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🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 🎵Music🎵 Alright, this time we'll go through our announcements together. If you don't have a bulletin, slip up your hand nice and high. We'll get to you with one. On the inside we have our service time Sunday mornings at 1030. Our preaching service Sunday nights at 6. Wednesday nights at 7 is our bible study. Tonight we're in judges chapter 11. We've got the soul winning times listed there below as well as salvations and baptisms. And then across the page is the note about the small town soul winning marathon. Out in Safford they had 15 soul winners over two days, nine salvations. And the next Safford trip is March 5th through 6th. This Saturday there's another trip out to Globe. So we're rotating back and forth each weekend. A single day trip to Globe on a Saturday. And then the next weekend a two-day trip Friday morning to Saturday evening. Food, transportation, everything's included. Just make sure that you sign up over on the clipboard by the kitchen over here. And then the bible memory passage we're just wrapping up with this little short one. Psalm 68 one through three. The deadline for that is Sunday March 7th. And then on the back is the note about the coffee and tea station. Keep praying for the ladies in our church that are expecting that they'll have a safe and healthy pregnancy and delivery. And then don't forget about the Spanish night coming up on March 11th. So let's go ahead and count up the soul winning from the past few days going back to Monday. Anything from Monday for the soul winning? All right we got one. Is that a three? Okay anything else from Monday? How about Tuesday? Okay anything else from Tuesday? And then what about today? I know we had two for the van today. Gotcha. Gotcha. All right very good. Keep up the great work on soul winning. With that let's sing our next song. Come lead us. All right we're going to sing hymn number five in your hymnals. Number five when I survey the wondrous cross on which the prince of glory died. Number five in your hymnals. Let's sing it all together now in that first verse. Hymn number five. When I survey the wondrous cross on which the prince of glory died. My richest king I count the cost and pour contempt on all my pride. Four minute more that I should go. Save in the death of Christ my God. All the main things that draw me most. I sacrifice him to his blood. Sleep from his head his hands his feet. Sorrow and love the home he go down. Then there's such love and sorrow meet. For thorns come both so rich a crown. Where the home ground of nature hung. That were a present far too small. Love so amazing so divine. Deep as my soul my life my home. Let's turn over to hymn number 170. Hallelujah what a savior number 170. Let's sing it on that first verse. Man of sorrows what a name number 170. Sing it on that first verse together number one seven zero. Man of sorrows what a name. For the son of God who gave. Ruined sinners to reclaim. Hallelujah what a savior. Fearing shame and scoffing fruit. In my place condemned he stood. Sealed my pardon with his blood. Hallelujah what a savior. Guilty violent helpless sweet. Softless lamb of God was he. Full atonement can it be. Hallelujah what a savior. Lifted up was he to die. His finish was his run. Now in heaven exalted high. Hallelujah what a savior. When he comes our glorious king. All is ransomed home to free. Then anew this song will sing. Hallelujah what a savior. All right this time we'll pass our offering plates around as the plates go around let's turn our Bibles to Judges chapter 11. Judges chapter number 11 as we always do we'll read the entire chapter beginning verse number one follow along silently with brother Varon as he reads Judges chapter 11 starting verse number one. Judges chapter 11 the Bible reads Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty man of valor and he was the son of an harlot and Gilead begat Jephthah and Gilead's wife bare him sons and his wife's sons grew up and they thrust out Jephthah and said unto him thou shalt not inherit in our father's house for thou art the son of a strange woman then Jephthah fled from his brethren and dwelt in the land of Tob and there were gathered vain men to Jephthah and went out with him and it came to pass in process of time that the children of Ammon made war against Israel and it was so that when the children of Ammon made war against Israel the elders of Gilead went to fetch Jephthah out of the land of Tob and they said unto him Jephthah come and be our captain that we may fight with the children of Ammon and Jephthah said unto the elders of Gilead did not ye hate me and expel me out of my father's house and why are you come unto me now when you are in distress and the elders of Gilead said unto Jephthah therefore we turn again to thee now that thou mayest go with us and fight against the children of Ammon and be our head over all the inhabitants of Gilead and Jephthah said unto the elders of Gilead if ye bring me home again to fight against the children of Ammon and the Lord deliver them before me shall I be your head and the elders and the elders of Gilead said unto Jephthah the Lord be witness between us if we do not so according to thy words then Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead and the people made him head and captain over them and Jephthah uttered all his words before the Lord in Mizpeh and Jephthah sent messengers unto the king of the children of Ammon saying what has thou to do with me that thou art come against me to fight in my land and the king of the children of Ammon answered unto the messengers of Jephthah because Israel took away my land when they came up out of Egypt from Arnon even unto Jabak and unto Jordan now therefore restore those lands again peaceably and Jephthah sent messengers again unto the king of the children of Ammon and said unto him thus saith Jephthah Israel took not away this land of Moab nor the land of the children of Ammon but when Israel came up from Egypt and walked through the wilderness unto the Red Sea and came to Kadesh then Israel sent messengers unto the king of Edom saying let me I pray thee pass through thy land but the king of Edom would not hearken thereto and in like manner they sent unto the king of Moab but he would not consent and Israel abode in Kadesh then they went along through the wilderness and compassed the land of Edom and the land of Moab and came by the east side of the land of Moab and pitched on the other side of Arnon but came not within the border of Moab for Arnon was the border of Moab and Israel sent messengers unto Sihon king of the Amorites the king of Eshbon and Israel said unto him let us pass we pray thee through that land into my place but Sihon trusted not Israel to pass through his coast but Sihon gathered all his people together and pitched in Jehaz and fought against Israel and the Lord God of Israel delivered Sihon and all his people into the hand of Israel and they smote them so Israel possessed all the land of the Amorites the inhabitants of that country and they possessed all the coasts of the Amorites from Arnon even unto Jabak and from the wilderness even unto Jordan so now the Lord God of Israel hath dispossessed the Amorites from before his people Israel and shouldest thou possess it will not thou possess that which Chemosh thy God giveth thee to possess so whomsoever the Lord our God shall drive out from before us them will we possess and now art thou anything better than Balak the son of Zippor king of Moab did he ever strive against Israel or did he ever fight against them while Israel dwelt in Heshbon and her towns and in Aror and her towns and in all the cities that be along by the coasts of Arnon 300 years why therefore did ye not recover them within that time wherefore I have not sinned against thee but thou doest me wrong to war against me the Lord the judge be judged this day between the children of Israel and the children of Ammon howbeit the king of the children of Ammon hearkened not unto the words of Jephthah which he sent him then the spirit of the Lord came upon Jephthah and he passed over Gilead and Manasseh and passed over Mizpah of Gilead and from Mizpah of Gilead he passed over unto the children of Ammon and Jephthah vowed a vow unto the Lord and said if thou shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon into mine