Parables 5

What a wonderful name it is, the name of Jesus Christ my King.

What a wonderful name it is, let me come close to this.

What a wonderful name it is, the name of Jesus.

Death could not hold you, the will told before you, his son is the most awesome and great.

Heaven's a-roaming, the waves of your glory, for you will raise to life again.

You have no problem, you have no evil, now and forever God you will wait.

Yours is the kingdom, yours is the glory, yours is the name of the whole day.

What a powerful name it is, what a powerful name it is, the name of Jesus Christ my King.

What a powerful name it is, nothing can stand against.

What a powerful name it is, the name of Jesus.

You have no rival, you have no equal, now and forever God you will wait.

Yours is the kingdom, yours is the glory, yours is the name of the whole day.

What a powerful name it is, what a powerful name it is, the name of Jesus Christ my King.

Nothing can stand against, what a powerful name it is, the name of Jesus.

I figured somebody would notice that.

I should have my answer sheet.

I don't have a back cover there.

Oh, here it is, I got it.

This worksheet was one of the more challenging worksheets that I have made because I ran into something unexpected while I was doing it.

Hopefully I will be able to help you see that by the time we are done.

We are still looking at parables, we will be looking at parables for a while.

We are looking at a variety of different parables so that we want to get fluent in the language of parables.

We want to get used to this method of communication that God uses for us to understand.

As you will recall, the parable serves a purpose.

It is to elicit a response and a request from the hearer.

When we hear a parable, we should go to God.

We are going to hear a parable, another one, today from the Old Testament.

It is used in a unique way, even more unique.

It caught me off guard a little bit as I was studying it in preparation for today.

If you look right at the top of your page, right above the first arm of that there, that is a bramble.

A bramble is like a low-lying, foreign bush that creeps along and grabs onto everything.

At the top there, it should say, Judges, and the reference is chapter 9, Judges 9, beginning in verse 5.

Isaiah 9 · chapter mention

We actually will go through verse 20.

It is 9, 5, dash 20.

That is what you have at the top.

That was pretty much the easy part.

If you go right down across the brambles, you will see it says, parables 6.

Under that, it says, the fable of the trees.

What we have is a person in this story, and I will clue you in as to who he was, why he was, the occasion of it.

I will do all of that.

That was telling the fable of the trees, and it is a parable.

The things in the parable kind of represent something so that people can learn what it is that he is trying to get them to learn.

They should theoretically respond and request more information, but you will see they do not.

That is interesting, and it goes very poorly for them because of that.

It was really neat that I was able to make that connection myself, and hopefully I will be able to help you see it.

This is Judges chapter 9, beginning in verse 5.

Judges 9 · chapter mention

We will be reading it.

You see it says, I start reading there, and we are working down the page, and I will clue you in.

Then we have some things off to the side, and those things are about that thing.

Like it says location, and then the arrow off to the side is going to talk about the location.

Then it says spoken by, and those blanks on the right are going to talk about the person who spoke it.

Then the occasion is going to be down, and so on.

We are just working down the page.

Thank you very much, sir.

Here we go.

This is Judges chapter 9, verse 5.

Judges 9:5

Hold on one second.

Okay, there is verse 5.

Then he, the he, is Abimelech.

I will go back and give you a little bit more about that in a minute.

Then he, Abimelech, went to his father's house at Ofra and killed his brothers, the sons of Jerobal.

Here is an interesting trivia question.

Does anybody know who Jerobal is by a name that everyone would recognize or most people would recognize?

Who had the alternate name Jerobal?

Does anybody remember?

Nope, not Jeremiah.

It is Gideon.

Gideon.

He got the name Jerobal early on because he was basically warring against the prophets of Baal and the false teachings of Baal.

This guy, Gideon, does anybody remember Gideon?

Gideon is the guy with the 300.

Gideon has a huge army.

God says you have too many people.

If you do it now, it is not big enough to win, but if you do it now, everybody will think you did it because you had a big army.

We are going to let all the men who are afraid go home.

They all went home.

We are going to have them all down to the water.

If they bend over to drink or if they keep looking around, that will determine whether they get to stay or not.

They got down to 300 men.

Then those 300 men went in with the pitchers and the torches.

They scared the camp.

The camp got up and they all killed each other.

That is basically what happened.

God delivered them that day through the hands of Gideon.

That army was a Midianite army.

That is the background story.

Gideon is an awesome dude.

He is a judge.

He is a judge for God.

He is a leader for God.

Now, he has all these sons.

Abimelek, who was his son, goes and kills all of his brothers, all the sons of Gideon.

You could put him there if you want.

70 men on one stone.

