Indifference Towards Idolotry

Transcript

GRS 2-57
2/18/2007
Indifference Towards Idolatry
Judges 17-18
Gil Rugh

We’ve been studying the Book of Judges together and we’re coming to the closing section of that book. We’re at Chapter 17 of the Book of Judges, Judges 17. The last five Chapters of the Book, Chapter 17 to 21 are something of an epilogue or an appendix to the Book. There are no new judges brought to our attention in these Chapters. The bulk of the Book of Judges has recorded the leadership of different judges in bringing deliverance to Israel from certain enemies. We’ve been reminded repeatedly of the decadence, spiritually and morally in the nation Israel during this period of time. And what we’re going to do in these closing Chapters is be given a look into a couple of personal situations that reveal, first something of the spiritual decadence and then something of the moral decadence of the nation.

Chapters 17 and 18 focusing on more the spiritual decadence in the nation and then the closing three Chapters will be on the almost unbelievable moral decay that has permeated the nation. These are days of anarchy in Israel and we will be reminded of that a number of times. Down in verse 6 of Chapter 17; in those days there was no king in Israel, every man did what was right in his own eyes. Chapter 18 begins; in those days there was no king of Israel. Chapter 19 opens the same way; now it came about in those days, when there was no king in Israel. Then the Book of Judges closes in Chapter 21, verse 25; in those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes, so days of anarchy. Remember Israel is a nation and without that central government which was to reinforce the spiritual loss of the nation.

The king would not be the spiritual leader, we have priests. The priests are from a different tribe than the king, but the king as God's representative was to enforce the spiritual loss in the nation and the moral loss, oversee the government of the nation that won’t always happen under the kings as you’re well aware. But this reminder in the Judges is an indication just wherever you go people are doing whatever they wanted to do. And we’re going to get an insight into something of that spiritual, say selfishness or people are debasing their own worship in the nation Israel during this period of time. It’s a time what we call religious syncretism and what syncretism involves is blending together different religious ideas and attitudes in one system and they’re synchronized.

So syncretism in the religious area is we’re bringing them together so they blend. They’re not totally abandoning what God says they were to do, they’re just mixing it with what goes on in the land of Canaan and Canaanites worship. And this becomes part of the practice that goes on and you see something of the corruption. Remember, the Book of Judges cover the period of time of almost 350 years in Israel’s history. We’re just going to highlight these closing Chapters on a chronological order. We don’t know when these events happened and where they fit in this period of time, but they give us insight and its personal situation not having to do with the Judges in their rule just the way people were living.

So let’s begin with Chapter 17. We have here a man named Micah and idolatry that characterized his family and how that idolatry is not only going to affect his family but it will also characterize then one of the tribes in Israel, the tribe of Dan. First six verses give you the necessary setting. There was a man of the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Micah and Ephraim is the central area Israel and that region was delegated to them, north of Jerusalem area up above that region. They’re in sort of the middle of the territory. He is a man of the hill country of Ephraim. His name was Micah. He said to his mother, the eleven hundred pieces of silver which was taken from you, about which you uttered a curse in my hearing, behold, the silver is with me; I took it. And now we’re going to get a setting which will lead to this family’s idolatry, making their own gods to worship.

Here’s a man, we are not told how old he is, young man. He has stolen from his mother and it’s evidently a family of significant wealth because the amount of money is significant, eleven hundred shekels of silver, eleven hundred pieces of silver would be a sizable amount of money. And evidently when he hears his mother’s curse because he says in verse 2, you uttered a curse in my hearing. She didn’t know he took it but evidently she call us down a curse from God on the person who stole her money, whoever that person might be. And this evidently scares him into a confession. He says, I took it, I’m the guilty party. So his mother responds. The end of verse 2, blessed be my son by the Lord. In other words, now I want to replace my curse with a blessing because I wanted to call a God to curse the person who took that money but now you’ve confessed, I want him to bless you. And further more, when he returns the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother, as mother said, I wholly dedicate this silver from my hand to the Lord for my son to make a graven image and a molten image.

Now therefore I will return them to you. And you see something of the distorted spiritual situation in Israel. Here’s a mother in Israel, her son is stolen money, now returned it. You might think that when she says blessed be my son by the Lord, the end of verse 2, that there is some spiritual sense here. Well, there is a religious sense but no true understanding of the living God because what’s she going to do? Well, I’m going to dedicate the silver that you’ve returned to me to the Lord for you. I say, wow, that was an action of devotion but what is she going to do with it? I’m going to turn it over to the craftsmen so they can make a couple of idols and then I’ll give the idols to you, so you’re going to get it back but you’re going to get it back better than you have it, because you’re going to get it back as your gods. And this is now in a Jewish family, sometime during this period of the Judges.

