This message is one of the Times Square
Church pulpit series.
It was recorded in the sanctuary of Times
Square Church in Manhattan, New York City.
Other tapes are available by writing World Challenge,
P.O. Box 260, Lindell, Texas 75771, or
calling 903-963-8626.
None of these messages are copyrighted, and you
are welcome to make copies for free distribution
to friends.
And please, if you'll turn there with me.
The title of my message is called, Placing
Your Enemies in the Hand of God.
Placing Your Enemies in the Hand of God.
Hallelujah.
Jesus, I thank you tonight, that every time
we meet, I'm aware that it's your desire
to bless your church.
You have only a one-fold desire.
To open the windows of heaven and pour
out a blessing that there's not room enough
to receive.
Lord, thank you that we have the knowledge
that that's your heart.
And no matter what kind of a word
that you bring to us as your people,
it is always in your heart to bless
your church.
Now I ask tonight that this word be
received as a blessing.
God, that there would be a desire in
our hearts to hear it, and to do
what you say, no matter what the personal
cost.
Father, I thank you, Lord, that you will
enable me by the unction of the Holy
Spirit to bring this word out in the
manner that you want it to be spoken.
Lord, it really doesn't matter how I deliver
it.
It matters how it's heard in the hearts
of the people that you gathered together tonight
in this house.
I ask you, Father, to open the hearts.
God, give us hearing ears and willful hearts.
Lord, this is going to be even a
painful process for some, but there's great grace,
Lord, when we obey you.
Great, great grace and freedom and liberty that
you give to those who make the choice
to walk in truth.
Because you said you shall know the truth
and the truth shall set you free.
And Father, I pray tonight that before some
and most leave this house tonight, that there
will be a brand new testimony of freedom.
That people will be able to leave this
house tonight and say, I am free, I'm
free, thank God, I'm free.
And Father, I thank you for that.
Lord, you're going to do that in this
house tonight.
I have every confidence because you've burdened my
heart with this, Father.
And God, I thank you for it in
Jesus' name.
Placing your enemies in the hand of God,
Judges chapter 9.
Now, before I begin to read anything in
Judges chapter 9, I'll just go over a
little bit of history.
Now, in the book of Judges, we're in
a period of biblical history called the period
of the Judges.
It's the time after the death of Joshua.
You remember Moses led the people out of
Egypt after their 400-year captivity.
They came through the wilderness.
Then Joshua, the next leader, brought them in
to claim their inheritance.
Now, throughout the days of Joshua, there was
peace in the land.
They subdued some of the land, but unfortunately,
not all of it.
And the tribes that were left in the
land of Israel became a snare to the
people.
Let that be a warning tonight to you
and I, that those things that we will
not let the Holy Spirit subdue will eventually
become a snare to us.
We will build an altar to them if
we follow the pattern of the people of
God through biblical history and unthinkably begin to
bow down to some things that are against
the will of God.
Now, some are sitting here tonight and saying,
well, how could that ever happen to me?
As this message progresses, you may begin to
realize that you've already been ensnared by one
particular thing I'm going to talk about tonight
that is an idol, really, of the people
of the land because they do build altars
to this and they do bow down to
it.
And if it's not dealt with in the
hearts of God's people, we too will build
altars and we will bow down to it.
Unwittingly, even at times, and sometimes even think
that we're doing God's service as we're doing
it.
Now, I pray for great grace.
I don't know if I'll preach or teach
tonight because I have a weight upon me
of the Holy Spirit tonight because of the
importance.
It's God wants to bless this church.
He wants to bless you.
He wants to bless me.
But if we're going to know the blessing,
the fullness of what God wants to do
for us, there has to be a receiving
of truth.
There's a condition, if I can place it
as such on our part, is to desire
and to receive the truth as God speaks
it into our hearts.
As higher law than all of our own
righteousnesses or our self-justification for what we
do and all of our own thoughts and
feelings and opinions, the truth of God must
take precedence.
And if we are the people of God,
there is a desiring in our hearts for
that truth.
Now, this period of Judges lasted about 350
years.
It began with the first Judge, which was
Othniel, a young man called Othniel, who married
Caleb's daughter.
And from there progressed to the last Judge,
who was Samuel.
And then the period of Judges ended when
Samuel anointed Saul to be the first physical
king of Israel.
And then, of course, after Saul came King
David.
The period of Judges was a time when
the people would sin against the Lord repeatedly.
They would build altars to Baal and Ashtoreth
and other different types of gods of the
nations around them.
Then they would subsequently become oppressed by the
people around them as they had allowed these
things that the people worshipped in that society
to grip their hearts.
It brought oppression.
And folks, to tell you something, when we
choose the way of the world over the
ways of God, you can be sure it's
going to bring oppression into your life.
Come to the house of God all you
want.
But if in your heart you've embraced the
ways of this society over the ways of
God, you will begin to live under oppression.
And because of that oppression, the people sighed.
They cried out to the Lord.
And God, in His graciousness, 13 times raised
up what we know to be a Judge.
These were people, men and a woman in
one case, Deborah, who were raised up sovereignly,
supernaturally, touched by the Spirit of God with
wisdom.
They were hearing the word of the Lord.
They directed the people and God, through these
judges, one more time, would raise up an
army, would raise up a movement as it
were, and lead the people away from these
false oppressions that were all around them and
lead them once again back into the worship
of the one only and true God.
Now it's a type really of what Jesus
said.
They once again embraced the truth and the
truth set them free.
I want that established in your heart tonight.
Not just as a scripture we memorize and
quote from time to time, but I want
it to become a living reality in my
life and in your life.
That we understand when we embrace the truth,
the truth sets us free.
