Transcription

Connor:
You’re listening to The Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun and practical ways.

Chris:
Hey good morning everybody we’re the Bible Guys or good afternoon or good evening depending on listening good night and we’re off. That’s all we have time for. There we go. Hey, I was going to say, we’re excited because this kicks off a brand new week. We’re still in the book of Judges in the middle of this, well, not quite the middle yet, but we’re in a series called Milestones of the Old Testament.

Jeff:
That’s right. Or Highlights. Highlights, or we still haven’t named it. No, not really.

Chris:
We’re just hitting the… It’s like the important, Big stories.

Jeff:
Our favorite stories.

Chris:
Our favorite stories.

Jeff:
Jeff and Chris’s favorite stories in the Old Testament. There you go. There you go. Whatever it is. But it’s fun. It’s really cool. And when you’re in the Judges, it’s action all the time. Yes. All the time action. So if you missed last week, jump in. It’s maybe one of the grossest stories in the Bible. We talked about last week with Ehud and a bunch of other fun ones. So yeah.

Chris:
That’s really great. Well, Jeff, today, Desiree held back nothing. She didn’t pull any punches. She’s kicking off a Monday with a stump the pastor.

Jeff:
Start the week off with a tough one. Yes. Yes. And this question I read ahead. This question might be, you know, one of the hardest things to deal with in all of theology.

Chris:
Yeah, never mind that it’s eight in the morning. We just get up and walk out of bed. Okay. So here’s what Nathan R. says. And by the way, thank you, Nathan R. for writing that. Yeah. Hi, Nathan. He writes, why should we pray if everything ultimately comes down to God’s will? Why should we pray if everything ultimately comes down to God’s will?

Jeff:
Great question.

Chris:
Well, I read it. So therefore you’re responding.

Jeff:
Oh, no. Well, I’m going to say not everything comes down to God’s will.

Chris:
What do you mean by that? Because that sounds like blasphemy.

Jeff:
Jesus taught us to pray, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Meaning sometimes God’s will is not done on earth as it is in heaven.

Chris:
Um, right. But, but the heart of this question is if we’re always praying God’s will, then why should we put effort behind something?

Jeff:
I think what he’s saying is everything’s ultimately comes down to God’s will means everything’s already predetermined.

Chris:
God decided. I didn’t read it that way. You know what I read it as? I read it as God’s going to do what he wants to do. Yeah. Sort of like why pray any other thing if, if the only thing that we should ever pray is, God, I don’t know your will, but whatever it is, that’s what I pray for. Yeah. Right?

Jeff:
So it’s like, well, that’s legit, but I just don’t know that that’s what I think his question is.

Chris:
Oh, interesting. Yeah. So, um,

Jeff:
So here’s, let me take my angle, and then you can take your angle. My angle, as I read it, is God’s just going to do what God’s going to do. It all comes down to God’s will. Right? So everything that happens, God’s already decided He wanted that to happen. That’s what He wanted to happen. Oh, that’s why you answered the way that you did. God’s will. Right?

Chris:
Because I didn’t quite understand your answer, but now I do.

Jeff:
Yeah. And so Jesus taught us to pray, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven, because God’s will is not always done. Right. Right. And what God wants and what God gets are often two different things. It’s spiritual warfare is real. The Bible wouldn’t use warfare kind of language to talk about the battles between good and evil. If there weren’t actual casualties, if there weren’t wins and losses. Now I read the back of the book, Jesus wins, but between here and there, he wins the war, but between here and there, there’s a lot of battles that get lost. There’s a lot of, There’s, you know, martyrs and there’s all kinds of bad things that happen. Evil happens in the world. The Bible mentions multiple times that God was grieved. If it was God’s plan, God wouldn’t be grieved. God would be like, my plan’s coming together. Right? So God is grieved on these things. This is why he invites us into the battle. I think that so many Christians are kind of sleeping with this mentality of, well, God’s just going to do what God’s going to do, as opposed to understanding God invited us into the battle to move the needle in his direction. And so I think that’s, it’s, it’s very significant to think of it that way. So that’s how I was viewing it was he was asking if God ultimately decides everything anyways, why do we pray?

