be seated. Good morning. My name is Matthew Capone, and I'm the pastor here at Cheyenne
Mountain Presbyterian Church, and it's my joy to bring God's Word to you today. A special
welcome. If you're new or visiting with us, we're glad that you're here, and we're glad
that you're here not because we're trying to fill seats, but because we're following
Jesus together as one community. And as we follow Jesus together, we've become convinced
that there's no one so good, they don't need God's grace, and no one so bad that they can't
have it, which is why we come back week after week to hear what God has to say to us in His
Word. We're continuing this week our series in the book of Judges, and you'll remember
that the book of Judges is about many things. It's about the need for constant revival and
renewal among God's people. It's about the need for a true and faithful king, a king
who can do what no human king can do, which is to change the hearts of men, and it's about
the power of spirit-enabled leadership. You'll also remember that the Judges, as we think about
the story of God's people in the Old Testament, come after they've been rescued from Egypt,
but before God gives them kings. So this is before King Saul, after their wanderings in the
wilderness, after God's brought them out of slavery in Egypt, and they are supposed to be
doing what was started in the book of Joshua. Joshua went with them to take the promised
land, and so they're supposed to finish what they started of clearing out the nations.
Two weeks ago, at the very beginning, we saw the first introduction to the book of Judges,
and the problem there was that there was partial, not complete obedience. God's people failed
to remember His power in the past, and they also failed to trust His promises for the present
in the future. In other words, they refused to take God at His word. And then last week,
we saw the second introduction where we had the lost generation. Things were good as long
as Joshua and the elders with him were alive, but as soon as they died, things went off the rails.
And so we talked about the challenge and the opportunity and the responsibility of passing
on our faith to the next generation.
Now, that catches us up to where we are at this week, and we left on an ominous note last week.
You may remember verse 15 said this,
And they were in terrible distress, which is a little bit of a cliffhanger. And you'll remember
they're in terrible distress for a variety of reasons. They're in terrible distress because
they had forsaken the Lord. And then in that same verse, verse 15, it says,
the hand of the Lord was against them. That means that the question this week is,
how is Israel going to get out of this mess? They are in terrible distress.
How are they going to get out of it? What's going to be the solution to their problem?
And we're going to see three things this morning. We're going to talk about first, hard hearts.
We're going to see a merciful God. And then we will also at the end see a greater judge.
Hard hearts, merciful God, and greater judge. It's with that I invite you to turn with me now
to God's Word. You can turn in your worship guide. You can turn on your phone. You can open up your Bible.
No matter where you turn, remember that this is God's Word. And God reminds us that His Word
is more precious than gold, even the finest gold. And it's sweeter than honey, even honey that comes
straight from the honeycomb, which is why we read now Judges 2, starting at verse 16.
Then the Lord raised up judges who saved them out of the hand of those who plundered them.
Yet they did not listen to their judges, for they whored after other gods and bowed down to them.
They soon turned aside from the way in which their fathers had walked,
who had obeyed the commandments of the Lord, and they did not do so.
Verse 18.
Whenever the Lord raised up judges for them, the Lord was with the judge,
and He saved them from the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge.
For the Lord was moved to pity by their groaning because of those who afflicted and oppressed them.
But whenever the judge died, they turned back and were more corrupt than their fathers,
going after other gods, serving them, and bowing down to them.
They did not drop any of their practices or their stubborn ways.
So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel.
And He said,
Because this people have transgressed My covenant that I commanded their fathers and have not obeyed My voice,
I will no longer drive out before them any of the nations that Joshua left when he died,
in order to test Israel by them whether they will take care to walk in the way of the Lord as their fathers did or not.
So the Lord left those nations, not driving them out quickly,
and He did not give them into the hand of Joshua.
Before the testing of Israel to know whether Israel would obey the commandments of the Lord,
which He commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses.
So the people of Israel lived among the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.
And their daughters they took to themselves for wives, and their own daughters they gave to their sons,
and they served their gods.
I invite you to pray with me as we come to this portion of God's Word.
