Today's Readings and Stuff -- Saturday, 25 April 2020

Last Saturday in April.  Lord willing, next Saturday will have us into May, the ONLY month of the year that I really like.  Oh, well.

Song of the day:   Lord I Lift Your Name On High.

On another note:  My father was a lover of learning.  He was the youngest child in his family, and the only one to be allowed to finish high school.  In the throes of FDR's imposed Great Depression, further schooling was out of the question, but he read constantly, loved the Bible and loved poetry.  And in his latter years, had several small books of poetry printed at his expense.  I came across a page the other day that one of our cats at some point had clawed out of the book and used for purposes not really intended.  Below, see

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WHAT DOES GOD NEED?

How can I write a hymn for Him, 

The Lord of all the ages?

How explain His majesty

Within these humble pages?

He's known as the Eternal,

How can we comprehend

A God with no beginning

Who will not have an end?

He cannot be tempted

Of this we can be sure,

For His thoughts and actions

Forever will be pure.

He is love and He shows love,

To what can we compare

The way that He shows goodness?

We're always in His care.

He expects great things from us,

This message has no end;

There is just one thing He needs,

He wants each one as friend.

He trusts us here a little while

To share His love and grace;

Then He will finally call us home

To see Him face to face.

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These passages do as good a job as you could want to describe the moral depravity of the land and of the culture.


Judges 17

Micah’s Priest

1There was a man from the hill country of Ephraim named Micah. 2He said to his mother, “The 1,100 pieces of silver taken from you, and that I heard you utter a curse about — here, I have the silver with me. I took it. So now I return it to you.” 

Then his mother said, “My son, you are blessed by the Lord! ” 

3He returned the 1,100 pieces of silver to his mother, and his mother said, “I personally consecrate  the silver to the Lord for my son’s benefit to make a carved image overlaid with silver.”  4So he returned the silver to his mother, and she took five pounds of silver and gave it to a silversmith. He made it into a carved image overlaid with silver,  and it was in Micah’s house.

5This man Micah had a shrine, and he made an ephod and household idols,  and installed one of his sons to be his priest. 6In those days there was no king in Israel;  everyone did whatever he wanted. 

7There was a young man, a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah, who resided within the clan of Judah.  8The man left the town of Bethlehem in Judah to settle wherever he could find a place. On his way he came to Micah’s home in the hill country of Ephraim.

9“Where do you come from? ” Micah asked him.

He answered him, “I am a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah, and I’m going to settle wherever I can find a place.”

10Micah replied,  “Stay with me and be my father  and priest, and I will give you four ounces of silver a year, along with your clothing and provisions.” So the Levite went in 11and agreed to stay with the man, and the young man became like one of his sons. 12Micah consecrated the Levite, and the young man became his priest  and lived in Micah’s house. 13Then Micah said, “Now I know that the Lord will be good to me, because a Levite has become my priest.”

Judges 18

Dan’s Invasion and Idolatry

1In those days, there was no king in Israel,  and the Danite tribe was looking for territory to occupy.  Up to that time no territory had been captured by them among the tribes of Israel. 2So the Danites sent out five brave men  from all their clans, from Zorah and Eshtaol,  to scout  out the land and explore it. They told them, “Go and explore the land.”

They came to the hill country of Ephraim as far as the home of Micah and spent the night there. 3While they were near Micah’s home, they recognized the speech of the young Levite. So they went over to him and asked, “Who brought you here? What are you doing in this place? What is keeping you here? ” 4He told them what Micah had done for him and that he had hired him as his priest.

5Then they said to him, “Please inquire of God  so we will know if we will have a successful journey.”

6The priest told them, “Go in peace. The Lord is watching over the journey you are going on.”

7The five men left and came to Laish. They saw that the people who were there were living securely, in the same way as the Sidonians, quiet and unsuspecting. There was nothing lacking  in the land and no oppressive ruler. They were far from the Sidonians, having no alliance with anyone. 

8When the men went back to their clans at Zorah and Eshtaol,  their people asked them, “What did you find out? ”

9They answered, “Come on, let’s go up against them, for we have seen the land, and it is very good. Why wait? Don’t hesitate to go and invade and take possession of the land! 10When you get there, you will come to an unsuspecting people and a spacious land, for God has handed it over to you. It is a place where nothing on earth is lacking.”  11Six hundred Danites departed from Zorah and Eshtaol armed with weapons of war. 12They went up and camped at Kiriath-jearim  in Judah. This is why the place is called the Camp of Dan  to this day; it is west of Kiriath-jearim. 13From there they traveled to the hill country of Ephraim and arrived at Micah’s house.