hands then it shall be that whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the children of Ammon shall surely be the Lord's and I will offer it up for a burnt offering so Jephthah passed over unto the children of Ammon to fight against them and the Lord delivered them into his hands and he smote them from Aror even till thou come to Minoth even 20 cities and unto the plain of the vineyards with a very great slaughter thus the children of Ammon were subdued before the children of Israel and Jephthah came to Mizpi unto his house and behold his daughter came out to meet him with timbrels and with dances and she was his only child beside her he had neither son nor daughter and it came to pass when he saw her that he rent his clothes and said alas my daughter thou hast brought me very low and thou art one of them that troubled me for I have opened my mouth unto the Lord and I cannot go back and she said unto him my father if thou hast opened thy mouth unto the Lord do to me according to that which hath proceeded out of thy mouth for as much as the Lord hath taken vengeance for thee of thine enemies even of the children of Ammon and she said unto her father let this thing be done for me let me alone two months that I may go up and down upon the mountains and bewail my virginity I and my fellows and he said go and he sent her away for two months and she went with her companions and bewailed her virginity upon the mountains and it came to pass at the end of two months that she returned unto her father who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed and she knew no man and it was a custom in Israel that the daughters of Israel went eerily to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in a year. Brother Daniel would you pray for us please? Dear Father in heaven please fill pastor through spirit and please bless us all and give us ears to hear and understanding from wisdom from this sermon we pray in Jesus name amen. Men judges chapter 11 we have the story of Jephthah and the first thing I want to point out before we get into the story of Jephthah is that Jephthah is mentioned in the new testament very briefly but in Hebrews chapter 11 which is known as the hall of faith where you have all these great men of faith listed and you go down through the list you know with Abel down through Noah and Moses and you know all the big names but at the end he says and what shall I more say for the time would fail me to tell of Gideon and of Barak and of Jephthah so in the list of guys that he doesn't have time to go through he mentions Jephthah as being another man who did great things for God by faith so even though there are some negative things about Jephthah in the story here we want to realize that he's still a man who God used greatly he was a man of faith and the spirit of the Lord came upon him now God throughout the bible uses imperfect people he uses people that have serious flaws in their character and truth be told we all have flaws in our character every single one of us is a sinner there's not a just man upon the earth that do with good and sin is not the bible says there's none righteous no not one some people's sins are more grievous than others some people have bigger problems than others but throughout the bible we read about people who do some pretty wrong things and bad things because of the fact that the bible is about real life now it always cracks me up when I run into somebody out soul winning maybe he's a Vietnam veteran or something and he'll come at me with this thing of like you know I saw some stuff over there and that's why I don't believe in God or that's why I don't believe the bible you know what I'm talking about have you ever run into somebody like that where they've seen some gnarly things and and they lost faith in God but you know if you actually know the bible the gnarlier the things you see in this world the more you're like wow the bible really is right on because the bible is a gnarly book now if the bible were all sweetness and light and unicorns and rainbows and then you go over to Vietnam and see that stuff then you'd wonder is the bible really true because the bible is painting this rosy picture of the world and the world is this rough place but let me tell you something there's some dark things in the bible because there are some dark things in our world and the bible matches reality you know over the past few days I'd put out some videos about Islam and the Quran I was responding to some things that the Muslims were saying and and one of the things that the Muslims love to point out is you know oh the bible's so bad because you know you have prophets in the bible doing bad things you know you have David committing adultery with Bathsheba and they go down the list of negative things done by men of God and prophets because their book the Quran is such a cheap cardboard lame story it's not even a story but when it tells a story it has no storytelling ability and one of the biggest just most obvious differences between good literature and bad literature is that good literature has complex characters bad literature is just like the bad guys are just like super bad and the good guys do no wrong and they're just perfect in every way you know I mean it's it's like a cartoon or something right like a crayon shredder you know or what you know I'm thinking of cartoon characters from my childhood you know they're not very complex of a character you know they're just bad but in the bible even the bad guys will sometimes do good things or the good guys will do bad things but isn't that how real life is and you know when I look at the bible stories I'm seeing reality like I'm connecting this and making it relevant with experiences that I've had and experiences that I'm going to have whereas the Quran is just junk you know what I mean it doesn't tell real stories about real life and it's really just a boring book now obviously the bible is more than just a fun a fun read but it is a fun read amen you know thank god if we're commanded to read the bible every day at least thank god it's got some great stories it's got some really complex characters it's got some things that really make you think not just kill the infidel burn them everywhere you find that you know just it's just like it's so one-dimensional it's not even good literature that's why no one outside Islam studies the Quran whereas tons of people outside Christianity study the bible and consider it just for its literary value alone and so this is one of those complex characters Jephthah okay and people with very small brains that are very simple-minded just want to put everything in a box was this guy good or bad well he's a good guy but there's some bad stuff about him and he's a complex character so you might have to actually think a little harder you know god forbid but that you'd have to actually analyze the story but but here's the great thing about it you could read this story and 10 years from now we're going to still be reading Judges 11 and it'll still be interesting and we'll be gaining new insights we'll be looking at it from new angles you know you read the bible five years from now it's not going to speak to you exactly the same as it did five years ago because it's so deep there's so much to learn there's just layer upon layer of meaning and that's why we can read the bible over and over again our whole lives and never get sick of reading it and what a blessing that is so let's jump into the story here Judges 11 verse 1 now Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty man of valor and he was the son of harlot okay so what do we know about Jephthah so far we're going to bring our new testament knowledge into the story so we know that he's a man of faith i mean this guy believes on the lord he trusts the lord he has faith in the lord he's devout he's a godly man in that sense he's a mighty man of valor what this means is that he is a guy that can fight you know out on the battlefield he has courage he has skill he's strong he's physically able and he's skillful and courageous in battle that's what that phrase means mighty man of valor but he's also the son of a harlot so his dad had legitimate children with his wife but then he also had a fling with a prostitute and Jephthah is the product of that relationship with a prostitute so that's obviously you know something negative not Jephthah's fault but it's something