STRAIGHT LINES, CROOKED STICKS: Ehud, The Left-Handed Assassin

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow. Because

He lives, all fear is gone. Because I'm no church,

and life is worth it. Because He lives. The Resurrection

Life Sunday Sermon is brought to you by Resurrection

Life Church in Apex, Holly Springs, North Carolina.

a congregation of the Presbyterian Church in

America. Resurrection Life Church is pastored

by Dr. Mark Kinesh and meets in the new Felton

Grove High School. Pastor Mark is currently teaching

from the Book of Judges in a series called Straight

Lines, Crooked Sticks, a study of a collection

of Old Testament characters who play a role in

God's redemptive plan. This week, our crooked

stick is... Ehud. I encourage you to turn to

your Bibles to Judges chapter 3. Judges chapter

Judges 3 · chapter mention Judges 3 · chapter mention

3. And in Judges chapter 3, we have a very colorful

Judges 3 · chapter mention

story of Ehud. And I'm going to just, we're just

going to read it, folks. And I'm just going to

just warn you now. This is, I remember hearing

this story as a kid for the first time and going,

wait, what now? This is in the Bible, but we

are committed to preaching the full canon of

God, which includes these stories. And this is

also an entertaining story. It's also a little

humorous at times here and there, and we're going

to get into some of the details as to why. But

please join with me as I read for you Judges

Judges 3:12–30

3, verses 12 to 30. It says this, and the people

of Israel again did what was evil in the sight

of the Lord, and the Lord strengthened Eglon,

the king of Moab, against Israel. So for those

of you who were last week, you heard a sermon

on Othniel, and Othniel was like the prototype

and archetype judge. He could do no wrong except

for the fact that he died, and then things spiraled

out of control again after he died. And so this

is what happens. People go back to doing evil

in the sight of the Lord. So the Lord strengthens

Eglon, the king of Moab, against Israel because

they had done what was evil on the side of the

Lord. He gathered to himself the Ammonites and

Amalekites and went and defeated Israel. And

they took possession of the city of Palms, which

is Jericho. And the people of Israel served Eglon,

the king of Moab, 18 years. Then the people of

Israel cried out to the Lord, and the Lord raised

up for them a deliverer, Ehud, the son of Gerah,

the Benjaminite, a left -handed man. The people

of Israel sent tribute by him to Eglon, the king

of Moab. And Ehud made for himself a sword with

two edges, a cubit in length, and he bound it

on his right thigh under his clothes. And he

presented the tribute to Eglon, king of Moab.

Now Eglon was a very fat man. And when Ehud had

finished presenting the tribute, he sent away

the people who carried the tribute. But he himself

turned back to the idols near Gilgal and said,

I have a secret message for you, O king. And

he commanded, the king said, silence. And all

his attendants went from his presence. And Ehud

came to him as he was sitting alone in the cool

of the roof chamber. And Ehud said, I have a

message from God for you. And he rose from his

seat and he had reached with his left hand, took

the sword from his right thigh and thrust it

into his belly. And the hilt also went after

the blade and the fat closed over the blade for

he did not pull the sword out of the belly and

the dung came out. Then Ehud went out from into

the porch and closed the doors of the roof chamber

behind him and locked them. When he had gone,

the servants came, and when they saw that the

doors of the roof chamber were locked, they thought,

surely he is relieving himself in the closet

of the cool chamber. And they waited till they

were embarrassed, but when he still did not open

the doors of the roof chamber, they took the

key and opened them, and there laid their Lord

dead on the floor. Ehud escaped while they delayed,

and he passed beyond the elders and escaped to

Sierra. When he arrived, he sounded the trumpet.

In the hill country of Ephraim, then the people

of Israel went down with him from the hill country,

and he was their leader. And he said to them,

follow me, for the Lord has given your enemies,

the Moabites, into your hand. So they went down

after him and seized the fords of the Jordan

against the Moabites and did not allow anyone

to pass over. And they killed at that time about

10 ,000 of the Moabites, all strong, able -bodied

men. Not a man escaped. So Moab was subdued that

day under the hand of Israel and the land had

rested for 80 years. And so brothers and sisters

in Jesus Christ, we're going to continue our

sermon series, straight line, crooked sticks,

seeing these very interesting Old Testament characters.

