Othniel, Ehud, and Jesus

As I made my way through the first few chapters of Judges, I could not get 2 Timothy 2:13 out of my mind. “If we are faithless, he remains faithful.”

Faithful is defined as, “steadfast in affection or allegiance.” So our God is “steadfast in affection” even when we aren’t giving Him the glory He deserves. It doesn’t make sense apart from His grace.

Grace is defined in the dictionary as, “unmerited divine assistance given humans for their regeneration or sanctification.“

Now, you would think that the nation of Israel would have been in awe of their Lord after seeing all he accomplished for them under the leadership of Moses and Joshua.  But they constantly were forgetting how great their Lord is, their sinful human will always seemed to get in their way of fully running hard after the God that kept saving them.

Judges 3 gives two examples of the lord remaining faithful even when the People of Israel were not. He sent them a deliverer each time. First, example:  

Judges 3:7, 9, “And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. They forgot the Lord their God and served the Baals and the Asheroth…But when the people of Israel cried out to the Lord, the Lord raised up a deliverer for the people of Israel, who saved them, Othniel the son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother.”

They cried out to God for help after they gave into their sin and the Lord stopped showing favor to them. And even though they had not been faithful, God was faithful to answer their cries and send them a deliverer. And they served the Lord for 40 years and there was peace, but then again in verse 12 and 15, “And the people of Israel again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord strengthened Eglon the king of Moab against Israel, because they had done what was evil in the sight of the Lord…Then the people of Israel cried out to the Lord, and the Lord raised up for them a deliverer, Ehud, the son of Gera, the Benjaminite, a left handed man.”

They fell back into their sins and were not faithful to their God. Yet, when they cried out to God. He was faithful once again to send a deliverer to help them; amazing grace indeed. Now there was rest in Israel for 80 years before… I bet you can guess what happens next?

Judges 4: 1, “And the people of Israel again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord after Ehud died…”

I started to get frustrated as I read this verse. But then God reminded me of how faithless I can be so often; I have no right at getting frustrated at the people of Israel. Instead of getting frustrated, the Lord directed my attention to how I can learn from these verses to better serve Him.

Our generation today is now enticed by so much sin instantly. We have access to almost anything through our computers, televisions and phones. We so often turn our face away from the Lord when we are watching a movie or browsing the web. Instead of living by our convictions and what the Word of the Lord has to say, we try to come up with any excuse to have our worldly passions and desires fulfilled.

Matthew 28:46, “And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying ‘Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?’ that is, ‘My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?’ … And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and yielded up his spirit.”

Jesus is the ultimate deliverer.

 

I want our generation to grow up remembering this truth 24/7. God forsake his very own son on the cross so that we might be able to live with Him for eternity in heaven.  Yes, even when we are faithless, God will remain faithful to those of us who have placed our faith in His death and resurrection.  But, if we are truly grateful son’s and daughters, we are going to study the Word of the Lord to find out what pleases our Father. We are going to be crying out to God to help us. We are going study our bibles to get a greater picture of who our Father in heaven is. And we are going to seek to live every second of our life bringing glory and honor to His name!