Unbullied (Part A)

Sometimes I ask the Lord, or I just say it to Him, it feels like I was more effective for you when I was in the workplace. I got to share Christ. As a pastor, I get to share and I get to, you know, explain Scripture.

So I have to, you know, certainly I submit to that. But as far as feelings go, to be able to share what's in the Bible with someone who doesn't know what's in the Bible, and they want it and they come back for more. Is that not thrilling?

Is that not exciting? This is Cross-Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville. 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 12, as he begins his message, Unbullied. Unbullied.

That's this evening's consideration. Here, Jephthah has had this great victory over the Ammonites, and he comes home a hero and great, just great. Somebody's got to mess it up on his own side, his own team. A civil war after his victory. Who would have thought that was going to be the case?

Everything was going so well. They drove these invaders out of the land, and this kind of disheartening thing pops up in our own lives in churches, and you try to do something meaningful for Christ, only to have some troublemakers swoop in that you never saw it coming. But that's the case with this first part of this evening's consideration.

Some people will just take the noblest victories and use them for grounds to divide. Now, on Sundays, we've been going through, of course, the New Testament, and a large part of the New Testament is concerned with correcting aberrant Christian behavior, or trying to not allow that wrong way of living to get the upper hand, the flesh, the sin. And it's very necessary, else God never would have given us the Bible as he has. But I am so looking forward to the Gospels.

I am so looking forward to walking with Jesus there in Israel and just get a little break from all the correction, because it's very real correction. It's not abstract. It's not, well, that's for these people back then and the ancient believers.

It's for right now. Well, in that section of Scripture of the New Testament, the precepts, the rules of the faith, from Romans all the way to Jude, Titus was told reject the device of man after the first and second admonition. I mean, you correct him and in a second give him another shot. You know what? We're done here.

It's not working. Now he's talking to a pastor in the church, concerning the church. Writing to the Romans, he says, I urge you, Paul says, brethren, those who cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which you learned and avoid them. Now, not those who deal with false teachings, he says contrary to the doctrine.

Those who just come in and cause problems. And that's what we're dealing with, with the tribe of Ephraim coming in and causing division and problems. Worse, though, in the case of Jephthah, is that these men were going to kill people. So now we come to the first verse, and they don't know who they're messing with. Then the men of Ephraim gathered together, crossed over toward Zaphron, and said to Jephthah, why did you cross over to fight against the people of Ammon and did not call us to go with you? We will burn your house down on you with fire.

We mentioned you don't pull on Superman's cape, and you don't pick a fight with bad Leroy Brown, and this is what they did. And why? Well, we know why. There's greed involved. There's sin involved. These were not righteous men, though they were supposed to be the children of God. This was an elitist bunch to add to all of the greed.

They really felt more special than everyone else, and that's going to come out in this story. And so the men of Ephraim gathered together, crossed over. Now, Zaphron is there not long after you go from west to east, crossing the Jordan River into what is now the kingdom of Jordan today, where the two and a half tribes of Israel had set themselves up. And this is Gilead's territory, known as Gilead, much of it. And he says, why did you cross over to fight against the people of Ammon and did not call us to go with you?

Well, that's not accurate. And he's putting Jephthah on defense, but Jephthah is not comfortable on defense. And so he's going to quickly go on to offense, and the men of Ephraim are going to regret it. They had done this very thing about 30 years earlier to Gideon. Gideon had defeated the Midianites, and here come the men of Ephraim with their own force, and they were picking a fight, Judges 8, verse 1. Now the men of Ephraim said to him, why have you done this to us by not calling us when you went to fight the Midianites?

And they reprimanded him sharply. Well, Jephthah and Gideon are two different characters. Gideon was wise, and he turned back their wrath with kind words. He says, we're here for the battle now. You know, the spoil still remains, and as much, you know, what am I compared to you?

And they bought it. Jephthah gritted his teeth and clenched his knuckle fist up and said, who are you talking to in that tone? That's the outcome. Now the challenge for the Christian, particularly maybe, well for all Christians, is when we're faced with confrontation, and we know we're right, we may default to the flesh too quickly. We shouldn't default to it at all, but we may just feel now we're justified in our rage, and we do not have to withhold our fury, and we can let the opposition feel the force of our disdain, and we can look at a man like Jephthah and say, yeah, that's how you deal with people like that.

