Judges 16 - Ruth 2 Recap | OT Ep 32

In this episode, Austin and Ashley study the narratives of Samson, Micah & the Levite in the Book of Judges, exploring themes of betrayal, idolatry, and God's sovereignty. It highlights the consequences of sin and the need for redemption, culminating in a transition to the Book of Ruth, which showcases God's providence and kindness amidst the darkness of the Judges' period.

Reading Plan - Old Testament in One Year
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tSmSv3JOd-gCJS6VSFMtu-iv14NZ45_M/view?usp=sharing

Transcript

Hey everyone,

My name is Austin. And my name is Ashley. Welcome to the Clean Slate Podcast. Where we're finding Jesus in the Old Testament.

Welcome back to another episode of What Has Samson Done Now? Today we're going to be recapping Judges 16-21 and starting Ruth Chapters 1 and 2.

So like I said, chapter 16 continues the Samson narrative. And as we see very early on in this chapter, Samson gets himself into a predicament. Although when you think you're invincible, nothing is a predicament, right?

The kids watch this cartoon video about Samson's story and it's set to this bluegrass type song. It's very catchy. But the song goes, though God was using Samson, Samson had a vice, he went out with evil women if he thought that they looked nice. And y'all, it lives rent free in my head. I'm sorry. I had to share it with you.

So now we get to the Delilah part of the story. I don't think Sampson was very quiet about his interest in particular women. So the Philistines knew that he wanted Delilah. seduce him and see what gives him his strength so that they could overtake him.

So she does, and the Bible doesn't tell us if there was much talk between them prior to this, but the first dialogue from her that we see in verse 6, she just jumps right in with a question, please tell me where your great strength lies and how you might be bound that one could subdue you. Delilah's going for the subtle approach, apparently. He tells her if he's bound with seven fresh bow strings that have not been dried, then he would become weak.

Now Samson is just messing with them because one, that's not true. And two, bowstring that have not been dried would have been like wrapping him with silly string. A dried bowstring would have been much stronger and the Philistines would have known that. So the fact that they actually fell for this shows their intense haste to capture him.

So Delilah screams like she's so surprised, the Philistines are upon you, Samson. But their capture attempt fails, and she basically admits to betraying him and gets mad because he made her look stupid. Well, bless both of their hearts. So the fact that there is even a round two shows the state of arrogance that Samson has. But she asks again.

This time he tells her they have to bind him with new ropes that have never been used. Then he will become weak like any other man. But the same result occurs and he busts out of those bonds no problem.

So round three, she asks again, how can you be bound? And he tells her, if you weave the seven locks of my head with the web and fasten it tight with the pin, then I shall become weak like any other man.

And the word web here, think like a loom used to weave clothing together.

So while he slept, she does this and cries again, ⁓ no, the Philistines are upon you, Samson. But again, he pulled away from the loom, the pen, and the web and broke free.

Verse 15,

She said to him, how can you say I love you when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times and you have not told me where your great strength lies. And when she pressed him hard with her words, day after day and urged him, his soul was vexed to death.

And unfortunately, Samson did not learn his lesson with the first wife, nor from these three previous scenarios with Delilah's obvious betrayal.

He tells her, his heart, the Bible says, meaning he was being truthful and she knew it too.

So now listen, I know that y'all are all shocked, but she cuts his hair and says again in verse 20, no, the Philistines are upon you Samson. And he awoke from his sleep and said,

will go out as at other times and shake myself free. But he did not know that the Lord had left him, meaning the strength God had given him was gone.

And the Philistines seized him and gouged out his eyes and brought him down to Gaza and bound him with bronze shackles. And he ground at the mill in the prison. we see this practice of blinding an enemy and forcing him to grind grain at the mill in several other ancient texts, one of which being letters from the Hittite people from the 14th century. So it's quite possible.

The Philistines could have adopted this practice from the Hittites, which I found that super interesting.

Anywho, look at verse 22. But the hair of his head began to grow again after it had been shaved.

Now, let's make something completely clear. Was Samson's hair magical? No. His strength came from the Lord. His hair was a symbol of his God-given strength. but the regrowth of his hair could indicate that Samson's faith was renewed in the Lord rather than in himself. So let's keep reading. The Philistines throw a celebration and sacrifice to Dagon.

their God, forgiving Samson into their hand. And they brought Samson out so that they could be entertained and mock him. They made him stand between the middle pillars of the structure.