Chris:
Yeah. So if I could try to distinguish the two in my words, I would say you were sort of receiving it from like God being in control kind of perspective. Everything. Yeah. And, and I was receiving it from, I want to be a good Christian and, and I, from, from, from the Christian’s perspective only, which is okay, what should I pray? And it seems pretty futile to, to even get on my knees and try to think of anything else. If, if, all I ever should ever pray is just say, okay, God, your will be done, the end. Therefore, why should we pray? Which is how it reads. Why should we pray if everything ultimately comes out? Which is interesting. It kind of works both ways.

Jeff:
Yeah, it does work both ways.

Chris:
Now, from that perspective, I would say that’s a harder question for me, because I mean, the way you responded, I’m like, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. You know, because we live in a broken world and, and God’s not going to force his will on, you know, predetermined all that stuff that, that’s, that for me is, it’s easier to wrap my head around. It seems more complex.

Jeff:
It almost seems like you’re saying I gave a better answer. That’s what it seems like.

Chris:
No, I’m saying you answered an easier question. That’s what I’m saying. But what I’m saying is, it’s like… And by the way, I have thought about this and I have had discussions about this where people have said, why do we even have to pray? You know, like, in other words, like if, if God’s going to, if God wants, you know, the one perfect thing in any situation, you know, what difference does prayer make? And then, you know, of course you respond with the fact that the Bible tells us that prayer makes a difference that, you know, if a bunch of, if all his people get together and pray and plead, There’s been demonstration before in the Bible where God has been persuaded by the hearts of people, right?

Jeff:
Yeah, we just read about Moses a couple weeks ago, where Moses comes in and begs God, well we didn’t read about it, I referenced it, and Moses begs God, don’t wipe out your people, what are all the other peoples around going to say that you just brought us out here to kill us in the desert? And the Bible said, God repented of the evil he thought to do against the people of Israel. Okay. Repent means change. He changed his mind. Right.

Chris:
Right. Yeah. And then, and then even Jesus told us a story, right? About the knocking. Remember? And he says, the kingdom of heaven is like this. And he said, you know, and the guy says, no, go away, go away. And he says, but because of his shameless audacity, he’ll get up and I’ll give him bread and answer the door. He said, in the same way, pray this way. So, so I believe that God does have a will, and sometimes his will is elusive. But really, I’ve always thought this, I’ve always thought it’s, I think it’s less about knowing his will, and it’s more about surrendering ours.

Jeff:
Yeah. I also think that God has different levels to his will. And I think Romans chapter 12 hints at that. Romans 12 too, hints at the idea that there’s, God has a perfect will, a good will and an acceptable will. Right. So there’s the perfect way to get there, straight linear line. There’s the zigzag and then there’s the bouncing off the walls, but God’s going to get you there kind of a thing. Right. And I think that, it’s not as fatalistic as just going, God’s going to do what God wants to do. Right. Right. That God is actually interacting with humanity. I also think that most of what happens in life is naturalistic. It’s God’s already set up his laws of nature, gravity. God doesn’t have to, if I step off the top of a building, God doesn’t have to determine next what’s going to happen. Right. right? He’s already decided gravity happens. You’re going to hit the ground. And so a lot of things that happen in life, isn’t that God decided that was going to happen in that moment, but rather God set up the laws of nature so that if this happens, then this is going to happen. And so God gets blamed for a lot of things I think he doesn’t do as well. So I think most of life is natural. And then when we ask God to intervene, we’re asking him to do something supernatural. So when God chooses to step in and do a thing, it’s a miracle. But I don’t think that every single thing that happens in life is an active decision to do a miracle in that moment, but rather God set up the laws of nature so that things would happen normally and naturally. And then when we pray for God to intervene, sometimes he steps in and does something supernatural outside of the natural.

