All right, let's look first at
Judges 1 concerning Christ, the judge of all. And that's really,
you know, the book of Judges refers to the time period after
the death of Joshua that God gave Israel judges. And these
judges were not judges who sit in a law court. Somebody said they were heroes
or something like that, but they're more like this. These judges
were deliverers. and they were protectors of the
people. God raised them up. There were
14 of them, and four of them are mentioned in the book of
Hebrews in the hall of faith. The most famous two are Gideon
and Samson. Most everybody knows about them,
but there were other judges, and these judges were pictures
of Christ, who is our great deliverer and our protector. And I added
that he is our judge because all judgment has been put over
into his hands. And so as we look through this,
we'll see pictures of Christ. And of course, I'm not going
to go through the book of Judges verse by verse, but I'm going
to hit some highlights. And if you'll look in Judges
one, look at verse one of chapter one. It says, now, after the
death of Joshua, it came to pass that the children of Israel asked
the Lord to ask a question. They said, who shall go up for
us against the Canaanites first to fight against them? Who's
going to lead us? Who's going to take us? And the
Lord said, here's the Lord's answer in verse two, Judah shall
go up. Behold, I have delivered the
land into his hands. Now this Judah was a tribe. This
is one of the 12 tribes of Israel. And of course you remember Judah
back in the book of Genesis, as he was one of the sons of
Jacob. And Judah obviously is a type of Christ. And what we're
gonna see in the book of Judges, it's the story of God preserving
Israel in the promised land in spite of their unbelief and their
sinfulness and their rebellion. Because you're gonna see that,
the story of the history of Israel under the old covenant in the
promised land, and even when they were in captivity, is a
history of ups and downs, more downs than ups. And so the people
were continually rebelling against the Lord, his word, breaking
the covenant. They were continually going after
other gods. And yet God tells them, he says,
you've forsaken me, but I'm not gonna forsake you, but hold on
to that thought. As Joshua was a type of Christ,
Judah also is a type of Christ. Even the tribe, the leading tribe
of the nation, to go up before them, they would go up first
against their enemies. And that's how their enemies
were defeated. So Joshua went, you remember
Joshua went up before them crossing the Jordan River. He went up
before them in conquering Jericho. Well, Judah now is going to go
before them to defeat their enemies. And that's a great picture of
Christ going up before us. He went before us to the cross
and conquered our sins. As we were brought under the
curse of the law by Adam, Christ went under that curse for us.
He went up for us. And he died on that cross, satisfying
the justice of God, establishing righteousness for us, conquering
all of our enemies, sin, Satan, the curse of the law, the flesh,
all of it. And then he was buried and arose
again the third day and he went up before us to the Father. And
now he's seated at the right hand of the Father, ever living
to make intercession for us. Christ went up before us to bring
us salvation, to bring us out of bondage, to bring us into
the land of promise that is the spiritual land of salvation.
by his grace. And so as the people of Israel
here, now they are secure and safe within the promised land,
not due to their own power, not due to their own goodness, but
they're secure and safe because of God's power. And it's based
on God's promise. And like I said, they were sometimes in obedience,
but very few times. We'll see one of those times
here in just a moment. But one thing that they did, one big
mistake that, you know, when God told them to go in and take
possession of the promised land, they were to defeat all these
enemies, and they weren't to gain any booty, you might say,
from that, you know? They weren't to gain any riches
from their conquerings. All the riches were to go to
God, because God's to get all the glory. But we see in Judges,
look over at verse 28 of chapter one. It says, and it came to pass
when Israel was strong, when they were at their best, that
they put the Canaanites to tribute and did not utterly drive them
out. Instead, in other words, they defeated the Canaanites,
and instead of driving them out like God told them, they put
a tax on them so that they could gain from their conquering. And that was wrong. That was,
what they did is, that was unbelief. That was trying to gain personal
gain, get personal glory for themselves. And of course we
know that in salvation, in true salvation, who gets the glory?
