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WOW!

What an amazing story, and yet scary at the same time.

First you have a Levite who is threatened By people from the tribe of Benjamin. Next, you have this man "sacrifice" his concubine for his own safety. Then you have his callous nature toward her body to awaken Israel to the problem in it's own midst. The tribe of Benjamin rejects correction and gears up to defend it's own tribes lawlessness.

Now Israel (minus Benjamin of course) assembles and army of 400,000 to fight a civil war and reestablish justice and unity. In the first to battles, Israel loses 22,000 and 18,000 men. In the third battle Benjamin loses 25,000 men and is defeated as a force that protects evil.

The following is part of a commentary I read about this event and I feel that it could be applied to America today.

God used this to humble the whole nation. They had to understand that the horror of the crime at Gibeah was not merely the result of the sin of one group of men, or one city, or even one tribe. The whole nation had to be humbled because they first thought that the sin problem was only in Benjamin. Israel had to see that that nation as a whole had a sin problem.

After the first failure, Israel was sorry and wept. But it was only after the second failure that they put their repentance into action by fasting and made a sacrifice for sins. Sorrow and weeping are not enough if they are not matched by real repentance and taking care of the sin problem through sacrifice - the sacrifice of the cross.

When I look at the sin that abounds in Hollywood or San Francisco, I'm thinking along the lines that Israel was thinking..."That's not my problem." From this story, you get the impression that God doesn't look at nations that way. Would America be willing to pay the cost that Israel paid to bring justice and decency back to America. I don't think America, as a whole even wants to return to a God honoring type of decency.

Scary and sad at the same time.

Sincerely

Read chapter 21. The tribe of Jabeshgilead did'nt bother to help fight against the evil and they were killed for it.

And the children of Israel said, Who is there among all the tribes of Israel that came not up with the congregation unto the LORD? For they had made a great oath concerning him that came not up to the LORD to Mizpeh, saying, He shall surely be put to death. ...
8 And they said, What one is there of the tribes of Israel that came not up to Mizpeh to the LORD? And, behold, there came none to the camp from Jabeshgilead to the assembly. 9 For the people were numbered, and, behold, there were none of the inhabitants of Jabeshgilead there. 10 And the congregation sent thither twelve thousand men of the valiantest, and commanded them, saying, Go and smite the inhabitants of Jabeshgilead with the edge of the sword, with the women and the children. 11 And this is the thing that ye shall do, Ye shall utterly destroy every male, and every woman that hath lain by man.