Jephthah's daughter
is a beautiful picture of the church, that the church has no
problem with the vow that God made in the covenant of grace
before the foundation of the world for the securing of their
redemption. Now, we may look at what went
on at the cross and say, oh, how could he go through that?
How could he go through that? Thank God he did. How could he put
his back to the spiders? How could he let his beard be
plucked out? How could he put a crown of thorns
on him? How could he be spit upon and
mocked and all of those things? He did it for our redemption. And the church, in standing back
and looking at what took place, are in complete agreement with
it. We would not have it any other
way. We would never say, as some have
said, if I'd have been there, I'd have stopped it. We would
say, Lord, it's your covenant of grace. You have determined
the requirements in that covenant of grace before the foundation
of the world. And in that covenant of grace, you have determined
for the joy that was set before you to endure this cross, despising
the shame And now he said at the right hand of the Father.
He endured the cross and the church says, amen. He went to
the cross and the church says, amen. And we say, it is our redemption. There is nothing I can find fault
in that. God did exactly what was necessary. He had to go to the cross. It
was predetermined that that was the way that he would give. Now,
much is said in the Old Testament about not doing human sacrifices. God warned Israel about that. You are not to have human sacrifices. The sacrifices that are acceptable
at this point in this economy are those sheep, and lambs, and
ewes, and cattle, and goats, and whatever, turtle doves, and
whatever else. But don't you ever put a human
on that sacrifice. Now there's one reason for it,
besides all the other reasons, there's one reason that just
stuck out to me, There is going to be one, the God-man, and we cannot, God did
not want, there's not going to be another human being that he's
going to accept their sacrifice for because there's only one
man, the man Christ Jesus, he's going to the cross and he's going
to lay down his life as sacrifice for our sin. a sacrifice for
our sin. So nowhere else are we gonna
have that type, shadow, and picture. Nowhere else are we gonna have
a human sacrifice excepted. People, we do the dumbest things,
and we can always find people that do dumber things than we
do. All we have to do is read a few chapters in the Bible and
find out people taking their own children and offer them as
a human sacrifice. They're not the first people
to do it. You go through almost every, a group of people in the
world over time. They had that kind of thing.
But it's a mockery, not only to their religion, but it's a
mockery to God. And there's only going to be one Lord, one faith. And that's Jesus Christ and him
crucified. He became the human sacrifice
to redeem his people who are humans. his brethren, his children, the
ones he was made like unto. He alone could be that sacrifice. So nowhere else is it requested,
intimated. Anywhere else is that brought
up about having a deliverance. Now, we find out in the book
of Numbers chapter 30, If you go back and keep your finger
right here, and I can say that with authority tonight, keep
my fingers right. Numbers chapter 30. When we were going through the
latter part of the book of Numbers, we went through a section on
vows. And there was the possibility,
particularly for daughters, there was the possibility of the father
getting involved and removing the vow from the daughter. It says here in Numbers chapter
30 in verse 5, I believe it is, it says, but if her father disallow
in the day that he heareth not any of her vows or her bonds
wherewith she hath bound Her soul shall stand and the Lord
shall forgive her because her father disallowed her. Now, thanks
be unto God, our father disallowed the vow. We had a vow with hell. We had a vow with death. We had
a vow with the grave. We had a vow. We were promised
to that from all that we could understand and all that we could
know. Now, I don't know about you, but I was thrilled when
I found out that I wasn't determined for hell and God had to snatch
me out. I had always been. a child. I'd always been one
of his. He elected me before the foundation
of the world. But there is a sense that the
vow that we had, God took away. He took it out of our heart.
He took that vow with death that we had, took it away. He annulled
it. How did he do that? By fulfilling
his own vow. He promised to lay down his life,
a ransom for his people. So he's the one that's going
to be the sacrifice for his people. He's the one that's going to
be the human sacrifice for his people. When he was on the cross,
he was human. And he suffered as a human, but
he also suffered as a human never could. And that was to have our
sins imputed to him, and God the Father could pour out his
indignation and wrath upon him, and his life would be taken in
a sense, and yet given in another sense. The Father, in such seriousness,
because of the love he had for the church, says, I must be just
and justifier. In order to be just, sin had
to be paid for. And in order for that to happen,
a sin bearer had to be found. In order for that to happen,
it had to be the sin bearer that was laid down in the covenant
of grace. So we have this young lady, the only daughter. How
many wives is God gonna have? How many wives does Christ have?
One. And we find that this is the
only daughter of Jephthah. No sons, no other daughters.
One of the things that is interesting to find out that as soon as, we can say one side says she
was taken as a sacrifice. The other side says she had perpetual
virginity. Doesn't matter, there was no
children or grandchildren that Jephthah could have. I am convinced
that almost every young lady virgin among Israel had some
thought about being the fulfillment of what we find in the book of
Genesis chapter 3 and verse 15, the seed of the woman. Now it
appears to me that there was only one person out of all the
women of the world, all the virgins of the world that were Jews in
the line that didn't realize that she was going to be it.
And that's Mary. Boy, how can these things be?
When the Holy Spirit came to her and said, she said, how can
these things be? You've been anointed by the Spirit.
You've been chosen by God. And she's the only one that says,
oh my goodness. Now, Jessica's daughter may have
been in the thought that this, I can go to bear the son in.
A lot of the ladies did. A lot of the virgins did believe
that. They understood that it was going to be in that process.