Not so fast. Now, there are times when we do have to deal with people as he does, but not all the time. By a long shot, sometimes you have to turn the other cheek, suffer the loss, take the pain, but we'll let the story tell itself it's so much better that way. But did they think that Jephthah would lose to the Ammonites, and that's why they didn't go with him when he invited them? Or did they think that, let him do all the fighting and whatever's left over, we'll just come down and take it all from him? What was going on in their heads? Because it wasn't righteousness.

Not to hurl a thread at him like that. We're going to burn your house down on top. We're going to kill you and your family because we want to spoil. They couldn't come out and say it that way. Well, he is going to refuse them, of course.

Had Ephraim been like-minded with the spirit of victory for the people, with care for the nation, they would have applauded this man. Instead, they come and they make trouble, and it is very serious, where they say again, we will burn your house down on you with fire. It's just psychos. There's something not right with these people.

Everything is not right with them. Totally uncalled for. Was he supposed to beg them for mercy? Was he supposed to, you know, buy them off?

What was he supposed to do? He is unflinching. He's defiant. You're not going to stand for this. And even though we as Christians have to turn the cheek, we still have a defiant spirit, but it's one built on love and care and allegiance to Christ. It's not one that is built on defeat ever.

It's not supposed to ever be that way. All the madness that's going on around us, the church's mission just does not change, no matter what. We are here to obey and be as Christ-like individually as we possibly can and to save souls in the process and to strengthen our brothers and sisters at the same time, no matter what. Satan, he wants to drag us into the flesh.

He wants to make it a flesh fight, and he pulls it off quite wonderfully. We got a call the other day from some news source. Who cares? I don't even care what they want to know. Why would I want to talk to a journalist? I want to talk to people whose souls are lost or who want to hear about Jesus Christ. That's my whole purpose for being here, not to be interviewed or polled or have a second in the limelight.

This is serious business about souls. And I think, you know, my response would be, why don't you let me give you a verse-by-verse exposition on a chapter of my choice? How about that? Instead of answering your questions, why don't you shut up, sit down, and get saved? Not too much to ask. A little bit of the flesh creeping up, even as I'm saying it.

Maybe you noticed. Well, anyway, Ephraim, they had this great ability to make war, but that doesn't mean they can finish it, and we have to count the cost, too. If we're going to stand up for Christ or righteousness, we better, you know, think things out if we have a chance to do that. But where were they when the battle was on? You got to like these kind of folks that show up later with all these accusations, and they just kill the joy. They steal the joy. Instead of having a parade for this man, they want to do him harm. And, you know, Ephraim even stopped to say, what does God think about what we're saying?

Nope. God was in none of their thoughts, only when it served their purpose. And so they were offended by another's success without them.

That was part of it. How dare you succeed without us? Never mind that we refuse to participate. You have no right to look good without us.

Refusing their own deserved blame, they rallied to riot. Proverbs 18, a brother offended is harder to win than a strong city, and contentions are like the bars of a castle. How true it is. You know, you read the Proverbs, and most of them, they just make so much sense, you say, why didn't I think of that? How come I can't articulate it like that? It's so simple.

It's so true. A brother offended is harder to win. Oh, his feelings are hurt.

That's it. You've lost him. Because you ain't ever going to forget. Unless the Spirit of God is prevailing over his flesh and his heart. Jephthah wronged no man. He did not deserve this, and nor did the people with him. Verse 2, and Jephthah said to them, my people and I were in a great struggle with the people of Ammon, and when I called you, you did not deliver me out of their hands.

Again, they don't know who they're messing with. He's trying to reason with them, but he is well prepared to go to battle with them. And he's got this independent spirit, which is a product of his upbringing. You remember he didn't have the best upbringing one would hope for, the best reputation because of his mother and father, and yet God used those circumstances to shape the man, and he was now a man who refused to be bullied. He says, my people and I were in a great struggle with Ammon, the enemy. We were fighting the enemy.

