GOD’S WORD FOR YOU
JUDGES 19:22-26
This is a terrible passage, grisly and shocking, and unfortunately with many present-day comparisons. But we need to put it into perspective, so let’s remember the inspired warning of Joshua:
“Be very careful to love the LORD your God. But if you turn away and ally yourselves with the survivors of these nations that remain among you and if you intermarry with them and associate with them, then you may be sure that the LORD your God will no longer drive out these nations before you. Instead, they will become snares and traps for you, whips on your backs and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from this good land, which the LORD your God has given you.” (Joshua 23:11-13)
What lies before us here in Judges 19 is a partial fulfillment of Joshua’s prophecy.
22 While they were enjoying themselves, wicked men of the city surrounded the house and began hurling themselves violently against the door. They shouted to the old man who was the owner of the house, “Bring out the man who came to your house so we can have sex with him! ”
Suddenly the town of Gibeah seemed like Sodom. A gang of men, the “sons of worthlessness” in Hebrew, showed up, surrounded the house, and made a furious pounding on the door. Commentator Dale Ralph Davis agrees with the translation of the New English Bible that the force of the Hebrew participle “suggests more than mere knocking or pounding on the door.” The stem of the verb is called a hithpael, which intensifies the verb’s meaning and adds a “back and forth” or reciprocal idea to the verb, which is why I’ve translated that “they began hurling themselves violently” against the door.
Old Testament homosexual sins seem to be always violent, and involving gang rape (Genesis 19:4-5). What was destroyed in Sodom and Gomorrah was continued later in other places—including here at Gibeah.
23 The owner of the house went out and said to them, “Please don’t do this evil thing, my friends. This man is my guest. Don’t commit this vile outrage. 24 Look, here is my virgin daughter and this man’s concubine. I will bring them out to you, and you can abuse them and do whatever you want to them. But don’t commit this disgraceful thing against this man.”
The old man was confident that he was not in danger personally from the homosexual gang, the “sons of worthlessness.” It’s shocking to us that he offers up his own virgin daughter to them instead, but perhaps he was confident from experience that she would be turned down since their lust was for men and not for women. Paul’s condemnation of homosexuality includes a hint about the spread of syphilis: “Men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion” (Romans 1:27). The spread of any kind of sin can rush like wildfire among the godless, but sexual sins (not just homosexual sins, but all sexual sins) are especially prone to catching on quickly, “the passionate lust like the heathen who do not know God” (1 Thessalonians 4:5). The spread of syphilis in ancient times is a testimony to the prevalence of sexual and homosexual sins.
25 But the men would not listen to him, so the man seized his concubine and sent her outside to them. They raped her and abused her all night until morning was coming, and at the first light of dawn they let her go. 26 Then at dawn, the woman stumbled back and collapsed at the doorway of the man’s house where her master was, just as it was getting light.
The old man’s virgin daughter is not mentioned; we don’t know for certain whether she was thrust into the streets or not. But the Levite forced his concubine—his wife, mind you—outside, so that he could get a good night’s rest.
Just about everyone in this story is wrong and twisted by sin, all in different ways. Sometimes one of them seems sympathetic for a while, but then their sins are exposed by some temptation or test, and we see how corrupt all mankind truly is.
The servant didn’t recognize the danger of the pagan city of Jebus, and thought only of his tired feet.
The concubine is caught in a downward spiral that began with her unfaithfulness to her husband at the beginning of all of this (19:2).
The concubine’s father was thrilled that his daughter would be involved in a polygamous marriage. Despite his indefatigable hospitality, he bore the responsibility for her marriage.
The Levite was not the best husband in the world. His coldness and brusqueness have only just peeked out behind his “I’m the victim here” veneer as he shoves his wife into a gang rape, but he will show just how cold he is in another verse or two.
The old man is every bit as hospitable as the concubine’s father, but he, too, offers his girl—his virgin daughter—to the “sons of worthlessness.”
And then there are those Sons of Worthlessness. This was Sodom all over again. But just as World War II was more horrifying even than World War I, Sodom II beats out Sodom I by because the men of this gay rape gang were all Israelites, men of Gibeah from the tribe of Benjamin. The command of God against homosexuality is clear: “Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable” (Leviticus 18:22; 20:13). This command is a natural command, not just part of the Mosaic Law. It stands even for New Testament people just as stealing is still a sin: “Neither…homosexual offenders nor thieves… will inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Corinthians 6:9-10).
For all of these sins, can there be forgiveness? Only unbelief damns, but a sinner—whether thief or rapist or homosexual offender—who rejects Christ, rejects forgiveness. Yet for anyone who repents, there is complete forgiveness in Christ. It is not the task of Christians to stamp out any one sin in the world. It is task of Christians to proclaim Christ. No sin will be repented of by a person who doesn’t know Jesus. And so we proclaim Jesus, and let the word of God and the Holy Spirit work faith and repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Think of it this way: You have many different items in your silverware drawer. Spoons, knives, forks, a spatula or two, tongs, chopsticks, and a few things like the tea cozy that the wife knows about while the husband in clueless. Let God use you for your task. If you’re a spoon, don’t try to cut things or stab things. You’re a spoon; do a spoon’s job. Let God judge and condemn. You keep spooning the gospel into the world so that the dry meat in danger of condemnation can marinate and soften in the soothing broth of the gospel. Rejoice in whatever task the Lord has for you, and do it as well as you can. The Lord will do the rest. And remember what Joshua said: “Be very careful to love the LORD your God.”
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
Archives by Wisconsin Lutheran Chapel: http://www.wlchapel.org/worship/daily-devotion/
Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, New Ulm, Minnesota