Gooding, David: 11 - Leading God's Nation

When we broke off before lunch, gentlemen, we were considering the tactics that Jephthah employed in his fight against the Ammonites. And notice that he stands out, distinguished among the other deliverers of Israel, in that first of all, he tried extensive diplomacy, sending messengers more than once to argue with the Ammonites. The argument involved citing past history and what the facts were. Because Is- uh, the Ammonites claimed that Israel had stolen their property, their inheritance, their land. It was necessary for Jephthah to put that straight. And knowing his history, he pointed out that they hadn't stolen the Ammonites' land. But that the Ammonites had stolen what Israel had been given by God. Because the Amorite king had come out to attack Israel, Israel had defeated him, and God had given him that inheritance. Now I want to apply the lesson to us, that we too, in our battles for the Lord and for his people, will come across situations where we need to argue church history. Now it is frequently said by well-meaning people that Christians ought not to argue, just witness for the Lord. And we all know the very good, uh, motives that lie behind that advice. Because for some people, arguing means nearly losing your temper and getting hot under the collar and red in the face and snapping and stulting and all sorts of things. To say, well, that is not what we are meant to do. But argue, yes. Somewhere about the nineteen seventies or eighties, John Stott wrote a book called Christ the Controversialist, and pointed out how much of our Lord's ministry when here on earth involved him arguing with the Pharisees. We have to learn how to argue. So may I, uh, refer you now to, uh, Paul's letter to the Galatians is a whole series of arguments. And it is very profitable not only to notice the truth for which he argues, but the method of arguing he uses. And the types of argument that he uses, and the order in which he uses those arguments. Why should he bother to argue at all? Well, because it is for God's truth he was arguing, and secondly, because people's salvation depended on it. The particular issue about which he is arguing in Galatians is on the basic principle of salvation. On what conditions is a person saved? Is it solely through repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus? Or is it so that in addition to faith in Christ, you have to be circumcised as a condition for being saved? And you will see at once, gentlemen, that the argument is about what is fundamental to the doctrine of salvation. So that we do need, from time to time, to learn how to argue in this matter. One of these days you may per- per- persuade somebody through your commander-in-chief to expound the arguments in Galatians, each in their own order, and what type of argument it is, and what, uh, order Paul gives to the different types of argument. That we haven't time to do today, for we must press on to cover Jephthah and Samson, if we can, before we part- depart this life. But in the first two chapters of Galatians, you will observe that Paul argues very strongly from church history. To the point that he, uh, verse one sets out, Paul an apostle, not from men, neither through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised him from the dead. Paul is talking about his apostolic authority, indeed his apostolic office. Who appointed him an apostle? The church? Or who? And Paul is making the point that he didn't get his apostleship from men. But not content therewith, he's thinking and s- talking very exactly, as you do when you're arguing, I hope. Neither through men. It comes ultimately from God. He said, my apostleship. God is the ultimate source. He was the immediate source. That is to say, it came from God, but it didn't come from God through men. It came direct from God. Why that is important, we shall presently see. But to help clarify the practical situation, let me recall for you an incident in my, uh, murky past. Some dear Christians came to me, uh, uh, uh, in the year of grace, somewhere about nineteen sixty four or five and said they had a friend at work who belonged to the Church of Ireland, but was thinking of leaving that and, uh, becoming a monk in the Roman Catholic Church. And these good Christian folks were anxious to help him and had tried their best, and they thought for some reason, uh, uh, uh, would would I be prepared for them to bring this friend so that I should talk to him, you see. Hm? So eventually the friend came and told me that he was thinking now, uh, to leave the Church of Ireland and to become a monk in the Roman Catholic Church. And what did I think about it, says he. Well, I said, I, I, I, uh, it's difficult for me to say because the church you're proposing to enter curses me. Curses you? Of course they don't. I said, yes, they do. This was, after all, uh, the year of grace, nineteen sixties onwards, before John Paul II and all that. How do they curse you? I said, well, read the, the, the, the Missal, my boy, and what the Council of Trent says, that anyone who claims to be sure of salvation is to