Othniel is the prototype and the archetype. Ehud

is really close. The only difference with him

is he's left -handed. So there's something a

little bit strange about him, a little bit different.

We're going to get into that. But I remember,

again, hearing this story for the very first

time and being left -handed. You know, who's

all left -handed here? Any lefties among us?

Yes, I see you. I see you. Okay. This is for

us. This passage is for us. I remember listening

to this passage again, thinking as a kid, I'm

a lefty. This speaks to me. And then I don't.

The application is a little spotty, okay, as

a kid with what he eventually does. But he's

also a Benjaminite, which is interesting because

my mom's maiden name was Benjamins. And so I'm

like, yeah, he's a lefty and he's a Benjamin.

This is so cool. He's like family. He's like

family. So Ehud is a very interesting guy. And

we're going to dive into a little bit more of

what he's all about. And we're going to be doing

so with these three main points here. I'll get

back to that map in a second. Four points, excuse

me. Context. We're going to deal with some of

the secrets in this passage. There's a lot of,

there's clearly deception in this passage, but

we're going to get into some of the details there

and some of the secrets that are hidden and embedded

in this passage. Then we're going to deal with

Ehud, specifically looking at him as a model

disciple. And then we're going to focus on Jesus,

who is the living tribute. And then we're going

to deal with the challenge for us, okay? A call

to discipleship. A call to discipleship is what

we will conclude with today. So let's first deal

with a little bit more context. mentioned to

you that I was going to go back to this map.

So this map here, you'll see Ehud's name. He's

the second last name there if we go north to

south. And he is situated in Jericho, the city

of Palms. And so that's very close to the border

there. And Moab is on the other side of the border,

east of the border there. And so Moab comes in

because Israelites are messing up. They're messing

up big time, doing evil in the eyes of the Lord.

And what's interesting as we get started in this

passage is that it's the Lord who strengthens

Eglon. It's an interesting movement in the text

where Ehud doesn't know as much information as

we do at this point. In fact, all of Israel at

this point, they're just living in slavery, 18

years. And so we have the secret of the divine

sleight of hand. The Lord strengthens, but then

he also raises up, okay? So the Lord raises up

a leader. They go through these 18 years of discipline

and Lord raises up a leader because people cry

out again. They cry out in repentance. So we

have a secret here, this divine sleight of hand.

And we also have the secret behind names. Now

last week, I had to repeat the name four times,

Kushan Rushathayim, King of Mesopotamia, four

times. So for those of you who were following

along last week, you're like, man, poor Mark,

he's got to say this name one, two, three, four

times. Same this week. We got four times we have

Eglon's mentioned, his name's mentioned. And

with the first guy, Rushun Roshethayim, we talked

about how his name means king double wicked.

Okay, so we have king double wicked. Eglon, Eglon's

name means bull calf. Bull calf or small cow.

Important information as we go through this passage.

We also have a secret behind the Savior's name,

Ehud. Ehud, son of Gerah, the Benjaminite, a

left -handed man. Now when you say left -handed

in Hebrew, in the original text here, it literally

means a man bound or impotent in his right hand.

So it's by definition, he's not like normal.

He's not your regular. Like when you're snowboarding,

Right -handed people, when they go down the hill,

those right -handed people, they're regular people.

Those who are left -handed usually are in what

position? Who are my snowboarders among us? What

position are you? Goofy. That's what we're called,

right? So you got what's regular and what's goofy.

Ehud's a little goofy. A man bound. But he also

is from the Benjaminite clan. And does anyone

here know what Benjaminite or Benjamin means?

Son of my right hand. Fascinating. So you have

this Ehud character who's a lefty whose name

means son of my right hand. So the Lord's going

to use this man. Lefties have disadvantages.

