[0:00] Take your Bibles and go to the book of Judges. We're rapidly nearing the end of the book of Judges. We're in the 18th chapter of the book of Judges. And we will read the entirety of the 18th chapter.
[0:14] We are in what many people refer to as an appendix to the book. It doesn't necessarily flow with the course of the rest of the book because after Judges 16, we no longer are introduced to any of the judges.
[0:34] Samson's the last one. So chronologically, we have reached, by the time we get to the 16th chapter, we have reached very near to the birth of Samuel.
[0:47] So we kind of stop right there because Samuel is raised up as a prophet and judge. He doesn't serve as a judge per se militaristically or fighting battles and delivering, but he serves as a judge, as a counselor, and as a prophet, and really kind of falls in that lineage.
[1:06] But he is the one that is used by God as a transition to the period of the kings. But we have chapters 17, 18, 19, 20, and 21 at the end of the book of Judges, which don't fall in that course.
[1:19] We're no longer talking about warfares. We're no longer talking about, well, we are a war, 19 through 21, but it's an internal war. It's a civil war. We're no longer talking about deliverances and a judge being raised up.
[1:32] Rather, we're kind of at this point where we have run the gauntlet, if you will, of judges, and we have seen how deliverance of man is vain. The great need of man is to be delivered from his ways.
[1:44] But the greater need of man is for a deliverer to come who is both perfect and eternal. Man cannot deliver himself. No matter how good, no matter how mighty, no matter how victorious in battle that individual ends, each judge came to a point where, and he died.
[2:02] And at his death, we reentered a period of turmoil, of sin and downward spiral. And if you remember, each passing judge led to a worse season in the nation.
[2:16] What the end of the book does is it points back and it's shown us where we're at, right? What the end of the book does is it goes back and shows us not what the judges look like, but what society looked like.
[2:28] Kind of what was going on in the world, so to say, among God's people. Now, and I know we're introducing this in a long way, but we need to have these introductions.
[2:42] When we open up the book of Judges in the first chapter, we are told, and you probably have forgotten it because it's been some months since we've been there.
[2:54] Othniel, the son-in-law of Caleb, is the very first judge. As a matter of fact, he's the model judge. He never does anything wrong. He is faithful. But prior to that, his introduction in the second chapter, in the first chapter, we kind of learned how we got here.
[3:10] Because the last time we knew, or the last thing we knew, Joshua had led God's people into the promised land. He had faithfully served the Lord as God. Sure, there had been periods of sin.
[3:21] Think of the sin of Achan. But they had left behind them all of these Ebenezers, these memorials, these stones of help, these piles of stones all throughout the book of Joshua.
[3:34] And these piles were to be reminders of how God had helped his people. And God had brought them into the land, and they lived, at the end of the book of Joshua, securely. It doesn't mean that they inhabited it completely, but they were living securely.
[3:48] They were no longer fighting an active war on a national level. So God had given them the land. He had brought the promises about. So we would expect things just to continue to progress and for God's people to prosper, right?
[4:02] Because that's what he said. I'm going to bring you into the land. I'm going to plant you in this land. It's a fruitful land. You're going to live in houses you did not build. You're going to drink from wells you did not dig. You're going to eat from gardens you did not plant. And I'm going to bless you, right?
[4:13] Your animals will not fail to give offspring. The womb will be fruitful. I'm just going to bless you, and you're going to follow me. And that's what we expect, but that's not what we find.
[4:24] So when we open up Judges 1, we see that while they were there and they had secured the land, they weren't really possessing the land. Now, that's important. Hold on to that because we'll see that here in a minute.
[4:36] That is, while God had distributed it among them, each of them had made compromises, so to say. We are introduced very quickly that they could not drive out.
[4:47] The tribe of Judah could not drive out the inhabitants of their possession because they had chariots with iron wheels. Now, that should surprise us because with God, anything is possible. And then we move on to the next where it says, and these people did not drive out.
[5:04] It wasn't that they couldn't. It's just that they didn't. And then we find in the 34th verse of the first chapter that prior to that, Judah could not drive out the inhabitants.
[5:16] Some of the other tribes did not drive out the inhabitants. And then we're introduced to the tribe of Dan. Dan not only could not and did not, Dan was pushed back.