Our Father in Heaven, we thank You again, as we do every week, that You speak to us in Your Word.
We ask that You would do it again this week,
that You would show us clearly and precisely our need for Your mercy and Your grace.
And You would also show us that You meet us at that very same need,
that You would challenge us and encourage us,
that we would see Your love and Your power and Your authority and Your mercy
towards men and women like us.
Most of all, we ask that You would show us Jesus Christ,
that we would see and know His glory and His beauty.
And we ask these things in the mighty name of Jesus Christ.
Amen.
In 1999, a young man named Christopher Miller decided to walk into Stride Wright,
a shoe store, on Hooper Avenue in Toms River, New Jersey,
because he wanted to steal.
So he did that.
He tied up the employees, he put them in the back room,
and he made out with some cash.
Now, he was arrested shortly thereafter,
and he ended up serving 15 years in prison.
Now, that's relatively boring.
Robbery happens all the time.
People end up in prison all the time.
What's interesting about this story is not how it began, but how it ended.
So, 1999, he starts his 15-year prison sentence.
He's released in 2014, 15 years later.
He is now not 25 years old, he is 40 years old.
What is the first thing that he does when he's released from prison?
Well, he takes a bus.
He goes to the Stride Wright shoe store on Hooper Avenue in Toms River, New Jersey,
and robs it again.
In fact, he tries to have an almost identical robbery.
And just like the previous robbery, he's quickly arrested again.
And so they ask the police chief, why do you think this happened?
And he said, well, maybe that's the only life he knows.
Maybe he's become so used to prison, he wants to return again.
Of course, that's simply a guess, right?
That's a theory.
That's why the police chief says maybe.
There's one thing we know for sure.
Prison restrained him.
It did not change him.
Prison restrained him.
It did not change them.
Remember, I told you the question of this passage is,
what is going to happen to Israel?
They are in a mess.
How are they going to get out?
And the answer is this.
They're not.
Israel is not going to get out of their mess,
at least not permanently,
because they are going to return to the same thing over and over and over.
In fact, it's such a pattern that it's become known
in the studies of Judges as the Judges cycle.
God's people will be restrained.
They will not be changed.
We're reminded of the problem at the very end of last week's passage.
Remember verse 15?
And they were in great distress.
Of course, this is because they were passed by the nations around them.
And so that problem requires a solution.
We meet the solution at the very beginning of this passage.
Verse 16,
Then the Lord raised up Judges.
Now, when we talk about Judges,
it's important to have clarity on what they are and what they are not.
You have a quote on the back of your worship guide,
which I'll briefly summarize for you, which is this.
When we think about Judges in the Old Testament,
we are not talking about people in black robes who sit in courtrooms.
When we talk about Judges in the Old Testament,
we are talking about military leaders.
And that makes sense,
because the problem and the solution need to go together.
The problem is that they are oppressed by other nations.
What would the solution then be?
It would be that they would have someone to rescue them from that oppression.
They would have a military leader who would be able to rise up
and fight against the nations that are holding them down.
So the solution fits the problem, right?
You're oppressed.
You need a rescuer to deliver you.
Notice, though, that we're not told about a judge.
We are told about Judges, plural.
In fact, that occurs in three verses in a row.
Verse 16, Judges.
Verse 17, Judges.
Verse 18, Judges.
Which is to tell us the author is not describing one event.
He is describing many events.
He is telling us about what happened over and over again.
Because, of course, these judges were not all serving simultaneously.
It's not as if Deborah was doing her thing,
and at the exact same time Othniel was working,
and then also Shamgar was doing something.
No.
These are judges that serve at different places in different times.
In fact, the book of Judges covers at least 200 years of history.
So the author is telling us here this is a pattern.
This is what happens over and over again.
We are getting, at the very beginning,
before we talk about any individual judge, an overview.
We are getting a look at what the rest of the book is going to show us.
And, in fact, it is not encouraging or heartening.
Because the pattern is this.
Verse 17 tells us,
Yet they did not listen to their judges,
for they whored after other gods and bowed down to them.
Didn't listen.
Went after other gods.
