Immerse: Kingdoms Full Volume - Flipbook - Page 109
1S
| 4:19–5:11
S am u el – K I N G S
97
God, Eli fell backward from his seat beside the gate. He broke his neck
and died, for he was old and overweight. He had been Israel’s judge for
forty years.
Eli’s daughter-in-law, the wife of Phinehas, was pregnant and near her
time of delivery. When she heard that the Ark of God had been captured
and that her father-in-law and husband were dead, she went into labor and
gave birth. She died in childbirth, but before she passed away the midwives
tried to encourage her. “Don’t be afraid,” they said. “You have a baby boy!”
But she did not answer or pay attention to them.
She named the child Ichabod (which means “Where is the glory?”), for
she said, “Israel’s glory is gone.” She named him this because the Ark of
God had been captured and because her father-in-law and husband were
dead. Then she said, “The glory has departed from Israel, for the Ark of
God has been captured.”
After the Philistines captured the Ark of God, they took it from the battleground at Ebenezer to the town of Ashdod. They carried the Ark of God
into the temple of Dagon and placed it beside an idol of Dagon. But when
the citizens of Ashdod went to see it the next morning, Dagon had fallen
with his face to the ground in front of the Ark of the Lord! So they took
Dagon and put him in his place again. But the next morning the same
thing h appened—Dagon had fallen face down before the Ark of the Lord
again. This time his head and hands had broken off and were lying in the
doorway. Only the trunk of his body was left intact. That is why to this day
neither the priests of Dagon nor anyone who enters the temple of Dagon
in Ashdod will step on its threshold.
Then the Lord’s heavy hand struck the people of Ashdod and the
nearby villages with a plague of tumors. When the people realized what
was happening, they cried out, “We can’t keep the Ark of the God of Is
rael here any longer! He is against us! We will all be destroyed along with
Dagon, our god.” So they called together the rulers of the Philistine towns
and asked, “What should we do with the Ark of the God of Israel?”
The rulers discussed it and replied, “Move it to the town of Gath.” So
they moved the Ark of the God of Israel to Gath. But when the Ark arrived
at Gath, the Lord’s heavy hand fell on its men, young and old; he struck
them with a plague of tumors, and there was a great panic.
So they sent the Ark of God to the town of Ekron, but when the people
of Ekron saw it coming they cried out, “They are bringing the Ark of the
God of Israel here to kill us, too!” The people summoned the Philistine
rulers again and begged them, “Please send the Ark of the God of Israel
back to its own country, or it will kill us all.” For the deadly plague from
God had already begun, and great fear was sweeping across the town.