Greg Ford - Breaking Sin Cycles
All right, we’re going to get right in today because I’ve got a lot to say and a constrained amount of time-33 minutes and 33 seconds. All right, so let’s get after it. We’re in a series right now that we’re calling «Cover to Cover,» and I appreciate those of you who have gone the distance with me in this series. We’re in week nine. What we’re doing is taking an overview — a flyover, zooming out, zooming in, zooming out, and zooming in-on the storyline of the Bible and trying to build a foundation of some things we can keep coming back to throughout the years, sharing understanding and language that we can use as we zero in on different parts of Scripture for the rest of our time together. Over the years, we’ll kind of know where it fits in the overall storyline of the Bible.
So that’s what we’ve been up to. Just as a summary, we have been talking about the meta -narrative of the Bible, which, in very simple terms, starts in Genesis 1 and 2. As God creates the world, He creates opportunity, and He creates what we call Shalom. He creates right relationship with God, self, and the world around us, and that’s really what God wants. That’s His will for people-that we would be in right relationship with Him, ourselves, and the world around us.
So He creates that in Genesis, and pretty quickly you see the free will aspect. Flesh starts making decisions, and some of them are disobedient decisions -where people have been clearly told what to do. At other points, it was foolish shortsighted decisions, where somebody thought they were going for wisdom, and instead, they went about the right thing in the wrong way. It starts to create collateral damage and fallout with ourselves, with the people around us, and even with God.
We see from this storyline going from creation to fall, and then ultimately to redemption. The grace of God is demonstrated all the way back in the Garden of Eden when He does not kill them-even though the wages of sin is death. He doesn’t kill them; He actually kills an animal to cover their shame and to put clothes on them, to cover their insecurities. He then gives them a new opportunity. They’ve lost the opportunity of the garden, which often poor decisions can cause us to lose, but He gives them a new opportunity outside of the garden.
We see that storyline run through the entire Bible. Where we are at now is we looked in Genesis, and as the population grew, as more and more people were on the earth, chaos ensued because everybody’s flesh and human decisions and free wills are colliding. And you know how it is. Sometimes, even the things we do that we look back on and think, «Why did I do that?» made sense at the time. Even, like, I can make a case for injustice, right? If you do me wrong at a one, it would make sense for me to come back with a one -an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.
But a lot of times, if I’m minding my own business and you do an injustice to me with a one, I have to come back with a two. Okay, see? I want to let you know I’m nothing to be messed with, so we’re not just going to be one-to-one here. Okay, you hit me with a one; I’m going to hit you with a two. And you would think it would be over because I just fired a shot over the bow, but actually now you’re like, «Wait a second! Now I’m down two to one. Who do they think I am?» So they can’t come back with a two because they need you to know they’re capable of more than a two. So they’re going to give you a three. So now it’s five to two. You get the idea; the math starts going up.
Yet, at the time, even though we’re in chaos, it made sense why I made the decision that I made. Pretty soon, you look up and the math has gotten out of hand; you’ve got suffering, you’ve got pain, and you’ve got injustice, and everybody’s looking through their own lens at how we got to where we were and who’s right and who’s wrong. It’s the chaos of the world.
So we see that God shows up in that chaos and says, «I want to correct this. I’m not giving up on people. I love humans. I want to make it right.» He sets Abraham apart and says, «I’m going to make a nation out of you. I’m going to make a promise with you connected to a purpose.» The promise is, «I’m going to give you land, I’m going to make you a nation, and I’m going to give you law so that you can show the world what I’m like. We’re going to put the world to rights, and I want to do it through you.»
So He makes this covenant with Abraham, and over a long period of time, eventually, they get to the promised land. Last week, we looked in the Book of Joshua that, through the conquest, they end up taking and seizing the promised land. Now we’re in the Book of Judges. You would think we’re here; we’ve arrived. It’s been hundreds of years, we’ve been through a lot in Egypt, through the Exodus. God brought them out on eagle’s wings, we’ve gone through hardship in the wilderness, we have the law, we’ve taken the land, now it’s time to do what the promise and the purpose were from the beginning-let’s live this Shalom here on the earth.