Where were you? When I called you did not come. How often do nothings become critics of those who are doing something? Yeah, maybe they're struggling, maybe they're failing, maybe they're not doing the best job that could possibly be done, but they're trying. And the do nothings come along and they kill the joy and they stir other people and they start winning people to their side. Absalom's at the gate. Well, I won't go into that.

It's just too easy. Ephraim, they had the ability to wage war. They just did not make themselves available because they had their own agenda for their lives to swoop in and take the spoils. It's an interesting verse in Psalm 78 that possibly applies. In other words, the psalmist probably had this event in mind, though he doesn't say it.

It could have been something else, but I'll read it. Psalm 78 verse 8. And may not be like the fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that did not set its heart aright and whose spirit was not faithful to God. The children of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows, turned back in the day of battle. Well, their hearts weren't right.

That matches this situation. They were stubborn and rebellious. That applies to them here. And they were armed and carrying bows. Well, maybe when Jephthah called them to the battlefield, maybe they rallied and then changed their minds.

Well, that's where the guesswork comes in. The point is, they were capable. They had the ability to fight.

And they turned back when they were needed. I don't want to be like that. This is scary. I mean, in Jephthah's situation, it takes a lot of courage to stand up to people like this. It's not easy. Sometimes you got to be willing to pay the price.

You're going to pay a price one way or another. God repeatedly calls humanity to answer the call. That's what we are supposed to be here for. Incidentally, as Christians, we're left behind in this life so that we can minister to the canes of the world. Because think about the injustice of it from a human standpoint. Abel gets killed and Cain gets to live.

Why not the other way around? See, God sees things differently. In this sense, he sees eternity on everything. We are left here to deal with the canes of the world so that they do not die as Cain, a murderer, one who pushed God away. Isaiah the prophet went to the people.

Jeremiah, of course, echoed Isaiah, but Isaiah says God speaking through him, therefore I will number you for the sword and you shall bow down to the slaughter because when I called, you did not answer. When I spoke, you did not hear but did evil before my eyes and chose that in which I do not delight. That's God's statement to his people. That's God's statement to humanity. It's a human thing. Satan's the one that makes it a racial thing. God says this is a human thing.

This is about sinners going to hell. That I used Jews and Gentiles alike should be an indication to you. We talked about on Sunday Luke's contribution to the New Testament measured at 27%.

He's a Gentile. Again the Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts, I can't imagine a New Testament without those two. Jeremiah, again, dealing with the self-righteous people. Again, I ask this question and it's rhetorical, of course. Do mean people know that they are mean? Do they know they just cause harm to others unnecessarily to satisfy themselves? That it feels so good to make you feel small so I can feel big. I mean, it would kill some people for them to just be nice, just to say hi.

I'm not going to try to sell you something. Just be nice. I'm talking about Christians. I'm talking about church-going Christians.

We've had our share and I'm sure there'll be more. I think kindness should most certainly be emphasized in the children's ministry. They need all the help they can so they can be kind to one another. No bullying.

And of course, many adults just get more slick when it comes to being mean so they're not outed so quickly. And then when they are, they just trot on down the road instead of fixing it. Well, of course, I don't want to sound self-righteous or high-minded or anything like that, but where else are we going to deal with these things but God's help? Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. And faith involves more than just believing Christ is your Savior.

It involves acting upon that knowledge in a way that's pleasing to Him. Faith is a New Testament word. You know, if you looked up the word faith in the Old Testament, it only shows up twice. Faithful shows up a few more times, but faith straight out is surprising, isn't it? The New Testament drives it home.

And not only are we not to lose sight of this fact, but we're not to let unbelievers lose sight of the facts that we gain in the house of God. In your workplace or wherever you find yourself, if you are lazy or abrasive or unnecessarily offensive, no one's going to look to you for information on God. But if you are upright and fair and not a loony Christian, people will look. They will come to you. And you will have information to share with them. And you will see things happen.

That's been my experience. Sometimes I ask the Lord or I just say it to Him, it feels like I was more effective for you when I was in the workplace. I got to share Christ. As a pastor, I get to share and I get to, you know, explain Scripture.

So I have to, you know, certainly I submit to that. But as far as feelings go, to be able to share what's in the Bible with someone who doesn't know what's in the Bible and they want it and they come back for more. Is that not thrilling?

