Man-Made Morality
Searching for a True Savior: An Exposition of Judges

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Good morning church. Guess what we’re doing today? We’re concluding the book of Judges! We’ve been in the book of Judges for twelve Sundays. This is our twelfth Sunday, going through the 21 chapters of the book of Judges. Today, we’ll conclude with the last three chapters of the book of Judges. We’ve entitled this sermon, “Man-made Morality.” This title fits with last week. The last five chapters tell two stories.

Chapters 17 and 18 tell the story of man-made religion. Israel had started to develop a religion that was really marked by the culture. It was kind of a syncretism between the culture and what has been revealed to them through Moses. This week, we’ll see that they’ve taken on a cultural kind of view of morality. The people are kind of picking and choosing the things that they’ll believe that God has taught them; they have kind of a man-made morality. These last two stories and these five chapters are dark stories.

As we look at these last three chapters, I think you’ll agree after I read this today, that it’s probably one of the most disturbing stories in the entire Bible. You might even ask why this is in the Bible. I would say to you, if you’re a first time reader of the Bible, if you’re new to reading the Bible, don’t start here because you won’t understand why it’s there. The book of Judges is one book. There are 66 books, written by over 40 human authors over a period of 1500 years. There is really only one author and that’s the Lord. and it’s one book.

When you read these three chapters, you need to read them in context with the whole in order to understand their significance and why they’re here. I hope that at the end of today, you may see why those chapters are here. It is like watching a “car wreck in slow motion;” these are difficult chapters, indeed.

If you were to go and google this on the internet, as I have done, you’ll find very few pastors who have ever preached these three chapters in their entire ministry. I know why. It’s hard. It’s difficult. This passage is difficult.

Why is this passage here? It is here, so that we can see what mankind looks like apart from God. Even God’s people cannot live up to God’s law without a savior. They’ve had twelve human judges and not one of them has really been able to rescue them from their deepest problem. It wasn’t their outward enemy; it was the enemy within their own heart and that is sin itself.

What we see in these three chapters today, is Israel at its best at saving itself and at its worst having done so. There’s no foreign oppressor in these last chapters. The enemy is within, not without; there are no judges named. Israel is on its own. There’s no king and there’s very little editorial comment by the author. The reader is left with the burden of interpretation. I would recommend to you that you don’t read the book from front to back; instead, read it from back to front. This is one of the few places where you need to watch the movie from the end because in the end, Jesus died for our sins, is raised from the grave and lives today. He’s the answer. He’s the true Savior, so we read it through the lens of Jesus and then we see what we would look like if we didn’t have Him.

God has revealed Himself to them; He’s called them “his people.” He delivered them from slavery in Egypt. He’s given them the law through Moses. He sustained them in the wilderness. He brought them into the Promised Land. He raised up judges to rescue them from their enemies, so that they might be His holy nation. Yet, they’ve become more like the immoral Canaanite people surrounding them than they have the people of God. In fact, you might call this section the entire “Canaanization” of Israel. They become just like the world, indeed.

Judges, chapter 19, “mirrors” Genesis, chapter 19. You could say this is Israel’s “Sodom and Gomorrah.” This is a difficult passage. Why did this happen? What went wrong with Israel? Why aren’t they becoming different from the world? Why aren’t they the holy people of God? Why do they look just like the world? Is it because they had fallen into the trap of moral relativism? That’s a philosophical title–moral relativism. You don’t have to go and study “philosophy 101” at college though. To know this, all you have to do is read your paper, watch the television or go on social media.

Moral relativism says this –that there is no absolute truth. There is no external truth that comes from above that we can all ascribe to. There’s no arbiter of truth that tells us what right or wrong is. Moral relativism says that there is no absolute truth, that it’s up to you to define your own truth. It’s ironic that moral relativism does have one absolute claim that there is no absolute and, in that, it’s absolutist itself. In fact, all moral relativism does is, it replaces God by capitalizing the culture and seeing the culture in place of God. Whatever the culture says is right and wrong becomes the new right and wrong. That’s moral relativism.

Moral relativism is summarized in the book of judges like this – “In those days, there was no king in Israel.” There is no king. There’s no absolute arbiter and source of truth. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes. In other words, “anything goes; it is your truth.” That’s moral relativism. Moral relativism is bankrupt and it’s displeasing to God. It, it means that this morality is based on current cultural mores and your own preference. This is the definition of what has caused, throughout human history, the downfall of every human society that’s ever existed. This is what happens to us, apart from God.

Can you think of any better description of our moral condition today? You might be thinking, Well, not me though. But yes, let’s think about this for a second. Do you remember being a teenager and your mom or your dad said that you’re not going to that party that you are wanting to go to? You say back to them, “But mom/dad, everyone is going. Everyone’s doing it.” It is your new rule of behavior –what everyone’s doing, you want to do. This is moral relativism– it’s putting culture in the place of God. I want to do what everyone is doing.

I remember listening to a singing group back when I was growing up called, “Three Dog Night.” You have to be pretty close to my age group or you have to be the children of people my age that were popping that cassette in the car when you were still sitting in a car seat. I remember one song that the verses talk about, how this young man got scared at a certain party. Things that were happening that scared him. The chorus goes like this, “Mama told me not to come. Mama told me not to come. She said, ‘that ain’t the way to have fun, son. That ain’t the way to have fun.’” That’s a funny song to me, because everyone here has probably gone somewhere that you shouldn’t have. “Mama” would have known you wouldn’t have done what she was doing. You wouldn’t have said what you said. You wouldn’t have put it in your body. You’ve done some things. You have come up with an excuse, ‘Everyone’s doing it.’

