Does Good Bear Evil?

 DEVOTION

JUDGES

DOES GOOD BEAR EVIL?

Judges 6:1-10

6:1 Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD, and for seven years he gave them into the hands of the Midianites. 2 Because the power of Midian was so oppressive, the Israelites prepared shelters for themselves in mountain clefts, caves and strongholds. 3 Whenever the Israelites planted their crops, the Midianites, Amalekites and other eastern peoples invaded the country. 4 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. 5 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. 6 Midian so impoverished the Israelites that they cried out to the LORD for help. 7 When the Israelites cried to the LORD because of Midian, 8 he sent them a prophet, who said, "This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: I brought you up out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. 9 I snatched you from the power of Egypt and from the hand of all your oppressors. I drove them from before you and gave you their land. 10 I said to you, 'I am the LORD your God; do not worship the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you live.' But you have not listened to me."

NIV

We will get the story of Gideon within the next few days, but first, we will look once again at Israel doing evil in the eyes of the LORD. Why did those people who just experienced Deborah and Barak, smashing their enemies, then singing a great song of victory and the land, or Israel, have peace for forty years?  Was it the peace and the resulting prosperity in the land that caused them to build altars to Baal and Asherah Poles, which definitely would be doing evil in the eyes of the LORD? How did the LORD respond to their evil? He had the Midianites invade the land and decimate everything in it, livestock and crops, leaving nothing, taking over completely, like a swarm of locusts, forcing the Israelites to flee to caves and clefts in the rocks. This was all because they did not worship the LORD and only the LORD; in fact, they looked to gods with no eyes to see, no ears to hear, and no mouth to talk. We cannot help thinking that they were either completely uninformed about the LORD, or they just ignored him and engaged with the gods of other people living among them. We think we would never do anything like that and keep ourselves wholly worshipping our God. We think we would never take on any of the gods of this world as part of our lives, in some sense, worshipping them. We think that would be impossible, and yet we wonder if we are simply ignorant of what we are doing. We wonder if, simply by default, we have accepted certain values of this world, because we live in it and we must make our way through it. The Israelites experienced those forty years of peace and prosperity in the land, planting, harvesting, building herds of sheep, cattle, and donkeys, creating wealth for themselves and all because of the blessing of the LORD. Yet, with all this, they became complacent in their worship of the LORD and turned to other gods. We would not dare to become complacent in our worship of our God, or have we? Have we lost our fervor in worship and simply stand like stiff statues, expressionless and as silent as a church mouse? We see churches that praise God with passion. We see some churches overzealous with praise, that maybe their praise has become their god. Is there a balance in giving honor and praise to the LORD without giving in to worship becoming our god? Yet, how can we not be zealous in praise and worship, for he is God and we are his people. Then there are the gods of this world that we must contend with.  Maybe our being too invested in the ways of the world has dampened our enthusiasm in worship of the LORD, the God of heaven and earth, the creator of all that has been created, the one who gave us life, who breathed his breath into our lungs. Have we allowed wealth and prosperity, because of the hand of the Lord, to overpower our complete, full-hearted worship of him? Have we become lazy in worshipping the Lord? We do live in grace, but we cannot allow our freedom to do evil in the eyes of the Lord. Let us worship the Lord with our whole heart, loving him with all our hearts, minds, souls, and strengths we have, giving him our whole worship he is due. We have a God who has eyes to see, ears to hear, and a mouth that speaks truth to our spirits. We have a God who lives within us and manifests his gifts and fruits within our very being. With all that he does for us, in us, and hopefully through us, we will worship him and only him. Because he does so much good within us, we can never think of doing anything evil in his eyes. However, does good bear evil?