There's no other path that it goes on.
And no matter how hard it might be
to embrace, when we hear it and move
in it, it brings us into a place
of freedom.
Now God, one of the judges that God
raised up was a man called Gideon.
A young man who was just plowing at
a threshing floor.
The land at that time was being mightily
oppressed by a people called the Midianites.
The angel of the Lord, which is Christ
in a sense appearing, a pre-New Testament
appearance of Christ, appeared to Gideon and called
him a mighty man of valor.
He said, go in this thy strength, a
mighty man of valor.
Now the strength that he was imparting to
him was really just the word that he
was speaking to him.
And that's our strength, folks.
It's nothing that's really changed.
God spoke the word to him and says,
go in this thy strength.
And Gideon's looking around saying, what me?
My father's house is poor.
I'm the least in my father's house.
What influence do we have?
How are we going to hire an army?
How are we going to fight against these
Midianites?
And he failed to realize that his strength
was the commission, the word that was being
given to him.
That was the source of his strength.
And that's the way it is for the
church of Jesus Christ today.
When God speaks the word and our hearts
embrace it, then the Holy Spirit comes and
makes it alive and quickens us to that
word that God has spoken into our lives.
Then we are sovereignly, by God, brought out
of what I call the realm of the
flesh and we're brought into the realm of
resurrection life, which was bought for us by
Jesus Christ.
Now Gideon raised up this mighty army of
300 men, you remember, that defeated, I believe
it's 130,000 Midianites, just simply by the
power of God.
And now we're going into, we'll start in
Judges chapter 8, and beginning at verse 30,
and I'm just going to be skipping over
some verses of Scripture to build a base
for this story.
Scripture says, And Gideon had threescore and ten
sons of his body, so he had seventy
sons, begotten, for he had many wives.
And his concubine that was in Shechem, she
also bare him a son whose name was
Abimelech.
And the Scripture says that Gideon, the son
of Joash, died in a good old age
and was buried in the sepulchre of Joash
his father in Ophrad the Abysarites.
And it came to pass as soon as
Gideon was dead that the children of Israel
turned again and went a-whoring after Balaam
and made Baal-bereth their god.
Now Baal-bereth, bereth means covenant, so I
mean here they made a covenant with Baal.
And if you remember some of the past
messages on Man of Conditional Trust, you'll know
what that is all about.
Trusting in what you can see and taste
and touch and feel, really just like the
society around them.
And the children of Israel remembered not the
Lord their God who had delivered them out
of the hands of all their enemies on
every side, and neither showed they kindness to
the house of Jeroboam, which is Gideon, namely
Gideon, according to all the goodness which he
had shown unto Israel.
So here's this man who literally lays his
life down, begins to follow God, God uses
him, becomes a judge of Israel in his
lifetime, there's peace in the land, then he
dies.
And the people turn one more time away
from the Lord, and they forget all the
goodness that this man has done for them.
It's a tragedy really of humanity, but it
happens time and again.
Folks, one day, if you are among those
who are looking for the praise of man,
if that's your whole sense of who you
are, I want to warn you, because one
day they'll say Hosanna, and about three days
later they'll say crucify him.
Humanity never changes, and it's such a tragedy
when we begin to look for praise of
man, and not for the praise of God.
There's only really one voice that counts when
we finally one day stand before the throne
of Almighty God.
Now, chapter 9 starts with the son of
the concubine, not one of the ten seventy
sons of his wives, but the son of
a concubine called Abimelech.
He went to the place called Shechem unto
his mother's family, or his mother's brethren, and
communed with them, and with all the family
of the house of his mother's father.
Saying, verse 2, Speak, I pray you, in
the ears of all the men of Shechem,
which is better for you, or whether is
better for you, either that all the sons
of Jerobel, which is Gideon, which are threescore
and ten persons, reign over you, or that
one reign over you.
Remember also that I am your bone and
your flesh.
And his mother's brethren spake of him in
the ears of all the men of Shechem,
in all these words, and their hearts inclined
to follow Abimelech, for they said, He is
our brother.
And they gave him threescore and ten pieces
of silver out of the house of Baal
-bereth, wherewith Abimelech hired vain and like persons
which followed him.
And he went into his father's house at
Ophrah, and slew his brethren, the sons of
Jerobel, that's Gideon, being threescore and ten persons
upon one stone.
Notwithstanding, yet Jotham, the youngest son of Jerobel,
was left, for he hid himself.
So here's this son of the concubine, Abimelech,
going and convincing some of the people of
the land that it's better that he reign
over the people than all the sons of
Gideon.
And he hires, with the money they give
him, treacherous people, and they go to Gideon's
house.
Now you imagine, how ungrateful can a people
get?
What a vindictive, vicious act for a man
who had really given his life to set
the people free when they cried out to
the Lord from the Midianites.
And he goes into his father's house and
kills all the sons of Gideon, save for
one, this young son called Jotham, who hid
himself.
And all the men of Shechem gathered together,
verse 6, and all the house of Milo
went out and made Abimelech king by the
plane of the pillar that was in Shechem.
Now, and when they told it to Jotham,
verse 7, he went and stood in the
top of Mount Gerizim and lifted up his
voice and cried and said unto them, You
men of Shechem, that God may hearken unto
you.
Now I want you to stop right there
for a moment.
Please don't read ahead of me.
Here's this young man Jotham.
An incredible injustice has been done to his
father's house.
An incredible injustice has been done to him.
And he knows that he too would be
dead had he not really sovereignly, by the
hand of God, escaped the plan that they
had had for his life.
He was powerless in himself to do anything
concerning the injustice that had befallen both him
and his household.
Powerless.
