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The Powerful & The Powerless (When No One Cares)
13 Plays6 days ago
Judges 19:1-30
Recommended
Transcript
Social Experiment on Compassion
00:00:00
Speaker
Several years ago there was a social experiment conducted in the busy busy city of New York and a man had went to a busy intersection and he laid himself down on the sidewalk where many pedestrians passed and he pretended to be injured and he waited for the passerbys.
00:00:17
Speaker
Hundreds of people walked right past him. Some glanced up from their cell phones, many did not. Some stepped around him so as not to bump into him.
00:00:32
Speaker
Most never even slowed down. Finally, one elderly lady stopped, and she stooped down, and she whispered in this gentleman's ear, Sir, are you all right?
00:00:45
Speaker
Is there anything I can do to help? It was at that point the camera crew came out, the interviewer interviewed some of the people that were passing by, and they said, hey, why didn't you lend a hand?
00:01:02
Speaker
Everybody said, well, I just thought somebody else was going to do it. Isn't that the danger, folks, for us? We just assume somebody else is going to do it.
00:01:14
Speaker
Somebody else is going to step up. Somebody else is going to stop. Somebody else is going to lend a hand. But too often there are times when no one steps up.
Introduction to Judges 19: Societal Neglect
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Speaker
This is what we're going to see today in Judges chapter 19. Maybe one of the most disturbing chapters in all of the Bible. It's ugly, it's uncomfortable, and it's meant to be that way.
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Speaker
It's meant to shock you. It's meant to shock me. It's meant to wake you up. It's meant to show you what happens when society stops caring about the weak and they forget about the vulnerable.
00:01:55
Speaker
In those days there was no king in Israel, and everyone did what was right in their eyes. How many times have we heard that as we journey through the book of Judges?
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Speaker
Repetition, ladies. Repetition.
00:02:12
Speaker
This chapter shows us a community of people where no one protects the defenseless. No one sticks up for the weak. And it forces us to ask ourselves today, individually, corporately here as the church, I would even suggest perhaps nationally as these great United States, what kind of people have we become?
Themes in Judges: Leaderlessness and Godlessness
00:02:36
Speaker
Turn with me Judges chapter 19 if you will. I want you to look at your outline because your outline will be super helpful this morning.
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Speaker
The very first section you'll see in your outline highlights three striking features. Three features that we've seen progressively get worse as we've looked through the book of Judges.
00:02:58
Speaker
We see that there's leaderlessness happening. There's a people leading themselves. There's no leader. There's godlessness.
00:03:11
Speaker
They've basically removed God from their sphere.
00:03:17
Speaker
And this morning we're going to see there's namelessness. This entire chapter, when you read chapter 19, and I will do it in sections today, not one person is name by name.
00:03:29
Speaker
It's very interesting. The author's doing something with simply the way he's writing this. He's letting you know that nameless people, people have lost their identity, they're innocent, they're weak, they're vulnerable, and the people who are in powerful positions will step on them at all costs.
Consequences of Absence of Leadership and God
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Speaker
When this happens, I put a note to myself, when no one prays, when no one obeys God, and God is somehow removed from the center of their lives, it's always the weak and it's always the defenseless who are the first ones who are victimized.
Personal Story on Safeguarding the Vulnerable
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Speaker
going to use this word abuse today several times. When I get to the end of this chapter where it's very graphic, I will Graciously step over that and leave that to you parents to discuss that with your children.
00:04:17
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I will simply use the word abuse and and you'll see where I'm going with this.
00:04:25
Speaker
God is absent. Leaders are absent. Everybody's doing whatever's right in their own eyes. Nobody's a obeying God. Nobody's praying to Him.
Narrative of Judges 19: Neglect and Violence
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Speaker
I envisioned myself as as a young parent with my kids and I thought we we ran our house like a well-oiled machine.
00:04:46
Speaker
We really did. We were all over our kids. We had four kids, many of you know, when they were little. I would dress them in the same color shirts anytime we'd go out somewhere. So visually, I would see them at a glance and go, they're all wearing red today.
00:04:58
Speaker
And I'd look and go, okay, there's three, I'm counting, there's four, right? We were super strict. We were, where were i what I would like to say, a very well-run house.
