 Good evening and welcome to today's midweek prayer meeting before we start. I'd like us to pray. Let us pray. I have a little further. Thank you so much for this wonderful evening, dear Lord, as we are going to have this prayer meeting. May you be with us from the start till the end. I pray for the speaker, dear Lord, may you speak to us through her. In Jesus' name I pray amen. We'll worship in song and we'll start with song number 595. Let every lamp be burning. Let every lamp be burning bright. The darkest hour is nearing. The darkest hour of a long night. Before the Lord's appearing. Then trimmy breath rendee. Then trimmy Godly fee. The mast is coming. Drow thousands come. First grace message is burning. We'll rest our living faith upon his promise of return. Godly fee. The mast is coming. Let every lamp be burning. Is what a lamp his truth our guide. We cannot be mistaken. Though dangers rise on every side. We shall not be forsaken. Then trimmy Godly fee. The mast is coming. Let every lamp be burning. Let good works with faith appear. To have the world around. We didn't springs. The blessing leaf has firmly bound. Godly fee. The mast is coming. Let every lamp be burning. We'll turn to song number 554. Or let me walk with thee. 554. Let me walk yet see. I cannot dare not walk. To be found from the book of judges for whole chapter. Before we read, let's pray. Our God and our Father, Lord, we come before you this evening to say thank you for the whole day. Lord, as we are going to read your word, may it find a place in our hearts to learn more about you. And even to bring us more closer to you for in Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Okay, I'll read judges 4. When Elliot was dead, the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord. So the Lord sold them into the hands of Jabin, king of Kanan, who raised in Heza. The commander of his army was Cicera, who dwelt in Herosef, Hagojim. And the children of Israel cried out to the Lord for Jabin and the 900 chariots of iron. And for 20 years he had harshly oppressed the children of Israel. Now Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth was judging Israel at that time. And she would sit under the palm tree of Deborah between Rama and Bethel in the mount of Ephraim. And the children of Israel came to her for judgment. Then she sent and called for Barak, the son of Abinom, from Kedesh in Naftali and said to him, Has not the God of Israel commanded, go and deploy troops at Mount Taba. Take with you then 10,000 men of the sons of Naftali and of the sons of Zebolam. And against you, I will deploy Cicera, the commander of Jabin's army with his chariots and his multitude at the river Kishon. And I will deliver them into your hand. And Barak said to her, if you will go with me, then I will go. But if you will not go with me, I will not go. So she said, I will surely go with you. Nevertheless, there will be no glory for you in the journey you are taking. For the Lord will sell Cicera into the hands of a woman. Then Deborah arose and went with Barak to Kedesh. And Barak called Zebolam and said, sorry, Barak called Zebolam and Naftali to Kedesh. And he went up with the 10,000 and under his command and Deborah went up with him. Now Heba, the Kenite of the children of Habub, the father in law of Moses, had separated himself from the Kenites and pitched his tent near the Terebeth tree at Zanim, which is beside Kedesh. And they reported to Cicera that Barak, the son of Abinom, had gone up to Mount Teba. So Cicera gathered together all his chariots, 900 chariots of iron, and all the people who were with him from Harosheth, Hajoyim, to the river Kishon. Then Deborah said to Barak, up! For this is the day in which the Lord has delivered Cicera into your hand. Has not the Lord gone out before you? So Barak went down from Mount Teba with 10,000 men following him. And the Lord rooted Cicera and all his chariots and all his army with the age of the sword before Barak. And Cicera alighted from his chariot and fled away on foot. But Barak pursued the chariots and the army as far as Harosheth, Hajoyim, and all the army of Cicera fell by the age of the sword, not a man was left. However, Cicera had fled away on foot to the tent of Jail, the wife of Hiba, the Kanaite. For there was peace between Jabim King of Heza and the house of Hiba, the Kanaite. And Jail went out to meet Cicera and said to him, turn aside, my Lord, turn aside to me, do not fear. And when he had turned aside with her into the tent, she covered him with a blanket. Then he said to her, please give me a little water to drink. For I am thirsty, so she opened a jug of milk, gave him a drink and covered him. And he said to her, stand at the door of the tent. And if any man comes inquiries of you and says, is there any man here, you shall say no. Then Jail, Hiba's wife took a tent peg and took a hammer into her hand and went softly to him and drove the peg into the temple. And it went down into the ground, for he was fast asleep and weary, so he died. And then, as Barak pasud Cicera, Jail came out to meet him and said to him, come, I will show you the man who you seek. And when he went into her tent, there lay Cicera dead with the peg in the temple. So on that day, God subdued Jabim King of Kenan in his presence of the children of Israel. And the hand of the children of Israel grew stronger and stronger against Jabim King of Kenan until they had destroyed Jabim King of Kenan. May God bless the world. We'll turn to our hymno for the opening song, which is 608, Faith is the Victory. Faith is the battle if the night shall veil the glowing skies. Against the fall in veils below, let all our strength be heard. Faith is the vision's health he shall know. Faith is worship service today. We invite the Holy Spirit to be our instructor. Even