Sunday – April 27, 2014 – Read the Word on Worship
Judges chapter 19 to 21 “Saving Private Benjamin” from Sunrise Community Church on Vimeo.
Word On Worship – Sunday – April 27, 2014 Download / Print
Judges 21:24-25
“The sons of Israel departed from there at that time, every man to his tribe and family, and each one of them went out from there to his inheritance. In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.”
The final five chapters of Judges function as an appendix to the entire book. Instead of focusing on the sins of Israel or of their judges, these chapters look closely at the lives of two Levites. Levites were the priestly tribe in Israel, the religious leadership of the nation. Sadly, we will discover that the religious leadership is not holding the nation accountable for its sin. Instead, the Levites are as messed up as the people they are supposed to lead. Their small, personal failures escalate to tribal and national dimensions and plunge Israel into political and moral anarchy. Thus, Judges concludes with a finger pointing in the face of the Levites.
When the Scriptures tell us each man did what was right in his own eyes, it is not singling out a single level of society or position of leadership. It was across the board. The surface issue is what people were doing, but the elephant in Israel’s room was the standard by which they governed themselves. It was no longer God’s standard but their own eyes and results in people insisting on following the leading of their own lusts, declaring their independence from God and echoing the lie of the serpent from the Garden of Eden.
The message of the Book of Judges is a message for the church today. How many of us are outraged at the conduct of the covenant people of God? They were called to be the people of God by a covenant but still refused to be subject to His commands. We have been saved by a covenant of God, but in our self piety, reject the rule of God for what is right in our eyes. We come to church on Sunday because it is congenial and find our moral standard commendable in our own eyes. Yet in our hearts we are as stubborn and sinful as the people of Gibeah in our rejection of God’s authority and standards in our lives.
Sometimes matters appear quite proper on the surface, but if we are willing to look past the obvious and dig a little deeper we will find the true enemy. We may be shocked at the author’s selection of Gibeah and their sins to document Israel’s depravity. But do not let the outrageousness of the offense blind us from the point that the Scriptures are making. The root of it all is each man doing what is right in his own eyes. That root may show itself in the grossest of sins as we see here at the end of Judges or in the veneer of righteousness that can be seen with the rich young ruler, but it all comes from the same source.