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No King But Jesus - Immersed Series
31 Plays19 days ago
In this sermon, pastor Ridley Barron preached about the need for unwavering commitment to God amidst cultural decay and moral relativism. He highlights the parallels between the ancient Israelites' struggles, as depicted in the book of Judges, and the current societal challenges faced in places like the United States. Ridley emphasizes the consequences of partial obedience and the danger of allowing idolatry to infiltrate our lives, drawing comparisons between past and present temptations. Through a call to live "sent lives," he urges listeners to prioritize their devotion to God and foster an environment where the next generation is conscious of the Lord's presence and works. The message is a compelling reminder to examine personal faith, eradicate compromise, and choose steadfast commitment to God as the true King.
Timestamps:
00:00 "Living Sent Lives"
05:40 "Following God Despite Challenges"
09:09 "Living God's Command: A Call"
11:56 Selective Obedience to God’s Command
13:53 "Trust Over Chariots"
19:04 "Lost Generation's Forgotten Faith"
20:55 "Sowing Biblical Seeds in Children"
26:09 "Breaking Generational Cycles"
30:36 Self-Reflection on True Worship
31:38 True God vs. False Idols
36:42 "Choose: Light Amidst Darkness"
38:13 "From Compromise to Commitment"
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Transcript
Living 'Sent Lives'
00:00:00
Speaker
It's always exciting for me to hear reports from these chips when they come back. the opportunities that we have to go. if you're newer to our church, one of the things you need to understand is that we believe that as followers of Jesus Christ, we're first called to follow Jesus, but then we're called to go.
00:00:17
Speaker
we are We are living what we call sent lives. Everything we do from the point of salvation to the time that Christ calls us home is about sharing the gospel with others so that they may hear the news. We have it right over here on our wall, from Chapel Hill to the ends of the earth.
Mission Trips to Guatemala and Denver
00:00:31
Speaker
We still have two major trips coming up this year. None of these things happen without not only 21 participants who gave up a week of their lives to go, but you supporting financially what goes on and giving to those trips and helping to support those people going on those trips.
00:00:47
Speaker
The prayers that you offer obviously making a huge impact as the seeds of the gospel are planted wherever these trips are taking place. I said we've got two major trips. We're going to Guatemala again in September.
00:00:58
Speaker
ah Meeting for that is next week. Is that right? 11 a.m. m So if you want to be a part of that, there'll be meeting over there at 11 o'clock. If you're interested in going and being a part of one of those trips, if you've never been on a mission trip, I encourage you strongly to find a place to get involved and do one of these because it will change the way you see the world.
00:01:17
Speaker
um The next trip, like i said, is Denver in July. This may be shocking news to you. Denver, demographically, is a more unchurched city than Guatemala, where we just were.
00:01:29
Speaker
It's it's ah somewhere like 90-something percent of them unchurched. Crazy. And it's happening right here in our country. We like to think that we're, you know, God-fearing nation.
00:01:39
Speaker
It's just not the case.
Modern America vs. Ancient Israel
00:01:41
Speaker
The reality is that as the world comes to the United States, they come out of their background, and many of them don't know the the Jesus that you and I come to worship every single Sunday.
00:01:50
Speaker
So we have this responsibility to continue to live sent lives, starting right here in Chapel Hill, and then, of course, to the ends of the earth as we go. you've got your Bibles, turn to Judges, as we continue through the story of God's story.
00:02:03
Speaker
As we're looking at all these incredible stories that are happening today, we we turn to a very dark period. um And we were just talking about the fact that Denver is an unchurched city, an unreached city. Many places in our country are.
00:02:16
Speaker
um I think the numbers are still the same. The state of Montana is less than 2% churched. That's here in the United States. In fact, I want you to imagine for a second a nation.
00:02:27
Speaker
A nation where children are sacrificed out of comfort or convenience because it's just not the right time to have a child. ah Where we lay our children on the altar of false gods in the hopes that somehow it will return in some kind of favor or blessing.