Now turn back to the Book of Exodus. I know you haven’t forgotten this but Exodus Chapter 20, and we shouldn’t think that these people well, they’re not familiar. First place we were told that this was a family in Ephraim. The arch of the Lord is presently in Shiloh, very near by. So they’re not even very far removed from the religious center of Israel at this time. Shiloh, further more subsequent events will indicate that they understand what the law has to say about priest in Israel who is eligible to be a priest and who is not eligible to be a priest. So they’re not in ignorance. They’re just doing it their own way. Exodus Chapter 20, verse 4; God spoke all these words saying, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt. I start with the first verse. And out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me, you shall not make for yourself an idol or any likeness of what is in heaven above or in the earth beneath or in the water under the earth.

You shall not worship them or serve them. I the Lord your God, I’m a jealous God and so on. Look down in verse 23, this is God speaking in verse 22; the Lord said to Moses, Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, you yourself have seen that I have spoken to you from heaven. Verse 23; you shall not make other gods besides me, gods of silver, gods of gold; you shall not make them for yourselves. And he goes on to talk about worshipping him and how they are to construct an altar for him. Turn over to the Book of Deuteronomy Chapter 4, verse 16, verse 15; so watch yourselves carefully since you did not see any form on the days that the Lord spoke to you at Horeb from the midst of the fire so that you do not corruptly and make a graven image for yourselves in the form of any figure, the likeness of any male or female, the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any wing bird that flies in the sky, the likeness of any thing that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish in the water.

Beware, not to lift your eyes to heaven and see the sun, the moon, and the stars, and all the host of heaven be drawn away to worship them, why? Those, which the Lord your God has allowed all the people unto the whole heaven but the Lord has taken you, and brought you out of the iron furnace from Egypt, to be a people of his own possession today. This repeated emphasis, down in verse 23; watch yourself, you do not forget the covenant, the Lord your God which he made for you and make for yourselves a graven image in the form of anything against which the Lord your God is commanded you for the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God. Now you come over to Judges and you see something of the spiritual decadence.

Here is a mother in Israel and she is calling down God's blessing on her son and she is going to devote this money to the Lord by having images made, gods made, a graven image and a molten image. Two images, the graven image would a carved image, then it would probably overlay with silver. Then the molten image would be a silver image that would be the silver melted and then formed into an idol. And so two gods for you to worship and I will return then the money to you. Verse 5; the mother does what she said in verse 4 and they were given to this over a smith and the craftsman makes the image and they were in the house of Micah. Now verse 5; the man Micah had a shrine and he made an ephod. You see that some understanding of the law and the knowledge of the law because the high priest in Israel was what to wear an ephod.

So you get this mixture religion. He had an ephod; household idols and now he need a priest, so he consecrates one of his sons to be his priest. Now he is part of the tribal Ephraim. The priest have to come from the tribe of Levite, but my son’s here and you know we like the family to stay together and the family the worships together, stays together and he’ll be my priest. And so in those days there was no king in Israel, every man did what was right in his own eyes. There is no divine authorization for this kind of worship in Israel. Israelites are just doing what they want to, this is just one example for us to understand something of the spiritual decadence that is come over the nation during this period of time. Then here you have them making their own gods, having them made by craftsmen, somebody in the family appoints his son to be priest after his mother has had these gods made for him, after supposedly calling down a blessing from the Lord on him.

There was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes. Verses 7 to 13, it has given more insight into the fact that these people knew what the law said about worship. Now there was a young man, verse 7, from Bethlehem in Judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite, and he was staying there. Though he was a man from Bethlehem, in the realm where the tribe of Judah had their territory and he travels north and comes to the house of Micah. Verse 8; the man departed from the city from Bethlehem in Judah to stay wherever he might find a place, and he is made his journey, came to the hill country of Ephraim to the house of Micah. Micah said to him, where do you come from. He said, I am a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah, and I’m going to stay wherever I may find a place.

Micah said to him, dwell with me, be a father and a priest to me. You see, he knows the law says that you should have your priest from the tribe of Levite. He didn’t have any problem of appointing his son a priest but now I get a genuine Levite, wouldn’t that be? That would be a lot better. And then you see, you take this and you think because you mix in some of what God said with some of with the peoples around are doing and somehow you have a better system of worship. Can you make idolatry more acceptable to God by adding a Levite and then what kind of character does this Levite have? I man, he is of the tribe of Levite, the priestly tribe, but he’s got a good deal here. Verse 10; dwell with me, be a father and a priest to me, I’ll give you ten pieces of silver a year. And you got an idea how much that 1100 piece of the silver was when priest here thinks he got a good deal, ten pieces of silver a year plus room and board and I’ll also give you a suit of clothes and your maintenance.

