In Judges 17-19 we read two accounts that are summed up by the words we read in Judges 17:6: 6In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes. Judges 17:6 (NLT) In the first account, we read of Micah, a man who stole more than 1,000 pieces of silver from his own mother. When he confessed his sin to her, she blessed him and had a silver ephod made out of the silver. Micah started to worship the ephod, and later when a Levite came to his home, he offered the Levite the opportunity to be his personal priest. We can find many things wrong with that picture, but the picture soon got worse.
Some men from the tribe of Dan came to Micah’s house, and eventually stole Micah’s “gods” and bargained with the Levite to become their priest, rather than Micah’s It was bad enough that one man was worshiping a silver ephod, but now hundreds from the tribe of Dan worshiped it. The Levite’s willingness to leave Micah’s service, because he would be able to have a bigger “congregation,” and undoubtedly better pay, makes it clear he wasn’t serving the LORD, but rather his own personal benefit and gain. As we look at this account, we are reminded what happens when people have no godly vision or leadership. The men from Dan had a vision, but it wasn’t godly. They turned from God to worship the silver ephod. The Levite wasn’t serving God either. He looked for his own gain rather than serving the LORD and the people.
In Chapter 19, we read the first half of an account, which we’ll finish tomorrow. In it a man from the tribe of Levi had a concubine, who left him and returned to her father. He went after her, and eventually was welcomed by the woman’s father when he came to the father’s house. After a couple days of partying, provided by the father-in-law, the Levite decided it was time to go home. He left in the afternoon, which meant he couldn’t make it home before nightfall. He decided to stay in Gibeah, a city settled by the tribe of Benjamin. No one welcomed the man into their home for the night, until eventually an older man of the town, offered him and his concubine a place to stay. We’re told some “troublemakers” from the town gathered and demanded to have the Levite sent out so they could have sex with him. The man offered to have his virgin daughter and the man’s concubine go out, but the men refused. Apparently, during the argument the Levite shoved his concubine out of the house and closed the door. The men raped the woman all night long. In the morning, when the Levite went out to get her, he found her outside the house. She was dead. This horrendous story, ends even more horrendously as we will see tomorrow. No excuse can be made for what happened. According to Mosaic Law, the “appropriate” response was “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a life for a life. While that seems extreme to us, tomorrow we’ll see the response of the Levite and the nation of Israel was even more extreme The response starts at the end of chapter 19, when the Levite cuts his concubine into twelve pieces and sends a piece to each of the tribes of Israel. The response of the entire nation was to ask, “What are we going to do?” Remember, there was no king to decide, so they would decide the matter corporately, and as we’ll see tomorrow, they did.
As we return to John 17, and Jesus’ “high priestly prayer,” let’s focus on one statement. Jesus said, “They (that is Jesus’ followers-including us) don’t belong to the world anymore than I do.” What a powerful statement. It’s easy to see why Jesus would say He didn’t belong to the world. After all, He is the Son of God. He came from heaven, to live His life on earth. We did not. Yet, after we’re born again, we become citizens of heaven. The Apostle Paul would pick up on that them, and use it extensively in his letters. Sometimes he used the term explicitly and at other times implicitly. The key is: we are bound for heaven. We are going to live our lives here for days, weeks, months, years, or decades, but we will live for eternity with Jesus. Always remember that. When we go through the loss of loved ones, which is always painful and difficult, we can remember that for those who trust Jesus, the pain, suffering, and even death are a short-term reality. I don’t say that lightly, or flippantly. I have lost many who were close to me: our first child, through a miscarriage; my Mom died what seemed to be far too soon to me; my Dad; Jim, my oldest brother; and most recently Cheryl Marshall, my sister-in-law. At those times the pain is eased when we know we will see our loved one again.
As we go about this day, let’s live as those whose first citizenship is in heaven. That doesn’t mean we won’t be good citizens of the United States of America, or of whatever nation we are a citizen. It means, we will always serve Jesus first, and be ambassadors for Him to the world. When we live fully as citizens of God’s Kingdom, we will make the best citizens of whatever earthly nation or kingdom we call home!