Judges chapter 17 gonna be looking at the whole chapter together verses 1 through 13 So we'll pick it up in verse 1 Says there was a man of the hill country of Ephraim. His name was Micah and he said to his mother the 1,100 pieces of silver that were taken from you about which you uttered a curse is And I also spoke it in my ears. Behold, the silver is with me. I took it. And his mother said, blessed be my son by the Lord. And he restored the 1,100 pieces of silver to his mother. And his mother said, I dedicated the silver to the Lord from my hand for my son to make a carved image and a metal image. Now, therefore, I will restore it to you. So when he restored the money to his mother, his mother took 200 pieces of silver and gave it to the silversmith who made it into a carved image and a metal image. And it was in the house of Micah. And the man Micah had a shrine and he made an ephod and household gods and ordained one of his sons who became his priest. In those days, there was no king in Israel and everyone did what was right. in his own eyes. Now, there was a young man of Bethlehem in Judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite, and he sojourned there. And the man departed from the town of Bethlehem in Judah, and sojourned where he could find a place, and he journeyed and came to the hill country of Ephraim, to the house of Micah. And Micah said to him, where do you come from? And he said to him, I'm a Levite of Bethlehem in Judah. and I'm going to Sojong where I may find a place. And Maga said to him, stay with me and be to me a father and a priest and I will give you 10 pieces of silver a year and a suit of clothes and you're living. And the Levite went in and the Levite was content to dwell with the man and the young man became like one of his sons. And Maga ordained the Levite and the young man became his priest and was in the house of Maga. And Maga said, now I know that the Lord will prosper me because I have a Levite as priest. Let's pray together. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for not leaving us in the dark, but revealing yourself to us. We thank you that these stories were recorded for our benefit, that we can see your mighty sovereign hand upon history, that we can see the depravity of the world and that we can refrain there from it. Give strength now for we are weak and without you we can do nothing. In Christ's name I pray and amen. So last time we dropped off with Samson we had ended his story in chapter 16 there that tragic story that someone who was so great that seemed to be so powerful had Remember, he had disobeyed God, his hair had been cut by the law because he had told her that was where his strengths come from. He had then been blinded, taken to that coliseum, if you will, that house where those 3,000 lords were. Those 3,000 Philistines were with the lords and he'd asked God to give him strength one more time. God had granted his request and he had then pushed the two main pillars over with his strength and killed everyone in the house, including himself. So we left off with that story, a very tragic story with his kinfolk, that last verse, remember his kinfolk just coming and burying him in the place of his father. And so now we jump off into this story here of Maga and the Levite. Not a story about any judge, simply just the story of depravity. A story that's going to show us the state in which we find the children of Israel. Before we had jumped from judge to judge and here now we see a break in that because we're coming into the closing chapters of the book of Judges. And so the author here is going to stress something to us in this closing chapter, and that's the true depravity and state in which Israel finds itself. And of course, the reason for that state is what we've seen throughout all the book, that this anarchy of everyone doing what is right in his own eyes, because there indeed was no king. Israel and so that's what we are seeing in the book. That's what we're gonna see in this chapter 17 when we see this this study of this man and his mother and What he's doing there. So let's jump into our text together in verses 1 & 2 and read them again Says there was a man of the hill country from whose name was Maga And he said to his mother the 1,100 pieces of silver that that were taken from you, about which you uttered a curse, and also spoke it in my ears. Behold, the silver is with me. I took it, and his mother said, Blessed be my son by the Lord." So here we introduce this man, this man named Maga here, whose name subsequently means, who is like God. We're first introduced to a man, and his name means, who is like God. No one is like God, right? His name's showing something of the holiness of God, the set-apartness of God. We meet this man, and his name tells us something of the covenant God. Yahweh, that Yahweh is holy. He is set apart. Who is like God? No one is indeed like God. He is set apart, totally different, totally holy. He is the thrice holy God, right? Holy, holy, holy. That is what the the angels proclaim around the throne of God. And so that's the meaning of his name, yet we quickly deviate from that in our story, and we find that what has actually happened is, is in the opening section here, is he has stolen something from his mother. Right. So already we are seeing this build up, right? We're seeing what the author is trying to communicate to us that these people who are said to be set apart, right? Just as Samson was. These people that were said to be set apart by God are actually indeed very common. They're very common people and sinful indeed. So that's what we see in verse two there. He has stolen something from his mother. And we see that he is coming clean about it there in verse two, that