Did he actually sacrifice his daughter?

I’m going to take a departure from my normal SOAP and offer up some insight from a commentary that I regard as one of the best. I do this for the sake of the Judges 11 story of Jephthah’s vow. If you read this passage in Judges you may be asking yourself, “What in the world!?” If so, read this commentary and then decide for yourself. Enjoy!

From the Bible Knowledge Commentary: 11:34-40. Victorious Jephthah was met at the door of his house by his rejoicing daughter, who was jubilantly celebrating her father’s victory over Ammon. Emphasis is placed on the fact that she was an only child. Anticipating the fulfillment of his vow, Jephthah expressed his great chagrin and sorrow in typical Near-Eastern fashion by tearing his clothes (cf., e.g., Gen. 37:29, 34; 44:13; Josh. 7:6; Es. 4:1; Job 1:20; 2:12). His statement, I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break, may reflect his ignorance of the legal option to redeem (with silver) persons who were thus dedicated (cf. Lev. 27:1-8). Also the Mosaic Law expressly prohibited human sacrifices (cf. Lev. 18:21; 20:2-5; Deut. 12:31; 18:10). Therefore many scholars conclude that when Jephthah did to her as he had vowed (Jud. 11:39), he commuted his daughter’s fate from being a burnt sacrifice to being a lifelong virgin in service at Israel’s central sanctuary. Other scholars believe Jephthah’s semi-pagan culture led him to sacrifice her as a burnt offering. Strong arguments have been advanced for both views (cf. Wood, Distressing Days of the Judges, pp. 288-95; Merrill F. Unger, Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, 2 vols. Chicago: Moody Press, 1981, 1:331).
Most of the arguments for or against Jephthah’s offering his daughter as a human sacrifice can be used to defend either position and therefore are not conclusive. For example, the grief of both Jephthah and his daughter readily fits either her death or her perpetual virginity. In either case she would die childless (whether sooner or later) and Jephthah would lack descendants. Her asking for two months to roam . . . and weep . . . because she would never marry may be one of the stronger arguments for the virginity view. But this could also mean she was wailing in anticipation of her death which of course would render her childless. Though Jephthah made his rash vow, he probably knew something about the prohibitions of the Mosaic Law against human sacrifice. Yet his half-pagan background, combined with the general lawless spirit dominating the period of the Judges (cf. 17:6; 21:25), could readily account for his fulfilling this vow. The record of the local annual custom that arose to remember Jephthah’s daughter (11:39-40) lacks sufficient detail to support either viewpoint strongly.
Even the existence of a group of young women serving at the tabernacle is not demonstrably evident from the passages used to support this (Ex. 38:8; 1 Sam. 2:22). Nor does the appeal to the law of options for vows (Lev. 27) apply directly to this situation. Nothing is said there about substitutionary service to God for the sacrifice—only the substitution of monetary payment. Therefore in the absence of any clear evidence indicating the girl’s dedication to tabernacle service as a perpetual virgin, the more natural interpretation of the euphemism that Jephthah “did to her as he had vowed” seems to be that he offered his daughter as a human sacrifice.

Whichever position is taken, the attitude of Jephthah’s daughter is worth noting. Whether by death or by perpetual sanctuary service, she was to bear no children. This was a cause of great sorrow in ancient Israel. Yet she submitted herself to her father’s vow: You have given your word to the Lord. Do to me just as you promised. An Israelite custom, though probably somewhat localized, developed from the incident. Each year the young women of Israel went out for four days to commemorate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.

Don’t Get Killed By A Woman

Scripture: Judges 9: 52-56 says, “Abimelech went to the tower and stormed it. But as he approached the entrance to the tower to set it on fire, a woman dropped an upper millstone on his head and cracked his skull. Hurriedly he called to his armor-bearer, “Draw your sword and kill me, so that they can’t say, ‘A woman killed him.’ ” So his servant ran him through, and he died. When the Israelites saw that Abimelech was dead, they went home. Thus God repaid the wickedness that Abimelech had done to his father by murdering his seventy brothers.

Observation: Abimelech, a son of Gideon, wanted to be a king. He became treacherous and killed his brothers. After a dramatic series of events, he is attempting to besiege a city for vengeance. God chose a woman to drop a giant rock on his head. He then asks a solider to kill him so it won’t be recorded in history that he had been killed by a woman.

Application: This passage reminds me about the character of God. God is brilliant and has an amazing sense of humor. Here we have a man who knew no humility, but would use conniving and treacherous schemes to accomplish his will instead of God’s will. God then uses a woman to kill him. How ironic! What is the application? God is so in control, and he’s not afraid to use creative ways to squash (no pun intended) our arrogance. It is humbling to be reminded that God is God and I am not.

Prayer: God, I pray that when ever I begin to get out of your will that you would creatively help me get back on track with you!

