Ten Shekels and a Shirt | Judges 17-18
Intro
There was a time in my life when I couldn’t stand country music, but I’ve come to enjoy it. As I’ve listened to country music, I’ve noticed that it reveals a lot about the way Americans think about God and relate to him. In the world of country music—which mainly comes from the Bible belt—it’s assumed that God exists, that Jesus saves, and that we’re all going to heaven. But the kind of religion expressed in country music is a far cry from biblical, gospel-centered Christianity.
I wanted to cite three or four examples, but I think one will do. This is from “Give Heaven Some Hell” by the country artist HARDY. He’s singing to a friend who passed away.
Yeah, I believe 'em when they say you're in a better place
You had a wild side but you had amazing grace
I know you're way off up in them clouds
But if you could still hear me right now
I hope you hit those gold streets on two wheels
I hope your mansion in the sky's got a ten acre field
…
Hide your beer, hide your clear from the man upstairs
Crank it loud, hold it down 'til I get there
And when I do, I hope you got some new stories to tell
'Til then, give Heaven some hell
…
I was there when you raised your hand
Heads bowed, singing just as I am
Walkin' that aisle, prayin' that prayer
Man, it ain't right but if you gotta be there … (and it returns to the chorus)
This version of “Christianity” uses all of the right language and ideas. It speaks of Jesus and prayer and amazing grace and heaven and God (or ‘the man upstairs’). But there’s no need for true repentance or genuine faith. There’s no true conversion, no sanctification, no godliness. In a lot of country music Christianity, you can live like the world, call yourself a Christian, and expect to go to heaven when you die.
Many people in America who attend evangelical churches, affirm that God exists, and claim to be Christians are actually self-deceived, far from God, and on their way to hell. Their attempt to worship the true God is nothing but false worship like we see in Israel in Judges 17–18.
Judges 17–18
1 There was a man of the hill country of Ephraim, whose name was Micah. 2 And he said to 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, behold, the silver is with me; I took it.” And his mother said, “Blessed be my son by the Lord.” 3 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 a carved image and a metal image. Now therefore I will restore it to you.” 4 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. 5 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. 6 In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
7 Now there was a young man of Bethlehem in Judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite, and he sojourned there. 8 And the man departed from the town of Bethlehem in Judah to sojourn where he could find a place. And as he journeyed, he came to the hill country of Ephraim to the house of Micah. 9 And Micah said to him, “Where do you come from?” And he said to him, “I am a Levite of Bethlehem in Judah, and I am going to sojourn where I may find a place.” 10 And Micah said to him, “Stay with me, and be to me a father and a priest, and I will give you ten pieces of silver a year and a suit of clothes and your living.” And the Levite went in. 11 And the Levite was content to dwell with the man, and the young man became to him like one of his sons. 12 And Micah ordained the Levite, and the young man became his priest, and was in the house of Micah. 13 Then Micah said, “Now I know that the Lord will prosper me, because I have a Levite as priest.”
1 In those days there was no king in Israel. And in those days the tribe of the people of Dan was seeking for itself an inheritance to dwell in, for until then no inheritance among the tribes of Israel had fallen to them. 2 So the people of Dan sent five able men from the whole number of their tribe, from Zorah and from Eshtaol, to spy out the land and to explore it. And they said to them, “Go and explore the land.” And they came to the hill country of Ephraim, to the house of Micah, and lodged there. 3 When they were by the house of Micah, they recognized the voice of the young Levite. And they turned aside and said to him, “Who brought you here? What are you doing in this place? What is your business here?” 4 And he said to them, “This is how Micah dealt with me: he has hired me, and I have become his priest.” 5 And they said to him, “Inquire of God, please, that we may know whether the journey on which we are setting out will succeed.” 6 And the priest said to them, “Go in peace. The journey on which you go is under the eye of the Lord.”
7 Then the five men departed and came to Laish and saw the people who were there, how they lived in security, after the manner of the Sidonians, quiet and unsuspecting, lacking nothing that is in the earth and possessing wealth, and how they were far from the Sidonians and had no dealings with anyone. 8 And when they came to their brothers at Zorah and Eshtaol, their brothers said to them, “What do you report?” 9 They said, “Arise, and let us go up against them, for we have seen the land, and behold, it is very good. And will you do nothing? Do not be slow to go, to enter in and possess the land. 10 As soon as you go, you will come to an unsuspecting people. The land is spacious, for God has given it into your hands, a place where there is no lack of anything that is in the earth.”
