Judges chapter 6, verse 1, again,
the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord. What a word,
again. And is it not true of us? Again, we do evil in the eyes
of the Lord. Is there ever a time, has there
ever been a time when it could not rightly be said of each of
us individually, again, we have done evil in the eyes of the
Lord. We may have done good in the
eyes of the world, for the world has different eyes than God does.
We may have done good in the eyes of the church, because the
church does not always see with the same eye that God sees. We
may even do good in our own eyes. In fact, that's one of the recurring
statements in the book of Judges, and the people did that which
was right in their own eyes. But again, the Israelites did
evil in the eyes of the Lord, and for seven years he gave them
into the hands of the Midianites. Because the power of Midian was
so oppressive, the Israelites prepared shelters for themselves
in mountain cliffs, caves, and strongholds. Whenever the Israelites
planted their crops, the Midianites, Amalekites, and other eastern
peoples invaded the country. Now, if I am right, I believe
that these are the descendants of Ishmael. The same people to
the east who now cause so much trouble. The Arab peoples. They camped
on the land. They ruined the crops all the
way to Gaza. and did not spare a living thing
for Israel, neither sheep, nor cattle, nor donkeys. They came
up with their livestock and their tents like swarms of locusts.
It was impossible to count the men and their camels. They invaded
the land to ravage it." Midian so impoverished the Israelites
that they cried out to the Lord for help. Now, the Book of Judges
is a tale of the gracious patience of God. Was there ever a more
wayward people than the people of Israel? Well, did Isaiah write
of them later on, all we, like she, have gone astray. This nation
of Israel, so blessed of God, so privileged in all the things
that he gave them, And yet, they cannot hold themselves back from
idolatry. They cannot go five minutes without
prostituting themselves to idols. Our translation uses the word
prostituting themselves. I like the way the King James
put it, simply because it's more brutal language, I think, describes
it more brutally, or more honestly. They go a-whoring after other
gods. And my friend, there is no other
word to describe going after other gods. Whenever someone
who names the name of Christ goes after another god, and we'll
see what some of those gods are, it is whoring after other gods. There's no polite way to put
it. God had chosen the forefathers
of these Jewish people, and at the appointed time had brought
the nation out of Egypt Across the Red Sea, he endured their
unbelief and complaining and griping all the way across the
wilderness. He drove their enemies out before them, and he gave
them the land, and he prospered them. But as soon as Joshua died,
and as soon as the few elders that outlived him died, when
that generation was gone, they began to vacillate in their obedience. They did not fully drive out
the people. Now, here's something to learn,
a principle to gather from them. God says, I give you this land. Now, when you go in there, you
drive out everyone. You spare none. Now, that was
that's kind of a brutal version of warfare in our day. We don't
assume that's or don't figure that's the right way to conduct
it. But God had a purpose in this. You see, those Canaanites
that dwelt in the land at that time, they were terrible idolaters. They were wicked in every way
imaginable. God did not let the Jews go in
there until, and this was God's words, until the cup of their
iniquity was full. God had been very patient with
them, but to give you an example of the kind of people that dwelt
in that land, this is where Sodom and Gomorrah were. They were
violent. They were perverted. And they
were the most gross idolaters that you could imagine. You see
Ashtoreth there. I believe that that's associated,
or you saw what we read about Ashtoreth. And this Ashtoreth
was associated with the god Molech, I believe. This is the god where
they would offer their infants to this god in a most despicable
fashion. They would make the god out of
brass, and it was hollow, and they would light a fire in there.