But she never had the opportunity. She never was married. She was
a virgin all of her life. And she celebrated that. That was part of it. All right,
we do know that our father did make an irrevocable vow in the
old eternity, the covenant of grace, never to be altered or
changed. Now, she said that about her
dad's vow can't be changed. We'll honor it. You vowed a vow. Turn with me, if you would, to
the book of Hebrews, Hebrews chapter six. Hebrews chapter six, verse 16. Hebrews chapter six, verse 16
and 17. Joseph made a vow. Our father
made a vow. And since he couldn't swear by
anything else, he swore by himself. He said here, for men, verse
16 of Hebrews chapter six, for men verily swear by the greater,
and an oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife,
wherein God, willing more abundantly to show unto the heirs of promise
the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath. and by him, by two immutable
things in which it was impossible for God to lie, who might have
strong consolation, who had fled for refuge to lay hold upon the
hope set before us. Which hope we have as an anchor
of the soul, both sure and steadfast, which entereth into within the
veil." So we have a God that has an irrevocable vow. The word of God, irrevocable.
The covenant of grace, irrevocable. The purpose of grace, irrevocable.
Salvation by grace, irrevocable. Cannot be changed, altered, just
like we find that David had to deal, or Daniel had to deal with
a law that could not be evoked. It could be carried out. And
it was carried out. And in a like manner, he was
offered to those lions So once it's over, he can be free. Immutability
of his counsel. All right, Jephthah's daughter
was a perpetual virgin. This was such a difficult thing
to bear and it removed the possibility of her bearing the Messiah. Jephthah's
line was ended, no other children, no grandchildren. And the Lord,
the church is also a perpetual virgin. Now, from our standpoint,
how can these things be? From our standpoint, we see ourself
and say, that's impossible. From God's standpoint, which
is the only one that stands, you are forever pure. Turn with me, if you would, to
the book of 2 Corinthians. 2 Corinthians chapter 11. 2 Corinthians chapter 11. 2 Corinthians chapter 11 and
verse two. Well, let's read verses one and
two here. Would to God ye could bear with me a little in my folly
and indeed bear with me. For I am jealous over you with
godly jealousy. For I have espoused you to one
husband that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. From God's standpoint, The robe
of righteousness took care of the problem. We stand before
him with sins put away, sins forgiven, and as Paul says, as
a chaste virgin. But I fear, lest by any means,
as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, so your mind should
be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. Now I'm convinced
if that can happen, then you didn't know to begin with what
it was. We find that warning through
the scriptures. Unless you believed in vain, that's what he brings
out in another place. Turn with me, if you would, as the Apostle
Paul brings this up in the book of Ephesians again. The Holy
Spirit leading him to write, we have these words, Ephesians
chapter five, verse 27. Ephesians chapter five, verse
27. that he might present it to himself a glorious church,
not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing." Have you noticed
any wrinkles? Any spots? We certainly do from
our side, but from God's side, he sees perfection. He sees his
son in his perfection. but that it should be holy and
without blemish. He's talking about you and I.
He's talking about the church. He's talking about the church
of the living God. He's talking about those who
say thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. So from
that very perspective, we find out that the Bible shares with
us exactly how Jephthah's daughter was to her very end. Brother Henry Mahan shared with
me one time that a person comes up with an idea, and they ask
people, and they don't get an agreement, and they don't get
an agreement, and they don't get an agreement, and they don't get an agreement,
and they don't get an agreement, and finally they run into somebody
that says, that's right, that's... And the guy says, I knew it all
along. I knew it all along. You know, I was reading, I don't
know how many translations on this. over and over. There's hundreds of translations.
Isn't the internet something? I can type in a verse of scripture
and there must be 50 translations come up about that. Well, there's
one translation. I have an interlinear Hebrew-English
Bible. Now, the printed is about that
big because the entire Bible is in a book about like that,
by that, by that, and it's all the Hebrew, which I can't read,
but as close as possible, the translation is made, and then
you have the King James along the edge. Well, I was reading
his translation, and he says this, and I want to stand by
it. and vowed Jephthah a vow to Jehovah
and said, if indeed you will give the sons of Ammon into my
hand, then shall be it the outcoming thing which comes out from the
doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the
sons of Ammon shall belong to Jehovah and I will offer it instead
of a burnt offering. Now, I liked what he found in
his studies. I cannot find, honestly, that
Jesper would offer up his daughter as a burnt offering. I believe
he caused her to be a virgin the rest of her life. There was
no children ever born. Their line was dead. I have my
mother's two brothers. One of them had no children.
That line is dead. My other uncle had a daughter.
She's dead. That line is dead. So we find
out Jephthah's line is dead. Now we're thankful for the first
seven verses of the next chapter, because that deals with Jephthah
also. So we're going to stop there
tonight. I am so thankful she understood that There was an
irrevocable vow, couldn't change. I'm thankful that we can understand
that the church like her was a perpetual virtue. And I'm thankful
that God made a vow to redeem his people from their sins. And
he's carrying that out in time as every one of those lost sheep
are born into families. And as they mature and hear the
gospel, he comes and saves them. And I'm also convinced when the
last sheep is saved, we will be taken out of this world in
such a glorious way. And so shall we be with the Lord.
So shall we see the Lord. And we will truly understand
what it is to be without blot and without blemish.