And in verse 28, we see something we haven't seen before. Then Samson called on the Lord. Now we are getting somewhere. I see you Samson.

Samson's strength returned to him and he pulled down the pillars and the entire building came crashing down.

While Samson called on the Lord for a little bit of personal revenge rather than protection of God's people,

The Lord knew that, didn't He?

Like we've seen over and over again, God even uses sinful hearts to accomplish his purposes, which ultimately he desires to turn his people back to him.

not let him fall, he never would have been humble enough to call on the name of the Lord. It would have always been Samson's own strength that he pridefully relied on. But Samson gave his life and fulfilled the Lord's purposes. God used Samson to destroy 3,000 Philistines, which was more than he had killed his entire life. For a surprising gospel glimpse here from Samson,

He wouldn't be the only man in history betrayed for silver or mocked or to give his life for God's people. But unlike Samson, it wouldn't be Jesus' own sin that got him in this situation. It's our sin,

And aren't we thankful that while Samson is a small shadow of a figurative Christ, that Jesus completes everything to the full. He is the greater than.

We see that God has worked again through sinful men, these judges, to deliver Israel and to protect His own name and reputation. So how is Samson like King David? He really isn't. But Samson does pave the way for a king for Israel. But we aren't finished with judges just yet. In the following chapters, the nation's apostasy sinks to even deeper levels.

And the stage is set for the coming of this faithful King, ultimately King David, who will restore moral order.

As we begin a new narrative in Judges, I want to call attention to chapter 17 verse 6 where it says,

early in the story of Micah and Eliabat, ought to let you know that this is going to go poorly.

The story opens up with a man named Micah who seemed to have stolen 1,100 pieces of silver from his own mother. He returns them to his mother and she dedicated the silver to the Lord. And it actually says,

to the Lord from my hand for my son to make a carved image and a metal image.

Y'all, I've read the Bible before, but the whole thing cover to cover. But every time I come back through, I find a story like this that I'm not as familiar with and it blows me away.

At this point, really aren't that many generations from the beginning of the law itself, so quickly the people have descended into thick idolatry.

to point that this lady is dedicating this silver to the Lord and simultaneously making an idol out of it.

So the story continues that Micah makes his own son a priest to this false god and even had an ephod made for him. There is so much wrong in this picture. obvious, as I have stated, is that this is a false god. son being made a priest. priesthood is for the Levites alone. It is not a public office that one can just hold.

Micah and his family were not Levites, they were of the tribe of Ephraim.

Again, I mentioned the Ephod. There was only one of these made and it was for the high priest in Israel.

So essentially what Micah is doing by giving his son, Ephud, is that he is saying that he is the high priest over their house.

We get a little further into the story and we see that a Levite was passing through and actually came to Micah's house. Micah strikes up a conversation with him and

One thing led to another and Micah wound up offering this Levite a job where he would pay the unnamed Levite and that Levite would be the priest of Micah's household.

Levite, who of all people should have known better, takes the job. Micah says to himself, quote, Now I know that the Lord will prosper me because I have a Levite as priest.

Y'all again, so much wrong. Micah knows enough to know that only a Levite should be a priest, but doesn't have either enough knowledge or faith to know that God is not going to prosper worshiped these false gods.

Chapter 18 begins by another reminder that there was no king in Israel.

We're also reminded in verse 1 that the tribe of Dan still has no inheritance in the land.

We see this originally accounted for in Joshua chapter 19, where the tribe of Dan was not able to dispossess their portion of the land from the Canaanites.

The people of Dan sent out five men to scout out the land and to try to find a place for them to settle.

As they were traveling through, came by the house of Micah, and the Bible says they actually recognized the voice of the young Levite that Micah had set up as priest over his household.

The men of Dan asked the Levite how he got there, like what he's doing there now. The Levite tells him about how Micah had hired him and made him a priest. So the men asked him, since he is a priest after all,

to ask God how this trip will go for them. The Levite, who doesn't seem to take time to pray or anything, told them right away that they would be successful.

not that you need to be convinced of this Levites apostasy at this point, but as priest he ought to know better than to so flippantly use the name of God in this way. So that's pretty telling.