he's coming clean about stealing the silver, which may seem good. It may seem like, well, maybe there is some sort of repentance here, but then we see this is because his mother had indeed uttered a curse. She had uttered a curse, and not only uttered a curse, but we can read it there again, just to get the emphasis in verse two. He had told his mother the 1,100 pieces of silver that were taken from you, about which you uttered a curse, and also spoke it in my ears, right? So what had happened was his mother had uttered a curse for whoever stole that money from her, something that was taken very seriously in biblical times, believing that whatever curse was uttered upon a man would indeed happen. right, especially by parents in this way. And so her most likely knowing that her son stole it, right, utters this curse right in front of her son, you see, to get him to confess, to get him to come clean with what he's done. And so in fear of the curse, that's what he does. He says, oh, well, that 1,100 pieces of silver that you had, it was indeed me that stole it, and I'm here to give it back to you. And after he does so, his mother seemingly takes away the curse with a blessing. We see that in verse 2 there in the last part that says, blessed be my son by the Lord. She invokes the covenant name, capital L-O-R-D, right? Yahweh. Blessed be by Yahweh. So they have this biblical language, right? They have this language of covenant people, but what we're gonna see is something far from it. Just like His name means what? God is set apart. Who is like God, right? God is set apart. God is holy, yet His actions are anything but. the same way as mother's invoking the covenant name of God and yet her actions as we're going to see are going to be indeed far from anything that Yahweh had prescribed for the children of Israel. Okay, that's what we are seeing in our text. It's the whole point and thrust of chapter 17. So we will continue there. He gives the money back. She gives him this blessing in return, thus undoing the curse supposedly that had been spoken upon him. That's what he was trying to do, trying to get out of that curse. So let's look at three through five now. It says, and he restored the 1,100 pieces of silver to his mother. And his mother said, I dedicate the silver to the Lord from my hand for my son to make carved image. and a metal image, now therefore I will restore it to you." So when he restored the money to his mother, his mother took 200 pieces of silver and gave it to the silversmith who made it into a carved image, a metal image, and it was in the house of Micah. And the man Micah had a shrine and he made an ephod and household gods and ordained one of his sons who became his priest. So the money is given back and we're told that the mother tells the son, she tells him that this money was indeed dedicated to the Lord. It was dedicated, there's again that covenant name, capital L-O-R-D. Oh, this money that you took from me, it was actually indeed dedicated to the Lord. Okay, what was it dedicated to the Lord for? To make a carved image. You seeing the contradiction there? It was dedicated to the Lord to make a carved image, a clear violation of Exodus 20 and verse four. If you remember in the commandments that were given to Moses, This is clearly been instated here in 20 and 4. You shall not make for yourselves a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them for I, the Lord, capital L-O-D, that covenant God, a covenant name, your God, am a jealous God. visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me." So this was something that was strictly forbidden for the Israelites to do, yet she says, well, this money anyway was dedicated to Yahweh to make these images with, showing that it actually wasn't indeed dedicated to Yahweh. Right? She was just simply giving that lit service, showing the spiritual ignorance of the time in which we're dealing with, the spiritual ignorance of the children of Israel during the time of judges, right? They'd been so indoctrinated with these pagan philosophies, these pagan practices, that they then interpreted them into the very laws of God, right? Something God had just clearly, clearly told them not to do. That's what's happening here. It's showing the spiritual ignorance. These people said they were of God, but actually were far from him. She was simply giving lip service to the fact. She doesn't even give the whole amount. She gives 200 pieces of it, right? Showing something greater, I think, here. And this is the greater fact. The money that she had was an idol long before it was made into any graven image. You see? It was an idol to this woman long before she gave any part of it up to be made into this figure, to be made into this image that they could worship, right? That was just the fruit, not the root of the problem there, you see. So that's what we are seeing here. Jesus had addressed the same thing. Excuse me, my nose is just running away with me this morning. Jesus had spoke about the same thing toward the Pharisees. If you remember in Matthew 15, it addressed them in this same manner. Matthew 15 says in verse one, then the Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said, why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders for they do not wash their hands when they eat? He answered them. Why do you break the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition? For God commanded on your father and mother, whoever reviles his father and mother must surely die. But you say if anyone tells his father and mother, what you would have gained from me is given to God. He need not honor his father for the sake of your tradition. You have made the vow, you have made void the word of God. You hypocrites, well