Tuesday, January 8, 2008
By Faith... the Judges, Part 52 of 62
TEXT: "What more shall I say? For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon and Barak and Samson and Jephthah, also of David and Samuel and the prophets" (Hebrews 11:32).
IDEA: God grows his leaders in strange places.
PURPOSE: To help listeners appreciate that when God creates leaders, he does so in his own way.
How important do you think it is to be a leader?
How important do you think it is to read books on leadership?
Do you think that God ever reads those books?
I. When you think of leaders of God’s people, where do they come from?
They come from different economic backgrounds.
Some like William Carey came out of poverty.
Others like Amy Carmichael grew up in comparative wealth.
God’s leaders come from both normal and dysfunctional families.
Billy Graham grew up in a farm community with good parenting
Ray Stedman came out of a very dysfunctional background and battled it all his life.
God’s leaders come from different educational backgrounds.
Saul, who became Paul, was well-educated.
Dwight L. Moody who grew up without much education.
Gladys Aylward was turned down by mission societies but went to China on her own where God gave her a significant ministry.
God doesn’t manufacture his leaders the way Toyota makes cars, all about the same except the color.
II. Judges 11:1 announces the appearance of another leader named Jephthah: “Jephthah a Gileadite was a mighty warrior.”
What turns a boy into a fighter?
He needs some human equipment—good IQ, good athletic ability, male aggressiveness, toughness, etc.
He needs some emotional conflict—some emotional pounding inside himself so that he never feels at peace with himself or others.
He needs some outlet for these emotions—a gang fight, a prize fight in a stadium, a football game, or an army to command.
Judges 11:2 tells us what it took to turn Jephthah into a commander of God’s people.
He didn’t get it in church. You would most likely find his background from the records in a home for delinquents.
Imagine that you are a social worker and you are writing up the record of Jephthah as a boy.
Describe his home life.
Tell about his father.
Who was his birth mother?
Describe his family history.
How did his siblings relate to him?
How did he relate to his siblings?
Why did he leave his home at an early age?
What do you predict for this child’s future?
