Judges 3 (Part 1) Bible Study / Podcast

Judges 3 as a Transition from Joshua to the Period of the Judges

Judges chapter 3. Let's do a quick review. There has been a transition from Joshua to Judges. The conquest of the land of Canaan is complete. Israel is dwelling in the land, but because of their failure to drive out all the remaining inhabitants, the Lord has determined that He is going to use the Canaanites.

He is going to use the inhabitants of the land to test His people. So in the first few verses of chapter 3, we see that the purpose of this testing is twofold. As we saw last week, one reason is to see if Israel would obey God.

The second purpose is so that the children of Israel would be tested or trained in the art of warfare. So those are the two reasons. Let's cover this morning. We're just going to do verses 1 through 11.

So this will be part one of Judges chapter 3, verses 1 through 11. Here we will be introduced to the first judge of Israel, a man named Othniel. Judges 3, 1 through 11. Now these are the nations.

Which the Lord left, that He might test Israel by them, that is, all who had not known any of the wars in Canaan. This was only so that the generations of the children of Israel might be taught to know war, at least those who had not formally known it.

Namely, five lords of the Philistines, all the Canaanites, the Sidonians, and the Hivites, who dwelt in Mount Lebanon, from Mount Baal Hermon to the entrance of Hamath. And they were left, that He might test Israel by them, to know whether they would obey the commandments of the Lord, which He had commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses.

Thus the children of Israel dwelt among the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. And they took their daughters to be their wives, and gave their daughters to their sons, and they served their gods.

So the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord. They forgot the Lord their God, and served the Baals and Asherahs. Therefore, the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel, and He sold them into the hand of Qushan Rishathayim, king of Mesopotamia.

And the children of Israel served Qushan Rishathayim eight years. When the children of Israel cried out to the Lord, the Lord raised up a deliverer for the children of Israel, who delivered them. Atheniel, the son of Kenaz, Caleb's younger brother.

The spirit of the Lord came upon him, and he judged Israel. He went out to war, and the Lord delivered Qushan Rishathayim, king of Mesopotamia, into his hand. And his hand prevailed over Qushan Rishathayim.

So the land had rest for 40 years. Then Atheniel, the son of Kenaz, died.

Types and Shadows in the Old Testament

Okay, so this is the first judge of Israel, this man named Atheniel. And remember, anytime we study the Old Testament, we must first understand the Old Testament is filled with types and shadows. For example, in the previous book, the book of Joshua, Joshua was clearly a type of Christ.

In the New Testament, when the Apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians, 1 Corinthians chapter 10, he pointed out how the stories about Israel were written for the instruction and admonition.

Of the church.

So what we want to do is we want to read these stories, understand them in their original context, and then make application for us today. So that Christians, as Christians, we might learn what to do and what not to do.

So Atheniel, we can assume, is a type of Christ. So these books, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 and 2 Samuel, this style of writing is considered historical narrative. So it's pretty straightforward and simple to understand.

When you get into the Psalms, that's more poetic, can be a little more challenging. And then when you get into the prophetic books of Isaiah and Ezekiel and Daniel, that's when it gets rather difficult.

But as for this, Judges chapter 3, what you see is what you get. This is pretty simple to understand. It's just telling you a story. And what's the story in Judges? Same thing over and over again. Israel disobeyed God.

The Lord delivers them into the hands of their enemies. They cry out to God for help. And then he raises up a judge. He raises up this man, Atheniel, to deliver them. And then the land, it says, has rest from war.

So in this way, Atheniel, he's a type of Christ because he is a deliverer. And another word, a synonym for deliverer, is a savior. So Atheniel is their savior. Not in the ultimate sense, obviously, but he is the savior of the people.

The Spirit of the Lord Came Upon Othniel

Now, there's one statement we're going to spend a little time on in just a few minutes. The statement in verse 10, very important to understand, very important. It's going to come up again and again in the book of Judges.

It says in verse 10, how the spirit of the Lord came upon him. So this is the charismatic gifting, which is sort of a misnomer, but this is the gifting of the Holy Spirit upon Atheniel that empowered him to do this or these great exploits for God.

