Judges 4:1-24

     The Central Idea of the Text is that Israel disobeyed God and worshipped idols, God punished them, they cried out to the Lord, and He raised up Deborah and Barak to save them. 

     Ehud had a positive spiritual impact on the nation of Israel.  After Ehud’s death, the nation forfeited their walk with God and turned back to idolatry, substituting the Lord’s blessing for cursing.  After a period of suffering, Israel cried to the Lord and He raised up Deborah, who served as a prophetess and judge in Israel, but the role of warrior/deliverer was given to Barak.  Deborah was one of three prophetesses mentioned in the Old Testament; the other two are Miriam (Exod. 15:20) and Huldah (2 Kings 22:14).  As a prophetess, Deborah communicated God’s Word, which produced faith among those who were positive to the Lord. 

     It was God who called Barak to battle and guaranteed him victory (Judg. 4:6-7).  Barak had enough faith to obey God’s call to battle and to defeat the armies of Canaan (see Heb. 11:32-33), but is also appears he had weak faith and requested Deborah accompany him (Moses, Gideon and Jeremiah also hesitated at God’s call; see Ex. 3-4; Judg. 6:11-40; Jer. 1:4-8).  Barak’s lack of faith resulted in the loss of glory from defeating Sisera, the commander of Jabin’s army.  Sisera was defeated by Jael, and Deborah honored Jael in her victory song (Judg. 5:24-27).  Scripture reveals that it was God who drew Sisera into battle, to the place he naturally desired to go, and then created the situation that determined his defeat.  From Deborah’s victory song we learn God sent rain to help Barak defeat Sisera, bogging his chariots in mud (see Judg. 5:4–5, 20–22). 

     Battles challenge the believer to live by faith and to trust God and His Word more than human resources and experience.  The weakening instinct of self-preservation motivates us to run from trouble, but God calls us to live by faith and to trust Him above all else.  Those who live by faith and gain life’s victories have joy the unfaithful will never know. Wiersbe comment on Jael:

• "Should we bless or blame Jael for what she did? She invited Sisera into her tent, treated him kindly, and told him not to be afraid; so she was deceitful. The Kenites were at peace with Jabin, so she violated a treaty. She gave Sisera the impression that she would guard the door, so she broke a promise. She killed a defenseless man who was under her protection, so she was a murderess. Yet Deborah sang, “Blessed above women shall Jael the wife of Heber the Kenite be, blessed shall she be above women in the tent” (5:24). To begin with, let’s not read back into the era of the Judges the spiritual standards taught by Jesus and the apostles. Also, let’s keep in mind that the Jews had been under terrible bondage because of Jabin and Sisera; and it was God’s will that the nation be delivered. Both Jabin and Sisera had been guilty of mistreating the Jews for years; and if the Canaanite army had won the battle, hundreds of Jewish girls would have been captured and raped (v. 30). Jael not only helped deliver the nation of Israel from bondage, but also she helped to protect the women from the most vicious brutality. She wasn’t a Semitic “Lady Macbeth” who murdered her guest for her own personal gain. There was a war on, and this courageous woman finally stopped being neutral and took her stand with the people of God."[1]

 

[1] Warren W. Wiersbe, Be Available, “Be” Commentary Series (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1994), 39–40.