The Judgeship of Othniel

Judges 3:7-11

This is the first example of the Lord protecting his people through the work of a judge. It is therefore an important passage, bridging the introductory theological perspective and the historical narrative which runs throughout this book.

It also serves to flesh out the principles which the first two chapters have enunciated concerning the cycle of degeneration and rebellion which characterised the people of Israel in the days of the judges.

More than this, however, it serves to demonstrate the character of Israel's God. This passage tells us more about God than about Othniel. In fact, although Othniel is the deliverer, no details are given about what he did. It is simply recorded that he saved the people of Israel. Much more information is given about God, whose activity is the main thrust of this passage.

For this reason, as we study this passage, we will 'theologise' as we go. God is known through his words to us; but he is also known through his actions for us. That pattern recurs throughout Scripture: revelation is always word/event; the great doctrines are exemplified through the great acts of deliverance; and the great acts of deliverance are interpreted and contextualised through the doctrines.

As we look, therefore, at what this section of the Book of Judges tells us about God, we are struck by at least five things.

First, the PROVOCATION of God: God is moved to anger with his people.

God's wrath is kindled, as He sees his people forsake him. The case against them is built up in stages, with four distinct sins heaped one upon the other. First, they 'did what was evil' in God's sight; second, 'they forgot the Lord their God'; third, 'they served the Baals', and, fourth, they served the 'Asheroth'.

Any of these on their own would have been enough to indict the people; but taken together they form a serious charge of apostasy and rebellion. On the one hand, the great works and wonders of God's redemption are forgotten and wilfully ignored. On the other, the injunctions and requirements of God's holy law are flagrantly breached. And these twin factors lead to the spiritual adultery that ensues, as they fly to the god of flies, to the Baals, and dance to the sensual rhythyms of the Asherah fertility cults.

The solemn message of all this is that God is angry with his people. He looks at those whom he has favoured with the light of his revelation, with the covenants of his grace, with the promises of his salvation, those whom he has taken out of Egypt and into Canaan, those who have been the object of his affection so long, and his wrath is kindled against them.

It seems to me that there are two important implications of this. First, it reminds us that the God of the Bible is a personal God. He hates and he loves, he is pleased and he is angry. You cannot have these kinds of responses from gods of wood and stone. The gods of the idols have tongues that never speak, eyes that never see, and hearts that feel nothing. The Baals and the Asheroth stand dumb and unfeeling, unmoved and unresponsive.

But the God of Israel is a personal God. He is not dead, but alive. He is no idol, but a responsive, personal God, who is not unaffected by what he sees in the world or among his people. That is the glory of the God of the Bible. We are made in his image: our personhood derives from his. You can create a Baal in your own image, but it won't talk back to you. God created man in HIS image, precisely so that man would talk back to him. How much we need to glory in this God, and be at pains not to offend him!

Secondly, this passage illustrates the constancy of God's covenant. Why is it that he is angry with sin? Because that is what he said he would be like. Was that not what the theological introduction told us: 'So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel ... Whenever they marched out, the hand of the Lord was against them for harm as the Lord had warned, and as the Lord had sworn' (Judges 2:14-15). This anger was nothing but the outworking, in covenant faithfulness, of what the Lord had threatened against the disobedience of his people.

It is easy for us to appropriate those elements of the covenant which are full of reassurance and promise. We can come to the word of God's promise and rejoice in the unchangeableness and the constancy of God's word and God's standard. But that is true not only in terms of his promises: it is also true in terms of his threats. We cannot embrace one side of the equation only. He is angry because he is a faithful God.

All of which highlights the fact that amid all the variables in the Book of Judges, the covenant word of God remains constant. It is the one straight line in this book of recurring cycles of apostasy. God always does what he says, is always the rewarder of the obedient, and is always angry with the disobedient. There is never any deviation from that standard.

Second, the PROVIDENCE of God.

The God of this passage is the sovereign God of all the nations. Imagine! The God of little Israel is the God of the whole world. He made that world for himself, for his own glory. But he did not leave the world to run, as if he had wound up a clock and left it to chime away the hours. This God is involved in his world, and is intimately connected with it.

That comes to prominence in the language of this passage. God 'sold' his people into the hand of Cushan-Rishathaim, king of Mesopotamia. The Hebrew literally says 'Cushan-Rishathaim, king of Aram-Naharaim'. The place is easily identifiable: Aram-Naharaiam is 'Aram of the two rivers' ('Mesopotamia' is a Greek version of this, literally meaning 'in the middle of the rivers'). It is a place well known in the biblical narrative; some of Abraham's descendants settled here, which is why Abraham sends his servant to Mesopotamia, to Aram, in order to find a wife for Isaac in Genesis 24:10. As a result, the people of God could confess that Jacob, their father, was 'a wandering Aramean' (Deuteronomy 26:5).