Abimelek takes a bunch of Hierarchretans and kills his 70 brothers all on one stone.

That word there, it is not on your page, but that word where it says on one stone, it could be a sacrificial stone to the false god Baal.

He may have sacrificed all of his brothers to Baal at that time, but they do not know for sure if that word means that.

They just say on one stone.

Jotham, the youngest son of Jerbaal, was left for he hid himself.

There was one youngest son that survives.

So he is a brother, kind of a half brother, right?

He is not saying mother, but a brother to Abimelek, who just killed all 70 of their other brothers.

Verse 6 says, and all the men of Shechem and all Beth-Miloh assembled together.

Now, the word Beth-Miloh is a weird word and they have a hard time translating it.

We do not really know for sure what it is referring to.

But it could have been a town, it could have been a clan, because it could mean the house of Miloh, right?

So they are not 100% sure. Beth is house in Hebrew.

And so it could be the house of Miloh or it could have been a town called that or whatever.

So they really do not know for sure.

But all the men of Shechem, that they do know, and Beth-Miloh, assembled together.

And they went and made Abimelek king.

They did this by the oak of the pillar which was in Shechem.

So Shechem was a big city.

And it was kind of between two, like at a key point where a valley comes through and all the merchants would come through.

Now when they told Jotham, he went and stood on the top of Mount Gerizim and lifted his voice and called out.

So we will stop there for a second.

So the location is what? Mount Gerizim.

Now Gerizim is spelled G-E-R-I-Z-I-M.

There are two I's.

It sounds like there is an A in there, but there is not.

It is G-E-R-I-Z-I-M.

So it looks like Gerizim.

So that is the location.

So now we are going to follow the arrow over for a second to the left.

Follow your arrow over to the left.

Big fat arrow there.

And the first word starts with an M and it is?

We are talking about the location.

M is what?

Mountain. That is correct.

So Mount Gerizim was a mountain.

And it was one of two.

Does anybody know what the other one was?

It was one of two and the W is with.

And the other one starts with an E and it is Bible scholars?

Anybody? No clue.

Nope. Not Israel.

It is Ebal. E-B-A-L.

I will give you a little bit more in a second.

But right now just go with me as we get through the rest of these blanks.

So it is a mountain.

One of two with Ebal.

And then it is the M-O-B.

I am going to take a stab at it.

If you don't know the history you might have trouble with this part.

How about if I fill in the history and then you will see if you get it.

So these two mountains, Gerizim and Ebal, sit side by side.

And there is a pass that runs between.

And when the Israelites came into the promised land,

since I started telling this story you will go,

oh I kind of vaguely think I remember this.

When the Israelites came to the promised land,

and I think it is Deuteronomy 27,

Moses told them that once they went in there

they were supposed to form all the men up on both mountains.

One on one side of one mountain and one on the other.

And one side they were going to tell all the blessings

that God was going to give them as they went into the land.

And the other mountain was going to tell all the curses

that God was going to give if they didn't do it.

Remember this whole story maybe?

If not it is in the book of Joshua.

I highly recommend you read it. It is really good stuff.

So they got up there and they cried out the blessings

and they cried out the curses.

And Mount Gerizim then was the, now look at the blanks,

Mount of Blessings. Exactly.

So Mount Gerizim was the Mount of Blessings.

So now realize that this story that we are reading

is taking place a little over a hundred years

after that story I just told you.

When Joshua had them all go up on the mountain.

They actually did it, right?

Moses looked before that, you know almost 200 years really,

that they were told to do it.

But then only a little over a hundred years later

this event that we are studying today was taking place.

This parable is being told.

And so they were up on this mountain a little over

a hundred years ago pronouncing blessings.

And the Israelites stood here to SL.

Anyone want to get a stab at it?

What do you think it could be?

They stood on the mountain, they followed the commands of Moses

and they stood there to do to SL.

Is that a shout?

No, that's really cool.

So shout is right, so the S is shout.

It's not literature.

It was loud but that's not the right L.

Loyalty, okay.

Remember that they were given the blessings that they would get

by God when they went into the land.

The curses that they would get if they did not remain loyal to the Lord.

So the blessings were all about loyalty.

If you go back and read them you'll see they were like,

yes, we're for God and God's for us and these things are awesome.

Things are going to happen.

It's going to be great.

The people over here are like, well, we're for God too

and these are the horrible things that are going to happen

if we don't follow God and we're for God too, right?

But Mount Gerizim was the mount of blessings

and the people stood on the mountain to shout their loyalty.

