Judges 10-12 Seek God First…

Jephthath was a man of passions and he was unimpressed with the tribes on the west. He was an outcast of his family but in times of distress they came to him to save them. How often do we do much the same?  We fail to keep families together but seek to use excuses to divide. Paul taught the Corinthians to be unified and here we see that Israel is divided because of a foolish decision. 

The question is why were they divided? It all goes back to a dishonoring of Jehovah and how Satan used the tool of idolatry. God was right to say to them, you have dishonored me, why then should I come and rescue you? Go and call upon your idol Baal. This seems to be recurring theme. Men are only pleased when all goes their way but when trouble comes, they seek anything to solve the problem, even to idolatry. 

The lesson here is to honor God not an idol. Idols will never save but God will. There is another lesson here and that is God allows all troubles to come our way until we are at the end of ourselves and then as the scripture says: “Finally the Lord grew tired of seeing Israel suffer so much.” [Judges 10:16] How gracious is our God and how patient.