Out of all the Bible, there is one part that I dread to read the most. It’s even worse  than the story when King David fell from honor and committed adultery then murder.

The story comes from the last three chapters in the book of Judges. It centers around an incident in which a man’s concubine was brutally raped to death and then the man cut up her up in twelve pieces and delivered the parts to each of the tribes of Israel. This caused all the other tribes to fight against the man’s tribe, Benjamin. Civil war broke out in the Promised Land.

In that day, there was no king or judge over all of Israel. The Israelites came together against the tribe of  Benjamin and sought God about the situation and God heard their cry. They had to destroy the tribe because of its great sin. Then the Israelites were sad that one of the tribes had been destroyed. Only a few remained. The Israelites had also made a vow to God. They would not provide wives for the few remaining men so that they could repopulate. But in the end, a way was made so the vow was kept and the men got wives.

Judges 19 ~

²² While they were enjoying themselves, a crowd of troublemakers from the town surrounded the house. They began beating at the door and shouting to the old man, “Bring out the man who is staying with you so we can have sex with him.”

23 The old man stepped outside to talk to them. “No, my brothers, don’t do such an evil thing. For this man is a guest in my house, and such a thing would be shameful. ²⁴ Here, take my virgin daughter and this man’s concubine. I will bring them out to you, and you can abuse them and do whatever you like. But don’t do such a shameful thing to this man.”

²⁵ But they wouldn’t listen to him. So the Levite took hold of his concubine and pushed her out the door. The men of the town abused her all night, taking turns raping her until morning. Finally, at dawn they let her go. ²⁶ At daybreak the woman returned to the house where her husband was staying. She collapsed at the door of the house and lay there until it was light.

²⁷ When her husband opened the door to leave, there lay his concubine with her hands on the threshold. ²⁸ He said, “Get up! Let’s go!” But there was no answer.^[d] So he put her body on his donkey and took her home.

²⁹ When he got home, he took a knife and cut his concubine’s body into twelve pieces. Then he sent one piece to each tribe throughout all the territory of Israel.

Judges 20 ~

⁴⁶ So that day the tribe of Benjamin lost 25,000 strong warriors armed with swords, ⁴⁷ leaving only 600 men who escaped to the rock of Rimmon, where they lived for four months. ⁴⁸ And the Israelites returned and slaughtered every living thing in all the towns—the people, the livestock, and everything they found. They also burned down all the towns they came to.

I have never heard the story of Micah preached from the pulpit. And I must’ve been half asleep when I read it from my Bible in the past but today I was like a new Christian getting that great feeling of discovery. The story of Micah was vivid this morning. He lived when Israel had no judge or king. His idea of worshipping God was off kilter but he had a reverence for God. His story begins in Judges 17 which I have put in this blog and continues on in Judges 18. I just don’t have time this morning to tell the interesting second part. So, just read it for yourself.

Judges 17 ~

1There was a man named Micah, who lived in the hill country of Ephraim.² One day he said to his mother, “I heard you place a curse on the person who stole 1,100 pieces^[a] of silver from you. Well, I have the money. I was the one who took it.”

“The Lord bless you for admitting it,” his mother replied. ³ He returned the money to her, and she said, “I now dedicate these silver coins to the Lord. In honor of my son, I will have an image carved and an idol cast.”

⁴ So when he returned the money to his mother, she took 200 silver coins and gave them to a silversmith, who made them into an image and an idol. And these were placed in Micah’s house.⁵ Micah set up a shrine for the idol, and he made a sacred ephod and some household idols. Then he installed one of his sons as his personal priest.

⁶ In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes.

⁷ One day a young Levite, who had been living in Bethlehem in Judah, arrived in that area. ⁸ He had left Bethlehem in search of another place to live, and as he traveled, he came to the hill country of Ephraim. He happened to stop at Micah’s house as he was traveling through. ⁹ “Where are you from?” Micah asked him.

He replied, “I am a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah, and I am looking for a place to live.”