[5:30] Dan failed completely. They were pushed back by the Amorites. And that radically changed what happens with the tribe of Dan.
[5:42] Because we don't find the rest of the story until the 18th chapter. The only other thing we know up to this point of the tribe of Dan is that there's a great warrior named Samson who comes from the tribe of Dan.
[5:54] But we don't really know what's going on in that tribe. So we'll see it here in Judges 18. If you remember, Judges 17 showed us the problem in society in the home.
[6:06] The home of Micah. He had this Levite that he hired to be his priest. He had a household of idols. That story continues here. So there's a problem of the home. And now we'll see that the problem of the home really began to permeate society.
[6:20] So it's a problem of a tribe. And then the problem of the tribe leads to the 19th, 20th, and 21st chapter, which is the problem of the nation. Because, see, the individual who affects the home, the home affects the tribe.
[6:32] The tribe affects the nation. It all goes back to the individual. The individual started it, and it just continued on. Judges 18 says, In those days there was no king of Israel.
[6:45] There's that repeated phrase again, so we should pay attention to it. In those days there was no king of Israel. And, in those days, the tribe of the Danites was seeking an inheritance for themselves to live in.
[6:57] For until that day an inheritance had not been allotted to them as a possession among the tribes of Israel. I'll go ahead and tell you before I continue reading. When we read had not been allotted, we need to read it as had not been secured by them.
[7:11] Okay? Had not been allotted to them as a possession among the tribes of Israel. So the sons of Dan sent from their family five men out of the whole number, valiant men from Zorah and Eshtael, to spy out the land and to search it.
[7:27] And they said to them, Go search the land. And they came to the hill country of Ephraim, to the house of Micah, and lodged there. When they were near the house of Micah, they recognized the voice of a young man, the Levite.
[7:37] And they turned aside there and said to him, Who brought you here? And what are you doing in this place? And what do you have here? And he said to them, Thus and so has Micah done to me, and he has hired me, and I have become his priest.
[7:48] And they said to him, Inquire of God, please, that we may know whether our way in which we are going will be prosperous. And the priest said to them, Go in peace.
[7:58] Your way in which you are going has the Lord's approval. Then the men departed and came to Laish, and saw the people who were living in security after the manner of the Sidonians, quiet and secure, for there was no ruler humiliating them for anything in the land.
[8:16] And they were far from the Sidonians and have no dealings with anyone. When they came back to their brothers at Zorah and Eshtael, their brothers said to them, What do you report?
[8:26] And they said, Arise and let us go up against them, for we have seen the land, and behold, it is very good. And will you sit still? Do not delay to go, to enter, to possess the land.
[8:37] When you enter, you will come to a secure people with a spacious land, for God has given it to your hand, a place where there is no lack of anything that is on the earth. Then, from the family of the Danites, from Zorah and from Eshtael, six hundred men armed with weapons of war set out.
[8:52] And they went up and camped at Kirith-Jerim in Judah. Therefore they called that place Mahanan Dan to this day. Behold, it is west of Kirith-Jerim. They passed from there to the hill country of Ephraim and came to the house of Micah.
[9:06] Then the five men who had went to spy out the country of Laish said to their kinsmen, Do you know that there are in these houses an ephod and household idols and a graven image and a molten image?
[9:20] Now therefore consider what you should do. They turned aside there and came to the house of the young man, the Levite, to the house of Micah and asked him of his welfare. The six hundred men armed with their weapons of war, who were of the sons of Dan, stood by the entrance of the gate.
[9:34] Now the five men who went to spy out the land went up and entered there and took the graven image and the ephod and the household idols and the molten image.
[9:44] While the priests stood by the entrance of the gate with the six hundred men armed with weapons of war. When these went into Micah's house and took the graven image, the ephod, the household idols and the molten image, the priests said to them, What are you doing?
[9:58] They said to him, Be silent. Put your hand over your mouth and come with us. And be to us a father and a priest. Is it better for you to be a priest to the house of one man or to be the priest to a tribe of the family in Israel?
[10:10] The priest's heart was glad and he took the effort and the household idols and the graven image and went among the people. Then they turned and departed and put the little ones and the livestock and the valuables in front of them.
[10:21] And 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?