Where we picked up last week was looking at idolatry-why does God have such an intense reaction to idols that are false gods? You see the names Baal and Asherah show up a lot in the Bible, and they’re not even real, but they are theological ideas. We looked last week at God’s issue with idolatry-it’s not petty; it’s not like God is jealous that Baal got credit for the crop because he was the rain god. It’s way more than that. It’s that Baal represented distorted theological beliefs, and what we believe about God is really important.
So, what they believed about God based on who Baal was presented to be was different than who Yahweh actually is. It wasn’t just the distorted beliefs, but the perverted practices of child sacrifice, sexual abuse, and even self-harm that came with trying to please these gods. In some way, the truth about God had been lost in the lies about Baal. So God’s whole issue with this is not about who gets the credit; it’s about the bondage created by these distorted beliefs.
We’re going to see that this lingers. We get to the Book of Judges; they’re now in the land, and yet this Baal problem does not go away. Look what it says in Judges 2:1-3. It says, «I brought you up out of Egypt, and I led you into the land I swore to give to your ancestors. I said I will never break my covenant or my promise or my contract with you, and you shall not make a covenant with the people of this land.» The reason He didn’t want them to connect with the people of that land is because they were entrenched in these distorted mindsets and behaviors-these reprehensible practices.
He said, «Break down their altars.» In other words, get rid of anything that resembles the perpetuation of these detestable practices. But yet you’ve disobeyed me. «Why have you done this? I’ve also said I will not drive them out before you, and they will become traps for you, and their gods will become snares for you.»
What you’re going to see in the Book of Judges is if we think of the metaphor of God as a father; if we look at God doing a parenting job, you’re going to see God’s tactic of training and teaching and helping the children of Israel to learn. He’s going to use the tactic of patience. «I’m going to let you live with it.» Imagine your child coming to you thinking they’re more mature than they are.
Think of your child-some of you are like, «I have no idea what that might be like.» Imagine your child coming to you, taking totally for granted the bills that are being paid-things they know nothing of. Think of your children coming to you now at an age where they’re able to connect dots logically, but they don’t have enough life experience to have maturity, yet they’re sure you don’t know what you’re talking about and that their ways are higher than your ways, that their thoughts are higher than your thoughts.
At some point, instead of arguing, you go, «Okay, fine.» In Judges, He says, «Okay, you think you’ve been winning these military victories on your own?» He says, «I’ve been driving them out before you. So what I’m going to do is you can walk to school by yourself.» The bullies have been looking at me and going the other way, and you thought it was you-no problem, go on your own. Pay your own bills; do it your way. If you want to do it your way, do it your way and see how it works out.
So what God does is ultimately He removes His protection. He removes His provision and says, «If this is how you want to learn, this is how you’re going to learn, and I’ll let you do it.» He is lovingly patient. Sometimes as parents, this is difficult because we see our kids in trouble, and we so badly want to jump in. We know that if we come in with intense energy, we can change the situation quickly, but we realize sometimes that if we come in with anger or loudness, we can get our kids to switch quickly because they’re afraid of us.
But in the long term, they didn’t learn the lesson; they just quickly complied. Sometimes, I have to ask myself, «Why am I coming in like this?» Sometimes it’s just because I’m frustrated with the situation, so I’m acting out of bad energy. I’m just tired of looking at it. I just want to do whatever. Sometimes that’s at the expense of my children learning what they need to learn, or sometimes I’m so tired of watching them fumble around. I’m becoming impatient myself. I’m tired of seeing them mess it up, so I just want to go in and fix it.
Yet sometimes the best thing for a parent to do is just to sit there and let you struggle. My wife hates this story, but I love it, and she’s not in this service, so I’m going to go ahead and tell it. When our daughter, Ella, was a baby, I saw my wife walking around, holding her, and she was talking about how bad her day was and how tired she was, saying her back hurt.