as we study the meaning of the word that you've blessed us with this evening, that you may be able to apply it into our lives, and that our lives will not be the same again. We want to pray you forgive us our sins, that my father, we may be receptive and nothing will stand in the way of your blessing for us as we have this prayer service. In Jesus name I pray and believe. Amen. Good evening. It's good to be here. And I'd like to welcome all of you, those who are in the sanctuary today and those who are watching online to our midweek prayer meeting this first day of November 2023. And I want to thank my friend and my sister for reading this long scripture so well and following with Jesus pattern where they would read the scripture and then it would be discussed after. The topic today is courage and empowerment and we are looking at the story of Deborah. Colin's dictionary describes courage as the quality of mind or spirit that enables a person to face difficulty, danger or pain without fear. What comes to mind if I was to ask you what courage synonyms like bravery, valor, guts, endurance, intrepidity or prowess may come to mind. Bibilically, courage means trusting the Lord as our true source of strength. Courage is a quality possessed by individuals of conviction and restraint. Empowerment on the other hand immediately probably brings to your mind the word of having authority or power given to someone to do something. Bibilically to give power is to authorize, permit or enable someone to achieve the impossible. My favorite description of empowerment is the release of God's ability to achieve His will. Let's get a bit of background. We have a judge called Deborah, but what really happened to the children of Israel? I like this man Paul, he was very educated and he knew how to do, is it a synopsis or an introduction to a whole write up. In the book of Acts chapter 13 and verse 20, you can start from verse 16, but let me start in 17. He summarized the life of the Israelites in three or four short verses. That is prior to the story of Deborah. He said the God of this nation Israel chose our ancestors. He then honored them in Egypt by leading them out of their slavery. He then nursed them through the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. He destroyed seven nations in Canaan. He gave Israel their land as an inheritance and judges ruled Israel for about 450 years. When we take a sneak preview back right there where this is playing out, we have this man of God called Joshua who is about to die. He knows this dealing with people that are stiff neck that keep forgetting. He reminds them in the last paragraphs of the book of Joshua of all of God's doings and treated them to be faithful. They promised to be faithful which he wrote down and lodged away somewhere and the famous script that says, as for me and my house we shall serve the Lord is born there. He told them that if they obeyed God, the good that they were already enjoying would continue to be theirs. But if they disobeyed God, that God could literally wipe them out and his anger would rise hot against them. So this story now moves to judges the period 400 BC to 1050 BC. Remember during this time judges are the highest civil authority and in most cases someone by God to serve the people by divine appointment. So the children of Israel have spent 40 years in the desert. They are now already entering Canaan and their trade during the 40 years in the wilderness had become nomadic in nature. So they come to a land of milk and honey that they had been promised where there was everything growing well. To land of Canaanites where the Canaanites were traders, they were agriculturalists and they were very good in the art of war. They also worshipped Baal, they worshipped El, that's EL, they worshipped Anath, Astoret among other deities and they really displeased God because among some of the practices they did were abominations against God, sexual immorality and even brutal acts of like murdering and killing children at the altars of their gods. So what happened? The Israelites quickly adapted agricultural practices alongside idolatry practices. Now when Joshua died they asked God what they should do. They had already been allocated where they were supposed to conquer and settle. Now listen to how this played out and I'll just read some of them. The house of Judah goes fast. They asked the Lord and God was with them and they won several battles and you will see this in the book of Judges chapter 1 from around verse 1 to 19 or 20 thereabouts. So many battles they won more than seven and then something happened. The last battle they fought, they failed to conquer the people of the valley. So what happened? They stayed with them. Then there is a faithful tribe, a faithful house, the house of Kaleb. Then they conquered Hebron the way they had been commanded. How are they supposed to do this? They had been instructed to drive out the people they find in these places they've been allocated. They'll drive them out either physically or by burning down everything and destroying everything and starting afresh. The house of Benjamin. Oh, what did they do? They spared some jebusites. So what happened? They continued staying together with these jebusites they spared. Joseph's house. You'd think this would be perfectly run. They conquered Bethel but they spared one man. The man who thought who they met at the city gate to give them secrets that enabled them to disseminate their city. But they spared one man who went on to Syria and started the city of Luz which is there up to date according to the Bible. Manase. The house of Manase did not even drive out anybody in their city or in the neighboring towns. They just moved in. The house of Zebulam. They did not kill everybody. They killed some and