14The five men who had gone to scout out the land of Laish told their brothers, “Did you know that there are an ephod, household gods, and a carved image overlaid with silver  in these houses? Now think about what you should do.” 15So they detoured there and went to the house of the young Levite at the home of Micah and greeted him. 16The 600 Danite men were standing by the entrance of the gate, armed with their weapons of war. 17Then the five men who had gone to scout out the land went in and took the carved image overlaid with silver,  the ephod, and the household idols, while the priest was standing by the entrance of the gate with the 600 men armed with weapons of war.

18When they entered Micah’s house and took the carved image overlaid with silver,  the ephod, and the household idols, the priest said to them, “What are you doing? ”

19They told him, “Be quiet. Keep your mouth shut.   Come with us and be a father and a priest to us. Is it better for you to be a priest for the house of one person or for you to be a priest for a tribe and family in Israel? ” 20So the priest was pleased and took his ephod, household idols, and carved image, and went with the people. 21They prepared to leave, putting their small children, livestock, and possessions in front of them.

22After they were some distance from Micah’s house, the men who were in the houses near it mobilized and caught up with the Danites. 23They called to the Danites, who turned to face them, and said to Micah, “What’s the matter with you that you mobilized the men? ”

24He said, “You took the gods I had made and the priest, and went away. What do I have left? How can you say to me, ‘What’s the matter with you? ’ ”

25The Danites said to him, “Don’t raise your voice against us, or angry men will attack you, and you and your family will lose your lives.” 26The Danites went on their way, and Micah turned to go back home, because he saw that they were stronger than he was.

27After they had taken the gods Micah had made and the priest that belonged to him, they went to Laish, to a quiet and unsuspecting people. They killed them with their swords and burned down the city.  28There was no one to rescue them  because it was far from Sidon and they had no alliance with anyone. It was in a valley that belonged to Beth-rehob. They rebuilt the city and lived in it. 29They named the city Dan, after the name of their ancestor Dan, who was born to Israel. The city was formerly named Laish.

30The Danites set up the carved image for themselves. Jonathan son of Gershom, son of Moses,  and his sons were priests for the Danite tribe until the time of the exile from the land.  31So they set up for themselves Micah’s carved image that he had made, and it was there as long as the house of God was in Shiloh. 

Today's Readings and Stuff -- Friday, 24 April 2020 -- delayed

Already at the last Friday in April.  Amazing.  We actually opened a few windows today, for a little while anyway, it was up to around 60° or so, not tropical but better than the snow we had earlier in the week.  We'll take it.
This has been another day of phone calls with the friends and family of my old friend who passed away yesterday.  The first from his oldest daughter who, with her daughter, was driving up from Florida, had stopped last night in North Carolina, and was just heading into the mountains of western North  Carolina, a favorite region of mine.  The calls continued much of the day, including from his wife, who has started to go through some of his "stuff" and will be sending me some of it.

But Wife and I did get a chance to "watch" the greats for a bit while mom and dad were at the store.  So that was good, we'd been avoiding such during this "Chinese Flu" thing, and miss the kids dreadfully.

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this computer went wacky last evening as I was doing this, I finally pulled the plug, full shut down, and went to bed.  Can't gripe too much.  Wife and I are both LOOOONG-time "tech nerds" and have generally had some pretty good, up-to-the minute (or at least the hour) equipment.  This desktop unit was purchased back in 2009 or so, a thousand miles and many experiences ago.  So some issues are aggravating but not surprising.  We shall see.

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Judges 15

Samson’s Revenge

1Later on, during the wheat harvest,  Samson took a young goat as a gift and visited his wife. “I want to go to my wife in her room,” he said. But her father would not let him enter.

2“I was sure you hated her,” her father said, “so I gave her to one of the men who accompanied you. Isn’t her younger sister more beautiful than she is? Why not take her instead? ”

3Samson said to them, “This time I won’t be responsible  when I harm the Philistines.” 4So he went out and caught 300 foxes.  He took torches, turned the foxes tail-to-tail, and put a torch between each pair of tails. 5Then he ignited the torches and released the foxes into the standing grain of the Philistines. He burned up the piles of grain and the standing grain as well as the vineyards and olive groves. 

6Then the Philistines asked, “Who did this? ”

They were told, “It was Samson, the Timnite’s son-in-law, because he has taken Samson’s wife and given her to another man.” So the Philistines went to her and her father and burned them to death.

7Then Samson told them, “Because you did this, I swear that I won’t rest until I have taken vengeance on you.” 8He tore them limb from limb  with a great slaughter, and he went down and stayed in the cave at the rock of Etam.

9The Philistines went up, camped in Judah, and raided Lehi. 10So the men of Judah said, “Why have you attacked us? ”

They replied, “We have come to arrest Samson and pay him back for what he did to us.”