11 So 600 men of the tribe of Dan, armed with weapons of war, set out from Zorah and Eshtaol, 12 and went up and encamped at Kiriath-jearim in Judah. On this account that place is called Mahaneh-dan to this day; behold, it is west of Kiriath-jearim. 13 And they passed on from there to the hill country of Ephraim, and came to the house of Micah.
14 Then the five men who had gone to scout out the country of Laish said to their brothers, “Do you know that in these houses there are an ephod, household gods, a carved image, and a metal image? Now therefore consider what you will do.” 15 And they turned aside there and came to the house of the young Levite, at the home of Micah, and asked him about his welfare. 16 Now the 600 men of the Danites, armed with their weapons of war, stood by the entrance of the gate. 17 And the five men who had gone to scout out the land went up and entered and took the carved image, the ephod, the household gods, and the metal image, while the priest stood by the entrance of the gate with the 600 men armed with weapons of war. 18 And when these went into Micah’s house and took the carved image, the ephod, the household gods, and the metal image, the priest said to them, “What are you doing?” 19 And they said to him, “Keep quiet; put your hand on your mouth and come with us and be to us a father and a priest. Is it better for you to be priest to the house of one man, or to be priest to a tribe and clan in Israel?” 20 And the priest’s heart was glad. He took the ephod and the household gods and the carved image and went along with the people.
21 So they turned and departed, putting the little ones and the livestock and the goods in front of them. 22 When they had gone a distance from the home of Micah, the men who were in the houses near Micah’s house were called out, and they overtook the people of Dan. 23 And they shouted to the people of Dan, who turned around and said to Micah, “What is the matter with you, that you come with such a company?” 24 And he said, “You take my gods that I made and the priest, and go away, and what have I left? How then do you ask me, ‘What is the matter with you?’ ” 25 And the people of Dan said to him, “Do not let your voice be heard among us, lest angry fellows fall upon you, and you lose your life with the lives of your household.” 26 Then the people of Dan went their way. And when Micah saw that they were too strong for him, he turned and went back to his home.
27 But the people of Dan took what Micah had made, and the priest who belonged to him, and they came to Laish, to a people quiet and unsuspecting, and struck them with the edge of the sword and burned the city with fire. 28 And there was no deliverer because it was far from Sidon, and they had no dealings with anyone. It was in the valley that belongs to Beth-rehob. Then they rebuilt the city and lived in it. 29 And they named the city Dan, after the name of Dan their ancestor, who was born to Israel; but the name of the city was Laish at the first. 30 And the people of Dan set up the carved image for themselves, and Jonathan the son of Gershom, son of Moses, and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of the land. 31 So they set up Micah’s carved image that he made, as long as the house of God was at Shiloh.
The True God and False Worship
When we come to Judges 17, there is a noticeable change from the style of the book thus far. It’s like when you’re driving cross-country on a road trip and the scenery changes and suddenly you’re no longer in the plains, you’re in the northwoods. Gone is the familiar cycle of idolatry, judgment, and deliverance from Judges 3–16. Gone are the judges. Instead, we’re dropped into a home in the hills of Ephraim where a man is in the middle of admitting to his mother that he stole 1,100 pieces of silver from her.
We are now in the conclusion of the Book of Judges, which comprises two final stories. Chapters 17–18 shows the depth of religious chaos to which the nation had fallen. And chapters 19–21 show the social and moral chaos that typified the day. Barry Webb comments, “This closing part of the book shows us a society that has lost its way and is on the verge of complete collapse.” Israel—the nation redeemed and loved by God—was on the verge of collapse! If any of the promises God had made to Abraham and Moses were to ever come true, it would be by the sheer grace of God.
And spiritual chaos like we see in Judges 17–18 is symptomatic of a collapsing nation. This story is not about pagan idolatry and foreign religion out there. It’s about the spiritual chaos of false worship in the midst of God’s covenant people.
The main point is simple: The True God does not accept false worship. He is not honored by it, impressed by it, or fooled by it. God will be known and worshiped in the way he has revealed, or not at all.
So how can you avoid the illusion of seeking the True God through false worship? Recognize the marks of false worship. Beware the worthlessness of false worship. Behold the end of false worship.