[10:35] And he said, You have taken away my gods, which I made, and the priests, and have gone away. And what do I have besides? So how can you say to me, What is the matter with you? The sons of Dan said to him, Do not let your voice be heard among us, or else fierce men will fall upon you, and you will lose your life with the lives of your household.
[10:56] So the sons of Dan went on their way, and when Micah saw that they were too strong for him, he turned and went back to his house. Then they took what Micah had made and the priests who had belonged to him and came to Leish, to a people quiet and secure, and struck them with the edge of the sword, and they burned the city with fire.
[11:15] And there was no one to deliver them, because it was far from Sidon, and they had no dealings with anyone. And it was in the valley, which is near Beth Rehob. And they rebuilt the city and lived in it.
[11:26] They called the name of the city Dan, after the name of Dan their father, who was born in Israel. However, the name of the city formerly was Leish. The sons of Dan set up for themselves the graven image, and Jonathan, this is that Levite's name, and Jonathan the son of Gershom, the son of Manasseh.
[11:45] He and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of the land. So they set up for themselves Micah's graven image, which he had made all the time that the house of God was at Shiloh.
[12:00] Just so you go back, the son of Gershom, the New American Standard says the son of Manasseh. Many people believe that is a scribal addition, that that's literally Moses.
[12:10] Yes, some translations say it. The reason the New American Standard says Manasseh is because that's how it reads in its oldest manuscripts, but it was a tradition of many copyists to preserve the purity of Moses' name and therefore to write an N above his name in times where it might have been defamed.
[12:31] So more than likely it's Moses, not Manasseh. Manasseh would have been a scribal addition, and we know that because of Gershom, okay? So here we have kind of the rest of the story of the tribe of Dan.
[12:46] And we're still looking at what society looks like when man gets his own way. Because that repeated refrain, in those days there was no king in Israel, and each man did what was right in his own eyes.
[12:58] And what we have seen throughout the book of Judges is man doing what is right in his own eyes because there is no one ruling over him, though there was to be one who ruled over him because, remember, they were to be a theophany.
[13:11] That is, God was to be their king. He was to be their ruler. He was to have control over every aspect of their lives. When we read the law, the Torah, we find that God has directions for every aspect of man's life.
[13:26] He has directions that pertains to everything for his people because he literally wants to rule over them favorably, yes, lovingly, absolutely. But still, he wants to be their king.
[13:37] He longs to be their king. But they had rejected that king, and therefore they had no king in Israel. And every man did what was right in his own eyes. And this is where we get. And we have seen, we have a really problematic home.
[13:51] And now we begin to see in the 18th chapter that's spreading to a tribe. But what I want you to really focus on is when the way of man leaves lacking. What lacks when man gets his way.
[14:06] And we see four things that are lacking in the 18th chapter when each man does what is right in his own eyes. And by the way, as we have reiterated each time we look at this, this isn't just a past historical event, though these things historically happened.
[14:24] This isn't something that we look back in time and we go, oh, that's pretty cool. That's amazing. I can't believe it happened because it's the word of God. It has present-day application, right?
[14:36] And since God does not change, we understand his ways do not change, and the book of Ecclesiastes tells us that there's nothing new under the sun, that what has been done is being done again.
[14:48] So evidently the way of man hasn't changed. Man's problem hasn't changed. So what we find lacking in the 18th chapter when man gets his own way is still the very same things we find lacking today when man gets his own way.
[15:04] The application is the same. When man does not submit to the lordship of he who is called to rule over them, when man wants to live as if there is no king in the land and does what is right in his own eyes, these things which we see lacking in the 18th chapter of the book of Judges are things that we can't expect and we do indeed still find lacking today.
[15:32] There are four great voids, if you will. And these voids are the very things which man works so hard to fill, but really the reality, the only way to fill them is by submitting.
[15:49] And we see it being played out in the tribe of Dan. Number one, there is a lack of contentment. There's a lack of contentment.
[16:01] When man does what is right in his own eyes, he is never content with what he has. There's a lack of contentment.
[16:15] It tells us in those days there was no king in Israel. And also in those days the tribe of the Danites was seeking a possession for themselves.
[16:25] The word of God is very literal, by the way. For themselves, because they had not as yet inherited their possession. Now, I told you that that word as yet inherited has put in the New American Standard.
[16:36] It should really be read, they had not assumed their possession. By an inherited, that means to take possession of and to live within. It does not mean that they had not been given a possession, right?
