rich’s blog

Preface: 

So if you missed it last week, we’re starting a message series that will look at difficult Bible passages or passages we rarely make a chance to ever really look at.  Today, we’re beginning by exploring a passage that I would bet none of us have committed to memory; but one worth noticing, I think.

 

I think if we could notice it, we’d be forced to evaluate just how honest and self-interested our relationships with God and one another really are. 

 

The passage is the one that was read to us, of course: Judges 17:1-18:31.  Feel free to turn there: But first, let’s pray.  

 

Prayer:

Father: Most of us likely haven’t spent all that much time recently–maybe ever–in Judges; but we know it’s part of Scripture, what you’ve given us to help shape us into people like Jesus.  Help today’s message to contribute to that process.  Stop me if I mislead us; and well up your Spirit within us. In Jesus’ name: Amen. 

 

Introduction:

So.  Judges.  Read a lot from that lately, right?  It’s a book tucked in between Deuteronomy and First Samuel, and it records a long period of time in Israel’s history after the promised land, Canaan, has been conquered, but before Israel demands a king for themselves.  And it records this repetitive cycle that happens over and over in which Israel breaks faith with God, they ignore basically, all the stuff that’s laid out in Leviticus and Deuteronomy–and they beg God for help, because they blew it and things are lousy, and God sends them a “judge,”–hence, you know, “Judges” to function as a leader of people.  This isn’t a black robe, high chair–highchair!–sort of judge, this is person who God sends to help them get out of the mess they’ve made for themselves, and lead them back to God: and then, you know, they began to ignore God again, and beg for help, and God sends them another Judge, and things are great for a while until the cycle repeats itself all over again.  As a book, it was probably finalized sometime between 600 and 400 BC: so roughly 2500 years ago, 500ish years before Jesus.  (And you all know I wasn’t born knowing this stuff, right; I’m giving you what other people have  laid out in other places.) (NIB)

 

The reason the Israelites need a judge, need a leader, is because Joshua has died.  Joshua was Moses apprentice; Moses, if you remember, helped free Israel from centuries of ethnic slavery in Egypt–the whole Exodus thing, if you’ve heard of that, and God used Moses to establish his covenant with Israel: But Moses died, Joshua died, and the Israelites were supposed to take this land that God had promised them.  

 

But they haven’t, and by the second chapter of the book we see them being rebuked by a messenger from God, the angel of the Lord, and we learn that a whole generation of God’s people have grown up, learning just nothing, jack, about any knowledge of what God has done for Israel.  

 

It’s a mess, team.  Basically, as far as Judges goes, God’s people have a not so wonderful start to what a commentator has called “social and religious disintegration” (NIB).  They need national therapy. 

 

This is a dark book; history that isn’t pretty: the people of God’s sins on paper, in their face, right? And the only real hero in the book is God, for not giving up on this tiny little people-group, when they have consistently and deliberately ignored everything that was in line with what he wanted.  

 

And so, we can read this book in two ways; we can come to it, and say, “Bummer that the Jews did so many bad things.  Glad I’m a Christian, glad that isn’t my history.”  Or we can say, “Yeah; these are my spiritual forebears, and for thousands of years the stuff of Judges has been a reminder to God’s people to be careful, and to remember that sin is as present an option today as it was then.”  Judges is a reminder to me, at least: that my spiritual landscape is one with pits and rocks. 

 

So, just for kicks, let’s read this passage as the warning & the reminder that it is. Cool?

 

We’re in Judges 17:1–turn there if you’d like.  

 

Micah’s Dysfunctional Family of Origin!

 

This passage marks the beginning of the end as far as Judges is concerned; the last section of the book of Judges. 

 

Now a man named Micah from the hill country of Ephraim said to his mother, “The eleven hundred shekels of silver that were taken from you and about which I heard you utter a curse—I have that silver with me; I took it.” 

Then his mother said, “The LORD bless you, my son!”

When he returned the eleven hundred shekels of silver to his mother, she said, “I solemnly consecrate my silver to the LORD for my son to make an image overlaid with silver. I will give it back to you.” 

