Partial Obedience Fails

Hey, hey, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. This morning we are at the book of Judges, Judges chapter 1. We're going to look at, kind of picking up the end of Joshua. What goes on after Joshua dies? What goes on as the people continue on in the conquest?
Let's have some coffee, we'll pray, and we'll get into God's Word. Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for this day. We thank you for your word, and we pray that you would please help us. As we read your word, Lord, that you would have us to understand it, and that we would know what it says, understand what it means, and that you would apply it to our hearts and our lives. We do pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, here we go. Judges, chapter one.
Now, after the death of Joshua, it came to pass that the children of Israel asked the Lord, saying, who shall be first to go up for us against the Canaanites to fight against them? And the Lord said, Judah shall go up. Indeed, I have delivered the land into his hand. So Judah said to Simeon, his brother, come up with me to my allotted territory, that we may fight against the Canaanites. And I will likewise go with you to your allotted territory. And Simeon went with him. Then Judah went up.
And the Lord delivered the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hand, and they killed ten thousand men at Bezek. And they found Adonai Bezek, Adonai Bezek means Lord of Bezek, So they found Adonai Bezek in Bezek, and they fought against him. And they defeated the Canaanites and the Perizzites. Then Adonai Bezek fled, and they pursued him, and caught him, and cut off his thumbs and his big toes.
And Adonai Bezek said, 70 kings with their thumbs and toes, big toes cut off, used to gather scraps under my table, as I have done, so God has repaid me. Then they brought him to Jerusalem, and there he died. So the first story we get is, who's going to go up? And the Lord says it's going to be Judah, and Judah and Simeon go in alliance together. They go against the Lord of Bezek. They capture Bezek, and they cut off his thumbs. and his big toes, right? He's no longer able to go to war. He's not going to be able to fight any battles. He can't grip a sword. He can't pull a bow, right? He's not going to be able to run, and that's how he used to treat the kings he conquered, and now he's been repaid.
So that's what that section is about. Let's go ahead and move on into verses 8 through 11. now the children of judah fought against jerusalem and took it they struck it with the edge of the sword and set the city on fire and afterward the children of judas went down to fight against the canaanites who dwelt in the mountains in the south that's the negev and in the lowland then judah went against the canaanites who dwelt in hebron Now, the name of Hebron was formerly Kirjath Arba, and they killed Sheshai, Ahiman, and Talmai. From there, they went against the inhabitants of Dabir. The name of Dabir was formerly Kirjath Sefir. So here we have get done, and they fought against Jerusalem is what happens with verses 8.
They fight against Jerusalem. They burn it with fire. We're going to find out later, though, that it's not complete. They don't do it totally, but that's what's going on in Jerusalem. And so, they fight against that, and then specifically now it's Hebron, and we get this story that is a mirror of what had happened previously in Joshua chapter 15. So, remember what had happened with that.
Well, verse 12, then Caleb said, whoever attacks Kirjath-sephir and takes it, to him I will give my daughter Aksa as wife. So remember Caleb was one of the two spies, Joshua's one, Caleb's the other, and Caleb is now retelling the story that had been told in Joshua 15. this challenge to take the city of Hebron, and whoever won the city won his daughter. Well, verse 13, And off kneeled the son of Kinn, as Caleb's younger brother took it. So he gave him his daughter Aksa as wife.
Now it happened when she came to him that she urged him to ask her father for a field. And she dismounted from her donkey, and Caleb said to her, What do you wish? So she said to him, Give me a blessing, since you have given me land in the south, give me also springs of water. And Caleb gave her the upper springs and the lower springs." So this is the conquering of Hebron by Othniel, giving of Oxa as the wife, and then this giving over of land and water as well.
So now we come to a different area. Now we're looking at the end of chapter, verse 15, and we're gonna go through verse 21, and this has a little bit to do with Moses' father-in-law, Jethro, or other places. Here it's gonna be, sorry, Caleb. 16, now the children of the Kenite, Moses' father-in-law, Jethro, other times called Rua, went up from the city of Palms with the children of Judah into the wilderness of Judah, which lies in the south near Arad.
And they went and dwelt among the people. And Judah went with his brother Simeon, and they attacked the Canaanites who inhabited Zephthah and utterly destroyed it. So the name of the city was called Horma. Also Judah took Gaza with its territory, Ashkelon with its territory, and Ekron with its territory. So the Lord was with Judah.
And they drove out the mountaineers, but they could not drive out the inhabitants of the lowlands, because they had chariots of iron. And they gave Hebron to Caleb, as Moses had said. Then they expelled from there the three sons of Anak, but their children of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites who inhabited Jerusalem. So the Jebusites dwell with the children of Benjamin in Jerusalem to this day.
So here we find it. In the book of Judges, very first chapter, this is kind of wrapping up Judah. honor Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, right? The city of Palms is Jericho. And they keep moving towards the south and then over towards the west. They even captured the Philistine cities, right? Those were those cities, Gaza, Ashkelon, and Ekron. Gaza is still in the news today.
And so that's what they captured, but not very long. And they didn't do a total conquest, right? Even in Jerusalem that was mentioned above, now we found in verse 21, the Jebusites dwell with the children of Benjamin in Jerusalem to this day. They didn't totally take the land. They didn't expel all the people. There were great victories, but it seems like once Joshua died, there's kind of a, well, it's not exactly being done entirely. Well, verse 22, and the house of Joseph also went up against Bethel, and the Lord was with them. So the house of Joseph sent men to spy out Bethel.
The name of the city was formerly Luz. And when the spies saw a man coming out of the city, they said to him, please show us the entrance to the city, and we will show mercy to you. So he showed them the entrance to the city, and they struck the city with the edge of the sword. But they let the man and all his family go. And the man went to the land of the Hittites, built a city, and called its name Luz, which is the name to this day."
