Male Dereliction (Part A)

We are disturbed when we see our children, for example, begin to have their innocence taken away by being exposed to things that are not right to unrighteousness, to lewdness, to immorality.

We are concerned as parents, or even if we're not a parent, we are concerned on behalf of others, because we recognize that, again, there are internal and there are external influences, and together they can completely wipe us out. This is Cross-Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher, Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of Judges.

Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about Cross-Reference Radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. But for now, let's join Pastor Rick in the book of Judges, Chapter 4, as he begins a new message called Male Dereliction. If you're familiar with Judges, Chapter 4, you know that Deborah is the one that everybody points to, and not wrong in doing that, because she stood in the gap, took care of business. But I don't think that's the message from the Holy Spirit in the times that these events took place in, and even in our day, and I hope to bring some of this out.

Let's review the cast of characters. There is, of course, Yahweh. He is referred to eight times by name as Yahweh here in this chapter. Jabin, the king of the Canaanites, he's mentioned seven times, he with his nine hundred chariots. Then there is Sisera, the captain of Jabin's army. He's mentioned 13 times in this chapter, more than anybody else.

That is significant. Deborah, the Jewish judge, the prophetess, a great woman of faith, she's mentioned five times. And Barak, the general, he's mentioned ten times. So Sisera the general for the Canaanites and Barak the general for the Israelites, they are mentioned the most.

That emphasis is intentional and it's meaningful. Barak will raise up 10,000 men very quickly, and then that will go into 40,000 men. At the end of the chapter, we meet Heber, who traded from his people and sided with the Canaanites. He's mentioned four times.

And his wife, Jaal, she is mentioned four times also. So the center, again, is on the two men, Sisera and Barak, forever warning men to do their duty. This is a rebuke to men who are derelict in carrying out their assignment as given by the Lord, not necessarily to be leaders, but to do their duty. Character is built by thought and action. And when the character is built through thought and action, duty is taken care of.

It is not neglected, certainly not as a routine. And as I look around all these years, I've come across quite a few men who need to learn what duty means, but I've also come across a lot of men who fully understand what it means, and they do get the job done. Verse 1, when Eud was dead, the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord. Well, Eud's death dates the chapter for us.

He was the architect of Israel's 80 years of peace, the longest stretch they had. Shamgar, however, is the last judge that is mentioned at the end of the previous chapter in verse 31 of chapter 3. We would expect to have read when Shamgar was dead, but that's not how it is given to us. And this, of course, suggests to us that Shamgar delivered the people during the days of Eud, and Eud likely outlived him. And when Eud died, the people drifted from that 80 years of peace that God had given them through their deliverer, their lesser Eud. And then it goes on here in verse 1, the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of Yahweh. This is soon after the death of Eud and Shamgar. They leaped back into idolatry.

They leaped into it. There was an eagerness about it. It comes off the pages and judges and kings alike, tailspinning into idolatrous practice. These idolatrous practices became routine.

This tailspin was routine. You could count on them doing it, but quick is God's response here. He turns them over to their enemies. One of the lessons out of this is if believers tolerate unbiblical ideas about God, which idolatry is, that even Christians, if they tolerate such ideas, run a high risk of going the way of apostate Israel too. Defectors into the enemy's camp.

That's what it amounts to. When the judge died, the people, their faith died with him, and they defected from God to the fake gods. Verse 2, so Yahweh sold them into the hand of Jabin, king of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor.

The commander of his army was Sisera, who dwelt in Huarasheth. Who wants to read that again? Listen, just because there's nobody here doesn't mean we're not going to be funny. Holiness to the Lord. It meant very little to this next generation. Holiness to bow. That's what started to mean something to them. But holiness to the Lord always means holiness to the Lord.

To him, to God, it is very important. This little village, this place, or this area, not little necessarily, Hazor, a fortified city, eight miles to the north of the Sea of Galilee. Joshua had dealt with a king named Jabin, also in Canaan, which tells us that the name Jabin is likely a title, like Pharaoh or Abimelech or king, and not necessarily his name. Just a side note, looking back at what has already happened to them, for eight years they were in servitude to the Mesopotamian king. And then for 18 years, Eglon, the king of Moab, had ruled over the Jewish people that lived in Canaan. Both of those enemies were foreign. Well, they were outside of the promised land, from Mesopotamia, up by the Euphrates River, the Tigris River, and Moab to the east of Jordan. But Jabin, this king of the Canaanites, he is coming out of the land, promised land itself. So one of the lessons is, as you read these stories and we apply them to our lives, is that we have to war against outside influences, bodily influences, as well as internal influences. Both would enslave us just as quick as the one as quick as the other. And we are disturbed when we see our children, for example, begin to have their innocence taken away by being exposed to things that are not right, to unrighteousness, to lewdness, to immorality.