I. Recognize the Marks of False Worship
There are at least 3 characteristics of false worship that are obvious in Micah’s story.
A. False worship is syncretistic.
Syncretism is mixing or blending different religions into one. All the characters here blend elements of Yahweh worship with idolatry and elements of their own imaginations.
The story is full of “words, objects, activities, and persons” that sound orthodox. A Levite is ordained as a priest, which sounds biblical. There’s even an ephod, a priestly garment like the one Aaron wore.
What’s more, everyone in the story professes faith in Yahweh, the One True God. Micah’s mother blesses her son in the name of Yahweh (17:2) and dedicates the silver to Yahweh (17:3). After Micah hires the Levite to be his personal priest, he declares, “Now I know that the LORD [Yahweh] will prosper me, because I have a Levite as priest” (Judges 17:13). When the men from Dan learn that there’s a “priest” in Micah’s house, they ask him to inquire of God for them. To which the Levite responds, “Go in peace. The journey on which you go is under the eye of the LORD [Yahweh]” (Judges 18:6).
The problem is that no one is actually trusting Yahweh or obeying Yahweh’s commands. All of the religious-looking activity directly violates God’s Law. Look at 17:3: “And his mother said, ‘I dedicate the silver to the LORD from my hand for my son, to make a carved image and a metal image.’”
This is the exact language used in the Law when the curses for covenant unfaithfulness are pronounced: “Cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast metal image, an abomination to the LORD, a thing made by the hands of a craftsman” (Deuteronomy 27:15).
It’s like the author is hyperlinking Micah’s actions to that curse. They pay lip service to Yahweh, but their actions violate God’s commands. The true God does not accept syncretistic worship.
B. False worship is pragmatic.
Pragmatic religion operates by a simple rule: if it works, it’s true. And religion works if it produces immediate and obvious benefits for me, usually in the form of health, wealth, or fame.
This is Micah’s expectation in 17:13: “Then Micah said, ‘Now I know that the LORD will prosper me, because I have a Levite as priest.’” To Micah, religion is a way to manipulate God. If I do religious things, God will prosper me. God is a means to an end. Micah’s good with God, so long as God is good to Micah.
People who relate to God this way interpret their own “success” as proof that God approves. Everything was coming together nicely for Micah. First he received early access to a trust fund from his mother. Then a personal priest for hire just happened to show up at his door. What could this possibly mean except that God loved Micah and had a wonderful plan for his life? #Blessed
The Levite, too, lives by this pragmatic, man-centered view of religion. Micah made him a job offer: ten shekels and a shirt in exchange for priestly services. And the text says, “And the Levite was content to dwell with the man” (17:11). When a better offer came along to be a priest for an entire tribe, the Levite jumped at it. Judges 18:20 says, “And the priest’s heart was glad.” The Levite is quite pleased with himself and the trajectory of his new life. #Grateful #Blessed
The same attitude is evident in the men from Dan. Back in Judges 1 we saw that the people of Dan were unable to conquer the Amorites and take possession of their allotted inheritance (Judges 1:34). But then a scouting group managed to find a “quiet and unsuspecting” town (18:7). Best of all, it was full of wealth and too remote to send for help. What could this mean except that God was blessing them? “The land is spacious, for God has given it into your hands, a place where there is no lack of anything that is in the earth” (Judges 18:10). #ThankfulGratefulBlessed
Paris Reidhead called this “utilitarian religion and expedient Christianity and a useful God.” False religion uses God as a means to an end. Your real god is whatever you desire the most, whether that’s health, wealth, or happiness. The aim of false worship is the happiness of man. The aim of true worship is to know and treasure the One True God. God is the end, the aim, the goal of all things. And the glory of God is the greatest good you could ever enjoy.
C. False worship is subjective.
The one explanatory note the author of Judges offers is found in v. 6: “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” Everyone did what was right in his own eyes. That is the essence of moral relativism—you have your truth and I have mine. The slogan for this moral philosophy today is you do you.
Everyone in this story is doing what’s right in his own eyes, not the eyes of God. Micah’s mother dedicated silver to the LORD to be used in direct disobedience to the revealed will of the Lord. In 17:5 Micah “ordained one of his sons, who became his priest,” self-appointed with spiritual authority.