The other excuse that we make is we say, ‘But, I’m a good person.’ If you would go knocking on doors here in Wilson County and ask people, “If you were to stand before a holy God tonight and He were to ask you, ‘Why should I let you into My heaven?’ what would you say?” Ninety-percent of the people will say, “I have tried to be good.” On whose scale is “good” on that slippery scale of yours or on God’s?” God said, “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” What do we do about this man-made morality? When we look at these three chapters, we’re going to say, ‘Oh, why did we have to look at that?’ Well, look in the mirror. When you look at these three chapters, don’t just look at Israel, look in the mirror and be sure. Are you living in a way that depends on Christ as your righteousness, rather than your own human righteousness?

In the book of Judges 19 through 21, God was displeased with their man-made morality and He let them have the result of their own sin. You can see His judgment on them and the way He allows them to have what they’ve chosen. This dark place in Israel’s history closes with the book of Judges. I’m glad the book of Ruth is next–those four little chapters in Ruth are like a jewel and, if you’re reading through the Bible, you might think, Whew, I can breathe again, because in Ruth, we finally see God moving.

Here, in these last three chapters, we see God letting them run their course to see how far they’ll go without a savior. Now, I have done a lot of reading in these past chapters, but this is our biggest reading today, so stay with me. I will be reading 103 verses. I’m going to read a chapter or so and then talk about it. We’ll be looking at three reasons why man-made morality does not please God. Let’s start with chapter 19.

Judges 19 (ESV) 1 In those days, when there was no king in Israel, a certain Levite was sojourning in the remote parts of the hill country of Ephraim, who took to himself a concubine from Bethlehem in Judah. 2 And his concubine was unfaithful to him, and she went away from him to her father’s house at Bethlehem in Judah, and was there some four months. 3 Then her husband arose and went after her, to speak kindly to her and bring her back. He had with him his servant and a couple of donkeys. And she brought him into her father’s house. And when the girl’s father saw him, he came with joy to meet him. 4 And his father-in-law, the girl’s father, made him stay, and he remained with him three days. So they ate and drank and spent the night there. 5 And on the fourth day they arose early in the morning, and he prepared to go, but the girl’s father said to his son-in-law, “Strengthen your heart with a morsel of bread, and after that you may go.” 6 So the two of them sat and ate and drank together. And the girl’s father said to the man, “Be pleased to spend the night, and let your heart be merry.” 7 And when the man rose up to go, his father-in-law pressed him, till he spent the night there again. 8 And on the fifth day he arose early in the morning to depart. And the girl’s father said, “Strengthen your heart and wait until the day declines.” So they ate, both of them. 9 And when the man and his concubine and his servant rose up to depart, his father-in-law, the girl’s father, said to him, “Behold, now the day has waned toward evening. Please, spend the night. Behold, the day draws to its close. Lodge here and let your heart be merry, and tomorrow you shall arise early in the morning for your journey, and go home.” 10 But the man would not spend the night. He rose up and departed and arrived opposite Jebus (that is, Jerusalem). He had with him a couple of saddled donkeys, and his concubine was with him. 11 When they were near Jebus, the day was nearly over, and the servant said to his master, “Come now, let us turn aside to this city of the Jebusites and spend the night in it.” 12 And his master said to him, “We will not turn aside into the city of foreigners, who do not belong to the people of Israel, but we will pass on to Gibeah.” 13 And he said to his young man, “Come and let us draw near to one of these places and spend the night at Gibeah or at Ramah.” 14 So they passed on and went their way. And the sun went down on them near Gibeah, which belongs to Benjamin, 15 and they turned aside there, to go in and spend the night at Gibeah. And he went in and sat down in the open square of the city, for no one took them into his house to spend the night. 16 And behold, an old man was coming from his work in the field at evening. The man was from the hill country of Ephraim, and he was sojourning in Gibeah. The men of the place were Benjaminites. 17 And he lifted up his eyes and saw the traveler in the open square of the city. And the old man said, “Where are you going? And where do you come from?” 18 And he said to him, “We are passing from Bethlehem in Judah to the remote parts of the hill country of Ephraim, from which I come. I went to Bethlehem in Judah, and I am going to the house of the LORD, but no one has taken me into his house. 19 We have straw and feed for our donkeys, with bread and wine for me and your female servant and the young man with your servants. There is no lack of anything.” 20 And the old man said, “Peace be to you; I will care for all your wants. Only, do not spend the night in the square.” 21 So he brought him into his house and gave the donkeys feed. And they washed their feet, and ate and drank. 22 As they were making their hearts merry, behold, the men of the city, worthless fellows, surrounded the house, beating on the door. And they said to the old man, the master of the house, “Bring out the man who came into your house, that we may know him.” 23 And the man, the master of the house, went out to them and said to them, “No, my brothers, do not act so wickedly; since this man has come into my house, do not do this vile thing. 24 Behold, here are my virgin daughter and his concubine. Let me bring them out now. Violate them and do with them what seems good to you, but against this man do not do this outrageous thing.” 25 But the men would not listen to him. So the man seized his concubine and made her go out to them. And they knew her and abused her all night until the morning. And as the dawn began to break, they let her go. 26 And as morning appeared, the woman came and fell down at the door of the man’s house where her master was, until it was light. 27 And her master rose up in the morning, and when he opened the doors of the house and went out to go on his way, behold, there was his concubine lying at the door of the house, with her hands on the threshold. 28 He said to her, “Get up, let us be going.” But there was no answer. Then he put her on the donkey, and the man rose up and went away to his home. 29 And when he entered his house, he took a knife, and taking hold of his concubine he divided her, limb by limb, into twelve pieces, and sent her throughout all the territory of Israel. 30 And all who saw it said, “Such a thing has never happened or been seen from the day that the people of Israel came up out of the land of Egypt until this day , until this day; consider it, take counsel, and speak.”