that he kind of has to live with growing up as a bastard son of this prostitute so it says in verse number two and Gilead's wife bear him sons and his wife's sons grew up in the thrust out Jephthah and said unto him thou shalt not inherit in our father's house for thou art the son of a strange woman strange there simply means an outsider someone who's not in the family and you can see why this would happen why there's enmity obviously sometimes siblings can be at each other's throats anyway and fight with each other but especially when they're half siblings there could be uh strife here and you know whose fault is this you know it's it's Gilead's fault for being with a prostitute and you know you got to think these things through before you go out and commit adultery or get divorced and remarried and break up your home that it's going to have repercussions on your children so there's this strife and enmity between the children they're obviously threatened by Jephthah okay obviously part of the reason is because he's a mighty man of valor so because he's a mighty man of valor he's superior to them in that way he's a threat to them they feel threatened by him so they want him gone and so they kind of use this excuse of hey you're the son of a strange woman when you know they could have just kind of focused on the other half of the family and said hey we're brothers right we're half brothers but this is the way people are and by the way you know if you ever excel at anything in life expect to have some enemies because of that expect to have some people not want you around because you're good at something you know you think that being good at your job is just going to mean everybody at the job loves you right because you're good at the job I mean oh isn't it so great to have him around but you know what the boss is going to love you if you're working hard and doing well but working hard and doing well could cause some people on the job to actually envy you and actually have a bad attitude towards you now we should still do our best and strive to excel but just realize that when you do well at anything you're going to have some people that are threatened by that and want you out look how many stories like this are in the bible think about daniel okay daniel is put in a position where there are three presidents over the provinces and you've got this structure of bureaucracy but daniel did so well that the king is thinking about just putting him over the whole realm you know instead of just putting him over a third of the kingdom he wants daniel over everything you know he wants daniel to be the second in command well daniel's fellow presidents his fellow rulers they don't like that very much they don't like to see daniel rising higher than them so because of their pride and arrogance and just being competitive and striving for vainglory they end up deciding we're going to take daniel down a notch and so what do they do they end up uh trying to find something wrong with his work and they can't find anything wrong with his work so then they said well we're gonna have to go after him in the area of religion and so then of course you know the story they end up going after his religion he ends up getting thrown in the lion's den god miraculously saves him but that's just one example of many that we could give where someone excels at something and other people don't want him around think about isaac in the book of genesis you know he sows the seed and he reaps a hundredfold and isaac's just thriving and doing well and so what does abimilech tell him hey you're too mighty for us go from us we don't want you around you're too powerful you're too strong you're too wealthy now this carries over into spiritual things if you excel spiritually what happens yay and all that will live godly in christ jesus shall suffer persecution so it's kind of the same thing going on there as you know you do really well at your job people could feel threatened by that and if you excel spiritually some people are threatened by that too because it just makes them look bad or makes them feel bad or they compare themselves to you or whatever but i just want to point out this is an ungodly attitude because you know the bible says where envying and strife is there is confusion in every evil work and the bible tells us that we should do nothing through strife or vain glory but in lowliness of mind let each seem other better than themselves so this attitude that looks at jefftha and says hey he's too powerful he's making us look bad he's a threat to us you know so hey let's just play this card of oh yeah well at least my mom is actually married to our dad you're a bastard get out of here you know they kind of play that card because they're threatened by his might and so we don't we want to make sure that we don't have this envious attitude you know if let's just bring it home you know if someone on the job is outperforming us that's okay right if someone in an academic setting is outperforming you that's okay right i mean what if what if i as a pastor and preaching and pastoring my church and what if another pastor who's also preaching the truth who's also a godly man you know ends up outperforming me you know or maybe he out preaches me right maybe we both go to a meeting and we both preach on the same evening and he preaches a way better sermon than me i should rejoice at that i should rejoice that god's word is being preached because it's not a competition okay it's not a competition we're all serving god together what if one of my pastor friends is pastoring and his church is just thriving and growing by leaps and bounds and it gets twice as big as faithful word three times as big as faithful word or or maybe his youtube channel gets way bigger you know which is pretty easy now because our youtube channel has been decimated but you know what that's great it's great we ought to rejoice and you know what even when we go to our secular job it's all about serving that company if you're ethical as a worker i mean if you're an ethical worker and you show up to work yeah you want to get paid but you know what you ought to be there doing what's best for the company they're paying you and you do what's best for them you know that's the agreement that's the righteous way to be an employee and the bible talks about that you know not with eye service as men pleasers but as the servants of christ doing the will of god from the heart and that's talking about your secular job and so you want to do your best for the company and if you have that attitude then when you see someone else in the company excelling you say hey that's good for the company that's good i that's what we like to see we want the company to make money we want the company to succeed you're like i don't care if my company makes money or not you know what then you're a bad employee and you're not right with god because you should care whether your company succeeds well my company is bad then get a job for a company you respect and change your attitude because we ought to do our work unto our job as unto christ and so we shouldn't have this envious attitude or a vain glorious attitude and you say why does it say vain glory well can i tell you something glory on this earth is pretty much all vain say what's vain glory pretty much any glory you can think of except the glory of god i mean think about vain glory is almost redundant because anytime you're seeking personal glory in this world and trying to get glory for yourself and accolades for yourself it's pretty much going to be vain 99% of the time and so we need to make sure that we're humble and that we love other people and care about other people and not put down other people because they're superior to us and that's what we see going on in this passage with jeff as brethren it's not his fault that he's the the son of a strange woman he's a mighty man of valor he's a godly man of faith but they're threatened by that so he gets thrown out of his home so it's kind of a sad story from the beginning he gets exiled he flees look at verse three jeff the fled from his brethren so i mean they're threatening him they're physically threatening him because that's what it means to flee you don't flee if there's no threat there's a threat of violence there they're going to gang up on him and so he flees from before his brethren and he dwells in the land of tobb you know wherever that