Judges 18 -- The Perils Of Doing Your Own Thing

With each chapter I read, I keep asking, “Can it get any worse?”  Yes, and here it is.

 

My commentary fleshed in the start of the story:  The tribe of Dan had been allotted choice land when the Promised Land was divided.  “The Lord had assigned the tribal allotments … God put each tribe just where He wanted it … The Danites, however, weren’t able to defeat and dispossess the enemy, thus they decided to go north and relocate … For the tribe of Dan to reject God’s assigned territory and covet another place was to oppose His divine will.”

 

Five spies had come to Micah’s house, seen his shrine, his idols, and his priest, and asked whether God would bless their trip.  Now, they’d returned with an army of 600 and stolen everything related to the shrine, “hiring away” the priest, who verse 30 says was Moses’ grandson!

 

Micah and his neighbors went in pursuit, trying threats to get it all back, but they were too outnumbered.  So now the tribe of Dan was adding theft and idolatry to its list of sins.  They attacked and killed the innocent, peaceful people in Laish, then burned the city and rebuilt it, renaming it “Dan”.

 

Now the tribe of Dan finally had its own land, not where God wanted them to be and taken from innocent people, with idols and a false priest set up for worship – a recipe for disaster.  In fact, Dan would be the site, once civil war split the nation hundreds of years later, where one of the golden calves would be erected.  No wonder they consented to it!

 

Father, this just reminds me how easy it is to slip farther and farther from You if we allow sin even the tiniest foothold in our life.  The devil will take anything we give him and use it against us while deceiving us into believing that we know better than You.  Please keep our eyes wide open to Your truth, instead.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford