Daily EncouragementSample

The account of Abimelech’s activities makes a sordid tale, as do many other things which are recorded in the Book of Judges. His end came swiftly as “a woman dropped an upper millstone on his head” and his armour-bearer “ran him through” in obedience to his dying command (Judg. 9:50-54). There is more in this incident than the inevitable misfortune of war. There is the hand of God: “Thus God repaid the wickedness that Abimelech had done” (Judg. 9:56).

The days of every wicked ruler are numbered, be his name Abimelech, Adolf Hitler or any other. “We should have known for certain,” says Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, “that God would only allow a man like Hitler to succeed up to a certain point, for when men pass that certain point, down they go. God smites them.”

The classic remark is still true: “God does not pay at the end of every day, but in the end God pays.” He may be pleased to use Abimelech to make “the men of Shechem pay for all their wickedness” (Judg. 9:57), but Abimelech himself will not escape. The exhortation to “leave room for God’s wrath” is not an idle word, “for it is written: ‘It is mine to avenge: I will repay, says the Lord‘” (Rom. 12:19).