Who gets the credit? God does. Not us, not man. That's the problem with false
Christianity today. It's in some form, at some stage,
to some degree, man trying to get some credit in some way for
his salvation, whether it's his good works as he sees them, which
are not good, or his choice, decisional regeneration, decisional
salvation. That's why they have to pervert
the gospel, claiming that God loves everybody, trying to save
everybody, Christ died for everybody. Now it's up to you to make the
right decision. And you might make the right
decision, others may make the wrong decision, but either way,
it falls upon you ultimately, and therefore you're gonna get
some credit. And that's not what God wants. That's not what God
has commanded. He's gonna get all the glory
for the salvation of his people. Well, look over at chapter two.
It says in verse one that an angel or a messenger of the Lord
came up from Gilgal to Bochum and said, I made you to go up
out of Egypt. Now this angel of the Lord is
Christ. This is a pre-incarnate visitation
of Christ. How do we know it's Christ? Well,
he's not an angel by nature, but he's the messenger of the
Lord. He's the messenger of the covenant. He's the angel of the
covenant. And he says, I made you to go
up out of Egypt. Now, who made them go up out
of Egypt? God did. Not any created angel. He says,
I've brought you under the land which I swear unto your fathers.
Now, who brought them up into the land? God did. Who made a
promise and an oath to the fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? God
did. This is Christ. This is the fullness of the Godhead
in pre-incarnate form, in pre-incarnate visitation. He said, I will never
break my covenant with you. He says in verse two, and you
shall make no league with the inhabitants of this land. Well,
they'd already done that. Of course, this is not exactly
chronological order now, but later on is when they put tribute
on the Canaanites. He says, you shall throw down
their altars, don't leave them, no matter if they're made out
of gold, silver, or whatever, but you have not obeyed my voice.
Why have you done this? You've not obeyed my voice. Verse
three, wherefore, or for this reason, I also said, I will not
drive them out from before you, but they shall be as thorns in
your sides and their God shall be a snare unto you. They're
going to be a trouble to you all the days that you're living
in this promised land. Now, I look at that as like a
picture of our salvation by grace. We're totally secure and free
in the promised land of salvation, but we still have the flesh that
wars against us, but hold on there. Verse four, it says, and
it came to pass when the angel of the Lord spoke these words
unto all the children of Israel, that the people lifted up their
voice and they wept. They wept at this, but they brought
it on themselves. And he says, and they called
the name of this place Bokom, and they sacrificed there unto
the Lord." Now, bokom means weepers. This is a place of crying. This
is a place of tears. And you think about that. So
here's the situation. And this was Israel's history
for 1,500 years under that old covenant. They broke the covenant,
but God said, I'll never break this covenant. On God's part,
the covenant was never broken. It was always in force and secure
as long as God had ordained that covenant to be in force. Now
there was a time when that covenant, that old covenant came to its
end. That was the will of God. That was the purpose of God from
the beginning. But Israel broke the covenant.
God said, I'll never break the covenant. And it kind of reminded
me of a verse over in 2 Timothy 2. And this is where the apostle
Paul in writing to Timothy, he's talking about his troubles in
the ministry. Paul was a preacher of the gospel,
a witness for Christ, and God used him so mightily. The Apostle
Paul, not only in writing most of the New Testament, God wrote
it through Paul, but also in establishing churches, but Paul
was one who suffered trouble over this. He said in verse nine
of 2 Timothy two, wherein I suffer trouble just as if I'm an evildoer
even unto bonds, but the word of God is not bad. In other words,
the people that are troubling and standing against Paul, they
looked upon him as being evil. One time he told, I think he
told either, I can't remember if it was Felix or King Agrippa,
he said, after the way that they call heresy, that's the way I
worship God. Isn't that amazing though? Because you remember when Paul
called the gospel heresy, before he was converted on the
road to Damascus. But he says, I suffer trouble.