then they left some people as slaves. The house of Asha. They didn't even drive out anyone. The house of Naftali. The house of Dan. Of the people they found. I think they entered a treaty like you, servers will spare your lives. The house of Dan. They did not even succeed in driving out anyone. They were even evicted to the mountains by the people they were supposed to drive out. So this is the recipe for disaster. These people mingled with the kana nights they met. They intermarried. The kana nights married their own children. So they became one big happy community but the result was devastating. They disobeyed God and they did idolatry. So God left their presence and God allowed them to be tortured and mishandled by the surrounding kingdoms. I'll give you an example. There were a number of judges but I'll just mention only three for the purpose of the discourse for tonight. So after Joshua died they disobeyed and for eight years God left them to the Masi of the King of Mesopotamia. And they were harassed, they suffered and then they remembered and asked God for help and God sent Othaniel. Othaniel was a judge in Israel. And so while Othaniel lived for 40 years they had peace. Then Othaniel died. After Othaniel died, can you imagine they forgot? I keep wondering in eight years even if you trained a child in Pathfinder for eight years, how quickly do they forget God and go back to their former life. But that's exactly what the children of Israel did. So for 18 years they suffered again away from God. Then they remembered and asked God for Masi and God sent Ehud. He delivered them from King Eglon of Moab and for eight years they had peace. Then Ehud died. And after Ehud died they again forgot God. And for 20 years they lived in bondage under King Jabin of Hazor. Now this king doesn't come alone. He comes as a package. He had Sisera, the captain of the army that bullied and tortured the children of Israel. I want us to just figure out what was happening the time God called Deborah to be a judge in Israel. The children of Israel had been bullied into a corner by this strong-handed man called Sisera. He ensured that there were soldiers packed in many places along the way so they could no longer use the main roads. They used back roads. They were so bullied that commerce ceased. They were so bullied and harassed and terrorized that according to judges chapter 5 and verse 6 to 8 and allow me to read it, it says that in those days highways were unoccupied and the travelers walked through byways. The inhabitants of the villages ceased. They ceased in Israel until I, Deborah, arose a mother in Israel. You can imagine whole villages vanishing. And the kind of calf you put them, I think with all sobaness, we thank God we are here. And it's very sobering when I look back at the last three years of our world's history. Imagine what we went through during the season of COVID. Governments made decrease. They made us stay in our homes. We could not walk certain times. People ran out of food. People died. People lost loved ones. People could not even bury their dead. You can imagine this children of Israel, this was the way of life for 20 years. We suffered for about 2 years. They suffered for 20 years. These people were so used to suffering that it took so long for them to cry out to God again. And God called to Deborah and she arose. Who is this Deborah? In Africa we sometimes identify married women and not their own names. I'm glad that she addresses herself as Deborah in Judges chapter 5. But assume we are here in Africa and then I'll say, Mrs. Lapidoth is the woman that became the prophet for Israel. Who is Mrs. Lapidoth? She was a prophetess. She was a judge in Israel. The only human being that I know in my Bible cover to cover we even had a tree named after her because she used to judge at the palm of Deborah. This was at some raised ground where she judged cases and brought peace between worrying people from Israel. Not only that, she prophesied directly on any word God gave her and she helped bring back sanity among the children of Israel. So she was brave, she was obedient to God, she served God during a terrible time and she had a great anointing. She was impeccable. There is no speck that is talked about in her character that brings any doubt about who she was in her character and upbringing and the way she lived her life. She was respected and she was respectful. She was a poet and a worship leader. It tells me that she must have been fairly educated and maybe in fairly high ranking status even among the Israelites despite all the harrowing troubles they went through. So what lessons do we pick from this amazing woman of God? First thing I learned is she was the first woman judge. It tells me that God can use anyone he pleases regardless of gender, race, age or abilities. What is your excuse? Is it I'm a woman? Is it I'm too young? Is it I'm too old? Is it I come from this kind of race and in my race people don't worship this kind of God? What are our excuses? By the way, especially to the gender of the females in the world, this history has been carrying through. Fortune 500 companies, the report shows that only 10% of the Fortune 500 companies are female CEOs and the world is so delighted because a year or two ago it was 8%. I want us to pick a lesson from some of these other players that we have here. I want to first of all talk about Sisera. Whenever the name Sisera is mentioned, it's mentioned in connection with the 900 ion chariot that he had. Have we put our faith and trust in chariot? He was a commander, he was a hash man he was keen and he was swift. As soon as he saw the army of Israel had gathered, he gathered his entire army and all the 900 chariot and he went down to go fight them. Now this man with his army, what God had planned is