Jephthah, Mighty Man
of Valor
“Whom God
Sets Free”
Take for example, the
experience of Jephthah. Jephthah will
be in heaven. He is in the honor roll
of faith. His name means “whom
God sets free.” [Gesenius,
Tregelles]. The root stem of his name
means, “to open,” “to
let loose,” “to begin to
lead in,” “to loosen
bonds,” “to loosen off the
girdle,” (used of a warrior
taking off his armour after a
battle). Jephthah loosened the bonds
of Ammonite oppression, by faith and
the Spirit of God.
Eighteen Years of
Terrible Apostasy
Jephthah started out
life with all appearances against
him. He lived in a time of terrible
apostasy, when Israel did evil in the
sight of the Lord, serving Baalim,
Ashtaroth, the gods of Syria, Zidon,
Moab, and Ammon. The Lord sold
them into the hands of the
Philistines and the hands of the
children of Ammon. For eighteen years
the Ammonites vexed and oppressed the
Children of Israel on the east side
of the Jordan, the land of Gilead, a
rocky, forested mountain region.
Thrust Out, An Exile
Jephthah was an
illegitimate child, the offspring of
Gilead and a harlot. Gilead’s
wife bore Gilead various sons. These
sons grew up, and when they were
grown, they threw Jephthah out of the
house because of the circumstances of
his birth. He was thrown out an
exile, disinherited “thrust
out,” “driven away.”
Judges 11:2.
Jephthah Leads A Band
of Warriors
Jephthah “fled
from the face of his brethren, and
dwelt in the land of Tob.” Tob,
the land where Jephthah dwelt, means
“good.” It is believed that
this area was according to
2 Samuel 10: 6, 8, which
uses the term, Ish-Tob, a district
northeast of Perea, on the border of
Syria, between Syria and Ammonites.
In time a band of worthless men
gathered about Jephthah in this
border region, “and they went
out with him.” (Judges 11:3). To
“go out with him” carries a
military connotation, a verb meaning
also ‘to march.” Jephthah,
by force of circumstances, learned
bravery, learned valor, learned
stamina and endurance, learned what
it takes to lead men in battle,
learned the military art, which would
one day be used of God by faith, to
save Israel.
A Mighty Warrior of
Power
Now the entire story
of Jephthah begins, before even
telling circumstances of his birth
with these words: “Now Jephthah
the Gileadite was a mighty,
valiant, powerful, warrior, man of
valor, a warlike hero, a mighty man
of military force, of mighty valor,
strength and power. So here
is the picture of a man, rejected,
driven away, surrounded by a band or
worthless men in the good lands of
Tob, a band of men who follow this
mighty man of force, power, and
capacity, as he learns military
tactics and strategy, welding his
band of worthless men into a fighting
force.
Israel Terrified
In time, after
eighteen years of oppression of
Israel on the east side of the Jordan
the enemy, the Ammonites, children of
Lot and his younger daughter, made
war against Israel, passing over the
Jordan to fight Judah and Benjamin,
and Ephraim, the tribes on the west
side of the Jordan. They had
oppressed Israel for eighteen years
(Judges 10:8) in the Gilead, but now
they decided on all-out war against
all of Israel. The Israelites
gathered in Mizpeh, frightened,
fearful, and terrified. Would Israel
survive, or would it be subjugated
and absorbed into Ammon?
Israel Repents
In mortal fear, Israel
put away the strange gods and sought
the Lord God of Israel, and served
the Lord. “And His soul was
grieved for the misery of
Israel.” Judges 10:16. God had
in reserve a man who had been
learning about faith, about valor,
about resourcefulness, about courage
and bravery.
No One Found to Lead
Israel in Battle
Throughout the
encampment, no one capable of leading
the army could be found. In the
crisis, there was no one to lead
Israel. Not one general. Not one
military man to save the nation in
the emergency. Someone had to be
found who had courage, valor, and
ability. He had to be “a mighty
man of valor,” a mighty,
valiant, powerful, warrior, man of
valor, a warlike hero, a mighty man
of military force, of mighty valor,
strength and power.
