Hey everybody. Welcome back to another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. Hello. Hello. Hello. It is Sunday and hey, we had Men's Bible study yesterday, pastor Rod. How'd you think it went? It was, it happened. It happened. I. It happened? No, I thought it was good, man. It was it was encouraging. You spoke on three different attributes for for us as men to to begin practicing and putting it into place, and able to teach was one of 'em. So you told the men that all of them have to preach a sermon before the end of the year. Is that right? That's right. That's right. So starting today, when you get to church, one of the men. Unbeknownst to him is scheduled to preach and he just has to be ready to jump up on the stage when we call his name at random. Yeah. It's like the Plymouth Brethren. Except, uh, we're just, we're not gonna say, does anyone have a word we're gonna say? You have a word. You have a word. You have a word you will teach. Yeah. No, we didn't say that, but we did say that every man has to be able, he should care about communicating truth. Totally. Doing so effectively and defending it when necessary. And of course that happens in a lot of different venues. It's. It's obvious in the family situation, but a work context or even just hanging out with the buddies in some kind of a, I don't know, team sport or something like that. There's gonna be conversations that you all have that will require knowing the truth and defending the truth and being able to communicate it well. So I charge the men to do that. Hopefully they're practicing it already. Yep. And to be hospitable as well. Yep. To see your home as a place for ministry opportunities and not just a safe haven for you to relax. That, that's part of the biblical command. There's actually a lot more on that than, at first I realized scripture's pretty replete with. Examples of hospitality. And within the New Testament, there's verses that are peppered all around that not only assume Christian hospitality, but charge it and encourage it. Romans chapter 12 says that we ought to strive to show hospitality. So it's not like we're just saying, Hey, I'll do it if the opportunity arises, but that we're seeking it. And then the first point that you had since we're working backwards, was to be respectable. We're, yeah, respectable is a really fun one because I really appreciate this one. 'cause it's. External. You can't see a man's respectability on the inside. But it showcases on the outside and that respectability looks at everything. It looks at the way that you conduct yourself and the way that you dress, the way that your hair or don't do your hair or even the words that you use. And so we looked at actually three areas, your words, your works, and your witness. And said, okay, based on these categories how do you feel like you're doing in terms of respectability? I got to hang out with one of the small groups. That was fun. Got to hear some of the guys processing through those questions. I think it was a, it's a good morning. It was a helpful conversation that they had. I enjoyed it. Benefited me as well, just hearing them think through those things. So hope the men benefited from the whole thing. And breakfast burritos. We had some really good breakfast burritos from Valerie's. That was a win. There was, they were substantial. They weren't Chipotle size, but they were hefty. They were, I appreciated that. Bigger than Chick-fil-A. Yes. That's for sure. Bigger than the Chick-fil-A's for sure. Yeah. Yeah. This morning we are still in John's gospel. We're finishing up chapter 18 big section 12 through 40 today. Wow. But it's buckle up for a long sermon, folks. It's not as long as you would think. I already preached Peter's denials back in John 13, so we're covering some familiar territory there. And a lot of it's narrative. There's a lot of movement there. But four point sermon, and then we've got communion today too, so Oh yeah, we do. The Lord's table, the Lord's Supper. In fact, you'll notice a difference in our communion today. You will notice that is not the chalky little disc in the bottom of the cup there. Thank the Lord. Yep. Yep. You're gonna have actual matsa bread that has been broken and that was intentional. And just the idea of Christ talking about his body broken. And that is, I think something even just visually there that is, is important. Thomas Watson was reading a book of his from the Puritan paperback series called The Lord's Supper, and he makes the argument therein that he talks about that the ordinance is preached a sermon. And even a better sermon than what's in the pulpit. He says, he said he did say that. Yeah. Now we may differ on that, but he does say the ordinances preach that the visible representation there. And I agree with him on that. When we look at the elements, we see the bread broken. And that's one of the reasons why we're going to this broken matza. And and then the, we see the cup, and even though we use grape juice, it's that red color, it's that dark color that reminds us of the blood of Christ. And so it's a visual sermon for us to take in every time we. We observe the Lord's supper together. And same with baptism, which is the only other ordinance that we have as a Protestant church also preaches in the death of the old man and the resurrection of the new man buried with Christ and raised with Christ in that. There you go. That's what's coming up this Sunday. And then after church, we are going out to hit more houses. Now, I wasn't able to