Corruption is pandemic and will be until Jesus comes back. Let's talk about it on Key Life. That was Steve Brown and I'm Mike Kellogg. The program Key Life, a program without an agenda, except to see you grow in grace. Here's Steve with a Teaching for today. Thanks Mike. If you have your Bible open into the book of Judges, we continue with our Old Testament survey. As you know, we are going through the books of the Old Testament. I'm giving you an introduction and you will be tested on the material to each of the books. Some of the major themes, the key verses, and then at the end of those many studies in each of the books in the Old Testament, I'm going to become your tour director and point out some of my favorite slides in the book as we go along. Now, yesterday we looked at Deborah, the judge, and I had some things to say about sexism and the church. It is interesting to see how people deal with the fourth chapter of Judges and Deborah. They say, well, God would have preferred to have a man. He just couldn't find the right man, so Deborah was the only one around and he didn't have anybody but women to use, so he used women. Do you realize how shallow and superficial that sounds? If I were a woman, I would be upset about that. That's bad exegesis. There's nothing in the text that suggests that Deborah was the only one around. Kind of hanging out at the corner of drugstore and God said, where are the guys and aren't any guys? So you come along with me. Women are gifted and we waste the resources of the church if we don't affirm those gifts within the church. And then yesterday, if you were listening, I brought up the ninth chapter of Judges and I was right at the end of the broadcast so I didn't have time to even read any of it. But I suggested then that political corruption is pandemic. I suggested that it always has been. Always will be until Jesus comes back to clean up the mess. I suggested yesterday that while I'm recording this, we've just gone through the election. You're listening to it long time afterwards. But we've just gotten the president of the let. And I've been drawn to the television. I mean, I say I'm sick of this. I'm tired of politicians. Both sides of it. I'm tired of this corruption and these lies they tell us and all this kind of stuff. But I'm drawn to it. Man, it has been one fascinating 38 days. Kind of scary too at any rate. You have a tendency to think, boy, these people are telling us the truth. They're doing stuff that's wrong. And you think, gosh, we live in a hard, bad time. Well, just so you know it hasn't changed much. And sometimes it was even worse amongst God's people. You'll find that in the ninth chapter of Judges. You know one of the reasons I love the Bible. It's because God always tells us the truth. And it's not pleasant all the time. I mean, this is our family we're reading of the health. And there are some of you wouldn't invite to your dinner table. I mean, you would want some of these people to be your best friends. I mean, these are not wonderful, nice, sweet Christian people who go to church three times a week. I mean, you've got liars and thieves. Our forefathers all had stuff in their lives that was really, really bad. You find a prostitute in the genealogy of Jesus. Man. Well, but any right. Case in point is the ninth chapter of Judges. And I've been elect the son of Jeruboble. That's a great name. If I had a son, I'd name Jeruboble. I went to check him and his mother's brothers and spoke with him. And with all the family of the house of his mother's father saying, please speak in the hearing of all the men of Shechem, which is better for you that all 70 of the sons of Jeruboble rain over you are that one rain over you. Implication. Me, babe. Me. Remember that I am your own flesh and bone. And his mother's brothers spoke all these words concerning him into hearing of all the men of Shechem and their heart was inclined to follow a demolec. For they said, he's our brother, so they gave him 70 sheckles of silver from the temple with which a demolec hard worthless and reckless man just sound familiar to you. And they followed him. And then he went to his father's hand. Well, it goes on and on. Oprah gets involved, too, by the way. I mean, it really is a modern days tour. But flip over, if you will, to the end of the ninth chapter of the end of the ninth chapter of Judges, where we kind of see Paul Harvey's the rest of the story. Thus God repaid the wickedness of a demolec, which he had done to his father by killing his 70 brothers. Let me jaze up, just so you know. Don't get so upset. In the end, the books will be balanced. In the end, things will come out in the wash. In the end, it's going to be fine. In the end, justice will be done. I used to have an elder in a church that I served. In fact, he's still a good friend, lives in the mountains of North Carolina. His name is Bill Cole. When I get upset and angry about something, he'd say, Steve, do it right. It'll come out right. Well, I don't believe that's always true in a fallen world. Sometimes you do it right and it doesn't come out right. Sometimes you do it right. And it even gets messed up more. Sometimes you act with integrity and justice. And nobody knows. Sometimes you're honest and you're honorable. And