Not Again

Judges 10

One time I remember I told a lie. I know that is hard for you to imagine that I would ever tell a lie but I have told some lies before. This one particular lie that I told was so I would have to get out of doing some kind of chore for a friend. As I thought my friend took my lie, I thought I was off of helping in any sort of way. Before I knew it the lie I gave that was a cover up then turned out that I had to actually make happen. It turned out that I spent more time trying to make my lie true than I would have just being honest with my friend. This happens all the time when we choose to sin. We choose sin and find ourselves in some sort of problem and ask how did we get into this situation? We find ourselves so deep in sin that we cry out for deliverance from it.

In this chapter we read about the sin cycle that Israel is in and the witty response God gives Israel

Tola and Jair

These two were judges for Israel after Abilmelech had died. Not much is known about them other than they judged Israel for some amount of time and died. Jair had 30 sons who rode 30 donkeys who also had 30 cities, that is interesting I guess. What this chapter really focuses on is the sin cycle that Israel is in.

This is Your Fault

Israel again cried out to the Lord from deliverance from their enemies. They again fell into the same sin, that Israel has been falling into. They went back into idol worship; they served Baal and Asheroth. This time the Philistines have taken over Israel and are ruling over them. 

When the people cried out to God, he asked them a question, “Why would I deliver you from these people when you keep on forsaking me?” He also said, “Why don’t you ask for help from the gods that you have been pursuing?” God had a point with this question. If they knew that God would be so great in delivering them from their enemies, then why don’t they worship him when things are going good?

As I was thinking about this for a moment, we do the same thing with sin in our life. Sin is pleasing for a time. We like to sin but it also brings about consequences that we do not like. There usually is some sort of hardship, hurt feeling, issue that needs more work to fix than before you started down that road. We always run to God when we need something, someone is sick, or that we are at a point of breaking; but what about the good times. Israel would be delivered and then that generation would pass and then they would start in the same cycle over and over again. What sin cycles do you have in your life? What areas of sin have you not killed yet? What areas of sin are you not willing to give up? What areas get you into the bondage of sin and you ask, “How did I get here?” We need to run to God now and  get rid of that stuff. We need to not look back at it. We need to keep our eyes fixated on the cross in which we are saved because of Christ. God is so gracious when he hears our pleas of forgiveness that he forgives us. We get ourselves into trouble because we give into sin, may we learn from Judges that the sin cycle is not good and creates problems.