Judges 20:1-7 (ESV) 1 Then all the people of Israel came out, from Dan to Beersheba, including the land of Gilead, and the congregation assembled as one man to the LORD at Mizpah. 2 And the chiefs of all the people, of all the tribes of Israel, presented themselves in the assembly of the people of God, 400,000 men on foot that drew the sword. 3 (Now the people of Benjamin heard that the people of Israel had gone up to Mizpah.) And the people of Israel said, “Tell us, how did this evil happen?” 4 And the Levite, the husband of the woman who was murdered, answered and said, “I came to Gibeah that belongs to Benjamin, I and my concubine, to spend the night. 5 And the leaders of Gibeah rose against me and surrounded the house against me by night. They meant to kill me, and they violated my concubine, and she is dead. 6So I took hold of my concubine and cut her in pieces and sent her throughout all the country of the inheritance of Israel, for they have committed abomination and outrage in Israel. 7 Behold, you people of Israel, all of you, give your advice and counsel here.”

Every Sunday, when I read God’s word, at the conclusion, I say, “This is God’s word” and you say, “Amen.” It is more difficult to say, “Amen,” here, but it is still God’s word. Now, let’s “unpack” this scripture.

WHY MAN-MADE MORALITY DOESN’T PLEASE GOD:

1. Because it seeks to shift blame rather than admit guilt.

Man-made morality always seeks to shift the blame off of oneself and put it on someone else. We see it in this chapter. The chapter opens with, “In those days, there was no king in Israel.” There was nobody; there was no arbiter of right and wrong. There was no judge, there was no one to say that this is right or this is wrong. It starts like that. When we get to chapter 21, it ends with, “everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” What’s that look like?

It starts off with a Levite man again. This time, we don’t have someone stealing something or someone doing false religion. We have a polygamist. We have a hypocrite. We have a coward and in both cases, it is the tribe that’s supposed to be God’s holy people, the ones “set apart” to teach the word to the people of God as the worst example–a Levite, a polygamist. Why? Why does he even have a concubine?

What’s a concubine, by the way? A concubine is one that a man has sexual relationships with, he has children by, but she has no rights as a wife. She’s of a lower status than a wife. She’s second or third, depending on a man’s wealth, however many women he can afford to support and their children . The wife has more rights. The concubine is more like a servant girl who gives sexual favors and also provides children.

It took the Levite man four months to go looking for her. She was unfaithful to him. The scripture says she went back home to her father’s house and so, he traveled after four months, he spoke kindly to her. She took him to his father’s house.

We have this story of Middle Eastern hospitality, not unlike Southern hospitality. Go ahead and stay a while. You should spend the night, really. Here in the south, they don’t just say “good night” to you. They follow you to the front door, they stand at the door, they follow you to your car, they stand in the driveway and wave “goodnight” to you. As you leave the whole time, they’re begging you to stay, then they go back in the house and they say to each other, ‘Can you believe how late these people stayed?’ If you’re from the north, you’re just now getting used to this.

The father-in-law in this story is being hospitable. He’s doing what’s expected of him. Probably, he’s smiling from ear to ear because this man paid him for his daughter in order to have her as his concubine, but he’s concerned that, since she’s come home, he might have to pay the man back. He asks him to stay another night and stay another night. The whole time, he goes to his wife later and says, ‘I can’t believe how long they stayed. They just ate us out of house and home.’ That’s what’s happening here.

The Levite stays too long on the fifth day and decides he’s going to go anyway. He heads out and it gets to be night. This man has a male servant with him who says, “Come now, let us turn aside to this city of the Jebusites and spend the night in it.” (When they go past the city of Jebus, which later is called Jerusalem. The Jebusites are still living there. They’ve not been able to get them out of there. I was not until the time of David; David actually overthrows the Jebusites and claims Jerusalem. But at this time, they were still there.) The Levite man does not want to stay in the city of foreigners. In verse 13, he said to his young man, “Come and let us draw near to one of these places and spend the night at Gibeah or at Ramah.”

They arrive at the City Square. There were no “hotels” in those days. If you were a sojourner, you’d stop in the City Square. At night, the people, because of the rule of hospitality in that land, would take you home, but nobody does, except a man who’s actually not from there. The old man was from Ephraim. He comes in late from working in the fields and he sees them there. He knows about these “worthless” men in this city that are going around. It says in the original Hebrew, that these men were, literally, sons of Belial; they were worthless, wicked and evil. They were going around committing homosexual acts, rape and other evil things.

