A Junkyard Orchestra

See, the irony is intended to make the point people who are powerful and skillful and valiant and experienced but do not have the power and pleasure of God are not as powerful as people with limitations who are empowered by God. Your disabilities do not disable God. Your limitations do not limit God's purposes.

Don't use them as an excuse. Have you ever made something from an item that would have otherwise been discarded? Something you created from trash?

As fulfilling as it is to make something useful from trash, it doesn't compare to what God can create from broken lives. Have you ever felt like you're not qualified? That your past, your limitations, or your circumstances make you unusable? Today's message will challenge that thinking. In Judges 3, we meet a man named Ehud. He was far from impressive, disabled in his right hand, overlooked by his own people. Yet, God used this unlikely man to deliver Israel from oppression.

God is a way of taking what others discard and turning it into something beautiful. Keep listening. Around 24 months ago, a major news service ran a story that caught my attention. The title of it is, or was, From Landfill in Paraguay, Sweet Music Emerges.

I don't know if you've heard about this, but it's fascinating. There's a poor community in Paraguay that's formed an amazing orchestra that plays instruments created from pieces of trash that have been thrown into the city landfill. There's actually a slum built there on the landfill where more than 1,000 residents live, and about 1,500 tons of trash is delivered to that site every single day. These residents make their living going through the trash with long hooks. Those long hooks are called ganchos, hence the garbage pickers are called gancheros. That's how they make their living. A young man by the name of Fabio Chavez, a young professional and a musician, saw the desperate poverty among the gancheros and their families who lived there in the landfill, and he decided to donate some of his time to gather some of the little children and teach them music.

What's happened has been amazing. At first, he only had about five instruments to bring with him. Problem was, it wasn't long before he had 50 kids showing up. So he came up with an idea, and he asked one of the gancheros to just kind of keep his eye out for materials that had been thrown away that they could use to fashion into musical instruments. And if you go on site, you just type in Paraguay landfill orchestra or something like that, you'll see kids playing cellos made out of oil cans and old cooking tools.

You'll see as I did a flute made from tin cans, a drum set that uses x-ray film for the skins, bottle caps that serve as the keys for a saxophone, a double bass constructed out of chemical cans, a violin made out of a battered aluminum salad bowl, and the strings are turned with old dinner forks. Now as I described that, you probably think the music has to be absolutely horrific. It is absolutely stunning.

It's beautiful. Just go online and watch a young man playing a classical piece on an oil drum connected to a stick with strings. This recycled orchestra plays popular tunes, classical music. The media sort of picked up on it. With tongue in cheek and a little change of the words, they don't refer to themselves as the London harmonic symphony.

They refer to themselves as the landfill harmonic symphony. Isn't that great? Chavez claims that this amazing story has taught him at least one profound lesson. Quote, people realize that we shouldn't throw away trash carelessly, but we shouldn't throw away people either. That caught my attention. It's amazing what creative, dedicated people can make out of trash.

Amazing. But I got to tell you as amazing as all of that was, it isn't nearly as amazing as what a creative, dedicated God can make out of people, especially people that have been carelessly tossed aside or overlooked or ignored or even considered unusable. The truth is God is most often looking for servants miles away from the beaten path. And He often chooses, doesn't He, according to what Paul wrote to the Corinthians, the unlikely, not those who are noble born, those who are well connected, those who are strong, those who are influential or impressive. I want you to take your Old Testament copy of the book of Judges and open there.

And while you're turning, you need to know several things. We'll take a little time to set this up here as we consider the context. So the book of Judges is the narrative of Israel's unrelenting sin and God's unrelenting grace. Now what God will do whenever His people walk away from covenant commands and then come to their senses and then cry out in repentance, God raises up a judge. And this is a narrative that simply records a number of them, hence the name, the book of Judges. Now one more thing before I introduce you to a long-forgotten judge.

I want to make sure you understand or that you don't think of these judges as you might think of that judge that you stood before not too long ago to pay your ticket, okay, or maybe something else. I don't know. He or she was wearing a long black robe.