So this scene that we're studying there today,

if you follow the arrow down a little bit,

actually let's leave those blanks for a minute

because you'll get a better idea as we actually look at what happens

during the scene.

So you can leave those there.

We'll fill them in later.

It's going to be HD when the time comes.

So going back up to location,

we just talked about Mount Gerizim.

So if anybody asked you what Mount Gerizim was,

it's one of the two mountains.

It was the mount of blessings

and the Israelites stood on that mountain to shout their loyalty to God.

Now he's standing there.

Who's he?

Help me.

Jotham.

Correct.

Very good.

Jotham.

He's standing there.

Okay.

And so if you'll see spoken by,

charged with a J, Jotham.

Okay.

And now follow over to the right.

We'll talk about Jotham for a minute.

Okay.

This is a little tricky, but if you're listening closely,

and I can read it again if nobody gets it,

YS.

The youngest son.

The youngest son.

That's good.

Somebody was listening.

Very good.

He's the youngest son.

That's tough detail to pick out if you weren't paying close attention.

And he was also the OS.

Very good.

Only survivor.

So he's the youngest son and the only survivor of the massacre.

Because he hid.

Because he hid.

Yes, that's right.

Which is what I would have done.

I think at that point,

if your 70 brothers aren't good enough to hold it,

you're the youngest, hold up to it,

and you're the youngest son,

I think hiding is about your only option

unless you've got a good course to run away.

Okay.

And then, so he's standing up there.

This is a little trickier.

It's not really in what we read,

but you kind of see what's coming, right?

He stands up there on Mount Gerizim,

and his purpose, why is he doing it?

CS.

Call.

Nope.

Okay, so let's go back into the text,

and you will get it.

All right, that's how far we've gotten so far.

Okay.

So we're just going to go back for one second to

verse seven.

At the top, at the very top?

Judges 9, 5, to 20,

and I'm reading in verse seven right now.

I'm sorry, yeah, 9, 5, to 20,

and I'm reading in verse seven.

Now, when they told Jotham,

he went and stood on the top of Mount Gerizim.

So what did they tell him?

No, that's why he went there,

but what did they tell him?

The verse is right before.

Right, they made, past tense actually,

a Bimelech king by the oak of the pillar,

which was in Shechem.

Okay, so Jotham heard that they made a Bimelech king.

That's what he heard.

Yep, absolutely.

Okay, now listen, it says,

now when they told Jotham,

he went and stood on the top of Mount Gerizim,

and lifted his voice and called out.

Thus he said to them,

we don't have to go very far,

listen to me, O men of Shechem,

that God may listen to you.

Okay, so, okay, good enough.

You could put called out,

technically called out is two words.

I put confront Shechem.

Okay, so he did this to confront Shechem.

Notice he leaves out,

S-H-E-C-H-E-M,

like Shechem, S-H-E-C-H-E-M,

or Shechem.

Okay, anyway, he leaves out that other group,

or city, or whatever it was, right,

the Beth-Millow,

which we don't really know for sure what it was.

He leaves them out,

he calls out, O men of Shechem, right,

and he confronts them.

Now if you follow the arrow down for one second,

you'll see that Shechem,

and we already talked about this a little bit,

so you might be able to fill it in,

is an MC.

Shechem.

It's a major city.

Shechem is a major city.

In fact, almost no trade was being done in that region

unless it went through Shechem.

So if you needed something that was not made in your hometown,

you couldn't get it unless it came through Shechem.

Very powerful city, big, lots of people.

And it so happens that Abimelek was from Shechem.

Okay, and we'll get into that in a second here.

All right, so we're back in the middle.

Let me recap.

So we have the location, Mount Gerizim,

spoken by Jotham, who was the youngest son,

the only survivor to confront Shechem,

which was a major city.

Okay, and now we're on occasion.

Occasion.

So we have the big capital A, which of course is Abimelek.

Yep, so Abimelek.

And then we have the big capital S, which of course is Shechem.

Right?

And we have a little a.

You could put accepts, anoints.

What's that?

Yeah, anoints.

And then we have an IK.

Anyone want to take a stab at that one?

Okay, so King is correct.

What kind of King is this Abimelek?

He does turn out to be one, and that is correct.

He's not an idiot.

In fact, he was a master craftsman politician at this point,

but he's on the wrong side of the battle.

You always lose when you go against God, right?

So he's illegitimate.

He's illegitimate.

He does not actually have any claim to be King.

The only claim he has to be King is you will see it before we're done.

Okay?

All right, so Abimelek, Shechem, anointed illegitimate King.

And now MGS.

I'm going to give you, the G is Gideon's.

Gideon, apostrophe, S, Gideon, as in Gideon's possession.