did Isaiah prophesy of you when he said, and this encompasses the children of Israel at this time and at the time in which we are reading in the Judges, this people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. They honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men. You see, and this time, what had happened and what Jesus is addressing is the Pharisees, of course, were coming against Jesus' disciples because they're not washing their hands every time they eat. That was a tradition of man. God had indeed told the children of Israel in certain instances, in certain times, in certain ceremonial laws, you are to wash your hands. You are to cleanse, right? But they had taken that and applied it to every time that you eat. which was something that wasn't applied. It was a tradition of man, right? It was just another way for them to feel holier because I wash my hands every time I eat something, something Yahweh had not told them to do. This is just a tradition of man. And they put that tradition of man in the same standing with God's law, which is idolatry. It's the same thing that this woman is doing here. She's taking a tradition of man, she's taking a idol worship, something that was not told them, they were not told to do by Yahweh, and she's installing it with the commandments of God in that same way, showing that just like these Pharisees, this woman and her son, they honor Christ, they honor God with their lips, but their heart is indeed far from Him. their heart is far from it. Man, he's still doing it. Absolutely. That's what's sad. Absolutely. So, you done? Yeah, I'm sorry. No, you're good. So, Micah puts the idol in his house along with some other idols of his making. One of them being, we can look back in our takes together, this ephod. First five there. And the man Micah had a shrine and he made an ephod and household gods and ordained one of his sons to become priests. This is what he's done here. He's not only that idol, but many idols he has taken and put in his house. One of them being this ephod here. Most likely this, remember it was the priestly garment, right? It was this robe type thing. the word I'm looking, apron. It was this golden apron that had the jewels on it. God had biblically commanded that in the temple for the high priest to wear such a thing. The 12 stones, remember the 12 tribes of Israel and all of that. But what we see here is a pagan spin on that and he's making this ephod for his house and then he has to find someone, of course, to wear it. Here's the priestly garment. Who's gonna be your priest? And so in that, he ordains one of his sons. He simply just takes one of his sons and says, well, I'll ordain you to be my priest, and you can be my priest in this house, making his own house. You see what I'm saying? The priests, the biblical Levitical priests, were not to just serve in houses. They were to serve in the house of the Lord. Right? It shows you who Micah thinks God is. Who does he think God is? Where does God dwell for Micah? in his house. You see what I'm saying? So that's really all boils down to this self-worship and mostly what Micah thought was this was going to get him better standing with God. We'll see that in a little while. But if you remember, this is something that also Gideon had done. If you remember back in chapter 8, we can look back together. Back in chapter 8, all the great things that Gideon had done, even though he was a coward when we met him. Remember he was, when we met him, hiding from Midian because they would come in and steal all the crops and all that. So he was threshing out the wheat and the wine press and Angel of the Lord come to him and said, you're going to be a great, a mighty man of valor. And that's what he made him. Yet through all that and all that Gideon had done, toward the end of his life, he just simply goes off into straight idolatry. And the way in which he goes off into idolatry is in this same manner. He makes this ephod, he makes this thing, and we'll just pick it up there in 8 and 22. If you remember, it says, then the man of Israel said to Gideon, rule over us, you and your sons and your grandson also, for you have saved us from the hand of Midian. Gideon said to them, I will not rule over you, and my son will not rule over you. The Lord will rule over you. Seemingly a good statement, right? We've talked about this before. Seemingly, he's saying, not me, God. You don't need to look to me, to God. But then his lip service is there. But then his actions show something much different, just like we find in our texts and just like we found with the Pharisees. All we're finding here is lip service. So this is his actions. And Gideon said to them, let me make a request of you. Every one of you give me the earrings of his spool. For they had golden earrings because they were Ishmaelites. And they answered, we were willing to give them. And they spread a cloak and every man threw in in it the earrings of his spool. And the weight of the golden earrings that he requested was 1,700 shekels of gold, besides the crescent ornaments and the pendants and the purple garments worn by the kings of Median, and besides the collars that were around the necks of their camels. And Gideon made an ephod out of it and put it in the city of Ophrah, and all Israel whored after it there, and it became a snare to Gideon and to his family. So if you remember, Gideon had done the same thing toward the end of his life. Some commentators go back and forth about whether this was an actual garment. The word there in Hebrew, ephod, in some instances maybe can be translated small idol. People go back and forth about it. I'm not gonna, we really don't know. I'm not gonna debate that fact. But in any sense, he made