00:02:44
Speaker
Our homes are disrupted by the entertainment we bring into them. In fact, we worship luxury. and convenience to the point where we will sacrifice in order to get more of it a nation where there's not much godly leadership if any at all and because of that there is chaos in the midst of that nation now I just described what could be easily understood to be the United States of America, but it also is Israel that we're fixing to read about.
00:03:14
Speaker
And you're going to see the parallels, symmetry, if you will, of what happens in this story in the book of Judges and where we are as a nation, where we are in our culture today and what's missing, the places that we are falling short, the places where we haven't carried out our part of the covenant that God has entered into with us.
00:03:32
Speaker
We're going to be reading just one very simple verse today. a verse that's repeated four times in the book of Judges. It's this. Chapter 17, verse 6.
00:03:43
Speaker
In those days there was no king in Israel. every Everyone did whatever seemed right to him. Now the first problem with that verse of scripture is that God was their king. He had said all along throughout this covenant with both Abraham and Moses and now even in his conversations with Joshua, if you will just trust me, if you will just follow me, I will be your king and you can be my people and I will take you to a place that will be a blessing to you.
00:04:08
Speaker
They should have recognized God as their king because he had shown up for them time and time again. But they rejected him and they were without good leadership. People served as their own guides for morality and ethics.
00:04:23
Speaker
The mentality was very much like what we have here today in our country. Follow your heart. Trust your heart. Let your heart be your guide. But contrary to what we say and what we think, the prophet Jeremiah said in Jeremiah 17, 9, do not trust your heart. It's more deceitful than anything else.
00:04:41
Speaker
The heart is deceitful above all other things. Our culture considers this idea that we all pick our own truth as to be the ideal state of a society. But anybody with common sense, which by the way isn't as common as it used to be, common sense would tell you that we can't all just pick our own way, right?
00:05:01
Speaker
If we all decided to drive on the wrong side of the road tomorrow, imagine what kind of chaos there would be. If we all decided just to pick our own path, imagine how much further down the moral...
00:05:12
Speaker
um Cesspool we would go into because of the just so decisions, the choices we make.
00:05:20
Speaker
But here's the reality. We still continue to try to pick our own way and decide what we think is right.
Strength and Courage in God's Word
00:05:27
Speaker
In fact, it was Adam and Eve who thought it was right to disobey God and eat fruit.
00:05:32
Speaker
It wouldn't be any big deal. It was Joseph's brothers who decided it was okay to fake his death and to sell him into slavery. It was David who decided that he would have Bathsheba as his and have his have her husband murdered in order to hide his sin.
00:05:51
Speaker
And ultimately, it was Judas Iscariot who thought it was right to turn Jesus over to the religious leaders because he wasn't picking the path that he thought he should pick. You see, this verse, everyone did whatever seemed right to him.
00:06:04
Speaker
This verse speaks to where we are. Let me point you back to Joshua 1, verse 7 and 8 last week where we were just to kind of help you understand where we're moving to in this story today. It says in verse 7, Joshua stood up before the people and he said, Why strong and very courageous? never easy.
00:06:22
Speaker
the whole instruction my servant moses commanded why strong and courageous because following god is never easy Following God in a culture that opposes Him is even harder.
00:06:34
Speaker
Making the right choice when the world is watching you is a difficult thing to do. And most most often, it's not a comfortable or convenient thing to do. but Joshua would on and he said, see, for Joshua, the key for is stay fixed on the word because that word everything.
00:06:49
Speaker
this book of instruction must not depart from your mouth you're to meditate it on in day meditate on it day and night you see the key for joshua the key for us is to stay fixed on the word of god because that word changes everything Years later, Joshua would wrap up his life by challenging the people with these words.
00:07:11
Speaker
Fear the Lord and worship Him in sincerity and truth. Get rid of the gods your ancestors worshipped beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt and worship the Lord.
00:07:22
Speaker
Now, to me, that's a stunning verse because here we are. They have been brought from being a nobody group of people, about 70 people who moved into Egypt, to now being a nation of millions of people who are about to enter the promised land. In fact, at this point, they've already entered the promised land.
00:07:39
Speaker
They've conquered most of their enemies. God has shown himself favorable time and time again. But they're still dragging around the idols from Egypt. They're still dragging around, he says, beyond the Euphrates. That's a reference to the time of Abraham.