get out today 'cause we had a meeting this morning, but we had quite a few people go out. I think a handful of people go out and blanket some neighborhoods on Saturday as we're recording the set. That's why I say today. But Sunday we are also sending out another team and I'll be there with my family. We're gonna go out and participate in trying to reach some neighborhoods, reach some houses there, trying to hit 4,000 homes before Easter with invitations to join us for our Easter events and services. Should be a good time. Let's let's jump into the water judges 19, 20, and 21. We are finishing the Book of Judges today, and then tomorrow we've got a brand new book that's only gonna take us one day, believe it or not, book of Ruth one day. And then we'll be in First Samuel after that. But as we finish up the book of Judges I made reference to it. I don't know if it was yesterday's episode or the day before, but the book of judges does not end well. It does not end on a high note and today's reading is. It's rough. Chapter 19, this is a disturbing chapter. There's no other way around it. The Levi in his concubine and basically the story of it is she ends up. Being abused to the point of death by the people of Gibbon. Gibeon was an Israelite town in the tribe of Benjamin, and they seek refuge there overnight, and the men of the city being wicked come and want wickedness to to, to satiate their evil desires, and he provides his concubine. And she ends up dying as a result of the abuse that she suffers. The Levite returns home with her and sends an unforgettable message, we'll just put it that way sends an unforgettable message to the 12 Tribes of Israel to reveal the atrocities that have been committed there by the Benjamin Knights. But this is. This is evil. This is wickedness. This is not good. There's nothing in this chapter that God is condoning. He's not condoning the presence of a concubine. He's not condoning the presence of what's going on in Gibbon. He's not saying that this is good just because it's in the Bible. This is in the evidence of the depravity of man and how the depravity of man was increasing because there was no king in Israel during this time, and everyone did what was good in his own eyes. And if this feels familiar, like maybe you've read something about this before, that's because you remember Genesis 19 where essentially the same event happens. This is the infamous section about Sodom and Gomorrah. And so the point is, yes, it is that bad in Israel right now. It is so bad there as bad as Sodom and Gomorrah, at least in some sections and specifically that of Gia. So this is meant to highlight. Demonstrate how quickly and how rampantly Wicked has grown in their own ranks. That's a bad situation. You're absolutely right. But that's the point. Things are not good. They're really bad. So bad. They're Sodom and Gomorrah. Yeah. So chapter 20 then. Justice gets brought to the table in a human form at least when when the Israelites come out against the Benjamin Knights. And what's even more atrocious about this is the be Benjamin Knights. They don't. Turn over the wicked men of the city. They basically say, Hey, take a hike. We're gonna defend our people here. And so the tribes gather and that civil War breaks out and the Lord allows it. And what's interesting is it takes three attacks before the Gibeon Knights and the Benjamin Knights are ultimately defeated. And I think the reason is God is punishing not just the Benjamin Knights, but all of Israel right now. This is God saying. To, to everyone, to the point that you were just making, there's wickedness throughout the entire nation. This is bad all the way around. There's no good guys anymore. There's bad guys and batter guys. And and God is demonstrating that here, I think as it takes three times, three rounds before the Lord finally gives the victory that that was necessary to bring justice against the Benjamin Knights. Which I also think suggests too, that when we obey God, that doesn't mean that we're gonna experience immediate success when we do the right thing. In fact, to the contrary, we will often experience opposition to doing the right thing not only from those who we expect, but maybe those we don't expect. Here. The expectation is that. Israel would be successful in squashing gibbon in this particular area the tribe of Benjamin because of their evil wickedness. So they're confused, rightly they're saying man, Lord, should we go up again? This has not been going well. We expect that you'd be with us. And yet God is deliberate and intentional. And the fact that he's telling him, yes, I do want you to go again, don't stop. Keep being obedient. Even if. The outcome isn't what you expect, and I think that's an important preaching point for all of us. Just because we're doing the right thing doesn't mean we're always gonna see the right or the expected consequences. We leave the consequences to him even as we obey. Yeah. You'll also note in judges 20 verse one. There's the phrase from Dan to Beersheba. This is the first time this shows up. You'll recall from our episodes last week that Dan has resettled now up in the north. This Dan de bras Sheba shows up 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 times in the Old Testament here. And it's a geographical phrase that basically means it's everything from the north to the south, I think it's called aism, is what what they use in grammatical terms for this. And so it's. It's meant to encompass everything from the north, all the way to