They were sitting up on a raised platform behind a very imposing desk. I'm going off what people have told me. I've never seen this with my own eyes. You think of that. Don't think of that. When you think of an Old Testament judge, they're different. You need to think more of a sheriff in Wyoming or Colorado. You need to think of Wyatt Earp and the showdown at the OK Corral. These judges were fighters. They were fighters that dispensed the justice of God on the enemies of God, those who'd rejected God. Samson, of course, was one of them.

Wherever they went, the enemies of God and the enemies of Israel, his covenant people were killed in nothing less than the judgment of God on their idolatry. Now, one of the lesser known judges is what we're going to focus on for a few minutes here. His name is Ehud. Ehud. I've never met a parent who named his son Ehud.

Probably a good reason for that. For one thing, we don't remember Ehud, but turn to Judges chapter 3. An unlikely nobody to become a special champion of God's justice. Let's touch down at verse 15. We're coming to the end of the cycle of sin. Now, notice what's happening. Now, when the sons of Israel cried to the Lord. Now they're repenting. The Lord raised up a savior.

You could render that a deliverer for them. Ehud, the son of Gerah, the Benjamite. And notice this, a left-handed man. Why make a big deal out of that? How many of you are left-handed? I am too.

That's just not even fair to include what's this all about. You know, in the French language, an awkward man is simply referred to as a left-handed man. What's with that? The word sinister in Latin is the word for the left hand. Well, the truth is, centuries ago is it considered a curse from God to be left-handed. In fact, you go back to early American history and they would correct it at all costs. They considered it evil.

Now we know through brain research that those people who are left-handed are dominated by their right hemisphere in their brain, which means left-handed people are in their right mind. I just had to say that. You knew I was going there.

I wanted it in the record. Now, is the Bible pointing out some kind of trivia? You know, Ehud was a lefty, so he's a little off. What does this mean? Well, the Hebrew expression, you might have it in your notes, literally translated means deformed in his right hand. Now, we're told, and you might think this, that he's from the tribe of Benjamin, and you may, if you're older in the faith, remember they were excellent sling throwers with their left hand. They were ambidextrous. This isn't what it's saying here. This text informs us that he is able only to use his left hand.

In other words, he's left-handed because his right hand is crippled or disabled. One Old Testament scholar wrote that Ehud then would have grown up enduring the taunts of children in his village and the whispers of young women his age. He had grown old enough to see old men shake their heads in pity and wonder how in the world he would ever earn a living when he reached manhood. All that to say is the people began to call out to God in repentance for a deliverer to end their shame and judge their idolatrous enemy, the Moabites, had there been an election runoff for a judge, Ehud would have never been on the ballot. For 18 years, by the way, if we do a little history here, the king of Moab and his allies have subjugated the people of Israel, making their life miserable.

He's required an annual tribute. He's taken their young men. He's trafficked their young women.

He's kept them nearly insolvent with demands for greater and greater taxation. And now after 18 years, the Israelites recognize this is the consequence of their sin against God and the rebellion, and they once again as a nation cry out to God. And God says, oh, I have the hero for you. Now it takes place during the time the tribute to Eglon, the Moabite king, is ready to be delivered.

That's where we find ourselves here. Now Ehud has made plans that are evidently confidential. You'll notice verse 16, Ehud made himself a sword which had two edges, a cubit in length, that's about the length of the knife you cut your turkey with at Thanksgiving, and he bound it on his right thigh under his cloak.

Now follow this. A right-handed warrior is going to strap his sword or his knife to his left side so he can reach it. They're not going to be wearing swords when they deliver this tribute. They're going to be searched.

They know it. They're going to be patted down. This is where Ehud's disability begins to open the door of possibility.

The Moabite guards won't even think of patting down the right leg, and they certainly won't think of patting down the right side of a disabled man. What others think of as a deformity, God is going to use as an opportunity. Ehud is the only Israelite. He's the only person in the nation with the remotest possibility of getting close enough to the king to kill him and release Israel from his Moabite grasp. Now with that in mind, let's go to verse 17. And he presented the tribute to Eglon, king of Moab. Now Eglon was a very fat man.