I remember picking up a guitar for the first

time and I put it backwards like this. And my

mom's like, what are you doing? I'm like, I'm

picking up a guitar and I want to learn how to

play guitar. She's like, no, no, no, you need

to flip it over. And I'm like, oh. And on one

hand, I'm really grateful for it. On the other

hand, I'm like, could I have been just that much

more of a guitar player if I learned how to play

the right way? In sports, oftentimes lefties

can have like a disadvantage. I already talked

about snowboarding. I remember as a kid, I was

told by my neighbor, Mr. Walgaroski, he was an

elderly man. I remember he was talking about

how He would one time talk about how there were

ringings in his field and he thought aliens landed.

And then shortly after that, he told me, do you

know that lefties being left -handed is from

the devil? I was like, I do now. So a little

bit odd, right? A little bit goofy. But there

are advantages of being left -handed. In basketball,

if you're trying to block a shot by a guy who's

a lefty, all of a sudden it's a little awkward.

Like I am actually weird because I shoot with

my right, but my son Mark, he shoots with his

left and he'll throw up guys who are trying to

defend him. There's also an advantage in volleyball.

If you're an offside hitter, lefties are usually

played offside. So if you're facing the net,

lefties are usually on the right and it throws

off those who are blocking because you're hitting

this way, not this way. There's an advantage

there. In baseball, there's a bit of an advantage

too when you're hitting the ball. It's made for

right -handed, this sport. But in the lefty,

there's certain advantages. One of them is you

hit the ball, you're closer to first. So there's

certain advantages. And Ehud uses his advantages

as a lefty by creating this double -edged sword.

And it's not quite a cubit. It's not the classical

word for cubit. It would be a little shorter

than a cubit. And it would be something that

could slide right along his right thigh. A double

-edged sword. while he's playing this double

agent. So those are some of the secrets. There's

other things we could talk about, but those are

some big ones here. What does Ehud now do? We

have this background, this context, and some

of the things going around behind the scenes.

How do we see Ehud now be the model disciple?

And what I want to argue is that Ehud is someone

who actually shows us a lot about how to deal

with idolatry. When we say, when we read in verse

15, the people of Israel sent tribute by him

to Eglon, the king of Moab. We have these people,

we have these God's people who are in slavery,

who put together tribute. And most of the scholars

that I read, most likely it's like an abundance

of food. They're bringing an abundance of food

as a tribute. And that word for tribute is where

we get the word offering. And it's oftentimes

used in the Bible as like something that you

would offer to the Lord. I love what Gregory

Mobley writes. He explains a problem, the problem

behind paying tribute to the king. Not only was

it repulsive to do this to a foreign king, not

only was it sacrificial for these slaves to come

up with the amount of money to to offer this

tribute, he writes, but for the Israelites, it

was also blasphemous. Since Yahweh alone was

their sovereign and the tribute in its priestly

sense of offering belonged only to Yahweh. You

also have undertones here of sacrificial preparation.

Sacrificial preparation. We have this tribute,

which is oftentimes referred to as a process

of offering over to the Lord. But wait, we also

have this sense of the fattening of the bull

calf. There's a preparation here of fattening

up the sacrifice. Barry Webb writes this, Eglon

has turned himself into a large, slow -moving

target and a helpless, sacrificial animal. Eglon

is the bull calf. Eglon becomes the tribute.

Because that's how Ehud understood it. Ehud presents

the tribute, but he's so different than all the

other people that he's with. Because what does

he do? Verse 19 is very, very cryptic. I'm not

quite sure exactly what it's saying here. But

it says, but he, that is Ehud, himself turned

back at the idols near Gilgal. Well, what does

that mean? So Ehud presents the tribute, all

this food to Eglon with his fellow Israelites

there under slavery. But then it appears as though

they leave. And so it's like Ehud is doing like

a reconnaissance mission, trying to figure out

the lay of the land, the lay of the room, where

he could escape, all right? And so he's, because

he has that sword strapped. So he's ready. He's

ready to go. He just has to figure things out.

