Gooding, AMS: Studies In Judges-04 ~ Dealing With The Flesh

Now we are going to look this evening at Judges chapter three, and we commenced last evening talking about Ehud and Eglon. We spent the whole evening talking about Eglon as a picture of the flesh. The flesh in its evil in England, and the flesh in its outstanding height in Saul. He talked about flesh as being that old nature, that thing called sin resident within us, the old man, and we noted that as long as we were in the body, we should have trouble with this thing called flesh. I suppose we, most of us, had a miserable time last evening, having a good look at what we really were like, for God in his word has no time for the flesh. And we noticed how God has so much no time for the flesh, but he sent his son in the likeness of sinful flesh, though he was not sinful, but in the likeness of sinful flesh, and then he put that flesh upon the cross and condemned sin in the flesh. So God positionally came to an end of the flesh at the cross, and he wants you and I practically to do the same thing. This evening we're going to read the passage again, or part of the passage, and we're not looking at Eglon now so much as Ehud, the man who dealt with the flesh. Those of you who were here before will forgive me if I say that we are looking at the judges as a picture of overseeing presence. And so we shall be looking this evening for ehots to deal with the flesh. First of all, in their own lives. Secondly, as leaders of God's people. Then we should be looking at God's people who will hear the word of Ehud, follow me and do as I do. And all the people followed Ehud, and they subdued the flesh. Now let's read. Judges chapter three verse twelve. and the children of Israel did evil again in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord strengthened Eglon. We noted that word, strengthen. Strengthen the flesh against his people. We noted that if you and I, as the people of God, allow the flesh place in our lives, the Lord will strengthen the flesh against us, and it will be so strong it will overpower us. We noted that Eglon associates with him Ammon and Amalek, Amalek again telling the same story, for Amalek is Esau depraved. That is, Esau degenerated, the ma- the first man degenerated. We saw that from verse fifteen they cried unto the Lord, and so we'll read there. But when the children of Israel cried unto the Lord, the Lord raised them up a deliverer, Ehud, the son of Gilead, a Benjamite, a man left-handed. By him the children of Israel send a present unto Eglon, the king of Moab. But Ehud made him a dagger, revised version sword, which had two edges of a cubit in length, and he did gird it under his raiment upon his right thigh. And he brought the present unto Eglon, king of Moab. Now Eglon was a very fat man. And, uh, when he had made an end to offer the present, he sent away the people that bear the present, but he himself turned again from the quarries. Better translation, he himself turned back again from the stones that were by Gil- by Gilgal and said, I have a secret errand unto thee, O king, who said, keep silence. And all that stood by him went out from him, and Ehud came unto him, and he was sitting in a summer parlor, a cooling house, which he had made for himself alone. And Ehud said, I have a message from God unto thee, and he arose out of his seat. And Ehud put forth his left hand and took the dagger from his right thigh and thrust it into his belly, and the heart also went in after the blade, and the fat closed upon the blade so that he could not draw the dagger out of his belly, and the dirt came out. Then Ehud went forth through the porch, and so on. Verse twenty five: and they tarried till they were ashamed, and behold, he opened not the doors of the parlor. Therefore they took a key and opened them, and behold, their lord was fallen down dead upon the earth. And Ehud escaped while they tarried and passed beyond the stones and escaped to Sira. And it came to pass when he was, when he was come, that he blew a trumpet in the hill country of Ephraim, and the children of Israel went down with him from the mount, and he before them, and he said unto them, Follow after me, for the Lord hath delivered your enemies, the Moabites, into your hand. And they went down after him and took the fords of Jordan toward Moab and suffered not a man to pass over. And they slew of Moa- Moab at that time about ten thousand men, all lusty and all men of valor, and there escaped not a man. So Moab was subdued that day under the hand of Israel, and the land had rest fourscore years. And after him was Shamgar, son of Anath, which slew of the Philistines six hundred men with an ox goad, and he also delivered Israel. One of the strange things about this passage is this, that when Eglon was strengthened against God's people, that I find one thing he did was he possessed the city of palm trees. The city of palm