Less Preferable Future
Pastor Dusty Mackintosh
Judges • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 27:14
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· 23 viewsThe people of Israel are making fantastic progress toward their more preferable future. They make a "small" compromise on a "big" issue: enslaving the Canaanites rather than killing them. The people of Israel's compromise with sin held back their more preferable future for them and the following generations. The stakes are high. Sin entangles and delays or destroys the more preferable future God has for us AND those around us. Under grace we are free to run without entanglement (Hebrews 12:1)
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Have a Good Trip
Have a Good Trip
Last night we invented a new family game. Logan started. He ran across my bedroom, leaped face first through the air and landing completely flat on top of my bed.
So what do I do. Run immediately after in, face first, and land completely flat on top of Logan. So what does Dylan do? Run and land on top of me. Arabelle was laughing too hard to make the jump. So we start taking turns running and landing on the bed. But there is a new twist. Dylan runs to jump on the bed and Logan takes him out with a pillow. Like takes him out out, he was going this way then BAM and now he’s going this way.
After the brief hesitation to make sure he’s alive, we are all crying with laughter. The game continues, but now whoever is running to leap on the bed is navigating past the other three throwing or swinging pillows to take you out before you make it to the bed. Hi-larious.
And here is the true miracle: I then called a halt to the game before anyone got seriously injured. There can be miracles.
Welcome to Next Step Christian Church. We are going to play a new game. ;-)
We have this idea of next steps after Jesus, next steps into Christian belief, maturity and ministry. Next steps into God’s more preferable future. And we are encouraging and equipping one another to take those steps. This is what we do here, this is our DNA, this is who God has called us to be.
But as we are taking those next steps into God’s more preferable future… what sometimes happens? BAM! Pillow to the face. Something sweeps out our feet from under us… and we are knocked to the ground.
Our “next step” gets interrupted.
What is the number one way to mess up your next step into God’s more preferable future?
This is the great mystery and I will reveal the secret answer at the end of the sermon...
Just kidding:
It’s Sin
It’s Sin
Shocker. Spoiler!!!
Sometimes we know how and why it happened to: it was our own sin and stupid. We said something or we did something, or a compromise we made with sin had its consequence and just ruined it.
Or this is terrible: someone else sinned or did something stupid. And it destroyed my day or my plan. You messed up… but I am affected by the consequence of what you did! Why did you do that???
We can’t say it is always my sin or his sin, sometimes it seems like crazy random circumstances (which could be spiraling consequences of unseen sin) and sometimes it really seems like divine providence and we just misunderstood our next step in the first place.
But a guaranteed way to mess up your next step into God’s more preferable future is to compromise God’s commandments on your life.
And this gets all too real… so let’s forget about our own mistakes for a bit and watch someone else mess up! Those silly Israelites...
What is the big deal?
A Future So Bright...
A Future So Bright...
Following Joshua, at the beginning of the book of Judges, everything is looking fantastic!
After the death of Joshua, the people of Israel inquired of the Lord, “Who shall go up first for us against the Canaanites, to fight against them?”
The Lord said, “Judah shall go up; behold, I have given the land into his hand.”
And Judah said to Simeon his brother, “Come up with me into the territory allotted to me, that we may fight against the Canaanites. And I likewise will go with you into the territory allotted to you.” So Simeon went with him.
What’s going to work? Teamwork. Things are off to a great start! They are winning and taking greater hold of the Promised Land.
Judges 1:1-
Then Judah went up and the Lord gave the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hand, and they defeated 10,000 of them at Bezek.
They found Adoni-bezek at Bezek and fought against him and defeated the Canaanites and the Perizzites.
Adoni-bezek fled, but they pursued him and caught him and cut off his thumbs and his big toes.
And Adoni-bezek said, “Seventy kings with their thumbs and their big toes cut off used to pick up scraps under my table. As I have done, so God has repaid me.” And they brought him to Jerusalem, and he died there.
Winner! Gruesome… but another huge win for the people of Israel. This is a win writ large. What follows in the chapter is a story of a win on the smaller family scale within Caleb’s family.
Judges 1:4-
They conquer on the tribe level. They win on the family level. They are taking huge next steps into God’s more preferable future.
What could go wrong? What are they going to do with their victory?
Be very careful, therefore, to love the Lord your God.
For if you turn back and cling to the remnant of these nations remaining among you and make marriages with them, so that you associate with them and they with you,
know for certain that the Lord your God will no longer drive out these nations before you, but they shall be a snare and a trap for you, a whip on your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from off this good ground that the Lord your God has given you.