[16:47] It does not mean that they had not been allotted a possession because when we go back to the book of Joshua, we find that though the tribe of Dan is small in number, though it is the smallest of the tribes, and it took up the rear guard of the processional of the Exodus, they get a very choice allotted position within the nation of Israel.
[17:07] They get a good piece of land. They have it allotted to them. It's one of the few that we find in the distribution of the land in the book of Joshua, in which, you know, they're not just drawing straws, so to say.
[17:19] They get a portion allotted to them. They have land given to them. Now, we should stop right there because it tells us in the first chapter, if you remember, I said it earlier, in the 34th verse of the first chapter of the book of Judges.
[17:35] Then the Amorites forced the sons of Dan into the hill country, for they did not allow them to come down to the valley. The valley is where they had been given a possession.
[17:48] Now, everyone that God gave a possession, he gave them a piece of land that had enemies living in it, right? But when God gives it to you and God goes with you, then the enemy is not a problem.
[18:01] Stay with me on that. Just because the enemy is present, it doesn't mean the enemy is the problem. Because if God says that is yours and I'm going with you, if you don't possess what he has given you, it is not because he is not able to give it to you.
[18:18] It's because you went without him. Because the land belongs to him. What we find in the allotment of the land of Israel is that that land, and this is where people get bent out of shape, isn't God a big mean God because he took the nation of Israel and he went in and he took other people's land away.
[18:36] Well, if you created it, then you own it. Okay? So it's God's land to begin with. And if God says this is yours, then it doesn't matter who is there, it is yours.
[18:50] And he wants to go with you to allow you to possess what he has given you. Now, look at this. Though God had given them a possession, they could not assume that possession because they allowed, the tribe of Dan allowed the enemy to be more powerful than God.
[19:11] Anytime Satan has more authority over you than the Lord God, it's because you allow it. Just go ahead and say that. They allowed the Amorites to have more authority in their present circumstances than the God who gave them the land.
[19:28] And since they were pushed back from the Amorites, pay attention, rather than fighting for what God gave them, they said, we'll go look somewhere else. They weren't content because it was going to be hard.
[19:43] It was going to be difficult. It was going to be a battle. They said, well, let's find something that we can go get easier. They weren't content with what God gave them.
[19:56] Therefore, they began looking elsewhere. When man does what is right in his own eyes, one of the things, primarily the first thing that is lacking is contentment.
[20:10] Because man will not be content with what God has allotted to him because most of the times, friend, listen to me, the spiritual life is a battle.
[20:21] What God has given us spiritually, he's given us a spiritual possession in the enemy's territory. He has given us a spiritual inheritance in the presence of an enemy who throws fiery darts.
[20:34] But rather than fighting for their inheritance, they chose to go find something else because it would be easier over there. And they weren't content.
[20:47] They wanted something better. They wanted something more. So the question we have to ask ourselves, and it builds, by the way, what the tribe of Dan does here is what creates everything else.
[21:01] Do you remember David got in trouble because in the time when the kings go out to war, David stayed behind. Well, when Dan should have been fighting for what he possessed, they went looking somewhere else.
[21:19] When they let the Amorites be more powerful than the Lord their God, they began to look elsewhere because they weren't content to fight over here. They wanted an easier battle to choose.
[21:31] They wanted something of their own choosing because when man does what is right in his own eyes, none of us like the struggle. None of us like the battle. We would all desire it to be easier, right?
[21:44] I wish the things God has promised us were easier to acquire. That we could, I mean, honestly, I wish it was name it and claim it, but that's not what the Bible teaches, right?
[21:56] There are some people who teach that, but I didn't say that's not what the Bible teaches. The Bible doesn't say name it and claim it. There are some people who say all you got to do is speak over it. Well, you can speak over it all day long, but sometimes it don't happen because there's a God who has a greater vision in store.
[22:12] And so what we see here is there was a lack of contentment with what God gave them, and because of the lack of contentment, they started on a journey they should have never went on. When man is not content with what God has given him to possess, he always goes where he thinks he will find something better, and there's the problem.
[22:33] There's the problem. Because when man does what is right in his own eyes, he's never content. Never. Let me think about it.
