THE STORYTELLER'S BIBLE
Act II - Conquest and Kings, Scene 2
Script by Bob Allen
For four voices

Scene 2

1          3          4          2

VOICE THREE:        The battle for the souls of men, waged by Satan and his demonic                                                          hordes, left the realm of the inner man and broke out into open warfare with 

                                 the invasion of Canaan by the people of Israel.   The iniquity of the Amorites, 

                                 prophesied to Abraham, hundreds of years before, had come to the full.

VOICE ONE:             The Osiris-Isis cult from Egypt.  The religious prostitution and infant sacrifice performed for Tammuz, the fertility god of Mesopotamia and Ishtar, the bloodthirsty goddess of war and love had produced a culture of depraved impurity plagued with sexually transmitted diseases.

VOICE TWO:              God knew the results of allowing such a culture to co-exist with  

                                     His people.  The holiness He demanded of them would never be                                      their experience.

VOICE FOUR:          Their daughters would marry idolaters.

VOICE ONE:             Their sons would visit the heathen temples.

VOICE THREE:        Their neighbors would persuade them to forsake Jehovah God.

VOICE TWO:           The nations that remained would fight them continually.  There is  

                                  no peaceful co-existence with sin.

VOICE FOUR:          Every man would do that which was right in his own eyes.

VOICE ONE:             (STAND)  Welcome to the days of the Judges.

VOICE TWO:            Baal, lord of heaven!

VOICE THREE:        Ashtoroth, queen of heaven!

VOICE FOUR:          Male and female consorts whose wrath needed to be appeased by  

                                   infant sacrifice.

VOICE TWO:          They served the former residents of the land well in times of   

                                 plague and drought.  Why shouldn’t we serve them alongside  

                                  Jehovah?

VOICE ONE:             Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.

VOICE THREE:        Most of the local kings had been defeated by Joshua, but God was                                   not about to allow sin to go unpunished among his people.  A  

                                  Mesopotamian monarch flexed his muscle from the other side of                                   the fertile crescent and the people of Israel served him for eight  

                                  years.

VOICE FOUR:         They were delivered by a nephew of Caleb whose name was                                                                    Othniel.  The remnants of the godly families were still present to  

                                 call them back to God.

VOICE TWO:          The next attack also came from outside their borders.  Moab,   

                                 Ammon and Amalek—the nations to the east of the Jordan River                                  decided they had put up with the upstart Israelis long enough.                                   

                                 Jericho was re-taken and the eastern tribes served Moab for                                             eighteen years.

VOICE ONE:          (SIT)  Eglon, the king of Moab, received the messenger with the  

                                annual tribute money from the eastern tribes, just as he had done  

                                for the past eighteen years.  But this year the taxes came with an   

                                added token of the esteem with which he was held by those he had                                 conquered.

VOICE FOUR:          Ehud happened to be left-handed, so the guards who searched                                    him at the gate overlooked his concealed weapon, a dagger  

                                   with an eighteen inch blade.

VOICE THREE:        Ehud called his knife “a message from God” as he placed it deftly                                   into the stomach of the extremely fat king, thrusting until the blade  

                                  and handle had completely disappeared. 

VOICE TWO:           Leaving the king dead in his summer parlor, Ehud gathered an                                                                 army from the tribe of Ephraim and delivered God’s people from  

                                 the leaderless Moabites.

VOICE ONE:             (STAND)  Shamgar killed six hundred Philistines with an ox goad.

VOICE TWO:            (STAND)  Deborah led the nation into battle against Sisera when   

                                   Barak refused to go alone.  The Lord gave them the victory and                                    Sisera fell into the hands of another woman, Jael, who finished him  

                                  off with a tent peg through his head.

VOICE THREE:        Still Israel had not learned their lesson for they did evil in the sight                                   of God yet again and this time they served the Midianites for seven  

                                  years.

VOICE FOUR:          (STAND AND WITH #1 AND 2 TURN TO LOOK AT #3).                                                                   Gideon proved to be a singularly reluctant judge.

VOICE ONE:             The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valor.

VOICE THREE:        (REMAIN SEATED)  Me?  The Lord is with me?  If the Lord is                                                             with me then why have all these terrible things happened to us?  

                                 Where are the miracles our fathers used to talk about?  I sure  

                                 haven’t seen any plagues being visited on the Midianites lately.