We don’t need no stinkin’ wet fleece! Live by Faith

Scripture: Judges 6:36-40 says, “Gideon said to God, “If you will save Israel by my hand as you have promised- look, I will place a wool fleece on the threshing floor. If there is dew only on the fleece and all the ground is dry, then I will know that you will save Israel by my hand, as you said.”  And that is what happened. Gideon rose early the next day; he squeezed the fleece and wrung out the dew—a bowlful of water.

Then Gideon said to God, “Do not be angry with me. Let me make just one more request. Allow me one more test with the fleece. This time make the fleece dry and the ground covered with dew.” That night God did so. Only the fleece was dry; all the ground was covered with dew.

Observation: Gideon lacked faith. Call it what you want, but he needed more than hearing the word of the Lord. Just a few verses earlier God said, “The LORD answered, “I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites together.” But Gideon needed more confirmation, so he tested the Lord. However, God was ok with it and answered Gideon’s request to perform some small miracles to prove that God was real and serious.

Application: Have you ever heard someone say they will “put a fleece before God?” What that means is that we are looking for something to confirm something we feel God has asked us to do. I use to say this all the time. I would wait for God to prove that what he said was true before I would step out with faith. But faith is “being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” If we need something other than faith before we follow God, is that faith at all? I would say no. We can second guess our faith all day long, we can tell God that we’ll believe him when he “proves it” but the reality is that we are now in a time where God is asking us to live by faith in the Son of God and to step out by faith. So what is the fleece for us as we live by faith? 3 things: First, did you feel that God placed it on your heart? Second, is what He is asking you to do contrary to His written Word? Three, did you ask some other strong Christians who you trust to pray with you and seek their wise counsel? If you did those three, step our on faith and stop waiting for a dry fleece. Just do it!

Prayer: Thank you God that you are building in me a faith that can move mountains. Please continue this good work and make it stronger today!

Stumbling Blocks

1 Corinthians 8:9-13 says, “Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol’s temple, won’t he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.”

Observation: We have a very popular and sometimes controversal passage from Paul. What he is saying is that when you love others you will put the wellbeing of others before your own as Christ did in his life and death. So the discussion becomes what do I do that may cause someone to stumble into sin? And when is it not me causing someone to sin, but perhaps legalism? All good questions. Allow me to use the Bible Knowledge Commentary to clear the air: “The selflessness of Christ was an example for the knowledgeable. If Christ loved this brother so that he was willing to give up His exalted rights and even His life (Phil. 2:6, 8), surely the strong could give up his right to eat such meat.”

Application: There are times in the life of a follower of Jesus that you will have to make a decision to give up something, even if for you it is not wrong, so that someone else will grow in their walk with the Lord. For example, drinking a beer at a restaurant is not a sin in it self. But say you are having a drink at out on the town, and a friend who has been dealing with alcohol sees what you are doing, assumes that since you are doing it, all is good, picks up a drink and falls back into addiction. Is that a sin? I’m not the judge, but go back to what the Bible Knowledge Commentary said: “The selflessness of Christ was an example for the knowledgeable. If Christ loved this brother so that he was willing to give up His exalted rights and even His life (Phil. 2:6, 8), surely the strong could give up his right to eat such meat.”
Prayer: God, let me give up the things that may hinder the spiritual growth of others!

Vigorous!

Joshua 14:10-11 says, “”Now then, just as the LORD promised, he has kept me alive for forty-five years since the time he said this to Moses, while Israel moved about in the desert. So here I am today, eighty-five years old! I am still as strong today as the day Moses sent me out; I’m just as vigorous to go out to battle now as I was then.

Observation: Joshua was a great leader and general. He has fought some serious battles and taken the land God was giving to his people. God had placed a calling on Joshua. God gave Joshua the strength to finish what he had started 45 years earlier. In this passage Joshua says that God placed a calling on his life, and as long as God had a job for him to do, God would strengthen him. He says we was vigorous!

Application: There are days when I feel that I do not have the strength necessary to “battle” for the Lord. My battles are different from Joshua’s. Each day I wake up I know that God has placed a calling on my life. As as long as God is calling me into battle I must trust that he will give me the vigor and strength to “fight.” When my faith is weak, or I am frustrated, or tired, I must remember the words of Joshua! I was 19 when God called me into ministry. 14 years later he is giving me what I need to carry out that calling. As long as he chooses I will be obedient to his calling.

Prayer: Forgive me when I lose faith. You are sovereign and you have given me the calling to battle. You will give me vigor and strength. Thank you God for giving me what I need to do what you have asked.

Tomorrow, the Lord is going to do something amazing!

Joshua 3: 5 says, “Joshua told the people, “Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the LORD will do amazing things among you.”

Observation: Joshua was preparing the people to cross the Jordan which was a significant step in taking the promise land that God had given Israel. He would do a miracle in changing the flow of the river it self! But before that happens Joshua tells the people to prepare themselves (consecrate) because God is about the blow their minds away!