I said, «Well, we paid good money for this rocking chair; you should sit in it.» She said, «I can’t.» I asked, «Why not?» She said, «Every time I sit down in the rocking chair, she cries. If I stand, she doesn’t cry, but if I sit down, she cries.» I said, «Give her to me.» So I took Ella, stood there, and she was fine. Then I sat down in the rocking chair, began rocking, and she started crying. I’m like, «Is this really how it works?» I stand up, and she stops crying. I walk around a little bit; my back starts hurting. I sit down, and she starts crying, so I try to see if I can wait this out.
I rock her for about a minute and she keeps crying; she won’t stop. I have her wrapped in a blanket in my warm arms, and that’s not good enough for her. So, I set her on the hardwood floor and take her blanket away. Now she’s laying there on the hardwood floor with no blanket, and I’m speaking to her lovingly, but I’m saying, «How does that feel down there? Do you like that? We can do this as long as you want; that hardwood floor is not going anywhere. If you want to lay there forever, you can.»
I let her feel it for a while, and I think, «These arms aren’t that uncomfortable. How does that feel?» Eventually, I scoop her up, put her in the blanket, and she starts acting right. That’s a true story, and she’s a smart kid; she picked up on it.
You see in the Book of Judges, okay? Let’s dive into the story. In Judges 2:1, it says the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals. All right, so here we are, back to Baal. We should have left Baal in Joshua, but here we are in Judges, and Baal is back. They did evil in the eyes of the Lord.
Look at Judges 3:7. The Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord. This is like a broken record; they forgot the Lord their God and served the Baals and the Asherah. You’re going to see throughout the Book of Judges. By the way, when you see «judges,» don’t think «judicial"-think «leader.» So, the word «Judges» is used in the title of the book, but when it talks about the action of the judges, it’s talking essentially about their leadership.
God would raise up a leader. Go ahead and bring up the cycle. This is a screenshot I brought up in one of the earlier weeks, but I want to bring it back so that you can have it top of mind. This is a screen shot from the Bible Project, and it essentially describes this cycle you’ll see throughout the Book of Judges.
Let’s start over at 10 o’clock. Right there, they’re in a place of peace, things are going well, and ultimately, they turn their hearts from God. They stop obeying God; they do it their own way; they begin to sin. When that happens, there’s oppression from other nations. God says, «I’m going to remove My protection and My provision. If you want to do it your way, you’re going to learn the hard way.» So now these other nations come in and take them over. They’ve lost their freedom. You think you know better? That’s fine; do it your way.
Once they lose their freedom, they come to their senses and come back to God. Eventually, they repent, and God raises up a judge or a leader ultimately to deliver them from their current problem. Again, let me give you a little overview. Judges 3:7-they did evil in the eyes of the Lord, they forgot the Lord their God, and they keep coming back to Baal. Judges 4:1-the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord. Judges 6:1- the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord.
Now, let’s stop here. We’re in Judges 6, and when it says they did evil in the eyes of the Lord, they go back to Baal and Ashterah. They’re not learning the lesson. It’s one thing to get put down on the hardwood floor and say, «Wait a second! I thought the rocking chair was bad; this is worse.» You learn your lesson; we can stop crying and get back to bonding.
If I don’t learn, I have to keep suffering. We get to Judges 6, and this is the story of Gideon. It says, «The Israelites did evil in the sight of the Lord.» The Midianites oppressed them for seven years. The Midianites are brutal bullies — they’re trying to starve them to death. Gideon is in total survival mode; he’s smuggling grain in a winepress, just trying to make it through the day.
The angel of the Lord appears to him: «Mighty Hero, the Lord is with you.» Gideon thinks the angel is being sarcastic. «What are you talking about, Mighty Hero? I am trying to survive. I feel like a wimp; I’m being shoved in a locker! The Midianites are wreaking havoc on us!» Ultimately, God says, «I want to use you as a leader to deal with this.»
Now, the first thing He says for Gideon to do is, in Judges 6:25–26, «Tear down your father’s altar to Baal and cut down the Asherah poles beside it. Then build a proper kind of altar to the Lord your God.» So ultimately, think about this now. If you’re Israel, what do you think is our biggest problem? What do we think about all the time? What is terrorizing us? You think the biggest problem is the Midianites, but they’re actually a distraction from the altars of Baal and Asherah.