Now, we talked about this a little bit a week or two ago.
If you are not a Christian, you might be wondering,
Okay, well, why should we really be that worried
that they are turning after other gods?
Some people are religious.
Some people are not religious.
And maybe Christians should be a little less uptight
about who worships what God.
Because really, we are all just trying to get along.
And to that, I will tell you the same thing I told you last week,
which is this.
Everyone worships something.
We cannot escape the reality of religion.
We are told, verse 11 from last week,
They did evil in the sight of the Lord.
When we worship anyone other than the triune God,
the true and living God of the Bible,
it will lead to evil.
It will lead to destruction.
If you worship money,
you will choose profit over people.
You will destroy those around you.
In fact, you only need to look at the news
to see this happening all the time.
If you worship sexual experiences,
you will choose pleasure over respect for other people.
You will choose the convenience of adults
over the needs of children,
sometimes over their lives.
You will idolize the young,
and you'll discard the old.
If you worship radical autonomy,
then you'll get to experience incredible isolation.
You'll see deaths of despair,
and at its most extreme,
we get to see the mutilation of people's bodies.
When we worship anything other than the true God,
destruction and evil follow.
And so that's what Israel experiences over and over.
They cannot, you cannot,
worship other gods
and expect everything to turn out fine.
Other gods can't and won't deliver on their promises,
and so we talked about this last week.
Verse 14, what happened?
Plunderers came and plundered them.
That's what always happens
when we turn away from the true God.
If you don't worship God,
what do you worship?
Because I guarantee you
that you worship something.
If this is not your religion,
what are you religious about?
Because I know you are religious.
Everyone worships something.
And so that's the problem
that the Israelites have worked themselves into.
It's a problem, in fact,
that's even worse than that.
A couple commentators point out,
really, pattern is not the right word
to use for what happens in the judges.
It is not, in fact, a pattern.
It is a spiral.
And it's a spiral that heads down.
We see this in verse 19.
Whenever the judge died,
they turned back and were more corrupt.
They did not drop any of their practices
or their stubborn ways.
In other words,
things get worse every cycle.
Things become more wicked,
judge after judge.
We'll come back to that next week.
We're going to see Othniel
as the first judge.
He's the best judge.
That's not a coincidence.
Because things start out good
and they get worse.
The worst chapters of judges
are going to be at the very end.
And so chapter 2, verse 19,
is a critical verse
for understanding
how the book of Judges functions.
It starts out not so great
and ends up really terrible.
And it's going to get worse
judge after judge after judge.
And so that's an interpretive key.
It's a paradigm
for understanding the entire book.
They're more corrupt.
They did not drop their practices
or their stubborn ways.
So what do we learn?
What does this teach us
at the end of chapter 2
and the beginning of chapter 3?
First, it shows us this.
We need a leader
who is more powerful
than a mere man.
We need a leader
who is more powerful
than a mere man.
Because these judges,
they're able, again,
remember,
they're able to restrain.
They're not able to change.
The judges are able
to hold things back.
They're not able
to fix the problem.
That's why I told you earlier,
what is the solution
to Israel's problem?
There isn't ultimately a fix.
Things actually get worse.
And so as we look
at these judges,
as we head through the book,
in what sense
are we going to see
these men as models?
Well, we're going to see them
as models
in a certain sense,
but a very narrow sense.
We're going to see them
as models
in as much
as they rely on God.
Okay?
In as much
as they cling
to God and His power.
In fact,
we see that
in verse 18 here.
Whenever the Lord
raised up judges for them,
the Lord
was with the judge.
These men
are not powerful enough,
and they are only powerful
as God is with them.
These men
are not powerful enough,
and they are only powerful
when God is with them.
In other words,
we don't
and we cannot
put our hope
in men.
We don't
and we cannot
put our hope
in earthly leaders.
We don't
and we cannot
put our hope
in pastors
and elders
and deacons
and our women leaders.
leaders.
Because no matter
how good
we might be,
we cannot
change
the hearts
of men.
We are not
powerful
enough.
And so we see
first
that men,
that leaders,
that humans
are insufficient.