Application: When you wake up in the morning do you prepare yourself for God to blow your mind away? I don’t wake up expecting a miracle, but I want that kind of attitude! There are two parts to this passage I want to apply for myself. First: I want consecrate myself daily in the expectation that God is going to do something amazing. By that I mean I need to be in a place with the Lord where He can speak to me. How do I do that? Get into his word, talk with him, examine my heart and ask that he gets rid of all the junk. Second: I want to expect that he will rock my face off. And when he does I want to give him all the praise and honor he is due!

Prayer: God, let me be prepared and ready for you to amaze me tomorrow at Sticky Conference and church!

Gaining Patience for “Foolishness”

1 Corinthians 2:14 says, “The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.”

Observation: Paul is teaching the Corinthians that without the spirit of God upon our hearts we can’t do or know his will. We can’t understand his mind or agenda for his life. He goes on to explain that for those around us that do not have the spirit in their lives, it goes beyond not knowing the mind of Christ…but to them the gospel is foolishness.

Application: When I watch TV or listen to the radio, sometimes I get so worked up over the ungodliness I hear. I think, “How can these people be so crazy?” I am holding them to a standard of God that to them is total foolishness. The same is true in politics. I expect that politicians should have some kind of moral compass. The reality is that they do not know the mind of God, and much of the morality that comes from him is foolishness anyway. I think this gives me a patience towards those who are spiritually discerned. It makes me want to pray for them instead of get upset and frustrated. How can I get frustrated over how they act when they don’t know how they should act. It puts a new desire in my heart to preach the gospel so that the spirit can be upon more hearts and perhaps in these last days we can begin to turn back towards God and the foundations on which this country was made.

Prayer: God, give me a new burden for those who need your wisdom upon their hearts.

Fruit

Galatians 5:22-23 says, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.”

Paul has been making a case that you can’t mix law and grace. That either you live by one or the other, but as for those who follow Christ, we are to live by the spirit. He describes what that looks like. The fruits of the spirit are probably one of the best measuring sticks for a believer. Not that we measure our spirituality but that we can look to God and see the way he describes us the way he would like us to act.

If we are not careful we could probably force these kinds of fruits upon ourselves. But you will notice that it is the fruit produced by the spirit in our lives. It is not something we produce, but it is the result of allowing Jesus to come alive in each of us.

God, let me live by your standards. Remove anything in my life that would prevent your spirit from producing fruit in my life.

Foolish Ryan, who has Bewitched Me?

Scripture

Deuteronomy 13:3-4 “you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul. ⁴ It is the LORD your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him.

Galatians 1:6-7 ⁶I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— ⁷which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ.

Observation

Both of these passages have a common theme. People are attempting to take the pure and perfect Word of God and either add or subtract from it. In Deuteronomy the people wanted to see more signs and miracles. In Galatia the Christians were creating a legalistic version of the gospel in which law was added to grace. In both passages, God and Paul were rebuking and correcting them for the way in which they are easily enticed and bewitched by something other than preaching Christ and his sufficiency. In Chapter 3 Paul actually says, “Foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you?”

Application

Can we really blame Israel and the Galatians? We have all been in a spot in our walk with God when we felt it more comfortable to add some law into grace in order to make ourselves feel better. Or perhaps we have told God that unless we see a sign or miracle, we will not move. Is faith in Jesus not enough to believe anymore? Is His grace not sufficient to sustain men when I’m feeling down or confused? The reality is that there is a perfect gospel. We are an unperfect people. But when we admit that we are scared, confused or even deceived perhaps that is when God can begin to work in us. Each time I read Galatians I am quick to judge. But how many times I have heard the truth and then walked out the door only to follow another gospel.

Prayer

Thank you God for your amazing grace. Thank you God that in my weakness I am made strong. Thank you God that everyday I wake up I have a change to hear your voice and walk in faith.

They Are Stronger Than You

Deuteronomy 7: 1 says, “When the LORD your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations—the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger than you- ² and when the LORD your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally.

Observation: The Lord had promised the Israelites a land of their own. We read a few weeks ago that 12 spies were sent in to scout out the land, finding giants and other people occupying their new home land. 10 of the spies were ready to run home to Egypt, but Joshua and Caleb knew that if God said that we their land, then he would give it to them. What I love about this passage is that the nations living in the promised land were stronger than the Israelites, and it is actually said by God. He says, “I’ll drive them out but you should know they are stronger than you.” I guess he could have not said the part about the nations being stronger than Israel, but he chose to keep it real with them. He goes on to say that HE will deliver them over to Israel and they must totally destroy them.

Application: Do you ever feel like you are being put up against impossible odds? Do you feel like God is playing games with you and there is no way to win? Do you think Israel felt this way? They must have thought that God was messing with their heads, but we must remember that while God has a good sense of humor, he doesn’t play mind games. When we feel that we are up against impossible odds, and the chips are stacked against us, we can remember that when you feel God has spoken, then he must do the heavy lifting. What is God telling you to do today that seems impossible. Where must he work and where must you be obedient?

Prayer: God, show me when things seem impossible but you are telling me you’ll do the work in my midst.