that the river where the war was going to happen and by the way, people, geography experts even now tell us that that river has such thick mud. If the rain falls for 15 minutes, it is hard to even walk on it. So are we then surprised that the horses that were pulling the chariot could not move and a very harrowing report is put in the Bible that tells us that the horses' legs even got broken and a horse with a broken leg is useless. And all the chariot vanished and all the men got killed by Israel's army. And this man, Sisera, when he found that everybody had gone down, he ran away on foot. Suddenly the horses could not help him, the chariot could not help him and he ran to a place where he thought he could get help and he meets our favorite Jail here and she encourages him to take a break at her tent and he asks for a drink of water and he is given milk. Now the kind of milk he was given is not fresh milk. She didn't go to milk or cow or camel. Historians say that she had cattle milk, full fat milk and this milk is very richer. It has hypnagogic effects or it helps you to fall asleep. It's like a luxury. It actually provides like sensory pleasure and the guy was able to sleep. So I want to ask a question. What is it that we are eating or consuming either through the food we eat, through our five senses, what we hear, what we see, where we go, what we do that is giving us sensory pleasure and it is darling the brain from listening to the voice of God. What is it in our life that we are doing or saying that is reducing our spiritual alertness? I want to go back to this amazing lady Jail. Jail was even like another tribe, married to another tribe. I think we understand that in the concept of Africa. They say she was Bedwin and wife of Heber, the Kenite. We know the Kenites were relatives of Moses in laws. Now the whole team of the Kenites, when they came they settled somewhere and I'm going to give that as homework to you to find out where as we chambua scripture. So they all settled but this one family moved. This one family moved and they happened to be in the way that Sisera passed. They were there by divine appointment. So let me now talk about this lady that we have come to admire who became the heroine in this story of the war that Deborah led. This lady, I think when she saw Sisera and I want to say with all due respect I don't think she was a murderer. She did not have weapons of murder in her tent. In fact they were very peaceful family. And this family happened to be at peace with the Kenites and Sisera knew it. So she lured him. She thought the Israelites would be hot on his heels. So she welcomed him. She covered him with a shawl which was very special in Israel by the way. There was some for honor and some for use at night and it was so important that God did not even allow you to take someone's gown because they used it at night when they slept. She covered him and after giving milk he fell deep asleep. She must have stood at the door as instructed and she must have waited and nobody came and she realized soon he would be awake. I want to submit to you and some writers have said that the Holy Spirit must have spoken to her and told her she needed to do something. So she used what was available to her, a tent peg and I think with viewer discretion because this must be a very scary image then she put the peg through Sisera's head and he died and that is how God gave the battle over to a woman. Now there's this man called Barak. Barak was an amazing guy. He mobilized 10,000 soldiers and all but when he was told to go and fight Sisera he gave another condition. God is calling us to unconditional obedience because he gave conditions and demanded that first of all he goes with the prophet means he did not have confidence in his faith. He actually used Debra as a handbag to even round up the 10,000 guys and tell them Debra is coming with us, there is war we are going to win. Debra said that she is coming with us. He did not have confidence in his ability as God had spoken to him. Could God be empowering us today and he has given us the courage to be able to do stuff. Walk in faith and walk in abundance and be able to serve him and we are making excuses thinking I must go with my pastor. Your neighbor is sick. You cannot offer a prayer because you need to call a pastor in. You see a child in the street and you could help but you are like I think the police should do that. Do we make excuses? We may lose the stars on our crown by not obeying when God speaks to us directly. I want to bring this down to one other party that I really want us to catch up with in Judges Chapter 5 and verse 23. This is a very important one and I don't want us to lose the lesson. Now, when the battle was won, Debra wrote this amazing poem in Chapter 5 of Judges and it's said to be the first and it's one of the most amazing poems and they praised and worshiped God and she says in verse 23. Kasi meroz say the angel of the Lord Kasi bitali the inhabitants thereof because they came not to the help of the Lord to the help of the Lord against the mighty. Now, just imagine what could have happened when all the houses of Israel were asked to come to war. A number of them, two houses just said immediately you got all of us, some send bans, some had to do what we do today. Call a church board, call a church business meeting. Oh, so and so the minutes are not yet out. Call consensus and then say no. We've got to discuss this better. We have to take this decision to the conference first. Oh, no, no, no. There were some of the tribes were so busy discussing whether they should go to war until the war was over and they missed the glory in participating and for not showing up the God sent an angel to cast them. Can you imagine that? This sends shivas down my spine. Could it be