And that's going to happen, of course, with Gideon. It's going to happen with Samson. The spirit of the Lord comes upon them and gives them almost superhuman ability. So Atheniel is sort of following in this line of charismatic leaders.

Moses was the most gifted, empowered mightily by God to work miracles. We read about that in the book of Exodus primarily, but also the book of Numbers. But then Joshua, Joshua was a charismatic, that is a gifted leader that has nothing to do with his charisma or his personality.

It's talking about the gifting of the Holy Ghost. That's what the word means. So first Moses and then Joshua, and now Atheniel, he's kind of in that line of Israelite leaders, just maybe to a lesser degree.

The Lord Tests His People Through Adversity

Now, before we go through these verses, I just want to give a hint at what the application.

Will be.

Normally we start out with the text. We read that. Then we give the original meaning, explain it in the original context. What would they have understood this to mean? And then we get to the application at the end, but just a little hint at what the application is going to be.

Who's the Lord testing? It says that the Canaanites were left in the land to test the Israelites. Many times throughout the Old Testament, you read about the congregation of Israel. And of course, that's what the word church means.

It means assembly or congregation. So if God tested his people in the Old Testament, will he not test his people in the New Testament.

As well?

Will he not test the church? And of course, I believe he is testing the church today. He tests us as individuals and he is testing the church. Uh, you could argue that he is, uh, allowing things to happen in our land to see whether or not we are going to be faithful.

And of course, God usually tests through adversity. And that's what's happening here in this chapter. So let's look at Judges chapter three, verse one, it begins. Now, these are the nations which the Lord left that he might test Israel by them.

That is all who had not known any of the wars in Canaan. So this would be a reference to the battles, the wars in Canaan, a reference to those battles, starting with the battle of Jericho onward. In order, I think we get this right in order for a military to be strong and effective, they need experience.

They need training. The United States has probably the best military on earth. And part of that is because we're always fighting somebody. Our soldiers are well-trained, but they have experience in battle.

So the generals know because they've been there and they've actually fought. So in order for Israel to be a strong nation, they need to be tested. They need to know warfare. So that's true with any military.

They need to actually fight in order to be a strong, tested military. Someone made a good point last week. They were talking about China, and we all know how China is a rising power in the world, and they have a large military.

I don't know, maybe their military, as far as the number of people in it, it could be bigger than ours. But one potential weakness is that they've never really done anything with it. So this is the point someone made and thought, yeah, that's true.

They've never truly been tested. Well, Israel was tested and they were strong. They drove out the majority of the Canaanites. They conquered the land of Canaan. They were tested. They were a strong, powerful military.

But over time, that could obviously change. So the point is, one reason God did not drive out the Canaanites is so that they would learn war. And then the other reason mentioned in verse 4, the Canaanites were left that God might test Israel to know whether or not they would obey his commandments.

So just think about it. There's somebody out there thinking this, so I'm just going to address it. This idea that God left them there to see whether or not Israel would obey. Someone's thinking to themselves, wait a minute, isn't God omniscient?

Doesn't God know all things? Even before something happens, doesn't he already know? So why does God need to do this? Doesn't he already know whether or not they're going to obey? And I would, of course, be inclined to say, yes.

Yes, God does know. So the testing, at the very least, is as much for them as it is for God. Think of Abraham when he was tested with the sacrificing of Isaac. I don't think God did it to learn any new information.

Abraham needed to have his faith tested to learn for himself. So the scripture says that God does this so that he would know. Doesn't he already know? I believe he does. But at the same time, that's what the Bible says.

So we have to accept it. So if you feel some theological, unresolved theological tension there, I just think we just let it be. Okay, so the Lord is testing his people. These are the five nations that are left.

Or these are the nation, the five lords of the Philistines. So there's five Philistine cities. So one ruler in each city. It mentions a couple other locations, this group and this group. Then it says all of the Canaanites.

So in other words, there are non-Israelites scattered all over the place.

They're everywhere.