So the Levite went in. The Levite agreed to dwell with the man; and the young man became to him like one of his sons. So Micah consecrated the Levite; and the Levite became his priest, and lived in the house of Micah. Then Micah said, now note this, now I know the Lord will prosper me, seeing I have a Levite as a priest. Amazing, once you begin to drift the way from the word of God, how do you end up so totally confused and away from what the Lord has planned and ordained. I have a Levite as a priest. Surely the Lord will prosper me and bless me as I worship my idols under the direction of these Levites. It makes things worse, not better. All right, now we have the setting for what’s going to take place in Chapter 18. You have this godless corrupt Levite willing to come and be a priest in this family with the center of their worship as their idols, two major idols plus the general household idols, that’s the focus of the worship in this family. But we got a Levite and he is the priest. So we can expect the God's blessing, say it, state of affairs.

Now what Chapter 18 does show you, this is just not an isolated family, an unusual Israel situation in Israel at this time. One family out of how many off tracked. Now this is an example of what the situation is like in Israel. And Chapter 18 will show you something of Israel’s attitude in this matter. There is indifference, the purity of worship. You know what happens when you mix what God is said, with what the world would like, people tend to say, well, look what we’ve got here what the bible says and these other things, well, you know, we understand that is just to help us. Look at Chapter 18. Chapter opens up with the reminder; in those days there was no king in Israel: and Israel with the king over the nation and the priests leading the spiritual life, the king was to enforce the laws of God in the nation. Later in church history with the time of Augustine and following, four hundred years after Christ and comedown to the reformation, we have the reformers called the Magisterial Reformers like Calvin and Luther who believed to use the magistrates to enforce the law of God.

So Calvin burned Servetus Heretic for being a Heretic but you that’s perfectly consistent if the church is Israel because that what the king is to do. He is to enforce the law of God on the nation and so here we’re reminded, in Israel as an earthly nation and God's physical people. We’re reminded there was, in those days there was no king in Israel because this kind of things that are to be a unified nation here and they ought to be functioning consistently and the king would enforce that or should otherwise how the priest do it. You had to have the backing of the king to keeps the nation on track as the priest didn’t have an army. Remember, they didn’t even have a lot of territory. They only had forty-eight cities allotted to them among the tribes of Israel. But the king was there to enforce the spiritual rule of the nation.

And so in those days there was no king in Israel and in those days, the tribe of the Danites was sinking in inheritance for themselves to live in, for until that day, an inheritance had not been allotted to them, follow into them, as a possession among the tribes of Israel. The reason Dan, the tribe of Dan is with out of territory is, they’re the tribes that did not do what God told them to do. Go back to Chapter 1 of Judges. Sometimes we may forget the background for these things. Judges Chapter 1; the sons of Dan were allotted to territory and their territory is above Judah but in the middle of Judah you have Benjamin and then going west you have the land of the Ephraimites and it will curve up around to the west along the Mediterranean. So they’re above Judah here.

That’s the territory that was allotted to them but there is problem, verse 34; then the Amorites forced the sons of Dan into the hill country for they did not allow them to come down to the valley. And rather than keeping the fight going to drive out the enemy, the Danites are floating around, wondering what they’re going to do. And so here they are now, they don’t have an area; they’re living in the hill country around in Ephraim. They have gone up into the hill country of the Ephraim become to be noted because that’s the tribe of Ephraim’s land. But we can go down to our land, the Amorites are there and so they don’t drive out the people. So now we’ve got problems. You get over to Chapter 18; part of the trouble’s going to come, the Danites haven’t functioned like God said, drive these people out, crush them.

They have to depend on the Lord to do it but it should have been done. So the Danites are looking to relocate. I don’t want to have that kind of trouble and they don’t want to trust the Lord and do the hard thing that God says they have to do. So they’re just going to look for a new place to live, new territory. So the sons of Dan sent from their family, five been out of their whole number, valued from Zorah, Eshtaol, to spy out the land, to search it. They said to them, go, search the land. They came to the old country of Ephraim to the house of Micah, lodged there. So they’re starting a travel up. Then you go up a little bit further north and you are in the region that was allotted to the tribe of Ephraim. In the old country there and long, behold, they come to the house of Micah to visit and to stay. Again the pattern, biblical times you went and people open their home to you, just a required hospitality.