The judges
are not going
to be enough
to fix Israel.
Second thing
we see
is this.
we must
have
radical
heart
change.
We must
have
radical
heart
change
or
we
will
keep
destroying
ourselves.
In fact,
this cuts
against
the religious
mindset.
One summary
of the gospel
goes like this.
If you are
religious,
then you'll
say,
be good
like I'm
good.
be good
like I'm
good.
If you're
not
religious,
you might
say,
well,
we just
each need
to find
our own
good.
The gospel
says something
quite different.
It says,
no one is
good,
only God
is good.
No one
is good,
only God
is good.
We're
reminded
of our
need
for a
radical
heart
change.
The
religious
person
says,
be good
like I'm
good.
The
non-religious
person
says,
find your
own
good.
The gospel
says,
no one
is good,
only God
is good.
I've told
you before,
embracing
the gospel
means admitting
two things.
First,
I know
I must
change,
and
second,
I cannot
change
myself.
I know
I must
change,
and I
cannot
change
myself.
The book
of Judges
shows us
that with
tremendous
clarity.
Verse 19,
they became
more
corrupt.
They kept
to their
stubborn
ways.
They did
not drop
any
of their
practices.
Do you
know
that you
need
a radical
change
in your
heart?
do you
know
that you
cannot
bring
about
that
change
yourself?
You
must
know
those
two
things
to be
able
to
embrace
the
gospel.
You
must
know
those
two
things
for
Jesus
to be
more
than
a
good
teacher.
If
you're
not a
Christian,
are you
honest
enough
to be
able to
say that
the evil
in the
world is
not just
evil
that's
out
there?
Are you
honest
enough to
say that
it's
also
evil
that's
in
here?
do
you
know
that
the
problems
of
the
world
include
you?
That's
the bad
news
of the
gospel.
The
bad
news
is that
we
must
change
and
we
cannot
change
ourselves.
Being
a
Christian
is
not
merely
about
believing
certain
things
and
it
is
not
merely
about
living
in a
certain
way.
Although
there are
things we
believe
and there
is a
way of
life to
being a
Christian.
Being a
Christian is
about much
more than
that.
It's
something
deeper
than
that.
It is
about
recognizing
that you
need a
supernatural
work in
your life
that can
only be
brought about
by God's
power.
It is
recognizing
that only
the Spirit
of God
is great
enough
to bring
the change
that you
need.
It is
realizing
that Paul
is correct
in Ephesians
chapter 1
when he
says the
same power
that raised
Christ from
the dead
is the
power that's
at work
in you.
And
knowing
that
resurrection
power is
the only
power that's
enough to
change our
hearts.
people of
Israel
must
change.
People of
Israel
cannot
change
themselves
and we
don't see
them admit
that in
this passage.
In this
whole book
the people
of Israel
actually need
more than
a judge
because a
mere man
is not
powerful
enough.
That brings
us to our
second point.
Remember I
told you
first we
would talk
about hard
hearts and
second a
merciful God.
And our
question at the
beginning was
what would be
the solution
to the
problem in
which Israel
finds themselves?
And we've
seen verse
16 God
giving the
judges is
actually not
a solution.
yes verse
15 and
they were
in great
distress and
for the rest
of the book
and especially
at the end
they are going
to be in
terrible
distress.
And so
what's God
going to
do?
Well
part of what
we see here
is what we
don't see.
Between
verses 15
and 16
there is
something
that's
missing.
Verse 15
and they
were in
terrible
distress
verse 16
God
raised up
judges.
What step
did we
skip?
Nowhere
does it
say that
Israel
repented
and turned
from their
sinful ways.
In other
words
God
shows
mercy
on his
people
because
he's a
merciful
God.
God
has
mercy
on
his
people
even
as
they're
turning
away
from
him.
We
find out
the reason
in verse
18.
Whenever
the Lord
raised up
judges
for them
the Lord
was with
the judge
and he
saved them
from the
hand of
their enemies
all the
days of
the judge
because
they were
really
sorry
and they
repented.
No
it doesn't
say that.
