A Historical Consciousness of Faith

(Judges 11:1–6, 11–13)                                                                             Pastor. Song Soo Park

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 group of adventurers gathered around him and followed him.

Some time later, when the Ammonites made war on Israel,

the elders of Gilead went to get Jephthah from the land of Tob.

 "Come," they said, "be our commander, so we can fight the Ammonites."

So Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made him head and commander over them. And he repeated all his words before the LORD in Mizpah.

Then Jephthah sent messengers to the Ammonite king with the question: "What do you have against us that you have attacked our country?"

The king of the Ammonites answered Jephthah's messengers, "When Israel came up out of Egypt, they took away my land from the Arnon to the Jabbok, all the way to the Jordan. Now give it back peaceably."

There have been many studies on how a person is born and how one grows. Among them, a man named John Locke said this: “When a human being is born, his mind and soul are like a blank white sheet on which nothing has yet been drawn.” As one grows, however, that blank soul is colored by the people around them and by their environment.

Yes, that sounds right. At birth, it seems as though there is nothing in our soul. Even as adults, when we reflect on ourselves, what fills our soul today appears to be the result of our relationships with people and the environment in which we have grown since birth.

But as I read the Bible, I realized that Locke overlooked one important thing. Human beings are not born with souls that are completely blank.
In Genesis 6:5 it says, “The LORD saw that the wickedness of mankind was great on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.”

And Romans 3:23 says, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. ”So, human beings are not born with a pure white, blank soul. Rather, what are we like? We are born more like crumpled, stained, and dirty paper.

Then what about the state of Jephthah’s soul, the man who appears in today’s passage? First, in verse 1, we see that Jephthah’s birth itself was tragic. He was not born under normal circumstances. His mother seems to have been a concubine of a married man, and her occupation was that of a prostitute.

So in one household lived the first wife, the second wife, the children born to the first wife, and Jephthah together. Imagine how cautiously Jephthah must have lived, how much discrimination he endured. Barely surviving with a self-esteem crushed to the ground by constant humiliation, what does Judges 11:2say?
“Gilead’s wife also bore him sons, and when they grew 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.’”

Yes, he was literally driven out. And what about his father? Even if Jephthah was born to a second wife, he was still his son. When such a young child was cast out, shouldn’t the father at least have taken minimal steps to ensure his survival? Yet he did nothing. This was Jephthah’s birth and the background of his upbringing.

Let us think about Jephthah’s soul. What must it have been like?
As mentioned earlier, what condition is the human soul in at birth?
Yes, everyone is born with a sinful nature. All are born with a stained canvas of the soul. But Jephthah’s already stained soul was further slashed with wounds, anger, and bitter roots.

With a soul torn and shredded by people and circumstances beyond his control, where could Jephthah turn for support? With nowhere to lean, where did he go? Let us look at Judges 11:3: “So Jephthah fled from his brothers and settled in the land of Tob, where a group of outlaws gathered around him and followed him.”

Yes, the place Jephthah found after being driven out with nowhere to rest his heart was a town called Tob. Though the name “Tob” means “good place,” it was by no means a good place. Tob was located near the territory of the Ammonites, enemies who oppressed Israel. Once they crossed the Jordan River, they could invade at any time.

For that reason, people generally did not choose to live in Tob. Most of its inhabitants were those fleeing from debt, slavery, or unbearable hardship.
Jephthah went there as if being chased—driven by circumstances and by people.

But what does Scripture say?Let us read Judges 11:3 again: “So Jephthah fled from his brothers and settled in the land of Tob, where a group of outlaws gathered around him and followed him.”

It says that “outlaws” gathered around Jephthah. Many people quickly judge Jephthah’s life when reading this verse. They say, “Of course—he grew up without a proper family, so he must have run around with thugs like himself,” judging and condemning him without truly knowing his life, fixating on a single word.

But the word translated as “outlaws” sounds very negative in Korean, yet in Hebrew it is a deeply sad and pitiful term. In Hebrew, the word is “rek enosh,” a compound of rek (empty) and enosh (people). It means “people who have nothing left,” or more simply, “people who are barely alive.”

Because of unexpected circumstances, personal mistakes, conditions from birth, or accidents, they lost everything—families shattered, bodies and hearts sick—and lived like weeds or stones rolling along the roadside. Such people were called rek enosh.

So when such people gathered around Jephthah, what did he do?
“…they gathered around him and went out with him.”

The phrase “went out with him” is often understood simply as associating together, but here it literally means going in and out—crossing boundaries such as gates, fortresses, or regions. In other words, while living in Tob, they crossed over the Jordan River into the land of Ammon and came back again.