When they were near the house of Micah, they recognized the voice of the young man, the Levite. They turned aside there and said to him, who brought you here? What are you doing in this place? What do you have here? So these five men are traveling up and they evidently recognized the voice of this Levite. And they hear him and say, hey, we know you, what are you doing here? We don’t appear, you’re from Bethlehem, and the region allotted to Dan is not too far from Bethlehem, moving to the west Bethlehem and may be a little bit north. The Levite said to them; thus and so has Micah done to me. So he tells them what Micah did and he is hired me, and I become his priest.

Well, verse 5; you think the Danites and you get some idea of the spiritual corruption. What do you mean Micah hired you to be as priest? The arch of the covenant is in Shiloh. He is go out and hire yourself out to be the priest inquire of God please that we may know whether on our way on which we are going will be prosperous. The priest said to them, go in peach your way and what you’re going has the Lord’s approval. They’re completely insensitive to the idolatry that takes place because they know what is the set up in Micah’s house. When he told them, back in verse 4; thus and so has Micah doe to me, and hired me, and I become his priest. He is told them about the idols in the house, household idols and the gods they have made and how he leads in the worship in this family, focused on these idols.

You know, it’s not mentioned here, it will be mentioned down further that these five men all about because Micah told them. But these men of Dan, they don’t say, what are doing as a priest with idols? You’ll have to die for this and so will Micah. Now they say, all inquire the Lord for us. No problem? God bow down before these idols, these graven images you’ve made and find out whether the Lord will prosper our way. You see the spiritual decadence. They’ve just lost any sensitivity to spiritual things and these are God's people. They know Levites are to be priest. So they’re familiar with the law this just pick and choose. What’s you like, what you don’t like, what you use, what you won’t use and somehow God ought to be happy that you’ve chose to use anything, he said in your version. So you’re a Levite go, inquire our God for us.

A Levite that worships before man, maid, grave and images and so were images, and then he comes back and said, all go, your journey has God's approval. So the five men departed. They go to Laish. Now we’ve gone a long way up here. When you’re in the hill country of Ephraim, you’re still in the middle part of Israel. When you go to Laish, you’ve gone twenty all the way up above the Sea of Galilee, twenty five miles north of the Sea of Galilee is where Laish is. So these men take along journey looking because they’re traveling through lands that’s been allotted to different tribes in Israel. So they’re looking for a place that may be they could take for themselves, what you will call easy pickings because they’ve already decided that they don’t want to have to fight for their land with the Amorites down where God allotted them their territory.

So, they journey all way up the Laish, they see people they’re living insecurity after the manner of the Sidonians quay and secured an isolated area. They come to this isolated city and so there’s nobody around and they say it’s a prosperous area and there’s no ruler here, there’s no army. So they come back, in verse 8; to their brothers at Zorah and Eshtaol. And we’re back down now, the land that had been allotted to Ephraim, all the way down that area, that’s west of Jerusalem, toward the Mediterranean. And they’ve report back, what did you report? And they said, arise, let’s go up against them for we’ve seen the land, it’s very good and where you sit still, do not delay, go up to enter to possess the land. Now, they’re excited. Why here is some people that we can conquer and we really don’t even need the Lord’s help.

Problem with the Amorites is, they’re going to have to depend on the Lord and do the struggle and the battle and have the conflict till they drive them out and destroy; there was the Lord’s haste, not willing to do that. So what we will do is go up north and we found a people there defenseless. And it’s a good setting, easy pickings. When you entered you’re come to a secured people with a spacious land, verse 10; for God has given it into your hand. And they think how spiritual godless people can be. We give all the credits to the Lord for this. I mean, we’ve found our from a Levite who went before the idols, the graven images, the God forbid ever to be made to encourage us on our way. I mean, we’ve just had confirmation that the Lord’s hand is in this. And I mean, doesn’t that just confirm what that Levite told them? The way would be prosperous and here they sure have found the place. Here, we’re not careful.

We get off track biblically but somehow we find confirmation, its okay to be off track, because the hand of the Lord is in it and so they’re back, the Lord is given it in your hand. Come on folks, let’s not hold back. The Lord is doing this. A place where there is no lack of anything that is on the earth. This is the perfect place for us. The only problem is it’s not God's place for them. There is an element of truth in this. It would be a lot easy to take Laish, then it will be to take the region that was assigned to them. The God has a purpose in bringing these difficulties and obstacles and trials into our lives. So that we learn to depend upon him and do it in his strength. They think, oh, now we can give the Lord the credit for the new place we’ve found. From the family of Danites from Zorah, from Eshtaol, they send 600 men armed with weapons. This is only a fraction of the Danite army.