The Levite was also doing his own thing. The entire tribe of Levi was responsible for serving in the tabernacle. And they were dispersed throughout Israel. They didn’t have land of their own because “the LORD God of Israel is their inheritance” (Josh 13:33; cf. Deut 10:9, Num 18:20). But the LORD commanded the other tribes to give the Levites cities to live in and pasturelands for their livestock (Num 35:2, cf. Josh 21:2). So in Joshua 21, the Levites were given 48 cities scattered throughout Israel.
What’s interesting is that this Levite is said to be from Bethlehm in Judah. And Bethlehem was not a Levitical town. Judges 17:7 tells us he was sojourning there. Then verse 8 says he left Bethlehem in search of a better life. All of this is meant to set off alarm bells in our heads. Here is a Levite clearly straying from and rejecting God’s provision for him.
The same thing is true of the tribe of Dan. According to Joshua 19, Dan’s land inheritance was in the south, along the Mediterranean Sea. But rather than trusting God and taking possession of the land God promised them, they went looking for a new home. Remember that “quiet and unsuspecting” town they found? It was located over 100 miles to the north and east. So they abandoned their inheritance, slaughtered unsuspecting people outside of their God-given jurisdiction, and then set up their own place of worship and their own priests so they didn’t have to travel so far to the LORD’s tabernacle.
Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
False Worship Today
Micah’s house of gods may have happened 3,000 years ago, but syncretism, pragmatism, and subjectivism are rampant today in the evangelical church in America. I don’t think you need me to point out all of the examples of false worship in the American church. I’ll just say this: We don’t merely need a revival in America; we need a reformation in the American Church. Five hundred years ago, God raised up men like Martin Luther and John Calvin to reform the church and recover the gospel out of the corrupt and idolatrous distortions that plagued the Roman Catholic Church. The evangelical church in America is in dire need of a reformation like that.
II. Beware the Worthlessness of False Worship
Scripture always speaks of idols with well-deserved scorn and derision. The psalms regularly refer to idols as worthless. “For all the gods of the peoples are worthless idols, but the LORD made the heavens” (Psalm 96:5).
What those passages assert about the folly of idolatry, Judges 17 dramatizes in a tragic comedy. No sooner has Micah confidently named and claimed God’s blessing on his life than trouble shows up, in the form of six hundred warriors “armed with their weapons of war” (18:16). Next thing Micah knows, the men of Dan have purloined his religious relics.
Now, the author clearly means to show the folly of idolatry so that we will scorn it and avoid it. When Micah chases down the men of Dan and confronts them, they respond dismissively: “What is the matter with you?” (18:23). Micah answers with a breathless rant, which Barry Webb captures in his literal translation: “My gods that I made for myself—you have taken! And the priest! And you have gone away! What do I have left? How can you say to me, ‘What is the matter with you?’” (v. 24).
Micah’s not even speaking in complete sentences—just sputtering and blurting. And more irony! Micah, you’ll remember, stole 1,100 pieces of silver from his mother. Now he’s indignant at the injustice of being robbed!
But notice how the false gods are presented. “My gods that I made for myself…” Do you think Micah even heard the pitiful irony in his own admission? These “gods” were the product of his own imagination, the work of his own hands. And what good did those gods do him? He so desperately wanted them back, but it’s not like they were able to protect him. They couldn’t even protect themselves from being carried away.
And if those gods couldn’t protect Micah, how will they protect Dan? The author hints at the long term outcome in the conclusion: “And the people of Dan set up the carved image for themselves, and Jonathan the son of Gershom, son of Moses, and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of the land” (Judges 18:30). That likely refers to the Assryian captivity, almost 500 years after the Judges, when the northern kingdom of Israel was destroyed and its inhabitants carried into exile as God’s final judgment against generations of false worship.
And did you catch that bombshell revelation in the second to last verse? Up to this point, the Levite has been nameless, but at the very end we learn that his name was Jonathan and that he was a direct descendent of Moses. This detail was so scandalous, that early scribes inserted a letter in their copies so that the name reads Manasseh instead of Moses. They couldn’t bear to think Moses’ name and legacy could be so disgraced.