The five spies leave and are in fact successful in finding a land for the people of Dan to settle in.

a small army of people of Dan sets out to take the men have found, and when they do, they make a stop by the house of Micah as well. When this force gets to Micah's house, all five of the men that had stopped the first time go in and start taking the carved image, the Ephod and the household gods, and the metal image.

The Levite asked them what they were doing and the men of Dan told him that it would be better for him to be quiet and come with them so that he could be a priest over an entire tribe than over one household.

Bible tells us that in verse 20 that this made the priest heart glad. Guys, this is very disheartening. Being a priest in this covenant was a big deal. The Levite had already abandoned God by becoming a priest

these false gods But now his turning away from what it meant to be a priest to God takes another turn when he then leaves ⁓ that post for a more lucrative post and one that would give him quote more honor.

I want to take a moment and just say that in the new covenant we live in today, that we have only one priest, and that is Jesus Himself. But Christ did set up elders and pastors to guide and teach and watch out for our souls. These men are not perfect, and they need grace just like we do. is a cautionary tale for anyone who would take on that role. Do not chase a position.

We see in the New Testament that desire in the office of elder is a good and godly desire. But friend, it needs to be a desire born from the Spirit and one that leads to servanthood and not self-gratification.

back into our story here, Micah sees all this happening and tries to stop it, but clearly there are too many of these men. Of course, they're armed and they warn him not to try it. Micah wisely takes their advice and goes back home.

small army goes on and takes the land aiming to conquer. The main city of that land was named Laish, but they destroyed it and rebuilt it. When they did, they named it Dan after their tribe.

At the end of chapter 18, we see that the people of Dan set up the car of the image they had stolen from Micah's house for themselves. And we finally learned the name of the young Levite we've spent the last two chapters talking about.

His name was Jonathan, son of Gresham, son of Moses.

Think now about Moses and how God told him at the end of his life that people would quickly fall into sin

Friends, as we've said in the past, sin leaks. There is no one who is immune to its destructive nature save one. Our promised Lamb, Deliverer and Redeemer, the Great High Priest, King Jesus.

The last three chapters of the book of Judges are really one big narrative and I think it's probably best to cover it in that way. I would also say that I think it's probably the darkest narrative in the whole book. The story starts out with a Levite who is sojourning Ephraim. Levite has a concubine and right here you should know this isn't going to go well. God had made it pretty clear that this isn't the sort of relationship that he's okay with already in the Torah.

I do want point out here that even though these two, the Levite and the Concubine, are the catalysts our story, we never actually learned their names. That is unusual for biblical recounting or storytelling, but I think it's likely because what the story shows, namely the dark nature of the human heart apart from the grace of God, is more important than the names of the characters.

concubine had been unfaithful to him and she had went to stay with her father in Bethlehem of Judah. After four months, the Levite went to what the Bible says, speak kindly to her, and in verse three, he's trying to bring her home. was received gladly by the lady's father.

The lady's father showed him an immense amount of kindness and was a really good host. In ancient Near Eastern culture, and especially in Hebrew culture, being a good host was a social norm and expectation. This father, however, went above and beyond. After a multitude of days, the Levite and his concubine finally pull away from the father's hospitality. So if you've not read it, they try to leave several times, but dad just keeps saying, no, no, stay one more night, stay one more night.

So as they're journeying home, they come upon a few cities. It's getting later in the day. ⁓ The first city they get to was Jabes, which would later be renamed to Jerusalem. But the Levite didn't want to stop there because it was controlled by outsiders. So, you know, a land, not Israel. So he chooses to stop at Gibeah.

Now right here, I want you to stop and realize something. This is the same city that was the capital of the people that fooled Joshua into making a covenant with him.

So think with me for a moment. If Joshua, all these years earlier, would have had his wits about him, and these people of Gibeah weren't able to fool him into making this covenant with him, what could have been? And now, generally, guys, we don't want a what if the Bible, but think about this just for a moment for me. If Joshua doesn't get fooled, then these people with these very, very sinful behaviors and desires,

get pushed out of the land and they don't commingle with Israel. This ensuing disaster probably doesn't happen.

back into our narrative, they enter into Gibeah, the Levite and the concubine, and no one takes them in for the night, which is a dramatic contrast from the last host they had, right? And it would seem strange, wouldn't it? If you know, again, much with these hospitality laws I mentioned, it would have been frowned upon for no one to take them into their house.

also not from Gibeah but is sojourning there is coming back into the city from working and sees them setting up to stay in the town square for the evening. This man advised him into his home and in verse 20 he says, Only do not spend the night in the town square.