Chris:
Right. Well, those are those are great thoughts.

Jeff:
That’s a great, great, great question, Nathan. Yes, man. You nailed it. Yes. Good question. Woke us up this morning.

Chris:
Yeah, we’re in we’re in mode now.

Jeff:
Here we are. We’re ready to go. Do you have anything else to add?

Chris:
No, I think I think those are I think it’s just a great thought. I think that we hit it from both perspectives. So however you meant it is hopefully covered. Right.

Jeff:
I think you meant it my way. But yeah, whatever. Of course you do. So, hey, we’re talking about a lady judge.

Chris:
This is the first and only.

Jeff:
Deborah is, of all of the judges God uses, Deborah’s the only female judge. Yeah. Right. And so this is kind of a cool one.

Chris:
And she’s wicked awesome.

Jeff:
Yes, so it says after Ehud’s death. Oh, this is Judges chapter 4 verse 1, by the way. It says after Ehud’s death, the Israelites again did evil in the Lord’s sight. There’s a theme.

Chris:
My shocked face.

Jeff:
So the Lord turned them over to King Jabin of Hazor, a Canaanite king. The commander of his army was Sisera, who lived in Harosheth. Haggaim? Does that look good to you? Hey man, good job. Herasheth Haggaim. Cicero had 900 iron chariots, ruthlessly oppressed the Israelites for 20 years. Then the people of Israel cried out to the Lord for help. Good job guys, it took you 20 years to think of the Lord. Deborah, the wife of Lapidoth, was a prophet who was judging Israel at that time. She would sit under the palm of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim, and Israelites would go to her for judgment. One day she sent for Barak, son of Abinoam, who lived in Kadesh in the land of Naphtali. Dude, there are a lot of weird words in this one.

Chris:
That’s why you read, buddy. Hey, 450 episodes ago, I said, you read, because I don’t feel like tackling all that.

Jeff:
She said to him, this is what the Lord, the God of Israel commands you. Call out 10,000 warriors from the tribes of Naphtali and Zebulun at Mount Tabor. And I will call out Sisera, commander of Jabin’s army, along with his chariots and warriors to the Kishon River. There I will give you victory over him. Barak told her, I will go, but only if you go with me. Very well, she replied. I will go with you, but you will receive no honor in this venture, for the Lord’s victory over Sisera will be at the hands of a woman. So Deborah went with Barak to Kadesh. At Kadesh, Barak called together the tribes of Zebulun and Naphtali, and 10,000 warriors went up with him. Deborah also went with him. Now Heber, the Kenite, a descendant of Moses’ brother-in-law, Hobab, man alive, had moved away from the other members of his tribe and pitched his tent by the When Cicero was told that Barak, son of Abinoam, had gone up to Mount Tabor, he called for all 900 of his iron chariots and all of his warriors, and they marched from Harasheth Hagoyim to the Kishon River. Then Deborah said to Barak, get ready, this is the day the Lord will give you victory over Sisera, for the Lord is marching ahead of you. So Barak led his 10,000 warriors down the slopes of Mount Tabor into battle. When Barak attacked, the Lord threw Sisera and his chariots and warriors into a panic. Sisera leaped down from his chariot and escaped on foot, and then Barak chased the chariots and the enemy army all the way to Harasheth Haggoyim, killing all of Sisera’s warriors. Not a single one was left alive. Meanwhile, Sisera ran to the tent of Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, because Heber’s family was on friendly terms with King Jabin of Hazor. Jael went out to meet Sistra and said to him, come into my tent, sir. Come in. Don’t be afraid. So he went into her tent and she covered him with a blanket. Please give me some water. He said, I’m thirsty. And so she gave him some milk from a leather bag and covered him again. Stand at the door of the tent, he told her. If anybody comes and asks you if there’s anyone here, say no. But when Sisera fell asleep from exhaustion, Dael quietly crept up to him with a hammer and a tent peg in her hand. Then she drove the tent peg through his temple and into the ground. So he died. When Barak came looking for Sisera, Jael went out to meet him. She said, come and I’ll show you the man you’re looking for. So he followed her into the tent and found Sisera lying there dead with a tent peg through his temple. So on that day, Israel saw God defeat Jabin, the Canaanite king. And from that time on, Israel became stronger and stronger against King Jabin until they finally destroyed him.

