07. Ehud And Shamgar

Ehud And Shamgar A Summary of the Times of the Judges When the leaders in Israel died, the people lost heart, they disobeyed, and in following after other gods they incurred the wrath of God against them. God in His mercy raised up deliverers to be a help to the nation. Othniel was the first saviour, or judge, or deliverer, whom God raised up for the benefit of His people, but after he died the same thing happened as before, the people went into disobedience and followed after other gods. We find in Judges chapter 3 that the nation was under bondage to the king of Moab for eighteen years (v.14). This was not directly because the king of Moab was a courageous man and vanquished the nation of Israel, the real cause was the failure and disobedience of the people of Israel. No nation would have been able to stand against them if they had remained faithful to the word of God; but because Israel was unfaithful then they came under bondage in different ways.

Application of These Old Testament Passages to Ourselves In applying these Old Testament Scriptures to ourselves today, there is a vast difference between the blessing that the people had in that day and the blessing that we have today; that is, we are not under law, we do not attempt to keep the law in order to get blessing from God, we are believers in the Lord Jesus Christ on the ground of sovereign mercy, our blessings are eternal, secure in Christ, and will never be taken from us. But the blessings in Israel’s day were consequent upon their believing God and being obedient to His law, and of course when they failed in that they forfeited their blessings. However, in the Old Testament and in the New Testament there are similar features, and obedience is one of them. The nation of Israel was responsible to be obedient and Christians are responsible to be obedient; there is the government of God consequent upon failure equally true in all days. So there are various other things that we must take account of that are common to the days in which we live and to the days of Israel. Blessings are consequent upon obedience, and chastisement is consequent upon disobedience. These things must be kept in mind to understand the application of these passages to ourselves.