So the M is what?

Massacred.

Massacred, Gideon's, sons.

Okay?

So Abimelek and Shechem go together.

They massacre his sons, and he becomes an illegitimate King.

Okay?

So we're going to take that arrow, if you'll see where you wrote Abimelek right there,

take that arrow down to the left.

See the arrow down to the left, and it says, Judges 831.

Judges 831 says,

this is talking about Gideon.

We'll go back up as far as 29 just so you get the run up to it.

Then Jeroboel, the son of Joash, went and lived in his own house.

Now Gideon had 70 sons who were his direct descendants,

for he had many wives, now 31.

And his concubine, who was in Shechem, also bore him a son,

and he named him Abimelek.

Okay?

It is not Shechem, son of...

So tell me what a concubine is, compared to a wife.

What's the difference?

Not married.

Not married, typically, and what?

Kind of, yeah.

Typically they were of lower station, a slave woman.

Okay?

So she was a slave woman.

Abimelek was the son of a slave woman.

Now it was a slave woman who became intimate with Gideon,

and so she is the mother of Abimelek.

Okay?

Then we're going to go down, the arrow down,

and it says, and this is Judges 8.23 now that I'm reading.

Judges 8.23, it says, 22 says,

Then the men of Israel said to Gideon,

Rule over us both you and your son, also your son's son,

for you have delivered us from the hand of Midian.

But Gideon said to them, I will not rule over you,

nor shall my son rule over you.

The Lord shall rule over you.

So Gideon, the G is Gideon, what?

Refused.

He refused to rule.

He would not be king.

He said, I will not be your king.

He refused.

Yep, Gideon refused or refuses.

But, and this is where it gets kind of soap opera sloppy, okay?

But, I'm just going to fill in the blanks,

and I'm going to read it to you here.

He named son, and you know what the capital A is,

Abimelek, but do you know what the translation is?

You can look at the letters on the bottom line, M-F-I-K, M-F-I-K.

Exactly.

The word Abimelek means my father is king.

Interesting, isn't it?

So if you had a slave woman, if you were Gideon,

you had a slave woman who lived in another city away from you,

and you had a son with her, why would you name him Abimelek,

especially if you're not king?

Why do you think you would do that?

Maybe, although I don't think that was Gideon's purpose,

because Gideon told them that he would not rule over them,

and he even says, nor will my son.

He said that, Gideon said, nor will my son.

Isn't Gideon Christian?

This is way before Christ.

Gideon is a God follower for sure.

Say it again.

There you go.

She was a slave woman.

She had nothing.

She had a son that belonged to Gideon.

He did not move her and her son to come live with him.

You follow?

He left them in Shechem.

What did they have going for them?

Not a whole lot.

He probably sent them some money, right?

So they were taken care of, but what was their social status?

Very low.

But if you name your son Abimelech, you elevate his social status.

He gave him a gift.

Right?

Remember the old, you may or may not remember,

this old song by Johnny Cash?

A Boy Named Sue, right?

And the whole song is about a name,

my dad named me Sue, and I never met him,

and I grew up hating him and fighting and all this trouble,

and in the end he runs into him in a bar,

and they knife fight each other, and they come up,

and they finally come to peace over it.

He said, I had to name you Sue, because I had to make you tough.

Right?

Because I knew you were going to be there without me.

I had to make you tough.

And at the end of the song, Johnny Cash says,

and if I ever have a boy, I'm going to name him Bill or George or John or Paul,

anything but Sue.

So the whole point of naming him my father as king

was to give him something, because he couldn't give him his father.

Does that make sense?

He couldn't give him his dad.

He couldn't go there and let him check him,

and he wasn't going to bring him to live with him.

So that being said, this problem that we're having in this story

starts a little bit with Gideon having a concubine and so many wives.

How many kings do you think it has been throughout Israel's history?

Gideon was not a king, he was a judge,

but how many kings had too many wives and got into trouble?

Many.

All of them.

All of them, all the kings.

They all had too many wives and all got into trouble.

As far as we know, we don't know for sure that that was some of the trouble for some of them,

but we know that most of them had multiple wives and it always didn't work out well.

And so that was not the...

And you know, by the way, that is not the way God set it up.

One man, one woman for a life is the way God set it up.

So God hates divorce, not getting on that topic,

but it literally says that, God hates divorce.

That is not what God prefers, but there is a reality of it

because of hardness of heart, betrayal, things like that.

There's a reality of divorce.

So God does not hate divorcees, right, who are divorced,

but he hates that divorce even exists.

That being said, Gideon had a concubine, had a son,

and gave him the name, My Father is King.