The name of the king is more problematic. 'Cushan' is a frequently attested name, but 'Rishathaim' seems to have been made up, because of its resonance with 'Naharaim'. Literally, the king's name means 'Cushan of double wickedness', and is a way of emphasising the deeply rebellious nature of the king who held Israel in thrall for eight years.

So in this act of Providence, God's sovereignty is emphasised. His hand 'sold' his people into the hand of Cushan, working where his fingers had traced a path going all the way back to Abraham, to bring chastisement upon his people now. And in spite of the double-wickedness, Cushan is the means, the instrument in God's hand, for bringing back his people.

Which shows us, secondly, how God's grace is emphasised in this act of Providence. Why did God sell them into the hand of Cushan? To free them from the embrace of Baal! He might have left them in their sensual dances and frenzied Baal-religion, but he does not. The fact that he stirs up Cushan and allows him the ascendancy over them is an act of supreme love. It demonstrates that, although his people have forgotten their God, he has not forgotten them.

This is our doctrine of God's Providence: God's sovereign control over the affairs of men and nations, in the service of his grace towards his own people. Sometimes he ordains hard things, but never ordains anything but necessary things for those who are bound to him in covenant.

Third, God's POWER is evident here.

For eight years, Cushan has the victory over Israel (or at least over some of the tribes of Israel). He is in the ascendancy. But there is a power greater than that of Cushan.

First, the power of God is displayed: 'when the people of Israel cried out to the Lord, the Lord raised up a deliverer...' Was this a cry of repentance? Possibly, but the word for 'cried' could simply mean that, out of their distress, they raised up their voice, wailing to God out of pain and affliction. God was not unmoved; nor was he at a distance, unable to act. He is neither impervious to their cry, nor impotent to help. He responds by stepping in to deliver his people.

Sometimes our prayers are articulated only with 'groanings too deep for words' (Romans 8:26). When we do not even know what we should pray for, God is able to turn the groans into a prayer, and is able to respond to them in ways that go above and beyond our asking. That is the true measure of God's power: not only that he is able to do things for us, but that he is able to reach into the depths of our being to hear the prayer we are not even able to put together.

Second, the power of God is displayed here through human instrumentality. On this occasion, the judge was Othniel, Caleb's brother (or perhaps his nephew). As Joshua 15:16-19 and Judges 1:12-15 tell us, Othniel had already distinguished himself in the capture of Debir. For that he had gained the hand of Achsah in marriage. Now he is called to rise to the challenge of Cushan of double-wickedness.

God is free to act without instrumentation, or even against it. Yet it is his usual way of working to demonstrate his power through human agencies of his own choosing. Perhaps Othniel did not know it, but the sack of Debir was only the prelude to an even greater challenge.

And is that not often the case with us? These moments of effort, stress and victory, which were momentous challenges in our lives at the time, are only points of preparation for greater tests and undertakings? God always has his people at the ready -- a Joseph languishing, forgotten in prison, an Esther, in the harem of the king, a Daniel, among the exiles in Babylon -- prepared for a grand purpose.

But it is not the strength of Othniel that wins the day; no, 'the Spirit of the Lord was upon him'. That was the secret. Supernatural strength was given for this great task and responsibility. That is how it always is. God gives his own power, strengthening, making ready, enabling. That blessing is ours now in all the fulness of the New Testament.

Fourth, God's PURPOSE is here.

As Othniel went out, 'the Lord gave Cushan-rishathaim king of Mesopotamia into his hand'. The same hand that had sold Israel into Cushan's power, now delivered them from it. God's purpose is to bring his people to something even better and more glorious than they had before.

The psalmist knew this blessing. 'Before I was afflicted,' he says, 'I went astray. But now I keep your word'. That is the great lesson. The purpose is not to leave Israel languishing under the grip of Cushan, but to demonstrate the power that saves, and that delivers.

This is the thread of purpose that runs all the way through the Bible. His end is to deliver. God's purpose is to save. And he does that for us, not through a human judge, but by a divine Saviour.

Finally, God's PROVISION is here.

What is that? 'The land had rest'. That is one of the recurring themes of Judges. God rested on the seventh day of creation, demonstrating that the end for which he made the world was that man would rest in him. The provision of rest was what Christ secured for his own. God's people rest in him, and they rest from all their labours as a result of his victory on the cross. May we know rest as it is to be found alone in Jesus Christ.