Genesis 50

All Egypt mourns Israel's (Jacob's) death

When the 49th chapter ends, Jacob blesses his children then dies. As we open the fiftieth chapter Joseph cries over his father. They embalm Jacob following Joseph's orders and Joseph asks for permission from Pharaoh to take Jacob to Machpelah to bury him as he promised Jacob he would do. 

Notice this picture here, not only does Pharaoh grant the request to bury Jacob in Canaan, but all Egypt mourns for seventy days and then Pharaoh sends a huge expedition up to Canaan in honor of Jacob and his burial. This is truly the hand of God and speaks of times to come where God will have honor for Christ by those that are not part of the original covenant. That shows the mighty hand of God and his power over all the world and those that are in it. 

Now we see why it is best to never sin in the first place. Christ can forgive us our sins, but unfortunately, we can suffer from a guilty conscience for a long time. Even after all the faithfulness that Joseph has shown his brothers in delivering them and saving their lives, they are afraid that he will get even for the evil they committed to him years ago. Joseph, once hearing this news weeps. The story of Joseph is a forerunner of Christ, and though because of sin this body will die, once our sins are forgiven, they are forgiven forever by Christ Jesus. Joseph and his brothers live in harmony and Joseph lives to see his grandchildren of many generations, telling them of his request to be buried in Canaan once God delivers them back out of Egypt. 

3rd Week of September Judges 19 Adult Sunday School Class

Judges chapter 19

We find out in the 28th verse of the 20th chapter that the events in the next three chapters take place not long after Joshua dies. Phinehas, Joshua's grandson is ruler over Israel at this time. This is not a shining moment for Israel, and the story here is one so horrible that you don't hear of stories much worse even in our wicked day. In my understanding of the story there are really no blameless people here. Every corner of the tale has some moral lapse that should be apparent. I'm not saying we're any better in our time, but in much of the history in the Bible, there is usually someone who is at least on God's side. Here it seems that everyone is out for themselves.

A man known only as a Levite from Ephraim takes a concubine against God's purpose for man and wife. This concubine then decides to sleep around on her 'mate', and leave and go live with her father. Out of shame or stubbornness we don't know. After four months of her absence the Levite goes after her. Where she is, and where the Levite's home was, wasn't all that close. He may have had many emotions while she was gone, but finally a cooler forgiving mind prevails and he journeys to go get her at his father-in-law's house.

His father-in-law seems genuinely happy to see him and they have a three day party. As the Levite thinks it is time to leave, he gets up to go and the concubine's father stops him and insists on him staying longer with more wine and food. After the fifth day, the Levite goes, even though it is too late to travel. Isn't this how we are sometimes? We procrastinate and fiddle until it is too late before we finally decide to do the task that must be done! Obeying human nature sometimes has a heavy price as we are about to find out.

The Levite is travelling with a servant, his concubine, and two donkeys with plenty of food for their journey. His servant says they should stay in Jebus because it is so late, but he says no, we'll have none of that, we'll stay with our own people further up the road. One can't help but wonder if the story would be any different if  they had lodged in Jebus. The Benjamites had a city called Gibeah and the Levite wants to lodge there. The only problem is when they get to Gibeah, no one will receive them, which happens to be against Jewish law not to receive a traveler. Finally a man coming from the field after work sees them, has compassion and finds out they are kindred people from the same part of the country. Things are looking up or so it seems. They make merry and eat and drink into the night.

Here the story goes south quickly. Unbeknownst to the Levite and his gracious host, there were some evil men watching for something evil to do. They picked this new stranger as there target for entertainment, and they didn't have anything good in mind. After trying to force themselves into the situation, the host decides to give out the concubine instead of his new friend to the evil men. They then have their way with her all night and let her go crawling back home when they are through with her in the morning.

This is a bad situation that seems to me to get worse by the moment. Instead of the Levite having compassion on the woman that sacrificed herself so that he might not be violated, he tells her to get up so they can be on their way. I understand that he would want to leave before things got worse, but I don't care what time in civilization this is, you couldn't help but have some compassion for this women in her state. I'm sure she was bruised and bloody, along with what psychological wounds she might have. Her injuries were bad enough that she died from them, so I would assume injuries were apparent on her body.

He finds out she will never go with him again, because she is dead. So now this heartless sinful man decides to carve up her body and send it to all the tribes in Israel to get justice. This is a story that makes the case that if two wrongs don't make a right, lets try three, four, five or more wrongs to see if that will make the situation improve. Of course, more sin doesn't make us any holier to God. Only Christ and his righteousness through the cross does away with sin.

The men from Gibeah were evil and should be punished. The Levite was wrong for taking a concubine, wrong for waiting too late to travel, wrong for having no compassion on this woman, and sinned again by what he did to her corpse. Israel truly was doing what was right in their own eyes.

1st Week of September Adult Sunday School Class Judges 18

Judges chapter 18

We have at the start of this chapter the tribe of Dan going out to seek and find an inheritance. While on their journey to spy out a new land they come across the Levite who is the priest to Micah. The reading of the chapter makes you believe that they know him and recognize his voice. So as the Levite explains to the choicest of the tribe of Dan how he came to be there and what his job is. So the men of Dan ask if their mission will be prosperous. They want this Levite, who is not a priest in the manner the law provides, to ask God whether they will succeed in their mission. We have to remember that this is a time in Israel when everyone did right in their own eyes. Micah's priest tells them they will do well and they depart.

When the spies go out and see a good piece of land occupied by the seemingly careless Zidonians, they know they have an opportunity to claim their own land. They give this good report back to the elders in Eshtaol and Zorah. The elders of Dan decide to get six hundred men together to go down and take the land form the Zidonians.

