A Strange, And Not So Strange, Story (4)

 

Judges Chapters 17 & 18

 

As we continue to ponder Judges Chapter 17; even though Micah and his mother are referring to Yahweh, the Covenant God of Israel, their actions are pagan and idolatrous. This ought to be a warning for us, we can talk “Jesus talk,” but that doesn’t mean that our thinking and practices reflect Jesus Christ – we can be just as far from the person and teachings of Jesus Christ as Micah, his mother, and the Levite were from the Law of God given through Moses.

 

Micah, his mother, and the Levite were making up their own rules as they went along. They were melding talk of Yahweh into pagan practices. They were referring to Yahweh while worshipping idols. Micah first consecrates one of his sons to be a priest, then he recruits a rootless Levite to be a priest (one wonders what happened to the son who had been consecrated). Micah took upon himself the authority to consecrate, thus usurping the Law of God. One of the great threats to the People of God through the ages has been syncretism, the blending of the Word of God with the cultures, religions, and philosophies of the world – syncretism is often subtle and seductive, and other times it is overt and blatant. Syncretism can be obvious to us, or we can be oblivious to it.

 

When we are raised in a syncretistic culture, such as in the United States, it can be challenging to discern what beliefs, thinking, and practices belong to the Kingdom of God and what don’t belong. Peer pressure, both in general society and in the professing church, can discourage us from pursuing the truth of God’s Word, for communities typically do not care for the destruction of their idols – whether those idols are within the church or in general society.

 

Micah operated without regard to the Law of Moses, without regard to the established priesthood of Aaron, and without regard to the covenant that Yahweh established with the Patriarchs. Is there a difference between Micah, his mother, and the Levite, and ourselves?

 

We are taught that we belong to the communion of saints, and that we’ve been “built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone” (Ephesians 2:20). But do we actually believe this? Does this actually inform our thinking, our decisions, and our actions?

 

Are we linked to the apostles and prophets? Do we build upon this foundation? Do we know the Bible well enough to answer this question? Is the cornerstone, Jesus Christ, central to all that we do? Do we have a functional understanding of the Patriarchs? The Patriarchs of the Old Testament and those of the Church, those whom we term the Church Fathers?

 

Do we, as individuals and congregations, live with reference to the Body of Christ? That is, are our lives informed by the reality that we do not live in a vacuum, but that we are to serve, and to be accountable to, the Body of Christ? This means the Body of Christ in our communities, in our regions, and in our world.

 

What would you think if you were on a tour of the Mississippi River, traveling north from New Orleans, and that you were promised that you’d be taken to see where the Father of Waters began, only to find that after a few hours your riverboard docked in upper Louisiana where a small creek enters the Mississippi and were told, “This is where the Great River begins?”

 

Or perhaps the riverboat tour traveled a bit farther and stopped at where the Ohio River entered the Mississippi, or where the Missouri River entered the Mississippi – and you were told at each place that “this is where the River begins.” What would you think?

 

O friends, this is what happens when we begin our history with our traditions; whether it is a renewal movement in this decade or that century, or a reform movement in another century -we fail to reach the headwaters of the Great River, we fail to see where we have come from, we fail to build upon the Apostles and Prophets, with Jesus Christ as our cornerstone. When we limit our heritage and understanding and praxis to a tributary of the Great River, we fail to live in the fulness of the Great River, we fail to live in the context of the heritage and trajectory that is expressed in Hebrews Chapter 11.

 

Little wonder that we are a fragmented people, when we dogmatically insist that our own tributaries are the Great River, when there is only one Great River, flowing form the Throne of God (Rev. 22:1; John 7:38).

 

Are we really any different than Micah and his mother and the Levite?

 

What do you think?