11Then 3,000 men of Judah went to the cave at the rock of Etam, and they asked Samson, “Don’t you realize that the Philistines rule over us?  What have you done to us? ”

“I have done to them what they did to me,” he answered. 

12They said to him, “We’ve come to arrest you and hand you over to the Philistines.”

Then Samson told them, “Swear to me that you yourselves won’t kill me.”

13“No,” they said,  “we won’t kill you, but we will tie you up securely and hand you over to them.” So they tied him up with two new ropes  and led him away from the rock.

14When he came to Lehi, the Philistines came to meet him shouting. The Spirit of the Lord took control of  him, and the ropes that were on his arms became like burnt flax and his bonds fell off his wrists. 15He found a fresh jawbone of a donkey, reached out his hand, took it, and killed 1,000 men with it. 16Then Samson said:

With the jawbone of a donkey

I have piled them in a heap.

With the jawbone of a donkey

I have killed 1,000 men.

17When he finished speaking, he threw away the jawbone and named that place Ramath-lehi.  18He became very thirsty and called out to the Lord: “You have accomplished this great victory through  Your servant. Must I now die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised? ” 19So God split a hollow place in the ground at Lehi, and water came out of it. After Samson drank, his strength returned, and he revived.  That is why he named it En-hakkore,  which is in Lehi to this day. 20And he judged Israel 20 years in the days of the Philistines.

Judges 16

Samson and Delilah

1Samson went to Gaza,  where he saw a prostitute and went to bed with her. 2When the Gazites heard that Samson was there, they surrounded the place and waited in ambush for him all that night at the city gate. While they were waiting quietly,  they said, “Let us wait until dawn; then we will kill him.” 3But Samson stayed in bed until midnight when he got up, took hold of the doors of the city gate along with the two gateposts, and pulled them out, bar and all. He put them on his shoulders and took them to the top of the mountain overlooking Hebron.

4Some time later, he fell in love with a woman named Delilah, who lived in the Sorek Valley. 5The Philistine leaders  went to her and said, “Persuade him to tell you  where his great strength comes from, so we can overpower him, tie him up, and make him helpless. Each of us will then give you 1,100 pieces of silver.”

6So Delilah said to Samson, “Please tell me, where does your great strength come from? How could someone tie you up and make you helpless? ”

7Samson told her, “If they tie me up with seven fresh bowstrings that have not been dried, I will become weak and be like any other man.”

8The Philistine leaders brought her seven fresh bowstrings that had not been dried, and she tied him up with them. 9While the men in ambush were waiting in her room, she called out to him, “Samson, the Philistines are here! ”  But he snapped the bowstrings as a strand of yarn snaps when it touches fire. The secret of his strength remained unknown.

10Then Delilah said to Samson, “You have mocked me and told me lies! Won’t you please tell me how you can be tied up? ”

11He told her, “If they tie me up with new ropes that have never been used,  I will become weak and be like any other man.”

12Delilah took new ropes, tied him up with them, and shouted, “Samson, the Philistines are here! ”  But while the men in ambush were waiting in her room, he snapped the ropes off his arms like a thread.

13Then Delilah said to Samson, “You have mocked me all along and told me lies! Tell me how you can be tied up.”

He told her, “If you weave the seven braids on my head with the web of a loom — ” 

14She fastened the braids with a pin and called to him, “Samson, the Philistines are here! ”  He awoke from his sleep and pulled out the pin, with the loom and the web.

15“How can you say, ‘I love you,’ ”  she told him, “when your heart is not with me? This is the third time you have mocked me and not told me what makes your strength so great! ”

16Because she nagged him day after day and pleaded with him until she wore him out,  17he told her the whole truth and said to her, “My hair has never been cut,  because I am a Nazirite  to God from birth. If I am shaved, my strength will leave me, and I will become weak and be like any other man.”

18When Delilah realized that he had told her the whole truth, she sent this message to the Philistine leaders: “Come one more time, for he has told me the whole truth.” The Philistine leaders came to her and brought the money with them.

19Then she let him fall asleep on her lap and called a man to shave off the seven braids on his head. In this way, she made him helpless,  and his strength left him. 20Then she cried, “Samson, the Philistines are here! ”  When he awoke from his sleep, he said, “I will escape as I did before and shake myself free.” But he did not know that the Lord had left him. 

Samson’s Defeat and Death

21The Philistines seized him and gouged out his eyes. They brought him down to Gaza and bound him with bronze shackles, and he was forced to grind grain in the prison. 22But his hair began to grow back after it had been shaved.

23Now the Philistine leaders gathered together to offer a great sacrifice to their god Dagon.  They rejoiced and said:

Our god has handed over

our enemy Samson to us.