According the Book of Numbers, when the various tribes are numbered, the armed men in Dan number over 62,000, they’re second only in number to Judah as far as the size of their army. So 600 men going is a drop in the bucket and now some will say, well, part of Dan, the tribe of Dan stayed in their original territory, that could be, we don’t know because Dan will become known by their identification with their northern location. In fact that will be the farthest northern part of Israel. So they were referred to Israel as going from Dan to Beersheba; Dan in the north and Beersheba in the south. The city of Laish after Dan conquers it will become known as Dan. And so when Israel you talk about going from Dan to Beersheba, you’ve gone from the farthest north to the farthest south. It’d be like talking about in our day going from New York to Los Angeles, I mean, you covered the whole country going from east to west.

Now when you go from Dan to Beersheba, you’ve covered the whole country of Israel going from north to south but this 600 men is in no way, all the army that Dan could master but it’s enough, you don’t need 60,000 men anyway to conquer Laish, I mean, it’s the city without an army. So you sent 600 well armed soldiers and they’ll get the job done. Okay. We’re ready to move on and they’re glad to do it, from the family of the Danites, verse 11; you get these 600 men armed with weapons of war, they move on, you see some of their stopping points and the reason you get, their stopping points in verse 12 going to move you on to the hill country of Ephraim and the house of Micah. And what happens here?

Verse 14; then the five men who went to spy out the country of Laish, so these original five men who had stopped and recognized the Levite and talked with him and asked him do inquire of the Lord whether it prosper their way. Now they speak up and said to their king’s men, this army of 600, do you know that there are in these houses, an ephod. And what a ephod, that’s key to the priesthood. And household idols and a graven image, and a molten image? Do you know there are Gods in this house? You see there is no spiritual sensitivity left. You think, well, this army of 600 is going to destroy this family for doing in Israel what is a capital offense.

They say at the end of verse 14; now therefore consider what you should do. What you should do is destroy Micah and his whole family. That’s not what they mean. They mean is we ought to take these gods to be our gods. They turned to side there, came to the house of the young man, the Levite, to the house of Micah and ask of his welfare. Now Micah is not home with Levites. The 600 armed men with their weapons of war, who were sons of Dan stood by the entrance of the gate. Now the five men who went to spy out the land went up and entered in there and took the graven image, the ephod, the household idols, the molten image. The graven image and the molten image, that’s what Micah’s mother had had made, these other gods with the general household gods, they weren’t especial as the one who she had spend so much. It’s over to have me.

They gathered these up. So you see Micah had shown these five spies these gods because the five men go into the house, they know right where to go, they know right where they are, they know what they’re looking for. The Levite who’s serving as the priest is standing watching this all go on. Well, at the end of verse 17; the priest stood with the entrance of the gate with the six hundred men armed with weapons of war. When these men went into Micah’s house and took the graven image, the ephod, the household idols, the molten image, say, how may times these things are mentioned that keep telling us these are the ephod, the household idols, the graven image, the molten image. Then we’re told that in verse 17, then we’re told that in verse 18, to drive home the point. I mean, this is going on in Israel. It’s not just a family, I mean, here you got a tribe and what they really want is these gods, what about what we’ve read in Exodus, what about we’ve read in Deuteronomy?

They know that because they know what the book, those books say about the Levites being the priest, they know what those books say about having an ephod. So they just pick and chose and that’s all right, besides people are more excited to worship something you can see but we’re doing with a Levite and an ephod. So we’re not abandoning what God is said, we just making our religion more effective and more personal and something that people can identify with and feel part of. Well, the Levites are little bit dumbstruck here. So he asked at the end of verse 18, what are you doing? I’m mean, I’m about to got a business here. I mean, I’m the priest, these are my gods, these represent the God that I’m supposedly representing. I mean, what are you doing? They said to him; be silent, put your hand over your mouth, come with us.

They got two choices; shut up and come with us or they got 600 armed men here that are taking these things, what do you think the order would be? Or we’ll just kill you here. It’s not going to be any big deal; they’re on the way up to slaughter a whole city. So put your hand over your mouth, shut up, come with us. But did they have any problem with his character? No, be to us the father and a priest. It’s better for you to be a priest to the house of one. Is it better for you to be a priest of the house of one or to be a priest to a tribe and a family in Israel? You know what, this is the promotion; you’re a priest to Micah’s family, would it be better for you to be a priest for a whole tribe in Israel? The priest’s heart was glad. He took the ephod, the household idols, the graven image and went among the people, I’m with you men. So he is the priest, he takes charge of these things that are being removed and off we go in the homes. I mean, it was just a good financial arrangement of good situation were in the Micah’s house but I got an opportunity for a better situation. Here I go.

