God Disciplined Israel for their Disobedience

“…and for seven years he gave them into the hands of the Midianites. Because the power of Midian was so oppressive the Israelites prepared shelters for themselves in mountain clefts, caves and strongholds. Whenever the Israelites planted their crops, the Midianites, Amalekites and other eastern peoples invaded the country. They camped on the land and ruined the crops all the way to Gaza and did not spare a living thing for Israel, neither sheep nor cattle nor donkeys. They came up with their livestock and their tents like swarms of locusts. It was impossible to count the men and their camels; they invaded the land to ravage it.”

Consequences.

Discipline.

Israel did not like the discipline of the Lord. They ran from it, hid from it in mountain clefts, caves, and strongholds.

The rest of the post appears on A Deeper Church. Head over there to read the post in its entirety.

Everyone did as he saw fit

I close my Bible and push it across the coffee shop’s small table as far away from me as I can. The ugliness hangs around me, the depravity. I close my eyes and shake my head, trying to clear the images from the last chapters of Judges from my mind.

Gang rape. Murder. Brother turning against brother. More murder. More rape.

This is the Word of Lord?

[Thanks be to God.]

I'm starting a new series based on my study of the book of Judges. You can find the rest of this post over at A Deeper Church.