Tag Archives: Judges

Devotions: August 3

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Judges 17

This story is about Micah. As a way of background, Judges 17:6 says “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” Apparently Micah found himself a wandering Levite whom he convinced to stay with him as his priest (verse 13):

Then Micah said, “Now I know that the Lord will prosper me, because I have a Levite as priest.”

It looks like even way back in the time of the Old Testament judges the “prosperity gospel” was alive and well. It’s all about who you know and what you do that makes God owe you.

Acts 21

I want to focus here on Acts 21:4-6:

And having sought out the disciples, we stayed there for seven days. And through the Spirit they were telling Paul not to go on to Jerusalem. When our days there were ended, we departed and went on our journey, and they all, with wives and children, accompanied us until we were outside the city. And kneeling down on the beach, we prayed and said farewell to one another. Then we went on board the ship, and they returned home.

If it was really the Holy Spirit speaking through the disciples in Tyre, why did Paul ignore them and continue on to Jerusalem? In all the other warnings on Paul’s journey back to Jerusalem from Greece, the warning is that difficulty is coming, not that he should not go. I wonder if that is what is meant in these verses or not.

Mark 16

Almost two thirds of this chapter (Mark 16:9-20) are not found in some of the earliest manuscripts and other’s have some other text inserted between verses 8 and 9.  Without these added verses Mark’s gospel ends without anyone actually seeing the resurrected Christ. Perhaps then a later scribe was motivated by that omission to fill in some detail in the end. Another theory is that the original ending past verse 8 was lost very early on and so a new ending, the one we have today, was grafted in. In any case, the version we have now is from the early second century. For those that are interested, I found Bible Research and Wikipedia articles that were helpful.

Devotions: August 2

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Judges 16

This is the story of Samson and Delilah. People generally know the story from Sunday school classes as a kid so I won’t go into full detail. Reading it again for the first time in a long time though, I was struck by how Samson seems to have known what Delilah was after. It is almost as if he is tempting her. Notice that the first time she asks him about the source of his strength he says that new bow strings would bind him. Now when he’s startled awake and finds himself tied up with bow strings I’m sure he put 2 and 2 together, but he doesn’t get rid of her. The next time she asks he says that if he is bound by new ropes, then he will lose his strength. Same thing, she tries it. The third time she asks he tells her that if his hair is woven that he will lose his strength. Now he’s getting awfully close to the truth. He knows that she is testing him, it sure seems like he would have to know what she is after. Why did he tell her his secret? Was he tired of her insistence? Was he tired of the secret?

Acts 20

Paul is on his way to Jerusalem from Greece. Even though he spent three years in Ephesus (a main city of Asia Minor, modern day Turkey) he decides to sidestep it on his way. Instead, he sends word to the elders of Ephesus to come see him in Miletus. I thought it was kind of weird for him to avoid Ephesus but then send out to the elders so he could talk to them until I read verse 25:

And now, behold, I know that none of you among whom I have gone about proclaiming the kingdom will see my face again.

Previously in verses 22 and 23 Paul had said:

And now, behold, I am going to Jerusalem, constrained by the Spirit, not knowing what will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and afflictions await me.

Paul is saying his farewell. He knows that he could be deviated from the course laid out in front of him if he were to go to Ephesus. I simply can’t imagine what would be going through Paul’s mind, but what is recorded in Acts 20:24 is:

But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.

Amen! If only we could keep that view before us. Not that we should haphazardly through our lives away, but that we should intentionally and earnestly abandon self and take on the life of Christ that was given to us.

Mark 15

This is Mark’s recording of the Crucifixion. What struck a cord in me today was verses 29 and 30:

And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, “Aha! You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days,  save yourself, and come down from the cross!”

These people knew what Jesus had said, what he had done, what he had prophesied, yet when he didn’t deliver on what they had anticipated and sought after, a long-lost King of Israel to overthrow the Roman rule and reestablish the kingdom, they “threw him under the bus” and abandoned him to death. The Pharisees were even able to convince them to call for the Crucifixion in the first place (verses 13 and 14). Yet just days before they were throwing palm leaves in front of him and yelling Hosanna, a cry for salvation. It almost makes one wonder if a significant miracle in the Crucifixion was getting Jesus to the Cross in the first place. I think this is one reason why antisemitism stemming from the Crucifixion is so misplaced and misguided. Something happened between the triumphant entry of Jesus into Jerusalem and the feverish cries of “crucify him” just days later, Jesus was appointed to die then and there, for the Jews, for us, for the world.