And it did indeed elevate his position in Shechem, didn't it?

Because now he's able to rally all the people in Shechem around him.

And then what did they use that power for?

They went and killed Gideon's 70 other sons.

That is terrible, that is tragic, okay?

All right, so that being said then, we've gotten all the way to the bottom,

except for my little note there.

So you're going to go back up, so you're back up under occasion,

a Bimilech, Shechem, an illegitimate king, anointed an illegitimate king,

massacred Gideon's sons, Bram...

Okay, and then you got to be there, but you haven't heard the parable yet.

All of that, and you've not heard the parable yet.

So now we're going to get to the parable, okay?

So here we go.

So he stands up, and he's going to tell the fable of the trees.

I've got to get back on the right page.

And we are in chapter 9 of the Book of Judges, and we are in...

I'll begin in 8.

This is the actual parable.

Once the trees went forth to anoint a king over them.

And they said to the olive tree, Reign over us.

But the olive tree said to them, Shall I leave my fatness,

with which God and men are honored, and go to wave over the trees?

Okay, so if you'll look straight down on your page,

right in the middle of the bottom, you see that thing that looks like a twisted...

has a twisted trunk and goes up into a kind of very oddly shaped tree head?

That is an olive tree.

And so the blank says olive tree, and right after there's a little blank,

and what did the olive tree say?

It's simpler than that.

No.

He said no.

The olive tree said no.

I will not be your king.

All right, continuing on.

Then the trees said to the fig tree, You come reign over us.

But the fig tree said to them, Shall I leave my sweetness and my good fruit,

and go to wave over the trees?

Okay, if you'll look in the upper right hand side,

you'll see a tree that has a straight shoot and that has like a branch off.

You can see the branches.

You can see kind of round things hanging there.

By the way, figs don't look anything like you think they look.

By the way, they look almost more like oblong pomegranates is what figs look like,

unless you've seen them before.

Okay, and then it's...

So that is a fig tree. F-T is fig tree.

And there is a blank there at its roots.

And the fig tree said no.

Okay, so he's telling them their first choice for king...

the tree's first choice for a king over them would decline.

Their second choice for a king over them declined.

Now we're in verse 12.

Then the trees said to the vine, You come reign over us.

But the vine said to them, Shall I leave my new wine,

which cheers God and men, and go to wave over the trees?

Okay, and if you'll look down on the bottom right,

you'll see in the bottom right corner, you'll see a grape vine.

And the word in the blank is vine.

And the vine said no.

All right, so they tried...

Now they tried three times to get a king.

If somebody tries three times to get a king, what does that say about them?

Not getting a king.

Yeah, probably not, but they want a king.

They really want a king.

They didn't settle for the one big one that they thought would be perfect.

That one wouldn't do it.

They went on to a second one.

They didn't settle for the second one.

The second one wouldn't do it.

They'd go for the third one.

The third one has now said no.

Finally, all the trees said to the bramble...

That's your bramble that goes all across the page up top.

We've got thorny, useless, good for making fires basically.

Finally, all the trees said to the bramble, you come reign over us.

In 15 it says, and the bramble said to the trees,

if in truth you are anointing me as king over you...

You know, you really mean this.

If this is for real, come and take refuge in my shade.

Now it's a comical thing, isn't it?

Because how much shade do you get from a bramble?

None.

Brambles don't give shade.

The thickest they ever get is like that thick and they're hard, right?

And the sun just goes right past them.

And even if they overlap and overlap and overlap,

you still don't get any shade from it.

They'd have to really grow densely.

And they don't because they're always spreading out.

So that's the joke.

He says, come and take refuge in my shade.

But if not, in other words, if you're not really anointing me as king,

if this is some kind of dirty joke, right?

May fire come out from the bramble and consume the cedars of Lebanon,

which were like the kings of trees.

They were the great trees of Lebanon, right?

That everybody desired for wood.

And so he's saying like, destroy the whole kingdom of trees.

If I cannot be king, if you're not really earnest in asking me to be king,

then let the whole kingdom of trees be destroyed.

See that?

Okay.

16.

Now therefore, so now he's going to give them a little bit.

So by what should they have done at this point?

Response, request.

There is no response.

There is no request.

Okay.

Now therefore, if you have dealt in truth and in integrity in making Abimelek king,

which of course we already know they did not, right?

And it, and if you have dealt with Jerobal and his house and have dealt with him as he deserved,

which they did not, right?

So we already know those two checks are definitely not the case.

And then he goes on to explain kind of parenthetically, he says,

for my father fought for you and risked his life and delivered you from the hand of Midian.