And sometimes, folks, that happens to you and
I, doesn't it?
People do things to us and we would
like to fight back, but we are powerless
to do anything about it.
There are some that you're sitting here tonight
and there are things that happened to you
when you were a child.
There were people that you trusted that had
leadership over your life or a place of
importance and they abused that place of leadership
over your life and you were powerless to
do anything about it.
Just like Jotham was powerless.
And he knew all the people are following
this half-brother Abimelech.
All he had the power to do was
to cry out against the injustice of how
he'd been treated.
And don't we hear that in society today?
We hear individuals and we hear groups at
times of people that are powerless to do
anything about what was done and all they
can do now is cry out against the
former injustice and live and relive the things
that were done to them.
Yet there is something a little bit different
in this cry of Jotham because the scripture
seems to indicate that there was a desire
in him to have his brethren understand that
the path that they had chosen was moving
them away from the blessing of God.
In verse 7, he stood on the top
of a mountain and lifted up his voice.
Now he's far enough away that they really
can't get their hands on him.
And he cried and he said, Harken unto
me, you men of Shechem, that God may
hearken unto you.
And the translation of the Living Bible says
it probably more simply.
He said, if you want God's blessing, listen
to me.
If you want God's blessing.
Now I don't know, that sounds fairly gracious.
I don't know in his position if any
of us would have the power to be
that gracious.
Would we not rather just stand and curse
these men that had taken away our whole
household and had done such evil to the
memory of our father?
But yet he said, if you want God's
blessing, he said, listen to me.
Listen to what I'm about to say.
And I believe this is the foundation of
what the Holy Spirit has given me to
speak tonight.
If you want God's blessing, I want you
to listen to me with all of your
heart tonight.
Listen to what I'm about to bring to
you from the Word of God.
Then he goes on to tell a story,
almost like a parable, from verses 8 to
14.
I'm not going to read the whole thing
because it would take too long.
But he said you had choices.
He said you could have had the olive
tree rain over you, or the fig tree,
or the vine.
And all of these things represent different things.
The olive tree, for example, is where the
oil of anointing was taken from, from the
olives.
And the fig tree always represents Israel, God's
inheritance, God's heritage, God's protection, God's power among
his people when they walk in right relationship.
Of course, Jesus referred to himself as the
vine.
You could really say, if you want to
take typology, you could say you could have
had the Father, the Son, and the Holy
Spirit rain over you.
You could have walked in God's way, but
you chose another path.
And then in verse 14 he says, then
all the trees said to the bramble, or
the brush, that type of brush that you
see on a windy day in a southern
town, just sort of blow across the street.
You could have had this wonderful, this wonderful
creation of God rain over you.
You could have known his blessing and his
favor.
But yet you went to the lowest, you
chose the lowest path to follow.
You went to that which is the lowest
and you stooped to that and you said,
this is going to be our leader.
This is what we're going to follow.
When you could have aspired to height and
you could have aspired to truth and you
could have known the blessing of God, yet
you chose the lowest form of carrying on
the heritage of those that have been called
by God to inherit the promised land.
He said, you have betrayed the house and
the lives of those who have done you
no harm.
This is what he was telling them.
Now, in verse 16, now he states then
what we know today to be a standing
truth of God's word.
In verse 16 he says, now therefore, he
said, if you have done, if you have
done truly and sincerely in that you have
made Abimelech the king and if you have
dealt well with Jeroboam and his house and
have done unto him according to the deserving
of his hands, for my father fought for
you and adventured his life far and delivered
you out of the hand of Midian, and
you are risen up against my father's house
this day and have slain his sons, threescore
and ten persons upon one stone and have
made Abimelech, the son of his maidservant, king
over the men of Shechem because he is
your brother.
Verse 19, he says, if you have dealt
truly and sincerely with Jeroboam and with his
house this day, then rejoice ye in Abimelech
and let him also rejoice in you.
If you have done his right, rejoice in
it.
But if not, let fire come out from
Abimelech and devour the men of Shechem and
the house of Bilo and let fire come
out from the men of Shechem and the
house of Milo and devour Abimelech.
And Jotham ran away and fled and went
to Beo and dwelt there for fear of
Abimelech his brother.
Now he basically stood up and said something
that we would know in another way is
said in the Scriptures to us today.
He basically said, this man, what you have
sown, you're going to reap or what you
have, yeah, what you have sown, you're going
to reap.
If what you have sown is righteous, you're
going to reap righteous fruit.
He said, if you have sown unrighteousness, it's
going to devour you.
This is the law of the harvest.
There's an immutable law of the harvest in
nature that's also found in the kingdom of
God.
And basically that law is threefold.
You will reap what you have sown.
Whatever you plant, that's what's going to grow.
Whatever's in your heart, that's what's going to
begin to show itself in your life.
Whatever you embrace in the interior part of
your life, that's going to begin to show
in your entire person.
If your eye is single, Jesus said, your
whole body will be full of light.
If your eye is focused on Christ, if
you desire Christ, if you want to live
for Christ, if you want to honor Christ,
if you want the truth of Christ, there
will be a light come into you and
the very life of Christ will begin to
be lived in and through you.
There will be righteous fruit because you are
sowing in truth.
You will reap a harvest of righteousness in
your life.
But the second law of the harvest is
that you will reap later than you sow
it.
Many people have things in their hearts in
the church of Jesus Christ and think that,
well, I can hide this thing.
I can come into the house of the
Lord and wave my hands and shout the
songs and never have to deal with it.
And they carry on in this manner and
I've seen it now.
I've been around long enough to see people
go a great, great distance in the house
of the Lord with hidden things of the
heart that they know are wrong according to
the word of God.
