3 Strategic Weapons of the Deborah Mantle that Overcome Darkness
By today’s standards, Deborah’s, Barak’s, and especially Jael’s actions would have been perceived as hateful, divisive, and unloving.
Jael was about to carry out a justice that would be considered highly offensive in our day. Am I suggesting we need to do something like her? It needs to be said loud and clear that I am not condoning physical violence of any sort, especially the kind we are about to read from Jael. Hers was a truly brutal and gruesome move. However, there are spiritual lessons we can draw from her actions.
Imagine for a moment how the larger Body of Christ might respond to the news of what she did. Jael would be cast out into the shadows, canceled, never to be spoken of again. It’s important that we understand the context of the times and learn how to decipher the differing strategies of warfare according to the age we now live in. Under the Old Covenant, God’s people had to fight in hand-to-hand combat because their battle was still with flesh and blood. Through the New Covenant of Jesus, the battle lines have shifted, and our warfare is now largely a battle with spiritual principalities. God’s people were still at war with spiritual principalities then, but they had no supernatural weapons by the Blood of the Lamb to fight with. We do. Therefore, while ours is a spiritual fight, there are significant spiritual lessons within Jael’s physical warfare that we can apply to the battles of our age today. There are three strategic tools that Jael used to take down Sisera.
1. The Mantle
And he turned aside to her into the tent; and she covered him with a mantle (Judges 4:18 BST).
When Sisera first entered Jael’s tent, she covered him with a mantle. Why is this important? Do you remember what Sisera’s name means? Meditations. This represents the battlefield of the mind, where thoughts and ideologies build their high places above God. This mantle she covered him with prophetically points to the Deborah mantle that God has anointed you to carry today. She covered the meditations of the mind with the truth of God’s Word. The word used for covered is the Hebrew word kasha, and it means to literally “cover over, make a covering, conceal, and overwhelm” (Strong’s H3680). God is anointing you in this hour, daughter, to cover and overwhelm the lies with the mantle of Deborah, which is the truth of the Word of God.
It reminds me of the quote by St. Augustine, “The truth is like a lion, you don’t have to defend it, let it loose, it will defend itself.” Unfortunately, far too many within the Body of Christ are hesitant to let the truth loose; therefore, they are giving lies free jurisdiction to reign. We must cover over and overwhelm the lies with the inherent truth.
2. The Milk
“I’m thirsty,” he said. “Please give me some water.” She opened a skin of milk, gave him a drink, and covered him up (Judges 4:19 NIV).
Why did she give him milk? And what could milk possibly mean for us today during the intense warfare we face? It seems kind of counter-productive, does it not? Milk in scripture represents God’s Word for the spiritually immature. Peter described milk as a drink for the spiritually young:
Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind. Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good (1 Peter 2:1-3 NIV).
So why did Jael give Sisera milk? It speaks of sharing the truth in a relatable way for those who are spiritually immature. We need to convey deep messages with simplicity. The Gospel need not be overcomplicated, but we must simply and profoundly speak the truth so that those who are willing to let go of all malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander will be freed of the meditations of the principality of Sisera and be able to drink the pure Gospel and be filled to contentment like a newborn baby.
By contrast, for those who refuse to adhere to truth—the milk of the Word of God—the Word of truth will cause them to get sleepy, much like a newborn, and they will be lulled into their own deceit. Which is exactly what we see happen to Sisera. He was lulled into a state of “milk drunkenness,” blinded to perceive God’s next move. When we witnessed the downfall of Roe v. Wade, no one could have predicted that this almost 50-year contract with death would be brought down under the most pro-death administration in America’s history. This reminds me of the principality of Sisera—they were lulled into a state of delusion by their own pride, believing that by their own power they could reinstate this death decree. Instead, the simple, inherent truth that God values the pre-born child in the womb was the very milk that blinded them and continues to. At exactly 10:10 am a decree went out to all the land—a stone into the head of this giant. John 10:10 (AMP) says; “The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, till it overflows).” Could it be any clearer that God’s word prevailed over this lie. His declaration rippled out to the Nations as he declared, “choose life, that thou and thy seed may live.” (Deuteronomy 30:19, KJV)
How do we minister the milk of the Word today? By speaking the constant, simple, profound, biblical truths of the Word of God to a lost and waning generation. By sharing “Jesus loves you and died for you” loudly and clearly from every conceivable vantage point that we have. By declaring His value for every human being. By speaking the unadulterated, guileless, and undeceitful Word of truth. By refusing to mix this pure milk with the meditations of our day. The pure milk of the Word will draw in those whose hearts are truly thirsty for the truth, and it will set them free.