[22:46] Historically, specifically, have you ever met anyone without the presence of God or the reality of Christ's redemption in their life?
[23:02] Have you ever met anyone in their own efforts who reached a place of self-contentment? No. Because as the book of Psalms in the book of Proverbs tells us, there are things that exist in a man's heart that cry out more, more, more, like leeches that are never satisfied.
[23:27] God is to be our all, end all, and be all, and without him we have no contentment no matter what we have. There's a lack of contentment. Secondly, not only do we see that there's a lack of contentment, there's also a lack of concern.
[23:45] because when man is not content with what he has, Warren Wiersbe said, there are really only three great truths in this world which men operate on.
[23:56] Three. What's mine is mine, I'll keep it. That's the first one. Second, what's yours is mine, and I'll take it.
[24:08] Or three, what's mine is yours, I'll give it. That's only three principles that man operates on. What's mine is mine, I'll keep it.
[24:20] What's yours is mine, I'll take it. Or what's mine is yours, and I'll give it. We're the keeping, taking, or giving. That's all we're ever doing. And where we register on the contentment level is what leads us to the concern level.
[24:34] Because when man is not content, then he's not concerned. And we don't have to read very far in past history, and we don't have to look very far in our present realities to see that when man is not content, he does not concern himself for the welfare of others.
[24:53] When Dan decides they need a better place to live, they send five spies. The five spies are traveling down the road. I'll put it all together for you here in just a minute. And remember last week when we looked at the 17th chapter that I said that evidently Micah's house was more kind of like a group of houses that was together.
[25:12] It was kind of a community, and most people believe it was kind of an inn, a staying place, much like Mary and Joseph would have looked at when they went into a place. An inn. An inn was usually just somebody's house. It's not like they had Motel 8's out there or Embassy Suites or anything like that, right?
[25:25] It's just people who were hospitable to one another. So Micah's house was probably one of those, and he had this separate house built out to the side, which was his idol house. So the five men, they end up there.
[25:35] Now they recognize the Levite. They don't recognize him personally, but they recognize his dialect because he doesn't sound like he's from Ephraim, right? He sounds like he's from somewhere else. So they ask this Levite what he's doing here, and they find out these five men, and they understand, and at least the Levite answers it correctly, and honestly, the Levite says, well, I'm here because of such and such, and he's paying me money, so now I'm his priest.
[25:56] So, at least he's honest. Rather than rebuking the Levite, they're not concerned about that because they want to ask him. They say, hey, well, if Micah's funding the bill, let's ask the Levite to offer a little prayer for us, right, to find out if God is in favor of us.
[26:11] So they ask him, and he goes and says, go in peace for the Lord. The message only has the favor of the Lord. The literal reading there is where you are going is before the eyes of the Lord. Okay, so we translate that at times as it is favorable to him, but it is before the eyes of the Lord.
[26:26] Just because God sees it doesn't mean he approves of it. We need to understand that because he sees everything, right? Just because it's before his eyes, there's actually a little wordplay here because this Levite who was nowhere near worthy of being asked counsel of God because he was a hireling is here telling these people that where you're going, God knows.
[26:51] And he's watching. So anyway, they go and they look over Leish, the city that will eventually become the city of Dan and we begin to see their lack of concern.
[27:04] Remember when I told you, and I say it jokingly because I kind of get tired of saying all their names, that when God brought the nation of Israel to the promised land, he told them to drive out all the ites, the Amalekites, the Jebusites, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Canaanites, it's all the ites.
[27:18] You know who we never find in that list? The Sidonians. God never commissioned nor appointed a battle with the Sidonians.
[27:34] This is about, I think if my math is correct, 100 plus miles north of where they were supposed to be.
[27:46] They had got outside of the realm where God had told them to fight. And they walk upon this city and this city is not fortified because it's secluded.
[27:59] And they notice they're secluded, they're isolated, and they don't want anything to do with anybody else. These people are content over here, these Sidonians, they're content.
[28:11] They look like an easy target because they're too far away from any major city. They're really content. They don't think that there's any concern, so they haven't built any fortifications because their battle is not with anybody, right?
[28:24] And rather than being concerned of, is this someone God, God had told them to drive the Amorites out of the land, but yet they went and picked a Sidonian city because it was an easier target.