They simply will not deal with it and
they go a great distance.
They have zeal, as Paul said, but oftentimes
not according to righteousness.
They have this supposed passion that speaks and
they go a great distance.
But the second law of the harvest is
you will reap later than you sow it.
And farther down the road, 15, 20 years
walking with God, all of a sudden one
day their life just seems to break out
into this unrighteous fruit because there's been something
sown in the heart that's never been dealt
with.
And the third immutable law of the harvest
is simply that you will reap more than
you sowed.
And oftentimes the last state of a person
who will not deal with truth ends up
worse than in the beginning.
Didn't Jesus say that?
He said the evil spirit goes out of
a man and wanders through dry places.
And then there's a sense of that scripture
that he's saying is gone and is distanced
from the man and then comes back and
says I will go back and have a
look at my house that I came out
of and finds it clean and swept and
garnished.
In other words, there's been no dealing.
There's been nothing come in to occupy the
place that the evil once had.
There's a season of grace that's given to
every life.
But I've got to tell you folks if
God changes your nature and your heart gives
you an opportunity to walk with him there
has got to be truth come in to
replace what used to be there.
If truth doesn't replace it, what used to
be there will come back as the saying
goes with a vengeance.
It will come back even stronger than it
used to be before.
And you have a lot of people that
after 20 years they get this bitter spirited
testimony that tries to tell everybody around them
it doesn't work, I tried it, it doesn't
work I tried to walk with God, it
doesn't work.
Oh, it works but it just didn't work
for them because they made a willful choice
to reject the truth.
When they could have had the vine, when
they could have had the olive tree, when
they could have had the fig tree they
chose the bramble to reign in their lives.
Proverbs 14.22 says Do they not err
that devise evil?
The writer of Proverbs says isn't it a
tragedy that those that aren't they on a
path of error?
Aren't they on a path of their own
undoing?
Paul says in Galatians chapter 6 verses 7
and 8 he said Be not deceived, God
is not mocked.
For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he
also reap.
For he that sows to his flesh shall
of the flesh reap corruption.
But he that sows to the Spirit shall
of the Spirit reap life everlasting.
Paul says don't be fooled, don't be deceived.
Don't get into a state of mind of
thinking that we can harbor in our hearts
things that we know are contrary to the
truth of God and somehow still reap a
righteous harvest.
He says don't be deceived.
It doesn't work that way.
It doesn't work that way in nature and
it will not work that way in the
kingdom of God.
Proverbs 17.13 says Whoever rewards evil for
good, evil shall not depart from his house.
Now folks these are absolutes.
God spoke these things.
He moved upon men, they were put by
pen in the word of God.
If those that reward evil for good shall
not depart from his house.
And then Hebrews 10.31 says It's a
fearful thing to fall into the hands of
the living God.
Now in chapter 9, I don't have time
to go through it tonight but from verse
39 to 49 we see that the very
thing that Jotham spoke came to pass.
He said if what you've done is right,
rejoice.
And if it's not, let fire come out
and let you devour one another.
And what they had done was not right
in the sight of God.
And subsequently this unbridled fire, this unrighteousness within
them rose to the surface.
The men of Shechem eventually rose up and
challenged the leadership of Abimelech and Abimelech came
against them and the scripture says he chased
them in the field and destroyed those that
came out of the city after him.
Then went to the gates of the city,
went in and salted the city.
In other words destroyed the land all around,
made the land useless for any kind of
growing and the people that were left in
Shechem went into a tower and they went
to the height of the tower and they
boarded it up hoping for protection.
Abimelech called for the people around him to
cut boughs down from trees and they went
and they put them at the door of
the tower.
They lit them on fire and the smoke
literally from the fire killed 1,000 people
in the tower.
So here are the people of Shechem that
initially put forward money and hired these vain
persons like Abimelech to kill the sons of
Gideon.
You see them now hiding in the tower
terrified and the smoke of the man that
they once thought, this leader that they once
thought was going to bring them victory and
deliver them.
This leader that they once thought was better
than God's choice for their lives now is
destroying them and that's exactly the way it
happens from generation to generation.
If we choose something that we think is
better than what God says is supposed to
be the leading factor in our lives you
can be sure that thing will come after
you eventually and no matter how high you
go or how much fortification you build around
yourself that thing will find you out.
Be sure the Bible says your sin will
find you out.
Hide in the highest tower you want and
it will just be the smoke, the stench
of the sin will find you out and
1,000 people died.
But you see Abimelech wasn't satisfied with just
that.
An enragement had come into his life.
How dare they challenge my leadership and so
Abimelech goes from that, from Shechem he goes
to the next town and he goes to
destroy that town.
The people go to do the same thing
so Abimelech following the similar pattern says go
cut down branches let's burn them out too
as well and as he gets close to
the wall putting down the first branch of
the next pattern of destruction a little old
lady from the top of the wall cast
down a piece of millstone says it hit
him on the head and broke his skull
and so he had one of his men
run him through with a sword pride right
to the end.
He said lest it be written about me
run him through with a sword and it
says thus verse 56 thus God rendered that's
chapter 9 verse 56 thus God rendered the
wickedness of Abimelech which he did to his
father in slaying his 70 brethren and all
the evil of the men of Shechem did
God render upon their heads and upon them
came the curse of Jotham the son of
Jerobel.
They were rewarded as their deeds deserved and
folks I want to tell you something one
day multitudes of millions are going to stand
before the throne of God and they're going
to give an account of the things that
they have done in this life which God
has entrusted to them.