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Our children's welfare was our top priority. i I joke with Kim often, I don't remember many of my dreams. Some of you guys have very vivid dreams and you remember them. I'm i'm envious of you.
00:05:24
Speaker
I just don't really remember. I have two dreams that I remember. One, somebody breaks into our house and I have to shoot them. I don't know why. It's maybe security guys, you guys can have a talk with me later give me some counseling.
00:05:37
Speaker
The second dream is I lose one of our children. And and it is it is a wrecking dream. And I think, why of all the dreams that I could remember, I bring this up, brothers and sisters, because somebody who takes the welfare of their children seriously, and the house is well run, and they protect their kids, that's one picture.
00:05:59
Speaker
The picture that we're going to see in chapter 19 is just the opposite of that picture. It is a chaotic house. It is an unhealthy house. It is a house where the authority has collapsed. it is a It's a picture of where children are neglected and they are harmed and they are abused.
00:06:15
Speaker
and And that happens because the leadership has has dissipated and God is no longer on the picture.
00:06:23
Speaker
right, let's unfold this story. i can't I can't pause any longer. It's as shocking as it as it's going to be. The truth here is, and I want to and i want to point out, this is why I outlined it the way I outlined it for you today.
00:06:35
Speaker
Every single one of these people that I'm going to bring up, could have stood up and protected the innocent. They could have stood up at some point and protected protected the vulnerable, but they all fail in some area. They're all culpable in some area.
00:06:49
Speaker
Chapter 19, let's look, starting in
Plight of the Concubine: Abuse and Indifference
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Speaker
verse 1. It says, Now in those days Israel had no king. There's our repetition, ladies. There was a man from the tribe of Levi living in a remote area in the hill hill country of Ephraim.
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Speaker
Ladies, you would be highlighting that part right now, going, where is that place? Why is that significant? One day he brought home a woman from Bethlehem in Judah to be his concubine.
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Speaker
And I just want to tell you right now, verse 2 in the New Living Translation does not do it justice. so I'm going to read it, but i'm going to really explain what verse 2 is. Hopefully your translation may do a better job. Verse 2 says, but she became angry with him...
00:07:35
Speaker
and returned to her father's home in Bethlehem. And about four months later, dot, dot, dot. Let's just pause right there. What's going on with this this picture? We have man, nameless, he's a Levite, and the text here tells us that he has a woman as a concubine.
00:07:57
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Well, if we just simply do a little bit further reading, we find out this woman is really his his wife. So there's already conflicting terminology being used here. It's his wife, but somehow it's also his concubine.
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And the New Living Translation doesn't do great here in verse 2 because it says she became angry with him and she returned to her father's home. What's really going on is this word is...
00:08:25
Speaker
It's not often used in the Bible, so there's a lot of ambiguity around it. What I can tell you from my vast study in 19, most likely is she is prostituted.
00:08:38
Speaker
This is the picture. She is a woman who is married to this gentleman, and he has prostituted her. This is where the concubine terminology comes in.
00:08:49
Speaker
Something happens, the the text doesn't give us exactly what happens, but she flees him in fear and she returns to her father's home in Bethlehem.
00:09:04
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Now, we later see this entire relationship as one just rot of instability, it's a rot of disregard for one another.
00:09:19
Speaker
When danger arrives, instead of protecting her like a husband should do, he doesn't. Matter of fact, he does the unthinkable, we'll see what that is in just a little bit. Instead of protecting the vulnerable, he protects himself.
00:09:33
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Imagine grandfathers that are here today. If you're in the parking lot of Walmart, and you have your grandson or your granddaughter in in the buggy, the push cart, you know as you're getting ready to go into the store.
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You do your shopping and as as you're exiting the store with your grandchild, there's a car speeding through the parking lot. Most granddads, I'd venture to say, would pull the cart back towards you, protecting that grandchild from that speeding car.
00:10:06
Speaker
The picture here, brothers and sisters, is he's pushing that cart into oncoming traffic.
Journey to Gibeah: Hospitality and Danger
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It is that bad, it is that unthinkable. He has little regard for this woman in his life.
00:10:22
Speaker
But he's not the only one irresponsible. Others had opportunity to step up and do what's right also. Let's continue reading verse 3 on.