00:07:55
Speaker
They're still carrying around false gods. They're still hanging on to options. It's kind of like, you know, i think I might want to date this girl, but I'm going to keep some options on the side.
00:08:08
Speaker
How far do you think that would fly? Yeah. It's just not the way it works. God is a jealous God and for great reason. What he's trying to say to us is you have to choose.
00:08:19
Speaker
Joshua left the people with this challenge in chapter 24. He said, you have got to get rid of all of the other options and choose who you will worship.
00:08:30
Speaker
The gods your fathers worshiped back in the Euphrates area, back in Babylon. The gods that you worshiped back in Egypt. The gods of the Amorites. But do you hear the words of Joshua? Even coming forward from last week, the one challenging word more than any other is choose.
00:08:51
Speaker
Choose. What is your choice? what do you What are you prepared to do? We get overwhelmed at the darkness of this world. We get overwhelmed at the brokenness in our relationships. Every single one of us in this room carry around scars from bad choices made for us or made against us.
00:09:10
Speaker
But here's the thing. We can't expect people in this world to act like they know God when they don't know God. And therein lies the command for us to go and take the gospel to the world.
00:09:22
Speaker
To live in such a way that they're given a choice. How can they choose if all they know is darkness? How can they choose if all they know is brokenness? We have to live in such a way, living out the instructions and commands of God, we have to live in such a way that they have something to pick from.
Personal and Family Commitments
00:09:40
Speaker
So when we get overwhelmed, we need to heed the words of Joshua to choose. So this morning, the question might be for you, so where do I start? Where do I start? I'm here this morning. I'm obviously trying to make the right choices. So how do I start to get my family in line where it goes? and Well, that's the key.
00:09:59
Speaker
Joshua says, ask for me and my family. You're not going to go out and change the country tomorrow. You change the country today by starting with your family.
00:10:11
Speaker
I want to celebrate what Hayden has done because Hayden this morning demonstrated a perfect example of saying, you know what? I can't change everything from night to day and one moment, but I can start with the next step.
00:10:22
Speaker
And the next step and the next step and the next step. Revival doesn't always come overnight. Most often it comes in slow increments as you continue to follow after Jesus Christ and to pursue Him with all of your heart.
00:10:37
Speaker
But here's the sad and shocking news that you're going to see as we dig into the story this morning. From Joshua, the end of Joshua, to the beginning of Judges was one generation apart.
Consequences of Compromise
00:10:53
Speaker
The parents of one generation, the children of the next generation. And it's going to lead to us reading today some of the most tragic words in the entire world. by
00:11:06
Speaker
So, how do we fall so far, so fast? I want to talk about three things that Judges reveals to us. Number one, we see the downward spiral of disobedience.
00:11:18
Speaker
Judges actually, as you're reading it, you might not picked up and i might not have picked up on it. It actually has two introductions to it. joshua i mean excuse me judges Judges chapter 1 is a historical and military perspective. It's kind of like continuation to the end the book of Joshua. And it kind of tells about everything that's going on.
00:11:36
Speaker
You might have picked up on this. There is no no designated successor after Joshua dies. You remember back when Moses was getting ready to pass away, God had already put his finger on Joshua and said, you're going to lead the people next.
00:11:48
Speaker
So there was a smooth transition from Moses to Joshua. But when Joshua disappears, there's no obvious successor. In this case, the people did something right. They went to God and said, what do we do next?
00:12:01
Speaker
Who's going to be our leader? But if you read the story carefully in chapter 1, what happens is that God says to Judah, go fight this battle. And Judah immediately turns and says to Simeon, will you go fight with us?
00:12:17
Speaker
Now on the surface, that doesn't seem like such a big deal. It seems like, okay, well that's cool. They're including another tribe and they're going to get more involved. and like But here's the thing. When God gives commands, God expects obedience to those commands.
00:12:31
Speaker
He doesn't expect you to take them and interpret them for your well-being or to help put your spin on it or to help you try to figure out a different way to do it. When Judah went to Simeon and invited them to join, they compromised on what God had commanded them to do because God's command was based on their trust in his ability to take care of them.