This old man knows about this. He says to them that they can’t stay in the City Square; they need to come home with him. These “worthless men” find them. They knock on his door and say, ‘Give us that guy we saw in the City Square. We were waiting until dark to come to your door, send him out to us so that we might know him.’ Now, they weren’t planning on having a “fellowship barbecue.”

If you go back to the book of Genesis, you find out what they mean by the word , “know.” Gen. 4:1, “And Adam knew Eve, his wife; and she conceived.” It’s a word, meaning sex.

These “worthless” men desired to rape this man. Of course, the preferred thing to do is to give them your virgin daughter and his concubine, the concubine that he just went all the way down to Bethlehem to bring back home? That seems to be the right thing to do? But, you must remember, that this is long before Jesus, long before Christianity. The church is the main place that women have been elevated throughout history. If it weren’t for the church, we would still be looking at something like this today, but women, back in the day, had no value.

This hypocrite, this polygamist, this holy man of God shoves his own concubine, that he had journeyed to get back, out the door in his place, to take the abuse and the rape, ultimately, to the point of murder.

I have a daughter and I have five granddaughters. I have a wife. I’m no hero, but I would die in any one of their places. No one would have to ask me twice. I would die trying to protect them. There was something about the culture then and how it had permeated the people of God, so that they viewed women in this way.

This is a nasty, nasty story. Why do we have to look at it? It is because we need to look in the mirror; Israel is a picture of what the church will become if it allows the cultural values, the cultural view of right and wrong to become our view.

It is clear that the author of this book is the Holy Spirit, but the man that we believe He inspired to write it was Samuel. The ancient rabbis agree that Samuel was the author. Modern conservative commentators agree that Samuel was writing this book. Certainly, Samuel was a student of the book of Genesis, because Judges 19 and Genesis 19 are very similar. Judges 19 is Israel’s “Sodom and Gomorrah.”

If you remember Genesis 19, Abraham had three visitors. One was the Lord and the other two were angels. The Lord said, ‘Should I keep it from Abraham that I’m about to go down into Sodom and judge it?’ He tells Abraham and Abraham says, “Will You judge it if there are 50 righteous?” and the Lord says, “No.” Abraham asks the Lord, ‘if 40, 30, 20, 10?’The Lord couldn’t find ten righteous; He sent two angels there. Where do the angels go? They go and sit in the city square. The nephew of Abraham, Lot, who’s not really from Sodom, is sojourning there . He sees them at the City Square. He knows the reputation of his city. He tells them, ‘Don’t stay at the City Square; come stay at my house.’ He takes them to his house that night. When the sun sets, “worthless” men encircle Lot’s house and say, ‘Send those two men that we saw at the City Square out here so that we might know them.’ Lot offers his virgin daughters in their place. Fortunately, for Lot and his daughters, these two men were angels and they blinded the men. They rescued Lot and his family.

We don’t have the same outcome here in Judges. What we have here is the ugly thing that I’ve just read. Notice how this holy man, this Levite, treats his wife, his concubine, the one he went to the trouble to go and get from her father. He shoves her out of the door in his place.

After her death,he takes her body home. In Jewish times, the body was to be buried the same day as the death and it was to be washed and carefully, lovingly cared for. It was to be placed in a tomb because of their belief of resurrection life, of eternal life. You can tell how much his love was for her in the way he shoves her out to those men and the way he treats her body afterwards. This is an awful story.

He gets the whole country’s attention. They turned out as “one man;” they hadn’t turned out as “one man” for anything. If they would have, they would have taken the land. They didn’t turn out as “one man” for God, but this disturbing image got them. They’d seen some nasty things, but this was the nastiest thing they’d ever seen. 30 And all who saw it said, “Such a thing has never happened or been seen from the day that the people of Israel came up out of the land of Egypt until this day; consider it, take counsel, and speak.”

When you read his version, he doesn’t mention that he shoved her out. He doesn’t mention what these men actually were threatening to do to him because men don’t like to mention that kind of thing. No, he parsed his words carefully to make himself look good. He says, ‘Look, they threatened to kill me and they raped her and killed her. Now you all decide what you should do.’

What do we do when we sin and we’re not willing to confess our part? We blame it on others. It is my parents’ fault. It was my upbringing. I was born this way. We blame it on everything and ultimately think, It’s your fault, God; You made me this way. That’s why I’m this way. The truth is, we’re all born with the “sin gene.” All of us are born with a bent towards sin and we all try to shift the blame. We don’t want to tell the whole story.

It saysinProverbs 28:13 (NIV) “Whoever conceals their sins does not prosper, but the one who confesses and renounces them finds mercy.”

God really wants Israel to finally get that He gave them the law that they can’t follow without the Spirit living within them to help them follow. To recognize that the law is a standard they can’t keep, but He’s also giving them a way out– to look to Him for redemption.

1 John 1:9 (ESV) “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Our invitation, as a church, is to come as you are, but don’t stay that way. “Come as you are, but be forever changed by the love of Jesus.”

This is why, in the book of Leviticus, before He even gives them the law, the first chapter gives them the way out and says that when you sin, bring an offering of a male, either a lamb or a bull. As you bring it to the door of the f meeting of the Tabernacle, place your hand on its head, symbolically placing your sins upon the sacrifice. It must be a firstborn male without blemish. This is what the teaching was. Then, you sacrifice it, you cut its throat and then you hand it to the priest and then the priest will gather its blood and sprinkle the blood upon the altar and burn the sacrifice on it. God gave them this provision for their sin, knowing that they couldn’t keep His perfect law, perfectly. They needed to be able to admit their guilt and receive forgiveness from God in order to grow in following Him. What a strange way and what strange details, unless we have the rest of the book, and recognize that there must be One who comes, Who will be the lamb of God. He will be the sacrifice for our sins, where we can receive our righteousness, then we can truthfully face our sin.

