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Our text for this morning you
will find in the last chapter of the Book of Judges, chapter
21. And I hope at this point you
aren't completely wearied by the melancholy account of the
Book of Judges and these last chapters in particular. We have been looking Actually,
through most of the entire book, we have been looking at the brokenness
of Israel. Their broken relationships, their
broken sense of morality, their broken reasoning. And what we've
seen, that brokenness, it's not just presented to us in the abstract. Oh, they break the word of God,
they break the law of God, violating some divine perfection. But we see it in the practical
evil that comes through and from Israel. Evil that nearly all
the world can acknowledge as wicked and foul, and yet is repeated
generation after generation throughout history in one culture after
another. Judges chapter 21, beginning
at verse 1. Now the men of Israel had sworn
at Mitzpah, no one of us shall give his daughter in marriage
to Benjamin. And the people came to Bethel
and sat there till evening before God. And they lifted up their
voices and wept bitterly. And they said, oh Lord, the God
of Israel, why has this happened in Israel? That today there should
be one tribe lacking in Israel. And the next day the people rose
early and built there an altar and offered burnt offerings and
peace offerings. And the people of Israel said,
which of all the tribes of Israel did not come up in the assembly
to the Lord? For they had taken a great oath
concerning him who did not come up to the Lord to mitzpah, saying,
he shall surely be put to death. And the people of Israel had
compassion for Benjamin, their brother, and said, one tribe
is cut off from Israel this day. What shall we do for wives for
those who are left, since we have sworn by the Lord that we
will not give them any of our daughters for wives? We'll pick
up the text in a moment. Pray with me, please. Father,
oh, that our ears are open this morning to the word of truth,
that Lord, you would guide us into all truth today. So lead
me, Father, in this word, and lead us, I ask, in Jesus' name.
Amen. Ever been in a bind because of
a promise you made? Honey, I'll take care of that
as soon as the game is over. Only you didn't know it was a
doubleheader. Or there's another game right after. Oh, wait a
minute, it's not really ended. I mean, that's a trivial kind
of thing. Promises we've made that have
been very hard to keep? I think of that one. Not that
she's been hard to love, but I know I've made it hard on her
from time to time. And I could give you specific
examples of which I will not. Thank you very much. Promises made in haste, not thinking
through the consequences. Promises that are going to cost
me in ways that I hadn't anticipated. Israel is in a terrible dilemma.
How do we preserve the 12th tribe? It started out that they were
going to punish those wicked men of Gibeah back in chapter
20, verse 13, but all of Benjamin became harem or devoted to destruction
as they aligned themselves with the men of Gibeah. And so they
were treated like the inhabitants of Canaan. Now we're told in
verse 6 that Israel had compassion on Benjamin. They'll say it again
in verse 15. They were concerned for the integrity
of Israel. There were 12 sons of Jacob. There were 12 tribes. There were
12 stones in the ephod of the high priest. There were 12 camps
that were placed around the Ark of the Covenant. Not 11, but
complements of their scorched earth campaign. Benjamin, if
it's going to survive, needs wives. But how do we keep our
vow? Our vows, actually, because two
emerge in this passage. They make a great oath. They
will put to death anyone who doesn't join them. Likely, they meant the whole town. Now,
you can surmise some reasoning behind it. They demonstrate,
is it a a town that shows no concern for the crime committed?
Do they not fear God's judgment upon the whole nation as a result
of that? Don't they support justice? Are
they defying the authority of the community gathered, of that
covenant community? And somebody comes up with what
seems to be to them a brilliant plan. And so the passage goes
on in verse 8, was there a tribe? Was there a city? Yes, there
was, Jebus Gilian. Oh, well, we can keep our word.