be cursed. And I said, I'm one of those that sure of salvation, hombre, and your church curses me for it. So I can't very well, I think you're doing a good thing to go to a church that curses me. You sh- you shouldn't be sure of salvation, you can't be sure of salvation. I said, why not? Well, he said, as I normally do, it depends on your works, my boy, and how you behave. I said, it doesn't, does it? So I read him from Romans chapter four. To him that worketh is the reward reckoned not of grace but of debt, but to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. Right, I don't know what that means. I didn't know that was in the Bible. Um, but anyway, who are you to say what it means? You see, that's your trouble. You think anybody can tell you what the Bible means, whereas you can't. They can't. You'd have to submit that to the church to see what the church says about it. Because the church gave us the Bible, and it's the church that interprets it. We can't interpret it for ourselves since the church gave us the Bible. I found the same attitude in Russia, when a good man that professed to be a believer, actually, went over to the Orthodox Church, and that led to a long correspondence between us. And when I pointed out what the Orthodox Church believed on certain matters contrary to scripture, he wrote back saying this was ridiculous. How can you possibly use scripture to criticize the church when it's the church that gave you the scripture in the first place? So the church knows what it meant. You can't say- take what the church, uh, said and uh uh uh and means in order to criticize the church. That would be a nonsense. So what is that a- answer to it? Did the church give us the Bible? And have we to depend on the church for understanding it? The first argument in, eh, the first or second big argument in Galatians raises the matter of church history. And the question at stake is what I pointed out to this good friend of mine in my rooms all those years ago. I said, you know, Paul himself tells us that he didn't get his gospel from the church. He did, said the chap. Of course he did. I said, no, he didn't. Tells us he didn't. He tells us that in one Galatians chapter, uh, uh, uh, one, do you see? And then in chapter two, That he didn't, uh, uh, consult the apostles. He went off to Arabia. And when he eventually went up to Jerusalem to talk to the apostles, chapter two verse six, but from those who were reputed to be somewhat, whatsoever they were, maketh no matter to me, God accepteth not man's persons, they I say who were of repute, imparted nothing to me. Oh, they did, said my friend, and I said, oh, they didn't. But here's Paul telling you. He didn't get his gospel from men, nor through man, nor his apostleship from, from, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh. He, he got his apostleship, uh, from God, but not through men. It is not from man, it's not through man. And when he went up to Jerusalem and discussed with the apostles the basis of the gospel, they that were apostles before him added nothing to him, and all s- uh, stated their agreement with him. Now, why is that important, historically? Because, uh, you'll see, think of it this way. Suppose you were in Arabia when Paul was in Arabia, and you'd heard of about Paul, and you were concerned you wanted to be saved and justified, so you sought out Paul in Arabia and said, sir, believe you are an apostle? Yes. Now, what do I have to do to be saved? And Paul had told you by word of mouth what he writes in his epistles, that it's not by your works, but it is by faith in Christ that we are justified. Now, could you, first of all, hear what he said, understand what he said, and in sincere repentance and faith, believe what he said and be saved? Or would you have had to say, well, I hear what you say, Paul, and that's very interesting and perhaps helpful, but of course I must go and check it, uh, with the apostles at Jerusalem. Because you got it from him, didn't you? But got it from them, didn't you? Could you have just listened to Paul, believed, and have been saved without concerting, without consulting the church in Jerusalem. That is what is at stake. And the answer is yes, of course. You don't have to go to the church at Jerusalem. He was an apostle. And the same thing is true as we come now to his writings. Can I read his writing, understand what he said, put my faith in God, like Paul says, not in my works, but in God and Jesus Christ our Lord, and be saved without consulting the church. Well, of course you can. But didn't the church give us the Bible? No, the church did not give us the Bible. That is false. The New Testament was given us through a succession of men, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, so was the Acts, Paul's epistles, Peter's epistles, James' epistles, Jude's epistles. It was the apostles through whom God gave us his word. The word was given to the churches through the apostles. This is not true to say the church gave us the gospel or gave us the Bible. And a little deeper thought on the matter will, uh, alert you to this fact. When some say the church