Chris:
Wow. What? Right.

Jeff:
Dude, that might have been the hardest read.

Chris:
So far, yeah. That was pretty rough.

Jeff:
Man, alive.

Chris:
Well, I’ll tell you what, this, this story is one of the most graphic, but different, different graphic than last week.

Jeff:
Yeah.

Chris:
He was just gross. I guess this is gross too, but I guess men who don’t mind like war of violence type stuff. So my, I remember my pastor, he called him JL. I know you call him JL, but JL or whatever, however you pronounce his name. Okay. Oh, excuse me. Yeah, her name, of course. But but anyway, I remember him back in the 80s talked about driving his head through a spike into the ground, and then he got on the ground and he ran in a circle, like with his head in the middle. Cicero?

Jeff:
Yeah. Cicero, he’s trying to get up and run.

Chris:
He’s nailed to the ground. He’s nailed to the ground, which I’m sure didn’t, of course, happen. But I remember my youth pastor doing that, you know, and, you know, he had his head in the middle and he’s running around in a circle and everybody just started laughing. It’s like breakdancing. Right, exactly. Well, in the 80s, right? So anyway, I remember that visually, and I was just a high school student, and I remember thinking like, wow, this is one of the coolest stories ever. But think about the wisdom of this woman who, again, you know, I mean, I’m sure that she was, it doesn’t say that she was a mother, but she had, of course, you know, motherly instincts. But I remember back then, even then, the youth pastor’s wife speaking up and saying, isn’t it interesting how she knew how to give him warm milk to put him to sleep?

Jeff:
Because that’s what that’s what grandma does.

Chris:
That’s what grandma does.

Jeff:
Right. Right. Some chocolate chip cookies and some warm milk. Yeah.

Chris:
Yeah. And so, of course, she was exhausted. But but, you know, she did whatever she could. She was cunning. That’s just a sign of her being wise, being cunning, knowing exactly what she’s going to do to play the part. You know, she’s like, hey, don’t know why Sisera has found my tent. Don’t know why this is meant to be, but I’m going to do my part. And sure enough, holy cow. Right.

Jeff:
Yeah, there’s a couple of really great things here. When Deborah tells Barack, which by the way, Barack means peace, right? So it’s kind of an interesting, he’s a general named peace. But when she tells Barack, yes, I’ll go with you, but you’re not going to get the glory from this victory a woman is, you think she’s talking about herself. Right. That’s what you think is going to happen. She goes with him. And then what you find in this story, which is just fantastic, I think, is the autonomy of this woman. So you tend to think back in those ancient days, how oppressed women were and all these kinds of things. But even within the Israelite worldview, the Jewish worldview, women were much more respected and autonomous. So her husband was an ally of Sisera. And of that King, what was the King’s name? Jabin. Yeah. Jabin. Right. And Jail’s like, yeah, I’m not voting for Jabin.

Chris:
I’m not voting. She’s definitely cast her vote.

Jeff:
That’s right. Her vote has been cast. And so it’s really great, I think, in the Jewish culture, in the Jewish mindset, as they would read their Bible, their Holy book, they didn’t even blink at the idea that this woman had this much autonomy. right? She’s the hero of the story. That’s fantastic. And, uh, that’s why it’s shared there. So she winds up driving this tent peg through Cicero’s head. You can imagine how pleased he was. I have an ally having no idea. Uh, he minimizes, uh, the, the strength and the autonomy of this woman. He thinks, well, her husband’s for me. So she’s going to be for me too. Right. And she’s got, well, I have another thing for you.

