1. Text summary
2. How is Christ in the text?
3. Application
Chapter 17-18
1. On a foundation of theft from his mother, an Ephraimite Micah sets up a shrine with an expensive idol. He buys a passing Levite to be his priest. Wandering Danites seeking land come across him, and take the priest and the idol
2. Jesus is the priest God gives us, not the one we make up or hire for ourselves.
3. This is the wild west, spiritually, where the strong swallow up the weak. You get the most impressive priest and shrine you can afford, or take by brute force. But God is not impressed with how much money we throw at him, or how much power we wield for Him.
Chapter 19
1. Another Levite from Ephraim takes a mistress from Bethlehem (!), who leaves him and goes back to her father. He goes back for her, and her father keeps him there, night after night, probably getting him drunk each night (!). He finally leaves late one night, makes an effort to not stay in Jerusalem, which is not Israelite at this time, and lands in Gibeah, late. He's taken in by a man who urges him not to stay in the public square (?).
But the Gibeonites come calling anyway, demanding sex with the Levite, the man (!). They offer the mistress instead (!), and they abuse her until she is almost-dead (!). When the Levite gets her home, dead, he sends one of her 12 limbs to each tribe of Israel (!), calling for justice.
2. Jesus knows all this debased wickedness. He takes a wife, not a mistress. He reclaims her, without giving in to consorting with her "father," the devil. He doesn't give his bride to the abuses of the world, but prays for her to be kept from the world (John 17).
3. Be fully committed to God, and your spouse, not just partially, or for what's in it for you.
- refuse to indulge sensually in a way that sacrifices your ethics.
- refuse the enticement of same-sex perversion
- don't hurt others to protect yourself.
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