God has given us a life to live
and he's only really given us one path
and Jesus said it's a very narrow path
it's to walk a path of truth and
to bring glory to him to follow his
will to follow his way now I'm not
talking about legalism I'm talking about relationship I'm
talking about loving him he leads, he guides,
he lifts, he carries, he holds he gives
us all that we need for life and
godliness he doesn't forsake anyone who calls out
to him he doesn't expect us to even
find a path on our own he leads
us in ways of righteousness the psalmist David
says for his namesake he leads us, he
walks with us through the valley of the
shadow of death he fights our enemies and
prepares a table for us even in the
midst of all hell that comes against us
he prepares a table for us and our
cup overflows of his goodness this is the
god that we serve this is the one
and he's entrusted to us a life he
gave us life it wasn't your mother and
father that gave you life it was god
because he gave you life just like when
he created Adam and he says he breathed
into him the breath of life and Adam
became a living soul when the day god
breathed into you you became a living soul
and you became the property of god the
property belonging rightfully owned by the son of
almighty god hallelujah and there are many throughout
history many in society throughout past generations and
even in our generation today who have done
like Abimelech and the men of Shechem and
they have taken the lowest road the lowest
possible road letting self rule and reign in
their lives despising the truth of god despising
the ways of god trampling and wounding people
along the way to gain what they think
is a prize but it's really just an
elusive dream they're looking for satisfaction but they're
looking in all the wrong places for it
and they're in for a time of the
truest and purest justice in the universe because
my bible says in Revelation chapter 20 let
me just read it to you Revelation chapter
20 this is what the scripture says I
saw a great white throne and him that
sat on it from whose face the earth
and heaven fled away for there was found
no place for them I saw the dead,
small and great, stand before God everyone's going
to stand there every president, every king, every
despotic leader everyone who ever professed the name
of Jesus Christ and was not living in
righteousness now folks, because this is the white
throne judgment this is the judgment of the
unrighteous dead there was no place for them
I saw the dead, small and great, stand
before God and the books were opened and
another book was opened which is the book
of life and the dead were judged under
those things which were written in the books
according to their works according to what they
had done what had they done with the
grace that was extended to them what had
they done with the promptings of the Holy
Spirit to search out a path of truth
and the sea gave up the dead which
were in it and death and hell delivered
up the dead which were in them and
they were judged every man according to their
works and death and hell were cast into
the lake of fire this is the second
death and whosoever was not found written in
the book of life was cast into the
lake of fire now folks, I want to
just make one statement before I go on
tonight beloved, God will deal with your enemies
God will deal with your enemies you don't
have to fight, I don't have to fight
God will deal, there is a righteous God
there is a righteous end to this world
to every man, to every woman, to every
child who ever lived I bear responsibility for
how I live my life here in this
world what I choose to do how much
truth that I choose to embrace in my
heart and allow the Christ of this universe
to be glorified through me Paul says in
Romans 12, 19 he says, dearly beloved, dearly
beloved I hear the heart of this apostle
as he's pleading in his sense with this
Roman church he said, avenge not yourselves in
other words, don't go and try to get
back vengeance for the wrong things that have
been done to you but rather give place
unto wrath in other words, Paul is saying,
put it away from you for it is
written, vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith
the Lord now, as Jotham fled the face
of his brother we can only hope that
in his heart he had released this injustice
into the hand of God all the scripture
says about him really is that he ran
away for fear of his brother he made
a pronouncement and then he ran away I
suppose that's where many are today in society
perhaps even some here tonight there was an
injustice done to you and you made a
pronouncement way back and just ran away and
in some cases you've been running ever since
only eternity now will reveal what became of
him we can only speculate as to what
might have become of him based on the
thoughts of what we would do I suppose
in similar circumstances what would you do in
Jotham's situation?
what would you do after you've been standing
on the hill you had the knowledge of
what was done to you was wrong what
was done to your house was wrong and
then you just ran away and behind you
is Abimelech and the men of Shechem and
they're just living the life of Riley as
if they've triumphed it seems like for a
season often times it seems like the wicked
are triumphing I wonder if he went away
to forever rehearse the matter in his heart
that's what a lot of people do there
are things that happened in the past and
they know it's wrong it's an injustice and
they run away from it but forever they
are rehearsing it in their heart perhaps imagining
scenes of vengeance where the sword in his
hand was exacting full payment from a trembling
or dying Abimelech you know it's so easy
to justify thoughts of vengeance and even feel
righteous in one's cause folks I'll tell you
something there are many many people who leave
a situation behind physically but they never leave
it behind spiritually or mentally they harbor it
in their heart and they're rehearsing it and
playing out scenes of how they would have
liked it to end or what they would
like it to be like in the future
they would like to see the one who
hurt them trembling and begging for forgiveness as
if there's some king with a scepter making
the decision whether or not they're going to
give him forgiveness or have some guard cut
their head off and relive these things in
their heart thinking that because this is hidden
this is alright it's not going to bring
any harm to me but that's not necessarily
true because the Bible says in Proverbs chapter
23 verse 7 says for as he thinks
in his heart so is he as he
thinks in his heart didn't Jesus say out
of the abundance of the heart the mouth
will begin to confess it's the issues of
the heart he said that will come forward
and defile the man when the Pharisees thought
that it was just eating pork and things
like this that were going to defile a
person he said no these things don't defile
you it's what you allow to stay in
your heart what you will not let the
word of God touch these things will defile
you and eventually if they're not dealt with
they will begin to overpower your person because
as you think in your heart you will
in effect become that kind of a person
I wondered if Jotham murdered his brother a
thousand times over and over again in his
heart I've got to tell you folks as