Chris:
Right. It’s interesting. They have a little map here in the Life Application Study Bible below. And, and it’s interesting how they place, and I guess, I guess this would be true. I would have no way of knowing this before I looked at this map, but, but Herosheth Haggoyim looks like it’s right on the coast, just east or just west of the Sea of Galilee. Just, just a little bit south, but just completely west on the coast. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah, that’s where that would have taken place.

Jeff:
So, when you were in Israel, did you see Mount Tabor? I can remember we drove, we were going through and we came across the Kishon River there into that valley. And the, one of the guides and historian that I was sitting up front talking to, he said, Oh, Hey, by the way, this is the, this is the area right here is where, um, you know, JL killed Cicero. Really? Yeah. Yeah. So it was kind of a neat thing. Yeah. It’s a two big hills. Well, there’s several hills in the area, hills, and then there’s kind of this flat valley and the river just kind of winds

Chris:
That’s the thing about every trip to Israel. You can drive for two weeks and still not see one-fifth of it.

Jeff:
Oh, yeah, and this happened here and this happened here. It’s non-stop.

Chris:
Well, not only that, but it’s an Old Testament and New Testament thing. So they’re like, well, in the Old Testament, here’s what happened here. In the New Testament, here’s what happened here.

Jeff:
And this is what’s so important about our faith as opposed to other faiths, say the Mormon faith or whatever, and that is within Christianity, within Judaism, within Christianity, everything that we believe is rooted in a place with real places and real people. right? There’s never been a thing that’s been, when it comes to, you read these things, by the way, all these funny names, I was trying to read them, I was plowing through them. You go, and this guy went to this place and this place and that place, and this guy went here, right? That’s what you do. So don’t get hung up with the words. Sometimes I like to try to plow through them. It’s kind of a challenge for me, but don’t get hung up with the words, stick with the story, but understand there’s never been a time in archeological history that they’ve come and went, oh, that’s not a real town. They’ve been able to prove it later. As a matter of fact, every time they actually find the town, even to the point of, you remember, we’ve read here recently, all the Ites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Hittites for the longest time, a hundred years ago, archaeologists are saying Hittites never existed. It’s not true. They didn’t exist. There should be, and it turns out instead now we’ve discovered the Hittites had a very large, they were spread out over a very large portion of land, right? And so the historical things, you read them and you kind of blast through them or get past them. And I get that. But just understand the reason why God includes those things is to say, these are real people in a real place at a real time. It’s not just some kind of legend like Hercules. It’s not some kind of odd thing that was given on gold tablets to talk about Jesus visiting the Native Americans. This is all this being unprovable. Instead, he says, this is legitimate. These are real places. Go find them. And the people, and that’s what’s so cool, even on a bus, Right. Even on a bus, a historian goes, yeah. And see this river right here, right over in that little Valley, probably right at the base of that Hill is where Sisera died. What? Right. And then you go on to the next one and it’s not just one or two. It’s like you said, we could go weeks and weeks and just over and over and over and over again. We know where these things happen. It’s legit. And it lends to the authenticity of this book. Right. Right. Because if God’s accurate with the little details like this, then we can trust him to be accurate with the big things too.

Chris:
Yeah. Yeah. And, and it is amazing how, if you think about how curious mankind can be and how exploratory, you know, we are and think about, the professions that have allowed us to spend, I mean, groups of people, they spend their entire lives either trying to prove or disprove things, you know, by archaeological digs and by history and everything else. And not only that, but think about this. Think about the droves of people throughout the world that are determined to prove Christianity false, right? I mean, there are people who, you know, who they have testimonies where they talk about groups of people where their mission is just to find one thing. And, you know, can we just find one thing that proves that it’s false? And every single time it’s, it’s proven to be true.