trees is, of course, Jericho. And you remember that Jericho was their first triumph in the land. Their first triumph after coming into the good of their complete deliverance. For God's complete deliverance was to bring them out, to bring them through, and to bring them in. And once they had crossed Jordan, their first triumph in the land was to take the city of palm trees. But now the flesh was strengthened against them, and Eglin's armies had crossed the border. The first thing Eglin robbed them of and possessed was the seat of their earliest trial. I wonder if that will strike a chord in the heart of any of the dear saints of God here. You go back to the moment when, having trusted Christ as Savior and having the full assurance of God's salvation, you knew something of your first triumph, can I say, in the land of your salvation. What a victory it was when there was some old habit of the flesh that you gave up, something in which you had indulged for many years. It was a master in your life, and you knew that you could not possibly break yourself from that ungodly sin or that ungodly habit. And in those early moments of triumph, you found you had a new power. Whatever that thing was, it fell before the power of Christ. It was your earliest triumph. I wonder, my dear brother, has the flesh retaken that place of your earliest triumph? My dear sister, has the flesh retaken that point in your life that you rejoiced in when those, in those early days of converted life, you threw away those old habits, you threw away those old things, and now the years have gone by, and the flesh has retaken Jericho. The city whose walls fell down flat in the early years of your triumph for God. I know the walls aren't up, but the enemies got the city. The place of your earliest triumph is the place of your present defeat. And instead of singing the songs of victory, you look back to the fact that God did give you deliverance, but through indulging the flesh. The enemy's retaken to that. Hm? You know what I mean? That man that gave up smoking. Hm? That man that gave up drink. That woman who gave up her bad temper. And our pride. Or some other thing that enslaved us before we trusted Christ, and in the moment of triumphant deliverance, the Lord gave us the strength to give them up. But in the territory where once we rejoiced at deliverance, the enemy has raised his standard again, and he's retaken the city of palm trees. He's retaken Jericho. That seems to stand almost as an emblem in this chapter. The enemy come from Moab. Of course, coming from Moab, they've got to come from the east side of the Jordan. They got across the Jordan, then Jericho. The enemy from the world side of things come in and retaken the possessions that once we had gained. There are so many spheres in our lives where we have known, many of us, deliverance from the power of the flesh. It would do us all good in the presence of God, having been searched last evening, if we should now ask ourselves the question, has the enemy retaken territory from which he was once driven out? And in which we once knew triumph. Notice, please, that the king of Moab dominated for eighteen yo- long years, until God's people cried unto the Lord for deliverance. He asked, is there anyone here and you've come to the point where you have decided to decry to the Lord for deliverance? Hm? Oh, the tragedy of needing to be re-delivered. Well, you can't get re-saved. Oh no, I don't mean that. But our salvation was a deliverance from this present evil. And are we losing territory? And do we need to be delivered? So some dear brother, and you look back in your life, the deliverance in the past, and you've been giving away to the flesh, and it's been retaking territory, and in your solitary moments in the presence of God, your conscience condemns you, and you almost feel like crying, oh God, if I could only get back. Hm? Cry to the Lord for deliverance. Hm? Some dear sister here, without talking about the vices that may be common to the female sex. My dear sister, any of you here, and sometimes your conscience smites you. You're not such a good Christian as you used to be. Not so much like the Lord as you used to be. It seems as though the adversary is gaining territory in your life. Ever cry to the Lord for deliverance? I like the idea. They cried unto the Lord for deliverance, and he raised up a savior for like them. And while I have said, and I believe, that the judges are a picture of the overseeing brethren, one cannot pass by this remark that in the revised version the word savior are not deliverer, and there's always a savior. And however much the overseeing brethren may fail, and however much our fellow saints fail, there's always a savior. Hm? And the Hebrew epistle says he is able to save them to the uttermost that are coming unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them. And how many of these judges fail? How