You know their names – Gideon. Deborah. Samson. These are the characters found in the book of Judges. But who were they as a whole? The Hebrew word for “judge” has a broader meaning than just acting judicially. It means “to govern, administer, and exercise leadership.” And that definition breaks into two parts of leading, one internal and one external. Internally, these were people who were judging disagreements and issues among the people. Externally, it meant deliverance. So the Judges were people operating under the empowerment of God in local, tribal contexts. And yet not one of them had the moral or spiritual constitution to bring the people back to God. This is not, in other words, a book of heroes. It is a book of broken saviors. 

And we know what that’s like too, don’t we? Because our lives are littered with broken saviors – they are all the unsatisfying solutions we look to for our own deliverance. Recently I found myself out running some errands at around lunchtime and decided I would stop somewhere to get something to eat. For whatever the reason, I thought about how long it had been since I had a McChicken sandwich from McDonalds, and it had indeed been a long time. Decades, in fact. And so to the golden arches I went and I bought, for the first time in 30 years, a McChicken sandwich. I opened it up, took the first bite, and it was good. Very good, in fact. I was taken back to my teenage days when my metabolism had not yet met a foe it could not conquer, and so I kept eating. Strangely, though, I got halfway through that sandwich, and there was a considerable drop in satisfaction. Oh, I finished it, but the last bite certainly wasn’t as good as the first one. And only two hours later, I found myself hungry again.

Isn’t that a paradigm we face all the time? We sense some acute need in our lives, and we think we have the solution. Often, you can phrase that solution in terms like these: “If only…”

• If only I had more money…
• If only my spouse was a bit more accommodating…
• If only I had a different boss…
• If only this person would put more of themselves into the relationship…

What are we doing in those situations if not trusting in someone, or something, as a savior? What are we doing if not looking to that person or that thing for deliverance? But time and time again, we find that all these saviors – be they money, or position, or relationships, or pleasure, or Gideon, or Jepthah, or Samson – they are all broken. Insufficient. Unable to truly deliver us. We see the inadequacies of these saviors in the book of Judges, and we are forced to confront all the broken saviors of our own lives that we tend to trust in. 

You can read the book of Judges and as you do, you come to story after story and you find yourself thinking, “Maybe this time this judge will actually be worthy of what has been entrusted to them.” And you think, “Maybe this time the people will actually recognize their sin and be faithful to their God.” But time and time again, you will be disappointed. But that disappointment leads us to a see something amazing:

Judges helps us see the determination of God. 

In the midst of this descending cycle of idolatry and sin, in the middle of this human commitment to its own version of truth, and in the midst of these imperfect deliverers, we are able to see the abject, steady, and faithful determination of God. We see that God is immeasurably committed to His people than we are to Him. It is a remarkable testimony to the faithfulness of God that He would continue in this cycle with His people despite their consistently proven fickleness. 

In his determination, He has given us the Savior we need.The perfect Savior. The One that does not fall short, for this is the kind of Savior we need. Indeed, only a perfect Savior can deliver such a continually wayward people. 

• We don’t need a savior like Ehud who, though he succeeded in killing an evil and oppressive king, did so in a spirit of anger and vengeance. We need a Savior that is gentle and lowly and conquered the ultimate enemies of sin and death through self-sacrifice. 
• We don’t need a savior like Gideon who, though he conquered the armies of Midian with a miraculously small army, was so fearful and doubting that he demanded signs from God three times before he went out. We need a Savior that even knowing what waited for Him there, resolutely turned His face and made His way to Jerusalem. 
• We don’t need a savior like Abimilech who was so fixated on his own power that he murdered 70 of his brothers in order to secure it. We need a Savior who even though he Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. 
• We don’t need a savior like Jephthah who in order to gain victory struck bargains with those around him and even God himself. We need a savior who bent low the night before His death and in faith prayed that not His will but God’s be done.
•  And we don’t need a savior like Samson who despite having an incredible amount of physical strength was never able to muster the spiritual strength to overcome his fleshly appetites. We need a Savior who though he could have at any moment called upon armies of angels to rescue Him willingly laid down His life for the very ones who were abandoning His lordship.

This is the kind of Savior we need. A better one. Because only a perfect Savior can deliver such a continually wayward people. The book of Judges is a call to recognize all the imperfect deliverers we have crafted for ourselves and abandon them, in light of God’s steadfast and determined commitment to His people, for the perfect Savior we find only in Jesus Christ.