Immerse: Kingdoms Full Volume - Flipbook - Page 84
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IMMERSE
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KINGDOMS
16:30–18:1
his hands on the two center pillars that held up the temple. Pushing against
them with both hands, he prayed, “Let me die with the Philistines.” And
the temple crashed down on the Philistine rulers and all the people. So he
killed more people when he died than he had during his entire lifetime.
Later his brothers and other relatives went down to get his body. They
took him back home and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol, where
his father, Manoah, was buried. Samson had judged Israel for twenty years.
There was a man named Micah, who lived in the hill country of Ephraim.
One day he said to his mother, “I heard you place a curse on the person
who stole 1,100 pieces of silver from you. Well, I have the money. I was
the one who took it.”
“The Lord bless you for admitting it,” his mother replied. He returned
the money to her, and she said, “I now dedicate these silver coins to the
Lord. In honor of my son, I will have an image carved and an idol cast.”
So when he returned the money to his mother, she took 200 silver coins
and gave them to a silversmith, who made them into an image and an
idol. And these were placed in Micah’s house. Micah set up a shrine for
the idol, and he made a sacred ephod and some household idols. Then he
installed one of his sons as his personal priest.
In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right
in their own eyes.
One day a young Levite, who had been living in Bethlehem in Judah,
arrived in that area. He had left Bethlehem in search of another place to
live, and as he traveled, he came to the hill country of Ephraim. He happened to stop at Micah’s house as he was traveling through. “Where are
you from?” Micah asked him.
He replied, “I am a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah, and I am looking
for a place to live.”
“Stay here with me,” Micah said, “and you can be a father and priest to
me. I will give you ten pieces of silver a year, plus a change of clothes and
your food.” The Levite agreed to this, and the young man became like one
of Micah’s sons.
So Micah installed the Levite as his personal priest, and he lived in
Micah’s house. “I know the Lord will bless me now,” Micah said, “because
I have a Levite serving as my priest.”
Now in those days Israel had no king. And the tribe of Dan was trying
to find a place where they could settle, for they had not yet moved into