people think just the opposite about you. Sometimes it doesn't come out right. But most of the time, because it's built into the universe, you do it right. And it's going to come out all right. You do it wrong. It's going to come out wrong. But if it doesn't, this side of heaven ultimately, it will all come out right. And in this case, with a bemaleck, we see how God does balance the books. Well, let's keep going. Let me show you some other things. You know, there's something interesting. And I just want to show this to you and mention it in passing. Look at the 12th chapter of Judges. And look at verses 6 and 7. Now, this is Samson. And you all know about Samson. You've heard those stories in Sunday School, the strong man and what God did through him. So the woman came and told her husband saying, a man of God came. Now, this is Samson's mother. A man of God came to me and his countenance was like the countenance of the angel of God. Very awesome. But I did not ask him where he was from and he did not tell me his name. But he said to me, behold, you shall conceive and bear a son. Now, drink no wine or similar drink nor eat anything unclean for the child, shall be a Nazarite to God from the womb to the day of his death. That's God's intervention in the lives of his people. He does that sometimes. I think sometimes we get the idea that God spoke in the Bible and he never said anything after that. That he's sort of on vacation and bermuda somewhere. But in the daily actions of what he does and the life of God's people, God sometimes acts in a supernatural way. And even in a prophetic way, now I don't want to go weird on this. I think you can become presumptuous about it. But I think people, especially people like me, are a formed, Calvinistic Westminster confession of faith, seminary, graduate school of theology types. And forget that God is God and that sometimes God intervenes in a supernatural way. I'll never forget as the result of some prayers of some very godly people. When my daughter was really, really sick, they prayed for her and she got well in a supernatural way. I thought I was intellectual in those days. I want you to know that was so life-changing and so mind-blowing, I could hardly stand it. I mean, I was burying babies and people who loved God more than I did. And I just didn't understand why God intervened. And now that I look back on it, I can see a number of reasons, none of which had anything to do with my purity or my godliness. It had to do with his grace. It had to do with showing me that God is not a proposition, he's not a doctrine, he's not a theology book, he's a person. And he hears our prayers and he intervenes sometimes in a supernatural way. And when I read that, when I read that about the birth announcement of Sanson, it absolutely blew me away. And speaking of Sanson and he was one of the really big judges and you know the whole story. Let me read you the, turn if you will, the 16th chapter of judges. Let me show you something, maybe I'll say a little bit more about it tomorrow, but you know the story. But listen, starting at the 6th verse of that 16th chapter, so Delilah said to Sanson, please tell me where your great strength lies, with what you may be bound to afflict you. And Sanson said to her, if they bind me with seven fresh bowstrings yet not dried, then I shall become weak and like any other man. So the lords of the Philistines brought up to her seven fresh bowstrings, not yet dried, and she bound him with them. And now there were men lying in wait, staying with her in the room, and she said to them, the Philistines are upon you, Sanson, but he broke the bowstrings as a strand of yarn breaks when it touches a fire. So the secret of his strength was not known, and it goes on and on and on until finally. With her wiles, she gets him to reveal the secret of his strength, and it was in his hair. Frankly, that's why I'm so weak. Don't have any hair left. And you remember what happened to the great tragedy that follows? I just, you know, I think that it's very important that we emphasize over and over to one another, and this is a case in point, that God's covenant people are to be as sly as serpents while at the same time being as innocent as does. You need to trust God, but make sure everybody else pays cash. You need to trust God, but be aware of the fallen nature of human beings. You've got to trust God, but you also have to be aware because not everybody loves you as much as he does. You think about that? I mean, well, maybe we'll spend a little bit more time in judges tomorrow. If you don't have the magazine that we send out, I'd love to send it to you. It's absolutely free. It comes out regularly, and when you subscribe to it, you're on the list. It's always helpful because we determine we're not going to just send out public relations pieces. So I wrote an article, it'll be an article by somebody else. There's a devotional mytenerary. Lots of dynamite resources to get you and those you love home with. Freedom and joy and faithfulness to Christ is your counting achievement. You can let us know that you want it, and it's free, by the way. Call 1-800-keylife-24 hours a day or write key life post office box 5,000. 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