But you have risen against my father's house today and have killed his sons,

70 men on one stone and have made Abimelek the son of his maid servant,

king over the men of Shechem because he is your relative, which is true.

He was, he came from Shechem.

So he had a lot of cousins there and all that kind of thing.

Verse 19, if then you have dealt in truth and integrity with Jerobal,

remember that's Gideon, and his house this day, rejoice in Abimelek and let him also rejoice in you.

But if not, let fire come out from Abimelek and consume the men of Shechem and Bethmillo

and let fire come out from the men of Shechem and from Bethmillo and consume Abimelek.

Then Jotham escaped and fled and went to Beir and remained there because of Abimelek his brother.

Okay, so now we're on the right hand side.

Under Massacre Gideon's sons, we have BDNGS. Anyone take a stab at it?

Bramble does not give shade.

That's right. Brambles do not give shade.

So one of the primary takeaways is their fourth choice for king is not going to give them any rest.

It's not going to give them any protection, any provision.

They really, if this story holds true, if the parable holds true, they've really blown it.

Rather what they've actually done is RAG.

What do you think?

In choosing a king, after Gideon told them, I will not be your king, my sons will not be your king,

rather God will be your king, what they've actually done is rebelled against God.

So what they've actually done is rebelled against God.

And they may think that this Bramble, which is Abimelek, can provide them some kind of protection,

but actually he cannot.

And then it says CA, which is just chose Abimelek.

So they rebelled against God, they chose Abimelek.

And then here is the lesson of the parable for them that they probably didn't get.

And it is, say it again, RAG, rebelled against God, then chose Abimelek.

Okay.

And I'll give you the first F is false.

And the K is kings, false kings.

The A is and, FF.

It's poetic, kind of, sort of.

Say it again.

False followers.

That's right.

False kings and false followers, CEO.

Remember the parable.

Nope.

What do they do?

Consume each other.

So the lesson of the parable is false kings and false followers consume each other.

So what you go after that's not God, it will chew you up in the long run.

You'll probably chew it up too.

That's the way it works.

False kings and false followers consume each other.

Now it's interesting because we have a reference there.

And I'll give you the results.

And watch this.

9, 23 to 26.

Then God sent an evil spirit.

Who sent the evil spirit?

God did.

God sent an evil spirit between Abimelek and the men of Shechem.

And the men of Shechem dealt treacherously with Abimelek.

In order that the violence done to the seventy sons of Jeroboam might come.

And their blood might be laid on Abimelek, their brother who killed them.

And on the men of Shechem who strengthened his hands to kill his brothers.

And the men of Shechem set men in ambush against him on the tops of the mountains.

And they robbed all who might pass by them along the road and it was told to Abimelek.

Now all the sons of Ebed came with his relatives and crossed over into Shechem.

And the men of Shechem put their trust in him.

So God sent an evil spirit between Abimelek and Shechem.

And now Shechem is betraying him.

And they've actually chosen another.

I don't know if you've ever heard this or not.

But if there's a married man for example and he cheats on his wife with a woman.

And then she manages to talk him into leaving his wife for her.

Then they get married.

And then what happens?

He cheats again.

He cheats again.

Right?

That's the way it works.

And so what Shechem did was they went on and they chose another king.

They already know they can do that.

They have the authority.

They're a big city.

Lots of money.

Lots of manpower.

They already know they can choose a king.

So when they start to think, well gosh, we don't want to be lumped in with Abimelek.

Which happened why?

Because God sent an evil spirit.

They rebelled against God.

He sent an evil spirit.

Now they say, well we don't want to be lumped in with him.

So they choose another man, Gal, to stand up against Abimelek.

And then if you go 953, I'm not reading the whole story.

I've got a certain woman threw an upper millstone on Abimelek's head, crushing his skull.

So they were sieging the city of Thebes.

And he got too close.

And all that was left was the tower.

And they were going to tear the tower down, burn it like he did with Shechem.

And she threw a stone down, possibly a millstone, and crushed his head.

And now he's dying.

And he says, I can't die to a woman.

And he has his sword bearer kill him.

And then in verse 57 it says,

Also God returned all the wickedness of the men of Shechem on their own heads.

And the curse of Jotham, the son of Jerobal, came upon them.

Yes ma'am.

What was the one over to the left by Judges 8-31?

By Judges 8-31, son of a slave woman?

No.

To the left of that?

We have to do that yet?

No.

Okay, that's the only thing we have left to fill out.

So you didn't miss it.

You're with me.

Okay?

So the point is, the parable comes true.

It becomes a curse against the people who heard it.

And what was their failing?

Now they already sinned, right?