We can honestly look in the mirror and say, ‘I’m no better than this story.’ If it weren’t for the true Savior, that they have been given hint about. They don’t have the full revelation yet that we have. If they would only look to Him, then they could be honest with themselves and get cleansing.

Judges 20:8-48 (ESV) 8 And all the people arose as one man, saying, “None of us will go to his tent, and none of us will return to his house. 9 But now this is what we will do to Gibeah: we will go up against it by lot, 10 and we will take ten men of a hundred throughout all the tribes of Israel, and a hundred of a thousand, and a thousand of ten thousand, to bring provisions for the people, that when they come they may repay Gibeah of Benjamin for all the outrage that they have committed in Israel.” 11 So all the men of Israel gathered against the city, united as one man. 12 And the tribes of Israel sent men through all the tribe of Benjamin, saying, “What evil is this that has taken place among you? 13 Now therefore give up the men, the worthless fellows in Gibeah, that we may put them to death and purge evil from Israel.” But the Benjaminites would not listen to the voice of their brothers, the people of Israel. 14 Then the people of Benjamin came together out of the cities to Gibeah to go out to battle against the people of Israel. 15 And the people of Benjamin mustered out of their cities on that day 26,000 men who drew the sword, besides the inhabitants of Gibeah, who mustered 700 chosen men. 16 Among all these were 700 chosen men who were left-handed; every one could sling a stone at a hair and not miss. 17 And the men of Israel, apart from Benjamin, mustered 400,000 men who drew the sword; all these were men of war. 18 The people of Israel arose and went up to Bethel and inquired of God, “Who shall go up first for us to fight against the people of Benjamin?” And the LORD said, “Judah shall go up first.” 19 Then the people of Israel rose in the morning and encamped against Gibeah. 20 And the men of Israel went out to fight against Benjamin, and the men of Israel drew up the battle line against them at Gibeah. 21 The people of Benjamin came out of Gibeah and destroyed on that day 22,000 men of the Israelites. 22 But the people, the men of Israel, took courage, and again formed the battle line in the same place where they had formed it on the first day. 23 And the people of Israel went up and wept before the LORD until the evening. And they inquired of the LORD, “Shall we again draw near to fight against our brothers, the people of Benjamin?” And the LORD said, “Go up against them.” 24 So the people of Israel came near against the people of Benjamin the second day. 25 AndBenjamin went against them out of Gibeah the second day, and destroyed 18,000 men of the people of Israel. All these were men who drew the sword. 26 Then all the people of Israel, the whole army, went up and came to Bethel and wept. They sat there before the LORD and fasted that day until evening, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before the LORD. 27 And the people of Israel inquired of the LORD (for the ark of the covenant of God was there in those days, 28 and Phinehas the son of Eleazar, son of Aaron, ministered before it in those days), saying, “Shall we go out once more to battle against our brothers, the people of Benjamin, or shall we cease?” And the LORD said, “Go up, for tomorrow I will give them into your hand.” 29 So Israel set men in ambush around Gibeah. 30 And the people of Israel went up against the people of Benjamin on the third day and set themselves in array against Gibeah, as at other times. 31 And the people of Benjamin went out against the people and were drawn away fromthe city. And as at other times they began to strike and kill some of the people in the highways, one of which goes up to Bethel and the other to Gibeah, and in the open country, about thirty men of Israel. 32 And the people of Benjamin said, “They are routed before us, as at the first.” But the people of Israel said, “Let us flee and draw them away from the city to the highways.” 33 And all the men of Israel rose up out of their place and set themselves in array at Baal-tamar, and the men of Israel who were in ambush rushed out of their place from Maareh-geba. 34 And there came against Gibeah 10,000 chosen men out of all Israel, and the battle was hard, but the Benjaminites did not know that disaster was close upon them. 35 And the LORD defeated Benjamin before Israel, and the people of Israel destroyed 25,100 men of Benjamin that day. All these were men who drew the sword. 36 So the people of Benjamin saw that they were defeated. The men of Israel gave ground to Benjamin,because the men in ambush whom they had set against Gibeah. 37 Then the men in ambush hurried and rushed against Gibeah; the men in ambush moved out and struck all the city with the edge of the sword. 38 Now the appointed signal between the men of Israel and the men in the main ambush was that when they made a great cloud of smoke rise up out of the city 39 the men of Israel should turn in battle. Now Benjamin had begun to strike and kill about thirty men of Israel. They said, “Surely they are defeated before us, as in the first battle.” 40 But when the signal began to rise out of the city in a column of smoke, the Benjaminites looked behind them, and behold, the whole of the city went up in smoke to heaven. 41 Then the men of Israel turned, and the men of Benjamin were dismayed, for they saw that disaster was close upon them. 42 Therefore they turned their backs before the men of Israel in the direction of the wilderness, but the battle overtook them. And those who came out of the cities were destroying them in their midst. 43 Surrounding the Benjaminites, they pursued them and trod them down from Nohah as far as opposite Gibeah on the east. 44 Eighteen thousand men of Benjamin fell, all of them men of valor. 45 And they turned and fled toward the wilderness to the rock of Rimmon. Five thousand men of them were cut down in the highways. And they were pursued hard to Gidom, and 2,000 men of them were struck down. 46 So all who fell that day of Benjamin were 25,000 men who drew the sword, all of them men of valor. 47 But 600 men turned and fled toward the wilderness to the rock of Rimmon and remained at the rock of Rimmon four months. 48 And the men of Israel turned back against the people of Benjamin and struck them with the edge of the sword, the city, men and beasts and all that they found. And all the towns that they found they set on fire.