this golden image. No matter what it was in the image of, and it was idolatrous to him, right? We talked about that before in this text, that it had become a snare to him. That's that same word in Hebrew for lure, right? A fisherman's lure. What does he make it? Does a fisherman want a lure that looks nothing like bait, looks nothing like a real fish? No, he wants something as close as he can get it. Right? And then when it bites down upon it, what do you realize? What does the fish realize? It's caught. It's a snare to him, right? The thing that looks so great, Just go over to this God, this God will give you more fertility. Just go over to this God, this God will give you more crops. The thing that looks so great when you get down to it and actually bite upon it is indeed your own damnation. It's a snare. You see, that's that language there. And that's what happened to Gideon. the people who were after it, and he had just led the people back into a worse state than he had found them, right? He couldn't keep covenant with God. That's the whole point. We've been looking at that all through the book. And so here we see the same thing happening with Micah here in this ephod being made and the ordination of one of his sons to become priest. Like we said before, something that was indeed not allowed. And yet again, we see a great spiritual disconnect from what Yahweh had told them. This whole thing starting out as his mother saying, take this money that is dedicated to Yahweh and go make an idol, go make idols. And so this is how he had started out, seemingly thinking that he was serving Yahweh, because he doesn't know God. You see, he doesn't know who God is. And so he thinks that these things are going to bring him favor. Something that the author is showing us here is truly the Israelites attempt at a syncretism. The Israelites attempt at a syncretism. What do I mean by that? Syncretism would be the attempt to combine different religions or studies of thought for one's own benefit. We found this today. You don't see them many, but I remember when I was a kid, you'd see them all the time. I think it's because people say now that there really is no neutrality. But when I was a boy, all the time on the back of bumper stickers and things like that, you would see those little stickers that would say, Coexist. You remember those? Coexist, and like the C would be something like a moon or something, and then like the T would be a cross, and like one of them would be a star. And basically what they were getting at was all roads lead to God. Just pull them all together and see what benefits you the most. That was the whole movement around the coexist movement. Like I said, we don't really see that much today, but that was an attempt back then in the 90s for a neutrality. for neutrality. Well, we'll just take a little bit from everything and we'll benefit from it, right? And that's what we're seeing here in our text. We're seeing a taking of everything, where he wants a, as we'll see here in a minute, a Levitical priest. He wants to serve the covenant God, which he's not. and he thinks all these things will benefit him if he just takes a little bit from here a little bit from there a little bit of idol worship and doesn't listen to the words of Yahweh may seem unapplicable to us today right may seem unapplicable to us today But if we spent time, and just think about this, and I've thought about this as I, just let us think about this humbly if we can. If we spent any time over the next year visiting churches across America, if we visited thousands and thousands of churches and we just spent every Sunday hopping from one church to another, as many as we could, within a known area, all the way across the state, how many, how many would be worshiping God in the way that He's commanded? Or how many will have pulled in things from this world and installed them into the worship of God, which is something that he never commanded. That's a scary thought indeed. But you still, we see, we still have this today. They may not have idols. up in their churches, but idols are there, you see. They may not think of themselves as idol worshipers, but indeed the idols are there, even though they have no form, even though they haven't given them form or physically bowed down to them, they still bow down to these things. So how many could we say are truly worshiping God biblically, right? And this is something that we need to think of soberly, sober-mindedly, because this is what we don't want. We don't want this to be said of us. We don't want, in 10 and 20 years, for it to be said of Grace Fellowship, well, they served God with their lips, but their heart was far from Him. And we can see that through their practices, right? And we don't need to thank ourselves above it, because I'm sure that those people did as well. They thought themselves above it, you see, and so we need to think sober-mindedly. I'm not saying I think that grace fellowship is going into idolatry, so don't quote me on that, okay? I'm just saying we need to be guarded against these things so that these things do not happen. You see what I'm saying? We need to guard the deposit of truth that God has given us, right? And I know the elders agree with me on that wholeheartedly, so yeah. But that's what Paul is addressing. The modern church today has totally personalized worship in this way. They truly have. You can find a church, and if you talk to people, I've talked to many people even in the county, and when looking for a church, this is what they look for. They look for if they like the music. They look for if the daycare program is good, or maybe even if there is a coffee shop within the church, right? That's not big around here, but in other