The Times of the Judges Part 1

A title for today's message is the Times of the Judges, Part 1. Subtitle, Compromise Sets the Stage for Downfall. Times of the Judges, Part 1, Compromise Sets the Stage for Downfall. Recent sermons I've tried to go back to the Old Testament and pull out accounts that we can find recorded there and bring them forward to highlight important lessons that we can learn as the people of God today. Because God's recorded these words for our learning, for our instruction. Here before the feast, we went back and we looked at Jonah and Nineveh in the Day of Atonement. We also, on the Feast of Trumpets, looked at the example of Jericho and how that actually points forward to judgment that God will bring one day upon Babylon as well.

Today we're going to continue in the same pattern of looking back to the Old Testament and start a series of sermons on the Judges. So, the Book of Judges is honestly pretty fascinating. It's a book of history.

It's kind of tucked into a spot that maybe we overlook it easily because a lot of times during the spring holy days we'll read about God bringing Israel out of Egypt. We'll see them come up to the brink of the Promised Land. We may even look at the wilderness wanderings and the crossing over to possess Jericho. Then there's times as well where we'll jump forward, we'll look at the kings, and we'll refer to King David and others.

But in between the kings, in between coming into the Promised Land is their important portion of history of Israel that's tucked in here, the Book of the Judges. There's a lot of things that we can learn from this book. It takes place at a time following Israel's entry into the Promised Land as they then began to spread out and take possession of their inheritance.

It's also a book of lessons and warnings for us as well. It's not just history. It's not just something that, okay, that happened long ago and what's that have to do with us. There are lessons and warnings for us as well in this book because the Judges show us clearly the consequences of Israel's actions when they either did or did not follow God completely. It shows those consequences. As we begin today, I want to remind us of the Apostle Paul's words. In 1 Corinthians 10, verse 11, he speaks of Israel's history. I'm not necessarily going to turn there, but I'll just remind us. He says, these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the ages have come. So part of Israel's history and example at that Paul would reference, I believe, also we can encompass the book of Judges into that and consider the lessons for life. So when we study this book, as well as other books in the Old Testament, the intent is that we would learn the important lessons that God has recorded through Israel's example.

Their obedience and their disobedience were to learn from both with the intent that we would not make the same mistakes that they made pertaining to faithfulness towards God and obedience to the commandments of God. And the intent is that the outcome in our walk with God would be different than theirs, both individually and collectively. So for our admonition, these things are here. We're to study and we're to learn from them.

I do want to take a little time and set the background for the book of Judges and give us just a little bit of an overview because we will spend, I would say, probably at least three sermons walking through bits and pieces of this book. We can't cover everything in detail, but let's just take a little time up front and set a little bit of the background and overview.

Time frame for the book of Judges is believed there's varying time frames put forward, but is generally accepted in the Church. That Judges spans a time of approximately 325 years of history.

It takes us from the death of Joshua, which is some 25 years after Israel came into the Promised Land, and it takes us right up to the time shortly before the crowning of the first human king, King Saul. So again, 325 years, essentially, in time span there. To give some context to that, the book of Judges was basically a time longer than the United States has been a nation.

You think of the independence of this country in 1776 and bring it forward to our time today. The United States has been independent for roughly 245 years. You have the time frame of the Judges, which is approximately 80 years longer even than that. This isn't a small little splinter of time or sliver of time.

This is a sizable chunk of time at a very important point in Israel's history when God brought them into the Promised Land and said, This is your inheritance, now go and possess it. But what happened during this history is foundational to what we see play out for Israel and Judah going forward. It's important to look at these things.

During that time expanse, these 325 years, Israel occasionally had leaders that arose on the scene. Actually, God brought them onto the scene. They were called Judges. Judges. Judges ruled over Israel much in the same way that kings did, except there was no line of hereditary succession that continued from the Judges. When a Judge died, their son didn't continue in their place. There was no Judge until the time then that God raised someone up again. The Judges were often times military men. There were Governors whom God led to deliver Israel from foreign oppression, and then once they were delivered, they went in, sit, and judge.

They would rule the people, they would organize the people, and they would even determine, as the name gives us, judgments over the people. They would do that in conjunction as well with the priests and the Levites. Because how God would have rulership of his people be, it wasn't just one man that declared everything as law and no other standard.