Jeff:
When God lays out these minute details, it’s almost like he’s challenging us. Go ahead. Right. Because there’s such minute details. Well, hey, let’s pivot just a little bit and take the last couple of minutes and let’s talk about Deborah herself. We kind of blew past that. Deborah was a judge for 40 years. That’s awesome. 40 years she led the nation of Israel. And there’s this really great little thing here in the Life Application Study Bible. You should get yourself one. She was the only judge of Israel. She had great abilities, as we see, as a mediator. She’s sitting there, you know, underneath this tree. People come and sort things out. She was an advisor. She was a counselor. And when it was her turn to lead, when God called on her to lead, she was able to plan and direct and delegate, even to generals, setting up for this great battle. And then of course, the Bible says she was a prophetess, right? And so just a really powerful woman. I love this story. You know, there’s been a couple of times here recently where we mentioned there aren’t very many people in the Bible that God mentions that don’t have some kind of big flaw too, right? I think we’ve mentioned Daniel doesn’t seem to have a big flaw. Joseph maybe doesn’t have much of a big flaw. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego don’t seem to have big flaws. But I mean, dude, a bunch of the others do. Moses killed a guy. David killed a guy and had an affair. I mean, you just go down the line. Abraham lied, right? You had all these things, but Deborah is one of the other ones. I think when we made that list before of just a stellar reputation with no, nothing is mentioned to her about her, her weaknesses. She just is a great leader for 40 years.

Chris:
And as a reader of the Bible for the last 30 something years, I often wonder about that sometimes. So sometimes I, cause I’m a very firm believer in we’re going to get to heaven, all of us, every single one of us, and every one of us is going to be wrong about something. Oh, sure. Right. And so we’re going to get to heaven and we’re going to understand, oh, that’s what that meant. Right. If God wanted us to know, he would have told us there are things that are omitted, not because, you know, not because they didn’t exist. It just could be that they just weren’t recorded. So there’s a part of me that wonders, is it, did she have flaws, but they just sort of, you know, isolated this one section of her life and highlighted it in full detail and referenced her big accomplishments and then moved on, even though she also had these big flaws or. Is it, is it to where she was a woman of integrity and leadership and maybe it was, she got to the end of her life and it was so stellar that she had no flaws or very little.

Jeff:
Yeah. She wouldn’t be sinless. I think there’s a difference between waking up on Monday mornings and being grumpy until you get your coffee. Right. And I don’t know, having an affair and killing a guy. Right. So, so, so one is a flaw. The other is a failure. I don’t know. For example. One’s a fatal flaw, right? One is a devastating, this is a massive mark on your reputation. And what she doesn’t seem to have is any massive negative marks on her reputation. Daniel didn’t have any, Daniel wasn’t perfect, but he didn’t have any massive reputational marks against him.

Chris:
I have a tendency to lean toward that if there was a flaw, it would have been mentioned. And the reason why is because God goes out of his way to talk about the depravity of all of his followers. Right. To just demonstrate to us that, yeah, we refer to them in the New Testament, for instance, as saints, which, by the way, is a pretty unfair label, you know, because, yeah, if you go by the definition of saints, I guess it could work. But saints, what that does is it sort of separates us from them. But the reality is, is everything in the Bible communicates to us that they were exactly like us, flawed in every way.

Jeff:
And so what we can learn from her is here’s a great leader who’s available to her people. Everybody knew where she was, had access to her and she courageously led, but she led in the power of God’s spirit and with God’s wisdom, right? That’s what she did. That’s great. So I think she’s a great lesson for all of us and we should look up to her and you might want to go on and read. She writes this really beautiful song of celebration in the next chapter, chapter five. We didn’t take the time to read it, but it’s pretty great.

Chris:
Well, hey, that’s all the time we have right now, and hopefully we’ll see you tomorrow on The Bible Guys.