When Religion Replaces a Relationship with God - Judges 17:1-18:15 (Session 16)

Judges 17 begins the final section of the Book of Judges, where the narrative moves away from individual deliverers and shows the spiritual and moral condition of Israel more broadly. The repeated statement, “Everyone did what was right in his own eyes,” becomes increasingly visible.

In this session, Glenn and Steve examine Micah and his mother, who attempt to combine the name of Yahweh with practices God had clearly forbidden. Micah steals a large amount of silver from his mother, returns it after hearing her curse, and is then blessed by her. She claims to dedicate the silver to the Lord but uses part of it to create carved and molten images.

Micah builds a household shrine, makes an ephod and additional idols, and appoints one of his sons as priest. He later hires a traveling Levite and assumes that possessing a legitimate religious official will guarantee God’s blessing and prosperity.

The passage demonstrates the danger of syncretism—mixing the worship of the true God with idols and worldly practices. Micah appears sincere and highly religious, but sincerity does not make false worship acceptable. He uses God’s name while repeatedly ignoring God’s commands.

Judges 18 then introduces men from the tribe of Dan who are searching for new territory because they failed to possess the inheritance God had already given them. Instead of seeking God before beginning their journey, they proceed according to their own plans and later ask Micah’s hired priest to confirm that they will succeed.

The priest gives them the answer they want.

This session warns against replacing obedience with religious activity, treating spiritual leaders as good-luck charms, and expecting God to approve decisions simply because His name has been attached to them.

Scripture: Judges 17:1–18:13
Series: The Book of Judges — An RTTB Study

Questions discussed in this session:

• Is all religious worship valid? 
• Is it possible to worship the true God and idols at the same time?
• Are all sincere religious people correct in their religion? 
• Can I do religious activities to make myself righteous? 
• What should religious leaders do if they are tempted to compromise? 

Transcript

Exploring the Book of Judges

Speaker 1 0:19

Music . Welcome to Reasoning Through the Bible . We've been working our way through our verse by verse study and we're in the Book of Judges and we're going to start off in chapter 17 . But before we get going , just a real quick summary of where we've been .

Speaker 1 0:33

In the Book of Joshua , israel has faith and drives out the enemies . God blesses them because of their faith and their obedience . But in Joshua they stop before they finish the job of driving out all of the Canaanites . So in the Book of Judges there's still a lot of Canaanites there , but Israel then falls into disobedience . In the entire Book of Judges there's a lot of struggle between Israel's sin and the enemy there that God told them to drive out , but they've not been doing it .

Speaker 1 1:05

Judges has this long cycle of disobedience that just gets worse and worse . I'll tell you what , steve . I'm going to be really glad when we get finished with Judges I'll be able to take a shower and pull out the bleach and cleanse all of the disinfect our study here . But in we just finished Judges , chapters 13 through 16 , is Samson . God raised up Samson , although Israel did not cry out for deliverance . Samson had supernaturally great strength , of course , but he wasted it for the most part , the good news of Samson is that even through his disobedience , at the end he did cry out to God and God used him , and that's a great hope for us and he has mentioned in Hebrews chapter 11 in the Hall of Faith , because we're going to fix and get in here in these chapters of 17 and 18 , and then we'll have another session on chapters 19 through 21 .

Speaker 2 1:57

We see a little bit of a turn in the style and the story in Judges . We've been talking about the actual judges in this cycle of what you just mentioned the people crying out and God bringing deliver . We have a little bit of a different turn in the narrative as far as what's being approached and given . It's not really talking about judges in these last part and in Jewish tradition these chapters 17 and 18 are looked as being one appendix to the Book of Judges . 19 through 21 is a second appendix to the Book of Judges and then the Book of Ruth itself as being a third appendix to the Book of Judges , because Ruth takes place during the time of the judges . When we get through here with judges , we're also going to do a small study and walk through the Book of Ruth , because it all fits into this Book of Judges that we've been talking about .

Speaker 1 2:49

In these last few chapters in Judges . There's some important things here that we can learn from and I can't remember a time , steve , where I've ever heard a sermon on these passages . But there's some really valuable stuff and that's why we do this verse by verse study . I'm going to read the first four verses of Judges , chapter 17 .

Speaker 1 3:07

Now there was a man of the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Micah , and he said to his mother the eleven hundred pieces of silver which were taken from you , about which you uttered a curse in my hearing , behold , the silver is with me . I took it and his mother said Blessed be my son by the Lord . Then he returned the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother and his mother said I wholly dedicate the silver from my hand to the Lord for my son to make a graven image and a molten image . Now , therefore , I will return them to you . So when he returned the silver to his mother , his mother took two hundred pieces of silver and gave them to the silversmith , who made them into a graven image and a molten image , and they were in the house of Micah . We have an interesting story here . So in verse one , who took the money and who did he steal ?