Now if this seems familiar to you, it is setting up eerily similar to the story of Sodom and Gomorrah from Genesis. The story continues, and the men of Gibeah come out and surround the man's house. They told him to bring out the man, talking about this Levite, so they may know him, which would mean they were trying to violate him.

The owner of the home goes to the door and actually offers up his virgin daughter and the Levites concubine in place of sending out the man. Y'all, this alone is such a heartless and mind-numbing thing to suggest. But then when the men wouldn't listen to him, he actually grabbed the concubine, threw her outside, and then shut the door.

The Bible tells us that the men of the city abused her all night and would not let her go the dawn was breaking.

As the sun rose, the Levak came outside to her and said, get up, let us be going.

Again, I don't have enough words to say how awful this whole situation is. I can't imagine being that callous to anyone, let alone someone you're supposed to care about. The poor lady didn't answer because she was dead. Then, as if that were enough, he puts her body on the donkey and heads home. And once he gets home, he cuts her body into pieces and sends one piece

to each of the tribes of Israel.

Verse 30 of chapter 19 says, Such a thing has never happened or been seen from the day that the people of Israel came up out of the land of Egypt until this day. Consider it. Take counsel and speak.

As in other times in Judges, the people came out to MISPA take counsel together.

It's important to note that Gibeah was located in the tribe of Benjamin and even though the tribe of Benjamin was aware of what happened, they did not come to this gathering.

So when the 11 tribes came together, they actually filled in an army of 400,000 men.

know from the Levite what happened and he explained to them what happened at Gibeah.

the people took counsel together, they decided to make war against the tribe of Benjamin, which has overtones Moses told the people back in the Torah, which was to purge the evil from your midst. Remember, in times of extreme sin, God may well judge the whole people of Israel if the sin is not dealt with.

Now, will say here, what happens after this moment is probably an overreaction what Moses said.

the 11 tribes of Israel go out to meet Benjamin in battle, the 11 tribes deployed their 400,000 men and Benjamin deploys its 26,000 men.

Oddly enough, Benjamin got the better of Israel for the first two days of fighting, and in those two days, 40,000 men of the 11 tribes were killed.

After that second day, Phineas, yes, that is the same Phineas from the other stories we've heard, goes to inquire of God.

And by the way, that timeline of Phineas being alive in chapter 21 of Judges seems strange, it's because Judges isn't really in chronological order. This story would have actually taken place earlier in the period of the Judges.

which shows just how fast the people spiraled out of control.

God tells Phineas to send the people out to fight one more time and that he would give Benjamin into the hand of the Israelites.

The battle does indeed go in favor of the 11 tribes and they do perform what Moses said, but they actually destroy not only Gibeah, but all of the cities of Benjamin. After all of that death and destruction, only 600 men of all the tribe of Benjamin remained alive.

last chapter, chapter 21, contains these two bizarre plans the people of Israel come up with to get wives for the remaining men of Benjamin. It's important to them that they do this

because they recognize that the tribe of Benjamin doesn't need to be cut off from Israel, meaning that if they don't help them find wives, the tribe will not have any future generations.

The people meet together again to figure out how to take care of this issue. A thing to know is that they had previously made an oath to not give any of their daughters to the tribe of Benjamin to marry. So that wasn't going to be solution. They, know, air quotes here, inquire of God, but it seems like they didn't actually wait for an answer and they just went straight into the planning phase.

For these folks, and for us, this should be a red flag. We need to remember to take time in prayer before making major decisions.

The first plan they came up with was to attack a city that did not offer any soldiers in the battle against Benjamin. They actually again killed everyone in the city except for 400 virgins. The plan was to give these young ladies, and if you read the passage, it is clear they weren't children, as wives to the 600 men of Benjamin. as if this wasn't bad enough,

The other plan was that they told the remaining 200 men to raid a festival to God and take the young women who were dancers at the feast.

So after all that, the remaining men of Benjamin and their new wives, kidnapped wives, returned to the destroyed cities

to rebuild the inheritance of Benjamin.