And so in real kind of cryptic quick language,

he leaves with this group. But then he turns

back at Gilgal where the idols are. Him alone.

Everyone else just keeps walking. In submission,

they're walking in a, like with a depressive

state. But Ehud, Ehud turns away. Where the idols

are. And so we see Ehud turning away from the

idols to go back and face the enemy. You have

all these, I call these tributaries. These fellow

brothers who are bringing this tribute. Who keep

walking. But Ehud turns. And Ehud turns back

in discipleship. Because he's got a mission.

He's got a mission. Where he's going to go back.

into the lion's den to defeat the fattened calf.

And so what does he do? He goes and he says to

the king, suddenly he's back in the king's presence,

I have a secret message for you. There's that

word secret, I love that. I have a secret. And

then Ehud yells out, silence. The NIV translates

it as leave me. That was the intent. So everybody

leaves and it's just Ehud and it's just Eglon

in this room. How gullible and foolish is Eglon

at this point? It's clear that the Lord is no

longer strengthening him. It's very clear now

that the Lord is raising up a deliverer. And

Ehud says again, I have a message from the Lord.

And so what does Eglon do? He gets up. He stands

up. He stands up as if he's preparing himself

for sacrifice. And so Ehud is facing this man,

the fattened calf, and suddenly... Ehud becomes

the left -handed assassin priest. And we get

in verses 21 and 22, the climax of the passage.

And Ehud reached with his left hand, took the

sword from his right thigh, and thrust it into

the belly. And the hilt also went in after the

blade, and the fat closed over the blade, for

he did not pull the sword out of his belly, and

the dung came out. Again, I remember hearing

this story as a kid. My jaw just dropped. Like,

what now? This is not a kid's story. His belly

swallows up Ehud's dagger. There's like, the

kind of language here is sort of like his belly

was still hungry. His belly was wanting to eat

it to death. And so the double -edged sword goes

from the hip of the protagonist into the belly

of the antagonist. And then you get this shocking

detail of King Eglon lying on the floor in his

waist. I remember hearing a story once from Heather

who was a nurse in the emergency department.

And there was someone that came in who was very

obese. And they had to clean this person. And

in the room they were like, something smells

really, really bad. And one person lifted up

a fold of flap of fat and found a sandwich there.

And that's what was causing the stench. Can you

imagine? This is the kind of situation. where

the stench is coming from his own waste, which

causes the servants to go, we can't go in there.

The king's taking care of his business. We don't

want to mess up. And gives Ehud all the time

to lock the doors, walk out, and get away. Brilliant.

Incredible. What a story. And then what does

it say in verse 26? Ehud escaped while they delayed

and passed beyond the idols and escaped to Sierra.

Why does it include this detail about idols?

So interesting. He turns away from the idols,

he kills the fattened calf, and then he walks

past the idols like a boss. Model of discipleship.

And we're going to get back to how to model that

in a bit. First, we're going to focus on this

next part of our story. Because all of this is

pointing us to Jesus as the resurrection, as

the sacrifice, as the one who is destroyed. the

enemy, which is Satan, his legion of demons,

death, and our own sin. Much, much more grotesque

than Eglon in his waist. We know in Genesis 3

.15, this promise that there's this person coming

and he shall what? He shall bruise his head and

you shall bruise, you will crush his head. He

will strike your heel, but you're gonna, there's

someone coming that's gonna crush the serpent's

head. Crush him. Complete dominance like he had

over Eglon in that moment. Last week we compared

Othniel and that story. We reviewed the gospel

there. And we focused on Romans. This week I

want to focus on Revelation. And how Revelation

shows us how Jesus is the conqueror over sin

and death and Satan and his legion of demons.

It says in Revelation 1, 5 -6, it says this.

To him who loves us and has freed us from our

sins by his blood and made us a kingdom, priests

to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion

forever and ever. He loves us and has freed us

from what? Our sin. By what? His blood. To make

us a kingdom. One who has the power to deal with

the spiritual darkness out there. Satan is uglier

than Eglon, our sin is uglier than Eglon, and

death is uglier than Eglon. And yet, none of

our enemies were powerful enough to keep Jesus

in the grave. Revelation 5, 5 -10 says this,

And one of the elders said to me, Weep no more.

Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root

of David, has conquered, so that he can open

the scroll and its seven seals. And between the

throne And the four living creatures and among

the elders, I saw a lamb standing as though it

had been slain. And they sang a new song saying,

worthy are you to take the scroll and to open

its seal for you were slain. And by your blood,

you ransomed people for God from every tribe

and language and people and nation. And you have

made them a kingdom of priests to our God and

they shall reign on earth. This is the kind of

holistic redemption that we have in Jesus Christ.

That Ehud foreshadows in his work of completely

destroying the enemy. It's not even close. I

love Revelation 19, 15 -16. It's a picture of

Jesus. From his mouth comes a sword, a sharp

sword. with which to strike down the nations

and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He

will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath

of God the Almighty on his robe and on his thigh

he has a name written on it, King of Kings and

Lord of Lords. This is our king who so overwhelmingly

defeats the enemy, who took on death that we

deserved and rose again on the third day. And

seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.

And he calls out like Ehud called out. Follow

me. Follow me. I love verse 28. He's standing

at this highest point in Ephraim. He says, follow

me. After me. For the Lord has given your enemies,

the Moabites, into your hands. Such a wonderful

statement of victory. And you notice that word

hand comes up again. By my left hand I destroyed

the enemy. And now the Lord has given. this country

into our hands. And they weren't just any kind

of men. They were 10 ,000 able -bodied soldiers.

Not even a problem. Not a problem at all. God

gave them the strength to defeat the enemy. And

Jesus says to us, I have destroyed the enemy.

I was the slaughtered lamb. Come, follow me.

And that brings us to then the call for us. The

challenge is a call to discipleship. And we're

gonna focus on two aspects of this. If it's true

what I just said about Jesus, that that demands

a response on our part, does it not? Two things

we're gonna focus on. Bring your tribute to the

Lord and follow with courage. Bring your tribute

to the Lord. I love the sacrificial language,

the undertones there. and how Ehud, you know,

deceptively brings a tribute, but he had a whole

different kind of tribute. He had the king as

the tribute to destroy. But for us, you know,

when I think about Ehud and how he was able to

also turn, destroy, and leave, that passageway,

that journey, excuse me, is something that I

feel like is a great model of discipleship. That

we're called to repentance, turn around, go the

other way. That in Christ we're able to die and

rise with Jesus. For what purpose? To walk in

newness of life past all those things that enslaved

us before. This past week I was at a training

and part of that training included some information

that really can be attributed to a number of...

pastors and theologians of the years. This one

I think was more popularized by Tim Keller. Although

I don't remember them. I think they made reference

to him here. But they talk about the difference

between surface idols and source idols. And here's

a list of surface idols. They're like the fruit

of something else that's going on deeper in our

hearts. And as we're going through the next few

slides here, I want you to think through what

does it mean to turn, to die and rise with Christ,

and then also then to leave, to not be shackled

again. And so some of you may look at this list

and be like, I don't know if that belongs on

there. If there's anyone that you think does

not belong on there, then that's probably the

one that you're probably going to want to take

a look at. Because oftentimes we can get defensive

of the things that we serve. And so as we go

through this list, As we think through the different

titles here, career, intelligence, addiction,

image, money, appearance, relationships, possessions,

pleasure, sex, success, fame, family, identity.

Some of these are, most of them are good things.

They're idols when they become ultimate things.