So here we find now it is the house of Joseph, and they're the ones who are going against Bethel. Bethel is this name that they have as house of God. This is the city that Jacob had established, and they're retaking Bethel. But notice the way they get into that is kind of finding a guy similar to Rahab, right? Except this guy, instead of staying with the people like Rahab did, he hightails it to another place and builds a different city. But he shows them the way in and the Israelites take it. Now, it's important though, as we continue on in chapter 1, these are important verses. Verse 27, it's a sad way to start.
However, However, Manasseh did not drive out the inhabitants of Bethshean and its villages, or Tanakh and its villages, or the inhabitants of Dor and its villages, or the inhabitants of Iblim and its villages, or the inhabitants of Megiddo and its villages, for the Canaanites were determined to dwell on the land.
And it came to pass, when Israel was strong, that they put the Canaanites under tribute but did not completely drive them out. Nor did Ephraim drive out the Canaanites who dwelt in Gezer, so the Canaanites dwelt in Gezer among them. Nor did Zebulun drive out the inhabitants of Kitrun, or the inhabitants of Nahalul, so the Canaanites dwell among them and were put under tribute. Nor did Asher drive out the inhabitants of Akko, or the inhabitants of Sidon, or of Ahalab, of Akzib, Helba, Afik, or Rehob. So the Asherites dwelt among the Canaanites and the inhabitants of the land, for they did not drive them out. Nor did Naphtali drive out the inhabitants of Beth Shemesh or the inhabitants of Beth Anath, but they dwelt among the Canaanites, the inhabitants of the land.
Nevertheless, the inhabitants of Beth Shemesh and Beth Anoth were put under tribute to them. And the Amorites forced the children of Dan into the mountains, for they would not allow them to come down to the valley. And the Amorites were determined to dwell in Mount Heres and Ejlon, and in Shalabim. Yet the strength of the house of Joseph became greater, and they were put under tribute. Now the boundary of the Amorites was from the ascent of Achrabeam from Sela and upward. Did you notice that? What's this section about?
Manasseh doesn't drive them out. Ephraim doesn't drive them out. Zebulun doesn't drive them out. Asher doesn't drive them out. Naphtali doesn't drive them out. Dan doesn't drive them out. They don't drive them out. They don't drive them out. They don't drive them out.
They just make them pay tribute. So the conquest stops. The people prove they can't keep God's word perfectly. He had told them, he had warned them about what would happen if they did not drive out all the inhabitants of the lands, that they would be like thorns in their side, snares to them, that they would introduce and would entice them to go serve other gods which they had not known. That's exactly what's going to happen, sadly. You know, I was reading a Archaeological Magazine one time and they were talking about, it's about time that we are honest with ourselves that the conquest never actually happened because it's very clear from the archaeological evidence that there was no actual destruction of all of these places and there's no massive turnover of the societies. And so he says this guy who is writing this archaeological magazine, he was saying that it's proof that none of this ever actually happened. the entire book of Joshua just as a fabrication of myth.
And I thought, well, why don't you just read Judges? Because it's very clear that they couldn't drive everyone out, or they didn't drive everyone out. And so it would make sense that you may have a few destroyed cities, but you're not going to have all the destroyed cities. You're not going to...
No, they essentially, you know, merged in with the people. And then, I mean, sadly, what we find is that they start worshiping the balls. They start worshiping the Asherah. They start worshiping the other gods as well. The gods that they were supposed to destroy and weed out because God was their covenant king who had redeemed them. So this is a sad story. It's a sad story about God still giving them favor. He's still their covenant king. And yet they keep turning their back on him. They're not able to do what he's told them they ought to do.
So what's the best verse to summarize this? Well, I have all sorts of things underlined in my Bible. but especially I have underlined verse 27, verse 29, verse 30, verse 31, and verse 33. That's what I have underlined in my Bible. I want to talk about seek calling. What are we called to do? How does this show us Jesus Christ? I did a long chapter. I know it's getting long on this video, but what are we called to do, right?
Well, one, I think we're called to Cry out to God. We cannot, we cannot ever totally root out all sin in our lives. We can't do it. There's nobody in history, and if any of us were in the same place as these people and judges, if we were honest, we're often more like them than we want to admit. but that drives us to Christ.
Because see, that's exactly what I think the third temptation of Jesus was. When the spirit had driven Jesus out into the wilderness, and there he was tested, and Satan said, just bow down to me and all the kingdoms that you see will be yours. What did Jesus respond with? You shall bow down to the Lord only and worship him alone. Jesus defeated that test.
They thought that, well, we don't have to totally destroy the inhabitants. We don't need to go all the way with obedience. We don't have to love the Lord with all of our heart and all of our strength. And we're going to find out in the book of Judges, this doesn't end well for the people. They'll be oppressed. They'll be oppressed by outside. by foreign armies that they once had the opportunity to subdue, but also they'll be oppressed by the desires of their own hearts as it leaves them a strain. And each time they go away from the Lord, it doesn't serve them well.
So we look to Christ now. We look to Christ who has conquered this world, was tempted in every way like we are yet without sin. We look to Christ who promises us the new heavens and the new earth. And we look to him because he's the one who has guaranteed salvation. He's the one who has guaranteed hope. He's the only one who's ever conquested perfectly. And so we follow him, knowing that he'll make all things good.
Well, let's pray. Father, we pray that you would forgive us for how often we half-heartedly follow you. Father, we thank you that you've given us your Son, Jesus Christ, who has lived the perfect life. has cared for us and has made a way for us to be with you forever. You are our covenant king. We pray that we will follow you and love you all of our lives. In Jesus's name, amen. May the Lord bless you. May you walk in the joy and peace of Jesus Christ.