We can go and wipe them out like we said we were going to. Ah,
but guess what? If we don't kill their virgin
daughters, we get to pick up the wives. Two birds with one
stone. We keep our vow and Benjamin
gets their wives. Now they want to show compassion
on Benjamin, but they show no compassion on Jabesh Gilead. What twisted reasoning. Jabesh
Gilead are Israelites as well. And so they send 12,000 of their
finest, it says, soldiers. You wonder, aren't they tired
of this slaughter yet? It just reminded me of the Danites.
taking on a quiet people. And so they attack and they carry
off 400 women who had never known a man. And their fathers didn't
have to violate a vow in terms of not giving up their daughters
because they weren't there to take that vow. So, pretty good
deal. Israel kept its vow, whether
it was honoring to the Lord Well, that's another question altogether. Are we careful with the promises
that we make, careful that we don't make rash, quick judgments,
statements, commitments? Because when you make a promise,
when you take a vow, you had better consider it long and hard.
It may mean, those words may mean consequences that you really
haven't considered or thought through. You want to take time
carefully because, as I said to the children, Our words do
matter to the Lord. So with brides in hand, the people
come and call to Benjamin, verse 13. Then the whole congregation
sent word to the people of Benjamin who were at the Rock of Rimen
and proclaimed peace to them. And Benjamin returned at that
time and they gave them the women whom they had saved alive of
the women of Jabesh Gilead. But they were not enough for
them. And the people had compassion on Benjamin because the Lord
had made a breach in the tribes of Israel. They bring a peace
offering. We have wives. Come back, brothers.
And so there's that restoration. Justice has been served. The
offense has been paid for. Here's a present for you. Oops,
we don't have enough. Now what do we do? Because once
again, now this second oath comes into play. Beginning at verse
16, then the elders of the congregation said, what shall we do for wives
for those who are left since the women are destroyed out of
Benjamin? And they said, there must be an inheritance for the
survivors of Benjamin that the tribe not be blotted out from
Israel. Yet we cannot give them wives
from our daughters for the people of Israel had sworn cursed be
he who gives a wife to Benjamin. And so they come up with another
great plan. There's a feast every year at
Shiloh. That's, of course, the Feast
of Booths. It's the celebration of the harvest. It's remembering
God's provision for his people in the wilderness. So the idea
is, well, let God provide for the Benjaminites at this feast. Go ahead, lie in wait, ambush
them, and carry off the women. Not the married women, just the
unmarried. And verse 22, they tell us, And
when their fathers or their brothers come to complain to us, we'll
say to them, grant them graciously to us, because we did not take
for each man of them his wife in battle. Neither did you give
them, else you would now be guilty. You see what they're trying to
do? They don't want them to violate their vow. And so the solution
is, we'll just steal them. And then when their fathers or
their brothers come to us, we can just say, look, we didn't
kill you in battle for them. So back off. And you didn't have
to violate your vow because you didn't give them up willfully.
They were stolen from you. So be at peace. Now, this dance
was like David's dancing before the Lord, it wasn't sensual.
Not even sure it was mixed because they had no trouble telling the
married women from the unmarried women. It was a time for the
girls to dance before the Lord. Matthew Henry was helpful last
week. This week he reminds us, their dancing thus in public
made them an easy prey to those who had design upon them. Whence
Bishop Hall observes that the ambushes of evil spirits carry
away many souls from dancing to a fearful desolation. Got that? Time to lock up your
daughters. Don't you dare let them dance.
And I know we have young women here who are dancing. And here's
my warning to you that souls, many a soul from dancing has
been carried away to a fearful desolation. I think they've read
a little into the text here, brothers and sisters. Just being
honest there. But ladies, be forewarned. I
don't know what I'm going to do with my own daughter who loves
swing dancing and ballroom dancing. I guess she's on the verge of
being carried away into a fearful desolation. In all seriousness, however,
Do you see what Israel is saying? We aren't going to break our
vow. No matter what that vow is, we aren't going to break
it. We're going to act like Jephthah here. So we aren't going to let
our daughters marry them. But instead, we'll tell the men
of Benjamin to act like Boko Haram. Just take them. And so the wives are secured.
And the people of Benjamin, verse 23, did so and took their wives
according to the number from the dancers whom they carried
off. Then they went and returned to their inheritance and rebuilt
the towns and lived in them. And the people of Israel departed
from there at that time, every man to his tribe and family.