“Come, And Be Our
General”
So the elders of
Gilead “went to fetch Jephthah
out of the land of Tob,” way off
to the wilderness of the Northeast,
offering him the generalship of all
the armies raised, and the Judgeship,
or headship of the nation after his
successful prosecution of the war.
“Come, and be our general, that
we may fight with the children of
Ammon,” they said. Jephthah
reminded the elders of Israel about
their rejection of him, “Did ye
not hate me, and expel me out of my
father’s house? And why are ye
come unto me now when ye are in
distress?” Judges 11:7.
“And the elders
of Gilead said to Jephthah, therefore
now we return to you that you may go
with us and fight against the sons of
Ammon, and you will be to us for a
head to all the dwellers of
Gilead.” Judges 11:8.
The Elders Swear That
Jephthah Will Be Their Head
After questioning
their sincerely further, and after
the elders swore to him that, if the
Lord gave Ammon into his hand, that
they would make him their head,
Jephthah went with them. Jephthah,
the man of faith, required that if he
was to lead Israel in war, he must
be made judge afterward to secure the
nation in obedience to God. The faith
required for victory in battle must
prevail in the nation after
victory. “And the
people set him over them for a head
and for a general and judge, and
Jephthah uttered all his words before
the Lord in Mizpeh.” Judges
11:11. [Hebrews.] Now all of
Jephthah’s experience in the
border land of Tob, successfully
leading a military band in mission
after mission, would become crucial
to Israel’s survival, and the
ultimate birth of the Messiah to a
nation surviving as Israel.
Suddenly Israel Had a
Mighty Man of Faith and Valor to Lead
Them
Brave Jephthah came to
Mizpeh with his band of
battle-hardened warriors, with his
small disciplined force, with once
worthless men made into men of
courage, and suddenly the terrified
camp of Israel at Mizpeh had a
leader, a battle-hardened man of
courage, capacity, and valor, a hero.
The picture immediately changed. Now
there was hope. A man, a mighty
man of valor had been found. Courage
revived. Faith dispelled terror. “A
deliverer was raised up in the person
of Jephthah, a Gileadite, who made
war upon the Ammonites and
effectively destroyed their
power.” PP 558.
When It Came Time to
Argue Israel’s Cause, Jephthah
Was Prepared
Thrust out, rejected,
driven away by apostate Israel,
Jephthah kept his faith, landing on
the feet of faith, upright. He made
the cause of true Israel his
own, despite Israel’s apostasy. When
the time came to argue the cause of
true Israel against Israel’s
enemies, Jephthah was prepared.
Jephthah Knew
Intimately Israel’s History
“We have
nothing to fear for the future,
except as we shall forget the way of
the Lord has led us, and His teaching
in our past history. LS 196
(1902).” LDE 72.
Jephthah issued his
legal challenge to Ammon. It was a
lengthy challenge that showed that
Jephthah had a long and intimate
knowledge of the history of Israel
and the justice of Israel’s
claim going back hundreds of years.
The challenge and negotiations last
fifteen verses.
The Man of Faith Knows
the History of God’s Dealings
and Is Prepared to Argue God’s
Case On Sound Truth
In any great conflict
it is critical to know the history
of God’s leading and teaching in
the past, so that we will have
nothing to fear for the future.
Jephthah, the outcast, not only
became a warrior, testing tactics,
and strategy continually in a border
region against the Lord’s
enemies, but as a man of faith, he
had studied deeply the history of
Israel’s experience with God and
was prepared on a moment’s
notice to defend the knowledge of
that history in a time of crisis.
The man who has true
faith, a faith that uproots all sin,
self, devil, apostasy, and the world
in the soul, can only receive
God’s sacred history. That man
of faith sacredly guards the
knowledge of God’s
truth-God’s leading and teaching
in his own soul and personal
experience with God.
True faith is
always anchored and housed in
truth-God’s Word, which is
truth. True faith is always in
submission to God, to Christ, to the
Holy Spirit.