and make that God just stoke up the fire till it's red hot
and they would put those babies on there alive in the hands of
that idol. To be cooked alive and sacrificed. That's the kind of people that
dwelt in this land. And God said when you go in there,
you spare none. And the reason they were to spare
none was not only because they were to be the judging hand of
God against this people, but because of this, as Paul put
it this way, bad company, corrupts good manners, God would have
a holy people. And by that, he means a people
entirely separate to himself. And he knew full well that they
being sinful men, like all people are, if they went in there and
did not fully drive out all of these Amorites, Hittites, and
all these people, that they would soon become involved in the very
kinds of sin as the Canaanites. How does that apply to you and
me? Well, we certainly aren't going to try to drive all the
sinners out of Rock Valley because we'd have to leave, too. Someone
once said that a fellow had been to one of these seminars where
they were trying to crank people up into being especially godly,
and he came back and he told his preacher, he said, I'm going
to do what they told me after church. I'm going to go home
and I'm going to take everything sinful out of my house. And the
preacher told him, well, the first thing you need to do is
get out a gun, shoot yourself in the head. He said, I'll eliminate
most of the sin right there. No, he's not talking about getting
rid of all the sinners. That's not the approach. But
we do. As a congregation of believers
in the Lord Jesus Christ, we cast out every idol. We drive away every false Christ. This church, we try to be loving,
we try to demonstrate our love, but it is not love to allow for
false doctrine to get a foothold. That's not love. It's not love
to speak peace when there is no peace. It's not love to twist
and distort the word of God so as to be tolerant of other views. It's not as though we think our
view is better than anyone else's. It's that we believe God's view
of things is the only view of things that's right. And we owe
it to the glory of God and to the love that we have for the
souls of sinners to tell them the truth and not tolerate that
any error be allowed to gain root within the congregation. For to do so is to court idolatry
and set ourselves up for failure. God disciplined these Jews many, many times. And He would discipline them.
You know, it says here that God turned them over to the Midianites
for seven years. You see the number seven pop
up a lot in scriptures, and there's a reason for that. That is the
number associated with completion or fullness. And what He's saying
is that God sent the Midianites in there for the amount of time
that God had ordained to accomplish a purpose, for the full time to accomplish
God's purpose among the Israelites. The Midianites were sent there
not because God was in a fit of rage and was going to destroy
the Israelites. He sent the Midianites in there
to provoke them to call on his name. Isn't that what it says,
verse 6? Many so impoverished the Israelites
that they cried out to the Lord for help. Nothing will make us
cry out to God like trouble. And nothing is more tempting
for me and probably for you too. Nothing is more powerful to tempt
us to forget God than a pleasant path. As I preached here recently,
and it's just a revelation of what we are. So long as it's
raining, there's no community prayer services, but let God
turn off the faucet. And right away, everybody's ready
to pray. I'm not saying it's bad that
we call on him in the day of trouble, I'm just saying it's
bad that it seems like trouble is the only thing that makes
us call on his name. But such we are, and such they
were. And God sent those many knights
in there, not to destroy Israel, but to save them. Not to bring
an end to them, but to preserve them. We don't see things as God sees
them. We so often see what we do as good, and God sees it as
evil. And then God sends us trouble, and we see that as bad, but God
calls it good. He sent it because we've closed
up our heart to him. And he must use something very
sharp to open our hearts again. However, with the Jews, no sooner
did the God missed a point here after he sends the discipline,
then he would send a judge. They were called judges. They
were deliverers, leaders. He would send someone through
whom he would deliver Israel from their trouble. And for the time that the judge
lived, everything would go well. It says that God would bless
the people or he would be with the judge and bless Israel. And
what a beautiful picture of the Lord Jesus Christ there. In our
trouble, when we recognize truly what our trouble is, and it really
is in all the circumstances of this life, they may be sad, but
they may be happy. They may be what we call awful,
they may be what we call good, but it's not the things of this
life that really account for our troubles. It's the things
of eternity. Sin, judgment, wrath, these are
our troubles. And God warns us about it. He
sends in warnings like Midianites to trouble our hearts and to
trouble our conscience. To speak to us in the stillness
of the dark night. And waken us from our spiritual
slumber. And make us call on the name
of the Lord. And when He does, He sends a
deliverer. Or when we call on Him, He sends
a deliverer. With the Jews, He would send
a deliverer and He'd be with the deliverer. And as long as
the deliverer lived, everything went fine. But no sooner Then
the deliverer would die. Read over, look over here, chapter
8, verse 27. When Gideon rescued, this is
Judges 8, verse 27, when Gideon delivered Israel from the Midianites. And they had all the spoil, and
that's the way soldiers got paid back then. You know, you didn't
get paid unless you won. If you won, of course, you took everything
that your enemy owned. After all, he didn't need it,
he was dead. That's the way they fought wars back then. And so they come
back with the spoil, and each of the soldiers gave to Gideon
a gold earring that they had taken from the slain enemies.