And they went out from there, every man to his inheritance."
It's all tied up. Benjamin has their wives. The
continuation of the tribe is secured. Nobody had to break
any of their vows. We kept them all. Now, yes, one
town was butchered, and some of those wives had to watch their
families be slaughtered as they were carried away. And others,
well, they were just ripped out of their families and their homes
and carried off to be married. But it's all good. It's all good.
Everyone, well, everyone who's been left standing, went home. Job well done. Everything wrapped
up, all's well that ends well. The end, not quite. In those days, there
was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in
his own eyes. The story's easy to tell. The questions that it raises,
however, are not so easy to address. And we have some really challenging
ones here in the passage. The problem of evil, the problem
of God's sovereignty, and the problem of God's mercy. Consider the problem of evil,
because we know this is evil. This is wrong. We don't need the writer to tell
us it is, but he did. Everyone did what was right in
his own eyes. This was evil in the eyes of
the Lord. It's evil in our eyes, but it was not evil in theirs. The fact is, evil is not fundamentally
a cultural issue. It wasn't just wrong. It's not
just wrong for our culture today. We look back on this and we say,
this is wicked behavior. Yes, it is. But it was wicked
behavior then, too. was terribly wrong for their
culture as well as ours, because it's not just our sensibilities
that are assaulted in these things. It's the character of God that's
assaulted and his law, which they had, by the way. We know it's evil because we
don't define it. God does. God defines evil. God says what is good. and what
is not. He sets the standard, and that
standard is the unchanging, inviolable standard, the law of God. That
standard is rooted in the nature of God, who is good and just and righteous
and holy. And the only way we can define
what is evil is to stand it apart from that. What is not good,
it is rejecting the good that God is. I take away his standard
of what is good and we're in a free fall. He has revealed that truth. The challenge comes every time
evil raises its head and we make a judgment of what is right and
wrong. There is a standard. And it is
not dependent on the culture. The problem with evil is that
many today want to be the arbiters of that standard themselves. They don't want an objective,
binding standard. So then what is judgment based
on? What is good or true or right based on? What I think right
now and arbitrary standards of no
use to us. It always changes. I don't know
if you've noticed, but the Western world seems to be in deep trouble
in this regard right now. I read very recently, both in
Canada and Great Britain, acquitted men, Muslim men, I probably shouldn't
say that because I'm profiling, acquitted men who claimed that
they didn't know their actions were wrong. Therefore, they couldn't
be held guilty. Their crimes, of course, were
against women. But those things weren't wrong in their own culture.
By their standards, their consciences were clear. Now, I don't know
about you, but I was told on more than one occasion, ignorance
of the law is no excuse. The standard holds. It doesn't
change. But we're looking at a world
around us where the standards are coming down. If your conscience
is clear, well, I guess we can't judge you then. And so justice
is perverted. What happens to the conscience
of the one violated? I guess that doesn't matter. You see, all sin is against God.
Sin is more than a violation of my conscience. Sin isn't defined
by my sensibilities. Even Paul can say in 1 Corinthians
4.4, I believe, where he says, my conscience may be clear, but
that does not mean that I am therefore acquitted. Because
it's not my conscience, it's the law of God. Sin isn't defined by my sensibilities. I am not the arbiter of right
and wrong. If that's the case, then everything
works in my favor. My sin is given permission to
run rampant. We need to understand that a
clear conscience and without guilt or without sin are quite
different. Israel had a clear conscience
in the way they handled this whole thing, the affair of Benjamin. but their guilt and their sin
remain. Godlessness leads to wickedness. And this idea that justice, right
and wrong, is dependent upon me and upon my belief, I mean,
it's contradictory. It's self-contradictory. There's
no basis to tell anyone that anything is wrong. Boko Haram says kidnapping young
girls isn't wrong. We have no basis on which to
judge them, if conscience alone is the determining factor. But sin, sin is against God. It's a transgression. against
God and against the law of God. We define in our shorter catechism,
sin is any want of conformity unto, in other words, I don't
do what I'm supposed to do, the law and the truth is set before
me and I don't do it. Want of, I don't match up to
it. Or transgression of, I break what is specifically clear, the law of God. There's one who
stands over creation. He sets the standards. But I think our definition of
sin needs to go deeper than that idea of I don't do what I'm supposed
to do and I do what I'm not supposed to do. That led to this idea
of sin is like you're shooting the arrow at the target and you
miss the mark kind of thing. That isn't truly a biblical concept
of sin, because that attributes a lot to us, really. I'm trying
to hit the mark. I'm trying to do what's right.