00:10:34
Speaker
so So after four months, her husband set out for Bethlehem and he speak to go speak personally and to persuade her to come back. He took with him a servant and a pair of donkeys, and when he arrived at her father's house, her father saw him and welcomed him in.
00:10:49
Speaker
So this is his father-in-law. Verse 4 says, her Her father urged him to stay a while. So he stayed three days, eating, drinking, and sleeping over.
00:11:02
Speaker
Ladies, eating, drinking, and staying over are are going to be a common repeated theme. You would probably highlight that as you were studying On the fourth day, the man was up early, ready to leave, but the woman's father said to his son-in-law, so there's our key that he's married to this lady, hey, have something to eat before you go.
00:11:21
Speaker
So the two men sat down together and they had something to eat and something to drink. There's our repetition again. They're eating, they're drinking, and then the woman's father said, hey, please stay another night and enjoy yourself.
00:11:34
Speaker
The man got up to leave, but his father-in-law kept urging him to stay. More repetition, more same thing going on. He wants to get up, he wants to leave, he wants to take his wife, he wants to take the concubine. He says, no, stay and eat, be merry.
00:11:48
Speaker
Verse 8, on the morning of the fifth day, he was up early again, ready to leave, and again the woman's father said, have something to eat, then you can leave this afternoon.
00:11:58
Speaker
They had another day of feasting. Later, as the man and his concubine and servant were preparing to leave, his father-in-law said, look, it's almost evening. It's almost comical, by the way, at this point, right? He's just like, wait, wait, wait where are you going?
00:12:11
Speaker
Wait, will wait, wait. Sit down eat some more. Hey, let's drink some more. It's almost evening. Stay the night. Enjoy yourselves. Tomorrow you can get up and be on your
Hostility in Gibeah: Safety Failed
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Speaker
merry way. But verse 10 says, but this time the man was determined or adamant, adamant to leave.
00:12:26
Speaker
So he took his two saddle donkeys and his concubine which is also his wife, and headed in the direction of Jebus, that is Jerusalem.
00:12:37
Speaker
The father-in-law here is just as complicit, just as culpable. He warmly invites them He offers them food, drink.
00:12:49
Speaker
I put in in quotes, eat, drink, and be merry. It's a picture here of excess. It's to stay and self-indulge for a while. It's hospitality without wisdom.
00:13:01
Speaker
it's It's overstay your welcome. He doesn't say anything about what happened between his daughter and this Levi man. None of that's discussed. It's let's just sit and get feasted on together.
00:13:16
Speaker
It's like telling somebody, hey, just stay for one more cup of coffee at 8 p.m. at your house. Caffeinated coffee, right?
00:13:26
Speaker
You know very well what that means. That poor person, when they leave your house, is gonna be up vacuuming and dusting at 3 a.m. m in the morning when they have that cup of coffee at 8 p.m.
00:13:37
Speaker
Poor timing, I put here. Poor timing can lead to poorly unanticipated problems. They don't realize how bad the situation is because he's kept them there so long that by the time they launch, verse 11 says, it's late in the day when they they neared Jebus, which is near Jerusalem. And this man's servant said to him, hey, let's stop at this Jebusite town and spend the night there.
00:14:02
Speaker
No, his master said, we can't stay in this foreign town where there are no Israelites. Ladies, I would have circled that. Why is that important, no Israelites? Instead, he would go on to Gibeah.
00:14:16
Speaker
Come on, let's try and get as far as Gibeah or Ramah, and then we'll spend the night in one of those towns. And so they went on, and the sun was setting, and they came to Gibeah, a town in the land of Benjamin, which is also important to know.
00:14:29
Speaker
because this is friendly territory, this is Israelite territory, and so they stopped there and spent the night, and they rested in the town square, but no one would take them in for the night. The picture here, friends, is they they were delayed so long leaving the father-in-law's house, that by the time they finally got on the road, it's late, and they can't just stop on any old town, because they're afraid some some foolishness will happen to them.
00:14:54
Speaker
So they said, let's get as far over to Gibeah because we know at least Gibeah is Israelite territory. We know we'll probably be safe there.