a young Christian especially I had some people
rise up against me from time to time
and say some vicious things and I had
to really fight because in my mind I
punched them out a thousand times in my
mind I went to their house and kicked
the door down you know if you've ever
heard my testimony a couple of times that
I actually went to a house one time
right to the yard right into somebody's face
and if God wouldn't send a bird dump
on his forehead I might have done some
damage to him 1st John 3.15 says
if any man hates his brother he's a
murderer and you know that no murderer has
eternal life abiding in him you see that
the context is that eternal life of God
will drive out this spirit of murder which
is really vengeance uncontrolled that's what the spirit
of murder is a murderer just doesn't wake
up one day and say I think I'm
going to kill somebody now there might be
an odd psychotic I suppose in society that
does that but the general trend is that
people receive an injustice they never deal with
it and it rolls and rolls and rolls
and rolls in their heart over and over
and over again and they start living out
scenarios of vengeance and then finally they cannot
distinguish between the imagination and reality anymore and
the next thing they know the knife is
in their hand they are heading to the
house and they live out what's been in
their heart for 15 years to do they
live it out I wonder about Jotham did
he rehearse the matter with his lips before
all who would give him a listening ear
did he rehearse it that Jotham may be
going to another place leave those people behind
and then anybody that would listen begin to
recount the story and tell every little detail
of the story to others who would hear
him now if you'll go with me to
the book of Isaiah which I think would
be really powerful that I had never seen
in the scripture before we look at Isaiah
chapter 58 it's a familiar chapter for many
it's the chapter where God says to Isaiah
he said I want you to lift up
your voice against something that's in my house
he said I have a people that are
seeking me daily they appear to delight to
know my ways they have an appearance of
a nation doing righteousness a nation that did
not forsake the ordinance of their God I'm
reading I'm just paraphrasing from verse 2 in
Isaiah 58 they ask of me in other
words they are approaching me there are people
of prayer they're asking for justice and they
take delight in approaching to God there are
people who in a sense maybe who are
even responding to the word of God to
a degree in the house of the Lord
but yet these people have a question they
know in their hearts there's a blessing beyond
what their present experience has been they know
that there's still a shortcoming there's still some
work that God wants to do to enable
them to be completely released to his will
and his way and they're asking a question
in verse 3 it says wherefore have we
fasted say they and thou seest not you
see God's showing Isaiah their thoughts we're fasting
we're approaching you but it's as if you're
not hearing us God why is this?
what seems to be the problem?
why have we afflicted our soul and it's
as if you don't even hear the knowledge
of it we're fasting we're praying we're seeking
you and this is so important brethren considering
that we're going into a fast beginning next
week as a church body and that we're
going to be meeting and praying every night
beginning Tuesday night it's so important to hear
this tonight and now he begins to tell
them some things and the general context that's
understood by this passage of scripture is that
God says you've been seeking me but you're
hiding at the same time from your own
flesh and we often preach it and it's
rightly preached so that you're not feeding those
that are hungry you're not clothing them naked
you're not breaking the bands of wickedness and
doing all of these things and it's not
erroneous to preach it that way because it's
fully in there in the context of this
passage of scripture but there's another thought here
that I had never seen before until the
Holy Spirit took me to it and it's
in verse 9 he says then shalt thou
call and the Lord shall answer he says
thou shalt cry and he shall say here
I am if thou take away from the
midst of thee the yoke the putting forth
of the finger and speaking vanity now we
generally just sort of pass over that in
the context of feeding and clothing and housing
and all these other things but I began
to research this as the Holy Spirit drew
me to this verse and I think the
New International Version of the Bible says it
the best and I want to just read
it to you he says then you will
call and the Lord will answer you will
cry for help and he will say here
am I if you do away with the
yoke of oppression with the pointing finger and
malicious talk with the pointing finger you see
God was saying the hiding from your flesh
is not just not feeding and not clothing
as necessary as that thing is but he
says you are still pointing your finger at
people who have wronged you and you will
not release them you put a yoke in
a sense on their necks you will not
release them and you are maliciously talking about
them you will not release the grievances of
the past you will not release in your
heart the wrong things that others have done
to you and God says for this reason
I'm not hearing you but if you will
do this he said if you will take
away this pointing of the finger at people
in the past who have wronged you if
you will stop speaking maliciously about them he
said then you will cry to me and
I'll say here I am I will reveal
myself to you this is how important it
is to deal with this issue because this
thing is not seen often times people feel
that it's not necessary to deal with it
but folks I want to tell you something
bitterness is one of the biggest killers of
Christians in the church today it is the
only sin in the Bible that is described
as having a root in other words it
goes deep and it affects the entire being
and out of that one sin comes a
whole lot of rotten fruit God says if
you will yes draw out and if you
will stop pointing to the past stop speaking
maliciously about the things that were done to
you and learn to forgive then you will
find the heart of God you will find
me in that one act that's how important
it is you will begin to know me
how can we know God how can we
know God if we're still pointing to the
past how can we know God if we're
still making lists of grievances how can we
know the one sin unto him the wrong
things that we have done but came down
to the earth and became a man and
was whipped and spit upon and bruised and
despised and nailed to a tree how can
we know him how can we know him
if we will not let go the grievances
of the past that's the very heart of
God what brought him to the earth what
made him a man why did he do
what he did why did he not just
smite the earth the moment Adam sinned and
started all over to impute our sins unto
us he was not willing to have us
separated from him for all of eternity and
God says if you will stop this if
you will stop this then you will call
and you will understand I'm right there you'll
say here I am I've been right there
you've not understood that this thing stops you
from knowing me you've got to let it
go I think of the illustration of the