But the parable becomes a curse when they fail to respond.

Yep.

So at that moment in time, if they had repented,

I mean think about Nineveh.

Think about others who received a letter of destruction.

God's going to destroy you.

They could have repented, turned back to God, and said,

okay, no wait, we don't want to anoint a Vimalic king.

We don't want to do this.

We shouldn't have done that.

They could have made sacrifices.

They could have been just for the rest of their lives,

hoping that God would forgive them.

They could have done anything.

But did they respond? No.

Did they make a request? No.

They didn't do anything.

In fact, they continued for a little while until God sent an evil spirit amongst them.

And then they sought out to kill a Vimalic.

So they just kept being the same evil people that they were all the way through the entire story,

searching for a king.

All right.

So that brings us back over to this scene where Jotham is giving that parable.

The occasion is what a Vimalic and Shechem have done,

massacring Gideon's sons, naming him.

He tells the parable, brambles do not give shade, rebellion against God.

They keep searching for a king.

So what do you think the HD is?

What is this scene teaching?

What is God's point?

What have they done?

I guess gave you the first word.

I apologize.

Have.

They have what?

D what?

Kind of.

But this is the process by which they get to death in this case.

They have denied God.

That's what they've done.

They disobeyed, they denied.

They've walked away from the king who is the Lord.

And they're choosing a king for themselves.

All right.

Now, if you look all the way down in the bottom left hand corner,

there's kind of a lesson to take away.

Right.

It says everything we do is provision for one kingdom or another.

You ever hear that old story?

It's kind of a parable basically.

It says that inside every person there are two wolves or two wolves struggling.

Which one basically is which one are you going to feed?

Right.

Well, everything we do is provision for one kingdom or another.

Are you going to be a blessing to God's kingdom or are you going to be a blessing to the enemy kingdom?

Right.

So if everything we do is perfect provision for one kingdom or another,

then we must not devalue our impact.

You can't forget.

So you go have sex with a concubine and make a baby.

Don't name him, my father is king when his father is not king.

Wait.

Don't go have sex with a concubine and make a baby.

Wait.

Don't take 20 wives.

Right.

So he was he started out this guy was afraid to work on behalf of God.

And then he saw God.

He finally said, OK, God, it's really you.

I'll really do what you say.

And then he embraced God so fully in the war and following him like that.

He was doing everything on the battle side that he was supposed to do.

And meanwhile, his house was kind of a mess.

Right.

So out here he's doing great.

But he forgot that what goes on here still fuels one kingdom or another.

So all this while he's saving God's people, he's defeating the Midianites, he's bringing it home.

Right.

He did everything that that they needed done and even refused to become king, refused to name somebody king.

He refused to do that.

That was all the right thing.

But the whole time he was doing that, his house was a mess.

And that was pouring into the kingdom of the enemy.

So much so that they chose a Bimalak king and murdered his 70 other sons to do it.

Be aware that the choices that you're making on a daily basis, you are like, well, that doesn't seem to affect anything.

That's not bothering anybody.

That's not making any real impact or difference.

Your choices are making an impact.

You're feeding one kingdom or another.

Every time you don't pick up your Bible feeds the wrong kingdom.

Every time you don't pray when you think you should feeds the wrong kingdom.

Every time you eat too much sweets and you go, oh, I think I had enough and you keep going anyway feeds the wrong kingdom.

Every time you are snippy to somebody, say something nasty feeds the wrong kingdom.

And you say, well, I made it through that.

No apparent negative effect.

Nothing really bad happened.

If you're feeding the wrong kingdom, ultimately it will come out.

All things that are hidden will eventually reveal.

And I don't just mean when it comes in front of Jesus and he'll reveal.

But in this case, Kydian's 70 sons, all because he had to have one more pretty girl, one more son,

and then couldn't bring him to live with them, couldn't govern him, couldn't teach him, grow him upright.

So he had to give him a name like, my father is king.

And maybe, maybe, Gideon meant God when he gave him that name.

Maybe he meant my father meaning God the Father is king and will always be king.

But that's not how Abimelek used it.

That's not how the people of Shechem used it.

And so you just be careful.

Sometimes you think you're feeding one kingdom and actually you're feeding the other.

That's what happens, for example, when you take a young Christian or a non-Christian and tell them to stop sinning.

Instead of telling them to draw close to Christ.

You pick somebody's sin, I say, that's a sin.

You've got to stop. You've got to stop. You've got to stop.

And they're not ready to stop.

That's really hard for them.

That really puts them in a difficult situation.

So they really wanted a king.

And as you know, they eventually get one and it doesn't go very well for quite a while.

