Year 7, Day 271: Judges 10

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Here’s a fun little chapter on humanity.  Once more we see that when life is good, people abandon God.  They follow the frivolous passions of their hearts.  They chase after their gods.  They leave the straight and narrow and follow what is right in their own eyes.

Get the next part of the story right in your understanding.  God lifts His hedge of protection.  He allows them to fall into the hands of the surrounding nations.  They begin to be oppressed.  Persecution falls upon them.  This happens not because God forces it, naturally.  It happens because God doesn’t protect them.  It happens because God allows the people to follow the natural course of action from their choices.

Furthermore, take notice of how long the people were under persecution.  They were oppressed eighteen years!  Sometimes human beings are really slow to pick up on wrongdoing.  This is even more true when it is a cultural issue and not an individual issue.  It’s hard to change a culture that is happy doing what’s right in their own eyes.  It takes them eighteen years to figure it out!

After eighteen years, they final turn to the Lord.  After eighteen years they finally repent. After eighteen years of oppression they final begin to see their error and how the pursuit of their own desires wasn’t as satisfying as it could have been.

That kind of explains why God seems so resistant to taking them back, doesn’t it?

In the end, though, God does hear them.  Above all else, God forgives.  He will allow us to walk away.  He will watch us live in the consequences of our own sin.  But He does hear repentance and forgive us.

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