is it's kind of a no-name place in the bible because you know it's not an important place that i know of and there were gathered vain men to jeff the and went out with him so he gets thrown out of his family and he finds a group of people that will accept him and here's the thing you're always going to be able to find a group of people that will accept you no matter who you are but here's the thing that doesn't mean that you want to be in that crowd and this is where a lot of teenagers get into trouble because teenagers they want to be accepted you know they want a sense of belonging and let's face it children and teenagers can be cruel to one another it's very sad it's wrong it's sinful and it doesn't mean that it's not going to happen though you know it's wrong and if you're a teenager you should never enjoy picking on other kids making fun of other kids because of their family situation making fun of kids because they're from a broken home or making fun of kids because they're a different race or making fun of kids because they're poor or making fun of kids because they're maybe disabled in some way or ugly or whatever you find wrong with them you know you shouldn't make fun of other people you should live by the golden rule as a Christian all things whatsoever you would that men should do to you do you even so to them you don't want to be made fun of you don't want to be picked on so don't pick on other people it's not fun or cool it's it's it's wicked is what it is it's ungodly and sinful but let's face it that's what school is like i mean i don't know what it's like these days but back when i was in school 30 years ago you know kids were constantly getting picked on and getting bullied and it was often a bad atmosphere in school and guess what it's not just the kids who had something wrong with them that are getting picked on if you excel you also get picked on for excelling just like jeff the hair gets picked on you know for excelling on the one hand and for being a bastard on the other hand well you know you go to school and you know what happens if you get an a-plus in the class do your do your uh fellow students pick you up on their shoulders and start singing for he's a jolly good fellow no they're gonna mock you and make fun of you why because you're excelling okay and and even excelling in good looks you know the most beautiful girl oh she she's gonna be popular not necessarily because what if the other girls get envious of her beauty you see what i mean and so in a school environment unfortunately there's a lot of bullying there's a lot of mockery of other kids and people being picked on and and things like that and so it can be a bad atmosphere and what can often happen is that kids get picked on or bullied or treated poorly by one group of people and then there's another group of people that's ready to accept them and so they'll kind of just go to that other group no matter how bad that other group is because you know who that other group is sometimes it could be the drug crowd there's like dude we'll hang out with you you know like you know they'll kind of you know maybe they'll kind of just accept anybody and then next thing you know you got teenagers doing drugs because they're accepted by that drug crowd or it could be the sodomites maybe the sodomites are like sure come on over to our crew you know and then that's where they're going to try to molest them and groom them and and twist them into that filthy death style and so what am i trying to say here i'm saying that you got to be careful that if you get rejected by one group of people if you get rejected by family rejected by friends rejected by a certain group on the job or at school you don't want to necessarily just go to whoever will accept you and start hanging around with a bunch of what vain men vain people you know the bible talks a lot about these kind of vain and light persons you don't want to just go hanging around with just whoever accepts you now look we as human beings we want to be part of a group we want to be accepted we're social creatures right we we typically don't do well on our own there's that rare person that wants to go be by themselves and be a hermit and be a recluse but let's face it 99 percent of us are social creatures and we want to be part of some kind of a group whether it's a family or friends we want to be accepted and here's the thing want to make sure that we don't just go to whoever will accept us no matter how vain they are no matter how sinful they are and let me tell you the answer is that the local church should be a place that accepts us okay that's where we should seek that sense of belonging now you know i hope that you will also feel a sense of belonging in your physical family and i hope that you feel a sense of belonging at your job you know i hope that at your job there's camaraderie and you know every few times a year there's a company party and and everybody gets along and i hope that you have a nice barbecue you know and whatever and i hope there's a sense of camaraderie at your job that's good right look i hope that you have acceptance and camaraderie in many areas of life but let me tell you something the one place where you should be able to come and be a part of the team and be a part of the family is the local church you know that's where you should seek to be a part of that group because this is a group that you can be a part of if you're a saved child of god you know this is the place for you red yellow black white we don't care if you're poor or rich we don't care if you're good looking or homely it doesn't matter you know we accept our brothers and sisters in christ here and we don't worry about those kind of vain things such as skin color or how good looking you are or your economic status you know the bible teaches that we should never have more respect for the rich person than the poor person you know the bible rebukes a church that would give good seating to the rich and then say to the poor you know you're going to be standing over there or sit here under my footstool but then the guy comes in with the the ring and the goodly apparel and you put them in a good seat you know that's wickedness we're supposed to not respect the person of the poor or the person of the rich we're not supposed to worry about people's ethnicity or those type of things in the local church our standing is based on whether we're in christ and obviously there are people who commit very grievous sins that get thrown out of the church and that's biblical but short of committing these awful horrible sins major sins you know what all of god's people are welcome and can be a part of the team and and you know what many people have successfully found a sense of belonging and acceptance in the local church and that's where we ought to find that and like i said it's good when we have it in other areas of life as well in our home and other places maybe even our job or other places but but we we don't want to just run to whoever will accept us and you got to be careful teenagers i hope the teenagers are listening to what i'm saying right now you know let's say you're a teenage girl and you don't have a great relationship with your dad don't just get sucked in by the first guy who gives you attention and shows you some love you need to be discerning and don't just marry the first guy that comes along or even worse commit fornication with the first guy that comes along don't just go running off you young dudes with the first girl that comes along the first girl that shows you the attention that you crave and desire you know be discerning and this is a mistake for Jephthah to just surround himself with vain people surround himself with with uh people that are not good friends they're not godly people they're not the right kind of people and you sympathize with them because he got thrown out well you know who's he supposed to hang out with you know well find someone else Jephthah all right but anyway it says in verse four it came to pass in process of time that the children of Ammon made war against Israel and it was so that when the children of Ammon made war against Israel the elders of Gilead went to fetch Jephthah out of the land of Tom and they said unto Jephthah come and be our captain that we may fight with the children of Ammon and Jephthah said unto the elders of Gilead did not ye hate me and expel me out of my father's house