And they gave that to Gideon because he led them in victory.
And he took that gold and he made a golden ephod, kind of
a vest-like thing out of it, and he took it to his hometown.
Verse 27, Gideon made the gold, into an ephod which he placed
in Ophrah, his town. All Israel prostituted themselves. They went a-whoring after that
ephod, worshiping it there. And it became a snare to Gideon
and his family. And then you read down in verse
33, No sooner had Gideon died than the Israelites again prostituted
themselves, went a-whoring after the Baals. They set up Baal-barith
as their god. and did not remember the Lord
their God who had rescued them from the hands of all their enemies
on every side. But God was gracious and forgave
them their sin and spared generation after generation of these people.
Is there really, has there ever been a people more wayward than
Israel? Maybe us. My friends, God gave to the Israelites
a country. He drove out all their enemies
before them. He prospered them. But He did
not give them one-tenth of what you and I have. And I don't mean
in the stuff we got around us. That's probably true too. Look
at the nation we live in. Look at our prosperity. But that's
not what I'm talking about. He drove out giants before the
Jews. He drove out the devil before
us. He put away their national sins
by typical sacrifices. But God, by the sacrifice of
the Lord Jesus Christ, has put away the real sin of our hearts.
He gave them blessings which lasted only so long as they were
alive. He has given us blessings that
only increase once we die. He gave them blessings that lasted
for as long as they breathed. He gave them blessings that last
for as long as they breathe. He gave us blessings that are
eternal. And so while we may have no statues,
while we may not name any other God, our idols are still there. They're just much more subtle. And it's amazing to me sometimes
that God does not treat me much more roughly than He does. But to each of us, from time
to time, there are Midianites. God troubles us. He sends things
to us to get our attention, to remind us that He is the God
who saved us. He is the God that delivered
us from all our troubles. He is the God that has put away
our sins. He is God that has given us an eternal inheritance
in Jesus Christ. Not these things we pursue day
after day after day. He sent the Midianites and oppressed
them so much, they finally began to call on the name of the Lord.
As we look at this scripture, spend just a few minutes here,
let's not look at this scripture as applicable to someone else. Last night, I had a bunch of
folks over at the house, our visitors from out of town, a
few others, and we were talking about How easy that is to do. Open up this Bible and read it
and say, boy, I wish so and so would read that. Or hear a sermon
and say, I'm glad they're here or wish they had been here to
hear that. Friends, this is for me. This is for you. Let us each one apply these things
to our heart. Or more importantly, let's ask
each of us, ask God to apply these things to our heart. We
have a host of idols before whom we will bow if we are left to
ourselves for just a moment. Now, our deliverer never dies.
But sometimes, because of our weakness and wayward
ways, he disappears. And I don't mean he leaves. A
bumper sticker from back when I was a teenager, one of the
few religious bumper stickers that made good sense. It says,
if you don't feel close to God, guess who moved? He didn't. And there are times that our
eyes are turned and Christ disappears from our sight, not because he
moved, because we're not looking at him. And it's just like when
one of those judges would die and he was out of the sight of
the Jews. And they would immediately go back to their idolatry. And
no sooner do our eyes depart from Christ than they will latch
on to something. You see, man is by nature a worshipper. All men worship something. Even
the atheist has a God. He's just not honest enough to
admit what that God is. That God is self. But every man worships something.
And if our eyes are off of Christ, they will latch on to something
and esteem it and bow before it. One of the most obvious ones
is money and possessions. Paul calls that covetousness,
which he says is idolatry. You know, to have money is a
good thing. And don't ever act like you don't
like it. Because we all do. None of us turn it down. At least,
I've not met anybody that would. They might say they don't want
to take charity, but that's just for pride's sake. It's nice to have. It's like
that one fellow waxing real philosophical one time said, I've been rich
and I've been poor. Rich is better. And that's the
truth. We might as well just admit it.