Is that not exciting? And I know some of you know that. You've been there, hopefully all of you.

And if not, ask God to get you there. Well, I digress because I know this is a very short chapter. I got to fill it up with something. Verse 3, so when I saw that you would not deliver me, and you're saying to yourself, what were we talking about?

You were just going on this whole rant about the workplace. So when I saw that you would not deliver me, I took my life in my hands and crossed over against the people of Ammon and Yahweh delivered them into my hand. Why then have you come up to me this day to fight against me? I wish I could see Jephthah's face as he's probably whacking his sword.

That's just my, I injected that. That's how I would envision him. He probably wasn't at this point. But anyway, he's laying, he's telling it like it is. I mean, civil wars and church splits, they are just especially distasteful. There's just something, it just, why? With most church splits, if not all of them, the people who made the split should have long been gone, but they stayed and they caused the split. Even if they're right or wrong, it's a very problematic thing. Anyway, Jephthah, his recital to them was of the truth. This truth insulted them incidentally, because mean people get insulted by the truth. And they get double mean when they know they're being mean and others know it. Well, anyway, Jephthah says to them, life goes on without you, surprise, you didn't show up, we had to fight ourselves, we really didn't need you and we won without you.

Couldn't count on you. And he's telling it to them. He's not letting their side of the story overpower his side of the story, which is true. And this was the case when he was dealing with Ammon. And Ammon was saying, that land belongs to us.

And he says, well, let me give you a quick history lesson to tell you about this land. And, of course, he won the argument and the war. I want to also add, it keeps mentioning that he crossed over into Ammon, though chapter 10 tells us that Ammon had crossed into Gilead.

Both probably took place, that initiated the battle and then once the battle ensued, if any of you are into the detail of that, it just spilled into Ammon's territory. Well, he says here in verse 3, and the Lord delivered them into my hand. God supported Jephthah vindicating any wrong. He had the proof on his side. He could say to the Ephraimites, look what the Lord has done.

Why are you here giving me grief over this? But again, their reasoning was not based on God. Their reasoning was what they could get from Jephthah, who had taken spoils from the Ammonites.

It should have been enough to end the dispute, but the do-nothings kept attacking and this won't go well for them. He says, why then have you come up to me this day to fight against me? Not easy to be a man like Jephthah.

Just some of us, you can't fake it. You have to have another system, like Gideon, but this is Jephthah's way of handling the situation of these who would bully him. Personally, Gideon's is closer to the whole kind word turns back wrath, but I like Jephthah's more.

No, it's a personality thing. Anyway, he was to the point. He said, you people are liars and if you want to fight, you got one. Let's summarize his response. He says, I was in a life or death situation and when I called to you, you ignored me. So we delivered ourselves.

We won without you. Closing point, get out of my face. That's how he ends it pretty much. Again, don't fault me because I'm liking Jephthah. I told you at the beginning I liked him.

He had that whole mess up thing with his daughter, but outside of that, I would have liked to have known more about him. So why is it that troublesome people are so surprised when other people have finally had it with them, finally fed up with them? Have you ever come across somebody just keeps picking and picking and then you deal with them and then they're just so shocked that you finally had enough? Well, verse four, I have to watch it. I don't vent up here. Just my life experiences through Jephthah. Oh, it's not me, Lord. It's Jephthah. I'm just commenting.

It's expositional teaching. So Jephthah gathered, verse four, together all the men of Gilead and fought against Ephraim and the men of Gilead defeated Ephraim because they said, you Gileadites are fugitives of Ephraim, among the Ephraimites, and among the Manassehites. Well, so there has to be some lapse of time. He likes, he had to have known they were coming into his territory in force. Otherwise, he would not have had time to gather forces to withstand them when he told them, you know, hey, you know, we won without you.

I don't know what you're doing here. They could have just killed him on the spot. Anyway, the point that I'm trying to make is Jephthah was a step ahead of them. He got ready very quickly. Men rallied to him very quickly. That goes back to his personality. When he says it's time for war, the men who had already gone to war came right back to his side.

It was, you know, really, you have to complement his leadership skills and the skills, the followship skills of the men that served him. 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.