No, the Judges, along with the Levites and the priesthood and the high priests, determined not only law in the land and governed the land, but also the religious system was involved in the leadership of the country as well. So he had the Judge in conjunction with the priests and the Levites.

Now, the concept of the Judge is not new to the book of Judges. We may think that, as we read it, that this is a new concept introduced in the book of Judges. But what you need to understand is that Moses was a judge. In fact, by definition in the Bible, he was the first judge of Israel, as well as a prophet. Joshua was a judge as well. And so it's not new to this book in terms of an original concept. It's something that had taken place for quite a while. But we do need to note that in the Judges, it was different as well from Moses and Joshua, because as they were judges, they ruled over the entirety of Israel and Judah, the entirety of the twelve tribes.

But as we'll see as we go through the book of Judges, oftentimes the Judges were raised up by God in a certain location for a certain period of time. And they didn't necessarily judge over all of Israel. In fact, there were times when there was more than one judge in the nation at a time. Maybe one up here in the north, one over here towards the south. And again, it was more of a regional judgment that they proclaimed, and there could have been more than one judge in Israel.

And actually, there were times as well when there was no judge in Israel. So as you can imagine, this sort of governance allowed a degree of freedom to the people. If you think about that, you didn't have a king that was directly over everyone, and you had times when there was nobody in direct rulership in terms of a man. Of course, God was their king, and that's something that Israel often forgot about.

You know, God was their king, but they did have a degree of freedom in how they would live. But how did they use it? As part of the lesson, we'll see. How did Israel use the freedom that was given to them? The book of Judges can be summed up into a couple of themes. First, one central theme could be stated as, The existence of Israel as a nation was dependent on their obedience to God. That's a theme throughout the book. The existence of Israel as a nation was dependent on her obedience to God.

All throughout Judges, there is a sad cycle that we see played out over and over and over again. That cycle can be described by four words. Sin, which obviously sent the ball rolling in the wrong direction. Sin, then servitude, followed by supplication and salvation. Sin, servitude, supplication and salvation. Again, sin was first, which Israel would stray from God in rebellion.

They would do their own thing. They would fall off the map into idolatry. They would chase after foreign wives. They would go after foreign gods. They would sin against God. Next came servitude in that cycle.

Servitude was the result of Israel's rebellion. God allowed them to be conquered. He allowed an enemy people, an enemy king, to come in, take Israel, and put them into a condition of servitude. They would stay there for a number of years because God wanted them to consider their ways. They wanted to think about the kind of people they should have been and what the consequence was of their actions. Eventually, after long enough, under servitude, you had supplication. Israel would, to a degree, maybe come to their senses. They would cry out to God. God in His mercy would then raise up a judge, a judge who would deliver them. That is then salvation. God would deliver them again. It's a cycle that played out over and over and over in Israel's history. Sin, servitude, supplication and salvation. But God is patient. That's another lesson from the book of Judges that God is patient. What we need to understand is that God is patient. Yes. He is merciful. Yes. But we can't afford to confuse the two because they are different. God is long suffering, and He will give His people time to repent, to come to themselves, to recognize their problem and repent. Upon repentance, God extends mercy. But there's a difference, again, between mercy and long suffering. Sometimes people think because the punishment didn't come, oh God is merciful. Well, He is merciful, but God is also long suffering. He gives us opportunity and time. But the truth is there comes a time when time is up. There comes a time when the time for repentance is up and judgment comes. We see that in the book of Judges as well. But let's just make sure we understand that God is long suffering and patient with mercy. In fact, they are two different things. Mercy is what is extended upon repentance. As history of Israel played out, the northern ten tribes were eventually ripped out of the land during the time of the kings. Again, because of their continual disobedience, God suffered long, but eventually judgment came. They were unrepentant. They went time and time again after false gods. And Judah as well followed shortly thereafter. So the lesson for us today in this central theme, lesson for us today is our existence as a part of the church of God is dependent on our obedience to Him as well. Just as Israel's existence was dependent on obedience to God, our existence is dependent on our obedience to Him as well. Our standing before Him is predicated on our actions. As Mr. Klein was talking about in the first message, do we glorify God in what we do, in what we say, and how we conduct our lives? That's what He looks for in us, and it's what He looked for in the nation of Israel. So that was the first central theme. The existence of Israel as a nation is dependent on her obedience to God. The second central theme we'll see through the book of Judges is that right leadership is essential.