And I know we do too. Every sinner saved by grace,
we suffer trouble in some way or some form. Now Paul's talking
about trouble that comes over our stand in Christ, preaching
the gospel. We have other troubles, we have
physical problems. We have the chastisements of
the Lord and we have to deal with them. But he's talking about
suffering trouble because he preaches the gospel. He preaches
a message that men and women by nature hate. The light, this
is the condemnation. Light has come into the world
and men love darkness and hate the light because their deeds
are evil. What do we do when we testify the gospel to the
point that sinners who are in unbelief hear us? Well, we're
telling them that what they're trusting in, what they're hoping
in, what they're secure in is a lie. Isn't that right? And boy, you start messing with
a person's religion like that, it brings out the worst in them.
And so Paul's saying we suffer trouble. But in verse 13, he
says this. Listen, this is 2 Timothy 2.13. He says, if we believe not, yet
he abideth faithful, he cannot deny himself. What do you mean,
Paul, if we believe not? Well, here's the case. If you're
a sinner saved by grace, given the gift of faith in Christ,
repentance of dead works, you're not in a state of unbelief. Now,
a person who's just flat an unbeliever is in a state of unbelief, spiritual
deadness, depravity. But if you're a true believer,
you've been brought from that state of darkness and depravity
into a state of grace. And you believe the gospel. But
we have a problem, it's called the flesh. And many times when
we get in trouble or suffer persecution, we begin to doubt. Paul called
it in Hebrews 12 to the sin that so easily besets us. A lot of
times it doesn't take a whole lot, does it? To bring us to
question and doubt, which is unbelief. And so a believer,
a true believer, a sinner saved by grace is not in a state of
unbelief, but there's still unbelief in us. And that's part of that
warfare between the flesh and the spirit. We have to deal with
that. And I believe that's what Paul was saying here. He's saying
if we believe not, in those moments when we are brought to doubt
and unbelief, think about this, God abides faithful. And why? Because he feels sorry for you?
No, because he cannot deny himself. Do you know that if God saves
a sinner by his grace through the blood and righteousness of
Christ, and if that sinner could lose their salvation, that would
be a blight upon God's honor and glory and his reputation.
His glory is engaged in the salvation of his people. by his grace through
Christ. Now go back to Judges 2 now.
It says here that God told him, he says, you've not kept the
covenant, and they named this place Bokom, and it says in verse
five, they sacrificed there unto the Lord. Now whether or not
in their sacrifices the majority of these Israelites understood
the true meaning of that sacrifice, sacrificial worship, and of course
you know all that's a picture of Christ, Bringing the blood
of animals to the altar of God, the brazen altar, the high priest,
you know all of that, we've seen that. That was established back
in Genesis chapter 3, when God slew an animal and made coats
of skin for Adam and Eve. And it ran all the way through
the history of the Old Testament. We learn from other passages
that the children of Israel, even though they went through
the motions of these sacrifices, the vast majority of them didn't
understand what it was about. They looked upon it as something
that they did in order to make them earn forgiveness and make
themselves righteous. And that's why, for example,
in the book of Isaiah, when he talks about, I'm tired, God says,
I've had enough of your oblations. Your sacrifices, their stench
in my nostril. Because they lost sight of what
the real meaning of those things were. They lost sight of the
fact that the blood of animals can never take away sin. The blood of bulls. They lost
sight of these things that they were pictures of the promised
Messiah, the Lamb of God, who would come and bear away the
sins of his people. And that's probably the same
here. But here's the thing about it, we know, we who are brought
to Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit, we know that it's
the blood of Jesus Christ that cleanses us from all sins. And
we're so blessed of God, aren't we? In that realm. Well, from
verses six of chapter two down to verse 16, We're reminded here
that Joshua, it says, verse six, when Joshua had let the people
go, the children of Israel went every man unto his inheritance
to possess the land and the people served the Lord all the days
of Joshua and all the days of the elders that outlived Joshua,
who had seen all the great works of the Lord that he did for Israel.
