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THE TIME OF THE JUDGES (I)
LORD’S DAY, JANUARY 1
Judges 1:1-21

Jude 1:3-4

 

“And the people served the LORD

all the days of Joshua…”

 

THE TIME OF THE JUDGES (I)
 
The book of Judges presents the history of the dark ages of God’s people, Israel. It was a time when the nation seemed to grope in the dark and walk without direction. A time when her sins separated her from her God and repeatedly caused her to fall. This is a book of testimony to the frailty of man, and the grace, compassion, and long-suffering of God.
 
The book also presents to us men whom God chose and empowered, filled, led, and used by His Spirit to lead, deliver, and judge the nation. Men raised in times of national emergencies, and through whom God’s grace, compassion and long-suffering was extended to the nation. As we look at the men God used, we begin by considering the time of the judges.
 
“Now after the death of Joshua…” (Judg 1:1; 2:6-7). Before the time of the judges, there was the conquest and possession of the Promised Land. The book of Joshua concluded with a solemn assembly and a call to personal and national responsibility as summarised in the words “choose you this day whom ye will serve” (Josh 24:15). Though the nation responded with commitment to serve, and obey God (Josh 24:24), this was not one to be made once and for all, but one to be affirmed repeatedly and individually in each generation. Israel had come into and possessed a land whose inhabitants were being judged of God because of their idolatry and sin (Gen 15:16). They were to be separate from the idolatry and sin that had brought judgment to the inhabitants of Canaan. What they confidently affirmed verbally in Joshua 24:16, 18, 21, and 24 (“We will serve the LORD”) was to be practically lived out daily. Joshua and his generation left the nation a legacy of loyalty, a heritage of faithfulness upon which they were to build, showing them that this is the way in which they  should walk (Isa 30:21). It was their responsibility to share in the faith of their fathers actively by their choices, and in continuing in the same path.
 
THOUGHT: (Read Proverbs 14:34.)
PRAYER: (Use Job 36:11-12.)

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