A Strange, And Not So Strange, Story (8)

 

Judges Chapters 17 & 18

 

“When these went into Micah’s house and took the graven image, the ephod and household idols and the molten image, the priest said to them, ‘What are you doing?’ They said to him, ‘Be silent, put your hand over your mouth and come with us, and be to us a faither and a priest. Is it better for you to be a priest to the house of one man, or to be a priest to a tribe and a family in Israel?’ The priest’s heart was glad, and he took the ephod and household idols and the graven image and went among the people.” Judges 18:18 – 20.

 

Is it possible that churches want chaplains and that pastors would be just fine serving as chaplains or social workers? That is, is it possible that what “we the people” really want is someone to dedicate or baptize our children, someone to marry us, someone to bury us, and someone to tell us nice things on Sunday morning? Is it possible that pastors are fine with serving in the foregoing capacity? Is it possible that even those pastors who enter ministry with a passion for Jesus Christ, a desire to see Christians actually become disciples of Christ, and a determination to see others come into a relationship with Jesus Christ, are eventually worn down to the point where they lose the sharpness of their calling and give in to the weight of the status quo?

 

The Danites say to the Levite, “We have a bigger and better job for you, how can you argue with our logic?” This sounds an awful lot like our religious reasoning today – “Bigger is Better” is the Great Commandment and the Great Commission merged into one. Of course, on the other end of the spectrum we have, “We don’t want new wine, we want to preserve our old wineskins.”

 

What happened to the Levite’s relationship with Micah that we see in Judges 17:11? “The Levite agreed to live with the man, and the young man became to him like one of his sons.” When “bigger is better,” relationships take a back seat. I’m sure there are exceptions to the norm, but how many times have we seen pastors leave one church to serve a smaller church? How often do we take a cut in pay to make a job move?

 

However, let me be quick to say that this mentality of “bigger is better” is not the fault of any one group of people, it is the result of many forces, of many areas in which we acquiesce to the world around us, to the spirit of Babylon. It is what happens when we desert the Christ of the Cross and the Cross of Christ. After all, “bigger is better” and inviting money to be our arbiter is really the spirit of the Great Whore – Babylon the Great (Revelation chapters 17 – 18). John Piper titled a book, “Brothers, We Are Not Professionals”; I agree with the thought behind the title, but I’m just not sure we can extricate ourselves from the spider’s web in which we are entangled, it is difficult to function while living in Babylon. What I am trying to say is that we ought not to give ourselves a pass when reading about the idolatrous and mercenary Levite of our passage, either as vocational ministers or as congregations.

 

“When they had gone some distance from the house of Micah, the men who were in the houses near Micah’s house assembled and overtook the sons of Dan. They cried to the sons of Dan, who turned around and said to Micah, ‘What is the matter with you, that you have assembled together’?” (Judges 18:22 – 23).

 

Can we see the sorry result of Micah’s idolatry? Can we see that his neighbors were seduced by his idolatry to the point that they pursued the Danites in an attempt to recover the idols? Micah’s idolatry was a cancer, first spreading to his neighbors and then being perpetuated in the tribe of Dan. The partnership between Micah and his mother was evil, and its fruit poisonous. The Levite added a false sense of legitimacy to the evil, and the evil spread not only to Micah’s neighbors, but then to an entire tribe, affecting others beyond that tribe. How are we influencing our families and neighbors? How are our congregations affecting other congregations?

 

While there are seminaries who remain faithful to Christ, for many generations there have been seminaries which have graduated men and women who reject the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the Bible. A seminary degree or an ordination certificate do not mean that the person holding them is a Biblical Christian, preaching and teaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And so as not to be misunderstood, there are many who do not have a formal theological education who are also propagating idols within the Temple of God, the Church of Jesus Christ. Just because a person is the equivalent of a Levite, or of the family of Aaron, does not mean that he is teaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

False teaching and idolatry have been a threat to the Church since its inception, as a result we have the New Testament letters, including the letter which we call Revelation. O dear friends, when Paul writes of a great “apostasy” (2 Thess. 2:3) and of “deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons” (1 Tim. 4:1) and of “difficult times” in which “men will be lovers of self, lovers of money…having a form of godliness” (2 Tim. 3:1 – 5) let us remember that these evil elements will appear Christian, very very Christian. The music will purport to be “Christian,” the written material will purport to be “Christian,” the teaching will purport to be “Christian.” Just as Micah and his mother and the Levite used the language of Yahweh, false teachers and idolaters today use the language of Jesus Christ and the Bible.

 

As we conclude this series on Judges 17 and 18, where would you like your name recorded? Alongside the idolatrous Levite and his family in Judges 18:30 – 31? Or alongside those faithful to Jesus Christ in Hebrews Chapter 11?