Week 3 – The Judges Harmony Christian Church

📖 What are we doing to pass on the knowledge of God to our kids? 🙏 Join Kent to explore this crucial question through the book of Judges!  EASY TO GIVE at Harmony, text any amount to (859) 459-0316 to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give ). Get the fill in the blank bulletins my.harmonychurch.cc/bulletins.



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OPENING ILLUSTRATION:



So, I need to confess something.  I am a problem in our family.  Not just a problem, I am THE problem.  Here’s how it works.  It will be 9 or 9:30 at night, our kids will have school the next day, and everyone is getting ready for bed, showers, brushing their teeth, etc.  One of our kids will come into our room to say goodnight and a half hour later we are wrestling around and joking or watching a show or whatever.  I am the agent of chaos in our family!  Lol, it’s what I do!



Our kids know it too, they know if they can get me to think something is funny or fun that it’s over, I’m gonna forget about the reality of the day that is looming on the other side of night and I’m going to go headlong into crazy.  



When I was a kid, I hated order, I hated structure - I’m naturally a rule breaker, but as I’ve aged, I like to think I’ve gotten a little wiser and one of the things I’ve learned is



Where chaos rules, consequences multiply



b



We all know actions have consequences right?  



If I stay up late on a school night, I’m going to have a longer harder day the next day…



You can only ignore the consequences of chaos for so long before they become unbearable.



WE:



-This may be a hoarder house where you can’t move around and can never invite anyone over to your house



-it may be the person who lives with the spouse that you can’t trust - anything they say is ever honest



-it may be the teacher who has no ability to manage their class 



I don’t care what the context is, if you ignore the consequences the chaos will eventually overtake your world.



I want to jump into a world that was FULL of chaos today.



b



The book of Judges in the scripture follows on the heels of Joshua and his generation passing away.



Listen, I tell you a few stories from the book of Judges you need to not think of the Jewish people as you might see them, an organized nation and religious group.  



These were more like an odd mix of the old west and native American Indian Tribes that were loosely connected to each other. 



There is a violence and a way of doing things that does not fit with our modern sensitivities…



God’s promise had been “If you obey me, I’ll be with you. If you don’t, I’ll remove my blessing…”



b



Over and over again this will be God’s promise to humanity and over and over again WE will walk back on the contract.



b



The Israelites stop following Yahweh God and begin to experience life outside of His blessing…  They experience violent oppressors, famine, and wickedness…



Here’s what’s crazy to me about this though



God never gives up on them…



b



He just keeps coming after them - no matter how many times they run from Him.



During this period, the way God comes after them is to raise up Judges.  There are a lot of them but I want to highlight 3 of them



Deborah



Debbie was a prophetess in Israel, she had a tree that she would sit under and people in the nation would come to her to have their cases decided.  She was wise and courageous.  She led in a time when Israel was under great oppression by a cruel leader named Sisera.  



I don’t want to simplify it too much, but at times it feels like God is like, “Ok, enough, the people need help.”  What Scripture says is that in essence 



God would raise up these judges in response to the people finally going “We can’t bear these consequences anymore…”



When God called Deborah he told her to anoint a military leader named Barak to go and war against Sisera from Mount