00:12:54
Speaker
not their ability to go recruit more soldiers. This is the first compromise in the book of Judges, and we are only just a few verses in when it happens.
00:13:05
Speaker
God wants his people doing things his way. If you want the blessings of God, you, not your spouse, not your parents, not your children, you must choose to trust God.
00:13:19
Speaker
That's the only way this thing works. Now, if you look at chapter 1, verse 19 of Judges, very quickly, I'll just read it to you if you have your Bible open yet. It says this, The Lord was with Judah and enabled them to take possession of the hill country.
00:13:34
Speaker
That's good. That's awesome. But they could not drive out the people who were living in the valley because these people had iron chariots. So if you read the story carefully, what's happening is Judah goes back to God and goes, Hey, we can't beat those people. They got some really tough technology. Right?
00:13:49
Speaker
they've They've got some really, really important implements of war. Their equipment is better than ours. They've got iron chariots. And it's as if God is going, hey, do you remember the Red Sea?
00:14:02
Speaker
do Do you remember who started the whole thing by wiping out the entire army of the greatest nation on the face of the earth? And now here you are placing your confidence in chariots and horses rather than placing your confidence in me.
00:14:20
Speaker
God didn't tell them to consult anybody else. He said, I'm going to be the one that's driving them out. You just follow me. Trust me. I will get you where you need to go.
00:14:31
Speaker
And what we read in the rest of Judges chapter 1 in verses 21, 27, 29, and 30, they failed to drive out the people. They failed to be completely obedient.
00:14:44
Speaker
In some cases, they made slaves of the Canaanites, which sounds normal. God didn't tell them to do that. In other cases, in even worse decision, they chose to live among the people they were supposed to be driving out.
00:14:59
Speaker
Why? Because they got tired. They got lazy. They questioned God. They said, man, this is hard work. Do you hear that?
00:15:11
Speaker
This is hard work letting you drive people out for us. but we're We're just worn out, God. We're worn out just watching you. Some of you guys say that to your wives while they're cleaning the house, right? I'm just worn out from watching you.
00:15:24
Speaker
That's the mentality of these people. God is driving out their enemies, and yet they are the ones who become worn out by the process. And they go to God and they say, will you accept our half-hearted obedience?
00:15:38
Speaker
And God says, no. You either give me your full devotion or you don't give me anything. You see, the problem is at this point that God's people are acting like fans.
00:15:49
Speaker
and not followers. What's the difference? Well, anybody can be a fan, right? Your team's winning national championships. It's good to be you, right?
00:16:00
Speaker
Your coach is making all the right decisions. Yeah, we don't care if for he does those Aflac commercials. That's great, man. we We love him. He's a great guy. Let him you lose a few games and guess what happens? Everybody's jumping off the bandwagon.
00:16:12
Speaker
Things get hard. Suddenly we look for someone else to follow. And I would argue that in a sense, that's why Israel drug all those idols along with them from Egypt because they were saying, hey, if this doesn't work out with this Yahweh dude, we've got other options.
00:16:28
Speaker
And the Yahweh dude is going, uh-uh, there are no other options. Just in case you're forgetting, the very beginning of the Ten Commandments says, i am the Lord your God and you will have no other gods besides me.
00:16:45
Speaker
When things get hard, it's easy for a fan to look for somewhere else to go. But a follower says, I'm all in. I'm not looking back. I'm not looking for other roads. I'm not looking for other choices.
00:16:58
Speaker
No matter where this takes me, I will follow you.
00:17:03
Speaker
Sadly for Israel, it's only a matter of time before the compromises they make lead to real destruction. And that's exactly what we see if you're reading in Judges 1 and 2 with us the nation begins to fall apart. And as you're reading Judges, it's like you're reading the obituary of a nation.
The Importance of Biblical Education
00:17:24
Speaker
It's sad. In fact, this is a very dark period. How many of you can remember the last time that a pastor preached from the book of Judges?
00:17:32
Speaker
Why? Because it is a very, very dark period. A couple of weeks ago, we were in one of the life groups and somebody said to me, hey, are we supposed to read this with our kids? This is pretty dark stuff.