places very much so. Very much so. We have indeed seen it, right? So they've capitalized on it in that way. So in the modern era here in America, church has been totally personalized to the individual. Whatever type of worship you want, that's what you can find. If you want to go sit on comfortable couches and drink your latte while a man tells you facts about the Bible, you can do that, right? You can find a church to do that. Something that's very sad to me. And you can find these all across America. But that's not what we were told by the apostles. That's not what we were told by Christ himself. We were told by Christ himself to uphold the truth. We can see this nowhere better, I believe, than 1 Timothy 3. Remember in 1 Timothy 3, Paul is addressing Timothy here, telling him to stand firm in the faith and all the things. And then we see this nugget of truth here in chapter three. Get there together. Timothy 3, 14. That's what Paul says. He says, I hope to come to you soon, but I'm writing these things to you so that if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and a buttress of the truth. So in Paul's mind, there was definitely a designated way that one was to believe in the household of God. And that was the things he had described to Timothy within this letter. This is how you are supposed to act. This is how even if you recall in verse two there or verse three, this is how a pastor is supposed to act. These are your qualifications for leadership within your churches. So you will not go astray. And then he gives us this great phrase here that the church is the church of the living God, right? He is not dead. He is indeed a living God, but it is a pillar and buttress of the truth. What does that mean? What does a pillar and buttress do? It upholds. You see, it upholds the truth. As the church, that is what we are called to do. We are called to uphold the truth of God. And the moment that you stop upholding that is the moment that you stop becoming the true church. You see, something that's very scary, we should think of this sober-mindedly. And that's what had happened In our time this people that were called right These people that were called to uphold truth, right? What did you always say all the nation should look at you and say what? What kind of God is this that is so close to their people that has laws like this, right? That was the purpose they were to be a lot to the world and instead what has happened here is they have stopped upholding truth and They have stopped upholding the truth of God. That's what we see in our text. Unfortunately, that's what we see in the evangelical scene today. So we should be mindful of that. So back in our text in verse six, we see this break here. So in these two sections, we see this break right in the middle and it's verse six. And so let's read that together. in those days there was no king in israel and everyone did what was right in his own eyes so now we see this break in the middle of our story to give us more insight and that insight is the same thing that we've heard all through the book that there was no king in israel and that everyone did what was right in his own eyes. This was both political and spiritual. Right? Political and spiritual. There was no physical king to rule them and everyone morally did what they thought was right. political and spiritual anarchy. That's what we are seeing in the book. We've seen this time and time again. We've seen it with Samson. He did what was right in his own eyes concerning his wife, concerning the Philistines, and that's a reoccurring theme in our book. The reason that the children of Israel are in the shape that they are in. So, seven and nine, back in our text. It says, Yeah, yeah, absolutely there is There is spiritual worship there, but it isn't the spiritual worship of the true God. You see, yeah, I see what you're saying there. That's the spiritual anarchy that we see in our nation today, where everyone has a claim to God. Everyone has a claim to Christ, especially we live in the Bible Belt. There's been multiple times in my life where I've tried to do street witnessing in this county. And I've never, maybe once or twice, run into someone that will openly say, I do not believe in Jesus. I do not believe I am saved. And that's just the culture in which we live. Everyone can speak the language, right? Everyone can give the lip service. The question is, well, how do we distinguish? We distinguish the same way that Jesus did, right? That they give the lip service, but their heart is far from me. Well, how do we know where someone's heart is, right? That's where the treasure is. Whereas your treasure is, your heart will be there also, right? And so if they're living their life in all these sinful things, well that shows you that's where their heart is. They're investing in the sinful things because they find the sinful things valuable. And so that's how we distinguish here. You see that time and time again in the Bible. Not only in the Bible, but I'm sure you can see that all over. But us being here, we see it very personally. Yeah, that's very true. It's something that had happened in Israel. at this time. And what we don't want is this to be said of us. We don't want it to be said of us that well, we just did what was right in our own eyes. We want it to be said that we did what was right. You see, there's a difference there. What God hasn't stated is right. And what man hasn't stated is right, are two different things. There's a way that seems right in the man, but the end is what? You hear a lot today, this is my truth. Yeah. You hear that all the time. People saying, this is my truth. Your truth don't matter. The truth is what matters. Right. Absolutely. The word of God. Yeah. The