Speaker 2 4:02

it from the son did and by nature of the son , he took it and stole it from his mother .

Speaker 1 4:07

What kind of a person would steal ? That's a lot of money . I don't know how much it was back then but a lot of money . What kind of person is going to steal from their mother ?

Speaker 2 4:16

Well , not only that , but what type of mother is then going to turn around and bless the son ?

Speaker 1 4:20

Bless him in the Lord , because now he's a thief . I would get thumped on my ear .

Speaker 2 4:25

Thumped on a few other places too .

Mixing Worship of God and Idols

Speaker 1 4:27

If you look at verses one , two , three , there's a list we could make here about ways this woman is spiritually confused . What can we count ? There's several places in here that this woman is just confused Right , it's the nicest way I could phrase it . In verse one , she tries to curse the money . I would submit that apart from the sovereign will of God , curses aren't really going to work . Verse two she blesses the son for returning it . Okay , we can kind of give her a little credit there . But then in verse three she consecrates the silver to the true God and then uses it to make a false idol . So that's why this lady's confused . She's doing some things that are okay , but then she's also trying to mix God and idols and she's confused .

Speaker 2 5:10

And it shows a picture . It's a picture of the side of the times . This is at the latter part of the time of judges , and the period of judges took place over about a 430 year period . That's the length of time that we're talking about . In the very first couple of verses there's several violations of the law of Moses . They're staffed . There's not honoring your mother . You're not supposed to have any other God , You're not supposed to have any other type of graven images . And then she says that she dedicates this image to Jehovah or Yahweh , Dedicate to the Lord , but she doesn't give anything or donate it to the tabernacle which is in Shiloh , which is where the actual Holy of Holies and the Ark of the Covenant is and where the actual worship of God Yahweh is taking place .

Speaker 1 5:54

And she says I wholly dedicate the silver from my hand to the Lord , to Yahweh , to make a graven image , and she's instead given it to her thieving son to turn into an idol .

Speaker 2 6:08

Now is it ?

Speaker 1 6:08

possible to worship the true God and an idol God at the same time .

Speaker 2 6:16

No , and that's why I chuckled . It's not a light matter , but that's what kind of brings out the ridiculousness of it .

Speaker 1 6:23

I think we're dealing not only with the top 10 lists . We're dealing with the top two , the first and second commandments . You shall worship no other gods and you shall not make for yourself a graven image .

Speaker 2 6:35

Would you say that this is maybe an example of syncretism , glenn , which is a kind of a mixing of religious beliefs . It's pseudo worship , right of .

Speaker 1 6:44

Jehovah . It's trying to mix together worldly things with the worship of the true God and we just can't do that . Second Corinthians 6 says what agreement has the temple of God with idols ? And first Thessalonians , chapter one you turned from idols to serve the living and true God . It's real clear from Scripture that we are to stay away from idols . Little children , keep yourselves from idols , it says in 1 John 5 .

Speaker 1 7:11

This lady is very confused because she's trying to mix worship of the true God with the worship of idols . Then , verse three she says how much of it did she dedicate Holy , dedicated to God ? But then in verse four she takes 200 of the 1100 pieces of silver and uses that to make an idol with it . So she says I'm taking all of this and I wholly dedicate it for this idol , but she's really only taking less than 20% of it and making the idol and I guess she pocketed the rest of it , it doesn't say anything in regards to her taking it to the Tabernacle in Shiloh , which is what you would think if you're going to dedicate that money .

Speaker 1 7:49

So she's coming out publicly saying , oh yeah , I'm dedicating this to the Lord , but she's pocketing it ? Is she even being honest with herself ?

Speaker 2 7:57

No , and what's not to say that the money's not going to come up missing again .

Speaker 1 8:01

She is a thoroughly modern churchgoer who has mixed worship of the world with worship of the true God , and they're trying to be a good churchgoer and have one foot in the church and one foot in the world .

Speaker 2 8:15

And you chose those words on purpose A church Goer . They're just going to church . They're not worshiping God or they're not studying God , they're just going through the motions , going to church .

Speaker 1 8:28

Remember Zacchaeus when he met Jesus , when he said if I've taken from anybody , I'll give it back fourfold . That was a changed man . This woman is not a changed person . And then , in verse four , she doesn't have any trouble finding a silversmith that knows how to make idols . Just the fact that there was anybody around in Israel that would be willing to , yet alone know how to make an idol is a sign that Israel had departed from the true God .