00:17:44
Speaker
And the truth is, yes, it is. But it's absolutely essential that we read this because in this book, God begins to say, this is what happens when you make bad choices. But here's how you break free of those bad choices.
00:17:58
Speaker
The second thing we see is the destructive results of sin. I said there were two intros, chapter 1, the military historical perspective, but it says if the writer of Judges is now led by inspiration to write it from God's perspective.
00:18:13
Speaker
And if you read chapter 2 very carefully, you see in verse 3 what God says. I will not drive out these people before you. They will be thorns in your sides and their gods will be a trap for you.
00:18:26
Speaker
Why would God say something like that? Because he's already come to them and said, tear down the altars, cut out the compromise, don't make these bad choices.
00:18:37
Speaker
Trust my word. And instead, they compromised. They settled. And so what God is literally saying to them in this moment is that he's saying this.
00:18:51
Speaker
If you want them to stay, I'll let them stay. And then every single day the rest of your life, there will be a trap for you. There will be a thorn in your flesh. There will be a pain in your side.
00:19:04
Speaker
And that's exactly what we see happen. God says, together we could have driven them out and this entire land would have been yours.
00:19:15
Speaker
But they choose to let them remain. And I said we would get to what I think are some of the most tragic words in all of Scripture. Here they are, chapter 2, verse 10. That whole generation, the generation that had come in with Joshua to help conquer the promised land, that whole generation was also gathered to their ancestors. They passed away.
00:19:36
Speaker
After them, another generation rose up who did not know the Lord or the works He had done for Israel. Do you hear that? An entire generation, just one generation removed from the ones who had seen the works of God, did not even know who he was or what he had done for Israel.
00:20:00
Speaker
Why? Because obviously the first generation have gotten the forgotten the words of the Shema. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one God. Take that, write it on your doorpost, put it on your forehead, talk with your children as you rise and when you sleep and as you walk along the road.
00:20:18
Speaker
Make sure your kids understand. And because they didn't, an entire generation woke up, rose up, going, who's this Yahweh guy?
00:20:30
Speaker
Why should we trust him? What's he done for us?
00:20:36
Speaker
And can I just tell you my heart breaks because this is what I see in our country. I am so incredibly thankful for Shannon Farrell. She was in our first worship service this morning.
00:20:47
Speaker
Shannon has done a fantastic job of leading our Awana program on Wednesday night. All the volunteers that help her, thank you so much. You're putting the seeds of the Bible in the hearts of young children.
00:20:59
Speaker
What an incredible gift. Lori, Kyle, the ministry of our students here, man, what an incredible thing that our kids are being taught what God has done for us and who he is and what he desires for us.
00:21:15
Speaker
But some of you in this room, if you if you felt encouraged enough, felt encouraged to do this, could come up here and stand on this altar and could say, let me tell you why I don't know the Bible. Why?
00:21:28
Speaker
um Let me tell you why I've never heard the story you preached about last week. Let me tell you why right now this reading through the Bible with my church is the first time I've ever read certain parts of the Bible.
00:21:40
Speaker
Why? Because a generation dropped the ball and did not teach you the ways of the Lord.
00:21:49
Speaker
I made the same mistake I make every Sunday morning because typically what I do on Sunday morning is I sit down, I read through the message a couple of times, make some notes, some last-minute changes to some stuff. Lisa usually stays out of the kitchen while I'm doing this because she knows at some point I'm going to go, golly.
00:22:06
Speaker
And it's usually got nothing to do with the scriptures because when I finish the scripture, I do the same thing every one y'all do. i pick up the phone and start looking at my Facebook feed. And this morning as she walked through the bathroom, I went, oh my word.
00:22:18
Speaker
She went, what is it now? said I said, I'm just over, and and not just one, not just two, several. As I'm reading through this, I'm watching the choices that people make.
00:22:30
Speaker
And there's a couple of them on there where I'm seeing like seven and eight-year-old kids. The parents are boasting about spending 20 hours at the ball field this weekend.
00:22:41
Speaker
Crystal, you're a teacher. going ask you a question. I'm going put you on the spot, okay? is
00:22:48
Speaker
What would happen? What grade do you teach? Second grade. What would happen? How long do you think it would take if you sent your second graders home with 20 hours of homework on a weekend before you got a phone call from a parent?