[28:38] Lack of concern. Rather than fighting the battles, God wanted them to fight, they wanted to fight a battle they chose to fight because they weren't really concerned about God's desire or the people living in that city.
[28:51] They go back, they tell their brothers, hey, this is a great place, it's got everything we need, it's got all the land we need, and people, they're easy targets, they're easy prey because the tribe of Dan, by the way, are battlers, they're warriors. I mean, Samson came from them, right?
[29:03] They are fighters by nature, so they're kind of like that, you know, they were at the rear of the march on purpose. They were the rear guard because they were such battlers.
[29:14] So they go and they tell their 600 men armed for war with all their war because we're told over and over again they're armed for war, armed for war, armed for war, and they take their wives with them, that's the little ones and their children they put in front of them and they march off and they camp about halfway and then they get to this place called Ephraim and they find the house of Micah and we're still seeing the lack of concern because the five men said, do you know what's in that house?
[29:38] There's an ephod, there's graven images, there's idols, and he's even got a priest consider what you should do. Now, Micah is a kinsman.
[29:53] He's of the tribe of Israel or the nation of Israel. The tribe of Ephraim but the nation of Israel. He is a kinsman.
[30:05] It's one thing not to be concerned about the Sidonians, it's a whole other thing not to be concerned about a kinsman. So they leave the 600 men at the gate and five men go in and they take everything because when I'm not content with what I have, what's yours is mine and I'll take it.
[30:26] When I'm not content, if I'm content, what's mine is mine and I'll keep it or if I'm really content, what's mine is yours and I'll give it. But when I'm not content, what's yours is mine and I'll take it. So they go in and they take it and the Levite objects for a moment and said, what are you doing?
[30:42] You shouldn't be doing this and they said, be quiet, put your hand over your mouth, don't say anything. What's better? Do you want to be a Levite of a house or do you want to be a Levite of a tribe? They said, well, you're offering me something better, I'll go with you and then it says he was happy.
[30:54] Did you notice that? The Levite was happy because he was a hireling. He just moved up in the world. Now he's of the tribe of Dan.
[31:05] He's a Levite to a whole tribe, not just to a house. And they leave with his stuff and then Micah comes running out and says, what are you doing? They're a little bit down and they turn around and look at Micah and say, what's wrong with you?
[31:17] He said, what do you mean what's wrong with me? You just took all my stuff and they say, be quiet for we fall on you. That's their kinsmen because friend, listen to me, one of the things that is missing when man gets his own way is a lack of concern for others.
[31:32] When man does what is right in his own eyes, the main thing before him is his own eyes. Lack of concern.
[31:46] I've read some disturbing history that mankind has done to one another. Things I would never want to repeat.
[31:59] And every one of them boils down to this. they didn't care. They didn't care because they were only doing what they thought was right.
[32:13] Lack of concern. The third thing we see that's missing when man gets his own way is lack of contentment and lack of concern. We see it in Micah.
[32:25] There's a lack of completeness. There's a lack of completeness. Man has a void and that void is we know it is only filled by the presence of God.
[32:37] Man was created to worship. Of all of creation we alone were created to worship and adore and to serve and obey.
[32:48] We were created for that. God designed us and set eternity in our heart and set a soul within us. He breathed the spirit into us. That's what the word when he breathed the breath of life into them that's the same word as spirit.
[33:01] He breathed his life into us and that life is a worshiping life. Animals don't worship. Contrary I mean I know I've had people tell me that their dogs watch me when I preach.
[33:16] I've had people tell me the dogs bark at the TV when I preach that their cats watch me when I preach. They probably just don't like me. Animals don't worship.
[33:27] They testify because when you study the animal kingdom you have to realize there's a creator. But they don't worship. Angels fall down and adore and pronounce praises but worship is reserved for mankind.
[33:46] Okay. Worship is a choice that only man can do. So man will worship something. Every man all people of all times and all ages everywhere worship something because that void is there.
[34:02] And what we find with Micah is that when God is not king because God alone fills the void he completes us. He is the other side of the coin if you will of what we were created to be and who we were created to serve he is the other side of that coin.
[34:20] And when he's taking out of the picture man lacks completeness because no matter how hard man tries no matter what man does no matter how much effort he puts into it all of his work all of his effort all of his energy given and Micah says what do I have besides these?