And then we have these source idols that basically

can be summarized down to three. And these are

all based on Garden of Eden reaction, what happened

to Adam and Eve when they realized that they

had sinned. The things that they wanted to get

back to, the things that they lost, the things

that they're striving to get back to, that only

Christ can fulfill. And it boils down to approval,

security, and comfort. Wanting the approval of

others, seeking security so you feel safe. Or

getting a position where you're comfortable,

you're okay. And you could plop any one of those

surface idols into these source idols. Where

if you do really good in your career, that could

be, perhaps for you, an approval thing. Could

make your mom or your dad really proud and you

would feel approved if you only did that. Or

if you're only that smart. Some of it is a security

thing. How do I feel safe? How do I feel safe

on the inside and how do I control that through

how I live? And then finding comfort, finding

pleasure in all kinds of different aspects of

life that won't fully fulfill. And what this

graph does for us, and I was thinking through

this this past week and think what we need to

do is this whole tree needs to be cut down. Sorry,

my neighbor this past week just had a bunch of

trees cut down. So the ground underneath us was

shaking regularly with trees that are coming

down or logs that are being placed on the ground.

Amazing kind of work that they did. And it's

just so incredible how swift these guys can be.

They just take a chainsaw, boom, they got this

crane holding the tree and just and takes it

over the house and plops it on the road and they

take it away and goes into a chopper and just

chops the whole thing off. It's that kind of

efficiency. That we need to think about when

we get rid of our idols. Because not only do

they cut the tree down, they also try to go down

to the root. So here's kind of this grinder,

right? They're trying to ground down the root

so that it will eventually just completely die

on the inside without anything popping up at

the top. Nothing else can come up. Because if

we go back, if we go back to this picture here,

you cut off a branch, what's going to happen?

What's going to happen? Say it really loud. It's

going to grow back, right? That space is going

to get filled. You get to the root, that's going

to change things. The source changes things.

And so that goes now, let's get back to what

we're talking about this morning when it comes

to now, what it means to have total security

and comfort and acceptance, approval in Jesus.

Hodderberg Catechism says my comfort in life

and in death is Jesus. It's not in anything else

that's out there. It's Jesus. To find your safety

in what Jesus has done for you and not what you

seek to control. And that it's Jesus who accepts

you, receives you fully, unconditionally because

of his grace. Because of what he has done for

you. And so there's this whole new kind of reality

we need to be living in so that we're not even

dealing with this thing over here. We're not

dealing with this source and this... And the

fruit, we're dealing with something entirely

different that's rooted in the cross. Jesus is

our comfort. He's our security. He has approved

you. He's destroyed the enemy. And now it's time

to turn. Some of you may be in the journey where

you're dealing with the surface idols and you're

having to turn like a Gilgal earlier in the passage.

And you need to go through this process of dying

and rising with Jesus before you're able to leave.

Some of you have to deal with these. And oftentimes

all of us have some issue we need to deal with.

Others of us want to get over that, but need

to dig deeper. And so we need to dig deeper.

We need to understand what does it mean to experience

security, comfort, and acceptance so that these

idols don't have any kind of control or grasp

on us. And we can walk right past them like a

boss. We can walk right past them like a boss,

go to Hilltop and proclaim, Jesus is Lord, he

is my deliverer, come follow me. There's a call

to evangelism here, I think. To rally the troops.

Let's bring us together. And that brings us to

our second response. Follow Jesus with courage.

I love how Ehud is just so courageous and brave.

What an example for us. He does it alone. His

fellow Israelites are bringing the tribute. They

don't do anything. His fellow Israelites walk

past idols. They keep going in their misery.

And what does Ehud do? He changes things. He

changes things because the Lord raised up a leader.