00:23:01
Speaker
One One time?
00:23:08
Speaker
Why? oh you you're oh you're wearing our children out. You're overwhelming them. Oh, my gosh. But yet, we don't think anything twice about giving up an entire weekend to sports. Now, don't panic.
00:23:23
Speaker
I'm not telling you to throw sports out the window. I'm not telling you to sell all the baseball equipment. i'm telling I'm not telling you to get rid of the tap shoes and get them away from from dance. What I'm telling you is we've got an entire generation where we find it convenient to offer our children to things instead of finding time to offer our children to Jesus.
00:23:42
Speaker
There's got to be balance in this. There's got to be balance. I will tell you, I've played sports since I was seven years old. I learned some incredible lessons about my relationship with Jesus Christ, playing baseball, playing football, because I was around godly men who helped me put those things into practice.
00:24:00
Speaker
I'm going to brag on Shelby Lightfoot right now. She runs an incredible softball program here at Forest High School, and Jesus is all over it. Okay? It's all over it.
00:24:11
Speaker
She's not preaching sermons. She's just living Jesus in front of people. And those girls are invited into it and they're participating in it. What I'm saying to you is if we're going to raise the right generation that's going to follow us, we've got to put Jesus all over it.
00:24:26
Speaker
It's got to be dressed up in Jesus. It's got to be supported by Jesus. It's got to be inundated with Jesus. And it's not just our sports. How about your entertainment at home? When's the last time you ever turned something off in front of your kids and said, we can't watch that because it doesn't honor God?
00:24:44
Speaker
And then took five minutes to say, let me explain to you why it doesn't honor God. Let me explain to you why we don't allow that kind of language in our house. Let me explain to you why that man and that woman should have never been in that bed in that movie before we turned it off.
00:24:59
Speaker
What happens is an entire generation dies without Jesus when we don't bring Jesus to the table in everything we do. We can't compartmentalize our life. It's interesting that this verse follows shortly after the story of Samson.
00:25:13
Speaker
Talk about a guy that compartmentalized his life. I mean, from the very beginning of his story, he's devoted to God, right? He's a Nazarite. He's supposed to do everything for God. Not cut his hair, stay away from dead bodies, drink no no fruit of the vine of any kind, right? Those are three things that he's committed to as part of his devotion to God.
00:25:33
Speaker
Before he is even six verses in, he's done all of those. He's killed a lion, ate honey from his mouth. He's drank wine. He slept with the process. He's doing it all.
00:25:45
Speaker
But when the time comes for him to honor God, he's like, God, give me strength. And I'm thinking, sounds like some of our deacons. I'm just kidding. oh yeah i'm just That's the reality that we face in many of our churches. We've got people who come in and give ah like like give some kind of word of encouragement to God. I'm here, God. You should be blessed.
00:26:04
Speaker
And then we walk out and we go choose to live our lives and think that compartment belongs to us. It doesn't belong to God. And an entire generation is watching us. And can I just say that we're the product of another generation that did the same?
00:26:19
Speaker
And that's why so many of us struggle with understanding this word and understanding what God really wants from us and what a godly life really looks like. But it's not too late.
00:26:30
Speaker
Because Joshua said, as for me and my house, we're going to choose. We're going to choose to do some things differently.
00:26:39
Speaker
So what happens in this story is because this generation forgets who God is and doesn't know what he's done, they enter into what we call a vicious cycle of sin that gets played out over and over and over again.
00:26:57
Speaker
They choose to rebel, forget God's word, worship other idols. God's righteous anger begins to burn against them. You don't want to be on the wrong side of God's anger because there's nothing left when he's done.
00:27:14
Speaker
Then God sends punishment from the surrounding nations to come and try to get their attention and say, hey, my grace is still big enough for you. The door's still open. If you will come home, I will receive you. Israel mourns and repents.
00:27:28
Speaker
They come home. God raises a judge up to help them. And then they fall right back into the pattern of sin again. Now, these are some cool stories. I love the book of Judges because of these stories about people like Othniel and Ehud.