gave us the Bible, exactly who do they mean by the church? What, all the millions of people that have, um, made up the Church of Christ down the years, they all gave us the Bible? But they may have given us a copy now and again, but who gave us the original? Well, not all the members of the church, of course not. Well, who do they mean by the church then when they say the church gave us the Bible? It's imprecise talk, isn't it? Nowhere does the New Testament says that the church gave us the Bible. The apostles writing claimed their authority, generally from the start, Paul an apostle. He got his apostleship not from the church, straight from God. Not through man, straight from God and our risen Lord. And he propounds the gospel. We can come to his writings or to him personally, understand, believe, and be saved. You will perceive, I hope, gentlemen, that this is absolutely vital to the gospel. But all down the centuries, there have been a tendency for people to steal from us and misappropriate what is our God-given inheritance and claim authority over it. And of course, at some stages, it reached gigantic proportions when ordinary Christians were not allowed to have the Bible. The thing to be remembered, four centuries, the church, so-called church, forbade people to have the Bible. And even when the King James Bible was produced by the high and mighty Prince Ja- King James, you will notice on the frontest page the thing, it is appointed to be read in churches, please? Not in your home. Mm. So here we, we, uh, have to learn our church history to get it straight, as you'll see. We need to know about how we got the Bible, do we? It's not the first thing you're going to raise with the public in your street evangelism, of course not, but sooner or later, people need to be taught a bit of church history and how we got the Bible, and whether we need to go to the church to understand believe and be saved, or can come directly to the apostles and be saved. Yeah? Of course, there are a lot of other arguments in Galatians, but I mustn't be tempted to go down that line, not this afternoon, at any rate. But gentlemen, not in the wrong sense, but in the right sense. We need to copy the apostles and learn how to argue in a true spiritual Christ-like attitude, but to follow our Lord, who likewise argued, extensively argued with the Pharisees. And if we're going to argue as Christians, then we must argue fairly. Paul eventually, in Galatians, uses the argument about the false motives of those who insisted that Christian, Gentile Christians should be circumcised. He points out their false motives. They do it only so that they may glory in your flesh. So he accuses his opponents, as I say, of these false motives, but notice where in the string of arguments he uses that argument. First of all, he establishes that their doctrine is wrong. Their church history is wrong. Their exposition of the gospel is wrong. Having proved those things wrong, it is the last argument he uses to point out that the motives of the false teachers were very questionable and wrong as well. It doesn't start with that argument. We're wise to follow his example, aren't we? But let's move on. Uh, learning to argue like this for the sake of our God-given inheritance, is in the end to know how to stand up and fight for the very gospel itself. We come to the last, uh, matter, uh, to do with Jephthah. And particularly two things, his vow, and then his treatment of the people of Ephraim. So as a way of summarizing our studies thus far. Let's go over the... the main details. Where did the people go wrong? See chapter ten verses ten to sixteen. People thinking that forsaking the Lord does not really matter. Because if it results in trouble, God will always save us from the consequences of our idolatry and start a new revival, like he has always done. The argument is false. And God pointed out to the Israelites that that attitude is false. When the Ammonites came up, they appealed for God to save them. Says, God, look here, you've been many times in this situation, and I have come in and saved you. In spite of my saving you, you persist in your idolatry. Well, let your God save you then. Go on, let your God save you. I shall not save you. They have to learn to repent, don't they? Another question was saying, well, you told us not to, um, have kitty cats, and so, um, well, we did, but there we don't like the taste, and so please give us Mars bars. It's a bit more serious than that, gentlemen. You don't just order a revival. Calls for repentance. And when God raised up Jephthah, he chose his man on purpose. For Jephthah was an illegitimate child. And at first the people had rejected him since he was illegitimate and thrown him out. And in the end, they were so hard put to it that they had to go and ask Jephthah to save them, the very man they had rejected. It will be so, of course, with Israel. There will be no salvation for Israel unless they repent and accept as Lord the very man that they rejected. Yes. Then when Jo- Jephthah came on the scene, as we were thinking this morning. The tactic that marks him out from the others