WHY MAN-MADE MORALITY DOESN’T PLEASE GOD:

2. Because it seeks vengeance rather than justice.

God is not pleased with manmade morality because it seeks vengeance rather than justice. It seemed that the people were seeking justice. In fact, the Israelites sent word to the tribe of Benjamin. They gathered there with their army, but they sent word and asked if they would turn over the worthless men in Libya that did this terrible act so that we might put them to death and purge this evil from their people.

Instead, they chose to say that “blood’s thicker than water.” They chose their tribe over God’s word. They would not give them over to the Israelites. I’m sure the people of Gibeah who knew that old man knew about it. It was well known; this was a problem in that town. It had become like Sodom, but they protected it. Those men were their people, good or ill. They were going to protect them; they chose tribe over truth and so, they went to battle.

When it started out, it seemed that Israel only wanted the people responsible, which would have been according to a law that we still use today called “Lex Talionis,” which in Latin, is the law of retribution. It’s the idea that the punishment must fit the crime; it originates from the Mosaic law even to this day. Our law stands and rests on all the Western world. Modern law rests on the Judeo Christian law, the 10 Commandments and others.

It was this idea that’s found in the Bible, in the book of Exodus 21 and Leviticus 24, limiting punishment to “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” It’s limiting , so that you don’t do vengeance; you only seek justice. So, if you steal, then you repay. If you kill, then you receive the death penalty. This law was to limit people taking vengeance. It’s human nature to want to make them hurt worse.

It began as a man who was threatened with being raped by men, who hypocritically and cowardly shoves his concubine out, to take his penalty and she’s abused and murdered. There’s one woman; this one offense that he creates further offense in, even in the law’s eyes, by being so abominable in his treatment of her body that it’s overlooked.

Let’s look at it like this: There was one offense of one woman. Now, 40,000 Israelites have died and 25,000 Benjaminites have died. So 65,000 men have given their life in battle, but they’ve yet to address the worthless men in this town that did the act. Why did they wipe out so many men? It is because when they go and start winning the battle against the Benjaminites, they burn the city of Gibeah and they start chasing the Benjaminites. Why do they keep chasing them? Why do they keep chasing them into the wilderness? It’s not justice now; it’s vengeance.

The Israelites counted the cost and pulled back, but they’re still ticked. They go back and they burn all the cities of Benjamin and kill all the men, women, children and beasts. They’ve never even accomplished that against the Philistines or the Canaanites. This is , this is genocide; this is vengeance. This is human morality. That’s what we see here. This is the canonization of God’s people. They look more like the world than they do God’s people.

Quoting Deut. 32:35, the apostle warns us not to seek vengeance but leave it to God. Romans 12:19 (ESV) Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.”

Do you remember the summer of 2020? Many are trying to forget it. Is it too soon to talk about it? In late March of 2020, we got a call that the governor was making an announcement. Churches are closing; COVID is scaring us all to death. A man named George Floyd dies in police custody. What started out as people expressing their outrage and sorrow at George Floyd’s death descended into nights of unrest, reports of shootings, looting, vandalism in 140 cities, including Wilson. Five people were killed during this time. The National Guard was called out in 21 states. Do you remember this? People became tribal in their allegiances. They really didn’t care about right and wrong. It was white versus black, conservative versus liberal, young versus old and republican versus democrat. During this time, the churches were closed. Church members were on social media arguing, waving the flag of the tribe that they followed and offending each other within the church.

Some of you are here and you’re still trying to heal from what people in this room or in the first service room said or did during that time. You still haven’t received forgiveness and reconciliation with them yet because of their tribalism. We’re no better than Israel. We’re still sinners. We need a Savior and it’s not us. We need a better morality that only He offers. Some of us still need to get with others and say , ‘I’m sorry, I waved the wrong flag,’ whether it was a rainbow flag or a “Black Lives Matter” flag. Somebody else said, ‘Well, blue Lives Matter.’ Somebody else said, ‘All Lives Matter.’ I made some of you mad just now by listing the flags.

What can we do? We can step away from our tribalism. We can step away from our vengeance in trying to hurt others. That summer of 2020, I was pulled in 1000 different directions; I couldn’t meet with you weekly because the church had to be closed. I got a call from the mayor; he was new to the city. I had met him once, but I never really got to know him. Mayor Stevens called me. He says to me, “Pastor, I was talking to some other pastors and I’ve been wanting to get some prayer meetings together in Wilson. All of them are telling me I need to call you because you’re the guy that knows all the pastors.”

It just so happened that the previous year, in 2019, the Lord called me to start a monthly prayer gathering of pastors, not according to domination, but according to the gospel. If you believe in the gospel, if you believe in Jesus, we won’t worry about your tribe. As long as you belong to the family of Jesus, you’ll promote Jesus. Red or yellow, black or white, I want to be with you and pray together for the revival of our city. So, we started a year ago before the mayor called. I think the Holy Spirit told me to start a monthly gathering because He knew what was coming.