Horrific Abuse in Gibeah: Parallels to Sodom
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Foreshadowing is what I wrote in my notes here.
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Speaker
Because what happens next, brothers and sisters, is the unthinkable.
00:15:14
Speaker
Look at verse 22. two I'm to summarize real quick up to 22 for you. they're in the town square nobody will take him in they meet a stranger he says don't stay in the town square come stay in my house they're in this man's house and now verse twenty two says while they're enjoying themselves and that enjoying themselves means they're eating drinking and being merry they hear this
00:15:43
Speaker
hey you hey y'all we know you're in there now listen how closely as i read this that that this sounds like another story in the Bible. And a crowd of troublemakers from the town surrounded the house.
00:15:58
Speaker
And they began beating on the door and shouting to the old man. Here's what they shouted. You might want to underline this. Bring out the man who was staying with you so that we could have sex with him.
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Pause. Does this sound familiar to any other story to you? Sounds like Sodom, right? Sodom and Gomorrah. Almost verbatim what happens here.
00:16:24
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So the man steps outside, verse 23 says, to talk to them. No, my brothers, don't do such an evil thing. For this man is a guest of my house. And such a thing would be shameful.
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It's interesting that word, how that's used in that context.
00:16:46
Speaker
Just when things couldn't get worse, verse 24.
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Let me paraphrase before we get to 24. Hey, I have these guests. They're in my house. I know you're knocking down my door. I know you want to have sex with my male guest. That's not going to happen.
00:17:06
Speaker
But I have a solution. Verse 24.
00:17:10
Speaker
Take my virgin daughter. And by the way, this man's concubine. That man's wife.
00:17:19
Speaker
And he pushed her out the door. And the men of the town abused abused them all night long. And I'll leave it there for your further reading. It's so bad, brothers and sisters, it says in in verse 26, she basically crawls her way back to the door and collapses at the door and lays there until it was light.
Aftermath and Indifference
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Speaker
When her husband opened the door to leave, there lay his concubine. Mind you, that's his wife. With her hands on the threshold, So understand the picture. she's She's prostrated, laying out hands on the the threshold of the door.
00:18:00
Speaker
To what she says in verse 23, hey, get up. Hey, get up, let's go.
00:18:07
Speaker
Do you feel the compassion there?
00:18:12
Speaker
Tragedy. But there's no answer. So that tells us something right there. Why is there no answer? Well, My Bible, NLT, has a little asterisk right there.
00:18:25
Speaker
So he put her body on his donkey and he took her home.
00:18:31
Speaker
Observation number one for me. She goes from being a concubine to a wife to a victim to somebody who's abused to a body.
Moral Decay: Israelites as Canaanites
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Just like that. Isn't that sad?
00:18:49
Speaker
It's a community, brothers and sisters, I put here of, we don't know if it's men and women that were knocking on the door that say, hey, take take out your male guest.
00:19:00
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We don't know who does the actual physical abuse here, but what we are told is they are Gibeites. They're not Canaanites. It's very important. The Gibeites are Israelites.
00:19:15
Speaker
These are their own people. This is this Levi and his concubine wife. This is their people. They've strayed so far, they look just like the Canaanites.
00:19:28
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They look just like the Sodomites.
00:19:32
Speaker
The tragedy I put these people aren't pagans. They're Israelites acting like Canaanites. God's people have become so indistinguishable from the most wicked people in the world.
00:19:48
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And I put today, this should trouble us. This story should trouble us in such a way that if if you were to hear one of your friends say to you, you know, maybe don't yeah ought to go to that First Baptist Church.
00:20:04
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I mean, you guys kind of like do what we do out here in the world. You kind of hear a lot like us. Boy, brothers and sisters, that should really worry you. We should be vastly different from the world.
00:20:16
Speaker
They should look at us and go, there's something completely different going on with them.
00:20:22
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But when God's people begin living like the world, the vulnerable lose their protection. The weak become a target.
00:20:32
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And it gets just tragically worse. The host offers both of these women, both women are abused, the concubine ends up dead, I won't read the end of it because, quite frankly, I wouldn't even know how best to describe it to you.
00:20:51
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It's a wake-up call.
00:20:54
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There's no compassion in this story at the end. There's only grief.
