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Lessons from the Life of Gideon 1: Where Am I, and How did I Get in This Handbasket?

by Jim Canter  
3/04/2010 / Bible Studies

Israel had served the Lord throughout the lifetime of Moses' servant, Joshua son of Nun, the servant of the LORD, the General of the armies of Israel. After that entire generation had died, a most amazing thing happened: the Bible says that the next generation after Joshua died grew up with NO knowledge of the LORD or anything He had done for Israel (Judges 2:10).

How is this possible? How, in only one generation (think of the lifetime of your father) could all knowledge of God and his great miracles in Egypt and the Red Sea and Jericho be completely forgotten? The answer is simple and sobering: they didn't listen to God's command to teach their children the things of God:

4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. 5 Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. (Deuteronomy 6:1-20; e.g. v4-7, NIV).

Wouldn't it have been a simple thing to tell their kids about the great God, the LORD, and teach them His commands? Yes, but the things of God were not on their hearts; they became preoccupied. The Jewish historian Josephus put it this way:

After this, the Israelites grew effeminate as to fighting any more against their enemies, but applied themselves to the cultivation of the land, which producing them great plenty and riches, they neglected the regular disposition of their settlement, and indulged themselves in luxury and pleasures; nor were they any longer careful to hear the laws that belonged to their political government: whereupon God was provoked to anger, (Antiquities, Book 5, Chapter 2).

As a result of not being taught by their parents about God, that generation began to worship the only gods they knew anything about, the ones served by and talked about by the people that were still in the land that God had intended for them to dispossess. God was angry with the Israelites because of this and actually fought against them when their enemies attacked.

The object lesson for Christian families today should be obvious. The LORD must be mentioned and discussed in our homes with our children; the stories of His miraculous works told and re-told; his Law, accounts of His intervention and involvement in our own lives and the assurance of His love for us in Christ Jesus recognized, lived out and taught daily.

Copyright 2012 By Jim Canter. Jim is the worship leader for Grace Church of Tallahassee.
http:www.surefoot-surefoot.blogspot.com

Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE, Copyright 1960,1962,1963,1968,1971,1972,1973,1975,1977,1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

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