The Influence of the Ungodly on God’s People

Now, the reason why the Lord told Israel to drive these people out is because the godly, here's the principle. The godly don't influence the ungodly as much as the ungodly influence the godly. Or to put it another way, Christians don't influence unbelievers as much as unbelievers influence Christians.

Well, all one has to do is take a survey of Christianity in America and, you know, who's having the bigger influence? The heathen or the church? Well, the church doesn't seem to be having that much of an influence.

So clearly the unbelievers have more of an influence. If you take a basket full of apples and you drop in one rotten apple, do the good apples make the rotten one good? Or does the rotten apple make the good ones bad?

We know the answer. So it's the same with the influence of God's people. If the heathen are dwelling in the midst of God's people, they're going to influence, you know, the Canaanites are going to influence the Israelites more than the other way around.

Or let's take a different situation because this there's many applications we could make. This is very important. Let's say a Christian marries an unbeliever, right? The Bible says you should not be unequally yoked, but people do it.

So let's say a Christian marries an unbeliever. Is the Christian going to turn the unbeliever into a follower of Christ? I mean, isn't that what people say? You know, I can change them. I know I can. Well, probably not.

I mean, it does happen, but generally that's not the way it goes. So what you had in Israel is a people in covenant with God. And part of God's law said that you are not to intermarry with the heathen.

You are not to marry people outside of the covenant. And God does know the future. And God does know what that leads to. And what does it lead to? The Canaanites, if they married the Israelites, the Israelites would become just like the Canaanites.

And that's exactly what happened. Look at verses five and six says, thus, the children of Israel dwelt among the Canaanites, the Hittites and the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites.

And they took their daughters to be their wives and gave their daughters to their sons. And what was the result? They served their gods. So they married the unbelievers in the land. And then because God's people married them, they started to adopt the Canaanite practices.

So what's the application? If you're a Christian and you're dating an unbeliever, either give them an ultimatum, say either convert or dump them. That's some pastoral advice.

Either.

And of course, even if they convert, are they sincere? So basically, you shouldn't be dating anyone who's not a believer. If you're a Christian, you should only date believers and certainly only marry believers.

And that's supposed to be the purpose of dating. So and but if you're already married to an unbeliever, the Bible, the New Testament is very clear on this. You are to stay with that person. Because over time, you can hope and pray that you do have a positive influence.

And again, that does that does happen. Okay, I'm done preaching about that.

But it's true.

All right.

So the children of Israel, they marry the unbelievers in the land. Verse seven says, so the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord. And they forgot the Lord, their God. And they served the Baals and the Asherahs.

Okay, so they adopted the Canaanite practices, then they adopted the Canaanite gods. So if you think of it this way, back then, if a Jewish woman married a Baal worshiper, do you think the Baal worshiper is going to lead his family to observe the Passover?

No, of course not. Is he going to teach his kids the law of Moses?

No.

The woman might, the mother might. But she's already started out on the wrong foot by violating God's law, marrying the unbeliever in the first place. So that sort of sets the tone going forward. So this is what happened.

When you blend the godly together with the ungodly, usually all you have left is ungodly. Therefore, verse eight, the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel. The anger of the Lord. So we learn in Judges chapter three that God gets angry.

And of course, this just flies in the face of most modern preaching, where pastors tell people that God just loves everybody and he loves everyone unconditionally. Of course, there's no verse in the Bible that says that, but that's sort of the narrative.

God is a God of love and he loves everyone unconditionally and that he has no anger or wrath, only love. Most modern preaching, because modern pastors don't typically teach verse by verse through the scripture, the result is that you only get half of the story.

This is why it's popular to have maybe a sermon series or just topical messages, because when you go verse by verse through the Bible, you have to deal with these things. You come across verses like this, that God, the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel, and that just contradicts the narrative that God is only love.

So is God love? Yes, but God also has anger and wrath. Does God love Israel? Because remember, he's going to punish Israel. He's going to deliver them into the hands of the king of Mesopotamia, and he's going to afflict them.