Now that bit of information we'll weigh in later, no pun intended, okay? Verse 18, all right? And it came about when he had finished presenting the tribute. See, he had been selected. He probably volunteered. That he sent away the people who had carried the tribute.

But he himself, that is Ehud, turned back from the idols which were at Gilgal and said, I have a secret message for you, O king. Now let's just kind of, this is fast motion here. Here's what's happening.

The Israelites go, that party of people selected, Ehud there is their leader, hand over the tribute. He's got this knife secreted away on his right thigh, expecting to have an opportunity. It doesn't happen. We're not sure why. The text implies the king is in a hurry to get back up to the cool roof where he can catch the breezes.

And the text implies that because of that, the pace of this is hurried. They don't have the chance to do anything more. It seems like they don't even know what Ehud's planning. The Israelites are traveling back home now and they get as far as these idols as they leave the king's palace in Jericho.

Ehud's no doubt in turmoil. He'd had this plan. He doesn't want to pass up this once in a year opportunity. And then no doubt the idea from God comes to him. He tells the other Israelites, well you just keep on with your journey and I'm going to go back to the palace. I've got a message for him from God and it's a secret. So they go on their way. He shows back up at the palace and he says I've got a message for you from God but there's a condition.

It's just got to be you and me. It's a secret. Eglon is intrigued and agrees. I mean what kind of threat can a disabled man be to our king? So he's granted a private audience on this flat palace roof. Verse 20. And Ehud came to him while he was sitting alone in his cool roof chamber. And Ehud said I have a message from God for you. And by the way he did. It was a message of judgment.

It was a verdict from the judge of death. The king arose from his seat, no doubt struggling. Ehud steps forward, reaches for that dagger with his left hand. The text tells us in verse 21 he thrust it into the king's belly. The handle also went in after the blade. The fat closed over the blade for he did not draw the sword out of his belly and the refuse came out. Now it's graphic here. It's like everything slows down.

It goes into slow motion. It's intended to show the utter futility and the ultimate tragedy of a man literally bloated with idolatry, luxury, the ultimate sinful decadence. He's killed by a disabled judge empowered by God. The irony drips from this text. By the way, this king was a descendant of Lot.

You remember him? Abraham's nephew. He along with his nation had continued to reject the God of Abraham and they proudly reveled in having Abraham's descendants under their heel. In fact, they're priding themselves on the fact that evidently the God of Abraham isn't as strong as our idols. What you see time and time again in the Old Testament is God raises a deliverer to bring about capital punishment, death.

Now hear irony of ironies. God uses a disabled man to end this proud king's life. Before we get any further, let me say the text seems to imply that Ehud really hadn't planned on coming back home.

This was a one-way military mission. No possible hope of returning home alive. God has other plans, even somewhat comical at that as he humbles this idolatrous nation's pride and he will allow his disabled servant to escape with his life. Look at verse 23.

You're already perhaps there. You're reading ahead. Then Ehud went out into the vestibule and shut the doors of the roof chamber behind him and locked them.

Pause for just a moment. In these days of antiquity, keys were made from pieces of flat wood. Doors could be locked from the inside. So Ehud effectively pushes the lock then closes the door behind him as he leaves. They're going to need a key to unlock the door. Verse 24, when he had gone out, his servants came and looked and behold, the doors of the roof chamber were locked. And they said, he is only relieving himself in the cool room.

That means exactly what you think it does. Okay? No secret here. In other words, they assume that the king has locked the doors because he's in the bathroom. Ehud all the while is calmly walking out of the palace. Now he's waiting at any moment to hear the alarm. But the guard is back in the palace assuming the king is in the bathroom.