Right leadership is essential. Each time that God delivered Israel from their oppression, He called a specific individual to lead them into battle, to bring them out of that oppression. And once they were freed, that person sat as a judge over the nation. And as long as that judge lived, the nation had peace. You can read that story time and time again, and so and so judged over Israel for 40 years, and there was peace until the death of that judge. But as that cycle would play out again and again, once that judge died, all too often, people of Israel fell back into their idolatry and turning from God in the opposite direction. And the downhill slide started again in every single case, except for the case of the final judge of Israel, Samuel. Because then you then transitioned from Samuel into the king. The lesson is, again, right leadership among the people of God plays an important role in their spiritual focus. It's true in the book of Judges. It's true in the Church of God today. Right leadership plays a huge role in our spiritual focus. So with that background set, let's delve into the book of Judges.

You can be turning over to Judges chapter 1. Judges chapter 1. Again, I'll remind us of the subtitle, which is, Compromise Sets the Stage for Downfall. Compromise Sets the Stage for Downfall. That's what we'll look at today in the first two chapters of the book of Judges. As this book begins, God has been with the nation of Israel under Joshua's leadership. He brought them across the threshold into the Promised Land, and they've been taking some possession of their property, of their inheritance. They've gone out, and they've taken possession of a portion of Palestine, but not all of it. It's important to notice that they did not have possession of all of it. Not immediately. He recalled that God had said He wouldn't expel the Canaanites immediately. Because honestly, it was a vast land. And if He just expelled them all out, said, okay, the land is clear. Now you go in, find your possession, take your inheritance and inhabit it. Enough time passes by that the crops go into failure, the buildings go into disrepair. If the land is empty, the wild animals move in. After our mudslide, we were off of our property for, I think it was close to two and a half years. Well, let me take that back. I think closer to two years, year and a half, two years. But during that time, we'd go up, we'd feed the horses every day, tend to things. But without someone living there, the neighbor saw a bear, the turkeys moved in, the coyotes moved in. It was kind of like a game preserve by the time we got moved back up on our property when we were reestablished. So just imagine the land of Israel. God said, I'm not going to push them all out immediately, lest it be to Israel's detriment.

At the end of the book of Judges, actually back up Joshua, at the end of the book of Joshua, what we find is that the people proclaimed a zeal. God said, this is your inheritance. And they said, you are our God, and this is our land. And we're all in. And they said, we're going to leave behind any of these gods that we saw worshipped on the other side of the river.

And the Lord Yahweh will be our God. And we will go in and we will take our inheritance. And we will turn away from anything that defiles God. There was zeal in completely obeying His instructions. That's the end of the book of Joshua. But let's notice what happens as now Israel moves forward apart from leadership of Joshua. Let's begin in Judges chapter 1. Judges 1, verse 1. Let's see what happens to Israel's passion, Israel's zeal, apart from that strong leadership.

Judges chapter 1, verse 1 says, Now after the death of Joshua, it came to pass that the children of Israel asked the Lord, saying, Who shall be first to go up for us against the Canaanites to fight against them? And the Lord said, Judah shall go up. Indeed, I have delivered the land into his hand. So Judah and Simeon, his brother, He said to him, Come. Come up with Me. You've got Judah who's saying, All right, we're all in.

We're going to get our land. But Simeon, my brother, you come with us. Because then once we take this land, we'll help you go and take your land as well. Judah said to Simeon, his brother, Come up with Me to My allotted territory, and we will fight against the Canaanites. And I will likewise go with you to your allotted territory. And Simeon went with him. Verse 4, Then Judah went up, and the Lord delivered the Canaanites and the parasites into their hand.

And they killed ten thousand men at Bezak. And they found Adonai Bezak in Bezak, and they fought against them. And they defeated the Canaanites and the parasites. And Adonai Bezak fled. They pursued him, they caught him, they cut off his thumbs and his big toes, something that he had done himself to those that he brought in subjection to him.

Verse 7, Adonai Bezak said, Seventy kings with their thumbs and toes cut off, used to gather scraps under my table, as I have done, so God has repaid me. Then they brought him to Jerusalem, and there he died. Verse 8, Now the children of Judah fought against Jerusalem, and they took it, and they struck it with the edge of the sword, and they set the city on fire. Afterwards the children of Judah went down to fight against the Canaanites who dwelt in the mountains in the south and in the low land.