So after he returned the silver to his mother, she took two hundred shekels of silver and gave them to a silversmith, who used them to make the idol. And it was put in Micah’s house. (Judges 17:1-4 tniv) 

 

So.  Micah has stolen his mom’s money, after he had heard her lay a curse on it (NIB).  He hauled away 30 pounds of silver; and for some reason he fesses up—probably because no one likes to be cursed.  And his mom (they’ve got a dysfunctional sort of relationship) blesses him for returning the silver instead of, you know: doing anything reasonable.  She decides, after consecrating her money to the lord–setting it aside to be only used for God’s purposes–to take a tiny little bit of what she set aside, and have an idol made up.  

 

And this is bad news.  This has always been bad news for Israel.  People don’t like a God they can’t see; so they’ll make a little figurine: honor it, worship it, let it be their God. An idol.

 

We in this room tend to remember at least some of the Ten Commandments.  We know that God’s people aren’t supposed to make idols.  Some of us might remember a story in the book right before Judges where Moses is up on a mountain, chiseling out “You shall not make for yourself an idol,” while his brother is at the bottom of the mountain helping people make one. And maybe we remember that God wasn’t too pleased about it. 

 

But this is how far God’s people have gone astray; they’ve forgotten the most basic things. 

 

Learning About Micah: 

And this informs us about Micah, doesn’t it: about his life of faith.  Maybe not a guy you want your kids to grow up and be like.  What’s ironic is that Micah means “Who is like the Lord”—a name that implies no one is, so don’t bother making little idols, because they aren’t worth your time (NIB).  

 

But our story continues after this, when we learn that not only did Micah’s mom set aside some silver to the Lord, like we set aside some of our cash for the work of the church—but Micah decides to set up his own little temple—he already had a shrine—complete with the right outfits, somebody to stand around and say the things that should be said for every thing to be proper. 

 

“Tornado Bros”

Have any of you played house, built forts, and pretended to be adventurers? Dressed up your siblings and bossed them around? Or, built houses out of hay bales with your younger brother and played a game in which you and he pretended to be brothers who had lived through a terrible tornado, and now had to survive only with knives they stole from the kitchen?  

 

I’ve never done anything like this. 

 

Micah is playing church, here.  Only he’s not 10, or 11, or 12.  He’s not playing pretend; he’s an adult, with grown sons, and he’s trying to make a little church for himself, his very own. 

 

And here we find the phrase, “In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit.”  This phrase functions as a sort of parallel to the phrase “The Israelies did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord” that is all over the rest of Judges (NIB).  People do what they see fit—and what they see fit is evil in God’s eyes. Not Good.

 

Enter the Levite: 

Let’s continue in our story.  v7: 

 

    A young Levite from Bethlehem in Judah, who had been living within the clan of Judah, left that town in search of some other place to stay. On his way he came to Micah’s house in the hill country of Ephraim. 

    Micah asked him, “Where are you from?” 

“I’m a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah,” he said, “and I’m looking for a place to stay.” 

    Then Micah said to him, “Live with me and be my father and priest, and I’ll give you ten shekels of silver a year, your clothes and your food.” So the Levite agreed to live with him, and the young man became like one of his sons to him. Then Micah installed the Levite, and the young man became his priest and lived in his house. And Micah said, “Now I know that the LORD will be good to me, since this Levite has become my priest.” (17:7-13 tniv)

 

We’ve met Micah already; here, we met another character, a Levite.  In a few verses the Bible names this Levite “Jonathan,” “the gift of God.” (you knew that, right?) 

 

So: Micah and Jonathan.  

 

Jonathan:

First let’s look at Jonathan.  He’s a Levite—one who God said should be a priest, the one whose portion in the Land of Canaan was God himself.  The Levites didn’t get a plot of land to farm, or a house from some Canaanite; instead, they got God.  That’s it; leftovers from sacrifices that people made, and a place to sleep.  But a closeness to the God who had saved Israel, who promised to bless the whole world through them, that no non-Levite could imagine or experience.  An important job. 