Read the newspaper, the magazine, whatever. He's evidently not the kind of king to be interrupted when he's in the bathroom. Notice verse 25. And they waited until they became anxious. I mean they're pacing around wondering why on earth he's taking so long. The Hebrew text literally reads they waited to the point of embarrassment. In other words, none of them wanted to volunteer to go knock on the door and potentially embarrass the king or embarrass themselves or worse, he wasn't the kind of king to embarrass. And so they wait and they wait and they wait and they wait and they wait until it becomes a national security crisis.

Somebody go knock on the door. I agree with one Old Testament scholar who wrote that God reveals what happens here in order to provoke some hilarity among the freed Jewish nation over this comedy of errors and this turn of events. Verse 25, therefore they took the key and opened them and behold their master had fallen on the floor dead.

Now keep in mind they're mystified. That's why we were given the details about the knife going all the way in and not coming back out. There's no murder weapon. There's no visible weapon.

It's going to be a while before they figure out if they ever do what happened. But by now Ehud, the disabled man, ends up commanding, the text will later tell us, the armies to draw up in battle array and they will kill 10,000 Moabite troops. I want you to notice the irony of verse 29.

And they struck down at that time about 10,000 Moabites. Notice all of them robust and valiant men as if to say they weren't crippled. They weren't disabled. But neither was God on their side empowering them.

See the irony is intended to make the point people who are powerful and skillful and valiant and experienced but do not have the power and pleasure of God are not as powerful as people with limitations who are empowered by God. Let me ask you something. What are your limitations? What are yours? I'm convinced everybody has them. Some more obvious than others.

What are yours? If God said to you, you know I want to make you a deliverer, what would you say? Have you forgotten about this or that? Well in the gospel, outreach which is global, what is our limitation there? What does the God of grace need to overcome or maybe forgive in order to use you for His glory? Abraham was old. Joseph had a prison record. David committed adultery. Leah was unattractive. Elijah wanted to die. Jeremiah grew deeply depressed. Jonah quit twice.

John Mark quit and ran. Peter chose sleep instead of prayer and then refused to admit he knew Jesus. How would you like that as part of your testimony?

I'm the guy that refused to admit I knew Jesus. He thought he was finished. Naomi was a widow. The Samaritan woman had a reputation.

Rahab never outran her former profession as a prostitute. Zacchaeus had spent a career stealing a white collar thief. He was. Thomas always assumed the worst and doubted. Paul was never physically healthy.

He traveled most often with a doctor named Luke. Timothy was inexperienced and fearful. Just go through in your own mind as I just did people that come off the pages of Scripture and you discover from these saints of old, including Ehud, this forgotten judge, your disabilities do not disable God. Your limitations do not limit God's purposes.

Don't use them as an excuse. He has a purpose for every one of them. In fact, there's no telling what God can do through someone who fully understands that he or she deserves none of the credit. Hudson Taylor put it this way late in his life. God is sufficient for God's work. God does not do his work by large committees.

He trains someone to be quiet enough and small enough and then he uses them. It's the treasure of his gospel poured into and through a vessel of clay which highlights the glory of his creative genius. Discarded pieces of trash. That's the body of Christ, by the way. A junkyard orchestra. That's a great term for the church.

I like that. A symphony made up of people recycled by grace, refashioned by our unrelenting gracious God, our creative, forgiving, redeeming, divine conductor who collects us. And aren't we a sight? And he uses us, allows us to play again and again and again, to show forth the praises of him who has called us out of darkness into a marvelous light.

That illustration of a junkyard orchestra is good, isn't it? God takes us with all of our problems, infirmities and limitations and creates out of us something beautiful and powerful. That was Stephen Davey and this is Wisdom for the Heart. One of the ways you can support our ministry is by sharing it with your friends and encouraging them to listen. Perhaps you can think of someone who would benefit from hearing the lesson you just heard. We've posted this message to our website and we've included some links to make it easier for you to share. You can post this message to your Facebook page or send it in an email to someone who could benefit. Our desire is for as many people as possible to hear the truth of God's word and you can help with that. Join us next time to discover more Wisdom for the Heart.