April 3 :: Judges 19-21; Luke 7:31-50

April 2 :: Judges 16-18; Luke 7:1-30

I just had to...

April 1 :: Judges 13-15; Luke 6:27-49

^{Judges 13:15-16}

Manoah said to the angel of the LORD, "We would like you to stay until we prepare a young goat for you. The angel of the LORD replied, "Even though you detain me, I will not eat any of your food. But if you prepare a burnt offering, offer it to the LORD." (Manoah did not realize that it was the angel of the LORD.) 

I wonder if angels still appear today and if we confuse them as humans like Manoah did...

March 31 :: Judges 11-12; Luke 6:1-26

Luke 6:19

"And all the people were trying to touch Him, for power was coming from Him and healing them all."

Just to touch Jesus healed people...just to touch Him. Although Jesus is not physically with us in this way, or...God in a bod if you will...in what ways can we reach out and "touch" Him now...and so be healed?

March 30 :: Judges 9-10; Luke 5:17-39

Judges 10 speaks of distress without God, repentance, mercy

God allows the Philistines and Ammonites to oppress Israel, because Israel has bowed down to their gods instead of Him. Israel repents in their distress and God saves them.

Judges 10:16

"Then they got rid of the foreign gods among them and served the LORD. And he could bear Israel's misery no longer."

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary on the Bible

"It is necessary, in true repentance, that there be a full conviction that those things cannot help us which we have set in competition with God. They acknowledged what they deserved, yet prayed to God not to deal with them according to their deserts. We must submit to God's justice, with a hope in his mercy. True repentance is not only for sin, but from sin."
 

Repentance = to make a 180, to turn from one way and go another

March 29 :: Judges 7-8; Luke 5:1-16

March 28 :: Judges 4-6; Luke 4:31-44

March 27 :: Judges 1-3; Luke 4:1-30

Book of Judges

Author :: Anonymous.

The Talmud suggests Samuel wrote it in part. Written after the death of Samson and the coronation of Saul, but before David's conquest of Jerusalem.

Dates :: 1050-1000 B.C.

Content (information retrieved from Moody's Ryrie Study Bible) ::

"The judges were military and civil leaders ruling during this time when the nation was a loose confederacy. Some of the judges ruled concurrently since each one did not necessarily rule over the entire land."