Then Judah went against the Canaanites who dwelt in Hebron. The name of Hebron was formerly Kerjath Arba, and they killed then these other leaders who were there. So we see right off the bat the tribe of Judah was zealous for what God had given them to do. This is your inheritance that is set before you. God has given them the green light go, and they are zealous for following God completely.

And their zeal is clear. They removed the pagan inhabitants from the land that they went in to possess, and they were successful at driving them out, as far as God would allow them to drive them out. Again, this was zeal for following what God had given them to do. As the passage goes on, Judah then goes and helps Simeon in the same way.

Let's jump down to verse 21. It says, But the children of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites who inhabited Jerusalem, so the Jebusites dwell with the children of Benjamin in Jerusalem to this day. We see that the tribe of Benjamin wasn't as zealous in their conquest as their brothers Judah and Simeon. What you have to understand is that these were the same Jebusites that Judah had driven out of Jerusalem.

They came back in to re-inhabit it, and Benjamin did nothing. They let them settle back in, and they didn't push them out of their inheritance, as God would have had them do. They said they were willing to compromise. They were willing to let the Jebusites remain, and that was to their detriment. That was an action of judgment that was not wise and something that would haunt them for a very long time. Let's see what God's instruction was for those who would go in and possess the land, how they were to do it.

If we go to Deuteronomy 7, verse 1, we'll see God's instruction. We'll keep a marker in Joshua, if you like. We'll be back. In Deuteronomy 7, verse 1, this is what they were to do when they went in to take possession. Deuteronomy 7, verse 1, it says, The point is, yeah, Israel, you're a great nation, 12 tribes, a lot of people, but you know what? You are small compared to the armies in the land. God put them in a position where they would not receive the land apart from him.

He's taking them in seven nations greater and mightier than you, Israel. Verse 2, when the Lord your God delivers them over to you, you shall conquer them. Notice, and utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them. You shall show no mercy to them. Verse 3, nor shall you make marriages with them. You shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor take their daughter for your son. Notice why. For they will turn your sons away from following me to serve after other gods. So the anger of the Lord will be aroused against you and will destroy you suddenly.

But this is how you shall deal with them. You shall destroy their altars, break down their sacred pillars, cut down their wooden images, and burn their carved images with fire. For you are a holy people to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth.

So God was very specific in how Israel was to conduct themselves when they took possession of the land and how they were to take possession of that land as well. They weren't to allow anyone to remain as good neighbors. These are nice people and maybe be kind of handy even to have them around, do some of the hard labor of the land.

God said they weren't to do any of that. They were to push them out completely because if they were allowed to remain, what would cause Israel?

The sin would be those peoples, that religion, their sons, their daughters. It would be a stumbling block to the children of Israel to allow these nations to remain, even in part.

What we need to understand is that Joshua was faithful. He was faithful all the way up to the end of his life. He led Israel well.

We recall that right leadership is essential. That's a theme in the book of Judges.

Following Joshua's death, there was a mindset that began to creep into the next generation of Israelites.

It was complacency, for one, but it was also compromise.

It was a mindset that was willing to live with a degree of sin in their midst.

They were content to live with a certain degree of idolatry around them. Rather than pushing that out completely, there was compromise and complacency that entered in one generation after Joshua.

Like I said, with the blessing of the little children, this was a fourth generation child here today.

What an incredible blessing. Israel, time and time again, says, when that generation died off, the next generation came up and they didn't know God.

How quickly they forgot. Such is the case with the generation following the leadership of Joshua.

If we go back to Judges 1.

Judges 1, again, we've looked at the instruction of how they were to actually push these people out and conquer the land, take full possession.

Judges 1, verse 21, again it says, But the children of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites, who inhabited Jerusalem.

So the Jebusites dwell with the children of Benjamin in Jerusalem to this day, to the time of the writing of this book.

And indeed, the Bible record shows that the Jebusites remained entrenched in Jerusalem until the time of King David.

When David, after he was reigning over Judah, now he's going to come in and reign completely over the kingdom, right?

And Jerusalem is the place of his throne. David comes in and conquers and boots out the Jebusites.

But you have hundreds of years, hundreds, that the Jebusites were side by side with the Israelites from the beginning, in opposition to what God's instructions would be.

