In search of the God-factor

Read Judges 17-18.

Verse 6 of chapter 17 contains a recurring theme that characterizes the book of Judges and explains the 7 cycles.  "In those days there was no king in Israel.  Everyone did what was right in his own eyes."  The statement should immediately alert us that the account here is historical to the writer and that the time of writing was later when Israel had a king.  The closing chapters of Judges are stories, providing specific examples, that fit into the previous cycles.

Micah was a thief.  He stole silver from his mother.  When she pronounced a curse on the one who took her money, Micah confessed and gave it back to her.  In her warped thinking, she decided to counter the stated curse she had put on her son with some sort of religious good work.  Obviously influenced by the pagan culture around her, she took part of the silver to make an idol to worship as her god.  Such an act was an abomination to the LORD.  If that were not enough, they hired their own private priest to lead their false worship.  Sadly, this was one of Moses' grandsons.

The situation is full of pride and rebellion against the LORD.  They had their own god, their own priest, their own way of worship.  All self-made and had nothing to do with the God of Heaven.

In chapter 18, even the tribe of Dan lost their spiritual bearings.  They forcibly took Micah's god and his priest as their own.  Then, they conquered the territory that Joshua had allotted to them in the north.  They set up the god they stole as their own and Dan became a center of idolatry.

Insights:

Louis Giglio once said, "If you have to carry your god on your shoulder, you need a new god."

It is pride and rebellion in the heart and mind of finite human beings that think they are smarter than the Infinite Creator.  Humans left to themselves will always put their trust in something else to "bless" them.

Instead of worshipping and praying to nature, the stars, and man-made objects, let us worship the One who created and sustains all that we see, including ourselves.  As scientists in Europe are searching for the God-factor in the mass of the universe, the Apostle Paul knew the answer a long time ago.  Concerning Jesus, he wrote, "...all things were created through him and for him.  And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together."  (Colossians 1:16b-17)