James 3:5-6 The tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.
Informed Faith - The Scriptures do not give us a perfect picture of God… It gives us a picture of how ancient cultures understood God, and their relationship to God.
Sacrifice in the Ancient World: Animal sacrifice was prevalent in ancient cultures such as those of the Mesopotamians, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, and various peoples of the Indus Valley and the Americas. These societies believed in gods or spirits that needed appeasement or acknowledgment through offerings, including animals.
Sacrifice was perceived as a form of gift or exchange with divine beings. By offering something of value (e.g., a prized animal), humans sought reciprocity in the form of blessings, protection, or other benefits.
Sacrificing animals was often part of larger religious rituals that marked important events such as harvests, births, deaths, and changes in seasons. The act itself was considered a sacred and symbolic offering.
Sacrificial uniqueness in the law of Moses: sacrifices were not to appease an angry God… They were recognition of the Person’s need for forgiveness of sin to be holy before a holy God.
Setup: (Judges were not spiritual leaders)
Judges 10:6-8 Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD. They served the Baals and the Ashtoreths, and the gods of Aram, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites and the gods of the Philistines. And because the Israelites forsook the LORD and no longer served him, he became angry with them. He sold them into the hands of the Philistines and the Ammonites, who that year shattered and crushed them. For eighteen years they oppressed all the Israelites on the east side of the Jordan in Gilead, the land of the Amorites.
Jephthah’s History:
Judges 11:1-3 Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty warrior. His father was Gilead; his mother was a prostitute. Gilead’s wife also bore him sons, and when they were grown up, they drove Jephthah away. ‘You are not going to get any inheritance in our family,’ they said, ‘because you are the son of another woman.’ So Jephthah fled from his brothers and settled in the land of Tob, where a gang of scoundrels gathered around him and followed him.
Jephthah Asked to lead
Jephthah’s Rash Vow
Judges 11:30-31 Jephthah made a vow to the LORD: ‘If you give the Ammonites into my hands, whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the LORD’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.’
The battle is won!!
Judges 11:34-35 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of timbrels! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter. When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, ‘Oh! My daughter! You have brought me down and I am devastated. I have made a vow to the LORD that I cannot break.’
Judges 11:36-39 ‘My father,’ she replied, ‘you have given your word to the LORD. Do to me just as you promised, now that the LORD has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. But grant me this one request,’ she said. ‘Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.’
‘You may go,’ he said. And he let her go for two months. She and her friends went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. After the two months, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.
Judges 11:39-40 From this comes the Israelite tradition that each year the young women of Israel go out for four days to commemorate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.
The commemoration of Jephthah’s daughter would have been a poignant reminder of the consequences of vows made to God and the importance of honoring those vows thoughtfully and responsibly.
Biblical Prohibitions: The Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) explicitly forbids child sacrifice multiple times. For instance, in Leviticus 18:21, it states, “Do not give any of your children to be sacrificed to Molek, for you must not profane the name of your God. I am the LORD.” This commandment was part of broader laws given to the Israelites to distinguish their worship from the practices of neighboring peoples.
Adam: Ethics and Integrity
Would a vow mean anything to us?
“My word is my bond”
London Stock Exchange. It reflects a time when business transactions were often sealed with a handshake and a person’s reputation for honesty and integrity was paramount in business dealings.
Do we honor our word?
Without lawyers & Contracts?
Do I still honor my word when it becomes… inconvenient, cost me money, cost me relationships, cost me credibility or brings ridicule?
My Rash Vow…
Matthew 5:33-37 ‘Again, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘Do not break your oath, but fulfill to the Lord the vows you have made.’ But I tell you, do not swear an oath at all: either by heaven, for it is God’s throne; or by the earth, for it is his footstool; or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white or black. All you need to say is simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No;’ anything beyond this comes from the evil one.
James 5:12 Above all, my brothers and sisters, do not swear–not by heaven or by earth or by anything else. All you need to say is a simple ‘Yes’ or ‘No.’ Otherwise you will be condemned.
What I’m trying to do, and remind myself of… Don’t make sweeping promises about what I will or will not do, but simply say “Today I will do what I believe God has called me to do… with faithfulness, courage and with integrity.”
Song intro: What is a Beautiful Life? Significance, purpose, integrity, is above all temporal pleasure… not is about Who am I?