¹⁰ “Stay here with me,” Micah said, “and you can be a father and priest to me. I will give you ten pieces of silver^[b]a year, plus a change of clothes and your food.” ¹¹ The Levite agreed to this, and the young man became like one of Micah’s sons.

¹² So Micah installed the Levite as his personal priest, and he lived in Micah’s house. ¹³ “I know the Lord will bless me now,” Micah said, “because I have a Levite serving as my priest.”

When a person becomes a Christian it is because the Holy Spirit helps them. Jesus was talking to a Jewish religious leader named Nicodemus. He told Nicodemus just like it’s hard to understand where the wind begins and ends it’s hard to understand how the Holy Spirit prompts someone to come to God.

John 3 ~

Jesus replied, “I assure you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.^[a]6 Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life.^{[b] 7} So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You^[c] must be born again.’⁸ The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.”

I love the peacefulness of nature. God makes His presence known there. He is into every intricate detail.

The other night I was watching a documentary about the Rocky Mountains. It showed how snow would covered the mountains and then when the weather warmed the snow became large flowing streams down the sides. God invented that.

Psalm 104 ~

Psalm 103 tells the angels to praise God.

The angel Gabriel praised God when he told Mary she would have a son and call Him Jesus.

Psalm 103 ~

And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is.

~ Ephesians 3:18

When you don’t feel loved, you need to run to God. Read the Bible. Search for His love in it. Ask Him to show you how much He loves you.

Psalm 103 ~

I love Psalm 103. It was written by songwriter/musician and giant-slayer, David, of the Bible.

God forgives all our sins. He heals all our diseases and He renews our youngness with all the goodness He puts in our lives.

Psalm 103 ~

When Jesus called Nathaniel to become His disciple He spoke a big compliment to him. He said Nathaniel was a man of complete integrity (NLT). Other Bible translations say he had no guile and no deceit.

If Jesus said that about me I would consider it the greatest compliment and encouragement of my life. And I would faithfully work to do what He needed me to do.

John 1:47-49, HCSB.

John 1 ~

⁴³ The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Come, follow me.” ⁴⁴ Philip was from Bethsaida, Andrew and Peter’s hometown.

⁴⁵ Philip went to look for Nathanael and told him, “We have found the very person Moses^[a] and the prophets wrote about! His name is Jesus, the son of Joseph from Nazareth.”

⁴⁶ “Nazareth!” exclaimed Nathanael. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?”

“Come and see for yourself,” Philip replied.

⁴⁷ As they approached, Jesus said, “Now here is a genuine son of Israel—a man of complete integrity.”

⁴⁸ “How do you know about me?” Nathanael asked.

Jesus replied, “I could see you under the fig tree before Philip found you.”

⁴⁹ Then Nathanael exclaimed, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God—the King of Israel!”

⁵⁰ Jesus asked him, “Do you believe this just because I told you I had seen you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than this.” ⁵¹ Then he said, “I tell you the truth, you will all see heaven open and the angels of God going up and down on the Son of Man, the one who is the stairway between heaven and earth.^[b]”

I’m excited to write this blog entry. It’s about Jesus’ disciple Peter.

Peter was greatly used as a disciple of Jesus. A little recognized fact about him is he and his brother were John the Baptist’s disciples before they were with Jesus. God had Peters life all planned out. Since he was John the Baptist’s disciple he had more experience than the others. He had the humble example of John the Baptist and personally experienced his untimely beheading. Simon was also the one who notably forsook Jesus at the pivotal time when He was falsely arrested.

Here’s another great truth about Peter, God’s intentions were to use Peter to help establish the church. Jesus told Peter, that He would use him to build His church and the Gates of Hell would not prevail against it!

John 1 ~

³⁵ The following day John was again standing with two of his disciples. ³⁶ As Jesus walked by, John looked at him and declared, “Look! There is the Lamb of God!” ³⁷ When John’s two disciples heard this, they followed Jesus.

