Judges 2:11-23 Click here for Bible Verses
Hi GAMErs!
Today’s passage is Judges 2:11-23. Let’s go!
Judges 2:11-19 (NIV)
11 Then the Israeites did evil in the eyes of the LORD and served the Baals.
12 They forsook the LORD, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed and worshiped various gods of the peoples around them. They provoked the LORD to anger
13 because they forsook him and served Baal and the Ashtoreths.
14 In his anger against Israel the LORD handed them over to raiders who plundered them. He sold them to their enemies all around, whom they were no longer able to resist.
15 Whenever Israel went out to fight, the hand of the LORD was against them to defeat them, just as he had sworn to them. They were in great distress.
16 Then the LORD raised up judges, who saved them out of the hands of these raiders.
17 Yet they would not listen to their judges but prostituted themselves to other gods and worshiped them. Unlike their fathers, they quickly turned from the way in which their fathers had walked, the way of obedience to the LORD’s commands.
18 Whenever the LORD raised up a judge for them, he was with the judge and saved them out of the hands of their enemies as long as the judge lived; for the LORD had compassion on them as they groaned under those who oppressed and afflicted them.
19 But when the judge died, the people returned to ways even more corrupt than those of their fathers, following other gods and serving and worshiping them. They refused to give up their evil practices and stubborn ways.
On verses 11-19: These verses summarize a pattern that you’ll see happening over and over again in the book of Judges: the Israelites forsake God; the Israelites are attacked, plundered and abused by other nations; the Israelites cry out to God; God sends a deliverer (a judge) to save them; the Israelites serve God for a time while under the deliverer’s leadership, but when that deliverer dies, the Israelites go back to forsaking God all over again, and the cycle repeats itself.
Amazingly, the way that God would end this cycle down the road is not by creating people who will never sin, but by sending a deliverer who will never die; that is, one who died but who rose again, who lives forever and who intercedes for sinners like us. His name is Jesus. So we have even less excuse than the Israelites to forsake our God, since our Deliverer will never forsake us. At the same time, we don’t need to live with the kind of hopelessness that the Israelites lived in when their judges would eventually die. Because our Deliverer lives forever, in Him we have a hope that is stronger than death and power to live so that the cycle we see in Judges need not repeat itself anymore.
Judges 2:20-23 (NIV)
20 Therefore the LORD was very angry with Israel and said, “Because this nation has violated the covenant that I laid down for their forefathers and has not listened to me,
21 I will no longer drive out before them any of the nations Joshua left when he died.
22 I will use them to test Israel and see whether they will keep the way of the LORD and walk in it as their forefathers did.”
23 The LORD had allowed those nations to remain; he did not drive them out at once by giving them into the hands of Joshua.
On verses 20-23: God’s original command to the Israelites was to drive out idol worshiping nations from the promised land. When the Israelites refused to do so, the LORD didn’t do it for them; rather He used those nations who remained to test the Israelites. It goes to show that when we don’t do as God commands, we will not be as blessed as God intended for us to be. Still, God will somehow use the situation to accomplish His good purposes. That’s how sovereign God is.
Thank You Father that more than ever we don’t need to be stuck in a cycle of forsaking You continually. That’s because our Deliverer lives forever and we have strength in Him to live for You. Holy Spirit, please fill me to live for You today. In Jesus’ name, AMEN!
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