24When the people saw him, they praised their god  and said:

Our god has handed over to us

our enemy who destroyed our land

and who multiplied our dead.

25When they were drunk,  they said, “Bring Samson here to entertain us.” So they brought Samson from prison, and he entertained them. They had him stand between the pillars.

26Samson said to the young man who was leading him by the hand, “Lead me where I can feel the pillars supporting the temple, so I can lean against them.” 27The temple was full of men and women; all the leaders of the Philistines were there, and about 3,000 men and women were on the roof watching Samson entertain them. 28He called out to the Lord: “Lord God, please remember me.  Strengthen me, God, just once more. With one act of vengeance, let me pay back the Philistines for my two eyes.” 29Samson took hold of the two middle pillars supporting the temple and leaned against them, one on his right hand and the other on his left. 30Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines.” He pushed with all his might, and the temple fell on the leaders and all the people in it. And the dead he killed at his death were more than those he had killed in his life.

31Then his brothers and his father’s family came down, carried him back, and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the tomb of his father Manoah. So he judged Israel 20 years.

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Psalm 83

Prayer against Enemies

A song. A psalm of Asaph. 

1God, do not keep silent.

Do not be deaf, God; do not be idle. 

2See how Your enemies make an uproar;

those who hate You have acted arrogantly.  

3They devise clever schemes against Your people;

they conspire against Your treasured ones. 

4They say, “Come, let us wipe them out as a nation

so that Israel’s name will no longer be remembered.” 

5For they have conspired with one mind;

they form an alliance  against You  —

6the tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites, 

Moab and the Hagrites, 

7Gebal, Ammon, and Amalek, 

Philistia with the inhabitants of Tyre. 

8Even Assyria has joined them;

they lend support  to the sons of Lot.  Selah

9Deal with them as You did with Midian, 

as You did with Sisera

and Jabin at the Kishon River. 

10They were destroyed at En-dor;

they became manure for the ground. 

11Make their nobles like Oreb and Zeeb, 

and all their tribal leaders like Zebah and Zalmunna, 

12who said, “Let us seize God’s pastures for ourselves.” 

13Make them like tumbleweed, my God,

like straw before the wind. 

14As fire burns a forest,

as a flame blazes through mountains, 

15so pursue them with Your tempest

and terrify them with Your storm. 

16Cover their faces with shame

so that they will seek Your name Yahweh. 

17Let them be put to shame and terrified forever;

let them perish in disgrace. 

18May they know that You alone —

whose name is Yahweh —

are the Most High over all the earth. 

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John 15

The Vine and the Branches

1“I am  the true vine, and My Father is the vineyard keeper. 2Every branch in Me that does not produce fruit He removes,  and He prunes every branch that produces fruit so that it will produce more fruit. 3You are already clean  because of the word I have spoken to you. 4Remain in Me, and I in you. Just as a branch is unable to produce fruit by itself unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in Me. 

5“I am the vine;  you are the branches. The one who remains in Me and I in him produces much fruit,  because you can do nothing without Me. 6If anyone does not remain in Me, he is thrown aside  like a branch and he withers. They gather them, throw them into the fire,  and they are burned.  7If you remain in Me and My words remain in you, ask whatever you want and it will be done for you.  8My Father is glorified  by this: that you produce much fruit and prove to be  My disciples.

Christlike Love

9“As the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you. Remain in My love.  10If you keep My commands you will remain in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commands and remain in His love. 

11“I have spoken these things to you so that My joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.  12This is My command: Love one another as I have loved  you. 13No one has greater love than this, that someone would lay down his life  for his friends. 14You are My friends if you do what I command you. 15I do not call you slaves anymore, because a slave doesn’t know what his master   is doing. I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything I have heard from My Father. 16You did not choose Me, but I chose you.  I appointed you that you should go out and produce fruit and that your fruit should remain, so that whatever you ask  the Father in My name,  He will give you.  17This is what I command you: Love one another.

Persecutions Predicted

18“If the world hates  you, understand that it hated Me before it hated you. 19If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own. However, because you are not of the world, but I have chosen  you out of it, the world hates you. 20Remember the word I spoke to you: ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’  If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they kept My word,  they will also keep yours. 21But they will do all these things to you on account of My name,  because they don’t know  the One who sent Me. 22If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin.   Now they have no excuse for their sin. 23The one who hates Me also hates My Father.  24If I had not done the works  among them that no one else has done,  they would not have sin.  Now they have seen and hated both Me and My Father. 25But this happened so that the statement written in their scripture might be fulfilled:  They hated Me for no reason.  

Coming Testimony and Rejection

26“When the Counselor  comes, the One I will send to you from the Father  — the Spirit of truth  who proceeds from the Father — He will testify about Me. 27You also will testify,  because you have been with Me from the beginning.