Does God love his people? I mean, if God loves the Israelites, why would he allow this? Well, he allows it because he loves them. Another principle in scripture says, for whom the Lord loves, he chastens.

God punished Israel because he loved them. He did it to correct their bad behavior. It's like when a parent disciplines their child. Maybe they spank their child. If they're doing it right, it's done so that they will be taught to be well-behaved, to fear God, to honor their parents so that their days may be long upon the land.

That's the fifth commandment. The only commandment or the first one with a promise. Obey or honor your father and mother that your days be long upon the land. That's what God wants for his people. He loves them, and because he loves them, he disciplines them because he wants what's best for them.

So, when Israel disobeys, God brings correction. He brings the rod of correction, and he does it by allowing them to be conquered by the king of Mesopotamia. One thing we can be certain of, the king of Mesopotamia definitely does not love the Israelites.

So, he treats them with cruelty. God treats them with chastening, but it's coming from a good place. Okay, so Israel is brought under the thumb of the king of Mesopotamia, and it says they became his servants for eight years.

Just imagine if another country invaded our country, and we came under the oppression of a foreign government, and we had to serve this dictator for eight years. Sometimes it was a lot longer than that.

It would just change your whole life. Everything you had, your security, all your hopes and your plans, it would just be brought to nothing. So, and it doesn't give all the details of, did the king of Mesopotamia kill the Israelites?

We assume that he killed some. Did he enslave them? How did he treat them? It was a bad time. And it was so bad that it led the Israelites to cry out to God. So, it's then and only then, under this severe oppression, that they cry out to God.

And because Israel cries out to God, it's then and only then that the Lord raises up Othniel to rescue them. So, who is Othniel? Othniel, again, he's the first judge. He is a man filled and empowered by God, the Holy Spirit.

But we've read about him in the past. I think he was mentioned first in the book of Judges, or excuse me, the book of Joshua. And we know about Othniel. He is the nephew of Caleb. And remember, he's also the son-in-law of Caleb.

So, he's an important man from an important family. And he is raised up by God to judge or to govern Israel. So, Othniel is their leader. He, like Moses, is called a deliverer. And that word deliverer, as I said a little while ago, it's a synonym for the term savior.

So, salvation and deliverance, it means the same thing. A deliverer is a type of savior. What did Othniel do? He saved the physical nation of Israel. Just like Jesus saves the spiritual nation of the church.

Different type of salvation. But Othniel, in this sense, is a type of Christ. Othniel saved from the bondage of slavery and oppression. Jesus saves from slavery and the oppression brought on by sin. Jesus, of course, is called what?

He's called the Christ, meaning the anointed of God. How is Jesus anointed? He was anointed by the power of the Holy Spirit. And we see the same thing regarding Othniel. Look at verse 10. It says, the spirit of the Lord came upon him.

So, this marked the special office of the judges. The Holy Spirit of God gave the judges, again, at times, this almost extraordinary strength, wisdom, power, intellect to do these great things for God.

One commentator says this. The spirit, that is the Holy Spirit at this point, is not realized as a distinct personality, but rather is the spirit of Jehovah in, or excuse me, the spirit at this point is not realized as a distinct personality, but rather is the spirit of Jehovah and is Jehovah himself in operation.

So, in the New Testament, of course, we start to see the teachings of the Trinity emerge where the spirit is a distinct person within the Godhead. But here in the Old Testament, it's just not that clear.

But speaking of the Holy Spirit, what did he do? In the Old Testament, he would come upon certain people. So, here he's coming upon Othniel. Later in Israel's history, in the time of the kings, the spirit of the Lord came upon Saul.

The spirit of the Lord came upon David. You remember when the spirit came upon Saul, what did Saul do? It says he began to prophesy. And the people were astonished by this. And they said, is Saul among the prophets?

And it says that God gave Saul a new heart. And then David, when he was anointed by oil, or with oil, by Samuel the prophet, oil being symbolic of the Holy Ghost, it says that the spirit of the Lord came upon David.