³⁸ Jesus looked around and saw them following. “What do you want?” he asked them.

They replied, “Rabbi” (which means “Teacher”), “where are you staying?”

³⁹ “Come and see,” he said. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon when they went with him to the place where he was staying, and they remained with him the rest of the day.

⁴⁰ Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of these men who heard what John said and then followed Jesus.⁴¹ Andrew went to find his brother, Simon, and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which means “Christ”^[a]).

⁴² Then Andrew brought Simon to meet Jesus. Looking intently at Simon, Jesus said, “Your name is Simon, son of John—but you will be called Cephas” (which means “Peter”^[b]).

Manoah and his wife had no children. The angel of the Lord appeared to his wife and told her she would have a son. Then Manoah prayed to God for the angel to return so they could know more details. And he did.

I respect this about Manoah. He’s like me. I like to know as many details beforehand, if possible, when change comes. It helps me mentally prepare. I also like the quality in Manoah that he loved his family. I have to also add this though, when Manoah and his wife had their baby they spoiled him and raised him giving him what he wanted. Their baby was Samson. Samson was a judge for Israel but he didn’t obey God very well.

Judges 13 ~

1Again the Israelites did evil in the Lord’s sight, so the Lord handed them over to the Philistines, who oppressed them for forty years.

² In those days a man named Manoah from the tribe of Dan lived in the town of Zorah. His wife was unable to become pregnant, and they had no children. ³ The angel of the Lordappeared to Manoah’s wife and said, “Even though you have been unable to have children, you will soon become pregnant and give birth to a son. ⁴ So be careful; you must not drink wine or any other alcoholic drink nor eat any forbidden food.^{[a] 5} You will become pregnant and give birth to a son, and his hair must never be cut. For he will be dedicated to God as a Nazirite from birth. He will begin to rescue Israel from the Philistines.”

⁶ The woman ran and told her husband, “A man of God appeared to me! He looked like one of God’s angels, terrifying to see. I didn’t ask where he was from, and he didn’t tell me his name. ⁷ But he told me, ‘You will become pregnant and give birth to a son. You must not drink wine or any other alcoholic drink nor eat any forbidden food. For your son will be dedicated to God as a Nazirite from the moment of his birth until the day of his death.’”

⁸ Then Manoah prayed to the Lord, saying, “Lord, please let the man of God come back to us again and give us more instructions about this son who is to be born.”

⁹ God answered Manoah’s prayer, and the angel of God appeared once again to his wife as she was sitting in the field. But her husband, Manoah, was not with her. ¹⁰ So she quickly ran and told her husband, “The man who appeared to me the other day is here again!”

¹¹ Manoah ran back with his wife and asked, “Are you the man who spoke to my wife the other day?”

“Yes,” he replied, “I am.”

¹² So Manoah asked him, “When your words come true, what kind of rules should govern the boy’s life and work?”

¹³ The angel of the Lord replied, “Be sure your wife follows the instructions I gave her. ¹⁴ She must not eat grapes or raisins, drink wine or any other alcoholic drink, or eat any forbidden food.”

¹⁵ Then Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, “Please stay here until we can prepare a young goat for you to eat.”

¹⁶ “I will stay,” the angel of the Lordreplied, “but I will not eat anything. However, you may prepare a burnt offering as a sacrifice to the Lord.” (Manoah didn’t realize it was the angel of the Lord.)

¹⁷ Then Manoah asked the angel of the Lord, “What is your name? For when all this comes true, we want to honor you.”

¹⁸ “Why do you ask my name?” the angel of the Lord replied. “It is too wonderful for you to understand.”

¹⁹ Then Manoah took a young goat and a grain offering and offered it on a rock as a sacrifice to the Lord. And as Manoah and his wife watched, the Lorddid an amazing thing. ²⁰ As the flames from the altar shot up toward the sky, the angel of the Lord ascended in the fire. When Manoah and his wife saw this, they fell with their faces to the ground.