many of the elder brethren fail in their ministry towards God's people? But there is a savior, and he never fails to cry. And if we cry unto him in the desperation of our souls, because flesh is regaining territory, to find there's a savior. Brother said to me as we went out the door last night, we need an advocate. Of course we do. We have a high priest whose ministry is to prevent us from sinning. We have an advocate whose ministry is to recover us when we sin. And the Savior said in John seventeen, for this cause I set apart myself, in order that they might be set apart through the truth, there is raised up a Savior. We're going to look at the Savior as being representative of elders, and in a broad sense, representative of all of us. Maybe you'll look at that first of all as being representative of all of us. In this battle that we must fight, in order that we might have victory over the flesh and drive it out of our territory and subdue it beneath our feet. And so he raised up Ehud. I like that one. Joining together. His name means joining together. When God's people greet him, fellowship is not enjoyed. I can't say fellowship is broken, because our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ, and that fellowship cannot be broken. But the enjoyment of that fellowship we may lose. And when the flesh regains territory in our lives, and sin becomes a feature in our living, instead of living sinless lives as we ought to do. Sin always comes in between. Sin always breaks communion. Sin always brings in a cloud. It always brings in a sense of distance, but here's a man joining together. It's a grand thing when you can join the saints together, isn't it? But it's even a grander thing when some dear saint of God has a cloud between them and the Lord, and you can move the cloud away and join them together. My dear fellow elders, you will have had experience of this, and I think you'll agree with me that it's a holy moment in Christian experience. When you go and spend a little time be- with a saint who's allowed some cloud to come in between their souls and the Lord, and in reading the scripture and prayer together, you see the cloud taken away. See the dear man or the dear woman down on their knees, talking to the Lord in tears. Maybe they haven't talked to him for a while. And you join them together. That's good, isn't it? That's overseer's work, you know. That's overseer's work. But then to take a ahad to ourselves individually. Some dear child of God, there's a cloud that's waiting. Do you know what it is? As you sit in the presence of God, my dear brother, my dear sister, the Spirit of God tells you what that cloud is. I don't need to tell you. Do you like to be joined together? Hm? Like to be able to look up and realize a far smile? Like to feel at home again in the presence of God instead of a guilty conscience? He has joined together, joined together. There's nothing like it, you know, when a prodigal saint returns home. The prodigal saint feels the father's arms as he runs and falls on his neck and kisses us. We see prodigal children back again, joining together. This man Ehud, the son of Gera, was a Benjamite, a man left-handed. Said on Lord's Day that didn't mean Cory Fisted. Only Scotsmen know what that means. Uh, no, it's not left-handed in the ordinary sense of being left-handed, which of course in our modern days they say, let the children be left-handed. Well, it's not that kind of left-handed. The word is shut of his right hand. Shut of his right hand. Oh, he had a right hand, all right. And he once had a right hand he could use. Somehow or other, either an accident or paralysis, and he was shot of his right hand. And his right hand couldn't grasp things as it should. So he, he wasn't naturally left-handed, but he had to use his left hand because he was shot of his right hand. Then I remember he was a Benjamite, and what's what's that? Oh, a son of my right hand. Yeah. That was his spiritual privilege, to be a son of the right hand. And as a son of the right hand, he had a place of elevation. As a son of the right hand, he was close, he was honored, if you like. As a son of the right hand, he should enjoy heavenly things. But here was a strange thing. A son of the right hand, but his hand couldn't rest. A son of his right, of a right hand, but something had gone wrong with it. And I'm glad that's the man that did it. Because, you see, I'm the son of the right hand. I'm blessed with all spiritual blessings, and the heaven is in Christ. God has given me a place of elevation, a place of honor, a place of the enjoyment of the very highest of spiritual truths, but you know, so often I shatter the right hand and fail to live in the good of my honored position. I'm a son of the right hand who's often lost his grip on divine things. Is that not where most of us are? You know, you talk to, to the saints of God about Ephesian truth today. They