word of God. That's what matters. Absolutely. All right. Let's see here. So, 7 through 9 there together. It says, 7. Now, there was a young man of Bethlehem in Judah. of the family of Judah, who was a Levite, and he sojourned there. And he sojourned there, and the man departed from the town of Bethlehem in Judah and sojourned where he could find a place. And he journeyed and came to the hill country of Ephraim to the house of Maga. And Maga said to him, where do you come from? And he said to him, I'm a Levite of Bethlehem in Judah, and I'm going to sojourn where I may find a place. And so here we find this Levite in between our sections, in between our sections of reminding us the state of the children of Israel, right? That's what he put six in there for. We have the section of the idols and what he had set up for himself. Now here we're getting into the section of the Levite and what he's gonna do in that sense. And I believe that both of those show us a different perspective of what is going on here. We looked at the first perspective with the syncretism, right? Of putting everything, grabbing a little bit from all these religions and putting them together and see what you can benefit out of it. The second part here we're gonna see in just a moment and we can really see it with the Levite and what corresponds with him. So this is what is happening. This Levite is journeying. He is looking for a place to use his calling, seemingly for profit. He's looking for work. He's looking for a place to use his, instead of staying around the tabernacle, instead of serving the way he was supposed to serve in all these capacities, all that has fell through and he is now simply trying to benefit from heritage. He's trying to benefit from being a Levite. Many people would want a Levite priest as we're gonna see in our text and so that's what he's doing here. Looking for work. He was looking for profit. Yeah. That's what the Levites looking for here. When indeed Yahweh had told them that what was the Levites profit? What was their portion? Was the Lord. Absolutely. Deuteronomy 18. What had God told them? Deuteronomy 18. all these things being set in motion. Yahweh says, this is verse one of 18, the Levitical priests, all the tribe of Levi shall have no portion of inheritance with Israel. They shall eat the Lord's food offering as their inheritance. They shall have no inheritance among their brothers. The Lord is their inheritance as he promised to them. So what is the gain that the Levite gets for his service? It's the Lord, right? Serving the Lord is its own benefits. You get to serve the Lord. You maybe get to go in the presence of God. You see, this is what you get. You don't get land, you don't get any of these things. You'll be fed from the Lord, from the tithes, and you will serve God and he will be your portion. But that's not what we find here. We find this Levite going out to find another portion. We find him casting off the portion that God had subscribed to him that told him he would give, which is himself, showing that he didn't value it, and going off for ill-gotten gain. You see? from the wealthy family. They would have their own personal altar or triptychs and things like that. That's a very similar picture. Yeah, that's a great comparison. You've seen tons of that idolatry going on at that time with the supposed priests who would give favors out and give this out for gain, right? Just straight debauchery. It's a very good connection there. And that's what we're seeing here. It's what this Levite is going to do. He has totally forsaken his office, his true office, as a priest. And he's a young man, right? Yeah. Couldn't have been a priest anyway. No. Right? And so he hadn't worked his way up. And so what he wants is he wants the reward without the work. He says, give me my portion. And so he goes looking for it. He can't get it there, so he goes looking for it. And he finds a man that will give him to him. You want to say something? Oh, I was just thinking he could be a character in Chaucer. What is it? Chaucer, The Pilgrim, The Pilgrimage, I forget what that... It's a piece of literature where they're doing a pilgrimage and there's all these characters and you see their debauchery. It's written at the same time as... It's like very early American literature. Oh, okay. That's interesting. Like, this guy could have been a character. There's a priest in... Really? The Canterbury Tales. I was trying to think of the name of it. Okay. okay they can't yeah i think that we read that that's interesting i never even thought of that okay very well yeah so in that same way i'm uh that's telling multiple facets of stories of debauchery of men right from what i saw so that's what we're saying here yeah we've seen the first side like i said before with his mother and the idols And now we're seeing the second side of this gain that is wanting to be had. He's wanting to gain from the Lord, you see. In reality, this goes for us as well, serving the Lord, serving Christ, our gain is Christ. Amen. You see? And if he's not worth it to you, if you hear me say that, and you think, well, that's not worth it, well, then you don't love him. You see? And so anyone that wants to make gain off of the gospel, gain off of the Lord, and I'm not talking about necessities, okay? I'm not talking about just let your pastors starve. That's not what I'm saying. Take care of your pastors, feed them all this thing. But if someone's wanting to make true millions of dollars gain off of the gospel, that shows that their gain is not Christ. You see? And that's what this Levite was doing. He was saying, y'all, it's not enough for me. I need land. I need goods. I want this portion. And so that's, that's what he's doing