So God says to Gideon, «If you deal with the idols, I’ll deal with the Midianites.» The Midianites are a piece of cake to God. Are you kidding me? I can run them off this land so fast; that’s nothing for me. The problem is, for seven years, I’ve been patient, watching you guys suffer. For seven years!
Now think about this for real. Think about the altars to Baal and Asherah and the fact that you now have the children of Israel making sacrifices and doing all the reprehensible practices to these gods. Imagine if God became impatient and said, «You know what? I’m tired of seeing my children suffer, and even though they’re making sacrifices to these altars, I’m going to deliver them anyway. I just can’t bear to watch them suffer anymore. I’m going to drive the Midianites out.»
The oppression of the Midianites was a mirror image of the spiritual bondage they were in. We are in economic and military bondage to the Midianites; that’s just a reflection-it’s just a mere image of the spiritual bondage we’re in to Baal.
If we don’t figure this out-if God were to deliver them from the Midianites while they still have altars to Baal and Asherah and are making sacrifices and doing all the things-they would confuse whom to credit for the deliverance! Ultimately, they’d go, «Oh, this stuff must be working with Baal. This stuff must be working with Asherah.»
So God says, «I have to sit here and let you suffer, and I’m not going to do anything with the Midianites until you do something about Baal-until you tear that down.» Again, what is God trying to do here? He’s trying to get them to learn the lesson that He’s trying to teach them.
You would think they would learn. Here’s the thing about Judges: we talk about this cycle, and we named it in one of the early weeks. This is the Redemption cycle-often it’s called the Sin cycle. I used to call it the Stupid cycle because it’s just kind of stupid; you just keep doing it. But I want to call it the Redemption cycle because instead of making it about our sin, we need to understand it’s about God’s loving, patient desire to redeem us.
It’s about Him doing anything to redeem us, even if it means waiting. Think about the story in Luke 15 of the Prodigal Son. It’s a story of a father willing to wait for his son to come to his senses. It’s told in the trilogy of the Lost Coin and the Lost Sheep, where they sweep the house incessantly, and the shepherd goes and leaves the 99 for the one.
But then you’ve got the prodigal story, where the son is rebellious and entitled, thinking he knows better than his father, just like the nation thought they knew better than God. In the story of the Prodigal, the father says, «Go ahead, do it your way,» and then waits in anticipation, believing that at some point when he gets low enough, he’s going to come to his senses.
Of course, the prodigal son does-he gets to a place where he’s so hungry and starving that the pig slop looks appetizing to him. He thinks, «What am I doing? I’ve cost myself the ability to be my father’s son, but my father’s employees eat better than this. Maybe he’ll hire me back as an hourly worker.» So he goes to see his father, and his father comes running out. This is a father willing to be as patient as he needs to be to wait for his child to learn the lesson he needs to learn.
You have God in the Book of Judges waiting seven years-seven years of the Midianites mistreating his children-until they get rid of Baal and Asherah. Go ahead and bring up that center graphic because I want to fast forward through some of this, but I want you to look at these important verses.
Judges 6:1- we just looked at this; this is the Gideon story. It says, «The Israelites did evil in the sight of the Lord for seven years.» That’s why I want you to get. Seven years they gave to the hands of the Midianites. So the Gideon story goes from chapter 6 through chapter 9, and God delivers the people. At the end of chapter 9, you’re going to see that they go back to idolatry.
Judges 10:6-again, the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord; they served the Baals and the Asherahs. They go right back. Look at verse 8: «For 18 years they oppressed all the Israelites.» In chapter 6 it’s seven years; in chapter 10 it’s 18 years. This is now a leader named Jephthah that God uses. Each subsequent judge or leader becomes more and more corrupt.
They go from decline to revival to deeper decline to revival to deeper decline to revival until it gets to Samson — who everybody knows because, you know, he’s strong and everything. He is a horrible leader — an egomaniac, complete narcissist, full of himself, completely self-indulgent. And it’s just getting worse and worse.
