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Grace Baptist Church of Danville

April 7, 2019

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The peace God gives is “perfect peace;” but none possess that peace perfectly while living in this body of flesh.

Happy Birthday!  Jayalita McCormack-14^th

Nursery Duty Today: Debbie Bartley (AM) — Diane Campbell (PM)

Gracious Savior, You have Promised — Don Fortner

(Tune: #61 — O the Deep, Deep Love of Jesus —87.87.D)

1.    Gracious Savior, You have promised,

Here to meet Your chosen race.

Graciously, pour out Your Spirit

With the bounties of Your grace. —

Let Your glory, let Your glory,

Now descend and fill this place!

2.    By the preaching of the gospel,

In our midst Your work perform.

Give the heirs of Your salvation

Special blessings from Your throne. —

Let Your glory, let Your glory,

In salvation here be known!

3.    As Your servant stands and preaches

To the people of his care,

Grant to him and us Your blessing.

Speak through him and let us hear! —

Let Your glory, let Your glory,

Shine within this house of prayer.

4.    On Your grace, our God, depending,

We within Your courts appear.

Holy Spirit, fall upon us!

Magnify our Savior here! —

Let Your glory, let Your glory,

In our midst this hour appear!

All men are aware of God’s existence. And all religious people have a fear of God. But the believer, the Christian, the child of God, is a person who trusts the living God. There is a vast difference between knowing that God is, or even fearing him, and trusting him. The believer is a person who walks with God in this world by faith, trusting him.

Jephthah and Me

Judges 11:1-40

Our great God delights to use weak, insignificant, despised instruments to accomplish his greatest works in this world (1 Corinthians 1:26-31). One great example of that fact is vividly set before us in the 11^th chapter of the Book of Judges. The man of whom this chapter speaks is Jephthah. His name means, “one that will open.” And truly the things here recorded by the pen of inspiration about this man open to our eyes God’s wonders of grace in Christ Jesus.

1.     Jephthah was born in shame, the bastard son of a harlot (vv. 1-2). — Me too (Psalm 51:1-5).

2.     Jephthah bore the pain and shame of his mother’s base, bestial immorality all the days of his life. He was cast out from his brethren by his brethren (vv. 1-3). — Me too (Ephesians 2:11-12).

3.     Following the example of his mother, Jephthah lived as a rebel, leading a band of vain men (v. 3). — Me too (Ephesians 2:2-3).

4.     Jephthah was by law excluded from the congregation of Israel (Deuteronomy 23:2). — Me too (1 Corinthians 6:9-10).

5.     Though despised by everyone else, Jephthah was beloved of God, chosen in Christ, and ordained as an instrument by whose hand he would save his people v. 29. – Me too (Jeremiah 1:5; 31:3).

6.     At God’s appointed time “the Spirit of the Lord came upon Jephthah” (v. 29). — Me too (Ezekiel 16:6-8).

7.     By the grace of God bestowed upon him and by the faith in Christ that was wrought in him, Jephthah “subdued kingdoms” and “wrought righteousness” (Hebrews 11:32). — Me too (Romans 8:37; 16:20).

8.     Jephthah feared God and believed his Word (vv. 9-11, 14-27). — Me too (Acts 27:25; 1 Corinthians 4:1-5).

9.     The Lord God honored the faith that honored him by delivering the Ammonites into Jephthah’s hand (vv. 32-33). — Me too (1 Samuel 2:30).

10.   Jephthah opened his mouth to God and declared, “I cannot go back” (v. 35). — Me too (Romans 6:4-6; Psalm 116:12-15).

    How blessed it is to be reminded once more that in this Gospel Day God’s Israel is freed from the law, its covenant, its curse, its vows, and its sacrifices, in and by Christ and his one great sacrifice. — “For by one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified” (Hebrews 10:14). Yet, we who have opened our mouths unto the Lord in heart faith, confessing him as our Lord and Savior, have a vow to pay; and we cannot go back.