We like that. To have money is not bad. For money to have us,
that's another thing. It's another thing altogether. I do believe, and I've told you
this before but I'll repeat it because we tend to forget it,
I do believe that every one of us has every penny that God can
trust us with. I say I wish I had more, and
there's that part of me that wishes I do, but I'm glad God's
in control of that, because I would suppose that if I had more that
it would no longer be me having it, it would be it having me.
And even with what I have, I find that money can have me. I can
be turned to it. I can worship it. I can be subject
to it. I can fear its disappearance
and be made glad by its presence. So that's the way we're supposed
to act about God. I'll tell you what should trouble
us more than anything is if we can't find God. Job was troubled. He said, I've looked for you
all over the place, God. I looked to the north and the south and
the east and the west, and I can't find you. The psalmist said, why are you
so cast down on my soul? And the other one said, as a
deer pants for the running stream, so does my heart pant for the
living God. When can I go see God? I wish I was as troubled by the
disappearance of God. I am troubled by the disappearance
of a bank account. We say we're not idolaters. Yes, we are. Every bit as idolatrous
as those Jews. Fame and acclaim. I know exactly
why God gave me no real performance talent. It's not a secret. I know it partly because I'm
smart enough to figure it out and partly because my wife told me. Because if I could do anything,
I would. If I had the talent to perform,
I'd be on the stage. Because I can't think, I'm just
being honest with you, I can't think of anything that would
excite me more than applause. Thank God I can't sing. Just
so. I can't. I mean, I do okay, but
I mean, nobody's offering me a record deal. I'll let you know
that. Oh, I tell you, this fame thing,
really it's a whole continuum. It's really just a matter of
wanting the approval of the world, and we all want that. We want
people to like us. We want people to think we're
good, and we want people to tell us that. I do. And I guess in some respects
there's nothing wrong with that, but it can become a consuming
thing to where we serve it, to where we're willing to bow and
scrape to the approval of men. Scripture says the fear of man
is a snare. And it is. What does it mean
by the fear of man? Not that you just always tremble,
but you know, We'll fear people enough to bend their will so
they'll accept us. And when it becomes really bad
is when churches begin to bend to the passing fashions of the
religious world, trying to gain that world's approval. Say, we'd
never do that. Maybe you wouldn't, but you know
something? As pastor and leader of this congregation, I constantly
battle that impulse in myself. It'll come on. What can I do
to make this church more attractive to people outside? So they'll
come. And then, well, wait a minute, you know, it comes to my mind.
Wait a minute. It's not those things. They're thinking about,
like, how can we redo the music or how could we arrange the service
or whatever, you know, that's not where the problem lies, folks.
There's no way to dress up the gospel so that the world will
like it. If they don't like it in plain
clothes, they ain't gonna like it all fancied up. A fella, Derek Webb, wrote a song
about that aspect of the truth. He says, the truth is never sexy. It's not an easy sell. You can
dress her up like the world, but she'll shock them just as
well. She don't need no apologies for
being what she is, and she don't need your help in making enemies.
And that's the truth, you know. I battle that. It's kind of like
one of these cyclical things. Just every once in a while, I
get it in my mind. There's something we can do to make people like
what we're saying. somehow enough to dress up this
beautiful truth and make it prettier. You can't gild the lily. You
cannot make God's truth any better than the way He told it. And
if men will not have God's truth any way it comes to them, then
they're not going to have it no matter how you take it to
them. Oh, but it's an idol that people fall to, and we would
too. How about pleasures and lusts?
What a nice, shiny idol we have there. Lust, that is sinful pleasures. Is anybody here yet done with
sinful pleasures? I mean, you're not tempted anymore?
If you are, if there's anybody here that's not tempted to sinful
pleasures, I want to meet you after church because I want you
to tell me how you did that. I want to know. I want you to read something from
Paul over here. Look at 2 Corinthians chapter 11. I am so glad that God made the
writers of Scriptures tell the truth. You know, you read biographies
of so-called great men of the faith. Most biographers distill
all the really good things about them and write about that. They
don't tell you about all the other things, you know. Well, whenever
you read about the lives of people in Scripture, Scriptures are
brutally honest. And here's what you'll find.
person in the scriptures was a sinner. Every believer whose
life you read about in the scriptures struggled all their lives with
sinful passions and unbelief. And here in 2 Corinthians 11,
verse 29, Paul is talking about his weaknesses. and how he looked
weak in the eyes of the world. And he was actually trying to
defend himself to these Corinthians, because there had been some hot
shots come in, some big shots come into that church and say,
Paul's a nothing. Look, if he was anything in God's sight,
well, he wouldn't be in prison and he would be well liked everywhere.
