The Value of training in the ways of God

  

 

Judges 3:1-6

 

“Now these are the nations that the Lord left, to test Israel by them, that is, all in Israel who had not experienced all the wars in Canaan.   It was only in order that the generations of the people of Israel might know war, to teach war to those who had not known it before.   These are the nations: the five lords of the Philistines and all the Canaanites and the Sidonians and the Hivites who lived on Mount Lebanon, from Mount Baal-hermon as far as Lebo-hamath.   They were for the testing of Israel, to know whether Israel would obey the commandments of the Lord, which he commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses.   So, the people of Israel lived among the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.   And their daughters they took to themselves for wives, and their own daughters they gave to their sons, and they served their gods.”

 

Often, way too often you and I read Scripture without giving thought to or asking the Spirit that lives in us to open our minds to what we have read.  Why did God want the people that had not experienced war, to understand the cost of being a people of God?  If you look at a person like me, drafted into the Army back in the dark ages of the 1960s to today's no draft and most of them would have a heart attack if you ask them to get off the couch and turn off the phone, for a few minutes. 

 

So, as you observe this upside-down world we are enduring, at this time in our great history, of freedom, and how easy the ignorant youth are willing to allow the government to be their provider, but have no understanding of the cost because they have never had any skin in the game.

 

It is apparent, their parents did not parent, as mine did at a very young age, I was taught the value of honesty, learning, of work, and that God loves me and wants a personal relationship with me.  Look at this chart of 33% in Gallup surveys conducted in 2019 to date say they have no religious affiliation.

Not only are millennials less likely than older Americans to identify with a religion, but millennials who are religious are significantly less likely to belong to a church. Fifty-seven percent of religious millennials belong to a church, compared with 65% or more in older generations.

And that is why Israel did not follow the laws that Moses had left, because they sought the gods of their neighbors, and paid a great price for doing so.

 

From the Back Porch,

 

Bob Rice