and why are you coming to me now when you're in distress so here's the thing you know they got rid of them but now they're at war with the children of Ammon and they don't have any mighty warriors they don't have a leader they don't have anyone to take them to battle and they're thinking where's Jephthah I mean we need Jephthah so they kind of had to eat crow a little bit and humble themselves and reach out to Jephthah and say hey man sorry about that back then but hey you know what do you say you come and fight the children of Ammon for us and of course he's mad about this and like what in the world now all of a sudden when you need me you're coming to me after you threw me out after you rejected me you hated me now you're coming to me that you're in distress verse 8 the elders of Gilead said unto Jephthah therefore we turn again to thee now that thou mayest go with us and fight against the children of Ammon and be our head over all the inhabitants of Gilead verse 9 and Jephthah said unto the elders of Gilead if ye bring me home again to fight against the children of Ammon and the lord deliver them before me shall I be your head now they just said that they just said that he was going to be their head you can tell this is really important to him though because they've already told him you're going to be the boss he's like so am I going to be the boss I just want to hear you say it one more time okay so you can see that that Jephthah has become a little bit of a vain person here now I wonder how Jephthah became a little bit of a vain person who's into vain glory was it because he's been hanging around with vain people maybe you see you are right now or you soon shall be what your friends are so we got to be careful about the friends that we hang around with because our friends will rub off on us not maybe they will rub off on us period I'm not saying it's going to be something bad because a lot of times it can be something good you know you get around some godly Christian friends and they start rubbing off on you next thing you know you're growing spiritually iron sharpens iron and sometimes it could be things that are neither good nor bad you know you you start hanging around with somebody you start using their mannerisms you start using expressions that they use you start dressing the way that they dress I mean that's just the way people are we tend to mimic and mirror the people around us and so because Jephthah went and hung around with these vain people now he's got sort of a vain attitude of you know I want to be the head honcho they're the whole point they're bringing him back is to lead the thing they need a leader it's not like they just need one more fighter they need a leader they need leadership that's the whole point but yet he just makes this big deal about how like okay but I've got to be the boss or I'm going to be the leader right you know he's really important to him to have that title because he's been hanging around with vain people and so they relent to that in verse 10 they the Lord the elders of Gilead said unto Jephthah the Lord be witness between us if we do not so according to thy words like we will obey you you are the boss and they're actually swearing in the name of the Lord verse 11 then Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead and the people made him head and captain over them and he gets to be head and captain over them and Jephthah uttered all his words before the Lord in his peace so remember Jephthah is a great man of faith so you know the first thing he does is he starts praying you know he prays to God right away I mean he's relying on God he's trusting on God and Jephthah sent messengers unto the king of the children of Ammon saying what hast thou to do with me that thou art come against me to fight in my land so here's another positive for Jephthah is that Jephthah is seeking a diplomatic solution here he doesn't just want to fight no matter what even though he's a great mighty man of valor it's not that he's a bad warrior or that he's not strong enough but we should always seek to be at peace and the Bible tells us that as much as is possible as much as lieth in us we should seek to live peaceably with all men who is another great mighty warrior in the Bible who's the guy who the Bible says that God taught his hands to war and his fingers to fight and he said to the Lord thou teachest my hands to war so that a bow of steel is broken by my arms who am I talking about David and yet David said I am for peace but when I speak they are for war so there are going to be times that we have to fight but we should never be just out looking for a fight spoiling for a fight we should seek for peace the Bible tells us seek for peace and ensue it and so here we see Jephthah seeking for peace you know he's got what he wanted he's the head and the captain and so he wants peace and so he does the right thing by trying to seek a peaceful solution he says to the Ammonites look I have no beef with you we shouldn't be fighting this is not legitimate let's go through and look at this quickly he says what has thou to do with me at the end of verse 12 that thou would come against me to fight in my land verse 13 the king of the children of Ammon answered unto the messengers of Jephthah because Israel took away my land when they came up out of Egypt 300 years ago by the way it's like dude let it go Israel took away my land when they came up out of Egypt and Arnon even unto Jabak and unto Jordan now therefore restore those lands again peaceably now here's what's going on basically the children of Ammon are exaggerating about which land they possessed they're saying man in the good old days we used to have the land all the way up to the Jordan River and that belonged to us and you took it away from us and it was so great well here's the thing Jephthah gives a little history lesson here and sets them straight on this because actually there was another group of people that was living in the land that they're trying to lay claim to and that group of people was called the Ammonites now I know that's only maybe one letter different in the sound two letters different you know between Ammonite and Amorite but these are two totally different groups of people now the Amorites are part of the Canaanites so the Amorites are of the descendants of Ham and the Canaanite peoples whereas if you remember the Ammonites are the sons of Lot right so Abraham's nephew Lot he has these two sons Benami and Moab right and they're the fathers of the Moabites and the Ammonites excuse me no Ammonites Moabites and Ammonites are the sons of Lot see it's easy to mix this up the Ammonites and the Moabites are the sons of Lot and so they're kin to the Israelites you know they're they're sort of like a distant cousin in a sense so if you remember when the children of Israel when they come out of Egypt and they're coming into the promised land God tells them you're not going to inherit the land of the Edomites that belongs to the Edomites you're not going to inherit the land of the Moabites that belongs to the Moabites you're not going to inherit the land of the Ammonites that belongs to the Ammonites because these groups of people are are somewhat related to the Israelites because of course the Edomites are from Esau and the Moabites and the Ammonites are from Lot okay now the Amorites on the other hand it's open season on the Amorites because the Amorites are the Canaanites the Canaanites are cursed by God they were more wicked even than you know the Edomites the Moabites and the Ammonites the Amorites are in the same boat with like the Jebusites the Hivites the Parisites the Canaanites right the Canaanites so everybody see the difference between these two groups of people I know it might be hard to to remember differentiate but just Amorites are Canaanites that God allowed them to defeat Ammonites are sons of Lot but here's the deal when the children of Israel showed up you've got these kings Og and Sihon and they're dwelling on that east side of the river and the land that the Ammonites are claiming that they own in this passage where oh yeah we owned everything all the way up to the river and it was great and you know it's like well no actually that was where the Amorites were that's where Og and Sihon were and if you remember the children of Israel they were treated bad by the Edomites they were treated bad by the Moabites and the