We are concerned as parents, or even if we're not a parent, we are concerned on behalf of others because we recognize that, again, there are internal and there are external influences and together they can completely wipe us out. The commander of his army, it says here in verse 2, was Sisera. Now the story we'll read, as I mentioned, Sisera is mentioned 13 times, the story we'll read as if he is the real power in Canaan. Jabin, the king, Sisera, the commander of the king's armies. In fact, when Deborah writes her ballad or ode in chapter 5, she mentions Sisera but not Jabin, which is an indication that he was the threat. From the Canaanite point of view, Sisera was doing his duty, doing what he was supposed to do, he was where he was supposed to be.

Of course, not from God's perspective. Who dwelt in Harosheth Hagoiam, that's Sisera's home, near Galilee, verse 3, and the children of Israel cried out to Yahweh, for Jabin had 900 chariots of iron and for 20 years he had harshly oppressed the children of Israel. That idea of harsh oppression is not something that we should just dismiss. These Israelites had brought this on themselves and it peaked. This was a Goliath situation as a people go, as military commander who would oppose these oppressors goes. Jabin had decades to amass these chariots, to forge them and put his army with them, while the Jews were simply living in the land and falling backwards into, or falling into apostasy. And he mechanized his army. Israel, here's the lesson, Israel allowed the flesh to get strong. So now he has 900 chariots.

Why didn't they just continue to press against the enemy? The flesh, that's why the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. For 20 years he oppressed the children of Israel harshly. Did any of them blame God? I wonder if anyone said, how could Yahweh do this to us? This is why I worship Ashtoreth or Baal. Well, if they did, they had their own full-hearted approach or response to their circumstances that they brought on themselves. It's like shooting yourself in the foot and blaming the gun maker. Verse 4, Now Deborah, a prophetess, wife of Lippidoth, was judging Israel at that time.

Deborah, the name means bee, like the honey bee. Now, it is Satan who causes and inflames male-female gender competition and the abuses and the things that cause a man to be derelict in his duty and a woman to not be the helpmate she should be there. I'm not trying to simplify it, I'd be here all day trying to list all the ways we sinners can come up with not doing what we're supposed to do. But we have to point this out because in our society we have the systematic emasculation of men and we have a lot of men helping them right along with it. We have this idea that men and women have equal roles according to God.

They do not. They are equal in value to God. God values a man's soul just as much as a woman's soul and we are to have that same value.

But the roles are different and they are different not only by assignment but biologically. Though the Frankenstein scientists are trying to reverse that and that's pretty creepy and spooky and nonetheless it's going on. And so none of what I am about to say is a slight on women and that I even have to say that is an indication of the damage that the world has already been allowed to have against how we think as people of God. But I intend to back it all up with scripture. We are attacked by those who don't care for what God's plans are and that's on them.

That's not on us and we must not cave to that ever. She was a prophetess. That means she was spirit-filled. That means God spoke to her and through her.

In a male-dominated society, male domination in this context, in this context, does not mean that the men were to be oppressors. They often became that way and are that way but that is not God's intention. This was God's grace on the people of Israel and a humiliation upon the men of Israel for not being who they were supposed to be.

And it's going to come out further by Barak himself. He's going to make this point for me. God has a plan A, but the people weren't ready for plan A. God could not find a leader amongst the men. So he had to go to the women and thank God he found Deborah.

Well, thank him. That's plan B. Just because there is a plan B doesn't mean we need to seek it. We would not encourage our children to say, well, as long as you pass the class, that's all I want. Well, maybe in certain circumstances a child may not have the aptitude and of course you go to plan B.

Plan A is of course to max out, to get the highest result that you can. Isaiah the prophet much later comes along and he is rebuking the people, God through the prophet. And he points this out in a rebuke in Isaiah chapter 3. God speaking says, as for my people, children are their oppressors. Something is very wrong with that. Children are not supposed to be oppressors. I mean, they could be pests.

No, quite no point. And no one in their right mind would dispute that. But that is a far cry from being an oppressor, especially in this context. He continues, children are their oppressors and women rule over.

Women rule over the men. God is saying, this is not how I planned it. This is not going to work for you or for them. This is going to be bad for both of you, male and female, for the family.

It's going to be bad. He says, oh my people, those who lead you cause you to err and destroy the way of your paths. That's profound for us living in an age where, again, emasculation of masculinity, which sounds like a redundancy but it's not, has gone wild. For God, again, to give his people a woman judge was to treat them like children. They had behaved spiritually like children and they needed a mother. Men can be too hard on young boys and it's good for boys to have a good mother, a buffer.

Come on, boy, why can't you do it? We're expecting them to be men long before it's time. It is exactly where they were when it came to spiritual things in need of a mother, not ready for meat, not ready for spiritual manhood. It is said here, the wife of Lapidoth, Deborah, a wife and a mother, she responds to the cry of the children of Israel. She considered her role in life to be that of a mother and a wife. She considers her role as a judge and prophetess as an honor, but she retains, I am a mother in Israel.

Judges chapter 5 verse 7, in Deborah's song she writes, village life ceased, it ceased in Israel until I, Deborah, arose, arose a mother in Israel. You see the rebuke there for the men? Why?

