“Everyone who saw it said, “Such a thing has never been seen or done, not since the day the Israelites came up out of Egypt. Think about it! Consider it! Tell us what to do!”
~ Judges 19:30
Hi James and Ellen,
Do you like to watch feel good movies? Do you like to read real life stories that have happy endings? Do you like to surround yourselves with encouraging friends? If the real life actions of the guys and gals who are mentioned in the Bible are put into a single cinema presentation in the chronological order that their actions took place, do you think that you would have a feel good movie? If each real life story of a guy and/or gal that is told about in the Bible is put into a book, would you always have a story with a happy ending? If each relationship that is recounted in the Bible between a guy and a guy, a gal and a gal, a guy and a gal and a kid and a guy and/or a gal is examined, would you always find an uplifting relationship? What needs to take place in a movie – after you have watched the movie, to leave you feeling good? What needs to be in a real life story that has a happy ending that makes you feel good? What needs to happen in a relationship that has encouraged you for you to know that you have a true friend? There are real occurrences recorded in the Bible that if a movie was made of the occurrence, the movie would have to be given a triple x rating. There are real life stories detailed in the Bible that are thoroughly repugnant and disgusting. There are real life relationships that are mentioned in the Bible that are morally depraved. There are throughout the United States pockets of self-loving, compromised and degenerate guys and gals who reflect what life is like for a guy or gal who has not made the decision of faith to accept what Jesus did for him or her after being unmercifully hung on and nailed to a cross where He excruciatingly suffered and died as a ransom payment for them.
The abject defilement of a moral lifestyle that is taking place at this time with seemingly more frequency in the United States was more of norm over the centuries of documented Biblical accounts before God – as God the Son, was embedded as an incarnate man on planet Earth. Judges 19 begins the second of two accounts which describes the fall of God’s specially chosen guys and gals – the Israelite people group guys and gals, into sordid lifestyles. The following true episode – which is the Judge Book’s epilogue, was recorded to illustrate how morally corrupt that a perverted gang of guys who were living in the town of Gibeah had become. Because of the nationwide repercussions of what ‘the Gibeah gang’ did, the twelve Israelite people group tribal clans of God’s specially chosen guys and gals who had had land allotted to them in the land area that God had given to them – which was Canaan’s land area, to always to have to live in as their very own land if . . . and land that was located on the east side of the Jordon River, were given a wakeup call regarding the debasing, defiling actions that a spirit of debauchery that had infiltrated the entire Israelite people group of guys and gals was causing. This real life story began when a Levi tribal clan guy who was living in a remote part of the land area that had been allotted by lot to the Ephraim tribal clan guys and gals, decided that he wanted a Judah tribal clan gal who was living the town of Bethlehem as a concubine. During the time that the books in the Old Testament were written, if a guy wanted a gal to live with him without having to marry the gal and if the gal’s dad was okay with that, the gal would become the guy’s concubine. When the gal who became the Levi people group’s guy’s concubine became unfaithful to the guy, the gal went back to her family who was living in the town of Bethlehem. After the Levi tribal clan guy waited four months for his concubine to return to his home that was in the remote, hill country of the Ephraim tribal clan land area, the Levi tribal clan guy walked to the town of Bethlehem to reclaim the gal as his concubine. After spending almost six days in the home of the gal’s dad, the Levi tribal clan guy was finally able to begin the walk back to his home – which was days away, with his concubine. When it began to get dark the first night that the Levi tribal clan guy and his concubine were on the path back to his home in the Ephraim tribal clan land area, the Levi tribal clan guy decided to stop with his concubine in the town of Gibeah – a town that was in the Benjamin tribal clan land area. After the Levi tribal clan guy took up the offer to stay with his concubine in the house of an old dude who had once lived in the land area that was allotted by lot to the Ephraim tribal clan guys and gals, a number of hooligans from the town of Gibeah showed up at the old guy’s house to demand that the Levi tribal clan guy come outside so that they could do whatever they wanted to do with him. In an attempt to get rid of the abhorrent, ruthless gang of depraved ruffians, the old guy who lived in the town of Gibeah arbitrary offered the evil mob his daughter and the Levi tribal clan’s guy’s concubine to do whatever they wanted to do with them. The Levi tribal clan guy’s concubine ended up being the one who . . . the gal ended up dying. When the Levi tribal clan guy got back to his house, the guy cut up the gal who had been his concubine into twelve separate body parts and he sent a body part of the gal to each of the twelve different Israelite people group tribal clans which . . . verse 30 says, “Everyone who saw it said, “Such a thing has never been seen or done, not since the day the Israelites came up out of Egypt. Think about it! Consider it! Tell us what to do!””
It would be easy to criticize the Levi tribal clan guy – who was from the tribal clan who God specifically chose to worship Him, or the old dude for being willing to hand over two defenseless gals to brutes but . . . your grandpaa is wondering how long that God is going to permit guys and gals who are living the United States to continue to get by – without any kind of recrimination, the deceitful things that they are saying and the sick acts that they are doing.
Judges 19 (912)