bear a story I heard one time it
comes to a campfire and he picks up
a hot cauldron where somebody is boiling water
and cooking their supper and a bear by
his brute instinct holds it to his chest
and it begins to burn him because it's
red hot and because he has no intelligence
he doesn't know what to do and so
he just begins to squeeze it harder because
that's all a bear knows how to do
the more it burns him the harder he
squeezes it until finally it kills him it
burns right through his fur and his skin
and affects just let it go now folks
it's exactly the same and how much more
are we to blame who have been given
the intelligence we have by God and we
know that harboring resentment is like holding something
to our heart it's like holding a dagger
and driving it into our own heart how
foolish to hold these things when the word
of God clearly tells us that it cuts
us off from his love it cuts us
off from understanding and we've got to deal
with these things this is truth that sets
people free this is grace berating and chastising
his people this is grace this is God
saying I want to bless you I want
you to know me I want you to
understand me but as long as you're pointing
the finger and making lists and slanderously speaking
you can't know me that's why all of
these churches that are simply a disguise for
grievance committees of the past they can't know
the heart of God all they can do
is list injustices every week and every month
they'll never know the heart of God all
they can do is bring division until it
finally kills them spiritually Jesus said you've got
to put the lists away you have to
put away the pointing finger and all the
malicious talk and then I'll you call out
to me he says and then I'll say
here I am hallelujah now you know my
heart I had every right God Almighty had
every right to condemn you and me he
has every right tonight to condemn us it's
but for his blood it's but for his
grace that we stand there's no other reason
we stand if he were to point back
at your life and mine and make a
list of the times that we wounded him
in our conversation and we did wrong things
and we even hurt his own children if
we were if he were to draw up
a list who could stand David the psalmist
David knew that he said if you counted
if you drew up a list of iniquities
which one among us could stand in the
presence of God and yet even with that
knowledge we're so foolish at times we still
want to make our list and still point
our fingers and talk maliciously and wonder why
lastly I wonder if Jotham ran from the
pain the intent on serving God he ran
from the pain intent on serving God but
yet to build his life on a foundation
of corruption this is an incredible thought and
some might say her tonight like how can
I be serving God on a foundation of
corruption well it's quite easy you see the
motivation for serving God is to be like
Christ he could have run away from there
saying I will never be like my brother
and I see a lot of people like
that I've met a lot of people like
that in the church I will never be
like my father I will never be like
my mother I'll never be like my uncle
I'll never be like that class of people
that I came from I will never be
like them and then they begin to live
their life and that's their motivation that's their
motivation you see it's a wrong
foundation it allows a man to be full
of hate in his heart and yet give
the appearance of seeking God you can be
full of hate and have this supposed zeal
you can answer every altar call in the
house of God and people can look at
you and say oh what a holy man
of God what a holy woman of God
how they're seeking the Lord but what's driving
you is not to be like Christ it's
to be full
of love and and love and love and
love and love and love and love
and love corruption
quite often the person becomes just like the
one they resent you say why because resentment
has cut them off from God and we
will always move in the direction of our
focus they are cut off from God to
if your motivation is not like to be
somebody else that is that is a false
judgment that's that's against the Word of God
he said judge not that you be not
judged that that is a condemnation of another
person that Christ died for and God didn't
give us the right to do that it's
not the heart of God and subsequently I've
seen it over and over again young men
young women wounded perhaps in their home wounded
even under ministry sometime and saying oh I
will never be like that person and they
begin to walk this walk with God with
this wrong motivation in their heart and they
end up just like them because the very
issue of unforgiveness in their heart has cut
them off from God and when you're cut
off from God where do you go how
can you grow when you're cut off from
God it's like a plant being put in
a garage and the doors are closed how
does it grow there's no light there's no
light and folks that I've seen that tragic
end to Christians lives over and over and
over and over again throughout my years of
being a Christian and especially as a Christian
pastor seeing weeping people sit in my office
saying I swore I'd never be like my
dad I swore it and now I'm just
like him the whole motivation is wrong the
whole foundation of their walk with God is
wrong they've been cut off from God the
whole time because there's been unforgiveness in the
heart Jesus said it himself you don't forgive
my Heavenly Father won't forgive you either they're
cut off from the life of Christ that
God wants to put into them because they've
chosen the bramble to rule in their life
as opposed to the vine and lastly we
can only wonder if Jotham had the courage
to release the dead and move on with
God to release the dead means that we
release those who have wounded us to the
justice and to the mercy of God it
means in our hearts there's a willingness to
see them forgiven and to forgive them ourselves
we know that God poured out all of
his wrath of vengeance on his own son
and full payment of justice for all who
would turn to him for forgiveness if we're
going to release them we are many people
can't release those that have wounded them because
they don't want them to experience the mercy
of God you remember the Prophet Jonah wouldn't
go he said because God I know you
I know you I'm going to preach I'm
going to tell them the word and they're
going to repent and you're going to forgive
them and they're my enemies I don't want
them forgiven so I don't want to go
and God had to deal with him and
bring him around to truthful thinking he said
ought we not to have mercy shouldn't we
have compassion on these people who don't know
their left hand from the right folks I
want to tell you something shouldn't you and
I have compassion if you have someone in
your past that wounded you or hurt you
or someone is even doing it today shouldn't
that we have compassion on them who don't
know their left hand from the right that
means they don't know right from wrong they're
just operating from a base of ignorance they've
chosen to let the bramble rule in their
lives and they're headed for destruction but if
we are Christians if we've come to Christ
shouldn't our heart be the heart of God
shouldn't shouldn't we be ambassadors for Christ shouldn't
shouldn't it be in us to release them
not only to the justice knowing that if