Ammonites but they still left their land alone they went around they took the long way they left them alone but when it came to the Amorites Og and King of Bashan and Sihon they ended up going to war with those people defeating them and taking their land so so even though they were heading for the promised land on the west side of the Jordan River they ended up taking over a portion on the east side of the river that belonged to the Amorites the Ammonites are trying to claim like well that's we had that and he's like no you didn't we defeated a different nation to take that and it had you never owned that that was never yours so that that's basically what this back and forth is between them I'll just quickly read you a couple highlights for sake of time but it basically says in verse number 21 and the Lord God of Israel delivered Sihon and all his people into the hand of Israel and they smote them so Israel possessed all the land of the Amorites the inhabitants of that country and they possessed all the coasts of the Amorites from Arnon even under Jabbok and from the wilderness even unto Jordan the Jordan River so now the Lord God of Israel hath dispossessed the Amorites from before his people Israel and shouldest thou possess it like you have no ancestral claim to this land he's saying like you never owned it because it was these other peoples and then we defeated them so why should you get it now it doesn't make any sense wilt thou not possess that which Kimosh thy God giveth thee to possess so whomsoever the Lord our God shall possess or shall drive out from before us then will we possess and now art thou anything better than Balak the son of Zippor king of Moab did he ever strive against Israel or did he ever fight against them because now let's stop and and think about this who's who's Balak Balak is the guy who was scared to mess with Israel and he was the one who hired Balaam the soothsayer to curse Israel he wanted to bring down some kind of a spiritual curse upon Israel because he didn't feel like he could defeat them or fight them and so that's Balak king of Moab and again he's lumping in Moab and Ammon because he's talking to the children of Ammon but he's saying like hey are you better than Balak king of Moab because that's their guy too because remember the Moabites and the Ammonites are kind of the same group of people they're both the descendants of Lot and so they're related you know it's like you know later Judah and Israel or something it's they're related so he says did he ever strive against Israel verse 26 while Israel dwelled in Heshbon and her towns and in Aurore and her towns and in all the cities that be along the coast of Arnon 300 years why therefore did you not recover them within that time he said look there's kind of a statute of limitations here if we stole your land 300 years ago it's kind of water under the bridge at this point you know don't tell that to the native americans you know but it's kind of like you know 300 years later it's kind of like okay here we are you know that was and you know this whole idea of these people stole our land and stuff it's like you know there's eight billion people in the world you know people have to live somewhere people are gonna inhabit different areas and you got to make room for everybody somehow and so this thing of well this lands our land and you know it doesn't belong to anybody else it's like you know everybody needs some space you know and and if you look at the history of our country there's a thing called the homestead act okay and then the homestead act basically in order for you to claim property or or even purchase property you know out west or whatever there were a few things that you had to do in the homestead act in order to have that land is that you had to put a fence around it you had to improve it you had to be using it and improve the land and you had to live there at least six months out of the year okay now what's the rationale behind that what's the logic behind that the logic is that you can't just show up somewhere you know you're the first one there right what if i'm just the first guy to get to arizona and i'm just like all of this is mine i put it all belongs to me now and then everyone who comes here forever has to pay rent to me and buy it from me and whatever i mean does that really make sense just because i'm the first guy there i just i know pronounce all of this mine you know and think about like the spanish conquistadors they're just kind of just cruising through north america just declaring everything this is all part of spain now and then they just leave it's like they show up this is not so look don't get mad at me for what i said about the indians because now i'm i'm down on the conquistadors now all right i'm a little bit down on the colonizers now so i'm i'm explaining both sides you know it doesn't really make sense for the spanish to show up and say oh this florida now belongs to the king of spain without building anything or improving anything or settling there you know what i mean so there's a there's an idea and i do think that it is somewhat rooted in the bible that in order to own something you have to use it you can't just sit there and just own everything you know and if you look at the way the property rights worked back in ancient israel and they divided up the land and everything you know you could god set it up a system to where one guy can't just own the whole thing because there's the year of jubilee and everything so there wasn't just kind of an unfettered property right of just we own this and you know there was a a a balance there and i i don't i'm getting a little off track so i don't have time to go into all that explanation i've preached that in other sermons about the year of jubilee and property rights and in in ancient israel that's a whole another subject but the point is that you know you can't just sit there and and ride around on horseback saying we own all this we own everything you know you gotta do something with it you gotta use it and you can't just sit there and say well somebody took this from my ancestors 300 years ago so it's my i i demand it after someone else improved it so like your ancestors are on land that's that's unimproved what do i mean i mean it's just it's just pretty much wild land you know it's just it's wilderness for the most part it's wilderness and then you know people come along and improve it and and irrigate it and farm it and build roads and infrastructure and then it's like oh oh actually this is mine you know there's a statute of limitations there and and and so you know i'm not trying to get into a big thing on that tonight but i'm just i'm just kind of pointing out some of the issues here between Jephthah and the Ammonites and what's going on here and why Jephthah has the moral high ground here because the Ammonites are wrong on history they're past the statute of limitations okay and they're worshiping some false god named so they're automatically the bad guys and we're automatically going to side with Jephthah because he's praying to Jehovah and he's our guy so anyway this is the back and forth he seeks the diplomatic solution it doesn't work out verse 28 i'm almost done how be it the the king of the children of Ammon hearken not under the words of Jephthah which he sent under them then the spirit of the lord came upon Jephthah and he passed over Gilead and Manasseh and passed over Mizpah of Gilead and from Mizpah of Gilead he passed over under the children of Ammon and this is where Jephthah makes a very stupid mistake here and Jephthah vowed to vow unto the lord and said if thou shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon into my hands then it shall be that whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me when i return in peace from the children of Ammon shall surely be the lord's and i will offer it up for a burnt offering so this is a very foolish vow we should always be very careful before we commit to doing or or or saying anything now in the new testament the bible very clearly commands us and i've done whole sermons on this swear not at all swear not at all do not swear don't swear by heaven don't swear by the earth don't swear by the lord just don't do it in the new now in the old testament it was permitted you know certain things are permitted that god eventually rolls back and says that's not permitted anymore and oaths are one