Speaker 2 8:58

Steve , read the next two verses verses five and six and the man , micah , had a shrine and he made an ephod in the household idols and consecrated one of his sons that he might become his priest . In those days there was no king in Israel . Every man did what was right in his own eyes .

Speaker 1 9:17

So what happens when every man does what's right in his own eyes ? He had made these idols , he made this image and this ephod , which we said was like a breastplate . It's this thing you fit over you when you're a priest . It's a religious garment , religious object .

Speaker 2 9:32

And we had previously saw this in Gideon and he took and made an ephod and it became a snare Damn . It became a thing that they worshiped , steve this man .

Speaker 1 9:42

he seems very religious , he seems very sincere . He's trying to worship the way he sees fit . This is a sincerely religious person . Who are we he says with tongue firmly in cheek who are we to question his religious sincerity ? I mean , shouldn't we say oh well , you know there's many paths to the top of the mountain and he's just picking his .

Speaker 2 10:03

Well , in verse six . There it says every man did what was right in his own eyes . That's another way to put that is . That's called self righteousness , in other words , doing what you think , what man thinks is a righteous thing to do . It's not in line with what God , or God's righteousness , here he is . He's a religious man , but he's way , way , way off base Again .

Speaker 1 10:26

First , two commandments says don't do this , so he's sincere . Is sincerity a measure of truth ? No , a person can be sincere and still be wrong .

Speaker 2 10:36

They can be sincerely wrong . That's correct .

Speaker 1 10:38

Whether or not the true God exists or not , or whether or not he's commanded us a certain way to worship is very different than whether or not I'm sincere .

Speaker 2 10:45

It depends upon what you are sincere about , is it true ?

Speaker 1 10:50

that all worship is valid .

Speaker 2 10:53

No , it depends upon who you are worshiping .

Speaker 1 10:57

Just because somebody's religious could be their worshiping a false God . That's what's happening here . I just keep remembering these statements . I've heard from people saying well , there's many paths to the top of the mountain and we're all may start from different places , but we're all aiming towards the same God . Is that true ? Is it true that all religious paths are equal ? I would submit no . That's what these people are doing . You called it syncretism . That's what it is . They're mixing worship of the true God , or at least the name of the true God , with these false idols . I would submit they're more interested in the false idols than they are the true God , or they wouldn't have them .

Speaker 2 11:37

Another thing is in verse 3 . There , when it says that she dedicated the silver from my hand to Yahweh for my son , the question comes up to did she have the right view of Yahweh ? Is just using the correct name sufficient ?

Speaker 1 11:54

Jesus said I am the way . No one gets to the father except through me . John 14.6 . Now I didn't say that . If it's just me and you voting , hey , live and let live , do whatever you want , okay , but I didn't write the Bible . All I can do as a teacher is sit here and say what the scripture says . And Jesus claimed there was one way God in the Old Testament claims . There's one way he says do not worship an idol . And yet here these people are . They've mixed false worship with true and it just turns into a mess . Verse 5, . What did he hire his son to do ? To become the priest ?

Speaker 2 12:34

the family , priest and he was from verse 1 , ephraim . The priest is supposed to , or is someone that is supposed to be a go between , between God and the people . While they mentioned the God , yahweh , we can clearly see they're not actually worshiping Yahweh , they're using his name . It's kind of like somebody if they say Jesus is Lord , but if they don't follow Jesus and they don't have anything to do and they're not a true believer in Jesus and who he is then saying Jesus is Lord , is meaningless .

Speaker 1 13:07

Jesus said in the gospels many will come to me that day and say Lord , lord , have I not done all these things ? And he said I never knew you , I never knew you .

Speaker 2 13:16

I'd , I'd , oh that's , that's a scary thing .

Speaker 1 13:18

Can people in the Old Testament here just we don't have a priest , so I'm going to go , I'm going to go make one .

Speaker 2 13:24

No , the tribe of Levi was the chosen tribe to be the priestly tribe .

Speaker 1 13:30

God insists on doing it his way , whether or not you . He didn't ask my council and lucky thing these guys were from the tribe of Ephraim and he's trying to make a priest from his son and it's really just a mess . So what happens when there's no moral code that is larger than all the societies of the earth ? Everyone does what's right in his own eyes .

Speaker 2 13:54

We also see another thing which is kind of introduced in here that we'll see in these last few chapters . It talks about and in those days there was no king of Israel . Now we're starting to see a little bit of a shading in God working through judges , but they're being introduced to the fact that there's no king . So there's no king . There's no person to provide direction , to make the people adhere to certain things and a certain worship of God . We'll see this as well , that there was no king in Israel .