 

But for Jonathan, this wasn’t enough.  He’s tired of this; Bethlehem’s too crowded, to filled up with priests, maybe.  He wants more.  So he leaves town; he abandons his place and duty, and sells himself to Micah for 4 ounces of silver a year; less weight than your cell phone; less silver used in the idol he’s guarding.  

 

He sells his position as a priest.  He trades the call of God, to be a Levite in Bethlehem, for security, for cash, for the ability to be a yes-man to a rich guy named Micah.  

 

An alternative reading to verse 8 ends with Jonathan looking for a place where he can carry on his profession, not just stay somewhere. 

 

And I know what that profession is, don’t you?  Jonathan is a dealer.  

 

He’s a dealer in God; a dealer in access to the things of God.  

 

Micah: 

But let’s go back to Micah for a moment.  With Jonathan on his payroll, Micah has legitimized business!  He’s not playing church anymore; he’s got his very own!  And Micah points out his whole hope for this little operation in v.13: “Now I know that the Lord will be good to me, since this Levite has become my priest.”  

 

Micah wants what so many people want; what I want, all the time, and maybe what you want.  He wants security.  He wants guarantees.  Micah wants to be guaranteed that God will be on his side—that God will have his agenda.  He looks to God and he sees God’s utility—God’s usefulness, the ability for God to make my life easy. 

 

Hold this is your mind: If Jonathan is a dealer, then Micah is a user.

 

If Jonathan is a dealer, Micah is a user. 

 

Then some time passes, and the tribe of Dan gets a little impatient for some land.  They’ve already lost the land that God gave them (Joshua 19 & the end of Judges one points this out, although its not clear from this passage) And so they decide to go get some more (thank you NIB, p.870!)  They send a group of people ahead of them, to spy out some places, get a feel for things, and this group stumbles upon Micah’s house and the Levite, who tells them to go ahead with their task.  This is an awkward scene; they don’t tell him what they are doing, he doesn’t ask, and it’s almost as if the Priest is just trying to get rid of them:  the text goes like this: 

 

So they entered the hill country of Ephraim and came to the house of Micah, where they spent the night. When they were near Micah’s house, they recognized the voice of the young Levite; so they turned in there and asked him, “Who brought you here? What are you doing in this place? Why are you here?” 

He told them what Micah had done for him, and said, “He has hired me and I am his priest.” 

Then they said to him, “Please inquire of God to learn whether our journey will be successful.” 

The priest answered them, “Go in peace. Your journey has the LORD’s approval.” (Judges 18:2b-6 tniv)

 

It’s weird.  I struggle with this passage; can this priest, who is so far outside the bounds of what’s appropriate, really hand out favorable judgments on the Lord’s behalf?  I don’t know.  Other translations of this passage simply point out that God is watching them, which is slightly ominous, and also fits with the moral ambiguity of the whole scene. 

 

What I know is this:  I don’t want to find myself ever being a yes-man to other people’s self-interested decisions, especially when those decisions are to claim something that they have already squandered away. 

How about you?  

 

Tragedy, etc: 

And what happens next in the text is hard.  The Danites find a great neighborhood; good land—it “lacks nothing whatsoever”—the people are unsuspecting and far away from anyone who could help them, and so, they decide to go ahead and take it in the name of the Lord.  They tell the rest of the tribe, and they happen to march by Micah’s house on the way to their military invasion.  So we read in 8:14:

 

Then the five men who had spied out the land of Laish said to their fellow Danites, “Do you know that one of these houses has an ephod, some household gods and an image overlaid with silver? Now you know what to do.” So they turned in there and went to the house of the young Levite at Micah’s place and greeted him. The six hundred Danites, armed for battle, stood at the entrance of the gate. The five men who had spied out the land went inside and took the idol, the ephod and the household gods while the priest and the six hundred armed men stood at the entrance of the gate. 

Then the five went into Micah’s house and took the idol, the ephod and the household gods, the priest said to them, “What are you doing?” 