is his diplomacy. His argument based on history. A lesson to us that we have seen portrayed in Paul's letter to the Galatians. Now let's think for a moment of Jephthah's weakness. He had been an illegitimate child and had suffered the resultant pain of being rejected by the true blooded Israelites. So when he came back and they asked him to save them, he laid down the condition. If the Lord delivers you through my hand, shall I be your head? They said yes. Doubtless he did it in all innocence. As you see, we're now a far cry from Gideon, who, when they came to make him head and lord, said, no, I will not, the Lord is your head. Now it is accepted without question that if the man becomes a deliverer, he shall be head. Then let us notice that whereas he argued with the Ammonites and then fought them and delivered Israel and saved to them their inheritance. When the Ephraimites came after him and attacked him and reviled him, he slaughtered them. He took the fords of Jordan. And we remember what happened with Ehud, the second deliverer. Remember that? He took the fords of Jordan. And when the Moabites were fleeing and wanting to escape, and they came to Jordan and they tried to cross the fords, Ehud took the fords of Jordan and they came over one by one. He executed them. He slew the enemy at the fords of Jordan. And Jephthah? He took the fords of Jordan. And when the people came across, he slaughtered them, but they weren't enemies. They he was Israelite brothers. Oh yes, they'd had an argument. But he slaughtered them. He laid down a test. The Hebrew word shibboleth or sybileth, and it was a dialect form, of course. Some couldn't pronounce the word shibboleth. They said sybileth, you see. Like our dear German friends, they can't say th, not to save their lives, can they say it? Dis and dat, do you see? Well, there's some other folks I know, but I won't go into them. That say dis and dat. Mm-hmm. And the Thames, the River Thames in London. But you see, uh, these things, by the way, this was, they meant the same thing when they said Sybileth instead of Shibboleth. These Ephra- Ephraimites, they meant the same. But no, it was used to distinguish the e- the the dialect group. And those that didn't say it exactly as you said it, he had them slaughtered. Sad, isn't it? That he would fight against the Ammonites, and God gave him victory, and he overcame them, that's one thing. But thereafter, to fight amongst his own people, the Ephraimite, Ephraimites ought to have known better anyway. If I used a crude analogy, gentlemen, but it's a very crude analogy, isn't it? It's jolly good for Luther to stand up and claim justification by faith against the darkness of medieval Rome. Would to God that so-called Protestants had not started fighting each other. Ever since. Stand for the truth, yes. But let us be sure it is the truth we're standing for. Lest we fall into jealousies that have nothing to do with the truth. Or develop such a narrow definition of what is biblical New Testament truth, that when people say the same thing but say it in a slightly different way, he slaughtered them. Finally, what about this question of his daughter? Jephthah made a vow. It was surely a hasty vow. He said if the Lord would grant him victory, then whatever came out of his house first when he returned, he would offer that up to the Lord as a sacrifice in fulfilling of his vow. And doubtless he was thinking that, uh, whatever animal came out of his house first, even if it was his prize bullock, he would sacrifice that to the Lord. And he left it to the Lord, therefore, to decide, didn't he? Because, uh, he would have believed that it wouldn't be by chance that anything came out of his house, that the Lord would be behind it. He was offering the Lord the choice. Take what you like, Lord, if you give me the victory. It is that that makes it the more difficult problem for us, isn't it? People say it was a rash vow, or it probably was. A rash vow. And if Jethro had come to see that he'd vowed something that was a, a criminal act, then God would never require a man to pre- to perform a crime in order to fulfill a vow, of course. With all those difficulties in the way, people have debated many times what was actually done with Jephthah's daughter. And some say, well, he never did really sacrifice her, but condemned her to perpetual virginity, and thus gave her to the Lord. Well, if you find that explanation satisfactory, uh, do by hold on to it. I'm inclined to listen more carefully to the end of the story. As it is told us at the end of chapter eleven. Verse thirty seven, she said unto her father, let this thing be done for me. Let me alone two months, that I may depart and go down upon the mountains and bewail my virginity, I and my companions. That is, bewail the fact she's never been married. And he said, go, and he sent her away for two months, and she departed, she and her companions, and bewailed her virginity upon the mountains. It came to pass at the end of two months that she returned unto her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed. And she had not known man. And it was a custom