Judges chapter 1, verse 21, shows us that. If we continue on down in verse 27 as well, it says, However, Manasseh did not drive out the inhabitants of Beth She'an in the villages, or Tanakh in the villages, or the inhabitants of Dora in its villages, nor the inhabitants of Ibalem in its villages, or the inhabitants of Megiddo in its villages, for the Canaanites were determined to dwell in the land.

They just weren't going to go out that easily.

Verse 28, And it came to pass, when Israel was strong, that they put the Canaanites under tribute. But they did not completely drive them out.

Again, they compromised in the clear instructions from God.

He says, you're not to let them remain. You're going to remove them. You're going to overcome them, and remove every obstacle and every shrine of their religion.

But again, they compromised with those instructions.

But again, they placed them under tribute.

Well, that may not seem so bad, right? A little forced labor. We have people to work in the house.

We have people to work in the field. After all, this is a blessed land.

We want the blessing, so some servants might be alright.

And taxation.

We can pat our pockets with these people.

Again, it is compromise.

The remainder of chapter one repeats the same story with the other tribes.

Ephraim, Manasseh left many Canaanites in their land.

So did Asher. So did Naphtali. And the tribe of Dan was actually driven away from possessing a great portion of their inheritance.

A lot of the inheritance of Dan, it included the mountains, but it included the plains and the valleys as well.

And they retreated from the Canaanites.

They went up into the hills. Dan did.

Into a small portion of their inheritance, and the Canaanites remained entrenched.

So come to see this half-hearted approach to ridding the land of its remaining inhabitants would cause Israel trouble generation after generation after generation.

God said, you're going to set this foundation as my people that you will be holy in a holy land, and this religion will be pure.

But again, they compromised in that.

Quoting from the United Church of God Bible commentary on Judges chapter 1, it says, This stage, or thus the stage with their actions here of compromise, thus the stage was set for continual miseries.

The half-hearted conquest would result in repeated wars, intertribal disputes, inefficient national government, frequent apostasies in which the Canaanite religious practices were embraced, and as a result eventual expulsion from the land.

Brethren, compromise is a very dangerous game to play.

And I can't overemphasize that enough. Compromise is a very dangerous game to play for the people of God.

The children of Israel ultimately were kicked out of the land themselves by God because they compromised.

Judah a short time later as well. This compromise proved fatal in terms of the inheritance that God intended for them to receive.

And it's because it was a pattern from the beginning, and it was not addressed.

Judges chapter 2 and verse 1, Judges chapter 2 and verse 1 says, It's important we take a minute to remember who the angel of the Lord is because we're going to see this being occur many times in the accounts as we go through the book of Judges.

The angel of the Lord will appear and will interact in various ways with various individuals throughout this book.

So who is he? Who is the angel of the Lord?

This being, to the best of our understanding in the Church of God, is the Word.

It was the one who became Jesus Christ, who came in the flesh as Jesus Christ.

This was the one who, in the beginning, John 1 verse 1 and 2, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and he was in the beginning with God. We can identify the angel of the Lord in that way because of the references that are used for him all throughout the Scripture, acknowledging him as God as well.

So the term angel of the Lord in English really is a poor translation because an angel, as we would understand it, is a created being.

As we're told in the New Testament, in terms of Jesus Christ, nothing was made that was made apart from him. He was there from the beginning.

So the Word who became Christ was not a created being. So the term angel is not a good translation.

In the Hebrew, it's malek, M-A-L-A-K, and it means a messenger.

A malek can be a physical messenger, as in the case of Malachi.

It can be an angelic messenger, and it can be a divine messenger as well. But in the case of the angel of the Lord, it is malek Yahweh, as it occurs in the Hebrew. Malek Yahweh.

And this being is the divine messenger of God.

And throughout the Old Testament, his divinity is also acknowledged as God and by the name of Yahweh.

So I do want to take a look at one direct example of that before we move forward. Let's turn to Genesis 16.

Genesis 16, again, just identifying this being the angel of the Lord because we'll see him repetitively throughout the book of Judges.

Deuteronomy 16, the first time the angel of the Lord appears in the Bible is here, in Genesis 16.

And it's an account that's important because the first appearance of the malek then sets the standard for who this being is as we move forward from this point.

He's going to appear subsequent appearances throughout the Old Testament. So Genesis 16 is foundational in this first appearance to who he is.