And so the fact that Paul suffered persecution made him look weak
in their eyes, but he goes on. He says, verse 28, besides everything
I face day to day, the pressures of my concern for the churches.
Now, notice this. Who is weak? And I don't feel
weak. Who is led into sin? And I do
not inwardly burn. What's he saying there? He's
saying, you think I look weak? Let me tell you something. You
think I'm a troubled man? Let me tell you something. Are
any of you weak? You think I'm not? Are any of you scandalized by
sin? Any of you shot through with
sinful temptations? And you think I don't burn? Oh, don't ever look at some preacher
of the gospel and think he's above you. No, sir. Don't think that you have anything
running through your mind that's never run through this one. Don't think that you've ever
had a weakness. that all your brothers and sisters
haven't also felt. You know why? Because we're all
made out of the same stuff. Paul says, in me that is in my
flesh dwells no good thing, so quit looking for anything good
there. And don't be surprised when that evil just bubbles up. Preachers abuse some of the people
of God by saying, well, you know, Once a man's saved, he'll no
longer have trouble with sin, non-sin. Once a man's saved,
well, that bottle won't be a problem to him. Hogwash. If a man's saved,
why? And here's the big ones for today,
you know. Homosexuality. If a man's saved, he won't have
any homosexual thoughts. Why do you say that? Show me
that in Scriptures. If a person is saved, they'd
never have an abortion. Boy, it'd be wrong if they did.
But don't tell me a believer wouldn't do it. After all, David went out and
had a man killed. What's the difference? Murder
is murder, friends. Say, oh yeah, but a believer
would never worship a false god. Solomon did. Put up shrines for
the false gods everywhere. Created a lot of trouble, but
God said, my love will never depart from him. I'm not saying this to Well, I am saying that to comfort
us in our sin, because we're going to have to comfort. That's
where it's going to have to be, because that's where we are all
the time. But you understand what I mean? I'm not saying this
so that we'll become complacent about our sin, so that we'll
say, well, it just don't matter. I don't care. I'm saying this
so that in the midst of your sin, you'll realize your sin
has not separated you from God if you are in Christ. Now in
one place, it says your sins have separated you from the Lord
your God, but there's a remedy for that in Christ. Sins may separate us from God,
but I'll tell you what keeps us from Him, and that's our own
righteousness. And I would have you know, if
there's anybody here this morning deeply troubled by sin, that
you know within your heart yourself to be an absolute wretch, unworthy,
of the least of God's blessings. Oh, I hope there's somebody here
like that. I've got good news for you. I really do. There is
a Deliverer. Are the Midianites all over you?
Are you troubled? Is your sin pressed down upon
your conscience? Has it robbed you of all your
joy? Has it blinded you to the truth? Good. It may get bad enough that you'll
call out on the name of the Lord. I hope it does. I don't think that there's any
intrinsic value in misery, but there's sometimes a very practical
value in it. Sometimes God uses misery to make people call on
His name. And if in your stubbornness you're
hanging on to anything but Christ, if you're bowing down to any
God but Christ, I hope He makes you miserable.
until you call on His name. Pleasures, even good pleasures,
become idols. Leisure, rest, and recreation,
these things are the gifts of God. And yet we can make pleasures and enjoyments to be
a God. In fact, sometimes the easiest
idol to make is a blessing from God. Remember that ephod? You
know what that ephod was representative of? That one that Gideon made? That was a symbol of God's victory
over the Midianites. That's why he made it. That's
why Gideon made it. He was made out of the spoils
of their victory over the Midianites. Gideon makes this symbol of God's
gracious deliverance. And what do men do? They bow
down and start to worship Him. They did the same thing with
that brass serpent. People do it with churches. They walk in a church and say,
well, I just feel so spiritual here. You do? I realize we have psychological
reactions to where we are, but hey, I'm glad for this building,
but that's all it is. It's pretty. Everybody that comes
here says, y'all have a nice building. And I'm glad we do.