God
rescues
his
people
because
of his
mercy
on them.
This
groaning
language
appears
only two
other times
in the
Old Testament
and it
appears in
the book
of Exodus
when God's
people are
crying out
in Egypt.
This is
rescue
from slavery
language.
God
rescues
his
people
because
and only
because
of his
great love
and his
great mercy.
God
continues
to pursue
his people
even when
they are
running
from him.
And so
what Paul
says in
2 Timothy
chapter 2
verse 13
is correct.
If we
are faithless
he remains
faithful
for he
cannot
deny
himself.
God
in his
grace
returns
to his
hard-hearted
people
over
and over
again.
Christian
God
returns
to you
in your
hard-heartedness
over
and over
again.
We have
hard hearts
and we
also have
a merciful
God.
Now
this raises
attention
for us.
If God
is a
God of
justice
how is
it that
he is
able to
show
mercy
for people
with
hard
hearts?
One of the
things we
see in
the judge's
pattern
or the
judge's
spiral
is that
the judges
are able
to tap
the brakes.
So if
we think
of Israel
as a
runaway
car,
the judges
are able
for a
time to
get in
the driver's
seat and
slow things
down.
Here's what the
judges don't
do though.
They never
turn the
car around.
I've told
you before
that's what
repentance is.
Repentance
is a
180 degree
turn.
So that
leaves us
with another
question.
How is
the car
going to
get turned
around?
If it
starts out
bad in
Judges
chapter 1
and gets
extremely
terrible in
chapters 19
through 21,
what is
the answer
to the
end of
Judges?
The answer
is simple.
We need
a greater
judge.
We need
a judge
who is
more powerful
than a
mere man.
We need
a judge
who can
do more
than tap
the brakes.
We need
a judge
who can
turn around
the car.
And it's
not until
long after
Judges is
over and
the period
of the
Kings has
passed
that we
meet the
true
and
greater
judge.
Of course,
the true
and greater
judge is
our Lord
Jesus.
He comes
and shows
mercy in
the way
that God
shows mercy
in this
passage.
He comes
for those
who need
to change
but are
unable to
change
themselves.
That's why
Jesus told
us in
Mark 2,
those who
are well
have no
need of a
physician but
those who
are sick.
I came
not to
call the
righteous
but sinners.
sinners.
And it's
in Jesus
that we
see how
God has
mercy on
those who
have not
yet repented.
That's what
Paul tells us
in Romans
chapter 5.
But God
shows his
love for
us in
that while
we were
still sinners,
Christ died
for us.
And how
does Jesus
do it?
how does
he have
mercy on
stubborn
people who
are running
away?
How does
he change
hearts that
are hearts
of stone and
make them
into hearts
of flesh?
Well, he
does it in
the way we
looked at in
the Gospel
of Mark.
He comes,
he becomes
not just
God but
also man,
100% God
and 100%
man.
He lives
the perfect
life that we
should have
lived and
he takes
the punishment
that we
deserved.
He does
not leave
things hanging
in injustice.
He does
not let
the guilty
get away.
Instead,
he takes
the punishment
himself on
the cross.
Jesus is
the greater
judge that's
able to bring
together people
with hard
hearts,
people like
you and
me,
and God's
great mercy.
will you
ask him
to change
your heart?
Will you
trust a
judge who
is more
powerful than
any man?
Let's pray.
Our Father
in heaven,
we praise
you and
thank you
that you
have not
left us
to our
own devices.
You
haven't
left us
to our
hard hearts
as we
return to
sin over
and over
again,
but instead
you've
sent Jesus
who's more
powerful than
a judge or
a mere man,
and who's
more loving,
who has
compassion on
the groanings
of his
people and
comes and
dies on
their behalf.
We ask
that you
would be
at work
in this
community,
that you
would change
our hearts
and make
them ever
true,
that they
would be
soft and
tender towards
you and
your word,
that we
would be
quick to
repent and
fast to
follow you,
that we
do this
because of
our Lord
and Savior,
Jesus Christ.
We ask
these things
in his
mighty name.
Amen.