00:27:43
Speaker
How can you not get excited about Ehud? A left-handed guy who stabs a sword inside a fat king so deeply that it's swallowed up by all the fat and he can't get his sword back out. Tell me the Bible isn't real.
00:27:57
Speaker
I mean, that's such a cool story. And then you've got the story of Shamgar. Shamgar is one bad dude. He kills 600 Philistines with an ox goad all by himself.
00:28:08
Speaker
And you think it's hard to get up on Monday morning. The story of Deborah, Gideon, who takes on 100,000 with not misprint.
00:28:21
Speaker
and that's not a mispprint
00:28:24
Speaker
then Samson.
00:28:27
Speaker
Big, mighty, strong, frail, rebellious, flawed Samson. Why do I say that? Because we want them to be heroes. If you're reading these stories, you're going, yes, come on, you can do this. You can pull through. You can make it happen.
00:28:43
Speaker
And it does for a little bit of time. But then we are quickly reminded that they're just humans. And what Israel needs is not another human. What Israel needs is a God who's been on the throne forever.
00:29:01
Speaker
Each season of peace between ah the judges grows a little bit shorter.
00:29:07
Speaker
And what we see is, quite honestly, the reflection of their lives in our life. The same pattern of sin, the same pattern of rebellion. God gets our attention from some way, some direction, some struggle, whatever. But he gets our attention and we repent. And before we know it, we're back into that same pattern again.
Complete Devotion to God
00:29:28
Speaker
This is why the book of georgia Judges is so important. It shows us how to break the cycle.
00:29:37
Speaker
So the third thing that we see here from the book of Judges is we see that God should be, is indeed, Lord over every part of our lives. He does not tolerate mix and match religion. He does not tolerate cafeteria style worship of him.
00:29:51
Speaker
You don't get to pick and choose what you want to have and what you don't want to have when it comes to God. God takes all of you or he takes none of you. Many of us today do exactly what Israel did. and we We don't outright dismiss God.
00:30:05
Speaker
We don't throw away the idea of morality, but we hang on to other things and we stuff them away in our pocket just in case we need some other option. For Israel, it was Baal, Asherah, Molech.
00:30:19
Speaker
For us, it's wealth, it's prosperity, it's luxury, it's comfort, it's convenience. So what does God want us to do? What does God expect us to do about this? He expects us to see the compromise in our own lives.
00:30:36
Speaker
So what I'm asking you to do here this morning is I'm asking you just to kind of quit worrying about everybody else sitting around you, including your spouse and your children.
00:30:46
Speaker
I'm asking you to look at your own heart.
00:30:52
Speaker
What is really worship? What it that you really worship?
00:30:57
Speaker
What is it that might potentially be an idol in your life? Now let's be clear what an idol is. An idol is anything that we give more affection, more energy, or more time to than God.
00:31:11
Speaker
Does anything fall in that category for you? Is it is it personal achievement? Personal advancement at work? Is it a relationship?
00:31:23
Speaker
Someone you spend more time worrying about than you do about your relationship with God. Maybe it's things, stuff. After all, we live in a country where we are told day after day after day, you deserve this.
00:31:37
Speaker
You deserve better than this. You deserve more than the last person.
00:31:45
Speaker
You want to know why God is a jealous God?
00:31:49
Speaker
Because He's a real God and a loving God and has great reason and great logic and He knows this. Fake gods only take life. They can't give it.
00:32:01
Speaker
You pour everything you are, everything you got, everything you believe into false gods and you wake up and realize everything is gone and you've got nothing in return.
00:32:12
Speaker
God, the real one true God, is the only thing that remains.
00:32:20
Speaker
So what can we do? We have to be courageous and call out the idols in our lives. We have to sweep compromise from our homes. We have to be courageous enough to inspect our own hearts.
00:32:34
Speaker
We have to repent. And we have to remove those things quickly. Because here's the whole crux of the sermon in one sentence. If we don't obey what God's word says, then we will have to face whatever God's will sends.
00:32:50
Speaker
If we don't make right choices, then we will face consequences. Not just our family, not just our church.