I'm always trying to do good. And sometimes I miss. Oh, I sin. I'm not as good as I should have
been, and I did something I shouldn't. So I'm missing the mark. The
Christian, I pray, is trying to hit a target. This is who
my God is, and I want to walk in conformity. But apart from
him, You've got your crossbow, and you're aiming for God. Because
you don't want his authority, and you don't want his rule.
It's not that I'm trying to do what's right. I'm trying to get
God out of the picture. I'm back to the garden. I can
be like God, as long as the true one isn't in the picture. Sin
goes deep. It is rebellion against God as
God. It's the desire for self. determination,
and, oh, we are really good at justifying ourselves, aren't
we? When we do, we need to set our
conscience against the Word of God, against the character of
God, and see how well we stand then. I didn't have a choice. Oh, did
I? I really didn't have a choice?
I couldn't stop what I felt was so important and act. I couldn't work for justice or
for righteousness. I had no opportunity to serve.
We'd better set it against God's standards. That's just one of our problems
in this passage. There is evil set before us. because it violates not just
my conscience, but the Word of God, defiling the character of
God. Another problem I think we've
got to address is the problem of God's sovereignty. Did you
hear some of these verses, some of these responses? Verse 3,
O Lord, the God of Israel, why has this happened in Israel that
today there should be one tribe lacking in Israel? As if they're
saying, well, we certainly weren't part of the problem. They've got amnesia. How could
this happen? That seems a pretty strange question
after what they've been up to. Can we pin this on God? And Israel
wanted to. And so I believe these statements,
verse 3 again and verse 15, are really from their perspective.
The author hasn't commented on these things. And so we need
to discern because he's not given a commentary on the text for
us, save that last verse. Now, at verse 15, the people
had compassion on Benjamin because the Lord had made a breach in
the tribes of Israel. It's the Lord's fault. He made
the breach. I mean, it sounds like they're
saying God didn't have compassion, but we do. Again, this sort of
self-justifying stance because the Lord had made a breach in
the tribes of Israel. Now, there is truth to that statement
because what we wrestle with in terms of God's sovereignty
is that he is absolutely sovereign. His will will not be thwarted. It will not be violated. His sovereign will controls all
things. There is nothing that happens
outside of that sovereign will and plan. So I know that the
world is not chaotic. I know that I am not subject
to fate or fate I know that the world is not
random and therefore impossible to understand or find meaning
in it. God has decreed whatsoever shall
come to pass and it will come to pass. And so all of those
promises that God made, I can rest in them because he will
fulfill them. And so I know that ultimately,
in an ultimate sense, yes, it was in God's sovereign will that
Benjamin would suffer in this way. Knowing His purposes, that's
outside of my knowledge or ability to discern. But God has also granted to us
His revealed will. That is, He has given us and
instructed us in what is right and good and just what is honoring,
what brings glory, what will bring blessing. He has given
us his revealed will. Now, those two, we must understand,
work together. It was Israel's sin that nearly
blotted out Benjamin. God did not make them act like
they did. They did so in their own free
will. He did not make them do anything. He did not force them to do anything. They acted according to their
own nature, their own plans, their own desires. God, in his
infinite wisdom, has laid those two together. You think about
it. Think of Christ on the cross. In Acts 2, verse 23, Jesus was
delivered up according to the definite plan and for knowledge
of God. And yet the finger is pointed
at the lawless men who crucified him and killed him by their own
hands. God has not violated their will.