Speaker 1 14:25

Next he's going to meet actual Levite . He tried to build a priest of his own son and then , starting in verse 7 , I'm going to read here he's going to actually meet a Levite . This is Judges , chapter 17 , verse 7 . Now there was a young man from Bethlehem , judah , of the family of Judah , who was a Levite , and he was staying there .

Speaker 1 14:44

Then the man departed from the city , from Bethlehem and Judah , to stay wherever he might find a place . And as he made his journey he came to the hill country of Ephraim , to the house of Micah . Micah said to him where do you come from ? And he said to him I am a Levite from Bethlehem and Judah and I am going to stay wherever I may find a place . Micah then said to him Dwell with me and be a father and a priest to me , and I will give you ten pieces of silver a year , a suit of clothes and your maintenance .

Speaker 1 15:15

The Levite went in . The Levite agreed to live with the man and the young man became to him like one of his sons . So Micah consecrated the Levite and the young man became his priest and lived in the house of Micah . Then Micah said Now I know that the Lord will prosper me seeing I have a Levite as a priest Again . Way off base he hires this Levite to be his own personal priest . Micah is very religious . Now he's got two priests the one he made and he went oh , here's a real one .

Speaker 2 15:50

Here's an actual somebody that's supposed to be a priest .

Speaker 1 15:54

He thinks that because now he's hired his own private religious person I've got my own holy man living in my own household here he thinks because of that that God's going to bless him . It's like a good luck charm .

Speaker 2 16:07

Is he correct ? No , and again he's treating it like oh , I've got a really good luck charm , I've got a Levite priest that's actually living here , so now I know . The A question is how does he know ? I mean , he doesn't really know . He's calling it good , but God calls something like that evil .

Speaker 1 16:23

If I go out and pay a religious leader to do things for me , is that going to make me righteous ? No , no , no , it's not going to make me righteous just because I may have enough money to go buy my own , holy man .

Speaker 2 16:37

And especially even if the religious leader is not doing what they're supposed to do . This Levite priest was not supposed to be doing . He wasn't for somebody for hire . He was supposed to be a priest of the people and so not a priest for a single family .

Speaker 1 16:53

So look at what this man , micah , did . He made his own shrine . He made this religious garment , this ephid . He had a lot of idols and in case he missed one and one of them was made out of 200 pieces of silver he hired two priests . Now , what religious activities can I do to make myself righteous ? How about if I go light candles ? Is that going to make me righteous ? Or sing in the choir ? Or pray more prayers , go to church more . I mean true story . My wife's grandmother went to Mass every day , every day . How about if I go twice a day ? Is that going to make me righteous , more righteous ?

Speaker 2 17:33

than a little woman . How about ?

Speaker 1 17:34

if I give more money , if I don't smoke , drink or chew or go with girls that do , is that going to make me righteous ? How about if I help a little old lady across the street ? How about if I give up mustard greens for Lent ? Is that going to make me more holy ? Avoiding things doesn't make me holy , and neither does collecting religious objects , which is what this guy was doing . He's confusing holiness and getting right with God with religious activity .

Speaker 2 18:02

And that religious activity that you mentioned are things that are examples of doing what's right in your eyes . You think that there's something that's going to be pleasing to God Will any religious activity .

Speaker 1 18:14

Pay my debt of sin before a holy God . No , doing good things will not pay for any past sins . To make me right with a perfectly holy and just God , what must I do to be saved ? Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ , and you shall be saved .

Speaker 1 18:31

Acts 16 , 31

Religious Activities and Seeking Prosperity

Speaker 1 18:32

. Then in verse 13, . Here's kind of a key , the end of this chapter , verse 13 . What does Micah say here about what he thinks the Lord will do for him ? He will prosper me . What's he trying to do here ? He's trying to make money . He's trying to get rich . He's trying to oh , he's going to broaden my business here he thinks that he's going to get a personal benefit because he's doing all these religious activities , and I submit to you that a lot of us think this way today . This man's very religious , but he shows no signs of knowing God's word or following the commands of God or desiring holiness . He thinks that religious activities is going to get him more money . He thinks that he can hire a holy man and now I'm close to God . He's as far from a true spiritual relationship with God as can become . So that brings us to Judges 18 . See , if you could read the first six verses .

Speaker 2 19:30

In those days there was no king of Israel and in those days the tribe of the Danites was seeking an inheritance for themselves to live in .