00:33:01
Speaker
I believe our nation. I believe there will come a time when the boys of America go out to fight wars and they won't come home the way they used to. Why? Well, look at Judges.
00:33:14
Speaker
God's chosen people went out to fight and he did not go with them. Why? Because they had broken the covenant.
Combatting Sin with Commitment
00:33:26
Speaker
Charles Spurgeon, great British pastor, said this, that sin must die or you will perish by it. Depend on it. That sin which you would save from slaughter will slaughter you.
00:33:41
Speaker
Later, John Owen, a 17th century Puritan, would write it in a more condensed form. It might be a good thing to write on your chalkboard at home or to put on your mirror as you're getting ready every every so single morning.
00:33:52
Speaker
But these are his words. Be killing sin or sin will be killing you. There is no room for sin in our lives. There's just not.
00:34:05
Speaker
This morning you sit in one of three places, every single one of us. Some of you are committed, very much like Joshua. Man, we love Joshua. Was Joshua perfect? Not at all.
00:34:18
Speaker
Did Joshua always get it right? Absolutely not. But the condition of Joshua's heart that was that he sought to follow after God with everything he had.
00:34:29
Speaker
We want to be Joshua. But for some of us, we fall in a second category. We're not committed. Instead, we're complacent. Oh, we like God. Everybody likes God when He does good things for us, right?
00:34:42
Speaker
Get that promotion? Way to go, God. The illness is gone? Way to go, God. But what happens when God chooses to work His way instead of ours?
00:34:54
Speaker
We love the stories. We love to share them with our kids. We love to hear the preacher tell them on Sunday morning. But we don't want to be too radical. We don't want to be offensive.
00:35:07
Speaker
I mean, after all, following Jesus is hard. It's too much work. It's too inconvenient. And so a generation gets complacent and opens the door for compromise so that they can remain comfortable and still have some kind of loose attachment to who God is.
Choosing Whom to Serve
00:35:26
Speaker
But by the next generation, the next generation leads to compromise.
00:35:34
Speaker
You're committed or you're complacent. Or you're compromised. What does it mean to be compromised? You look to the world to find your identity.
00:35:45
Speaker
You look to the world to tell you what your values should be. You look to the world for cues on how you and your family should live and how you should make choices. We compromise with the culture and say, well, there aren't that many cuss words in that. There weren't that many sex scenes in there. There weren't that many places where they mocked God. There weren't that many people who were offensive and rebellious. We we are okay with that many times of places where we have chosen to compromise.
00:36:14
Speaker
And before long, we look, talk, think, and act just like them.
00:36:21
Speaker
And what's written on our tombstone is, we neither knew the Lord nor what he had done.
00:36:30
Speaker
You see, what Israel needed, what we need, is a true king. Israel thought that Saul and David and ultimately Solomon would be that person. None of them were good enough.
00:36:41
Speaker
No, when darkness, real darkness, like what you and I see in the world around us, when that kind of darkness comes... it should lead us to a true and better and eternal king.
00:36:53
Speaker
His name is Jesus. The book of Judges, the stories from this dark, dark period in Israel's history, should cause us to long for a true judge.
00:37:06
Speaker
So today, it's up to you. Choose who you will serve. Will you pray with me?
00:37:19
Speaker
Father, we thank you for your words that encourage and guide our lives if we allow them. But the word that has kind of stuck in my mind for the last several weeks in reading these these books of the Bible is choose.
00:37:33
Speaker
Choose. It's our choice. like We can't point the finger at others. We can't blame others. We can't. say we didn't know, we didn't hear.
00:37:43
Speaker
Just the fact that we've read this story this morning reminds us that we have a choice and we are responsible for it. So Father, help us to be real and genuine about the choices we're making, the things we're allowing into our lives, the places we allow things into our the lives of our children, what we allow in our home, what we call luxury, what we call entertainment, what we call comfort and convenience.
00:38:13
Speaker
Lord, help us to move from compromise to commitment. And if we're already committed, help us to be resolved not to allow complacency.
00:38:29
Speaker
So the next generation and the generation after that, know who you are and what it is you've done on our behalf. It's in Jesus' name I pray.
00:38:39
Speaker
Amen.