Rejected by family and friends within Israel, unable to do anything in their homeland, they risked their lives crossing into enemy territory—sometimes fighting to seize goods, sometimes selling baskets or handmade items,
sometimes gathering herbs in Tob, or catching fish in the Jordan River—
we do not know exactly how, but in order to survive, they repeatedly crossed into the land of their enemy, Ammon, at the risk of their lives.

But Judges 11:1 calls Jephthah a “mighty warrior.” So it is unlikely that he survived merely by gathering herbs or selling baskets or fish. More likely, he entered Ammonite territory, fought, and lived on the spoils of battle.

That is why, when the Ammonites later attacked Israel, people who had heard of Jephthah’s reputation came to seek his help. Judges 11:4–6 says:
“Some time later, when the Ammonites were fighting against Israel, the elders of Gilead went to get Jephthah from the land of Tob. ‘Come,’ they said, ‘be our commander, so we can fight the Ammonites.’”

At this point, we need to examine Jephthah’s life carefully once again.
He was born with a stained soul. On top of that, his closest family inflicted wounds upon that soul.

Yet how did this man—living in Tob with people who were barely surviving—manage not only to endure but to live boldly, becoming so influential that those who once despised and mocked him, even the elders of Israel, came seeking his help? It was not simply because he was good at fighting.

As we continue reading Scripture, the reason becomes clear—why God raised him up as a judge. First, let us look at Judges 11:11.

When the Ammonites attacked, the elders of Israel came to Jephthah and asked him to become their commander. Jephthah expressed his resentment: “You drove me out and despised me—why come to me now in your distress?” Then the elders offered another condition: if he won the war, he would not only be the military commander but the leader over all Gilead.

Jephthah accepted this condition, and verse 11 shows us his response:
“Then Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made him head and commander over them. And he repeated all his words before the LORD in Mizpah.”

The first thing Jephthah did after hearing this was to pray to God.
And where did he pray? At Mizpah.

Mizpah was Jephthah’s hometown. In the Old Testament, Mizpah holds deep spiritual significance. When Jacob was pursued by his uncle Laban and faced danger, God appeared to Laban in a dream and warned him not to harm Jacob. Through God’s intervention, Jacob overcame the crisis and made a covenant of non-aggression with Laban. Laban called it Jegar Sahadutha in Aramaic, but Jacob called it Mizpah, marking it as a testimony that God had intervened.

From then on, the Israelites prayed, worshiped, and made vows at Mizpah.
Judges 20:1; Judges 21:1; and 1 Samuel 7:5–6 all testify to this.

So Jephthah had a place of prayer—Mizpah. Though people drove him out of his hometown, no one could drive him out of that spiritual place of prayer. Because he did not lose this place, he was able to guard his soul.

But Jephthah had another important spiritual quality besides this place of prayer. In Judges 11:12 and following, Jephthah sent messengers to the king of Ammon, warning him to return to his land. The Ammonite king replied (Judges 11:13), claiming that Israel had taken his land during the Exodus.

Was this claim true? No. Jephthah carefully explained the entire history of the Exodus, the wilderness journey, and the conquest of Canaan (Judges 11:14–28). He explained that Israel did not seize land recklessly, that they respected Edom and Moab, and that only when attacked by Sihon did they fight—and God gave them victory. The land, he said, was not taken by human strength but given by God.

Jephthah then made his decisive point: Israel had lived on that land for 300 years—why claim it now? With nothing left to say, the Ammonite king chose war, and God completely defeated the Ammonites through Jephthah.

From this, we see that Jephthah was not only a man of prayer, but also one who knew God’s redemptive history precisely. He understood the Exodus, the wilderness journey, and the conquest of Canaan, and he applied that history to the problems of his present time.

Yes, Jephthah was a man with a historical consciousness of faith.
Historical consciousness means recognizing that past events are not disconnected from us today, but are linked to our present lives.

The Exodus still has spiritual meaning for us today. The events at Kadesh Barnea still affect us. The fall of Jericho and the capture of Ai can still be reenacted in our own lives. We live with the awareness that the spiritual events and grace of the past can be experienced again in the present.

That is why, as we read Scripture, we prepare and pray like Moses,
fight with courage like Joshua, without turning to the left or the right.
Because Jephthah possessed this historical consciousness of faith, he was able to guard his soul and be used by God as a judge.

Hebrews 13:7–8 says: “Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”

The faith of believers in the past continues to influence us today because the God who authored that faith transcends time and space and is always the same. Thus, historical consciousness of faith is not merely knowing stories of believers from the past, but experiencing the same God they experienced, here and now.

That is why those who possess this historical consciousness of faith have deep and broad faith. They do not judge God by present circumstances or visible results alone, but see Him within the great flow of redemptive history.

Because Jephthah held such faith, his name is recorded in Hebrews 11, the chapter of the heroes of faith: “And what more shall I say? I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson and Jephthah, about David and Samuel and the prophets” (Hebrews 11:32).