An Apostate Levite; An Apostate Tribe

Judges 17-18

            We know we’re in for trouble when we start with cursed silver. Micah, to his credit, confesses that he stole it from his mother, but instead of following through on her curse, she prays the Lord’s blessing on her son. More, she gives him a big chunk back. Well, she didn’t give it to him; she gave it to a silversmith to make an idol. This is the same syncretism we saw in Exodus 32 with the incident of the golden calf. It’s a dangerous attempt to mix the true worship of the Lord with the idolatry all around them.  Micah sets up a shrine, an alternate site of worship.

            Then, we meet a Levite from Bethlehem, which was not one of the cities set apart for the Levites. He, too, seems to be living outside the laws of God. Even though he is just a Levite, not a direct descendant of Aaron and therefore not a priest, he is going to act as a priest. Irregularities abound.

            Finally we have the strange story of a migrating tribe. Dan was not able to secure their allotment of the land (1:34). Although Judges doesn’t come right out and say it, it seems to me that when the tribes couldn’t complete the conquest it was because they didn’t believe the Lord could give it to them. It seems to me that the incomplete conquest was about a lack of faith. And here is Dan, migrating to a place of their convenience and choosing and grabbing an illegitimate priest of a syncretistic god to boot. “Everyone did as they saw fit,” indeed!

            There’s a deep connection in these two chapters. A couple of hundred years done the road, one Jeroboam, from the tribe of Ephraim is going to rebel against Rehoboam, son of Solomon. And Jeroboam, from Ephraim, is going to establish two shrines, with golden calves, at Bethel—in the hill country of Ephraim—and at Dan: two connections to Judges 17-18. And here’s the payoff. Do you know whose sin is mentioned in the Bible more often than anyone else’s? Jeroboam’s. Jeroboam led the Israelites of the northern kingdom away from the Lord their God, and that terrible failure becomes his legacy.

            Idolatry is a big deal, and the most common idolatry is to make ourselves the measure of all things. The true faith tells us that the Lord did it all for us in the death and resurrection of Jesus. Our faith isn’t about the good that we do, even though we are called to do good; it isn’t about our actions in the world, even though we are called to love all people (Galatians 6:10). Our faith is about God’s free gift of forgiveness for all people. That good news will have an effect in the world, but it is essential to remember that “it is by grace you are save, not by works, lest anyone should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).