The Great Controversy
Is God’s Account of His Dealings
With His People in the Past, Present
and Future of the Messianic Age
Inspiration is clear
that it is crucial to not only know
the truth, but the history of the
truth in conflict with falsehood in
the Great Controversy. That is why
the Lord God of Heaven called upon
His servant to write the book The
Great controversy Between Christ and
His angels and Satan and his Angels.
The book The Great Controversy is
a theological apology for the truth
and the history of the conflict
between truth and falsehood,
delineating clearly the spiritual
forces at work in history, prophecy
and the future. It is the testimony
of Jesus. Revelation 12:17; 19: 10.
Today in the terrible
apostasy, we see in the highest
echelon men saying that the book The
Great Controversy was for the
nineteenth century and that we are
beyond that now. Nothing could be
further from the truth. That book,
like Daniel and Revelation, speak not
only of the past, but also the
present and the future, on through
end-times, the millennium, and the
New Earth.
Books of a New
Order
“The enemy of
souls has sought to bring in
supposition that a great reformation
was to take place among Seventh-day
Adventists, and that this reformation
would consist in giving up the
doctrines which stand as the pillars
of our faith, and engaging in a
process of reorganization. Were this
reformation to take place, what would
result? The principles
of truth that
God in His wisdom has given to the
remnant church would be discarded.
Our religion
would be changed.
The fundamental principles that have
sustained the work for the last fifty
years would be accounted as error. A
new organization would be
established. Books of a new order
would be written. A system
of intellectual philosophy would be
introduced. The founders of this
system would go into the cities, and
do a wonderful work. The
Sabbath of course, would be lightly
regarded, as also the God who created
it. Nothing would be
allowed to stand in the way of the
new movement. The leaders would
teach that virtue is better than
vice, but God being
removed, they would place their
dependence on human power, which
without God, is worthless. Their
foundation would be built on the
sand, and storm and tempest would
sweep away the structure.”
1 SM 204.
A New Breed of
“Adventist” Historians and
Theologians
A new breed of
Adventist historian and theologian
has arisen, nursed in the New
Theology, and determined to rewrite
the history and theology of
Seventh-day Adventism. One example is
the new Annotated Questions on
doctrine, with its effort to redefine
the gospel along the lines of the New
Theology’s basic thesis.
There were highly
placed men in the Structure in the
1970s that believed that the first Questions
on Doctrine should never have
been written, as it sought to change
fundamental positions on theology
taken in the 1950s. I heard a
vice-president of the GC state that Questions
on Doctrine should never have
been written.
Institutionalizing
in History New Theology Positions
However, now the
effort has been taken to a new level,
to incorporate New Theology positions
from the 1970s and 1980s, thus adding
further levels to the historical
institutionalization of apostasy.
Lessening the
Fear of God
Beyond this, a whole
new class of books, such as
Who’s Afraid of the Old
Testament God? Are being written,
which are adjusting God’s people
to adapt to the age of skepticism and
the loss of the fear of God.
Tampering With
the Conception of God
Bob after book now is
appearing in the Structure, tampering
with people’s conception of the
character of God.
In the end, Ammon
rejected Jephthah’s just legal
and historical challenge to the
legitimacy of their claims and
matters were set for war.
The Spirit of
the Lord Came Upon Jephthah
‘Then the Spirit
of the Lord came upon Jephthah, and
he passed over Gilead, and Manasseh,
and passed over Mizpeh of Gilead, and
from Mizpeh of Gilead be passed over
unto the children of Ammon.”
Judges 11:26.
Jephthah rose above
the rejection by Israel, rose above
the circumstances of his flight and
struggle, and by faith made the cause
of spirituality revived Israel
his cause, and fought for God and true
Israel. Then the clash came.
Faith Triumphs
By faith, Jephthah,
under God, won the war, and went on
to judge Israel for six years (Judges
12:7). An illustrious career by a man
who had all the strikes against him,
but by faith, and a
character developed by faith in the
most difficult surroundings, made
good for time and eternity, saved the
nation, and provides a great example
of faith for all time.
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