Verse 21; they turned and departed, put the little ones a life stocks of valuables in front of them. They’ve gone some distance, Micah returns home and he finds out his place is being plundered and his gods have been taken. So he assembles the men around his area to pursue after. They cried out to the sons of Dan. Verse 23; they turned around and said to Micah, what’s the matter with you? They have assembled together. What’s your problem that you’ve gathered these men to come after us? I mean, they obviously know this is Micah’s men that have joined with him; they don’t have any chances to take on the Danites. He says, you’ve taken away my gods which I have made, verse 24. Aren’t there something perversely humorous in that? You have taken away my gods, which I made. I mean, this fallen man ever think? You’ve taken away the gods which I made.

Now, we’ve to stop, go to Isaiah 44; God explains what happens the people’s thinking. Isaiah 44, tremendous section in Isaiah. We were in this Chapter earlier today to talk about God promising to pour out his Spirit, that a sentence in Israel in verse of Isaiah 44, verse 6 that we’re going to pick up; thus says the Lord the King of Israel, and his redeemer the Lord of hosts; I am the first, and I am the last; there is no God besides me. End of the verse 8; is there any God besides me? Is there any other rock I know of, none. Now look at verse 9; those who fashion a graven image are all of them fiddle. Their precious things are of no profit. Their graven image, that molten image, their precious things are of no profit even their own witnesses failed to see or no so that they will be put to shame.

Who is fashioned to God or cast an idol to no profit, behold, all his companions will be put to sham, for the craftsmen themselves are mere men: let them all assemble themselves, let them stand up, let them tremble, let them together be put to shame. The man shapes iron into a cutting tool, the worst, he has to make the tools, and does work over the coals, fashioning it with hammers, working with his strong arms: he also gets hungry, his strength fails, he drinks no water and become weary. You see what happens. Here you have to craftsmen who first took iron and made a cutting tool and now he is slaving away and he gets hungry and he gets thirsty, and he gets tired. This weak links are the one who is making the God. Utter stupidity. Another shapes wood, he extends the measuring line, he outlines it with a red chalk, I loves the details; he works it with planes, outlines it with a compass, makes it in the form of a man, like the beauty of a man so that it may sit in a house.

Surely he cuts cedars for himself and takes the cypress or an oak and razes it for himself among the trees of the forest: he plants the fir, the rain makes it grow, then it becomes something for a man to burn. So he takes one of them and warms himself; he also take makes the fire to bake bread, also makes a God and worship it. See, he takes the same tree, part of it; you’re going to burn in the fire to keep warm, part of it you’re going to burn in the fire to cook your dinner, and then the other part of it you’ll make your God. Is that anything but absolute stupidity? Let me stop and think. That God that you’re bowing before, you made that God out of the same thing that you cook your meal over, that you warm yourself with.

Verse 16; half of it he burns in the fire; over this half, he eats meat, he roast a roast, and is satisfied: he also warmed himself, and says, I am warm, I have seen the fire but the rest of it he makes into a God, his graven image, he falls down before it and worships. He also prays to it and says deliver me for you are my God. Note this, they do not know nor do they understand for he has smeared over their eyes so they cannot see and they are hard, and so they cannot comprehend. No one recalls nor is there any knowledge or understanding to say, I’ve burned half of it in the fire and I also baked the bread over its coal, I roast meat and eat, then I make the rest of it into an abomination. I fall down before a block of wood. He feeds on ashes. A deceived heart has turned him aside, he cannot deliver himself, nor say, is there not a lie in my right hand? Understand the futility of trying to reason with fallen men, he had no ability to comprehend it. He can’t sort it out.

The most stupid thing, there are very intelligent people in this city that have been in worship services today and they sit there and a man stands up and tells them all kinds of things and they believe it. Do they ever stop and think? How does he know? Who’s he to tell me what God is like? And think about men who don’t believe the bible. Vis-à-vis with a man a number of years ago who was a pastor in the city for some time. I had a hard time finding anything in the bible, he believed, every place I took them in the bible, so why I believe that. I don’t believe that. I finally said to him, why don’t you tell me what you believe, we could start there. And yet in his church you have some of the most well educated people sit week after week and supposedly learn something about God. It’s the same stupidity, a man creates a God and people are willing to worship that God that he has created for them with his words, with his mind, with his hands, so why you shouldn’t make fun of people’s religion. Well, I say, I did know that, as he spoke for God. He said, they don’t even know a lie that’s in their right hand, that God is alive.