say, you know, it's all right, brother, living in the heavenlies, but I'm so conscious. I'm very much on earth. It's all right talking about living in the heavenlies, you see, but you know the home I live in and the job I do, and if you knew my heart, all living in the heavenlies. But that's what we are, sons of the right hand that have lost our grip. Shatter the right hand, not living up to what is ours in Christ. Have you noticed, my dear brethren, when you go to the Ephesian epistle, you've got all the right hand things in chapter one, two, and three. That's a practice. That's the doctrinal bit of the epistle. All our spiritual blessings in the heavenlies in Christ. And then in chapter four you have a look at the assembly from the heavenlies. That's where sons of the right hand view the assembly from, the heavenlies. But do we view the assembly from the heavenlies? No, we think how awkward brother so and so is, and how difficult sister so and so is, and all the troubles we've had. My dear brother, men of the right hand look at the assembly from the heavenlies, and it's a wonderful place. Go over later in the epistle, and you look at the relationships of husbands and wives, and you look at them from the heavenlies. I tell you, even married life is better when you look at it from the heavenlies. How does the husband love his wife? Oh, just like Christ loves the church. How does the wife reverence her husband? Just how the church should reverence Christ. And married life is wonderful from the heavenlies. But so often, many dear saints fail to look at married life from the heavenlies. And I hear men and women in your country who say, well, you know, we don't love each other anymore. As though that's an excuse for breaking up a marriage. My dear brother, if you don't love your wife, the book says husbands love your wives. And it's instructions for you to do, and you to obey. Don't sound so pathetic as though you can't help not loving your wife. Divine instructions so to do. Love your wife as Christ loves the church. If you can't grasp that, you're a man shot of your right hand. But then Ephesians says, look at, look at parents and children. And the relationship between parents and children are elevated in Ephesians when you look at them from the heavenlies. And then masters and servants. That becomes elevated when you look at it from the heavens. And you and I should be men and women who are men and women of the right hand, and look at all these things from the divine angle. But you see, we're like Ehud. We are shut of the right hand. You say, you know, if I live on such a low plane as that, all of us got to admit that we live very low as far as spiritual things are concerned. If I can only live like that, can I ever possibly have victory over the flesh? And for my encouragement, it's a man shut of the right hand who subdues heaven. So, my dear brother, there's, my dear sister, there's no excuse for you, is it? Is there? Well, you can't write to Ephesians two, Even though you're blessed with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies in Christ. You say, I just can't live there. Never mind. You may not be able to grasp that. You're shut at the right hand. But while you may not be able to grasp that, you can deal with the flesh. While this man did, he was shot of his right hand. Now, what did this man do? This man made him a sword. That's interesting, he made him one. No. The cutting off of the flesh. Cal. So I turn my eyes again to Calf. Sign of the circumcision, the cutting off before God of everything of the flesh. He'll go. When I betake myself as a sinning Christian. First to the stones, and then to Gilgal. Remember, flesh went down in the death of Christ, never to come up. Flesh has been cut off in the cutting off of Christ. I view Calvary and all it means. It touches my conscience to its very core, as I remember that every time I succumb to the flesh, I am allowing to live the thing that Christ died to put away. Always good to have look at the death of Christ. And remember, every time I sin, Christ suffered for that sin upon the cross. Hm? My dear brother, have you or I sinned today? My dear sister, have you sinned today? Think seriously. Two thousand years ago, upon a Roman gibbet, the Lord Jesus suffered. For the sins I have committed, die. Serious. That's why you need to look at the cross. Now he comes back from the place of the stones. It's interesting to notice that he went to the place of the stones again after he killed Eglam. We do sing sometimes, don't we? Jesus, keep me near the cross. Keep me near the cross. It's a good place to live with this idea of the end of the flesh. It's a good place to live at the cross. God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. Good place to live. Keeps you from sinning when you live there. Now, says Ehud, as he goes into the presence of Eglon, he says two things. He says, uh, addressing