that due to inaction on my part and I know I've been guilty many times and I'm repenting. I don't know about you that stuff is happening and I do not participate and God will still have his way with or without me and God will send a curse for inactivity. During COVID, we raised money to support the needy and some people never gave a shilling that opportunity passed. This year we've had project for Hope Africa. We were told to invite people to watch people to come. Many of us are guilty for doing nothing. May Lord have mercy on us. But the recordings are still there will we do something about it. Some of us are keeping children in the house we are not bringing them to the Lord. Some of us, a child says let's take food to our neighbor. You look at how much it costs and you'd rather throw it away in the rubbish bin than give another person that needs it. Some of us live in gated communities are greeting a kind wife to the watchman we will not give. And we lose an opportunity that God has placed in our path. May God help us and forgive us for the things that we have failed to do. And may God take away the curse of meros from our medist as we purpose to be who he really meant us to be. I like what Martin Luther King said. He said, the silence of good people is more dangerous than the brutality of the bad people. In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends. Do we fail to speak up when we should? Do you know a neighbor who is going through abuse and you could help and you do nothing? Is it possible that you are gifted in understanding the word and you could start a Bible study and you are silent? May God help us be aware of the gifts and talent he has put in us so that when the time comes we are able to utilize this gift when he enables us to make use of them. The challenge today and my prayer for all of us before we move into a season of prayer is the book of Hebrews chapter 12 and verse 1. So I'm going to invite you to read that with me from your various versions and allow me to read from the version I have here. Hebrews chapter 12 and verse 1 and verse 2. Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us and let us run with patience the rest that is set before us. Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith who for the joy that was set before him endure the cross, despising the shame and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. I pray today that we can have the courage to stand like Deborah. I pray today that we will take up the empowerment God has already given us that is ours with all the abilities and gifts he has put in us and that will not let God down. At this point, I'm going to request wherever we are if you have your family with you or you're by yourself those in the sanctuary and those in our homes I pray that we find the time to solemnly do some soul searching and beyond this prayer I'm trusting God that we will take time to continue to be in a mode of worship and soul searching and to mend and repair our ways that we will not be caught sitting inactive and passive where we should take action to the glory and honour of the name of the Lord. Let us pray our Father, our God we come before you you are a great and gracious God you are wanted to be worshiped you are wanted to be praised and none like you you have been there from the beginning of the world and you will be there beyond the end of the world and we are privileged to call you Abba Father we thank you for your goodness and your massi we thank you for your masses which are ever new we thank you for Jesus Christ and the blood of Jesus shed at Calvary for forgiveness of our sins and it's because of this that we come in confidence that when we confess our sins today you are faithful you are just you will deliver us and forgive us our sins as far as they may be from east to west and you will wash us as white as snow my father we pray today that you will give us a new beginning we thank you for the word that you've given us we thank you for the opportunity to be able to listen and to watch this word we pray that we will not be caught being inactive and sitting on our laurels anymore as we know about Jesus Christ we pray that we may be seekers of truth that we will intensify our task for knowledge that every single day my father we will start our day with the knowledge and acknowledgement of your lordship of our lives that we will seek to understand scripture more dearly that my father every day we will open our eyes both physical and spiritual eyes to the needs around us that you need us to fulfill oh my father that where you have enabled us to be the voice of reason to be your hands and feet and eyes and mouth that Jehovah God will not be found failing anymore I want to pray that when all these things happen and the victory has come through our actions and the opportunities you've given us that we'll be careful like Deborah to give all the glory and honor back to you we pray my father that nothing will hold us back that we will remember the courage of Deborah that we will remember that you have empowered us and that we remember that even those who have been feeling marginalized or disempowered that narrative has been rewritten so we thank you we worship you we glorify you for all you've done and all you will do because I've prayed in the precious name of our lord and saviour Jesus Christ amen may God bless you amen thank you for the wonderful sharing sister Phoebe we'd like us to turn to our hymnals for the closing song 602 O brother be faithful O brother be faithful Son Jesus will come for whom we have waited so long Oh soon we shall enter a glorious home and joy is sung such deep, such unbounded regions of angels its chariot attend and now may the grace of our lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us now and forevermore amen