Genesis 16, verse 7 says, This is the time where Hagar fled from Sarai, her mistress, who was being heavy-handed with her.

And my point isn't actually in the context. I want you to see who it is that speaks to Hagar and take note.

Again, Genesis 16.

Verse 8, Verse 10, Again, I want us to recognize how many times it reiterates who is speaking to Hagar.

It is the angel of the Lord.

Verse 11, Big difference.

Notice verse 13, You are the God who sees.

For she said, So who spoke to Hagar?

I think it's clear four times. The angel of the Lord spoke to her. The Malek Yahweh spoke to her. And we have the identification here in verse 13. It says, So the passage confirms that the one who spoke to Hagar was Yahweh, also in this case identified as the angel of the Lord. And it also confirms that this being who interacted with her was also God.

This doesn't diminish the Father and His activity in the Old Testament, in the fact that He is God and the Most High God. And He is Yahweh. Alright, but we have to identify as well this being.

The Young's literal translation says of Genesis 16, verse 13. It's a literal translation from the Hebrew. She called the name of Yehova, or Yahweh, who was speaking unto her, Thou art, O God, my beholder. The literal standard version says that she calls the name of Yahweh, who was speaking to her, You are, O God, my beholder. So clearly the one speaking to her in this passage is the same one who she sees. Okay, I've seen him who sees me. And he is her beholder, and it is the Malek, the angel of the Lord, the one who is also called by the name of Yahweh and the title of God. And as we understand Genesis, Moses recorded this passage. And Moses wasn't confused about who this being was. Moses had many interactions as well with the Malek. And he says the one that spoke to her was Yahweh and the God who sees.

So I want us to understand that because as we go through the book of Judges, we're going to come across a number of encounters again where the angel of the Lord engages with people. Gideon, Manoah, and his wife. And in that context as well, he's called the Lord in that conversation. And it can be confusing if you're trying to take a scalpel and separate those out. Let's just understand that in some cases and in some passages, angel of the Lord and Yahweh are referring to the same being. Such as it here is in Genesis chapter 16. So that's all I want to say on that. We'll just keep that in the back of our minds for a foundation. Let's go back to Judges chapter 2.

Judges chapter 2. And again, I want to reiterate acknowledging the Word who became Christ as Yahweh, as the Bible does, doesn't diminish the Father who is Yahweh, to whom He submitted and to whose will He fulfilled. Joshua chapter 2 in verse 1. Excuse me. I'm sorry. Let's go to Judges. I keep trying to mix the two books.

Judges chapter 2 and verse 1. It says, Verse 2, and it says, That's what they were to do. He says, Here we have the Malek who is confronting Israel about the fact that they haven't completely driven the Canaanites out as the command from God was. And in fact, they were immersing themselves in the culture and the religion of the nations around them. And the question is, why are you doing this? Why have you done this? This, in fact, is to their detriment.

God would keep His end of the covenant if they would keep theirs. Because, see, human beings, we are the weak link. God is not the weak link in these things. Why have you done this? Verse 3, And so it was when the angel of the Lord spoke these words to all the children of Israel, that the people lifted up their voices and wept.

And they called the name of the place Bochum, and there they sacrificed to the Lord. Verse 6, So again, we have it confirmed in chapter 2 that under Joshua's leadership, Israel did hold fast.

And they did pursue what God had given them to do. But trends away from God were already developing in Israel at the end of Joshua's life. In fact, you can go back to the book of Joshua, and you can see some of his lament over their lack of zeal to go take possession of the land. He says, how long are you going to wait? So those trends away from God were already developing in Israel, even towards the end of Joshua's life. Their actions upon his death, though, were what we saw in chapter 1. A refusal to actually go through and fully do what God had given them to do.

Carrying on in verse 8, it says, Now Joshua the son and none, the servant of the Lord, died when he was 110 years old, and they buried him within the borders of his inheritance, Timnath, Haris, and the mountains of Ephraim on the north side of Mount Gash. It says, When all the generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation arose after them, who did not know the Lord, nor the work which he had done for Israel.

So after the generation that came out of Egypt, you had the young children who could pass into the Promised Land, as well as those that were born in the wilderness. When that generation died, when the elders who lived at the time of Joshua died, that next generation came on the scene and it says, they didn't know God. They didn't know the Lord, nor the work which he had done for Israel. It wasn't that they didn't know who God was. He was in their history, clearly. His tabernacle was in their midst. So they knew who God was, but the fact is they didn't know Him in terms of a personal relationship, and they hadn't engaged in Him being part of their life in that same way. They essentially forgot Him. And for Israel, that was to their detriment.

