Judges chapters 1-5
Shamgar was the next judge of Israel. He led his people against the Philistines; and all by himself, with nothing but a sharp stick and the Lord’s help, he killed six hundred of the enemy.
But when the people of Israel began to worship idols again, God let them be conquered again. This time they were slaves for twenty long years. Then the Lord gave them another judge to help them in their troubles. This judge was a woman named Deborah. She lived near Bethel in a house beneath a palm tree.
Deborah sent for a man named Barak and told him that the Lord wanted him to lead ten thousand Israeli soldiers against Sisera, the captain of the enemy army. But Barak was afraid and wouldn’t go unless Deborah went with him. Deborah said she would, but that the honor of the victory would go to a woman!
So Barak and Deborah led the ten thousand men of Israel against Sisera. Sisera called up all his reserves , including nine hundred iron chariots, and came out to fight. But the Lord gave Israel the victory.
Sisera jumped from his chariot and ran away to the tent of a woman named Jael. He didn’t know she was a friend of the people of Israel. “Give me a little water,” he begged her, “for I am very thirsty.” So she gave him some milk to drink.
“Stand in the door of your tent,” he told her, “and if anyone comes by and asks if you have seen me, tell him no.”
He was so tired that he lay down and slept. Jael took a sharp tent peg that was used to fasten the tent to the ground, went quietly over to him, and drove it into his head with a hammer, killing him.
Soon afterwards Barak came by looking for Sisera. Jael went out to meet him and said, “Come here, and I will show you the man you are looking for.” Then she took him into the tent, and there lay Sisera, dead.
So the Israelis were freed from the king of Canaan that day.
But after forty years of freedom, the people of Israel began worshipping idols again. Then the Midianites came and fought them, and made slaves of them and treated them very cruelly. They drove the Israelis from their homes, making them live in dens and caves in the mountains. They destroyed their crops, leaving little for the Israelis to eat. And they took their oxen, goats, and sheep, so that the people of Israel grew very poor and hungry.
Then, as they had before, the Israelis cried to the Lord to help them. The judge the Lord sent this time was Gideon.
Gideon was threshing wheat one day and trying to hide it from the Midianites, when the Lord came to him in the form of an angel and spoke kindly to him. Then Gideon told the Lord about the troubles the people of Israel were having because of the Midianites.
“You will free the people of Israel from the Midianites!” the Lord told him.
“But, Lord, how can I do that?” Gideon asked.
“That’s easy!” the Lord replied, “I will be with you, and you will destroy their whole army as if it were it was only one man!”
Then Gideon said to the Lord, “Please wait here while I go and get an animal to sacrifice to You.”
So Gideon went and killed a young goat, cut it up, put the meat into a basket, and brought it out to the Lord. The Lord told Gideon to lay it on a rock; then He touched the meat with the end of a stick He had in His hand, and fire flamed out of the rock and burned the sacrifice! Then the Lord disappeared.
Questions:
Why did God let His people become slaves again?
What was the name of the first woman to lead and judge Israel?
When Gideon sacrificed the goat, what happened?
Have a awesome and blessed day.
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