Along the way back to take their inheritance, they pass by Micah's home in Ephraim. They meet the priest and tell him that they would be happy if he would be their priest over their company, and oh by the way, wouldn't that be a greater honor than being priest for just one man? He takes them up on their offer, so this priest not only disregards God's laws as priest but also has a vanity problem. He has agreed to be the priest of Micah for an agreed payment and now leaves him without a second thought.

Of course none of this sits well with Micah and he chases down the army of the Danites to see why they have done such a things as this. The Danites don't like Micah's tone, regardless of his justification, and tell him more or less to watch his mouth around them. Micah new he was not strong enough to take his priest and idols back by force and he wisely went home.

The soldiers from Dan go down to Laish and lay waste to the inhabitants of the city. These particular Zidonians were separated from the rest of their people who lived further away. The city was conquered and the name changed to Dan in honor of their father. After they settle into the land they make the golden images part of their worship for years if not centuries. It is interesting that the Zidonians were defeated in large part because they were so far away from the rest of their own people. Now, the tribe of Dan suffers in their relationship to God because they are separated by distance from the customs and laws of their own people.

4th Week of August Adult Sunday School Class Judges 17

Judges chapter 17

I want to put a some things out there about this chapter. First, the Danites are still looking for their portion of land in Canaan. Given that, this part of Judges is not in chronological order, and these events happened earlier in the history of the Jews before the events of the last chapter about Samson. I believe that all scripture is for our Godly education and use. These particular chapters feel out of place with the previous stories in Judges about judges who rose up to be a good or false leader. I think these chapters are important and have a purpose, but the type of story that is told differs enough that it is a noticeable departure from the rest of Judges.

Reading these next chapters, it is a story of what not to do when serving God or trying to follow his commandments. I don't know how you feel reading the final chapters of Judges, but I keep thinking 'that's not right', and 'that's not wise', and 'isn't that exactly what God said not to do'? I can sit here these hundreds and thousands of years later and cast judgment with the hindsight of the Holy Scriptures. Before I get too high on my wobbly horse, I'll remind myself that it is easy to fall into these traps and I'm guilty of some of them no doubt. How many times in my life have I held up a hobby, task, job, or even another person ahead of my relationship with Christ Jesus. No, I've never bowed down before a graven image, but I've spent countless hours in front of the TV or on the Internet doing literally nothing, when I could have given God just a portion of that time and been better for it. I've spent time in recreation and play when there are far more serious matters to pray about. Should we spend every spare moment in prayer and communication with our Lord through his word? When someone actually goes that far to neglect their more worldly endeavors and forgets to bath and other mundane matters, I'll be the first one to warn them they've gone too far. I've never had to warn anyone that they are spending too much time in prayer, and I don't think I'll ever have to do that either. Rehab clinics aren't full of people who devote too much time to God, not that I'm aware of.

Back to this chapter in Judges, we meet a young man named Micah. Micah steals a bunch of money from his mother and she rightly is upset. She doesn't know it is her son, but after seeing his mother upset, his conscience causes him to reveal the matter to her. Instead of being enraged with her son, she is just happy to have the money back. His mother then vows to take the money and have a graven image made in honor of her son. If this all sounds bad, it is because it is bad. This story has wrong written all over it. This is in clear violation of God's laws and commandments to his people. In the third verse they are talking about breaking the first two of God's commandments, and by the fifth verse they are breaking them.Then after all of this, he takes one of his own son's and makes him a priest, which just in case you're wondering, is another violation of God's laws.

The sixth verse explains some of what is going on here. Everyone was doing what was right in their own eyes. People were their own God's, judges, leaders, and spiritual men. They didn't want or seek help from God's laws, but wallowed in their own sin. Now here comes a Levite wondering about. The only thing right with this part of the story is that the Levites were supposed to be priest by God's law. That's it, after that, nothing else is right about the story. Micah asks the Levite to stay for a small offering and salary. This Levite was so happy for something, that he doesn't seek any other higher calling or purpose of God. Be careful that you are satisfied with doing just so much for the Lord when you know you are capable of doing so much greater for him.The story ends with Micah just giddy with himself that he has done this thing and then just can't wait for how the Lord is going to bless him. We need to seek God in prayer to make sure that the path we are on is one given and chosen by him.

4th Week of July Adult Sunday School Class Judges

Judges chapter 12

We start out the twelfth chapter with more trouble for Jephthah from the tribe of Ephraim. Notice this is very similar to what happened when Gideon went after the Midianites. Gideon was able to sooth over the tribe of Ephraim with cool words, but that wouldn't happen with Jephthah.

All out war between the two tribes breaks out and Gideon and his men fresh from victory quickly take the upper hand in the fighting.We find out something interesting here about the tribes. They had different accents living in different parts of Canaan. That itself isn't so odd, because we have the same things in our own country here, but the distance between some of these tribes isn't that great. It goes to show that without mass communication and transportation short distances and cause people to vastly different. The Epraimites couldn't pronounce Shibboleth correctly. We have the same thing with Irish not pronouncing their 'th's' in that, third, or things. Irish pronounce those words with a distinct 't' sound.

After Jephthah and the Gileadites take the pass at the river Jordan, they use this pronunciation difference to find out who is trying to pass themselves off as a different people. It is a sad story that the tribes would fight each other, but interesting to see the tactics used against one another. Seems man is never so clever as when he is trying to perform evil on his fellow man.

I think the victories over Ammon and now also Ephraim show that Jephthah was a great general. This shows again that where you come from isn't as important as having God on your side. Jephthah only judged a short six years and after him came Ibzan. After his seven year judgment, there was Elon who judged for 10, and then Abdon for eight years. I think it goes to show that we need to be thankful to God when we have good leaders and examples because you never know who long they will be with you. Sometimes good men and women die too young and you miss their light and example. Cherish up the gifts that God gives you, especially when it is a good leader.