They answered him, “Be quiet! Don’t say a word. Come with us, and be our father and priest. Isn’t it better that you serve a tribe and clan in Israel as priest rather than just one man’s household?” The priest was very pleased. He took the ephod, the household gods and the idol and went along with the people. Putting their little children, their livestock and their possessions in front of them, they turned away and left.  (8:14-21 tniv)

 

“The priest was very pleased.”  Another version says he accepted the offer: 

 

Of course he did, right?  Of course he was pleased; He was on the fast track; his was a life of upward mobility.  And all he had to do to get here was to say the right thing at the right time, give up his integrity, and man: he’s a hero!  He’s the one who carries the ephod, the idol, and other household gods with him.  He’s the religious authority now—not just of a big family—but of a whole tribe, filled with people, all of whom will want the God that only he can act as gatekeeper over.  

 

Epilogue:

Micah of course, tries to get his stuff back, but the Danites have a lot of swords, a lot of men, and he doesn’t press the issue.  The passage ends with this epilogue in vv 27-31.

 

Then they took what Micah had made, and his priest, and went on to Laish, against a peaceful and unsuspecting people. They attacked them with the sword and burned down their city. There was no one to rescue them because they lived a long way from Sidon and had no relationship with anyone else. The city was in a valley near Beth Rehob. 

The Danites rebuilt the city and settled there. They named it Dan after their ancestor Dan, who was born to Israel—though the city used to be called Laish. There the Danites set up for themselves the idol, and Jonathan son of Gershom, the son of Moses, and his sons were priests for the tribe of Dan until the time of the captivity of the land. They continued to use the idol Micah had made, all the time the house of God was in Shiloh. (18:27-31 tniv)

 

This is not a heroic tale.  The peaceful city is destroyed; Dan sets up a religious shrine, with Jonathan in charge of it, that is destined for destruction–although they couldn’t have known that.  Micah is utterly forgotten.  

 

Application, anyone?  

And if this story that we never look at was meant to remind Israel that their past could always be their future, if they weren’t careful, then we should ask:

How can it function in our lives, right? 

 

What should we talk about? How can we let the story of our lives be informed by the story of Micah and Jonathan and the Danites?  We could talk about Idols, I suspect: we’d have to go metaphorical with the thing, because I doubt we’ve melted down old bracelets & dimes and made a little statue we can worship–but we’ve certainly offered daydreams, people, ministries, and relationships a level of devotion only God should receive.  

 

 We could talk about the Danites, and what it means to lose what you have, even something God has given you: and long for it back so badly that you do unwise, unholy, terrible things in your attempts to get it back: killing people–emotionally and psychologically, if not literally.  

 

I think it’s best, though, to talk about the user and the dealer; Micah & Jonathan. 

 

Micah is a user; he looks to God and sees how useful God can be to have around.  He wants to know how God can get him what he wants.  

 

Jonathan is a dealer: he looks around, realizes the special access that he has to God, and exploits it. He exploits the users around him for his own upward mobility, and increased influence over people. 

 

We need to wonder: Are we like Micah? And if we’re not, let’s be careful of becoming like him.  We should ask: Are we like Jonathan?  And if not, let’s be careful of becoming like him. 

 

Are we like Micah? 

So.  Are we like Micah?  

 

When it comes to God and faith and Jesus and the church: are we mainly concerned with how useful God is to us?  And I doubt any of us would boldly proclaim “yes!,” but have we somehow ended up there? Over time have we lost what it means to be in a relationship with God, and now, show up before God and others mainly because there are a lot of benefits from being part of God’s people.  

 

I’m spitballin’ here, but I can think of ways we–none of us, you know: other people–might treat faith like a benefits package.

 

“I better give a lot of money to the church, so I can stay under the next tax bracket, or donate this old thing to the church so that I can buy that new one I’ve been wanting for ages.” 

 

“If I get more involved in a church maybe I can get…what? Padding for my resume? Free Babysitting or help with my house or yard? An ego boost that comes from being an important person?” 

 

“I’m going to go pray because…why? I want to avoid some other responsibility that is being asked of me?  Because I need direction in life?  Because it will impress someone else I want to impress?” 

 

And God wants to give us direction, right?  Wants to provide for our material and emotional and psychological wants: But imagine if you only called your friend, or your parents, or your spouse–someone very close to you–only when you wanted advice, a ride, or some cash.  