Verse 11, carrying on, it says, This is a consequence, brethren, of playing with fire and not expecting to get burned.

For Israel to leave the inhabitants, at least a portion of them, intact around them, it was playing with fire. And indeed, they did get burned. They had compromised in the commandment of God to rid the inhabitants completely, and as a result, they severely compromised themselves in the process. When after foreign gods received the wrath of Yahweh.

That generation forsook God, and they blended the worship of the true God with the practices of the false gods. And this is a part of the compromise as well. Not to totally throw God away, but to bring other things in to add to your religious worship. It's called syncretism. When you blend false worship with the worship of the true God, Israel did it at Mount Sinai. Remember the golden calf? This is your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt. It's the blending of the pagan practices with the worship of the true God. In today's day and age, we could label it as Christmas and Easter, and many other things as well. The syncretism is something which God hates, and it was the road down which Israel was traveling.

The lesson for us today, brethren, is don't ever settle. Don't ever settle for good enough. Israel said this is good enough. We've pushed some of them aside so we can have a little piece of land. But don't ever settle. Don't ever compromise. Don't ever say, this is good enough. I can deal with some level of the world in my religion. Or I can yoke myself right alongside those who don't fully know God and expect that it will be okay. Because the lesson of the book of Judges is that it will not be okay. That that compromise will come back to bite you in the end, cannot play with fire, and expect not to be burned.

What makes compromise so dangerous is that it's subtle. It just tends to creep into our lives.

Because compromise, by definition, doesn't involve a wholesale embracing of the ways of this world. It's not like you leap both feet into the ways of the world and wrap your arms around it and just love this world. That's not what compromise is, by and large. Compromise actually is simply an accommodation of the world.

As in, I worship God, but I can accommodate that. I can make room for this, allowance for that. I can maybe turn a blind eye to this and allow it to creep into my life. It's making accommodation.

I think all of us would probably draw back very quickly at the thought of tossing God aside and embracing an idol.

We would be horrified about that.

But compromise never asks us to do that completely. Compromise says, you know what, you can have God, and there's room on the shelf for the idol as well.

There's room for God, and there's room for whatever it is you might go after in your heart, apart from God.

It's a small step at a time.

Probably Israel thought the Canaanites, maybe were a good idea to leave around.

Again, we can have servants in the house. We can have servants in the field. That makes our life a little easier. Tribute? Well, we can receive taxation from them. Again, that pads our pocket. Why is that really so bad? We can keep them under our control if we really want to. But what happens? Well, pretty soon, one of the handsome young men of Israel, one of the beautiful young ladies of the Canaanite persuasion, and now there's a marriage, now there's children. What happened to Solomon as his heart was carried away then to other gods?

It happened in Israel time and time and time again. Pretty soon, they're drawn away.

You see, brethren, compromise generally happens in small, incremental steps.

Again, it's not giant leaps forward. It can even just be little baby steps, little compromises along the way. But the end result is often the same. It is spiritual shipwreck. And unrepentant compromise ultimately, again, leads to that shipwreck. God is long suffering. He gives us time to repent and acknowledge those things and change. But unrepentant compromise ultimately leads to spiritual shipwreck. Major lesson of the book of Judges is that compromise and the things of God comes with a price.

Compromise and the things of God comes with a price in Israel, because this is the foundational period. Paid the price for hundreds of years, generation after generation.

The Tyndale Old Testament commentaries on the book of Judges makes this comment. And it notes that the period of the Judges set the stage for the apostasy that later led to the national punishments that God visited on Israel and Judah. It says, quote, "...few periods in Israel's eventful history are as important as the period of the Judges. During these centuries, the nation took the wrong turning that led to her downfall in near destruction." The apostasy of the later generations has its origin in the early years of the settlement. And there is a clear line between the time when the nation first went after Baal and the Dark Age when Jerusalem's temple itself was defiled, with all the trappings of Baal worship not excluding the cultic prostitutes. End quote.

So the point is, the wrong foundation was laid from the beginning. And the foundation at Israel and Judah lay when they took possession of the land impacted their outcome, not just for their immediate time, but for generations to come. Ultimately, they battled those people through the Judges, through the Kings.