Mayor Stevens asked me, “Will you help me?” I said to him, “What do you want me to do?” He said to me, “I want to do weekly prayer services that we put on the city’s website and put on Facebook. Since nobody can go to church right now, they can see and hear these prayers for our city.” I agreed to help him. I worked with the other pastors and we lined up weekly meetings. We started on this stage.Mayor Stevens brought his media team from the city and they set up cameras. I prayed for our city from this stage and they videotaped it. The following week, it was the pastor from Peace Church. The following week, it was the pastor from Mount Moriah Church. The following week, it was the pastor from Christ Temple of Praise. The next weeks after that, the pastors from Wave church and Farmington Heights were videotaped. It went all over the city.

Many of our pastors are black and I could see the hurt in their eyes over the incident with George Floyd. I wanted to hear from them. We called a panel that met in this building that summer (you know, the summer that you weren’t going to church and I wasn’t working. You thought, ‘Well, he only works a couple of hours every Sunday, right? That’s all he does.’) We met here on a Monday morning for several hours. We invited black pastors in our town to come and speak to us and tell us how they were feeling. I opened up the meeting. I said to the pastors, ‘This meeting doesn’t belong to me. It belongs to the Lord. I’m not even going to facilitate it other than opening with prayer.’ I instructed our non-black brothers to quietly listen. That’s what we did for several hours. We wept together and we prayed together. We put away tribes and races. We put away our banners and our flags, except for one. That one is Jesus.

There’s only one true Savior. Israel doesn’t get it yet. They’ve wiped out one of their own tribes because they’ve lost their minds.

Judges 21 (ESV) 1 Now the men of Israel had sworn at Mizpah, “No one of us shall give his daughter in marriage to Benjamin.” 2 And the people came to Bethel and sat there till evening before God, and they lifted up their voices and wept bitterly. 3 And they said, “O LORD, the God of Israel, why has this happened in Israel, that today there should be one tribe lacking in Israel?” 4 And the next day the people rose early and built there an altar and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. 5 And the people of Israel said, “Which of all the tribes of Israel did not come up in the assembly to the LORD?” For they had taken a great oath concerning him who did not come up to the LORD to Mizpah, saying, “He shall surely be put to death.” 6 And the people of Israel had compassion for Benjamin their brother and said, “One tribe is cut off from Israel this day. 7 What shall we do for wives for those who are left, since we have sworn by the LORD that we will not give them any of our daughters for wives?” 8 And they said, “What one is there of the tribes of Israel that did not come up to the LORD to Mizpah?” And behold, no one had come to the camp from Jabesh-gilead, to the assembly. 9 For when the people were mustered, behold, not one of the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead was there. 10 So the congregation sent 12,000 of their bravest men there and commanded them, “Go and strike the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead with the edge of the sword; also the women and the little ones. 11 This is what you shall do: every male and every woman that has lain with a male you shall devote to destruction.” 12 And they found among the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead 400 young virgins who had not known a man by lying with him, and they brought them to the camp at Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan. 13 Then the whole congregation sent word to the people of Benjamin who were at the rock of Rimmon and proclaimed peace to them. 14 And Benjamin returned at that time. And they gave them the women whom they had saved alive of the women of Jabesh-gilead, but they were not enough for them. 15 And the people had compassion on Benjamin because the LORD had made a breach in the tribes of Israel. 16 Then the elders of the congregation said, “What shall we do for wives for those who are left, since the women are destroyed out of Benjamin?” 17 And they said, “There must be an inheritance for the survivors of Benjamin, that a tribe not be blotted out from Israel. 18 Yet we cannot give them wives from our daughters.” For the people of Israel had sworn, “Cursed be he who gives a wife to Benjamin.” 19 So they said, “Behold, there is the yearly feast of the LORD at Shiloh, which is north of Bethel, on the east of the highway that goes up from Bethel to Shechem, and south of Lebonah.” 20 And they commanded the people of Benjamin, saying, “Go and lie in ambushlie in the vineyards 21 and watch. If the daughters of Shiloh come out to dance in the dances, then come out of the vineyards and snatch each man his wife from the daughters of Shiloh, and go to the land of Benjamin. 22 And when their fathers or their brothers come to complain to us, we will say to them, ‘Grant them graciously to us, because we did not take for each man of them his wife in battle, neither did you give them to them, else you would now be guilty.’” 23 And the people of Benjamin did so and took their wives, according to their number, from the dancers whom they carried off. Then they went and returned to their inheritance and rebuilt the towns and lived in them. 24 And the people of Israel departed from there at that time, every man to his tribe and family, and they went out from there every man to his inheritance. 25 In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.

WHY MAN-MADE MORALITY DOESN’T PLEASE GOD:

3. Because it seeks its own righteousness rather than God’s.

This is the third reason that God is displeased with manmade reality. It’s because it seeks its own righteousness rather than God’s. They were thinking, We need to make this right. Remember, how they prayed to God, ‘Why has this happened? Why have we lost the tribe in Benjamin?’ They need to look in the mirror. They committed genocide. God never told them to do that.