And then they do get King David, who will get the promise to be in the line of Jesus and be on the throne forever.

So praise God for that. Gideon's not there.

God not in there. He's not in the line.

He doesn't make it through, unfortunately.

All right. Questions or concerns?

We've got it. All right.

We're going to go fast on this here.

All right. So we're going to do it a little differently today.

Starting out teenagers only.

I'm going to give you the question.

And then if you know the answer, you raise your hand.

If the person I call on gets the answer correct, then every teenager that has their hand raised will get candy.

Got it? Or something.

Because I might throw chips.

Depends on how many hands there are.

But if the person I call on gets it wrong, nobody gets candy.

Okay. You got it?

So don't raise your hand if you don't know the answer.

But if you do know the answer, definitely raise your hand because that's the only way to get candy.

So you'll get candy. All right. So here we go.

See if we can see. We'll do candy first.

All right.

A Benelux mother was a?

See one, two, three, four, five. Natalie, what's the answer?

That's correct. Okay. Here we go.

Your hand up.

Okay. Pretty good. Pretty good. Pretty good.

I guess that was kind of an easy one. Okay.

All right. So this one is on the page, but you have to pay close attention.

The last time Gotham was standing on Mount Gerizine, the other mountain next door was called?

See one hand. One, two, three, four.

Okay. Give it to me. That is correct. Good job.

Pass that back, please. Okay.

We'll do one more this way. Let's see.

Okay. Name in 30 seconds or less.

All four types of trees who might have been cane.

See one hand, two, three, four, five. Hannah, go.

Keep going. You got 25 seconds left.

Yep. Correct.

Did I get everybody? Anybody had a hand up that I didn't get? Okay.

All right. Here we go.

This is for the pup. One person.

For this question only, you may shout it out.

First person to shout it out gets it. If you don't catch it, you have to throw it back.

Okay. Only teenagers, please.

All right. Here we go.

Gotham was the youngest son and also?

We only survived.

He's rocking. One more pup today. One more pup. Here we go.

This is an interesting one. I hope you paid close attention.

Gideon had this number of sons.

Still waiting.

Still waiting.

He did not get it correct.

That is not correct.

Now you're guessing. Okay. We're going to hit 72.

He killed 70 sons. Gotham survived.

I'll make 72.

You were guessing. I told you you were guessing. It was over.

You have to have the answer.

They were up here like, Chapter 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.

Got to be faster than that.

72. I didn't say. Actually, I said 70 and then there's Gotham.

He said 71.

Trying to find another tough one here.

Oh darn.

Okay.

Okay.

The problem with the final king chosen in the Parable of the Trees is what?

It does not provide shade.

Okay.

We've got three cans of chips and then we're going to eat fruit.

What?

Yeah, brown is sticky.

If you drop the chips, you must give them back.

I'm throwing pretty well today.

Well, then don't drop it.

All right.

This is the period of time between

Mount Gerizy, Mount of Blessings, and this parable.

100 years.

Go ahead, Jason.

100 years is actually incorrect. You're on the right track.

Don't take answers from me.

Go ahead, Erin.

Nice try, Jason. It was over 100 years.

Greater than sign, not equal than sign.

All right.

I guess chips can be for anybody.

Adults are on the table if you want to win chips.

You've got competition now.

This is what false kings and false followers do to each other.

Okay, last one for today.

What did Gideon say, you can paraphrase, when they asked him to be king?

No.

He said no. That's correct.

No, and also not my son, but you're not done yet.

King.

Okay, that's it.

He said no, I will not be king. My son will not be king.

God is the only king.

All right, let's pray together.

I did bring fruit because we are fighting off this cold season,

so we've got a couple different kinds of fruit, whatever, in there.

And all food stays in the cafeteria, includes water.

All right, let's pray.

God in heaven, thank you for letting us do this.

For me, I was blessed to see that you've been at work in such a powerful way

in a kingdom of people who lived so long ago.

I just can't fathom. I feel it. I really do.

But it baffles my mind that in just over 100 years, they did so much.

I mean, that means the walls of Jericho fell.

And probably just over 100 years later, they chose a false king.

Unbelievable, and yet completely believable.

I pray we will not be like that, and we'll be busy feeding the right kingdom,

making the choices, and we won't say,

this one doesn't really matter because the truth is it could be the one that really matters,

and they all matter.

We matter, as I said, not this week, but last week in the sermon.

You care about us, and you care about this moment.

When you put us in this moment together, you have expectations.

I pray that we will live by faith in Christ, strong, persevere, overcome, and feed the right kingdom.

We pray it all in Jesus' name. Amen.