A Woman of Warfare
Judges 4-5
Essential 100 Series
February 10, 2008
Evening Service
This message has been adapted through the use of a variety of sources including points from other messages on the same passage here on Sermon Central.
Introduction
Here is an abridged version of the Judges cycle just to refresh your memory from this morning. Israel went through this cycle at least seven times over the three hundred year period of Judges.
Stage One: the people would be doing good.
Stage Two: after these years of prosperity they would turn their backs on God....
Stage Three: God would allow an enemy to oppress them
Stage Four: The people would cry out to God
Stage Five: God sends a deliverer
Stage Six: the people start doing good again (Repeat stages)
Why is the book of Judges set up on such a pattern? First, it is historical. Second, it is instructive. Here is how one commentator describes it:
The entire account is deliberately constructed to emphasize the deliverance provided by Yahweh. He is the One pulling the strings, raising generals, deploying armies, dictating strategy, and effecting the victory. … This passage thus encourages us to perceive God’s sovereignty over history and our own lives. Whether it is in his chastening, in his compassionate deliverance, in his financial provision, or in his leading and guiding decisions, God is sovereign over life, and he is at work bringing his plan to fruition. K. Lawson Younger, Jr.
What do we see happening here as we look at chapter 4 of Judges?
There is a need for deliverance
1 After Ehud died, the Israelites once again did evil in the eyes of the LORD. 2 So the LORD sold them into the hands of Jabin, a king of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor. The commander of his army was Sisera, who lived in Harosheth Haggoyim. 3 Because he had nine hundred iron chariots and had cruelly oppressed the Israelites for twenty years, they cried to the LORD for help. Judges 4:1-3
The same sad cycle begins once again and Israel walks away from God. Things had been good. God rescued them through Ehud and then after Ehud dies, Israel goes right back to evil practices and ways. Again, these people knew right from wrong and chose to do what was wrong.
Look at verse 2: So the LORD sold them into the hands of Jabin. Notice the word sold as the main description of God’s action. There would seem to be several implications with this. The Hebrew word here for sold means to sell oneself, to be sold or to be given over to death. God allows Israel to be in bondage to the pagan king of the Canaanites. Israel is also oppressed by Jabin for 20 years because he was a powerful king.
Several times the passage refers to the fact that Sisera has 900 chariots. The chariot was a weapon to be feared. It would have the modern day equivalent of a tank because chariots would have the effect of a tank. They would carry the driver and at least one other rider through the battlefield breaking enemy lines. Chariots would have had a variety of weapons that they would have carried including spears, javelins and short bows with arrows.
Israel had entered the cycle of sin, servitude and surrender. They sinned, were forced into bondage and then cried out to God for assistance. Notice that it took them 20 years to seek God for assistance.
God brings deliverance from unexpected places
4 Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lappidoth, was leading Israel at that time. 5 She held court under the Palm of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim, and the Israelites came to her to have their disputes decided. Judges 4:4-5
Make no mistake; God can do whatever He wants, whenever He wants through whomever He wants. Israel had been under a heavy oppression from the Canaanites for 20 years. Imagine that Israel lived under an incredible oppression for twenty years without crying out to God. Why would they do such a thing? They were stubborn and hard hearted and would not return to God.
God raised up the only person who was able to lead and that was Deborah. In the ancient times, women in positions of authority were virtually unheard of. However, we see God using women in amazing ways throughout scripture.
Ruth becomes the great grandmother of King David
Esther becomes queen over Babylonia
Mary becomes the mother of Jesus
Mary Magdalene is the first to carry the message of the resurrection
Lydia is used to establish the church in Philippi
Deborah served as judge over Israel and worked as Moses did settling disputes among the people. The name Deborah means honeybee and focuses on the ability to arrange.
Deborah is also said to be a prophetess. This means that she was the spokesperson for God. She was God’s chosen instrument to speak on His behalf with the people.
Let’s be clear that the standard manner of authority was through the leadership of men. Israel was often led by men in positions of authority.
When we hesitate to trust God hesitates to move
6 She sent for Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali and said to him, "The LORD, the God of Israel, commands you: `Go, take with you ten thousand men of Naphtali and Zebulun and lead the way to Mount Tabor. 7 I will lure Sisera, the commander of Jabin’s army, with his chariots and his troops to the Kishon River and give him into your hands.’ " 8 Barak said to her, "If you go with me, I will go; but if you don’t go with me, I won’t go." 9 "Very well," Deborah said, "I will go with you. But because of the way you are going about this, the honor will not be yours, for the LORD will hand Sisera over to a woman." So Deborah went with Barak to Kedesh, 10 where he summoned Zebulun and Naphtali. Ten thousand men followed him, and Deborah also went with him. Judges 4:6-10
Who can really blame Barak? He is told to go do this without hearing from God himself. Deborah tells him to go and he hesitates. Human reasoning often fails us and we cannot come to a logical decision based on the facts in front of us. Barak is dealing with a similar situation.