My friends, God's no more inside these walls than anywhere else. Oh, we make idols out of the
pleasures and blessings that God gives us. We can even make
an idol out of godliness. No wonder John said, children,
keep yourselves from idols. And it's my belief, And I'm going
to close with this. I never really got around to
what I intended to preach on, but this is going to have to
be it. I do believe, as much as I can
understand these things, that the grief that our nation is
bearing right now comes from idolatry. I'm no prophet. I cannot define the providence
of God. Any nation as militarily powerful
as we are, any nation with the resources that we have and the
influence and power should be able to do pretty much whatever
it wants. And we're being held hostage. I'm not trying to make
a political statement here. I'm just saying that we're in
a mess. Why? You know what comes to my mind,
and I say this for a spiritual lesson, because I think it's
a spiritual lesson to be learned in this. Do you remember 9-11? It'll be five
years ago here in just a little bit. We all remember that day.
It was a Tuesday, I think. And next Friday, I went to Mankato
to preach. And that was the day that they
had that memorial service at the National Cathedral. And I
was shocked by what happened. They put up on that stage a guy
that claimed to be a Christian, a Jewish man, and a Muslim. I know why it was done. It was
done for political reasons. It was done in order to show
that, you know, we're all buddies here. You know what they did? That was as high-handed an insult
against the God of creation as could be done. They elevated
to the same stature a wicked man from the 7th century, 6th
or 7th century, Mohammed, and put him on a level with Christ. And they said Moses is as worthy
as Christ. Now that was just a symbolic
thing that shows the great idolatry of this nation. God help us. God help us. And our salvation, our deliverance
as a nation is not going to come from bombs and guns. Oh, we may
end up winning over there, I don't know. I tell you, we've got much
bigger trouble than Arabs. And maybe, just as God sent these
Midianites, Arabs of their day, God's troubling
our nation. by that same group of people.
And may God trouble us until we call on his name. But there's
something even more important than that. Churches have their troubles,
too. We have our troubles. Maybe some of you as individuals
are having your troubles, and I ask you this. Why are there
Midianites? Is God troubling us? God troubling
you? To make you call. It may be matters
of circumstance. It may be matters of the heart.
God's got all kinds of Midianites to work with. But I know this. I'm prone to idolatry. I will quickly worship anything
and anyone but the God of my salvation. And God bless the Midianites
who never let me worship anybody but God peaceably. God bless
those troublers he sends to make me call on his name. And if you're
in trouble, it's an easy way out. Call on his name. That's why he sent you to trouble.
And when you call on his name, he'll send the deliverer. Whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be delivered. And maybe you've never believed
the gospel. Yet your heart is troubled. It
ought to be. If you haven't believed the gospel,
your heart ought to be troubled. I hope it is. And I hope God's
Midianites will swarm all over you. Maybe you're worshiping your
own righteousness. God can topple that idol. Maybe you're worshiping
your own sense of repentance. You say, well, you know, sooner
or later, I'll feel sorry enough for my sin. You never will. Maybe you're worshiping your
humility. I don't know. But I know this, if there's an idol in your
heart and you belong to God, the Midianites are on the way.
God help you. And may you call on His name
for help, and He'll send Christ to deliver. Heavenly Father,
such as we can, we've spoken about some serious things. Lord, I can't apply anything
to anybody's heart. I can't apply it to my own, but
You can. Oh, Lord Jesus, show Yourself to us in all Your glory.
Make Yourself very evident, If we don't see you, we'll latch
on to somebody else. And Lord, if we're so stubborn, it would be right of you to send
Midianites to us. To us as individuals or as a
church. Lord, we could never find fault with your providence,
however severe it be. But we ask this, Lord. We call
upon you now and say, deliver us. Spare us your disciplining rod. May the word preached be sufficient
to restore our hearts so that we need not suffer as the Jews
did. Bless us now as we partake of
your table. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.