You’re in Isaiah 46, then we will go back. Isaiah Chapter 46, verse 6. Verse 5 says, to whom would you liken me, and make me equal, and compare me that we will be alike? What are you going to compare God to? Let’s say, what God is like, no he isn’t. God is like, you can’t compare God to and he is unique in that sense. Those who lavish gold from the purse and weigh silver on the scale, hire a goldsmith and he makes it into a God, they bow down, they worship it. They lift it upon the shoulder, they carry it, they set it in place, and it stands. It does not move from place to place. The one may cry to it, yet it cannot answer, it cannot deliver him from his distress. They’re worthless.

Verse 9; I am God, there is no other; I am God, there is no one like me, and it’s his words that will be accomplished. Now you come back to Judges Chapter 18. The sad thing, Israel, the people chosen by God as his own nation for himself and he would be their God, have betrayed him for the gods like the Canaanites. We want to be like the people around us. Why don’t want to be different, we don’t want to stand out, we don’t want to be marked off and it’s easy to look at the stupidity of Israel, their foolishness and yet it’s far less understandable how the church of Jesus Christ can turn away from the word of God and the worship instructed in the word of God and be happy to have it that way? It is no different, we take man’s ideas, mix some bible into it, stir it up and people are pleased. And the hand of Lord must be in it. Look at the numbers; look at how well peoples speak of us. I mean, it’s got to be a good thing.

All right, we have to finish Judges 18 here and it goes quickly. Verse, I’ll jump down to verse 27; Micah goes back because the Danites tell him don’t speak too loudly because there’s so men here who are short of temper. And if they hear you speaking, they’ll take a fence at it and you and everybody with you will be dead. And so Micah realizes that, verse 26; Micah saw they were too strong for him; he turned and went back to his house. Then they took, verse 27, what Micah had made, and the priest who had he belonged him, and came unto Laish, to a people quiet and secure: struck them with the edge of the sword, they burned the city with fire. There was no one to deliver them, because it was far from Sidon, they had no dealings with any one who was in the valley which is near Beth-rehob. They built the city, and lived there. They called the name of the city Dan, after Dan their father, who was born in Israel. The city was formally called Laish. Here, we named it after name our father, one of the twelve leaders, twelve sons who they are descendants of.

Verse 30; the sons of Dan set up for themselves the graven image: and Jonathan, the son of Gershom, now we are told the name of the Levite first time. Now you got the sons of Dan, you got a tribe in Israel, adapting this pagan worship for themselves as the try. The graven image, they set up the graven image and Jonathan, the son of Gershom, the son of Manasseh. Some of the ancient versions, his name here is Moses and that fits because it’s from Moses to his son Gershom that you’re have this line some of the scribes had a hard time accepting the identification of this Levite in this way. So they, it’s only a minor change in the Hebrew text to make it Manasseh. But Manasseh, that godless king, is yet in Israel’s future. He and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of the land. Dan never does recover from its idolatry and under a future king, there will be golden calves set up at Dan and at Beth-rehob and drawing the northern tribes and keeping them in this pagan worship. Is it interesting how it multiplies out?

Here you have a mother in Israel, who wants to honor her son, so has gods made for him, we’re more all done, you’ll have the whole northern kingdom joined in this idolatrous worship that will ultimately be of the calves that are made to stand at Dan and worship. No big deal, we’ve a custom to worshipping idols and these will be more glorious idols which means, the more glorious gods. So they set up for themselves Micah’s graven image, which he had made all the time at the house of God was at Shiloh. Reminder, the center of God's worship is still at Shiloh where the tabernacle is, where the Ark of the Covenant is. God hasn’t changed. People think what they’re doing now and everybody is doing it and the whole tribe now is doing it. So therefore it is acceptable. There is a reminder at the end here, all the time the house of God was at Shiloh, nothing has changed from God's perspective.

We don’t alter God, he doesn’t adjust to us, he tells us how it is. So they’re worshipping the idols at Dan but the house of God is at Shiloh. So there is no true worship of God going on at Dan. There’s a lot of religious activity but they are not worshipping the living God. All right, let me summarize several things here. That worship as I mentioned will go on to the captivity of the land that probably refers to the captivity under the Assyrians of the northern ten tribes in 722 BC, which is several hundred years away. All right, several lessons from this. And the first one is a sad one; parents sometimes often provide their children with a corrupted form of worship, as with this mother in Israel. She provides pagan worship for her child and we have some pagan system like Roman Catholicism was learned this well that you get the children, get them early build that in, in developing the system.