of those things okay and i proved that from the bible in my sermon on swear not at all but but the point is you know even if we don't swear odes the bible still says that we should let our yay be yay and our nay be nay and so you know the acronym that i always think of as d w y w y s w d something like that do what you say you will do all right so if you say you're going to do something you do it and this should be what we strive to do and you know sometimes i've i've committed to things and then later i realize like man i shouldn't have made that commitment but it's like you know what i said i was gonna do it so that's what i'm gonna do you know i remember i bought my house you know at the worst possible time 2005 december of 2005 okay i bought a house and it was like the worst time peak of the market the values were just through the roof interest rates were bad but you know what i have no regrets because you know i started faithful word baptist church in that house you know i i needed to do that and so it is what it is right but i bought my house at the worst possible time and i remember uh the housing market crashed a couple years later so i i bought that house for 225 000 two years later three years later it was worth 85 000 so here i bought this house for 225 000 now it's worth first it went up to 240 then it went down to 85 000 and i mean houses on my street were literally selling for like what 75 grand and 68 000 like right in my neighborhood and i'm just like oh man and i still owe on my house you know a couple hundred grand or whatever hundred and some grand you know tons of money that i still owe on my house and a lot of people at that time were bailing from their mortgages bailing from their houses and and i remember i remember people coming to me at that time being like man i'm upside down on my house i gotta get out of this mortgage i'm gonna walk away from it i'm gonna bail on it and i remember asking those people did your payment change no no my payment's still the same did your job change like did your amount that you're getting paid at your job change no and i'm thinking to myself like okay well if you're still making the same amount of money and your payment's still the same what's the issue well but you know it dropped and it's like well i i said just just don't worry about it it's just a number you know but but but i you know and i i do feel that i was a little bit ripped off in that whole deal because of the fact that the the the lender pulled a bunch of shady things and squirrely deals you know on the day you the day you go to sign it's like totally different than what you agreed on and everything it's like whoa you know the closing costs are way more than what they promised and everything but you know what i you know and a lot of people are telling me that i you know you can get out of it walk away but i'm thinking to myself you know what this is what i signed on to like even though i kind of knew i was getting ripped off i realized i was getting ripped off and i signed it anyway you know i knew that they had changed things on the last couple days and stuff but i was i was so committed at that point i'd already printed the address on the church invites what do you do at that point you know i i got a thousand so invites here that i bought with my own money it's like what do i do you know i'm just like whatever here take a couple more thousand dollars of my money thanks a lot jerk you know i just felt like i just felt like i should just i just felt like i should stay with something that i signed on to you know that i agree i agreed to this and if i can stay with it you know and i can understand people get in situations where they have to default on something or whatever you know i get that and they're they're you know but i'm just saying like since since i was making enough money i just stayed with it you know and in the end it came back and i was able to sell it for more money than i paid because i just stayed with it and hung with it over the long haul but you know the bible talks about a person swearing to their own hurt and changing not that they will receive a blessing from the lord and so sometimes you commit to things or say you're going to do things even just little things you know you say you're going to go to one birthday party and then you get invited to a better birthday party you go to the original birthday party because that's what you said you would do you know and we should really strive to do what we say we're going to do now obviously if we make a vow you really got to say do what you say you're going to do but we shouldn't be making a bunch of oats anyway so even just when we say yay let our yay be yay and our nay be nay and when we say we're going to do something we should be reliable and stick with it don't you hate it when people go back on their word to you i had a job one time and they told me if you go get this certification we're going to give you a 50 cent an hour raise oh 50 cents you know but man when you're living paycheck to paycheck you know 50 cents an hour is 50 cents i mean yeah that's 20 bucks or whatever a week and so that mattered to me we need i needed that money so i actually i had to take these tests this this these series of tests and i had to take two sets of tests well i figured out and the tests are like three months apart but i figured out that i can take the test in california and then i can drive across the border in nevada two days later and take the test in nevada and i can actually take all the tests and get certified i thought that my boss was going to be really happy that i was like taking initiative and driving to nevada you know and i mean i had to put gas in my car to go to nevada i come to my boss and say hey i'm certified let's go let's do it oh well we didn't know you were going to do it that fast didn't give me the raise made me wait three months to get the raise he broke his word he said get the certification as soon as you get it you get an extra 50 cents i you know put 50 dollars of gas in my car and he broke his word to me you know what and it wasn't going to hurt him to give me 50 cents but you know what even if it does hurt you if you say you're going to do stuff do what you say you're going to do honor your commitments right keep your word but then there's a vow a vow is another level of commitment right and pretty much the only vow that we really partake in or the biggest value that we partake in is marriage right because we do make that lifelong commitment to marriage that is a vow that we take and here's the thing about that is that people are pretty flippant with that vow today aren't they you know people go into marriage thinking well if it doesn't work out i got plan b you need to burn your bridges behind you when you get married you need to burn the ships you need to be do or die with marriage because guess what till death do us part isn't just a slogan that's a commitment that you're making okay and so you don't want to break your word on that now jeff the stupidly foolishly commits to doing something and he doesn't even know what he's committing to you know we need to make sure that we know what we're getting into when we commit to do something so he commits oh the first thing that comes out to meet me i'm going to offer it as a burnt offering to lord he assumes it's going to be a barnyard animal that comes out to greet him and of course he goes out he fights he wins the battle and then his only daughter comes out to meet him and before any of the animals come out she comes out which is very unlikely you'd expect animals to you know you expect the dog to come running out and barking and wagons tail first thing but no you know it's his daughter that comes out so now he's in this horrible position and people have people have endlessly debated this passage and and because of the fact that it's disturbing it's unsettling when you read it it kind of makes you uncomfortable right but that's what it's supposed to do i think you should be a little bit perturbed by this chapter you should be a little bit unsettled it is a rough chapter and so here's what we have to understand you know everything is in the bible the way it is for a reason number one it's an extreme example showing the seriousness of a vow as a warning don't make stupid vows don't say stupid things don't make these rash odes that's number one what can we learn from this that's number