the south. Dan to Beersheba that shows up in Judges 21. You're gonna see it quite a few times in first and second Samuel. When we get into our study of the text there, chapter 21, then things go from bad to worse or bad batter. Baddest worst. It's just, it's still just a horrible scene here. Like I said, judges did not end well. Wives are are necessary for Benjamin because the people say, Hey, we don't want Benjamin to be snuffed out. We don't want to lose this tribe that is is part of the 12 tribes. And so we need to figure out now what we're gonna do for the men of. Of Benjamin because the wives had been wiped out during this battle against them during the Civil War. And so they take these 600 men that are left over and they say, how are we gonna get wives for them? They have this holy convocation where all of the tribes were supposed to show up, and there was one area, there was one town, Jes Gi, they didn't show up at this event. And these Israeli Israelis come against them and end up taking them out and taking the virgins from Jesh Gilead and bringing them to the Benjamin Knights. There's still not enough for the Benjamin Knights there. So they're like, what are we gonna do now? Then they go on and they end up kidnapping the Virgin Daughters from Shiloh and taking them back and giving them to Benjamin instead. So it's just, you just, God is nowhere in this, as far as condoning any of this. This is not God's plan saying This is what's good. Go do this. And I'm rubber stamping this. This is men trying to deal with the consequences of sin. And realizing, man it's messy when we have sin and we don't go to the Lord and we don't try to figure this out in a way that's honoring and pleasing to him. It just goes from bad to worse to worser. So if there's a single man who's listening to this and or even reading this story and saying, you know what Preston Wood has a couple young ladies that maybe they just need to be kidnapped, it's bad and made to marry me we would discourage you from doing that. Don't do that. Yeah, please don't. Yeah. Yeah, it's the book of judges. It's it's meant to set up the depravity here. And it, we're about to turn the page into Samuel in a couple days here. Samuel ruled around this time as, as well and he was really the last judge because the people said, we don't want your sons anymore. Samuel's gonna be a highlight. But Samuel's not in the book of judges. The book of judges is just meant to show us that Israel is. Depraved and wicked. And like you pointed out, there's even parallels with Sodom and Gomorrah here, which you never want any parallels with Sodom and Gomorrah anywhere in your life. And judges is just a testimony to what what man does when man rejects the theocracy of God. When it says here, there was no king in Israel in that time, I think it's an indictment, not just on the fact that there's no human king in Israel. But they had rejected the Lordship of God too. They had thrown off his rule, his reign, his his kingship over them. This is, at this time a theocracy. That means that God is the ruler. God is the the one in charge. God is the king and they're rejecting him. And that's gonna come to full fruition there in in one Samuel. But this is just a bad book. Yeah, it is. But notice here in verse 15, in chapter 21, it says that the people had compassion on Benjamin because. The Lord had made a breach in the tribes of Israel. And so even though scripture never charges God with evil or wrongdoing, it's scripture's not afraid to show or to say yeah, God's behind this. Even though, yeah, it's evil. There's bad things happening. God himself is not actively. The agent of operation when it comes to the commitment of evil. He's working through willing subjects and he uses sin sinlessly through people who are sinners. Who will the sin to take place. So again, just notice that scripture's not apologetic about this. I just find this so fascinating 'cause you would expect some kind of here's the way it works, or here's what we're trying to say. And you see a parsing out of how the word functions and what they're trying to communicate doesn't. Do that. I love the boldness of scripture. It just drops it in your lap and says, deal with that. Yeah. God is sovereign. Go figure it out. Yeah. Or don't just trust it. Let's pray and then we'll be done with another episode. God, we we need an increase of faith even along those lines. It's easy for us in a vacuum to believe these things, and yet when the evil that that you have ordained, befalls us and shows up in our life it's a lot harder. So God, guard us. I pray against a, an approach to your word that is governed by our emotion, governed by what we feel in the moment. Though you've created those feelings and emotions within us we really wanna come to your word and read it to understand what it truly means and not what we feel in the moment or what we feel is right or feel is fair. Help us to suspect our feelings even, and to choose to truly believe what your word says when we come to it. Lord your word needs no apology. And it, it demands none from us. It demands. Mission to it. And so we want to be those that submit and obey you completely and fully, and we need your spirit to enable us to do that. And so we ask for that in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Keep your Bibles tuning again tomorrow for another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. See you. Bye.

Yeah. I would agree with everything that you said

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