in Israel. You see, did unto her that which he had vowed. The daughters of Israel went yearly to celebrate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite, four days in a year. Beside her, the text earlier tells us, beside her, he had no son nor daughter. The only way he had of getting an heir to his dynasty through a son or a daughter. Was now gone forever. Beside her, he had no son or daughter. Now, a lot of the judges, some of the judges, they made their sons judges, so there was a family succession. But not with Jephthah. They said to, uh, uh, they, uh, uh, he said to the men of Ephraim, if the Lord delivers the people into my hand, shall I be the head? They said, yes, okay. Jephthah offered God to take what he look- liked. God took the daughter. And the significance of it? He never married. Beside her, Jephthah had no son or daughter. Jephthah had no descendant to establish his dynasty. Ponder it, gentlemen. I would not be dogmatic on it. I'm just thinking aloud, you see, because I have the confidence in you that you're sensible men and won't condemn a man for thinking amiss. For what man has never thought amiss, particularly on a Saturday afternoon? But with that, we ought to come, to begin at least, our thinking about Samson, the last of the judges. And perhaps the best way to introduce ourselves to him is to start once more by reconnoitering the enemy. Now, in some of the previous captivities, the Philistines were involved, but hitherto not as the prime mover. Now, on this occasion, chapter thirteen and verse one, the children of Israel again did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord delivered them into the hand of the Philistines forty years. So in this captivity, the Philistines are the main enemy. And I come back to my old hobby horse. Gentlemen, if we've learned nothing from the book of Judges, we learned this, we remember this, that the enemies were not all the same, they were different. And therefore we need to reconnoiter the enemy and see what they stand for, and therefore learn what are the best tactics against them, and how to go about dealing with them. So who are the Philistines? They gave their name to the land, in that the land thereafter was frequently called Palestine. And of course, the modern Israelis don't like you calling the land Palestine, for obvious reasons. Palestine means the land of the Philistines. Israelis want the land called Israel, of course. So the Philistines, yes. And what about them? Well, once more we come across the way that the Holy Spirit speaks. We noticed on an earlier occasion that when it comes to Amalekites, the Holy Spirit frequent- uh, refers to them more than once as the sinners, the Amalekites. All men are sinners, but the Holy Spirit chooses to, uh, point this out and emphasize this aspect with Amalekites, the sinners, the Amalekites. Yeah. When it comes to Philistines, it is the uncircumcised Philistines. Now, a lot of the nations around were uncircumcised, though you should, uh, observe that others of the, uh, Semitic races practice circumcision, as I think Islam does to this day. But the Philistines were not Semitic. As far as we know, they were Indo-European. They came, and here the evidence goes apart, they came either from Crete or from Cappadocia. They were Indo-Europeans, and they, by definition, were uncircumcised. But why is that significant? Well, because that of the circumcision given by God to Abram and his posterity. God had given the land to Abraham and to his seed. Yes? Now, it wasn't given to Abraham on the condition that he got circumcised. One must be clear that the land was given to Abraham and his seed by the covenant recorded in Genesis fifteen. God promised him to give him and his la- his seed this land. And God guaranteed the promise by the covenant sacrifice. And as Paul puts it in Galatians, once a covenant is signed, sealed, and settled, you can't add to it any further condition. It was over ten years later that God called upon Abram to undergo circumcision and laid it down that all those physically descended from him should be circumcised, including slaves that became members of his household. So Ishmael, his son of thirteen years old, was circumcised the same day as Abram was circumcised. Thirteen years, and possibly more, after the covenant was made with Abram to give him the land. And Paul, uh, argues this. Have I ever mentioned that to you, that in Galatians Paul has a number of arguments? And one of them depends on this exactly, when was Abram circumcised? And what on earth is this covenant that cannot be added to, that gave the promise of the inheritance to Abram and to his seed? Yeah? It's very important. The argument comes up again in Romans chapter four. When was Abram justified? After he had been circumcised or before he was circumcised? You say, what does it matter? Well, because if Abram had first to be circumcised and then was justified, you could argue that circumcision was necessary for cer- for justification. Whereas he was justified first and then circumcised later, which shows that, uh, circumcision isn't necessary for justification, yes? And