The great difference, of course, between David and Saul is that the spirit departed from Saul. As we will read later on in Judges, the spirit comes upon Samson. Samson does have superhuman strength. But because of sin, the spirit will also depart from Samson.

And that's one of the saddest statements in all of Scripture, where it says the spirit of the Lord departed from him and he knew it not. But this is part of the spirit's ministry in the Old Testament.

He would come upon a man, but he would also leave. The spirit's ministry in the New Testament, however, after the day of Pentecost, the spirit comes in a new way to gift and empower, just like he's doing here, but in the New Covenant.

And here's why the New Covenant is so much greater. When the spirit comes in the New Covenant, he comes to stay. He comes to permanently indwell the believer. And give them and give us the gifts of the spirit.

And of course, in the book of Acts, the spirit gives the apostles the ability to discern, to heal, to teach, and to speak with other tongues. I mentioned the word charismatic before. And I think when people hear the word charismatic in a religious context, that's typically what they think of miracles.

And but the average person, when they hear the word charismatic, they think of someone who has a charismatic personality. You know, they're charming. Well, that's not what the term in this context means.

The charisma here is the gifting of God, the Holy Spirit. So the Holy Spirit comes upon Othniel to empower him for the work of the ministry. Now, this empowerment is one more comment on the New Testament gifting of the spirit.

In the New Testament, the giving of the spiritual gifts, we think of them as relating to spiritual things. You know, preaching, teaching, administration, you know, in the church, the gift of mercy. But here, it's interesting.

When Othniel is given power by the Holy Spirit, what is he given power to do? Well, he's given power to make war. Verse 10 says, The Spirit of the Lord came upon him, and he judged Israel, and he went out to battle.

He went out to war. And the Lord delivered Cushan Rishitham, king of Mesopotamia, into his hand. And the hand in his hand prevailed over Cushan Rishitham, so that the land had rest for 40 years. Then Othniel, the son of Kenaz, died.

So, it has been pointed out that the Old Testament deals more with earthly things, and the New Testament deals more with heavenly things. So, the Old Testament deals with earthly things. The land had rest.

The judges delivered a physical nation. But remember, all of this points forward to spiritual things. And it's in the New Testament that the types and shadows are fulfilled in Christ. Jesus is the judge, or the deliverer, of the spiritual nation known as the church.

That's what Peter calls the church, a spiritual nation. And the saving, or the delivering, that Jesus does…. You know, Othniel is fighting physical battles, right? We're fighting spiritual battles. But the delivering that Othniel does, he saves the nation.

But the saving Jesus does, he saves souls, making us fit for heaven above. Of course, Jesus does save physical lives from destruction. There's a lot of people who are on the path to destruction, both spiritually and physically.

And when they give their life to Christ, they're saved from both. But that's the spiritual fulfillment of Othniel, the judges, the delivering. Jesus does that in a spiritual sense. So, based on all of this….

And again, this is just part one of our Judges chapter 3 study. Lord willing, we'll pick up again in this chapter next week. But before we end, what is the application? We've read the text. We see what it says.

We're trying to explain it in the original context, what it meant for them back then. But what's the application for us? I would like to read what Matthew Henry says about Judges 3, 1 through 7. He says, "...as the Israelites were a type of the church on earth, they were not to be idle and slothful.

The Lord was pleased to test them by the remains of the nations they spared. Temptations and trials detect the wickedness of the hearts of sinners and strengthen the graces of believers in their daily conflict with Satan, sin, and this evil world.".

So, speaking of believers, he says, "...they must live in this world, but they are not to be of it, and are forbidden to conform to it.". The marks, this marks the difference between the followers of Christ and mere professors.

So, in conclusion, by leaving the ungodly Canaanites in the land, the Lord, you could say, was separating the wheat from the tares. The true Israelites who loved God, they stayed loyal to the covenant.

But the false converts in Israel, what did they do? They married the heathen. They adopted their practices. And they conformed to the ways of the world. So, this ends our study part 1 of Judges chapter 3.

And given that application, I'd like to close with Paul's words to the church in Romans 12, 1 and 2. He says, "...I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service, and do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.".