the king, he says, I have a secret message unto thee. Secret message. You know, confession should be secret. There was a time when the Oxford Group movement fl- flourished, ensnared many of the saints of God. The principle of the Oxford Group movement was public confession of sin, and it was supposed to have a psychological effect that when you rehearse the sins you had committed before others, it made you loathe yourself. Well, I suppose the idea was all right, until it began to degenerate, and it became a case of who could boast of the biggest sin. And instead of deterring people from sinning, in the end it encouraged folks to sin. No, confession of sin is a secret. You secretly deal with the flesh. You get into the presence of God about it, you and God alone, to deal with the flesh. You'll need to get that great fat eggland in your life, right into the presence of God with the word of God. A secret dealing life. You know, the sins in our lives are mainly secret, huh? Just that's from God. Things in our lives that other people don't know anything about. Hm? You get in the presence of God. That was a time he had in England, alone, only God looking. That's the way to deal with sin. There in the presence of God is spread it out, with all its fatness, like Eglin. There it is before him. Don't want to be too crude, but there's Eglin, and he talks about his belly, all that fat. That's the way to deal with sin in the presence of God, spread it out. Then he said, I have a message from God unto thee. That's it. First it was secret, then a message from God to him. Why, if somebody could go from this meeting tonight and get in God's presence and there secretly deal with the egglin in their lives, what a message from God. What a smiting of flesh. I tell you, when you smite the flesh, what the authorized version says will come true, whether it's right translation or not, may be questioned, but what the authorized version says will be true. When you put the knife of the word of God right through the flesh, the dirt will come out. And you'll see the flesh is far more obnoxious as it lies dead in all its filth than ever you thought it was. Quickly to finish now. Notice, please, that when Ehud dealt with Eglam, he said to the people of God, follow after me. My dear elder brethren, this is you now. This is me as an elder in my local assembly. Have you mortified it in your own life? Does it lie dead with all its filth exposed and dealt with secretly in the presence of God? My dear brother, as you have done that, you are in a moral condition to stand before God's people and say, follow me. Leave God's people to deal effectively with the flesh. Notice, please, they dealt with the flesh, and they slew of the flesh ten thousand men, and they were all, as we said last evening, ridiculously fat men, but they were all men that could fight. And every one of us has got a ridiculously fat man living inside us, the Moab principle, and it can fight desperately to retain its power and its dominance in our lives. And elders must lead, and the people must follow, and we must all deal with the flesh. Let me close with this. You'll notice what he says. So Moab was subdued. Now that's interesting. Different things happen to different enemies. Against, uh, Cushan-Rishathaim, they prevailed. Against Moab, it was subdued. Jabin was discomforted. Then Israel prevailed against him. Then Jabin was destroyed. Different terms. But notice, please, that Moab is not destroyed. You'll never destroy Moab as long as you live. He's like Amalek. He lives forever. All you can do with Moab is subdue him, which means constant vigilance every day of our lives to keep the Moab principle down. We must subdue and subdue and subdue and subdue, and he had managed to do it for eighty years. If we all manage that, he won't cause us any more bother, will he? Eighty years he kept Moab subdued. The Lord help us to do it through Christ. Oh God, we acknowledge again before thee that that old nature is prevalent in every one of our lives. With some of us, Moab has taken territory where once we had victory. Many of us, O God, have failed to give thy word the place it should have in our lives. Some of us even, O God, seek to cut pieces off thy word, try to excuse our consciences. As we have sat humbly before thee with subdued spirits, help us, O God, to take thy word, in thy presence alone with Eglon, to deal with him, mortify him, put him down, put off the features that characterize it. Help us to learn a lesson again of the stones. We've died with Christ, risen with him. Help us to take the knife of circumcision, cut away the flesh, in order that with flesh subdued in our lives, we might serve thee acceptably, with reverence and godly fear. So write thy truth on our souls. Bring us close to thee. Make us holy. Thou art holy. Part us with thy blessing now, in the name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.