91 lines
9.5 KiB
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91 lines
9.5 KiB
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<title>Blue Letter Bible - Chuck Smith Sermon Notes</title>
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Passage = 'Judges 5:23 ';
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SermonID = 1879;
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<div class="SSN_title">"THE CURSE OF MEROZ."</div>
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<div class="SSN_rnum">I. THE BACKGROUND TO OUR STORY:</div>
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<div class="SSN_level2">A. The children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">1. As a result, the Lord delivered them into the hand of Jabin who ruled over that great city of Hazor in the upper Galilee.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">2. He had a powerful army under the leadership of a captain named Sisera.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">3. He had been ruling over Israel for twenty years.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">4. The people in their distress cried unto the Lord.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">5. Sisera's army was well-armed; he had 900 chariots. In those days a chariot was equivalent to a tank in modern battle.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">a. Imagine the infantry armed only with rifles going against an armored division of 900 tanks, and you have a picture of the impossible situation they were facing.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">b. Their chance of freeing themselves from the bondage of the Canaanites was zero.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level2">B. At that time a woman, whose name was Deborah, was the ruling judge over Israel, and she was a prophetess.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">1. She called a man named Barak to her, who was from the tribe of Naphtali.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">2. Being a prophetess, she said that the Lord had commanded him to take 10,000 men from the tribe of Naphtali and Zebulun and go to Mount Tabor and that the Lord would draw Sisera to the valley of Megiddo, and the Lord would deliver Sisera and his army to him there.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">3. Brave Barak told Deborah that he would not go unless she would go with him.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">4. She promised to go with him, but prophesied that a woman would receive the glory for destroying their enemy Sisera.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">5. When Sisera heard that the Israelites had gathered 10,000 men at Mount Tabor, he brought a great army with the 900 chariots into the valley of Megiddo to the river Kishon to fight against them there.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">6. God sent a heavy rain that caused the Kishon to overflow, and the chariots got bogged down in the mud and became useless.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">7. The army of Sisera was soundly defeated, and Sisera sought to flee the battle scene on foot.</div>
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<div class="SSN_rnum">II. THE SONG OF DEBORAH. SHE COMPOSED A SONG TO CELEBRATE GOD'S GREAT VICTORY AGAINST THEIR ENEMY.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level2">A. "Praise the Lord for delivering Israel when the people willingly offered themselves."</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">1. God had summoned the people and they willingly responded to the call of God.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">2. It is important to remember that the enemy was much greater in number and power.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">3. It was one of those many times, when the people of God were willing to face a much stronger enemy because they had the promise of God that He would be with them.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">4. Paul the Apostle asked in <a onClick="return mV('Rom',8,1);">Romans 8</a>, "For if God be for us who can be against us."</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">5. It appears that the people of God are always facing an enemy that seems overwhelming because of their seeming superior power.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">6. There is that great psalm that declares:</div>
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<div class="SSN_verse"><a onClick="return mV('Psa',124,1);">PSA 124:1</a> If it had not been that the LORD who was on our side, may Israel now say;</div>
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<div class="SSN_verse"><a onClick="return mV('Psa',124,2);">PSA 124:2</a> If it had not been that the LORD was on our side, when men rose up against us:</div>
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<div class="SSN_verse"><a onClick="return mV('Psa',124,3);">PSA 124:3</a> Then they would have swallowed us up quick, when their wrath was kindled against us:</div>
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<div class="SSN_verse"><a onClick="return mV('Psa',124,4);">PSA 124:4</a> Then the waters would have overwhelmed us, the streams would have gone over our soul:</div>
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<div class="SSN_verse"><a onClick="return mV('Psa',124,5);">PSA 124:5</a> The proud waters would have gone over our soul.</div>
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<div class="SSN_verse"><a onClick="return mV('Psa',124,6);">PSA 124:6</a> Blessed be Jehovah, who has not given us as a prey to their teeth.</div>
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<div class="SSN_verse"><a onClick="return mV('Psa',124,7);">PSA 124:7</a> Our soul has escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers: the snare is broken, and we have escaped.</div>
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<div class="SSN_verse"><a onClick="return mV('Psa',124,8);">PSA 124:8</a> Our help [is] in the name of Jehovah who made heaven and earth.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">7. Looking at the power of the enemy and the odds that we face, it seems that our seeking to overcome the enemy is futile.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">8. And so it would be if the Lord was not on our side.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">9. Today as we see how deeply entrenched evil is in our society, we are prone to faint. We see how Satan seems to control the whole media, magazines, papers, T.V., movies, the government here in the state of California; the public school system.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">10. How can you possibly fight against such a powerful enemy? How can you ever hope to win?</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">11. We see the power of the enemy and many times we then fail to see the power of God.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level2">B. Deborah praised those who offered themselves willingly to go out and face the powerful enemy, verse 9.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">1. She speaks how that God fought with them from heaven, referring to the flood of rain that disabled the chariots.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">2. The flooding of the river Kishon carried many of them away.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level2">C. She then proclaimed a curse upon Meroz.</div>
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<div class="SSN_verse">JUD 5:23</span> Curse ye Meroz, said the angel of the LORD, curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof; because they came not to the help of the LORD, to the help of the LORD against the mighty.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">1. Note that the curse was not for some great evil that they had done.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">a. Not for idolatry or the worship of false gods.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">b. Not for some great transgression.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">2. The curse was for doing nothing.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">3. The curse was for their unwillingness to get involved.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">4. Jesus declared that if you were not for Him, you were against Him.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">5. There are those today who are as Meroz.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">a. They have not done anything overtly evil.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">b. The problem is that they just have not done anything good.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">c. They may even stand back and decry the evil that is in the world today, but they do nothing to stand up against the evil.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">d. They just do not want to get involved.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">e. Someone has said that all that it takes for evil to prevail is for good people to do nothing.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">f. The fact that evil is prevailing in our nation today is due to the fact that good people have done nothing.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">g. They used to call us the silent majority, but because we were silent, we have become the silent minority.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level3">6. Our kids in school today are facing terrible pressures from this amoral society in which we live.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">a. Even a Christian high school has many problems because of the worldly pressures.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">b. Is there nothing that we can do? Are we helpless against the overwhelming odds?</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">c. You may say, "Are you advocating that we march on Sacramento?" Should we write our representatives? Shall we get placards and parade through the streets, or shall we endorse certain candidates?</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">d. These are all carnal methods to fight the battle, and the battle is not carnal but spiritual.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">e. I suggest that you begin to use the secret super weapons that we have been given by which we can defeat the enemy. That is the weapon of prayer.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">f. How long has it been since you have been on your knees praying for your children, your home, your city, your nation.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">g. I am asking you to do something, don't be like Meroz and just do nothing, but let us take the battle to the enemy, let us counterattack.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">h. We have plenty of prayer meetings here at the church, but it isn't necessary that you come to the church, the beautiful thing about prayer, you can pray anywhere, under all circumstances.</div>
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<div class="SSN_level4">i. It may be that in prayer God will lead you to other actions, for you can often do more than pray after you have prayed.</div>
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