That’s what we do, as well. Something goes wrong in our life that we did to ourselves and we don’t want to take the blame, so we shift it to something else and if we can’t think of somebody else to shift it to, we blame God. God, why did this happen to me? Why can’t I pay my bills? It is because you charged up your credit cards. 90% of what happens to us, we did to ourselves. I’m not saying everything, but a lot of it. Then, we blame God. God, why did you put me in this family? Why did you make me this way?

Israel forgot to look in the mirror and say that they were the ones who didn’t turn back. They were the ones who went too far and wiped Benjamin out. On top of that, they made these two vows, these two great oaths, probably to intimidate others so that they would take part in what they were doing. They said, ‘If you don’t send representatives, then we’re gonna kill you.’ That was one of the oaths. They’d forgotten about it until they found out they needed it. The other oath was, “Curse be the one who gives their daughter to one of these Benjaminites.” They have killed all of the Benjaminite women, children and beasts in their cities. Then they asked, ‘God, why did You let this happen?’ ‘How do we fix it?’

They found out that the Jews, their own people from Gibeah, had not seen anybody and they said, ‘Let’s go kill some more people; that’ll make it right. There hasn’t been enough bloodshed; let’s go kill. They killed every man, woman and child and burned the cities. They find 400 virgins and come up 200 short. We will use that oath. That’s their kind of righteousness. They develop a “workaround,” a “loophole” in the oath. This is human morality. This annual feast in Shiloh is coming up; it is the Passover. What are those virgin girls doing? They’re out there dancing before the Lord. This is whatthey did. They were dancing; they were worshiping. Then there came this idea: Let’s go to Passover and you guys hide in the bushes. When the time is right, jump out and snatch yourself as a girl, throw her over your shoulder and take her home.

So the murder and rape of one woman has resulted in 65,000 men falling in battle, an entire people of Benjamin being wiped out and another city, Jabesh-gilead, being wiped out. Women and children were killed, 400 women were kidnapped and 200 women taken at a church service.

We seek our own righteousness; we seek to make it right ourselves and, as a result, we fall into what Isaiah said in Isaiah 5:20 (ESV) “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!” What the Bible says is wrong, is wrong and what the Bible says is right is right. When you reverse them and then brag about it, woe unto you, Isaiah said, because “pride goeth before the fall,” even when we try to do our best and we try to do what’s right.

Proverbs 14:12 (ESV) “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death.” Our very best is not good enough. Isaiah 64:6 (NIV) “All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.” No one is good enough. We need a better Savior; otherwise, we end up looking just like Israel. Even the church, the people of God, ends up being tribal, so that we wave the wrong banners instead of waving the cross of Jesus.

I’m reminded, as we close, not only this sermon, but this book of Judges. Pastor Tim Keller says this about the gospel. He says, “The gospel is this: We are more sinful and flawed in ourselves than we ever dared believe , yet at the very same time we are more loved and accepted in Jesus Christ than we ever dared hope.”

That’s what the gospel says to us. We’re more sinful than we ever realize. That’s the first thing that the Gospel does; it shows you you’re a sinner, apart from God, bound for hell and eternity and for misery, even in this life, never fulfilling what God called you to be. The Gospel comes at you, telling you that, first of all, you’re a sinner. But then, at the same time, it tells you you’re more loved and accepted in Jesus than you ever hoped for, simultaneously. We need both.

The book of Judges exposes the raw side of that–we are more sinful than we realized. At the same time, it caused the people of Israel to cry out, ‘God, write some more books, don’t stop at Judges. Give us more. Give us a true Savior. These human judges failed .’ As we conclude this series, we’ve learned some things. We have learned that we need a Savior, from God, that He sends from above. We’ve learned that we need a Savior that will do the work of salvation alone because we can’t do it. We need Him to do it for us. We’ve learned that this Savior will need to accomplish this salvation by His own death. We learned, through Samson, that we need a Savior that will judge, not just to purge the evil from our culture and our world, but to purge it from our hearts.

Let’s stop shifting blame and admit that we are sinners and confess our sins. Let’s stop trying to earn God’s favor through our own righteousness and recognize there’s only one righteous. His name is Jesus. Place your faith upon Jesus and believe and receive His righteousness. Stop waving the wrong flag and bend your knees and surrender to the Righteous One.

Let’s pray, Lord, thank You for Your word. We are Your people. We sit before Your word, Lord . I pray that my presentation would be absent from my opinion, that it would just be You speaking to hearts right now. First of all, I pray for that one that came to this hearing today, of the hearing of the word, far from You. I pray that you would surrender your life to Jesus. Are you ready to do that? Are you ready to come to Him, just as you are, but then say, ‘I don’t want to stay this way. Change me. I repent of my sin. You can say that to Jesus right now, “Lord Jesus, I’m a sinner. I repent of my sin. I believe that You died on the cross, that You were raised from the grave that You live today. Forgive me of my sin and make me the person You want me to be. I want to follow You.” If you’re praying that prayer, believing, He will save you. Others are here today and you’re a believer, but you’ve got a mix mash of morality that you’ve taken from the world . Right now, say, “Lord help me to put away these worldly tribes, these worldly identities, these worldly views of self and of others and to see myself, first of all, through the lens of Jesus. What You say I am, I am. Who You say I am. I am. That’s my identity . Who You say others are, help me to love them the way You’ve called me to love them. Lord help me and help us, as a church, to only be part of one body, under one book and one Lord. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.