Paul speaks of the milk of the Word in Hebrews:
In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil (Hebrews 5:12-14 NIV).
You will know the spiritually mature, as opposed to the spiritually immature, because they are able to distinguish good from evil. If a leader in the Body of Christ cannot rightly discern what is good and what is true, you have good standing to ask whether that person is leading you and others into the whole truth and in righteousness. There should be serious red flags if someone you follow is unable to distinguish and call out what is wrong and what is evil, because it reveals that they have not graduated from the elementary milk of the Gospel. They are failing to constantly use and train themselves in the solid food of the Word. If they are still drinking baby milk, why are you giving them authority to lead you spiritually? Either they have blatantly ignored the pure milk for the sake of crowd pleasing or they have turned aside from the truth. Be very wary of any leader—whether a worship leader, a biblical teacher, a pastor, or even a social media influencer—who refuses to acknowledge and call out the elementary truths of God’s Word, who cannot clearly discern simple right from wrong according to scripture. When Jael offered Sisera milk, it was both a mockery of his inability to discern truth and a trap to lull him into a state of fatigue. Do not fear speaking the truth of the Word, for it will blind and therefore expose those who have chosen to be influenced by the principality of Sisera. It will awaken others to the reality of the truth, which will lead them into repentance and, therefore, freedom.
3. The Hammer and the Tent Peg
But when Sisera fell asleep from exhaustion, Jael quietly crept up to him with a hammer and tent peg in her hand. Then she drove the tent peg through his temple and into the ground, and so he died (Judges 4:21 NLT).
I cannot over-exaggerate the sheer boldness of Jael in this moment except to merely say Jael is savage. Nothing here describes hesitancy, only calculated accuracy for the task God had set before her. Why did she quietly creep up on Sisera, though? The hammer and the tent peg both represent, you guessed it, the Word of God. Sisera can also mean “binding in chains” and speaks of strongholds and attitudes of the mind. In this very moment, Jael used a prophetic picture of the Word of God and tore down the altar of his high place in the very position where it had been built—the mind. She drove it through his temple, where our warfare is positioned today, where high places are built today. She drove the Word into the high place and tore down in a moment the idolatrous high place of Sisera.
The word used for drove is the Hebrew word taqa, and it means “to blow, to trumpet, to blast” (Strong’s H8628). It speaks of violently driving the weapon deep into the meditations of the high place that Sisera had built. The tent peg represents the establishment of territory. Isaiah 54:2 (AMP) says:
Enlarge the site of your tent [to make room for more children]; stretch out the curtains of your dwellngs, do not spare them; lengthen your tent ropes and make your pegs (stakes) firm [in the ground].
This is governmental; this is territorial. When we read Jesus declaring the truth, He was enlarging the site of His tent. He was stretching out the habitation of His dwelling to inhabit the New Covenant that He was building by His Blood. He was tearing down the old to make room for the new. It was offensive, but it had to be done. Likewise, Jael established new territory by driving the tent peg, by the hammer, down into the ground through Sisera’s temple. She was tearing down the old to make room for the new. It is time that you and I grab hold of our hammers and our tent pegs and do the same.
Right then, Barak had been pursuing Sisera. In Judges 4:22 (NIV) we read:
Just then Barak came by in pursuit of Sisera, and Jael went out to meet him. “Come,” she said, “I will show you the man you’re looking for.” So he went in with her, and there lay Sisera with the tent peg through his temple—dead.