 

And a ride, and cash, and advice are all things we’ll give to those we love, but if getting is all a relationship is about, it’s just not much of a relationship, is it?  When our friends know people who only call them because they need something, we tell them not to pick up the phone, because they are being “used.” 

 

And we’d want to Micah to be a reminder to us that our relationship with God cannot only–and I stress only, because God does want to give us many things, and we are right to ask for them as children ask of their parents–but our relationship with cannot only be about “getting,” whether that getting is a tangible thing–cash and a car ride–or something intangible–a sense of personal importance that comes from being a leader in a church.   We have to  be aware that we can  end up as people who engage with God because we want to be sure that “he’ll be good to us” in the ways we want him to be good to us.  We can’t use God.  Micah in this story reminds us of this. 

 

Are we like Jonathan? 

And remember Jonathan?  He was a dealer; he used his position as a priest, his special access to God, to get what he wanted: which was more influence, more importance, and more power. 

 

But maybe Jonathan isn’t as relevant to most of you, right?  I mean, we are talking about a religious authority, here, and the most natural application of this Levite would be a paid pastor. Maybe this is a guy only I can learn from. 

 

And we could be thankful for that.  We could be thankful that this passage is probably only relevant to those of us who have authority and influence in the church: people like paid pastors.  Maybe people like unpaid elders & interns & deacons, influential people like the leaders of this ministry team, or the core members of that one, influential people like those who  dutifully and faithfully show up when they’re needed, and give graciously of their time and treasure and talents and unique voice and perspective.  

 

See, the thing is, in a church–everyone of us has influence.  Because everyone is critical, everyone’s voice is important: And of course, everyone of us has the Holy Spirit, has an access to God–an “in” with God, whether we “feel” it or not–that would make Levites bow before us out of respect and maybe fear.  Each of us who have partnered with God has been gifted by the Spirit critical gifts that the church cannot do with out. 

 

Which means that even those of us who feel at times that we are the most unimportant of people, without influence and any authority at all: and because of this, we distance ourselves, don’t participate, withhold our time, and treasure, and talent and perspectives–even those of us who feel this way need to hear, at least, because that’s all I can do right now, right? that when we disengage from the body of God, believe that we are unimportant, we deeply, deeply affect our church, our small group, those who are closest to us: because they need what only we can offer them to help fulfill God’s hopes for them.

 

So wouldn’t it be easy, wouldn’t it be great, if we could just pretend that “senior pastors” are the only ones with access to God, the only ones who have the ability to influence the people of God? 

 

Then we wouldn’t have to ask questions about if we’ve ever used our influence with other people to get our own way, instead of seeking group consensus about some ministry or some program?  We wouldn’t need to reflect on if we’ve left some good, important ministry to do some other more public and more praised thing.  We wouldn’t have to ask if we ever  speak critically about one another–just a little, you know, and only when we’re talking to someone we trust ’cause they won’t tell–and in the process, use our influence with that person to divide the body of Christ, one person from another? We wouldn’t have to ask if we’ve given up our integrity so that we can get what we want. 

 

Conclusion:

Jonathan is a dealer, using the access he has with God to get what’s best for him; and we’re told about it because we need to remember, even now, thousands of years later, that any one of us can end up acting like him, in little or large ways.    

 

And Micah is a user, turning to God to get what he can, while he can.  

 

They are in the book of judges, and God has offered us the book of Judges, because we need to remember that we who are God’s people will always be tempted toward self-interest: what God can get and do for us, and how we might use the influence we have with God’s people for our own good.  

 

But if we give in to the temptation to be Micah, or Jonathan, it may be the case that our most lasting legacy, the thing people talk about if they ever come across the story of our lives, is just how bad an example we really are.  And I know we can do better than that. 

 

 

Prayer: 

Father: help us to be people who turn to you in our need, who appreciate your church so much for all it gives us: but don’t use you, and don’t exploit the way we’re needed by one another, so that we can get what we want.  Let this story be a reminder to us to draw close to you, to consider our ways, and reject the things that you find unpleasing.  We love you; we need you, God and King.  In Jesus’ name. Amen.