Parents often provide their children with a corrupted form of worship that’s why absolutely a sensual for us with the parents, the adults to be faithful to the word and model that, evidence that. I can’t guarantee how my children will come out. You can’t guarantee how your children will come out but you are responsible to be faithful to truth and to the moral that in your life and worship of the living God. Number two; good intentions can completely corrupt the worship of God, as a good intentions casting it in the light here of this mother. I’m going to have verse 3 of Chapter 17; I will wholly dedicate the silver from my hand to the Lord. You got to say, well, that’s admirable. No, it isn’t, disastrous. I’m going to make you a graven image and a molten image. So what turn you further away from the worship of the God of Israel? Good intentions don’t count, they can corrupt very seriously.

Number three; we like to make our own gods and have a religion of our own liking, they made the images, appointed the priest, and established the place of worship. They did it all. We like it that way. We want to worship that we’re comfortable with, we want to worship like we like and we all battle that and find ourselves drawn to that. And does that have to be that tight; does that have to be always just away? It has the always be just away God says. Once we decide to step off from that, we don’t know where we’ll end up. You know what back in the days of Moses, Israel is affirming, oh, yes, will do everything the Lord has said. Yes, the law, we’ll bind ourselves to that. Yes, we’re at agreement. Yes, we will do it. Here they are, doing their own thing as part of fallen men, so we are just as fallen. We look at Israel and shake our head, but we realize we fight the same battles, in that sense to make our religion more compatible, our worship more compatible with the likings of the world. And we then think we’re more successful.

Number four; religious syncretism; mixing of truth with error always leaves you with error. Micah is concerned to have a Levite as his priest, didn’t make his worship any less abominable to God. Any time you mix error with truth, what you have is error. Then we’ll use the example in a number of times; any time you mix poison with good food, you have poison food, period. You won’t have good food and a little bit of poison, you have poison food. Let’s say, let’s root around here, maybe we can find something good. No, let’s get rid of it all. I mean, you just can’t mix error with truth, you corrupt the truth. So they had a Levite, they had an ephod, what they had was totally abominable to God.

It is the responsibility, number five, for the leaders of God's people to lead them biblically and that’s what the kings of Israel are to come in and they are godly kings. There will be none in the northern kingdom after it splits, but there are some godly kings in the south that do enforce the law of God in Israel according to his instruction. Number six; false worship is self-centered and self-seeking. I mean, there is no way to get around it. The reason we have false worship, corrupted worship, syncretistic worship is we want to please ourselves and God ought to be pleased as long as we are doing something to please Him and something to please us. I mean, we get done with all we call a worship service, do we ask ourselves, do ask somebody, well, did you like it?

We got to ask ourselves, was it pleasing to God? If it is pleasing to God and I didn’t like it, I have some adjustments to make. God's not up there hoping, well, I hope they like it, I hope they like it, I hope they happy with it; if they’re not, I hope they feel free to make whatever adjustments that they would like, not the way it is. False worship is self-centered, self-seeking, and it’s self-worship. And that is always opposed to the worship of the true God. What this does remind us and bring before us with the situation of Israel is spiritually during the time of the judges. It’s not that they are not a religious people, I mean, here you have one family, they’ve got their own center of worship with their own priest. They’re very religious but it is a corrupted religion. It’s not totally Canaanite because they have a Levite as a priest, they have an ephod. But it is an abomination to God because they have taken its truth and corrupted it so that they worship the work of their hands.

Let’s pray together. Thank you Lord for the truth of your word, Lord we’re saddened to read this history of your people, the people that you loved, that you redeemed out of Israel, that you delivered from their enemies, that you established in a good land flowing with milk and honey, that you promised you would destroy their enemies. Yet in all of this, they quickly turned from you. They quickly turned to do as they pleased. Lord, may we learn from these examples. We upon whom the ends of the earth have come learn the importance of purity in our doctrine of being faithful to your word in the little things as well as the big things, that we as adults and parents, grandparents learn the importance of faithfulness to truth, that we might model before the generation coming up, the young people, the children, the young adults; faithfulness to your truth in difficulty, in trial, in hard times, in grief, in sorrow. Whatever comes we are faithful to our God and do His truth and model this truth with godly lives. Lord, guard us from pride and arrogance. Let me take it to hearts, let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall as we be deceived by the deceitfulness of sin, corruption of the flesh. May we be faithful in our service and in our worship. We pray in Christ’s name, amen.