here. Even though Yahweh had told them that he was indeed their portion in Deuteronomy 18 there. So let's continue in our text. Let's see here. 10 through 12, 10. So this is Micah's response. The priest had come to him, he'd said, I'm from Judah there, Bethlehem, and I'm sojourning to find a place, a place of work, a place that I can use my, be a priest, use my priestly talents, if you will. And Micah said to him, stay with me and be to me a father and a priest, and I will give you 10 pieces of silver a year and a suit of clothes, and you're leaving. And the Levite went in, and the Levite was content to dwell with the man, And the young man became to him like one of his sons. And Michael ordained a Levite, and the young man became his priest and was in the house of Micah. So we see here that he has found exactly what he wants here. We're told that Micah gives him, this Levite, what he was looking for, gain. You want gain from your priestly duties? Come and be my priest and I'll give you gain. We see it here with this 10 pieces of silver and these clothes in this yearly portion. That's what you want. You want to make gain off of these priestly duties. Come to be within my house. Come be in this false temple that I've created and you indeed can be one of my priests. And we were told that the young Levite was content to do this, right? He wasn't forced in any way. He thought, well, this is a great opportunity for me. You can see that there in verse 11. And so he became like a son to Micah here. We also see that Micah ordains the Levites. He ordains Levi, what is this showing? It's showing that he taught himself above the priests in general. Right? If you ordain a man, you find yourself above a man. You see, God ordained the Levites, remember? He said, I'm setting these people apart from Aaron, they're gonna be my priests, they're gonna be holy to me, they're gonna do all these things, right? And here he's saying, well, I'll ordain this man, you see? thanking himself above even the priest, you see. He had made himself God. He had made his house, this center of worship, his house, this center of priestly duty, when it was the Lord's house all along. It was the temple, it was the tabernacle where the priests were supposed to serve, you see. So we can see that there. We were running low on time. Let's try to work our way through this. Let's see. So we see that he is doing all of this. We just got one verse left. So let's look at it together. It's 13 there. And Maga said, now I know that the Lord will prosper me because I have a Levite as a priest. So he signed off on himself. I know that the Lord is going to prosper me now. I did have my son that wasn't cutting it. Now I've got this actual Levite. We're good to go. He'll help me worship these false gods, these idols. He'll help me do all these things. He's in pursuit, what we're seeing here is Micah is in pursuit of favor with God. He's in pursuit of favor with God. What we're seeing here, and it was hinted at before, is a sacramentalism. What do I mean by that? That is a believing that certain acts or certain deeds give one favor with God or even salvation. You see, and that's what we're seeing here. Before we had seen the syncretism of putting everything together, and now we're seeing this deep, deep sacramentalism of Micah believing that, hey, if we do these things, if we do these sacred things, then this gives us favor with God. We can do these things, God will have favor upon us. Something that Micah didn't understand, something that Micah didn't see, because he didn't truly know God, is Deuteronomy 7. We've looked at Deuteronomy 7 countless times before, do you remember? This has been the backdrop, but now we're gonna look at the second part. Remember what Yahweh tells the people? Look at six there. If you are a people holy to the Lord, you're set apart. To the Lord, you're God. God has chosen you to be a people of his treasured possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. So God is stating here, I've chosen you. He has, I've chosen Israel to be my people. Out of all the other peoples, I chose you. And so the question would be why? Is it because of the things they did? Is it because of the sacramental things they give to God? They had the right idols, they did the right things, they were the most in number? Well, Yahweh tells us. 7. It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set His love on you and chose you through the fewest of all peoples. but it's because the Lord loves you and is keeping an oath that he swore to your fathers that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. So you're always telling them, here, listen, it's not because of anything that you do that I love you. Nothing that you do finds you favor with me, right? The reason that we have favor with God is simply all of grace. And that goes for us again today. If you're thinking anything within yourself, that I'm going to do these actions, I'm going to come to church, I'm going to sit in the pew, I'm going to tithe, I'm going to give money to charity, all these things, and this somehow finds me favor with God, you will find that it finds you no favor at all. The only favor that is found with God is found in Jesus Christ and those who are united to Him. That's it. And we understand that that is all of grace. That is all a gift of God for us. Something that Micah didn't understand is something that we should. Well, that's all the time we have, so let's pray together. Father, I thank you for this text. I thank you for your grace upon us, that you indeed loved us, that you indeed care for us, that your favor is nothing of ourselves. It is totally dependent upon you. Give us strength now to live in that grace. In Christ's name I pray. Amen.