they don't turn yes vengeance is mine God
says I will repay but God will also
forgive remember this tonight if God poured out
all the vengeance that is due for their
sin as well as for yours in mind
on his own son his son satisfied the
complete wrath of God everything was poured out
upon him and if you and I want
the heart of God we have to be
willing to have God forgive those who have
wronged us we've got to release them in
our heart and begin to pray for them
say God they were in ignorance they didn't
know what they were doing as painful as
it might have been in my life and
for the things that I have had to
suffer because of it they were in ignorance
but Oh God I am NOT in ignorance
today I am now your child I now
know your word I now I'm not justified
for holding on to this thing anymore I
want your heart manifested in me Jesus you
had every right to condemn the whole lot
of us and send us to hell but
you came down and took upon yourself our
sins you didn't take into account the wounds
that we've given you the times we've grieved
you the times we cursed your name the
pain we caused you you didn't take it
into account you didn't grieve us you didn't
wound us you allowed yourself to be wounded
that's why Jesus said you have to move
yourself away from this desire for vengeance or
you will never know the fullness of who
I am you cannot know it until you
have released everyone that owes you a debt
if we claim to have the heart of
God we too desire to see our former
enemies forgiven we know the depths of his
love we know that we're forgiven not demanding
from us any payment for the wounds which
we have caused thank God thank God and
this love is now being manifested through us
and that we desire that all should come
to the saving knowledge of Christ I want
to leave you at this thought Jotham stood
on the hill after all that had transpired
and he said to these this half-brother
of Bimelech and these men of Shechem who
had chosen the bramble to reign over them
they'd chosen a poor and a foolish way
but Jotham stood and I hope he and
me I can only hope he maintained the
integrity that he appeared to have but he
said if you want God's blessing listen to
me and maybe I guess I have the
privilege of standing and being your Jotham tonight
if you are among those tonight that have
chosen to reject the vine you rejected the
fig tree you've rejected the olive tree and
you've let the bramble rule in this area
of your life and maybe I'm your Jotham
tonight standing here in a sense on a
hill just slightly above physically the crowd that's
here except for those in the balcony obviously
and saying if you want God's blessing listen
to me and tonight that's simply the cry
of my heart God wants to bless you
God wants to reveal himself to you the
fullness of Christ God wants to change you
and draw you and make you a man
or woman of God that has a forgiving
heart that is tender that is gracious that
that can become as it says in Revelation
a pillar in the house of God one
who holds up and doesn't tear down one
who strengthens and doesn't make weak once your
pursuit of Christ to be in truth and
pursuit according to righteousness wants to bring you
to a place one day where you stand
before him and he says well done well
done not the deeds we do but the
truth we embrace the deeds simply come out
of the truth that we embrace you don't
have to worry about deeds they'll come once
truth is in the heart if you want
his blessing listen to me Jotham said and
tonight that's simply my challenge I challenge everyone
in this house tonight that has a grievance
against anyone or anything there might be some
very serious things that have been done to
some people here in this house but I
want to tell you something there's nothing more
serious than what we did to Jesus he
never did one wrong thing to us yet
we crucified him and rejected him we did
it our sin crucified him and so we're
unjustified to say my my grievance is such
that I can't let it go because God
released us and he promises not just to
call us to to walk in this truth
but he says I'll give you the power
I will give you the power to let
it go but I want to challenge tonight
everyone who has a grievance against a person
a particular type of people a particular race
of people a particular class of people just
as the Holy Spirit is speaking to your
heart tonight I'm going to call you to
this altar and give you an opportunity to
release them from the debt to put the
finger back in your pocket tear down the
list of grievances and say Lord you said
you said you'd bless me and you said
I would call and you would say here
I am God I take you at your
word lead me now and bless me this
message tonight is all about blessing all about
blessing and God's desire to do a new
thing in many many lives that are in
this house tonight after we pray at this
altar we're going to have a time of
open prayer one of our elders will be
there by exit 7 you'll have an opportunity
to share with him your prayer request I
want to give you an opportunity this evening
for those who want to publicly release without
names and details but to publicly release those
that owe you a debt to encourage the
rest of the body as we all stand
if the Holy Spirit is drawing you the
balcony you can go to either exit and
come down the aisle the main sanctuary to
slip out of wherever you are please come
forward and we're going to pray together tonight
so important before we enter into a time
of fasting and prayer next week if you
if the tears come just let them come
you don't have to be ashamed of weeping
tonight if the Holy Spirit is if it's
tough for you to let it go the
Holy Spirit will enable you tonight to let
it go please make come in close make
room for the people that are coming hallelujah
hallelujah let's pray together Lord Jesus thank you
for loving me thank you for forgiving me
when I think of all the wrong things
that I have done I know in my
heart that you're completely justified to cast me
out of your presence forever but yet because
you love me you took my sins upon
yourself and invited me to come and have
fellowship and eternal life with you Jesus I
love you I love you for that you've
been so good to me there's a few
things you asked me to do just out
of gratitude to you and one of them
is that you asked me to forgive others
just as you had forgiven me to release
them from the dead you said I'll look
after it you just let it go so
tonight I come to this altar just to
obey you this thing is hard to do
some of the wounds are deep but you
said if I would that when I cried
out to you you would be right beside
me and you give me the strength this
very moment I release the dead to those
who did me wrong to those who hurt
me and wounded me I release them because
Jesus you love them and you died for
them Lord I ask you to have mercy
on their souls I ask you to help
them to understand the wrong things they have
done and bring them to the knowledge that
they too can have eternal life through Jesus
now I thank you right now I would
ask you to lift up your hands I
want you to lift them up this way
look at me right now lift them up
this way say Lord I release I release
them just an act of faith I release
them I let them go just like you'd
release a bird just as they said it
free this is the conclusion of the message