[34:40] literally five men came and took all that Micah had away in a moment in a moment and his despair is that without these I have nothing yet we read in scripture of people who have everything taken away from them and they have it all because when man does what is right in his own eyes he tries to complete himself by his own works and his own efforts and in a moment when that's taken away from him he's void he's empty he's not complete man will never be complete apart from the lordship that comes from God reigning over their lives and he alone filling the void that they possess because our greatest efforts friends can be taken away in a moment think of Job though he slay me
[35:50] I will praise him had everything taken away Job never once said what have I besides these his wife told him to say that his friends told him to say that and Job said I came naked into the world and I'm going to leave the world naked though he slay me I will praise him for I know that I will see my redeemer in the land of the living someday that there is more to me than what I possess and when man has his own way one of the things that is lacking is completeness he's never complete because of that there's always this search to fill it the search to find what's missing and there's this constant battle that is going on there's a lack of contentment there's a lack of concern there's a lack of completeness fourth and finally when man has his own way there's a lack of conviction lack of conviction the tribe of Dan takes the household idols of
[37:00] Micah they take the Levite of Micah they go up to Laish and they destroy they decimate the city kill all the inhabitants because there's nobody there to help they burn the city and then they rebuild the city and they set up the city of Dan you should pay attention to this because Jonathan now all of a sudden Jonathan and his sons become the priest to that city the tribe of Dan was in the northernmost part of the nation of Israel the city of Dan I'm sorry was in the northernmost part of the nation of Israel even before the separation of the two kingdoms so during the Davidic kingdom during Solomon's kingdom very northern part the tribe of Dan we find here in this 18th chapter is the very first tribe to introduce sponsored idolatrous worship the very first ones because they isolated themselves they separated themselves and they sought what they wanted they weren't content where God had put them so they took these household autos and they went up there and they built a shrine and they built this shrine they put
[38:04] Jonathan over it and they had the lineage of Moses with them and they used that as leverage and they had appointed idolatrous worship now think about this they had sought the Levite to petition God to see if where they were going was his approval but when they got there they set up their own God because there's no conviction when they set up their own idol temple and they have you know kind of mandated idolatrous worship things progress even further you remember when after Solomon's death the kingdom was divided there was the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom there was a man named Jeroboam I know all the names kind of run together Jeroboam becomes the first king of the northern kingdom Jeroboam all of a sudden realizes there's a problem because by that time the name of God was put in Jerusalem I mean Solomon's temple was completed and Jeroboam realizes that if all the people in the northern kingdom still want to worship
[39:07] God they'll have to go down to Jerusalem and by going down to Jerusalem they'd be subject to the southern kingdom or Judah's presence and therefore they may desire to come back together so to preserve the northern kingdom which is referred to as Israel in the Old Testament and there's Israel and Judah to preserve the northern kingdom of Israel he erects two golden calves remember that and it says these are your gods you can worship these gods the first of those golden calves goes up in the city of Dan because they were already doing idolatrous worship there's no conviction the first region to fall because the northern kingdom does not fall to the Babylonians the northern kingdom falls to the Assyrians to Sennacherib remember your biblical history the Syrian empire which eventually falls to the Babylonian empire the Babylonian empire is the one that takes over the southern kingdom but the Assyrians are the ones who attacked the northern kingdom first northern kingdom fell a couple hundred years before the southern kingdom do you know the first city to fall
[40:14] Dan you know why because they were the closest ones to the Assyrian empire because when you get out of the presence of God you put yourself closer to the enemy than you ever should be tribe of Dan never comes back it's never mentioned again every prophecy that was spoken in the book of Genesis pertaining to the tribe of Dan comes true in this 18th chapter that they would war against one another that they would be a thorn that they would be a serpent that they would introduce idolatry it all happens here why because there was no king in Israel and every man did what was right in his own eyes and when man does what is right in his own eyes he lacks contentment concern completeness and conviction and without conviction worship falls by the wayside and we do whatever we see it in Judges 18 friend those are not just things that happened then those are things that still happen now when there is no king reigning over the lives of God's people these things still lack in that individual's life and that individual will affect a family and that family will be a part of a community that community will influence society and we're still the same cycle that we see in the book of Judges thank you brother so
[42:37] Thank you.
[43:07] Thank you.
[43:37] Thank you.