In my first church there was a lady who would share with me the things God told her. Often, the things that God told her were things for me to do. I listened with patience. After a few times of these divine instructions, I responded to her latest instruction for me. If God wants me to do something He will tell me to do it.
Barak may have felt in a similar situation but with one important difference, Deborah was already seen as a leader. She was a judge and prophetess. It would seem here that these were the first instructions she gave regarding military matters.
When we hesitate with God, we lose out. Barak loses the honor of victory over Sisera and God gives that victory to another woman. It seems fitting that a woman be the one to kill Sisera. Deborah gives the command, Barak hesitates and then a woman gains the honor. Most importantly God gains the glory for the actions and the defeat of Sisera.
God takes on the fight
12 When they told Sisera that Barak son of Abinoam had gone up to Mount Tabor, 13 Sisera gathered together his nine hundred iron chariots and all the men with him, from Harosheth Haggoyim to the Kishon River. 14 Then Deborah said to Barak, "Go! This is the day the LORD has given Sisera into your hands. Has not the LORD gone ahead of you?" So Barak went down Mount Tabor, followed by ten thousand men. 15 At Barak’s advance, the LORD routed Sisera and all his chariots and army by the sword, and Sisera abandoned his chariot and fled on foot. 16 But Barak pursued the chariots and army as far as Harosheth Haggoyim. All the troops of Sisera fell by the sword; not a man was left. Judges 4:12-16
Barak is preparing for the coming battle that Deborah called Barak to fight. Barak goes to Mt Tabor and waits for Sisera to come with his nine hundred chariots. As Sisera approaches, Barak is ready to advance on him. Sisera waits for the word from Deborah to attack. Look at the words that Deborah uses with Barak. "Go! This is the day the LORD has given Sisera into your hands. Has not the LORD gone ahead of you?" Deborah gives the command to attack and then reminds Barak that God has already gone ahead of him to prepare the way.
God gives the directives, the manner we are to conduct ourselves and the directions, the timing we are to follow. Barak followed the directives of God as given through Deborah. He went and gathered an army. Barak waited to get the exact direction from God as to when the attack should happen. When we follow the direction of God and the directives of God, we come away victorious.
We have to remember that God is always right on time. There has never been an instance when God did not do as He wanted in the right time. God’s timing, unlike ours, is completely perfect. We may feel that God is taking too long to do something or maybe moving us too fast to catch our breath but God always works according to His time table not ours.
17 Sisera, however, fled on foot to the tent of Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, because there were friendly relations between Jabin king of Hazor and the clan of Heber the Kenite. 18 Jael went out to meet Sisera and said to him, "Come, my lord, come right in. Don’t be afraid." So he entered her tent, and she put a covering over him. 19 "I’m thirsty," he said. "Please give me some water." She opened a skin of milk, gave him a drink, and covered him up. 20 "Stand in the doorway of the tent," he told her. "If someone comes by and asks you, `Is anyone here?’ say `No.’ " 21 But Jael, Heber’s wife, picked up a tent peg and a hammer and went quietly to him while he lay fast asleep, exhausted. She drove the peg through his temple into the ground, and he died. Judges 4:17-21
The battle does not go well for Sisera, even with his force of 900 chariots and his army is defeated. Knowing that his life will be lost, Sisera flees on foot to get away. He hides in the tent of Jael counting on the good relations between Jabin and the house of Heber. Unfortunately, Sisera falls asleep with the wrong woman and she makes the decision to kill Sisera.
The way that Jael decides to kill Sisera seems almost poetic justice. Jael assures him that he is safe, obviously plotting to kill him. Jael waits for him to fall asleep. Sisera is exhausted from the battle and quickly falls into a deep sleep. Then she drives a tent stake though his temple. Not only does Jael drive it into his temple but all the way through his head and into the ground. This was one mad woman.
22 Barak came by in pursuit of Sisera, and Jael went out to meet him. "Come," she said, "I will show you the man you’re looking for." So he went in with her, and there lay Sisera with the tent peg through his temple--dead. 23 On that day God subdued Jabin, the Canaanite king, before the Israelites. 24 And the hand of the Israelites grew stronger and stronger against Jabin, the Canaanite king, until they destroyed him. Judges 4:22-24
Barak comes searching for Sisera and likely comes close to passing Jael but she stops him. Deborah had already told Barak that because he would not go without her the honor of killing Sisera would go to a woman. Can you imagine the look on Barak’s face when he sees Sisera dead in Jael’s tent? Can you imagine Barak’s shock in how Sisera has been killed?
In the end, Sisera’s army is destroyed and the strength of Jabin is broken. The final part of this chapter is final victory over the tyrant that oppressed Israel for so long.
Life Lessons
God can use anyone to accomplish the work that needs to be done.
No one would have expected Deborah to be the chosen instrument of the work of God. God has a way of choosing people that may seem less than great candidates for service to accomplish great victory. Why does God do this? When God brings victory from an unlikely source, he gains the credit and the glory.
God makes use of unexpected people to accomplish unexpected tasks.
God can do incredible things through the least likely people and the most incredible events in the most unlikely places. God is so good, He uses frail and faulty people to accomplish his divine work.