Jesus is our leader and we are called to follow

him. The battle remains and we're in it. And

the call today is go to the highest place. Some

of you are in jobs where you're in a position

of influence. Some of you are at school where

you have peers, you have peer pressure. What

does it look like to be a follower of Jesus in

those moments where it's hard? A call to discipleship

is a call to confidence. courage. Ehud is not

only just a foreshadowing of Christ, it's also

a foreshadowing of discipleship. And there's

something powerful about his courage that I think

inspires us because ultimately it's the Holy

Spirit who's raising up leaders in us. So for

us, you know, wherever you are locally in your

home, in your job, in your neighborhoods, I think

even about like this area here around us here

at Felton Grove High School. There's a battle

here. There's a battle here. Some places it's

obvious, some places it's not so obvious. I was

reminded this past week that every time we step

into this room, we're reminded starkly that there's

room for others. And so our call to discipleship

is also a call to invite others. The Lord raises

leaders for a purpose and it's a call to courage

for us. In a few minutes, we're gonna witness

a new leader among us. And he's going to take

some vows. He's going to be committing to us

pretty significant things about what it means

to lead and what he's vowing to you. That's a

courageous thing to do. We're also going to respond

and we're going to have to say some things back

and it's going to be like this conversation where

we're going to be solidifying each other because

we need it. We need it moving forward. So that's

how Scott's going to be putting this sermon into

practice right at the get -go. What is it for

you? Like, what are the things in your life that

you need, that the Lord is calling you to grow

in as a leader? In your courage, with all the

different influences that are in your life. We

can't go to all the places you can. And where

you go, there you are, the ambassador of Jesus

Christ. As we wrap up, the book of Revelation

was intended to be a book of encouragement and

comfort. You read it, and it's like a little

spooky at times. Like, what is happening? There's

all these monsters, there's crazy things that

are happening. And so it can be scary, especially

for some of the kids here reading it. Like, what

is going on here? I'd just rather avoid that

book. But I think if you go into reading that

book with this premise in mind, that it's intended

to give the early church comfort. that Jesus

wins, he can destroy, he will destroy, he has

conquered all of our enemies, and he calls us

to discipleship. It's right there in that whole

book. Another verse of encouragement is a very

verse that we started our worship service off

in Isaiah 41 .10, and this is my dad's favorite

verse, and it came to my mind several times this

past week as I was preaching on Ehud. But I hope

it's an encouragement to you because I don't

want a call to courage and a call to discipleship

to be a guilt trip. I want it to be a comfort

trip. I want it to be something that you feel

encouraged to do, not guilted to do. And so here

are these words of comfort from Isaiah 41 verse

Isaiah 41:10

10. Fear not, fear not, for I am with you. Be

not dismayed, for I am your God. will strengthen

you. I will help you. I will uphold you with

my righteous right hand. 80 years of peace is

the longest amount of peace that we read in the

book of Judges. That's what Ehud gave, 80 years

of peace. Jesus gives us an eternity of it. Let's

come to God in prayer. Gracious Heavenly Father,

we thank you for this book, or this chapter.

We thank you for the story of Ehud. Lord, there

are so many different ways we could have taken

this passage. Many, many sermons have been preached

on it. And it's a colorful one. It's also a very

challenging one. And so we pray, Lord, that through

all the secrets and the deception that we read

about, we see clarity. We see a revelation. We

see something that's ultimately fulfilled in

Jesus Christ. as clear as day, where the Holy

Spirit is shining the spotlight on who Christ

is and his work for us and him defeating Satan,

his legions of demons, death and our sin. We

thank you for the victory that we have in Jesus

and we pray that as you call us to discipleship,

we will have the kind of courage modeled by Ehud.

Why? Because you raised him up. You did it. And

you could do the same through us. We pray that

we will leave this place not with a burden, but

in freedom with raised voices from the hilltops.

We pray, Lord, that we will find comfort, approval,

and security in Jesus alone as we do so. We pray

that we will die to these surface idols and ultimately

die to the source ones. And we pray all of this.

We pray all of this because we know you can do

it. And we know that we have the power of the

Holy Spirit in a unique way and in a better way

that Eve would never have. And so give us strength,

Lord, as you raise us up. We pray in Christ's

name alone. You have been listening to the Resurrection

Life Sunday Sermon from Resurrection Life Church

in Apex, North Carolina. Resurrection Life is

now meeting at our new location in Felton Grove

High School off Stevenson Road, Apex, just outside

Holly Springs. Resurrection Life is pastored

by Dr. Mark Konech. Join us this Sunday morning

at 10 a .m. for worship in the New Felton Grove

High School Auditorium. And if you found this

podcast to be a blessing to you, share it with

a friend. And be sure to subscribe on Spotify,

Apple, or GoodFunds so you don't miss next week's

Resurrection Life Sunday Service. is worth living

just because he lives