He has not forced them to do anything. And yet they have served
God's ultimate purposes, such as the challenge of the sovereignty
of God in regard to his sovereign will and his revealed will. David knew what he was doing
with Bathsheba, with Uriah. Did God force him? We know that
that is a foolish thought. David would have to confess his
sin against the Lord. And of course, we read what Jesus
said to the Pharisees, woe to you scribes and Pharisees, you
hypocrites, because they were doing what Israel was doing.
Hey, we'll keep the vows. We'll get them right down to
the nitpicky stuff. But in terms of justice and mercy, off the
screen. They were blind guides straining
out gnats and swallowing camels. How often am I doing right in
my own eyes at the moment? And God must bring me to my senses. And I can acknowledge there my
capability, my culpability, my responsibility. Here's the distorted
reasoning of that sinful mind, a mind that needs to be renewed. Yeah, there's tension in this
passage. But I think maybe the greatest
tension as we come to the end of the book of Judges is the
problem of God's mercy. If God is just, And Israel has
persisted. And we'll go on from this point.
Remember, this was fairly early on in the time of the judges.
They would go on. They would continue before the Lord to do
what was evil in his sight. And they would know struggle
and suffering at the hands of those around them. They would
eventually cry out to the Lord, rarely in real repentance, just
crying out in their suffering. And God would hear, and he would
respond. And he would draw them out, and he'd raise up someone
who could help them, who could save them, who could deliver
them. Why? Because God, like Israel, and
very unlike Israel, in a sense, had committed himself to a vow,
a promise, that he would not break or violate, and he would
not distort it by unloving, by unwise, ungracious by unfaithful
acts of any sort. No. I, the Lord, do not change. Therefore, O children of Jacob,
you are not consumed. Malachi 3.6. It goes back to
Genesis, when God said to Abraham, I'm going to raise a great people
out of you, my people. And at Genesis 17, 8, I will
be their God. So that the prophets throughout
the whole, the entire Old Testament could proclaim, and they shall
be my people, and I will be their God. Because God had said to
his people, Exodus 19, you shall be my treasured possession. among all peoples. Malachi 3,
they shall be mine in the day when I make up my treasured possession
and I will spare them as a man spares his own son. But you know he did not spare
his own son to make them that treasured possession. Why does he call us back? Why
does he take us when we come over and over again, confessing
our sin, repenting, trying to turn away? Because of his promise.
Because he is faithful. Because he is God and we are
not. Because it's not some changing
standard, some cultural design or plan that guides his plans
and his promise. He is faithful. We have been chosen as His own
possession to be holy and blameless. And that He will do. His promise
wasn't rash. There wasn't anything about His
promise, or any of them, of which He did not know every detail,
every part, every implication, every purpose. possible problem,
every challenge to it, He knew it all. He knew what it would
cost when He made that promise. He knew from the start what sacrifice
would be required to fulfill that vow. That in love, because He loved
us, He would send His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. that is to take the wrath that
belonged to us and laid it on his son so that all who would believe
and all who would rest would be secured, delivered, saved,
forgiven, indeed granted life because his son could only fulfill
the promises perfectly. Fulfilling all that law not destroying
it, not wiping it out so that that standard isn't there anymore.
So now we can't even think about good anymore. No, no, it's been
fulfilled, fulfilled wondrously and gloriously. God has kept his promise. So we can declare all is well. Father, thank you. Praise you. Praise you, O Lord, for so great a salvation. We praise you, most glorious
one, most holy one, that you have made yourself known in Jesus
Christ. You have made your ways, your
law, your goodness has been revealed. Lord, let us lay hold now of
Jesus Christ by the power of the Spirit and the life that
he grants that we would walk, Lord, in the obedience of life,
we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.
Keeping a Clear Conscience
| Sermon ID | 56181651382 |
| Duration | 35:51 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | Judges 21 |
| Language | English |