The Compromise
The Compromise
Manasseh did not drive out the inhabitants of Beth-shean and its villages, or Taanach and its villages, or the inhabitants of Dor and its villages, or the inhabitants of Ibleam and its villages, or the inhabitants of Megiddo and its villages, for the Canaanites persisted in dwelling in that land.
When Israel grew strong, they put the Canaanites to forced labor, but did not drive them out completely.
And Ephraim did not drive out the Canaanites who lived in Gezer, so the Canaanites lived in Gezer among them.
Zebulun did not drive out the inhabitants of Kitron, or the inhabitants of Nahalol, so the Canaanites lived among them, but became subject to forced labor.
Asher did not drive out the inhabitants of Acco, or the inhabitants of Sidon or of Ahlab or of Achzib or of Helbah or of Aphik or of Rehob,
so the Asherites lived among the Canaanites, the inhabitants of the land, for they did not drive them out.
Naphtali did not drive out the inhabitants of Beth-shemesh, or the inhabitants of Beth-anath, so they lived among the Canaanites, the inhabitants of the land. Nevertheless, the inhabitants of Beth-shemesh and of Beth-anath became subject to forced labor for them.
The Amorites pressed the people of Dan back into the hill country, for they did not allow them to come down to the plain.
The Amorites persisted in dwelling in Mount Heres, in Aijalon, and in Shaalbim, but the hand of the house of Joseph rested heavily on them, and they became subject to forced labor.
And the border of the Amorites ran from the ascent of Akrabbim, from Sela and upward.
Judges 1:27-
They did not drive them out. They enslaved them.
The command: Drive out all the Canaanites.
The compromise: Enslave the Canaanites instead.
They are the instrument of God’s judgement upon these lands, a judgement he has been “storing up” (as God told Abraham) for 400 years until “their iniquity is complete”.
They are the instrument of God’s judgement upon these lands, a judgement he has been “storing up” (as God told Abraham) for 400 years until “their iniquity is complete”.
This isn’t a minor issue. This is the big one, the one that God, that Moses and then Joshua stressed over and over. They knew this would be a tempting area of sin and so they repeated it over and over. For the Children of Israel this is not a gray area.
Be very careful, therefore, to love the Lord your God.
For if you turn back and cling to the remnant of these nations remaining among you and make marriages with them, so that you associate with them and they with you,
know for certain that the Lord your God will no longer drive out these nations before you, but they shall be a snare and a trap for you, a whip on your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from off this good ground that the Lord your God has given you.
This compromise is the alcoholic saying “I suppose one drink can’t hurt...”
This is the porn addict who says “It doesn’t count if it’s HBO...”
Fill in your biggest temptation to sin, your biggest distraction from loving God with all your heart, mind and soul. This is where they are compromising.
It reminds me of Adam and Eve in the garden, just don’t eat the fruit of that one tree. And, I expect they heard that same whispering in their ear...
They are the instrument of God’s judgement upon these lands, a judgement he has been “storing up” (as God told Abraham) for 400 years until “their iniquity is complete”.
Did God Really Say?
Did God Really Say?
The devil’s oldest line.
Did God really say that we were supposed to drive them all out? Isn’t enslaving just as good as?… with the added benefit of having slaves to then do our work for us?
We don’t know the justification they made, or the words of the temptation. But we do see the compromise. Tribe after tribe choose to compromise God’s command.
And that compromise came with a consequence.
Every sin comes pre-packaged with its consequence
If you think your sin is just harming you, you are fooling yourself.
The stakes are high here. It wasn’t that first generation that really suffered. They had taken possession of all the land they could hold at the time and they had their slaves and a life of ease. It is the next generations that will be ensnared by the culture and religion of the Canaanites.
Every sin comes pre-packaged with its consequence… and sometimes the stakes are ludicrously high, so far beyond what we would expect.
God gave them a clear next step into a more preferable future. They compromised and walked into a less preferable future.
The Sentence
The Sentence
Now the angel of the Lord went up from Gilgal to Bochim. And he said, “I brought you up from Egypt and brought you into the land that I swore to give to your fathers. I said, ‘I will never break my covenant with you,
and you shall make no covenant with the inhabitants of this land; you shall break down their altars.’ But you have not obeyed my voice. What is this you have done?
So now I say, I will not drive them out before you, but they shall become thorns in your sides, and their gods shall be a snare to you.”
As soon as the angel of the Lord spoke these words to all the people of Israel, the people lifted up their voices and wept.
And they called the name of that place Bochim. And they sacrificed there to the Lord.
