I told you that when God’s people did evil, God allowed the surrounding nations to become a whipping rod to punish them.
While they were being punished, He told them that heaven would become like brass and He would not hear their prayers.
After God felt they had been punished severely enough for their disobedience, God would hear their prayers and deliver them from their enemies.
To accomplish this, He would raise up a judge to deliver them from their enemies. This was before there were any kings in the land.
God chose twelve judges to do this over a period of two hundred and ninety-six years.
The first judge is a man named Othniel.
WHO WAS OTHNIEL?
You might say he was a NOBODY!
You see, sometimes God uses a NOBODY that no one has ever heard of to do something He wants done. This is the case with Othniel.
• He had one thing going for him in the category of greatness; he was Caleb's younger brother.
• The Bible says this about him also; “The spirit of the LORD came upon him, and he judged Israel, and went out to war.”
The events in the Book of Judges that took place over 296 years, revealed not only a cycle but a downward spiral of behavior. As time goes on, the people continually grow worse.
• As the people became worse, so did the judges. For example, the last judge was Samson, and he is hardly an example of morality.
• The earlier judges actually are closer to God, and the people are closer to God.
• Othniel, the first judge, is considered by some to be the best of all the judges. Othniel is the model judge. That is, like King David who was a model King to judge all kings by, so Othniel is the model Judge.
However, the Bible only gives five verses to this great judge.
These five verses reveal something very wonderful about this man. Let’s first look at:
I. THE JUDGMENT
Look at Judges 3:7-8 “The Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD; they forgot the LORD their God and served the Baals and the Asherahs. The anger of the LORD burned against Israel so that he sold them into the hands of Cushan-Rishathaim king of Aram Naharaim, to whom the Israelites were subject for eight years.”
Notice, the Bible says when God chose Othniel in this passage of scripture, two things occurred.
A. LOOK WHAT THEY DID
(1) First, we notice, “The Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD.”
It seems to be a problem with mankind; they do not know God is watching them.
Illus: The children were lined up in the cafeteria of an elementary school for lunch.
At the head of the table was a large pile of apples. The cook made a note, and posted it on the apple tray. The note said, "Take only one. God is watching."
Moving further along the lunch line, at the other end of the table, was a large pile of chocolate chip cookies. One child whispered to another, "Take all you want. God is watching the apples."
God is capable of watching every one of us at the same time.
Did you know:
• There is not a thing you can do without God knowing about it
• There is not a place you can go without God knowing about it
• There is not a thing you can read without God knowing about it
• There is not a thing you can watch without God knowing about it
• There is not a thing you can think without God knowing about it
• There is not a word you can speak without God knowing about it
God knows everything about us. There is not one thing we can hide from God. NOT ONE!
Did you know that God can see in the dark as well as He can in the light?
“The Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD.” God saw these people and He was very angry with what he saw.
(2) The Bible says, “…they forgot the LORD their God.”
We are all aware of the fact that as we grow old, we lose our memories.
Illus: It seems to be a problem with men. Someone said, "First you forget names, then you forget faces, then you forget to pull your zipper up, then you forget to pull your zipper down."
Illus: A wealthy businessman forgets his wife's anniversary and boy, she is mad! She was hoping for a new Ferrari.
She said, "You'd better make up for that this time.” She then said, "In fact, tomorrow morning, there better be something sitting out on that driveway that goes from 0 to 200 in 5 seconds! AND it better not be second hand!”
The next morning she went out, and there was a small package on the driveway. When she opened it, she found herself holding a brand new bathroom scale!
Isn’t that something? THEY FORGOT THE GOD WHO CREATED THEM AND PUT THEM ON PLANET EARTH.
The same thing is happening to day. There are people who will go days and days without God ever crossing their minds.
(3) The Bible says they, “served the Baals and the Asherahs.”
They did not just worship these false gods; they SERVED THEM!
Isn’t it amazing that the cults will get out here every day PEDDLING THEIR FALSE RELIGION, and we who have the GOSPEL OF TRUTH will not walk across the street to witness to this lost world.
If God’s people would just serve the living God like these cults serve their gods, we could see some wonderful things happening.
We have LOOKED AT WHAT THEY DID, but now -
B. LOOK WHAT GOD DID
The Bible says, “The anger of the LORD burned against Israel so that he sold them into the hands of Cushan-Rishathaim king of Aram Naharaim, to whom the Israelites were subject for eight years.”
Look at the words “Burned against Israel”
WHY WAS GOD SO ANGRY WITH THESE PEOPLE?
In the verses that precede this Bible passage, in Judges 3:5-6, we read, “Canaanites, Hittites, and Amorites, and Perizzites, and Hivites, and Jebusites: And they took their daughters to be their wives, and gave their daughters to their sons, and served their gods.”
This was strictly forbidden by God in the Old Testament.
The reason God prohibited these marriages is because of the danger they involve. WE BECOME LIKE THOSE WE ASSOCIATE WITH.
Illus: Solomon was a man that truly loved God, but when he began to marry these women, they turned his heart from God to serve their gods.
We have looked at why God sent THE JUDGMENT.
But we need to also look at -
II. THE JUDGE
Look at Judges 3:9-11 we read, “But when they cried out to the LORD, he raised up for them a deliverer, Othniel son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother, who saved them. The Spirit of the LORD came upon him, so that he became Israel’s judge and went to war. The LORD gave Cushan-Rishathaim king of Aram into the hands of Othniel, who overpowered him. So the land had peace for forty years, until Othniel son of Kenaz died.”
I want to remind you again that Othniel was a NOBODY! But God uses people that the world would not think of using.
That is, there are people who get God’s attention that the lost world pays no attention to.
Illus: Remember, when God sent Samuel to find a King to take Saul’s place, David was the last and the least to be expected to be God’s choice. BUT HE WAS GOD’S CHOICE!
Today it seems that people that are evil get all the attention.
• Today we have comedians that are filling up peoples minds with their filthy jokes. They no longer insinuate; they say the nastiest things that can be said on television, and the audience of men and women are laughing almost breathlessly!
• Today we have athletes that should be thrown off their teams for their evil lifestyle. Instead, they are given million dollar contracts and placed before our children as role models.
• Today we have actors and actresses that are the scum of the earth, that we should not even walk across the street to see, yet people will pay ridiculous amounts of money to see them act.
Yes, it is true! It is the evil crowd today that is getting all the attention!
Othniel was a NOBODY, and God chose to use him to deliver God’s people.
He was a NOBODY that we know very little about, but notice that the Bible makes one thing clear; “So the land had peace for forty years, until Othniel son of Kenaz died.”
They had peace until he died.
Our death reveals the way we lived our life.
God used him to judge Israel for forty years, and the Bible says that during this time they had peace.
God used this great man to bring PEACE to the Land.
That is rare when you consider that Israel these days can not have peace for four weeks, not to mention forty years.
Conclusion:
Othniel reminds us that you don’t have to be #1 in man’s eyes to be #1 in God’s eyes.
We have looked at:
I. THE JUDGMENT
II. THE JUDGE
