Lesson 27

background notes

doctrinal / teaching points

1. God's people can sink to the moral level of unbelievers.

2. Society's moral values are not the same as God's moral standards

practical application

1. Remember, we don't drift into godliness.

questions

1. Why did the Holy Spirit select the sad events toward the end of the Book of Judges to be recorded?

2. Do some of these conditions exist in our nation today?

3. What are some of the indications that the Levite had sunk to a low moral and spiritual level?

4. What was an indication of the low level of the men of Gibeah?

5. Why did the master of the house offer his daughter in place of his guest?

6. In Old Testament times, what was the penalty for adultery?

answers

1. To show how low Israel had sunk spiritually and morally. It is a lesson for us, because it could happen to us today.

2. Unfortunately, yes.

3. The Levite was traveling with a concubine, when he was supposed to be a servant of the Lord and a model for the rest of Israel. Also, he was wandering about the land when he had been assigned to a city by God.

4. The men of Gibeah demanded homosexual relations, and they were God's people. It is more understandable in the days of Lot, for those men were pagans. (Not excusable, but more understandable).

5. In that day, society's values were to protect your guest, no matter what the cost. However, society's values are not the same as God's standards, then or now.

6. It was punishable by death.

discuss / consider

1. Do you think that God's people cannot sink to the moral level of unbelievers? In our society today, Bible-toting men in high office justify immoral acts by saying they are not really immoral, and they are backed by a nation. We must be very careful to adhere to God's level of morality in our lives.

2. Society's moral values are not the same as God's moral standards. Let's not be brainwashed with society's values. Let's be sure that we get our moral standards from the Bible.

challenge

1. Remember, we may drift into godlessness, but we don't drift into godliness. In the time of the judges, people turned away from the Lord and His laws and they went step by step downhill into ungodliness. The same can happen today in a society that cuts itself off from biblical standards. On the other hand, godliness must be maintained by a steady diet of reading God's word, lots of prayer, and fellowship with God's people.

memorize

• "No such deed has been done or seen from the day that the children of Israel came up from the land of Egypt until this day. Consider it, confer, and speak up!" Judges 19:30

• "Whatever things were written before, were written for our learning." Romans 15:4

• "Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God...and do not be conformed to this world...prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." Romans 12:1-2