The Judges, An Era of Spiritual Darkness

After Joshua died, the Israelites were ruled by various tribal rulers known as “judges,” and the lack of good central leadership contributed to moral and political chaos.

O LORD God, help us! I don’t pray for deliverance from the Philistines but from our apostasy. We have forsaken You and turned to false gods—and so many times! Up, down, up, down, like a bucket in a well, has been our history. We turned from You and followed other gods; You sent oppressors. We cried out to You, and You so faithfully sent deliverers—seven of them now (Othniel, Ehud, Deborah and Barak, Gideon, Jephthah, and Samson)—You are so faithful! But after You delivered us through Your leader, it wasn’t long before we turned away from You to other gods again. Will we never learn?

We have not listened. We have turned away from You. We all do what we think is right.

You sent Your angel to us just after we had conquered the land. You reminded us of Your faithfulness in bringing us to the land, fulfilling Your covenant. But we disobeyed: we did not break down the foreign altars as You required. I remember Your words delivered on that occasion; my great-grandfather always recounted them with tears as he quoted his father’s telling of the event: “Why have you done this?” I don’t know why, LORD. How could we have been so quick to forget what You asked of us and what we said we would do?

Now, these people have been thorns in our side, and their “gods” are a snare to us, testing us time and time again to see if we will be faithful. We have not been faithful, LORD. We have forsaken You and served the Baals and the Ashtoreths. These Phoenician gods are not the “storm god” nor the “queen of heaven”; they are simply pieces of wood carved by humans to look like humans. They are not fertility gods. Only You, LORD, can give and take life.

Deliver us, O LORD, again I say, not from our oppressors but from our apostasy. Deliver us from this downward-spiraling, sin-driven cycle. May we worship You alone. You are the LORD, our God.