Judges 2:1-5
Now they are sorry… because they have just now felt the pillow to the face. They actually tripped awhile ago… but now the consequence has been called out and they can see the pain and loss coming.
So now I say, I will not drive them out before you, but they shall become thorns in your sides, and their gods shall be a snare to you.”
Snare. What a word. The right word.
You are walking along. Taking step after step. What’s that God? Oh, okay I’ll do this next. I’ll learn about this, I will pray about that, I will grow in faith, and grow in faith and step into ministry, and practice my gifts and step and step and walking into God’s more preferable future… and making out the outlines of still more to come...
And then. A snare. A trap used to catch or capture or entangle so that I can’t move forward anymore.
This is a punishment… but we will see in the course of Judges it is also an act of grace. By covenanting with the Canaanites the Israelites end up chasing after false gods and polluting or abandoning the worship of Yahweh.
And God ins’t going to leave them there. He frees them and they start walking again and then. Snare. Again and again.
This is a punishment… but we will see in the course of Judges it is also an act of grace. By covenanting with the Canaanites the Israelites end up chasing after false gods and polluting or abandoning the worship of Yahweh.
It was funny with the pillows because nothing was at stake. No one was getting hurt. Here it is heartbreaking. Generations lost. Literal war and famine and enslavement. It is generations of parents dooming their children with the consequence of their own sin. Snared again.
But Yahweh is not content to just abandon His people. And he uses the Canaanites and other surrounding enemies to draw His people back to Him. To teach them that they need Him, that they depend on Him, that the only more preferable future is the one where they are wholly following after Him.
As we said a couple weeks ago, God is going to use the difficult, dangerous and disastrous circumstances to teach His people.
Something within the human heart settles again and again for a cheap imitation of God, idolatry instead of divinity, it’s a trap and they fall into it over and over again. They settle for an image when they could have God Himself. Snared and snared again.
Every sin comes pre-packaged with consequence.
What is the number one way to mess up your next step into God’s more preferable future?
Sin and all of it’s pre-packaged consequences.
Consequence of Grace
Consequence of Grace
Oh, they wept. They were sad. But did they repent? Did they go and follow through and
Now we read an old testament story like this and see the disastrous consequences of sin, consequences that spill across generations. Blood spilled and the people of God enslaved. How does this fit in the new covenant of grace where we live forever free from guilt and shame by the blood of Jesus?
In Christ and under His Grace, we are free of the eternal consequences of our sin. That is a beautiful and freeing thing. But nothing in Scripture says that we are free from the consequences.
In Christ and under His Grace, we are free of the eternal consequences of our sin. That is a beautiful and freeing thing. But nothing in Scripture says that we are free from the consequences.
In Christ and under His Grace, we are free of the eternal consequences of our sin. That is a beautiful and freeing thing. But nothing in Scripture says that we are free from the
Sin still comes pre-packaged with consequence. And the stakes can still be high! Those consequences can still ensnare me… entangle my children… my sin can trip you up. Isn’t that heartbreaking?
I bet every one of us have
All of you have been hurt by someone else’s sin, sometimes in deep and lasting ways that continue to shape your life. Sometimes the consequences of sin cascade through generations.
A father abuses his son, and his son grows up full of anger at his father, and that anger spills over into abuse of his own son, and the cycle continues.
We are forgiven… but sin still wounds and consequences still
We get snared still. Can we also be free?
Watching my kids, laughing, helping one another up every time (even though they threw the pillow that took their sibling out).
The grace of Jesus, the blood of Jesus, the life and the love of Jesus extends beyond just the eternal judgement of our sin… it extends to freeing us from sin. Even to the Israelites way back then, God gave instruction and leaders and chiseled in stone… here is a safe path to walk. He wants us to avoid the snares, to walk and even run freely into His more preferable future.
And so He gives us His word, a lamp, a light unto our feet that we may not stumble.
He gives us the cloud of witnesses, faithful saints who have gone before and blazed the trail.
He gives us one another, a cloud of living witnesses, that we may encourage and equip one another, that we can call out “jump” when we see the snare coming… and we can pick one another back up when we get ensnared.
Watching my kids, laughing, helping one another up every time (even though they threw the pillow that took their sibling out). Get up… let’s keep going together.
We can get snared… but we don’t live there. By the grace of God, in the life of Christ, with help from one another (the Body of Christ) we shake off the snare and press forward into God’s more preferable future.
Encouraging and equipping one another to take next steps into Christian belief, maturity and ministry.
Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,
looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.