Call to Compassion: Reflecting Christ
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And I put, it's intentionally shocking. I think especially here at the end of Judges, mind you, we only have one more Sunday of Judges, and then and then that's it. You guys get a ah recess from Judges.
00:21:13
Speaker
I always say I love going into Judges. It's like so rejuvenating by the time you get out. It's just, boy, it's like you just think, wow, God's people have really been through the ringer.
00:21:26
Speaker
i know about you. i hope I hope this journey has been rewarding for you. I put here it's super super telling where God's people are at.
00:21:37
Speaker
They've fallen so far out of God's favor. He's not even mentioned one time in this entire chapter. no No God, no prayer, just the people doing whatever they think they want to do.
00:21:52
Speaker
And that's what it forces us to ask, what would it look like
00:21:57
Speaker
if we were to act differently than these people today. If they are the example of what not to do, what are you and I supposed to do? How are we supposed to care for the defenseless in our community? How are we supposed to step up and step in for the weak in our community?
00:22:15
Speaker
Well, I think I just have one one suggestion this morning. It's gonna be pretty simple.
00:22:23
Speaker
Identify somebody that you know that is somebody who's overlooked, if I can use that word. Because oftentimes I think when we think of the term weak or vulnerable, it's hard for us to put that to a face or a name of somebody.
00:22:41
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But if I asked you, who do you think somebody overlooked? Maybe in our congregation, maybe somebody in your family group. I put to me, how about when we had...
00:22:52
Speaker
um Potluck last week or two, was it couple weeks ago we had potluck? I saw people sitting by themselves at the table.
00:23:01
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Do you know that?
00:23:04
Speaker
I was shocked. I was a little saddened. I thought, what about that person? What about the person on Wednesdays when we come up and they're sitting by themselves at the end of our wonderful meal that Mildred provides for us? What if they're sitting out there by themselves?
00:23:19
Speaker
What if it's somebody that's a widow here in our community? What if it's somebody who's a shut-in? We have several of those in our church here. What if it's somebody who sits alone in worship? Somebody who recently lost a spouse?
00:23:31
Speaker
Identify that person. And then here's what I want you to do. It's very simple. You call them. You write them. You visit them. You bring them a meal.
00:23:42
Speaker
You send them a note. You send them a text. What, pastor, all of those? That's too much.
00:23:50
Speaker
Pick one. Pick one person and do one thing this week. Because caring for the vulnerable isn't some big church program. It's not like, hey, we're going to launch this huge missional effort to save the vulnerable. It starts with you and me doing one small thing.
00:24:05
Speaker
One small bit of individual compassion. One stepping out of our comfort zone. Hey, I don't normally sit next to that person. You know, going to sit next to that person.
00:24:18
Speaker
Remember that story from the very beginning, the man lying on the sidewalk in New York City? Hundreds passed by, but that one lady stopped? She didn't assume somebody else would do it.
00:24:29
Speaker
She chose compassion.
00:24:33
Speaker
She was displaying Christ-like qualities, ladies. We talked about that, right? I told them, by the way, in our teaching, I said, every time you teach the Bible or you prepare the Bible, you have to apply it.
00:24:46
Speaker
And that application has to be real, it has to be solid, concrete, something that you guys can take away. And it has to reflect some type of Christ-like quality. This lady showed compassion.
00:24:57
Speaker
And so um'm I'm saying, brothers sisters, this is the Christ-like quality I'm i'm compelling you to exhibit this week is is compassion. Find somebody who is in dire need and reach out to them so that they don't feel alone, that they don't feel vulnerable, so that they don't feel weak.
Christ's Compassion as a Model
00:25:15
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We do that because Christ did that for us.
00:25:20
Speaker
He never just walked past the hurting. He always stopped. you know when the masses, when and that's not the Catholic masses, I'm talking the masses of people.
00:25:31
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When he saw the masses that he was teaching, do you know what the the number one response that it says Jesus did? He had what? Compassion.
00:25:44
Speaker
He never passed the hurting. He never stopped for the blind. He never stopped for the outcast. Oh wait, yeah, he did. Often. He always stopped. He always stopped for the brokenhearted.
00:25:55
Speaker
And ultimately, brothers sisters, he stopped for you and for me.