Speaker 2 19:39

For until that day an inheritance had not been allotted to them as a possession among the tribes of Israel . So the sons of Dan sent from their family five men out of their whole number , valiant men from Zorah and Eshtah , to spy out the land and to search it . And they said to them go search the land . And they came to the hill country of Ephraim , to the house of Micah , and lodged there . When they were near the house of Micah they recognized the voice of the young man , the Levite , and they turned aside there and said to him who brought you here and what are you doing in this place and what have you have here ? And he said to them that's the Levite . Thus , and so has Micah done to me , and he has hired me and I have become his priest . They said to him inquire of God , please , that we may know whether our way on which we are going will be prosperous . And the priest said to them go in peace , your way in which you are going has the Lord's approval .

Speaker 1 20:40

Verse one this was the tribe of Dan . It says here they needed a place to live . Now , actually , Dan had already been given some land back in Joshua , chapter 19, . Verses 40 through 48 . They were given land , but they didn't drive out the Canaanites and specifically the Philistines .

Speaker 2 20:57

Their inheritance was down on that land where the Philistines were , the plain there and what we would today picture , the gods of strip . The Philistines had driven them and kept them up in the hill country . It's hard to farm rocky caves . So here they are . They're looking for a place because they couldn't drive out and didn't drive out the Philistines , specifically in the Canaanites .

Speaker 1 21:20

So they're up in the hills . Verse two they send five spies to search out a place to live . Where have we seen that before ? And then , verses three and four they meet this Levite and find out he's been hired by Micah . Verses five and six the men of Dan asked the Levite to ask God whether they're gonna be successful . Okay , so why didn't they ask before they left God , what should we do ? Right Now , they're just going about what they thought was good until they bump in oh , here's a holy man . We found a paid holy man . Let's ask him whether we're gonna be successful or not .

Speaker 2 21:54

Which doesn't make sense either , because the Levite priest , who's supposed to be a priest of the people and is supposed to operate in the Tabernacle area and also the other areas around the different tribes yes , but they're not supposed to be personal priests to a family . He tells them Micah has hired me as his personal priest , and it's just like this just goes right over their head . They go oh okay , well then inquire of God and see if where we're doing is a correct thing to do .

Speaker 1 22:25

So the paid holy man tells them what they wanted to hear . What they should have done was before they even left . God , what should we do ? I mean David over and later . He does this routinely , lord , what should I do next ? They just set out to do what they thought was good . Let's talk for just a second about the idea of religious leaders that are being paid . Take it in terms of a pastor of a church . Let's say that there's a pastor and he has a number of very influential people in his church paying his salary , and the pastors know many churches . There's a very few families that are more well off and they end up paying the vast majority of the funds around the church . This happens fairly routinely

Pastors Should Prioritize God's Word

Speaker 1 23:08

. If a pastor finds himself in that situation and then one of these very wealthy donors from the church start trying to say well , pastor , you need to sort of change your message here . You need to kind of . We want to hear some sermons on , we need to soften here and emphasize there . What should the pastor do ?

Speaker 2 23:28

The pastor should tell them respectfully . I preach the word of God and that's all I'm going to preach , and that's where my direction is coming from . It's coming from God , it's not coming from you .

Speaker 1 23:41

Oftentimes pastors are . I mean , they're just people . They've got families , they've got bills to pay , they've got kids they've got to put through school . I might lose my job If I go crossways with these influential people in the church or I have plans .

Speaker 2 23:55

we have plans to do these things for God through this church , and if I lose those funds then we won't be able to do those things . So you start justifying some of the actions that you might take , albeit they might be the wrong justification .

Speaker 1 24:13

So to our pastor friends , the congregation should change to the word of God . It should not be that the congregation changes what is taught them . The pastor's responsibility is before God as a shepherd . The sheep are owned by God . The pastor is really hired by God to shepherd God's sheep and give the sheep what the sheep need . And if the sheep start saying , well , we don't want to hear this , I respectfully say to our pastor friends out there , I've lost more jobs than you and God always took me through it and I can say that with a high degree of confidence . Thank you very much and God always got me through it . If it means losing your job , then you lose your job . There'll be congregations out there that are willing to hear the word of God . Pastors can't bend the message to the wishes of the congregation . Rather , the congregation should bend themselves to the word of God .

Speaker 2 25:09

And in the long term , you're going to be happier following God than you are following men .

Speaker 1 25:15

In verses seven through 13, . The men of Dan find this land and it looks good and it seems to be easy to conquer . So they go back and they get their army and they come back and on the way they stop at the house of Micah . Next time we're going to find out what happens when the men of Dan come up against Micah and his Levite and all of his things . We'll learn that next time on reasoning through the Bible , that's .