one that we can that's the big takeaway from this don't make a stupid vow okay but the next thing we can learn from this is that sometimes through your stupidity you can put yourself in a position where no matter what you do it's wrong and sinful you could put yourself in a situation where what do i do pastor anderson do i do a or b and i'm like both of those are wrong both of those are sinful you can put yourself in a stupid position where no matter what you do it's a sin so the moral is don't put yourself in that position but there are situations where both options are wrong and it's like you just have to pick between wrong and wrong here okay so that's the next thing that we could learn from this and then lastly we can learn from this that even something as as unsettling or perturbing or or or unsavory as this in the word of god you know can still point us to something beautiful because this points to the gospel this points to the lord jesus christ because here's the thing when we read this and we feel so bad for jeffa's daughter and we're we're lamenting jeffa's daughter like why does she have to die it's so stupid like man you know why did you do this but here's the thing actually as much pity we feel for the daughter and and and we can put ourselves in jeffa's position he has one child and it's a daughter you know and and remember he had a messed up home life he's probably trying to give his daughter a better situation but here's the thing however you feel whatever emotion you have about jeffa's daughter or whatever emotion you can picture jeffa having about his daughter think about the father sending jesus to be the savior of the world because that that's what's pictured here you know it's it's the only child dying well guess what jesus christ died for us you know god so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life you say well i don't think that's an exact parallel but here's the thing no picture of christ in the old testament is an exact parallel i mean nobody in the old testament dies on a cross but yet you have all kinds of pictures pointing to jesus the picture is never exact you know this is a daughter jesus is a son but still it's an only child you know being sacrificed as a burnt offering i mean think about it folks it obviously is pointing us to jesus christ and so actually as unsavory as the story is this story can actually help give you a deeper understanding of the gospel it can actually give you a deeper understanding of jesus dying on the cross for us and the father sending the son to be the savior of the world and so there's that aspect of this that we don't want to miss now i'll tell you what some people have done with this passage they're kind of just in denial about this passage and they say well he didn't really kill her he didn't really offer her as a burnt offering she just had to be celibate now it does talk about the fact that hey she knew no man she's lamenting the fact that she didn't get to live a normal life and and you know get married and have kids and so forth but that's not but but here's the thing what does the bible actually say what the bible actually says in verse 39 and it came to pass at the end of two months that she returned unto her father who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed end of story the narrator is telling us that he did what he said he would do he did what he vowed he would do and you say well that that's horrible i i can't i can't handle that hey uh i'm done reading the bible this story just has just ruined it for me here's the thing about the story is it tragic yes but hold on a second we're all gonna die physically so what happened in the story somebody lost a child a woman died a young innocent woman died hey we're all gonna die she's most likely in heaven she seems to be a godly righteous person her dad is jephtha he's a great man of faith chances are she's saved he's he's communicated the gospel to her it would be bizarre if she weren't you know so we can assume she's in heaven so did she miss out on some things yeah but she also gets to be in the bible and she also gets her own holiday i mean how many people have a holiday right now in the us you know abraham lincoln doesn't even have a holiday anymore george washington doesn't even have a holiday they only get a half holiday now they got combined into president's day so she gets a holiday right the four and she gets a four-day weekend right it says at the end the daughters of israel went yearly to lament the daughters of jephthah the gilead died four days in a year so here's the thing look she gets to heaven and as soon as she gets to heaven somebody can explain to her hey actually you're a picture of jesus christ and people are going to be preaching about you thousands of years from now about how you picture jesus and you know what i'm sure she's enjoying her time in heaven and jephtha yeah it this was a horrible thing especially because it's all his fault it's one thing to lose your child it's even worse when you lose your child and it's your fault so this is horrible for him but guess what he got a little honorable mention shout out in hebrews 11 and he's up in heaven too and he gets it now you know and and you know what i'm sure he's sitting up there thinking in heaven you know what did i live a screwed up life yes son of a prostitute kicked out of my family and he finally hung around with the gangs right the vain persons going to you know he's got his gang and tob grew up hard and tob you know ends up sacrificing his daughter but i think at the end of the day he's up in heaven he realized you know what hey my life had problems but at least my life could be used for millions of people i mean how many millions of millions of people are the only one preaching this every baptist is preaching this other denominations are preaching this it's being preached all over the world it's being preached in non-denom churches maybe rarely but here's the thing if his life could be used to help millions of other people live a better life millions of other people could could could save hassles and by realizing don't make a stupid vow be careful what you say don't hang around with vain people you know and and and they can learn even about jesus from this passage you know what in the end it's okay you know he and look sometimes we're gonna have some messed up things happen in our life but just realize that in the end all things work together for good to those who love god and even when we screw things up and do something stupid sometimes what we mean for evil god can mean for good and and it can all turn out okay so even though this is a rough chapter there are a lot of good things we can learn from this chapter so let's not try to change the chapter or water it down or censor it well i'm not going to tell this bible story it's it's got the wrong message you know what here's why it's got the right message because it actually happened and it's teaching us about real life and it's showing us that even godly people can do stupid things and ruin their family so hey if we love the lord if we pray our prayers if we have faith in the lord let's make sure we don't screw up our family or screw up our life let's be careful and take this as a cautionary tale let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer father we thank you so much for this uh great lesson lord many lessons from this chapter i pray that these things will sink down into our ears lord and that we would uh use jefftha for a positive example in a few ways where he where he did the right thing where he was a man of prayer he's a man of faith and where he's a mighty man of valor where he sought to be at peace but then also learn some of the the things that we shouldn't do like being vainglorious hanging around with the wrong crowd and making a stupid vow and making a commitment that we can't keep lord help us to use these stories to make our lives more godly and in jesus name we pray amen amen let's be dismissed and singing hymn number 261 turn your eyes upon jesus number 261 let's sing it out on that first verse number 261 oh soul are you weary and troubled number 261 let's sing it out nice and loud on that first verse number 261 me look full in his wonderful face and the things of earth will grow strange through death into life oh in his wonderful face is his words shall not fail so turn your eyes upon is i'm gonna sing it's not yours so you