VOICE ONE:             Go in your own might and you will save Israel from the hand of                                     the Midianites.  Haven’t I sent you?

VOICE THREE:        Me?  How am I going to do that?  My family is the poorest in all                                   of Manasseh and I’m the least in all my father’s house.

VOICE ONE:             God will go with you and you will smite the Midianites.

VOICE THREE:        If you are really from God, then show me a sign.  And while I’m  

                                  waiting for the miracle I’ll scrounge up something for us to eat.

VOICE TWO:          As soon as the meal was set out on top of a flat rock the angel told                                                         Gideon to pour hot broth over the entire meal.  When everything   

                                was soaking wet the angel touched it with his staff and fire from  

                                the rock consumed the cakes, the meat and even the broth.

VOICE THREE:        Not bad.  I’m impressed.  But let’s try another test.  I’ll leave this  

                                  wool fleece out on the threshing floor tonight.  Let’s see you make                                   the fleece wet with dew while all the ground around it is dry.

VOICE FOUR:          Gideon may not have realized it, but he was in the process of  

                                   learning that God is longsuffering.  The next morning the fleece   

                                   was wet and the ground was dry.

VOICE THREE:        All right!  I’m beginning to believe that you really will use me to  

                                  defeat the Midianites.  But let’s try it the other way.  Keep the  

                                   fleece dry while the ground gets wet.

VOICE TWO:           So God did what Gideon asked, but now it was His turn to test  

                                  Gideon.

VOICE ONE:             Thirty-two thousand men?  Way too many.  You are going to think                                     you won this battle all by yourself.  Send all the men home who                                     admit to being afraid.

VOICE THREE:        God, what are you doing?  I just lost twenty-two thousand troops.

VOICE ONE:             Still too many.  Take them down to the stream for a drink and send  

                                  away all those who lap like a dog without staying alert for a  

                                   possible attack.

VOICE THREE:        Just three hundred men, God?  What are you thinking?

VOICE ONE:             I’m not finished yet.  Now prepare for battle with trumpets and   

                                   lamps, but hide the lights inside empty clay pitchers.

VOICE THREE:        I hope you know what you’re doing.

VOICE ONE:             Divide into three companies and surround the Midianite camp.

VOICE FOUR:          Under cover of darkness Gideon and his three hundred obeyed the                                    Lord.

VOICE ONE:             Break the pitchers.  Blow the horns.  And shout, “The sword of the  

                                   Lord and of Gideon.”

VOICE THREE:        (UNBELIEVING)  The sword of the Lord and of Gideon?

                                  (SHOUTING HALF-HEARTEDLY)  The sword of the Lord and                                   of Gideon.

                                  (STAND AND SHOUT)  The sword of the Lord and of Gideon!

VOICE TWO:              By that time there was no doubt in Gideon’s mind that the Lord  

                                     God had given them the victory.

                                    (ALL SIT BACK DOWN ON THE STOOLS.)

1          3          4          2

VOICE FOUR:          When Gideon was dead, the people of Israel turned again and   

                                   worshipped Baal and made him their god.

VOICE ONE:             God sent the judge Tola to the tribe of Issachar.

VOICE TWO:          He sent the judges Jair and Jepthah to the land of Gilead.

VOICE THREE:        Ibzan judged Israel from Bethlehem.

VOICE FOUR:          Elon up in Zebulon.

VOICE ONE:             Abdon in the land of Ephraim.

VOICE TWO:             And all the time the Philistines increased in might until they had  

                                    dominated the people of Israel for more than forty years. 

VOICE THREE:        This time God chose a man named Manoah whose wife was barren                                   and promised them a child, giving them strict instructions as to  

                                  how the child should be raised.

VOICE FOUR:          A life-long Nazarite, dedicated to Jehovah God.

VOICE ONE:             Never cut his hair.

VOICE TWO:           No strong drink.

VOICE THREE:        Touch nothing that is unclean.

VOICE ONE:             And call him Samson.

VOICE FOUR:          Specially endowed with power from God, Samson successfully  

                                  defeated the Philistines every time he engaged them in battle.  His                                   superhuman strength should have made him the most effective of                                   all the judges.  But Samson would not keep the vows his parents                                   had made to God.

