Photo courtesy of FranUlloa
I've been reading the Book of Judges, which can be pretty dry reading if you just skim over it, but parts of it can be surprising if you delve into it a bit. For instance,
Now the angel of the LORD went up from Gilgal to Bochim. And he said, "I brought you up from Egypt and brought you into the land that I swore to give to your fathers. I said, I will never break my covenant with you, and you shall make no covenant with the inhabitants of this land; you shall break down their altars.' But you have not obeyed my voice. What is this you have done? So now I say, I will not drive them out before you, but they shall become thorns in your sides, and their gods shall be a snare to you." As soon as the angel of the LORD spoke these words to all the people of Israel, the people lifted up their voices and wept. (Judges 2:1-4; ESV)
My initial impulse, upon reading this is to say, "You absolute idiots! What knuckleheads these people were to have seen what God had done for them but to still have disobeyed. But then again, It sounds totally like me (and you too, Dear Reader). How wayward and wilfully disobedient we are! What knuckleheads we are! What absolute idiots! Thank God that He never breaks his covenants with us.
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Think about that and stay tuned for more surprises in Judges!
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Patrick Parker, is a Christian, husband, father, judo and aikido teacher, Program Director for a Cardiac Rehab, and a Ph.D. Contact: mokurendojo@gmail.com or phone 601.248.7282
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1 comments:
I've often thought that the Old Testament is a marvelous book of examples. When people read the material in the New Testament, I am sure that they are often thinking, "It would sure be nice if He would give me an example." Well, there it is in the OT.
1 Corinthians 10:1-11
(1) For I want you to know, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea,
(2) and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea,
(3) and all ate the same spiritual food,
(4) and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.
(5) Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.
(6) Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did.
(7) Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, "The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play."
(8) We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day.
(9) We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents,
(10) nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer.
(11) Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come.
Of course, those verses are applied directly to the story of the forty years in the wilderness, but I have often thought that much of the rest of Israel's history falls into the same category. At the very least, you can teach the same kinds of lessons from it.
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