Where were you? Why is the wife having to go out and do it when you're supposed to be doing it? Fine. If you won't do it, God will get someone else. Well, that's true for male and female alike. It's true in ministry. It holds us to ministry.

Fine, you want to quit? Go ahead, I'll just raise somebody else up, God will say. For a woman, there is no higher calling. There is no higher calling than being one of three things, a mother, or a wife, or a handmaiden of the Lord. Who would argue? What Christian would say, I object, there's got to be something more for me, that's not enough. You would unveil your folly and your ignorance and your lack of understanding were you to object. There is, again, not a more honorable role or to fulfill. If I am any use as a man to this day or in my life, it is largely because of what my mother instilled in me. I'm not going to take the time to itemize the things.

I have a Bible, a little pocket Bible at home, and it says in the beginning, as soon as you open it, my mother gave it to me in her writing, turn to page so and so, and you turn there and there's a scripture verse highlighted, and then there it says turn to page, and it just keeps leading you to just the Lord Jesus Christ and the gospel. And I consider it hate speech and an insult to the role of the wife or the mother or the handmaiden of the Lord to suggest that those positions are not dignified, that there's more for her, that there's a corporate ladder to top out at, never mind being a mother or a wife or a handmaiden of the Lord. And I pity the full man who has a wife or a mother or treats the handmaidens of the Lord as though they were something less. Yes, we all struggle with sin.

I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about how we perceive, how we think as they started, when the character is shaped, it is shaped by thought and action, not one without the other. If you just think about it and you don't do anything, you're derelict in duty. If you act but you don't think, you're a brute. They have told our women you can be like men, and they're telling our men you should be like women. These are devils. These are advocates of Satan's doctrine. God designed the role of a woman, and it is slandered by Satan and his advocates. And the world is spiritually blind to this, and we should expect that. We don't hate them for it. We full out stand against it and disagree. And so again, the women, be they with or without husband, be they with or without child, they are equally eligible for the nobility that God has granted it.

He grants a status of nobility to men when they do their duty, and he grants the same status of nobility to women when they do theirs. And Satan is always trying to push them off that. Push them off. Be something else. Don't miss out on life.

Cut your own road. Isaiah chapter 54 verse 5, for your Maker is your husband. Yahweh of Hostess is His name, and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel. He is called the God of the whole earth. See, God said that to Isaiah to say it to the nation when the nation was failing, and God was rebuilding them and encouraging them, saying, You are my bride.

Because it is a worthy calling, and it comes, the calling is initiated by the Lord. And it continues here in verse 4, that she was judging Israel at the time. Again, the reason she was judging Israel, overseeing the laws, settling disputes, is because the men weren't. This was an exception.

It was not the ideal. This is Israel. This is not the church.

But the church too. The men fail, the women will step up, and that's a rebuke to the men, a strong rebuke. There's no rebuke to the women. It's not a rebuke to the women to say, You're the helpmate. I need you in the executive position, not the command position. There's no rebuke in that. There is a rebuke to when the man is told, Why aren't you in the command position? Why are you in the support position? That's not how I arranged it. You're not the helpmate.

It's the other way around. There's no better helpmates under the circumstances, situations given to us in Scripture than what we find coming from the Word of God. The Bible does not preach that women are to spiritually lead the men, and neither do I. Abigail. Abigail managed male servants.

There's nothing wrong with management in that context. That's not the same as being a spiritual leader, or official, an official spiritual leader. Interestingly enough, when we come to the New Testament, Deborah is not the one remembered from this story.

Barak is in Hebrews 11 32, which I'll quote later. Deborah would have approved of what I'm saying. If she were sitting in the congregation, she would say, Amen.

I've lived it. I had to go through that, where there were no men coming up, or calling out, Where are the men? Why wasn't her husband doing? Maybe he wasn't alive.

I don't know. But it was not what it should have been. And Deborah would say, I don't care what the world thinks. I know what Yahweh says.

We're going to find her issue a prophecy to validate her office that she genuinely was a prophet of God, and it will be fulfilled in this chapter. The world again does not like the idea of women being helpmates. And so we have this emasculation movement that we have to face.

Let me ask you, do you want your sons subject to that? Femininity is dead. It's gone.

It would be really hard to find it, as it used to be, as though it were some sort of a curse. Now you may say, and that's just you speaking. But it is. It has been the last 25 minutes.

But I know I'm right. Thanks for tuning in to Cross-Reference Radio for this study in the book of Judges. Cross-Reference Radio is the teaching ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel in Mechanicsville, Virginia. If you'd like more information about this ministry, we invite you to visit our website, crossreferenceradio.com. You'll find additional teachings from Pastor Rick available there, and we encourage you to subscribe to our podcast. By doing so, you'll be notified of each new edition of Cross-Reference Radio. You can search for Cross-Reference Radio on your favorite podcast app, or just follow the links at crossreferenceradio.com. That's all the time we have for today. Join us next time to continue learning more from the book of Judges, right here on Cross-Reference Radio.