Walk Through the Bible: Judges
Text for Sermon: Judges 2:10-19; 17:6
Last week we ended the book of Joshua with the death of Joshua and the people of God settled into life in the Promised Land. What would be our normal expectation after God led His people out of the wilderness and into the Promised Land and gave them victory over the peoples of the land?
God’s people should have settled down to an existence of peaceful contentment in total dependence of their good and gracious God who provided everything they needed. After 400 years of bondage in Egypt and 40 years of wilderness wandering and living in tents, what would their new found freedom and new prosperity be like?
The book of Joshua should end with, “And they lived happily ever after.” But if you are looking for a warm, cozy fairy tale ending. This isn’t it. Judges is about as bleak a story as you will find in the Bible. If Judges were made into a movie, it would get an R rating.
Judges is a 21-chapter downward spiral into deception, oppression, idolatry, murder, human sacrifice and betrayal, gang rape, scandal and apostasy, just to name a few sins.
It is an embarrassment to our modern sensitivities, so primitive, so violent. It starts badly and then goes from bad to worse to terrible. Even the best known heroes of the book like Gideon and Samson turn out to be flawed heroes at best.
No wonder the book is skipped in sermons and Sunday School lessons.