Judges

It's been a while since I've been able to sit and read. I just started some vacation time and now this morning am sitting on my deck, first to read, and now type. All accompanied by my faithful companion - a Diet Coke.

Judges is full of a bunch of crazy characters and stories. Every other page, the author tells the reader that this all happened before Israel had a king, so people just did what they thought was right.

There's Ehud, who killed Eglon, the King of Moab. Eglon was so fat that when Ehud put the sword in his stomach, even the handle got swallowed up by his fat.

Debaroh led an attack, and when her enemy Sisera hid in Jael's tent, Jael hammered his head to the ground with a tent peg. That's gotta hurt.

Gideon had an angel appear to him, and then God himself. I've always heard people talk about Gideon and elevate him, but when reading for myself, he was doubtful & fearful. He needed proof that it was God, then was afraid of his family. As the attack is being planned, God said, if you're still afraid, sneak into the enemy camp and you'll see that I will deliver them to you. Gideon snuck in. The author went out of his way to tell us Gideon was afraid and doubted.

After all that, "Gideon returned to his home in Ophrah and had the gold made into a statue, which the Israelites soon started worshipping" (8:27-29, CEV).

Abimelech, Gideon's son, killed all his brothers except Jotham, who in turn put a curse on him and those who installed him as "king." They eventually all got what was coming to them. Abimelech was died after a woman dropped a rock on his head and in his desire to not be killed by a woman, asked one of his men to run him through with a sword. Hmmm.

Jephthah, the son of a hooker, was used to deliver Israel. Then, made a promise to sacrifice the first person who greeted him upon his return. Not a lot of thought went into that promise - it was his daughter. He eventually sacrificed her.

Samson got a lot of time devoted to him in this book. He was chosen before he was born, did significant feats of strength against the Philistines, and gets smitten by a woman destined to be his downfall. He walks right into it, gets his eyes plucked out and eventually dies a cinematic death by taking out thousands of Philistines when he collapsed a roof.

The final story is a cornucopia of crazy. A Levite man visits Gibeah in Benjamin. Some of the locals demand his host sends him out so they can rape him. He sends out his wife, and the rape her so bad she dies. The Levite cuts up her body in twleve pieces, sends a piece to each tribe with a message. Fast forward, and the other eleven tribes attack Benjamin & defeats them, but only after thousands of people are killed on both sides. Then, they make promises not to let there daughters marry the few Benjaminites that are left, so they come up with a plan to manipulate the promise to give them wives.

All this happened before Israel had a king.

So, I'm sitting here, wondering what is my take-away. What have I learned and how am I better for reading this? What does God want me to learn?

God uses people who are messed up. Sure, killing and wars were a way of life then. It was civilized at that time, although it's hard for me to wrap my head around. But, the one constant is his people kept turning their backs on him and he kept saving their backsides. He's merciful and faithful; we're not. For sure, if Gideon, with all his doubt and then Samson, being stupid and arrogant as he was, could be used by God to do such great things, then he can use me with all my screw-ups.