Seems like there was a brief time of obedience, national obedience,
we will say, which would probably mean the majority of the leaders
And the majority of the people obeyed the covenant of God. And
it was run the last days of Joshua and the first days of those elders
who came out of Egypt. I think, what do you say, Mark?
Some of them might've been like 19 years old, because everybody
from 20 and above was already gone. Yeah, and so these were
elders now. And they carried on the tradition. They led the people right in
the keeping of the covenant. And then they died out. And it
says in verse eight, look at verse eight. It says, and Joshua,
the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died being 110 years
old. So you see there, Joshua died,
and then the elders died. And what happened? But when a
new generation rose up, Look down at verse 10. It says, and
also all that generation were gathered under their fathers,
and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the
Lord, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel. And the
children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and they
served Balaam. Now, Balaam is like a general
term for all false gods, all idols, all right? But you see,
verse 12, they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, which brought
them out of the land of Egypt and followed other gods and the
gods of the people that were round about them and bowed themselves
unto them and provoked the Lord to anger. And they forsook the
Lord, Sir Balaam and Ashtoreth, that was two specific gods, Sir
Bael and Ashtoreth. And it says, and the anger of
the Lord was hot against Israel, and he delivered them into the
hands of spoilers that spoiled them. He sold them into the hands
of their enemies roundabout so that they could not any longer
stand before their enemies. Whithersoever they went out,
the hand of the Lord was against them for evil as the Lord had
said, and as the Lord had sworn unto them, and they were greatly
distressed. Now, If you read through the
Book of Judges, you're going to see a people who are constantly
bothered, attacked by foreign enemies in that land. When you
get to Gideon, for example, the Midianites are the ones who are
against them. When you get to Samson, it's the Philistines.
But see, because they didn't drive these people out, the Lord
left these people in and they were going to be a thorn in their
side. the rest of their days. But look
at verse 16. It says here that, nevertheless,
the Lord raised up judges, which delivered them out of the hand
of those that spoiled them. God, even then, even against
their rebellion and their idolatry and their unbelief, God raised
up judges. And these judges were people
who God appointed and who he had given the strength, the power. You know about some of them.
Like I said, there were 14 of them. But look, it says, verse
17, now listen to this. God raised up judges who believed
the truth and who were to lead the people and protect them.
It says in verse 17, and yet they would not hearken unto their
judges. They wouldn't listen to the judges.
But they went a-whoring after other gods and bowed themselves
unto them. They turned quickly out of the
way which their fathers walked in, obeying the commandments
of the Lord, but they did not sow. Verse 18 says, when the
Lord raised them up judges, then the Lord was with the judge.
In other words, these judges, you know, you think about men
like Gideon and Samson, it wasn't, Their success in whatever they
did, and you know the story about Gideon, how 300 men defeated
thousands of the Midianites. It wasn't in their strength.
It wasn't in their power or for their goodness. And obviously
you know about Samson, how he ended up. We'll get to that later
on. But it was God. And that's what
it is in salvation. It's not our goodness, it's not
our strength, it's not our righteousness, it's God, it's Christ, our great
judge. God, the Father, is with the
Son. And He has the Spirit without
measure. He's the fullness of the Godhead
bodily. And we're complete in Him. And
so what is this teaching us? It's teaching us of the absolute,
utter depravity of man and his own helplessness to save himself
and the sovereign power and goodness and mercy of God to save his
people from sin. And we know it's all of grace.
Grace, grace, grace. It's never anything but grace
to save us, to keep us, to bring us to glory. It's always Christ. He is our life. He's our righteousness. We don't have any of our own.
And look at verse 18, it says, and when the Lord raised them
up judges, then the Lord was with the judge and delivered
them out of the hands of their enemies all the days of the judge,
for it repented the Lord because of their groanings by reason
of them that oppressed them and vexed them. Now what that repentance
is, it's not a change of mind like it is in us. God doesn't
change. The Bible says that the Lord
is not a man that he should repent. And yet repentance sometimes
is attributed to the Lord. But it's not a change of mind.