But the biggest indictment is saved for the very last verse: “So they set up Micah’s carved image that he made, as long as the house of God was at Shiloh” (Judges 18:31). Even the name of the main character is loaded with irony. Micah means Who is like the LORD? His name is literally a rhetorical question that expresses God’s unrivaled holiness. But then Mr. Who-Is-Like-the-Lord shows himself to be an ignorant fool by building a shrine—the Hebrew literally says “a house of gods” (plural)—and filling it with idols. Meanwhile, the very house of God was at Shiloh the whole time!
God had revealed himself to Israel and given them his Law-Word. He gave them a way to worship him—a tabernacle, a priesthood, a sacrificial system. He promised to dwell in their midst. And his house was in Shiloh! Shiloh was in the hill country of Ephraim, which is where Micah lived (17:1). That means the tribe of Dan marched right past the house of God without stopping.
False worship is not only weak, it is wicked because it rejects the True and Living God. And the True God does not accept false worship. There are many in America who have just enough veneer of Christianity to fool others and reassure themselves while they continue in their own stubbornness and sin. Beware the worthlessness of false worship.
III. Behold the End of False Worship
The only commentary the narrator provides is this: “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (Judges 17:6). In fact, this is the theme of the conclusion to the Book of Judges. It’s repeated in 18:1; 19:1; and 21:25.
What you need to know is that this phrase is not original to the author of Judges. It’s a quotation from God’s Law in Deuteronomy 12:8: “You shall not do according to all that we are doing here today, everyone doing whatever is right in his own eyes.” In Deuteronomy 12, the context is Moses specifically instructing Israel to do two things when they got to the Promised Land: 1) destroy the places where the Canaanites worshiped their gods, and 2) worship God exclusively in the place that God would choose. The very scenario Moses warned against is playing out before our eyes in Judges 17–18.
And twice we hear this explanation: “In those days there was no king in Israel” (17:6, 18:1). With this observation the author hints at the remedy to the problem of false worship. Instead of expressive individualism, Israel needed divine revelation. Instead of moral relativism, Israel needed objective moral truth. Instead of syncretism and religious chaos, Israel needed direction and order in worship. What Israel needed was a faithful King.
Indeed, we get a glimpse of all the good a king could do in the reign of King David, who established Jerusalem as the capital city and the central place of worship. David’s final act as king was to organize the Levites (1 Chron 23:17), the priests (1 Chron 24), and the musicians and singers (1 Chron 25) to serve in the temple. Then David’s son Solomon built the temple in Jerusalem (1 Kgs 5–8), which God blessed with his glory and presence.
But even that solution was temporary. Solomon soon fell into idolatry (1 Kgs 11) and worshiped foreign gods. Then God divided Israel into two kingdoms: Judah in the south, Israel in the north. Jeroboam was the first king in the north, and he set up a golden calf for the people to worship so they wouldn’t return to the southern kingdom to worship in the temple. And where did he set up that abomination? “And he set one in Bethel, and the other he put in Dan. Then this thing became a sin, for the people went as far as Dan to be before one” (1 Kings 12:29–30). The legacy of Micah’s house of idols extended even into the days of Israel’s kings.
If false worship is to be replaced with true worship, it would take a king better than David, a prophet better than Moses, and a priest better than Aaron. And God has provided such a Savior by sending us his own Son to become a man. Jesus is the faithful King, the true prophet, and the perfect priest. Jesus is the one to whom this passage points, the King for whom this text cries out. Jesus is the end of false worship—the way, the truth, and the life (Jn 14:6). No one can come to the Father through syncretism or subjectivism. But all who submit to and rely on Jesus as he is revealed in Scripture are made into true worshipers. And the True God will not reject any who come to him through the Son.
One day, while passing through the very region where Micah built his house of idols, Jesus engaged a Samaritan woman in a conversation about true worship. “The woman said to him, ‘... Our fathers worshiped on this mountain [referring to Mt. Gerazim there in the hill country of Ephraim], but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth’” (John 4:19–24).
True worshipers worship in spirit and truth. Without truth about God it’s impossible to worship God rightly. But truth about God without heartfelt affection for God is not true worship either. True worshipers know and feel the truth about God. True worshipers love God with head and heart. There is light and heat.
And Jesus the Son of God lived and died and rose again to display the matchless worth of the God to you, to deliver you from false worship and to make you a true worshiper forever. The coming of Jesus marked the end of false worship.
Have you come to the Father through the Son, in spirit and in truth?