Look at Judges 13:1. Again, the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord, so the Lord delivered them into the hands of the Philistines for 40 years. You see it go from seven years to 18 years to 40 years. I heard somebody say one time, «Everybody’s good for something, even if it is being a bad example.» It’s kind of savage, but it’s a good point if you think of the Book of Judges.
This is that bad example. At some point, after Judges 6, after the story of Gideon, the community could have come around and said, «Guys, let’s seal the problem here. Let’s be done with this Baal and Asherah deal. We had seven years of oppression, seven years of misery, and we learned what we needed to learn.»
Then there is no chapter 10 and 18 years, and there are no 40 years in chapter 13-we don’t continue to go further down. At some point, you’ve got to pull the nose up. At some point, you have to recognize a spiral for what it is. Just because you’re lower than you’ve ever been doesn’t mean you’re as low as you could go.
Sometimes we think we’ve hit rock bottom, and actually, no, this seven years isn’t rock bottom; it can get much worse. At some point, the cautionary tale, if we’re going to really honor this text, if we’re going to really look at Judges and get everything we’re supposed to get out of it, is that it is one of the hardest to watch and read books of the Bible, and the way it ends is it ends in civil war.
It ends with a story so awful you’re reading it and asking, «Why is this in the Bible? Why is this even here?» It shows the cultural and moral decay of what happens when you continue to let idols fester and you don’t deal with them. Each time you take a cycle, you go deeper and deeper, and deeper.
You’ve seen this before. You may have seen it in your own life and in your own relationships. Something bad happens-if we take that bad event and put all the truth on the table and take it seriously, we’re going to take this seriously. This is bad-it’s embarrassing, it was wrong, it was flesh, it was fall-but we believe in redemption and restoration.
We believe in a new day, and we’re going to put all the skunk on the table and deal with it. We’re going to be honest about what happened. We’re going to take it seriously; we’re not going to sweep anything under the rug. We’re not going to act like it didn’t happen; we’re not going to let pride get in the way, and we’re going to learn everything we need to learn.
In chapter 6, if we deal with it, we seal it right there. If we don’t, when that problem shows up again, it shows up deeper and deeper; it keeps reappearing and keeps robbing us. At the end of the Book of Judges, the way it ends is you have a Levite, and I’m just going to tell the story. If you have kids in here, I’m sorry; I’m just going to tell you what happened.
In the Book of Judges, you have a man who’s a Levite. He’s traveling, so think of the children of Israel-there are 12 tribes in Israel. This man, a Levite, is traveling through a city that is part of the tribe of Benjamin, and this place has become very corrupt and very violent. He’s traveling with his concubine, which was kind of considered a second-class wife, but it’s his wife essentially. They’re traveling, and they can’t find a place to stay; all the hotels are booked.
So they decide they’re going to stay in the town square. An older man walks up and asks, «What are you guys doing?» They say, «We’re going to stay here tonight in the town square.» He says, «You don’t know where you’re at. You don’t want to stay here; come stay at my house.»
So they go to his house. At some point, a group of men from the tribe of Benjamin come banging on the door. They want to rape this man. This whole group of them want to degrade this guy. While he’s in there, panicking about what is going to happen, this Levite becomes so afraid for himself that he throws his wife out there.
They not only rape her, but they kill her. He wakes up the next morning, and his wife has been brutalized, and now she’s dead. So he takes her body, cuts it into 12 pieces, and sends a piece to each tribe in Israel, saying, «This is what these disgusting Benjaminites have done. We need to deal with them.»
Because of this catastrophic event, a civil war breaks out. The tribes of Israel are now attacking each other. You want to talk about the opposite of Shalom! You want to talk about the opposite of right relationships with God, with yourself, and with each other. The whole reason I gave you the law, the whole reason I gave you the land, the whole reason I made the promise was for a purpose, and you’ve gotten so far. You’ve allowed idols, Baal and Asherah- distorted beliefs that I’m sure, in some way, seem to make sense in your minds- to create such a distortion of justice that it’s cascaded so far that now you’re turning against brother against brother.
Now it ends in this heap of civil war. So what does Judges serve? It serves as a cautionary tale. This is what happens when, number one, we don’t obey God, number two, we do it our way, and number three, when we don’t take seriously the lessons we’re learning. Just because I know better doesn’t mean I’ll do better. At some point, you have to decide, «I’m going to do this God’s way.»