VOICE ONE:             He killed a lion with his bare hands but could not conquer his own                                    lust.

VOICE TWO:            He caught three hundred foxes and tied their tails together with a  

                                   firebrand stuck between them to destroy the fields of the Philistines                                    but he couldn’t catch a vision of what God really wanted him to                                    do.

VOICE THREE:        He resisted the army of the Philistines and killed one thousand of  

                                  them with the jawbone of a donkey as his only weapon, but he  

                                  couldn’t resist the enticement of Delilah who finally learned the

                                  secret of his long hair.

VOICE FOUR:          Samson was the only judge who destroyed more of the enemy in                                    his death than he did in his life.  They brought him into their  

                                   temple of feasting to make sport of him and he brought down 

                                  the house—right on top of their heads.

VOICE ONE:             Constant battles for control of the land.

VOICE TWO:            Maltreatment at the hands of their enemies. 

VOICE THREE:        The judgment of God in the form of drought and  resulting famine. 

VOICE FOUR:          Anarchy as every man did what was right in his own eyes.

VOICE ONE:             Faithlessness resulting in a cycle of rebellion, repentance and rescue.

VOICE TWO:            Is it any wonder that a couple like Elimelech and Naomi would seek for some 

                                   respite in the land of Moab?

VOICE THREE:         Naomi had come into Ruth’s country as a young bride.  She was leaving as a widow. 

                                  She had arrived in Moab with two young sons.  She saw them marry, and she            

                                  watched them die.  Talk about a non-traditional family.  A single Jewish mother living 

                                  with two Gentile daughters-in-law.  No wonder Naomi wanted to change her  

                                  name to “Bitter.”

VOICE FOUR:          Orpah went back to her people and her gods.

VOICE ONE:             Ruth chose Naomi’s God—Jehovah; and Naomi’s people in Bethlehem.

VOICE TWO:            (TAKES STOOL TO CENTER STAGE AND SITS)  Did Ruth have a cultural 

                                  precedent for choosing to follow God, even though she was from Moab?  Who was  

                                  the father of the nation of Moab?

VOICE THREE:        Moab?

VOICE TWO:            Right.  And who was the father of Moab?

VOICE FOUR:          Lot?

VOICE TWO:           Right again.  And Who did Lot worship?  Chemosh, the chief god of the Moabites?

VOICE ONE:             No.  Lot worshipped Jehovah, the God of his uncle Abraham.

VOICE TWO:           Right once more.  So, did Ruth have a historical precedent for choosing God?  You’d 

                                  better believe it.  God was the God of the Moabites from a time long before 

                                 Chemosh  had ever been carved out of the rose red rocks of Petra.

VOICE ONE:             Ruth wasn’t dishonoring her mother’s God.  She was choosing her mother’s God.

VOICE THREE:       She was also choosing her mother-in-law’s God.  When Ruth hung on to Naomi’s arm

                                that day and said through her tears, “Your God will be my God,” she was actually 

                                saying, “Naomi, I’ve seen in you a faith that has sustained you through the death of 

                                your husband.  I’ve seen in you a faith that is still evident in spite of  your bitterness at 

                                the loss of your two sons.  Naomi, you have a God who is real, and I want your God 

                                to be my God.”

VOICE FOUR:        The desire of every mother in Israel was to have a son.  Twice Naomi had rejoiced at

                                the birth of a male child and twice she had stood at the graveside and wept for what 

                                might have been.  But the day came when Ruth and Boaz placed a warm, wiggling 

                                bundle of joy into Naomi’s arms and the neighbor women said, “A son has been born

                                to Naomi.”

VOICE TWO:          It was the desire of every mother in Israel to produce a king.  Naomi didn’t live long  

                                enough to realize it, but through Ruth she became the great-great-grandmother of 

                                David, King of Israel.

VOICE ONE:          It was the desire of every godly mother in Israel to be the one through whom the

                                promised Messiah would come.  The book of Ruth ends with the name David, but we 

                                know the rest of the story.    The line went on through Solomon and Abijah, Asa and 

                               Josiah until “in the fulness of time God sent forth His Son.” 

VOICE TWO:        (STAND)  Ruth brought honor to Naomi by becoming part of the   genealogy which 

                              brought to the world the greatest blessing ever known to mankind—the birth of the Son 

                             of God.