{"id":27764,"date":"2023-08-30T22:00:30","date_gmt":"2023-08-31T05:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/judges-19_1-15-copy\/"},"modified":"2023-08-15T22:32:12","modified_gmt":"2023-08-16T05:32:12","slug":"judges-19_16-30","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/judges-19_16-30\/","title":{"rendered":"“Farewell My Concubine”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Judges 19:16-30 \u00a0<\/strong>Click here for Bible Verses<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Hi GAMErs!<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s passage is Judges 19:16-30.\u00a0 Let’s go!<\/p>\n

Judges 19:16-30 (NIV)<\/strong>
\n16\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0That evening an old man from the hill country of Ephraim, who was living in Gibeah (the men of the place were Benjamites), came in from his work in the fields.
\n17\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0When he looked and saw the traveler in the city square, the old man asked, “Where are you going? Where did you come from?”
\n18\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0He answered, “We are on our way from Bethlehem in Judah to a remote area in the hill country of Ephraim where I live. I have been to Bethlehem in Judah and now I am going to the house of the\u00a0LORD. No one has taken me into his house.
\n19\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0We have both straw and fodder for our donkeys and bread and wine for ourselves your servants–me, your maidservant, and the young man with us. We don’t need anything.”
\n20\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0“You are welcome at my house,” the old man said. “Let me supply whatever you need. Only don’t spend the night in the square.”
\n21\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0So he took him into his house and fed his donkeys. After they had washed their feet, they had something to eat and drink.
\n22\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0While they were enjoying themselves, some of the wicked men of the city surrounded the house. Pounding on the door, they shouted to the old man who owned the house, “Bring out the man who came to your house so we can have sex with him.”
\n23\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0The owner of the house went outside and said to them, “No, my friends, don’t be so vile. Since this man is my guest, don’t do this disgraceful thing.
\n24\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Look, here is my virgin daughter, and his concubine. I will bring them out to you now, and you can use them and do to them whatever you wish. But to this man, don’t do such a disgraceful thing.”
\n25\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0But the men would not listen to him. So the man took his concubine and sent her outside to them, and they raped her and abused her throughout the night, and at dawn they let her go.
\n26\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0At daybreak the woman went back to the house where her master was staying, fell down at the door and lay there until daylight.
\n27\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0When her master got up in the morning and opened the door of the house and stepped out to continue on his way, there lay his concubine, fallen in the doorway of the house, with her hands on the threshold.
\n28\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0He said to her, “Get up; let’s go.” But there was no answer. Then the man put her on his donkey and set out for home.
\n29\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0When he reached home, he took a knife and cut up his concubine, limb by limb, into twelve parts and sent them into all the areas of Israel.
\n30\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Everyone who saw it said, “Such a thing has never been seen or done, not since the day the Israelites came up out of Egypt. Think about it! Consider it! Tell us what to do!”<\/em><\/p>\n

On verses 16-30:\u00a0 Here we read of one of the most shocking and vile crimes ever described in the Bible.\u00a0 To protect themselves from a sadistic mob, the Levite and his old man host\u00a0in Gibaeh offer up the Levite\u2019s concubine to a sadistic mob who gang rapes the concubine all night, leaving her for dead.\u00a0 Then the Levite takes his concubine and cuts her up into 12 pieces and disperses her body parts throughout Israel.\u00a0 This raises a bunch of questions, not the least of which include:<\/p>\n

(1) Which man was it \u2013 the old man or the Levite \u2013 who gave the concubine over to the sadistic mob in verse 25?\u00a0 In any event, the fact is that this Levite allowed his concubine to be gang raped this way to protect himself.\u00a0 Contrast this to Jesus who allowed himself to be abused, tortured and killed to protect us his bride, the church.<\/p>\n

(2) Was the concubine dead by the time her Levite husband picked her up and put her on his donkey?\u00a0 It\u2019s not clear.\u00a0 The author of Judges leaves open the possibility that the concubine was not yet dead after the night long gang rape and that it was her Levite husband who later ended her life in the most violent way.\u00a0 Also, considering the callous way that the Levite treated his concubine after he took her from her father\u2019s home, could it be that this was the Levite\u2019s malicious plan all along, to \u201crescue\u201d his once unfaithful concubine only to have her raped, killed and her body cut up and dispersed as revenge?\u00a0 Did the Levite plant the old man and the mob himself?\u00a0 What a twist in the story that would be.<\/p>\n

Whether or not those above possibilities are true, ultimately, either through cowardice and passivity or through malice and evil intent, it was the Levite who killed his own concubine, even more than the gang rapists or the old man did.\u00a0 All of this goes back to verse 1 of chapter 19: \u201cIn those days Israel had no king\u201d.\u00a0 In other words, when the LORD is not ruling over our lives, there is no limit to the heinous evil, injustice and sin that can result.\u00a0 That’s why we so desperately need God to be the Lord of our lives.<\/p>\n

Jesus, thank You that You don\u2019t rescue Your bride only to let her be abused, killed and dismembered.\u00a0 Rather You laid down Your life for us Your bride and were abused and killed for us.\u00a0 Thank You that while we can\u2019t trust everyone, we can fully trust You.\u00a0 In Jesus\u2019 name, AMEN!<\/em><\/p>\n


\n Copyright \u00a9 2021 Justin Lim. All rights reserved.<\/em><\/em><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi GAMErs!<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s passage is Judges 19:16-30.\u00a0 Let’s go!<\/p>\n

Judges 19:16-30 (NIV)
\n16\u00a0\u00a0That evening an old man from the hill country of Ephraim, who was living in Gibeah (the men of the place were Benjamites), came in from his work in the fields.
\n17\u00a0\u00a0When he looked and saw the traveler in the city square, the old man asked, “Where are you going? Where did you come from?”
\n18\u00a0\u00a0He answered, “We are on our way from Bethlehem in Judah to a remote area in the hill country of Ephraim where I live. I have been to Bethlehem in Judah and now I am going to the house of the\u00a0LORD. No one has taken me into his house.<\/p>\n

On verses 16-30:\u00a0 Here we read of one of the most shocking and vile crimes ever described in the Bible.\u00a0 To protect themselves from a sadistic mob, the Levite and his old man host\u00a0in Gibaeh offer up the Levite\u2019s concubine to a sadistic mob who gang rapes the concubine all night, leaving her for dead.\u00a0 Then the Levite takes his concubine and cuts her up into 12 pieces and disperses her body parts throughout Israel.\u00a0 This raises a bunch of questions, not the least of which include:<\/p>\n

(1) Which man was it \u2013 the old man or the Levite \u2013 who gave the concubine over to the sadistic mob in verse 25?\u00a0 In any event, the fact is that this Levite allowed his concubine to be gang raped this way to protect himself.\u00a0 Contrast this to Jesus who allowed himself to be abused, tortured and killed to protect us his bride, the church.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27766,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gametime-sharing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27764"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27764\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27767,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27764\/revisions\/27767"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}