The point I want us to take away today as we think about the Book of Judges is that God is patient and gracious. Let’s not take His patience and grace for granted. Let’s not take it for granted. Wherever you are right now, take seriously the lesson that God is showing you. I fast forward to the Book of Romans. In Romans 5:20, it says, «God’s law was given so that all people could see how sinful they were.» In other words, the law is there not to demoralize me, but to create definition for sin so I know what not to do.
But as people sinned more and more, God’s wonderful grace became more abundant. Because God’s grace outpaces our sin, just as sin ruled over all people and brought death, now God’s wonderful grace rules instead, giving us right standing with God and resulting in eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. And that’s great-his grace covers our sin.
Now flip from Romans 5 to Romans 6. He says in verse 1, «Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show more and more of this wonderful grace?» Of course not! Since we’ve died to sin, how can we continue to live in it? In other words, we know what chapter 6 does; we know what seven years to the Midianites does. Why would we want to have 18 years? Why would we want to have 40 years? Let’s learn what we need to learn.
It says in verse 12, «Do not let sin control the way you live. Do not give in to sinful desires. Do not let any part of your body become an instrument of evil to serve sin. Instead, give yourselves completely to God.» This is the point: let’s not take His grace and patience for granted. For you were dead, but now you have new life, so use your whole body as an instrument to do what is right for the glory of God.
I end with this thought. In Judges 17:6, it states that all the people did what was right in their own eyes. In fact, in Judges 21:25, it says it again. The whole book ends with that line; it’s the last line of the Book of Judges. 21:25 says, «All the people did what seemed right in their own eyes.»
When you look at Judges, how do we go and just not be completely demoralized by what we read and how it ends? Well, a couple of things. One, I think in the real world, it’s good to be sober about potential realities. There are times that these cautionary tales, as unpleasant as they are, without letting ourselves sink into hopelessness and despair, we have to consider where things can go if we don’t make the changes we need to make. I think this is a gift.
The second thing though is that the Book of Judges really does point to Jesus. You think about the awful husband at the end of the story who, in order to save himself, sacrifices his wife. This awful husband, as hard as that is to read and think about, points to Jesus, who does the exact opposite. He doesn’t sacrifice us to save himself; He sacrifices Himself to save us.
When you read in Judges, there were some good judges who ruled and led with justice, and they, in many ways, point us to Jesus as the type of Savior and Redeemer we ultimately seek after Jesus. But then there are other bad judges, like Samson, who is so self-absorbed and really uses all of his strength and power and position for his own gratification. Yet he points to Jesus, even as an example of what not to do.
He points to Jesus, who didn’t consider equality with God something to cling to, but emptied Himself of His divine rights. He took on the nature of a servant; He humbled Himself and came as a sacrifice for us. So even in the midst of these really poor examples, and even in the midst of this really awful ending, it still points to Jesus. It’s eventually making its way to Jesus.
Why do we need Jesus? Because we find ourselves in chaos, and nothing is beyond redemption and restoration. It’s through Jesus that we receive that sacrifice; it’s through Jesus that we find salvation. It’s through Jesus that we’re able to stop at chapter 6 in our mistake and not carry it on to 18 and 40 years. It’s through Jesus that we find the grace we need.
Let’s reach out to Him today. Lord, we come to You, and we thank You that You meet us right where we are. Lord, we recognize that now, right here, right now, is the time to repent and change. Lord, we thank You that when You invite us to repent, You’re doing it with patience and grace. This isn’t an angry, frustrated parent just coming in and going off; this is someone who loves us enough to do whatever it takes for us to learn what we need to learn.
So today, Lord, we lean into Your arms. We ask You to show us our idols; show us, Lord, the Baal that keeps showing up in our lives. Help us to take it seriously today before it’s too late. Help us to take it seriously today so that we can operate in Shalom and freedom. Lord, we trust in Your grace today and turn to You, but we certainly don’t take it for granted. In Jesus' name, in Jesus' name, everybody said, Amen.»