It's not a change of purpose. It's not God being what I call
the cosmic chess player. You know, he makes his move,
we make our counter move. Or the cosmic janitor, we mess
it up and he comes behind us cleaning up the mess. No. What
that is, in God repenting, it just shows his pity upon the
people. He was compassionate towards
the people for himself, for his own glory. They didn't deserve
it and they didn't earn it. And God's not saying when he
repents, he's not saying, oh my goodness, I made a mistake.
I should have picked some other nation. No, this was God's purpose
all along. He never changes. But he had
pity upon them for his own sake. And verse 19 says, and it came
to pass when the judge was dead that they returned and corrupted
themselves more than their fathers in following other gods to serve
them and to bow down unto them. They ceased not from their own
doings nor from their stubborn way. I'm gonna talk about that
in the main message, about God's one way of salvation, man's many
ways of death. And that's what they're doing
here. They won't cease from their own doings. Whatever it was they
were doing, they wouldn't cease from. And you know that's the
way it is with us. Before God saved us, we wouldn't
cease from our own doings in false religion, trying to work
our way into God's favor. until God brings us to faith
in Christ and repentance of dead works. And so it says in verse
20, the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel. He said,
because that this people have transgressed my covenant, which
I commanded their fathers and have not hearkened unto my voice,
I also will not henceforth drive out any from before them of the
nations which Joshua left when he died. Now, you notice God
said, I'm not gonna cast them out. And he didn't. Now later on, they did go into
captivity, but God did bring them back. But what's happening
here? He's leaving them in the promised
land. He promised that land to Abraham, an unconditional promise,
and they possessed it, even though they didn't do what God said
and they had those enemies, but they were troubled all their
days in the promised land. Verse 22 says that, through them
I may prove Israel, test Israel, whether they will keep the way
of the Lord to walk therein as their fathers did keep it or
not. And therefore the Lord left those nations without driving
them out hastily, neither delivered he them into the hand of Joshua."
Well, all of these issues certainly shows that if God doesn't
save us by his grace, we won't be saved. And for people to look
back on this and say, oh man, those rebellious Israelites,
I wished I'd have been there. I would have done better. No.
You know, Israel, in all of their history, is a picture of all
of us by nature. And if there is any time when
God blessed them in temporary ceremonial ways, It's a picture
of how God has blessed his spiritual Israel, his elect, with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ. And the reason is,
is because Christ is our deliverer. Christ is our judge. And I've
got at the end of this lesson a little section on that, how
You know, this shows our need of salvation by grace. You know,
are we better than they, Paul asked? Are the Jews better than
the Gentiles? Are the Gentiles better than
the Jews? No, in no way. The scriptures concluded all
of us under sin. If we've all sinned and come
short of the glory of God, we're all in need of God's grace. We're
all in need of a righteousness that none of us, not even the
best of us, can produce. It's totally Christ. Bible says
in Psalm 711, that God judgeth the righteous and God is angry
with the wicked every day. And when you read passages of
scripture like Romans 3.10 that says there's none righteous,
no, not one, where does that leave us? God judgeth the righteous,
he's angry with the wicked. Well, who are the righteous?
Well, they're sinners saved by grace who are washed in the blood
of Christ and dressed in the robe of his righteousness imputed.
That's the righteous. We're not righteous in ourselves.
You see, only God is good. And so we see Christ, you think
about this, and this always gives a comfort to me. When I think
about the Father delivering all judgment unto the Son. that we
will stand before God at judgment, dressed in righteousness clothes,
righteous clothes, not our own, but given us, they are ours,
but given us by Christ. And that we didn't have anything
to do with it. God's gonna judge the world in righteousness by
that man whom he hath ordained, that's Christ. That's an assured
thing. So what's our only hope? Well,
Paul said it. He said, to be found in him,
not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that
which is through the faithfulness of Christ, the righteousness
of God. Well, that's the lesson of judges.
That's the lesson of the whole New Testament, isn't it? Okay.