those of Abraham's posterity who were circumcised to denote their physical descent from Abraham, when it came to justification, had to be justified on the same grounds as Abraham. They couldn't say that their circumcision contributed to their justification. But this gentleman you know very, very well, and if you should happen to have forgotten it, read again Romans four and Galatians three. This is absolutely fundamental to the gospel. Mm-hmm. And we have to be clear in these things, uh, in our minds so that we can argue the case for salvation, that is, in its terms of salvation. As Paul does in Galatians. Where were we now? Yeah, we were here. That God promised this inheritance to Abraham and to his seed. And now, as a token of their physical descent from Abraham, to whom the promise was given, God required that all his seed should be circumcised. This is Genesis seventeen. The Philistines were not circumcised. They were not heirs to the covenant. They couldn't claim that the land was theirs. But they came in their ships, they tended to settle in the coastline, down in Gath and other such cities on the coast. But at some stage in history, they penetrated inland. They became the enemies of the, uh, Israelites, and particularly strong in the days of Saul and David. Saul never managed to beat the Philistines. It was Philistines that eventually had his head off, because they defeated him in battle. David is famous for the fact that he did defeat the Philistines and put them in their place. In subsequent centuries, the Philistines faded out, and the great enemy of Israel were the Arameans, what we now call Syrians, in Lebanon and beyond. Now the Philistines became a very powerful lot. Lot. What can we say about them? Not only uncircumcised, but look at the god they worshipped. His name was Dagon, amongst other things. And there is marvelous story in Samuel, when the Israelites under Eli and his two corrupt sons were absolutely immoral and hopeless, and when the Philistines attacked them, they brought out the ark as though it's some magical box that would work a miracle for them and save them from the Philistines. But of course, God disowned it and let the Philistines take the ark of the Lord, and they brought it to their territory, and they put it in the house of their god Dagon. The ark was not just a little magic box that you could use when you got in trouble, in spite of the fact that the priests were horribly immoral. But of course, the, but the ga- the ark was God's own appointed symbol, and in it was his law. So when the ark got among the Philistines, and they put it in the temple, when the Philistines came the next morning and, uh, went into their shrine of their god Dagon, lo and behold, their god Dagon was fallen over on his face. Now you know it won't do if your god falls over? What on earth is a man to do if his god falls over? They put their brains together, you'll see, and they said we help the god back into his place. So they got hold of the god and they put it back in his place. That's where god should be. Then they offered him their worship. The next day they came, and the god had fallen over again, and this time it was worse. His head had been knocked off, and his hands. Well, that was a catastrophe. Ha! I mean, a god, uh, has lost his head and lost his hands. That won't do. So what do the Philistines do? Well, of course, they did have heads, brains, and they thought it out how what you have to do. You see, to put your God back in in action again. And and they had hands, you see, and they put the old God back again and bowed down and worshipped him. Read your Isaiah, the way Isaiah lampoons idolatry, and what it means when man depart from faith in the living God and start to deify either the forces of nature or their own intellect, and make human intellect the final arbiter of everything in the universe, and deify human power as though that were the ultimate in the universe. That is the position of every atheist under the sun, of course. And if you want to have a ex- full flower expression of Philistinism, have a look at s- uh, Goliath. For at a certain stage in the warfare, when the Israelites were fighting the, uh, Philistines, the Philistines put forth a champion. His name was Goliath. He was a mighty big man, you see. And they challenged Israel and Israel's God. And Israel at first were in a panic and didn't go out to fight him, until David came along and dealt with the man. Yeah? The deification of man, big man. That's the Philistine with his brain and his brawn. So that's a big story, and I must appeal now to the chairman. Time to leave off? Yeah, well, we'll leave off because we need to listen to the New Testament on this, to show that the Philistine attitude, the faith in the big man, is not a sort of a relic of the past, but is always a danger to the people of God, to put their faith in big men rather than in God. So much then, for the moment, for our reconnoitering of the enemy, what the enemy represents. Let's break for tea, and then in our final few moments, consider what tactics Samson adopted for dealing with the Philistines. Very good.