The land was never rid of them completely, and Israel played a very, very dear price. Remember the title, Compromise Sets the Stage for Downfall.

And we need to notice the results in Israel's case.

Carrying on in chapter 2, verse 14, it says, And the anger of the LORD was hot against Israel, so he delivered them into the hands of the plunderers who despoiled them. Remember, he said, these are seven nations greater and mightier than you. So all God had to do was withdraw his help, and Israel was overwhelmed.

He says, He sold them into the hands of their enemies all around so they could no longer stand before their enemies. God's hand of blessing was withdrawn because of their compromise.

Verse 15, Wherever they went out, the hand of the LORD was against them for calamity, as the LORD had said, and as the LORD had sworn to them, and they were greatly distressed. Nevertheless, the LORD raised up judges who delivered them.

We get a little forepicture of what's going to unfold throughout the remainder of the book. He lifts up these judges and raises them up, puts them in position of deliverance of his people, out of the hand of those who plundered them. Yet they would not listen to their judges, but they played the harlot with other gods, and they bowed down to them. They turned quickly from the way in which their fathers walked, and obeying the commandments of the LORD. They did not do so. And when the LORD raised up judges for them, the LORD was with the judge to deliver them out of the hand of their enemies, all the days of the judge. For the LORD was moved to pity by their groaning, because of those who oppressed them and harassed them.

Verse 19, And it came to pass, when the judge was dead, that they reverted and behaved more corruptly than their fathers, by following other gods, to serve them, and to bow down to them. It's like each generation got worse than the previous. The idolatry, the pagan practices, the worshipping false gods, and putting their children in the fire to Baal and to Molech. Again, generation after generation, they did not cease from their doings, nor from their stubborn way.

So again, the book of Judges is a record of this repetitive cycle over and over and over. Sin, servitude, supplication, and salvation. It played out time and time again. There are lessons that we can learn from their experiences of going through that, as well as the judges that God sent to bring them out, if we indeed will heed those things. Verse 20, It says, Nor did he deliver them into the hand of Joshua.

So God left a portion of those nations intact in order to test Israel, and see what was in their heart. And if they had turned to God in obedience, he would have driven them out. He would have delivered the land into their hands completely, if only they had fulfilled their end of the covenant. But instead, they compromised.

They allowed sin to remain in their midst. And as a result, they lived with the consequences of that decision for generations to come. Unrepentant compromise sets the stage for downfall.

Brethren, for you and I, as the people of God, we must never be willing to compromise with the covenant that God has set before us all. We must obey His instructions fully as we seek the kingdom of God.

We can't settle for halfway.

We can't hope to hold on to God and reach over and bring a little bit of the world in alongside as well. This is all the way in or all the way out. And it's a lesson that we can see through the book of Judges.

The existence of Israel as a nation was dependent on her obedience to God. And the same is true with us today.

I want to conclude by quoting from the United Church of God Bible commentary again.

It says, quote, As Christians, we have been given the command to fight the good fight of faith, pressing onward to receive our reward in the spiritual promised land of God's kingdom. It requires constant and energetic effort, and there are always spiritual Canaanites who oppose us and attempt to drive us away from our inheritance. The question is, how have you pursued your inheritance?

And, brethren, that's a question you and I should ask ourselves each and every day. How am I pursuing my inheritance from God? He says, it's there. Open the way before you. If you obey me, come and get it.

How have you pursued your inheritance? Have you slacked off? Have you warred with half a heart? Are you willing to fellowship or run with spiritual Canaanites? Not recognizing that to do so only means eventual expulsion from your inheritance. If so, now is the time to repent. Now is the time to redouble your efforts and make a good warfare. And while warring, it says, don't forget to aid your brother as he strives for his inheritance also.

Just as Judah and Simeon came alongside each other to help each other receive the inheritance that God had set before them. So, brethren, I hope that's been insightful as we begin a study into the book of Judges. Next time we're going to take a look at the actions that were the basis for the expression, Everyone did what was right in his own eyes. It's actually the concluding comments of the book. There was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes. We're going to look at how that played out for Israel. What lessons can we learn that apply to us today? Brethren, there's really nothing new under the sun. The more things change, really, the more they stay the same. God is calling a people unto salvation. That salvation requires our trust in God and our faithfulness to the covenant he's extended to us.