      The word translated “cannot” in Judges 11:35 is very instructive. It means I am not able to go back. I am not able to go back, because my God has sworn that he will not allow it. I have no power to go back, because, as powerful as my wicked heart is to do evil, it has no power to overcome God’s purpose, God’s grace, Christ’s blood, Christ’s intercession, or the Spirit’s seal (Romans 8:28-39). I cannot be prevailed upon, or forced by any means or influence, to go bac, because Satan has no power to harm me. No evil shall befall me. My God has promised, “It shall be well with the righteous.” I will not go back, because I cannot go back (John 10:28-30). — I will not go back, because I know that I have nowhere to go (John 6:66-69).

Jephthah’s Vow

Judges 11:30-40

That for which Jephthah is most commonly known is his vow to God and the fact that he conscientiously kept it, though it was terribly painful for him to do so, and even more painful for his cherished daughter, his only child. Most look upon his vow as a weakness, and consider his keeping of the vow a matter of greater weakness still. The fact that Jephthah’s name is mentioned, and that he is held before us as an example of faith in Hebrews 11:32 convinces me that this is the very thing for which this remarkable man is commended to us. Jephthah’s vow is directly linked to his victory over the Ammonites, an act of faith in Christ, for which he is held before us in Hebrews 11 as an example to follow. Jephthah’s fidelity and perseverance in the faith is seen in the keeping of his vow by keeping his daughter in continual virginity. If his dog had come out to meet him, no one would ever imagine that he would have offered his dog on God’s altar, polluting it with the blood of a dog. Yet, many insist that Jephthah killed his daughter to keep his vow to the Lord. That simply was not, and could not have been the case.

A more literal translation of Jephthah’s vow in verse 31 would be, “It shall belong to Jehovah; and I will offer it instead of a burnt offering.” Young’s Literal Translation reads, “I have offered up for it a burnt-offering.” The Modern King James Version reads, “Surely it shall belong to the LORD.” I am certain that Jephthah did not kill his daughter for four reasons.

1^st — This was a personal vow, a vow Jephthah made to God, a vow that Jephthah alone could fulfil. In fulfilling the vow, he could not take that which did not belong to him and offer it to the Lord; and his daughter’s life was not his to sacrifice (Ezekiel 18:4). As her father, it was Jephthah’s right in those days to give her to another man in marriage, or not, as he saw fit (1 Corinthians 7:36-38); but it was not his right to kill her.

2^nd — Throughout the Scriptures, human sacrifices are set before us as abominations before the Lord our God, and were strictly forbidden by Mosaic law. In order for Jephthah to have killed his daughter and offered her as a sacrifice, he would have had to intrude upon the office of God’s priest, and would have polluted God’s altar. Both of those acts were always punished by violent and immediate death.

3^rd — In addition to those things, the Scriptures tell us plainly that there was no need for Jephthah to literally sacrifice his daughter’s life, because God provided redemption for the child, and even for the unclean beast that was dedicated to the Lord (Leviticus 27:1-5, 11-12).

            4^th — The ordinance kept in Israel every year tells us that Jephthah’s daughter lived for quite some time after bewailing her virginity upon the mountains. Among the ancient, believing Hebrew women, no lamentation equaled that of being kept unmarried, single and celibate, in perpetual virginity. Every believing daughter of Israel (as Jephthah’s daughter clearly was) looked to the coming of the promised Seed, the Messiah, the Redeemer, hoping that she might be the woman through whom the woman’s Seed should come into the world. To be devoted to an unmarried life, in perpetual virginity, forbade that hope. Every year, the daughters of Israel spent four days with Jephthah’s daughter talking to her about her devotion and her consecration to God because of his great goodness in the salvation of his chosen.

The Grace Bulletin

April 7, 2019

Grace Baptist Church of Danville

2734 Old Stanford Road-Danville, Kentucky 40422-9438

Telephone (859) 576-3400 — E-Mail don@donfortner.com

Donald S. Fortner, Pastor

Schedule of Regular Services

Sunday

10:00 A.M. Bible Classes

10:30 A.M. Morning Worship Service

6:30   P.M. Evening Worship Service

Tuesday

7:30 P.M. Mid-Week Worship Service

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http://www.DonFortner.com

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Don Fortner

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