Shamgar

Charity, and did you pray to God to put it in their hearts to go with you? Christian, yes, and that with much warmth, for you may think how dear they were to me.

thus did christian talk with his friends till it grew dark and then he took his rest in a large room the name of which was peace there he slept till break of day and then he sent a hymn they told him that he should not live till they had shown him more of the rare things that were in that place There were to be seen the rod of Moses, the nail with which Jael slew Caesarea, the lambs with which Gideon put to flight a host of Midian, and the ox-goat with which Shamgar slew his foes.

And they brought out a drawn bone of an ass with which Samson did such great feats, and the sling and stone with which David slew Goliath of Gath.

then i saw in my dream that christian rose to take his leave of discretion and of prudence piety and charity but they said that he must stay till the next day that they must show him the delectable mountains so we took him to the top of the house and bade him look to the south which he did and lo a great way off he saw a rich land full of fields woods vines shrubs and streams what is the name of this land said christian then they told him it was emmanuel's land and said they it is as much bent for you and the like of you as this hill is and when you reach the place there you may see the gate of the celestial city then they gave him a sword and put on him a coat of mail which was proved from head to foot lest he should meet some fault in the way and they went with him down the hill of a truth said christian it is as great a toil to come down the hill as it was to go up crudence so it is for it is a hard thing for a man to go down the vale of humiliation as thou dost now and for this cause have we come with you to the foot of the hill so though he went with great care yet he caught a slip or two Then in my dream I saw that when they had got to the foot of the hill, these good friends of Christian's gave him a loaf of bread, a flask of wine, and a bunch of dry grapes, and then they left him to go on his way.

And so we see this glimpse of hope in this otherwise rather sad and difficult story of decline.

But it leaves us tonight challenged because the ultimate humiliation here for Israel was really Shamgar, the third judge mentioned in the chapter.

Shamgar wasn't actually a Hebrew.

He was an outsider.

And because of their sin, God didn't even choose an Israelite.

He was likely a Canaanite.

And Shamgar uses an ox code which is used to prod the two oxen under the yoke to keep them in line to bring about Israel's rescue.

And it's a real statement about why they need that in the first place.

What was Deborah doing? If we go to Judges 5, verse 6-7, they sing a song of deliverance.

And what does it say? In the days of Shamgar, son of Anath, in the days of Jael, the highways were abandoned.

Travelers took to winding paths.

Villagers in Israel would not fight.

cool.

But she brought up, and I even had to make a quick little chart where 18 times where Savior is being used were Moses, Joshua, Nathaniel, Deborah, Gideon, Shamgar.

Gideon actually three times is called it, Samson, David, Tilgath.

All of these people are called the Savior.