Judges 2:1 – 5 “Now the angel of the LORD went up from Gilgal to Bochim and said, “I brought you up out of Egypt and led you into the land that I had promised to your fathers, and I said, ‘I will never break My covenant with you, and you are not to make a covenant with the people of this land, but you shall tear down their altars.’
Yet you have not obeyed My voice. What is this you have done? So now I tell you that I will not drive out these people before you; they will be thorns in your sides, and their gods will be a snare to you.” When the angel of the LORD had spoken these words to all the Israelites, the people lifted up their voices and wept. So they called that place Bochim and offered sacrifices there to the LORD.”
Several years ago, a friend used to sing a song in Sunday worship entitled, “I’m tired of being stirred but not being changed.” That song precisely describes the Israelites.
God has delivered the Israelites from Egypt. God has protected the Israelites through 40 years of wandering around in the wilderness. God has repeatedly given the Israelites victories over some of the toughest armies going. And as if that weren’t enough, God has promised to help the Israelites completely conquer Canaan with all its small nations and armies.
Throughout all this time, have the Israelites been grateful or obedient? Are you kidding? It’s a good thing that Moses spent 40 years herding sheep in the wilderness before he began leading the Israelites! There must have been many days when Moses wished that he was back there where all he had to listen to was “Baaaa.”
At Mount Sinai God made a covenant with the Israelites. When Moses challenged the Israelites to obey the Lord, everybody was right there agreeing. Later on when Joshua challenged the Israelites to decide which gods they would serve, the Israelites insisted that most definitely, they were ready to serve the Lord. But that was before the Israelites got into Canaan, before they saw all those iron chariots, and before they actually saw giants. What’s so ridiculous about this is that God already helped the Israelites defeat the giant named Og, King of Bashan, east of the Jordan River.
As recorded in Judges 1, the Israelites were doing a poor job of conquering. Any time things got a bit tough, the Israelites backed off and compromised. And among other things, the pagan altars dedicated to demons still dotted the landscape. Finally, God had had enough. The angel of the Lord met up with the Israelites at a place that was probably close to Bethel and confronted them with their failures. The angel reminded the Israelites that God had already warned them that these altars would become a thorn in their sides and a snare.
Whew! You would think that if an angel showed up to reproach people, those people would pay attention. Perhaps the people would even repent and beg for forgiveness. It’s possible that had the Israelites completely humbled themselves and repented, the whole story might have been far different.
Rather than truly repenting and begging God to forgive them and to continue to help them, the Israelites shed a few tears, slaughtered a few animals, and that was it. The Israelites were stirred but not changed.
APPLICATION: The Israelites made a whole series of terrible mistakes. They began well by making a covenant with God, but then they went back on that covenant repeatedly. Throughout the wilderness journey and throughout the early conquest of the Promised Land, God continued to warn the Israelites that all places of worship of any kind had to be completely obliterated. The nations already in Canaan were to be completely destroyed. But the Israelites failed miserably.
When I was in surgery residency, one of my chief residents used to admonish us that if we came to a patient’s bedside to carry out a procedure, we should do that procedure completely and not shy away at the last minute. Failure to properly and thoroughly care for a patient could mean the death of that patient. This doctor’s advice was good and applied to other matters outside medicine.
There are times when God calls us to do difficult things. When those times come, we must choose. Will we struggle and complete the task, no matter how difficult, or will we settle for something less? Will we take a strong moral stand and stick to it no matter what, or will we compromise? Will we allow God to change us or will we settle for being stirred and then subsiding back into mediocrity?
Christians are not called upon to be popular; we are called upon to be faithful. Sometimes faithfulness may result in loss of our careers or even our lives. Even as I am writing this, Christians in Nigeria are dying for their faith and Christian school children are being kidnapped by terrorists. But God tells us in Revelation 2:10 “Be faithful even unto death, and I will give you the crown of life.”
PRAYER: Father God, thank You for loving us and caring for us. Help us to follow hard after You all the days of our lives. Help us not to compromise or to “go along to get along.” Please change us into Your image. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.
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