Kintsugi: Jephthah the Abandoned Judge (morning)
Notes
Transcript
6 Then the Israelites again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. They worshiped the Baals and the Ashtoreths, the gods of Aram, Sidon, and Moab, and the gods of the Ammonites and the Philistines. They abandoned the Lord and did not worship him.
Now we know whenever a story starts off this way, it means that the Israelites are going to be in trouble.
How many of you have ever heard of a man in the bible by the name of Jephthah?
I’m not sure why this account it not often told.
But before we get to Jephthah. So far we have been talked about Gideon, the fearful warrior and Moses, the tongue tied prophet.
If you remember Gideon was afraid. Moses thought he wasn’t good enough and that God should choose someone else.
Today we are going to talk about something else. Sometime we let other people opinion determine our usefulness.
Have you ever felt like no one wants you or loves you.
Maybe some of you have felt rejected. Maybe you feel likes no one likes you. Maybe you have begun to believe the lies that your situation has been telling you, No one wants you.
Now the story of Jephthah is found in Judges 11.
2 Gilead’s wife bore him sons, and when they grew up, they drove Jephthah out and said to him, “You will have no inheritance in our father’s family, because you are the son of another woman.”
Now Jephthah’s mother wasn’t married to Jephthah’s Dad. Jephthah’s dad married and had other brothers. But when Jephthah’s dad died the younger brothers were concerned that Jephthah their half brother would inherit everything including leading the family. So his brothers got together and forced him to leave. In fact, he had to flee to the wilderness.
Can you imagine not only your dad dying but then your brothers running you off into the wilderness. Even threatening to kill you.
This is what happened to Jephthah. He had nobody. He was all alone. Yet God had not left him or forgotten him.
3 So Jephthah fled from his brothers and lived in the land of Tob. Then some worthless men joined Jephthah and went on raids with him.
So wow not only did Jephthah have to flee his home all alone. He started hanging around some pretty bad people.
The Bible calls them worthless men. In other words they were most likely murderers and thieves.
Now I don’t know about you but it seems like Jepthah must have felt pretty angry and lonely to have joined up with a gang of thieves. Jepthah was a pretty broken man.
In fact, he became the leader of this group of men . Together they would go and rob neighboring villages and towns.
Jepthah allowed his brokenness to control him.
You know often times we do the same thing?
Did Jepthah have any control of the fact that he had a different mother?
Did Jepthah have any control over being run off and rejected by his family?
Did Jepthah have any control over joining up with a group of thieves?
Yes. Jephthah could have chosen to do better. But He was broken and didn’t know how to fix himself.
Maybe some of you have had somethings happen that are out of your control. Maybe some of you have had a hard time in your family.
And maybe some of you like Jephthah have started acting out. Doing things that you know don’t please the Lord, but inside you feel broken, like nobody cares about you or what you do.
Let’s continue to see what happens:
4 Some time later, the Ammonites fought against Israel.
5 When the Ammonites made war with Israel, the elders of Gilead went to get Jephthah from the land of Tob.
6 They said to him, “Come, be our commander, and let’s fight the Ammonites.”
7 Jephthah replied to the elders of Gilead, “Didn’t you hate me and drive me out of my father’s family? Why then have you come to me now when you’re in trouble?”
8 They answered Jephthah, “That’s true. But now we turn to you. Come with us, fight the Ammonites, and you will become leader of all the inhabitants of Gilead.”
Now Jephthah had a choice to make. He could be bitter and not help them. They rejected him rand him out why should he help them after all they didn’t help him when he needed friends. Now, He was seen as powerful warrior. He didn’t need them.
Or he could help them.
9 So Jephthah said to them, “If you are bringing me back to fight the Ammonites and the Lord gives them to me, I will be your leader.”
10 The elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “The Lord is our witness if we don’t do as you say.”
Jephthah kind of does something unexpected here. Jephthah agrees to help them. You see something must have changed in his heart. The bible doesn’t tell exactly how or when it took place. I might have been at this very moment Jephthah realizes that if he agrees to help them and fight the Ammonites He couldn't succeed with out the help of the Lord.
Jepthah came to a realization that many people never choose to admit. The Lord uses broken people like Jephthah.
11 So Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead. The people made him their leader and commander, and Jephthah repeated all his terms in the presence of the Lord at Mizpah.
You see many people who have had bad things happen to them will go on to ignore God and continue to live in brokenness. Yet God wants to begin to repair them. Only God could repair them.
So maybe your here and you have had no control over the bad things that have happened to you.
We can become like this pot here the more broken we are, it’s easy for us to just accept that we are a mess and instead of turning to the Lord, we keep making bad choices that add even more brokenness.
Yet Jephthah allowed God to begin to heal him. Begin to use him in a great way.
When we turn our hearts to God he can do with us unimaginable things. He can take a person who others may see as worthless and make him into something useful.
Tonight we will continue the story of Jephthah.