So this story marks the end of a hard book to soldier through, What are we to make of this book? How does this help us?

is that even with the Law of God being written down for the people, the people aren't able to walk in an upright manner for long. Even with the priest sacrificing day and night, the sin is ever continuing.

Even with the judges, total victory over the enemies of God remains elusive.

Y'all, what we are to make of this is that all of these things that I mentioned are good, of them can save from sin. This is why God promised all the way back in Genesis 3 that He would send one through Eve that would crush the head of the serpent and give us rest.

Even though we did have a few gospel glimpses along the way of her judges, let's transition now into Ruth, which coming out of judges is going to feel like a ray of sunshine after a dark and stormy night.

That's exactly right, Ruth is in fact a ray of sunshine. Friends, we made it.

Austin and I have been waiting to get to this book since January. It's one of our favorite books to mainly because in this book we see so clearly the Lord's sovereignty and kindness, both physically and figuratively, in Boaz. The story is titled Ruth, but it realistically could have been titled Naomi, as she's very central and could be even considered the catalyst of things that happen.

You could also make a great argument for the book to have been called Boaz.

in a lot of ways, he is a Christ-like figure in the story. Without giving too much away, I think it is most appropriate that the story is called Ruth,

because it shows how the faithful member of God's family, Boaz, takes for his bride, Ruth, a foreigner who doesn't have any right to be there, in the same way Christ took us as his bride when we didn't have the right to be his. This story takes place sometime during the time of the judges. We don't know what judge this takes place under, but just coming out of the book of judges where everyone did what was right in their own eyes,

You guys have a great understanding on what the time of the judges looked like. So the Book of Ruth is unique in several ways. Number one, most of the story is told by dialogue. In Hebrew, it's about 52 % dialogue, which for a biblical narrative is definitely high. Number two, the name of Yahweh is only mentioned by Ruth one time, and that's in the opening chapter.

This book is all about God's providence, but in such subtle ways, what Austin and I like to call the mundanely miraculous. Just the everyday ordinary things that we all take for granted, but God is using every single circumstance to draw people to himself

and to bring himself glory.

Number three, this is the only time we get a glimpse into how the law of a kinsman redeemer or a Goel functioned in the society. There are big gospel connections here, but we will talk about those once we get into the book. So let's jump into chapter one.

I didn't give you much of a setting because chapter one sets that up nicely for us. There was a famine in Bethlehem in the land of Judah, so this family decides that they have no choice but to go to Moab. and his wife, and their two boys, Malon and Kilion, travel to Moab to sojourn, but end up staying there for 10 years.

By the way, Malon in Hebrew means sickly or weak, and Killian means wasting away. These poor guys, what terrible names they have. Unfortunately, Elimelech and Malon and Killian die,

and Naomi is left with her two daughters-in-law, who were Moabites. Now, marrying a Moabite would have been highly frowned upon, primarily due to their commitment to pagan gods, particularly Molech and Chimosh.

And remember the whole debacle with Balaam?

but in the place they were in, Alimelec and Naomi knew they weren't leaving anytime soon due to the famine and the boys weren't getting any younger. So I'm sure they allowed this under these circumstances.

So Naomi is left without her husband and her boys and finds herself in a particularly desperate situation. I mean, if she was at home in Judah, it would have been bad enough. But at least there, there were laws from the Lord to care for widows. Here in Moab, there were no such commandments or laws of that nature. There was no social security or a food stamp program to help them. But

Naomi overhears that there's food again in Bethlehem. So Naomi and her daughters-in-law, Ruth and Orpa, prepare to leave Moab. But Naomi tells the women to go home and remarry while they're still young enough. And this is a very emotional moment for these ladies.

mean they are a family of widows all of them having lost the men that they love she considered them daughters it's a definitely a very emotional time in verse 14 we see orpa kissed her mother-in-law and went home but Ruth clung to her

Now, Orpah oftentimes gets a lot of heat for this in people's teachings. Some even go as far as accusing her kiss of being equivalent to Judas' kiss of betrayal to Jesus. And this is just unfair to Orpah. Now, this likely means she was returning to worship her gods also, which we don't want for her. But just to say that she betrayed Naomi, that is just preposterous. Ruth, however,

clings to her and Naomi tries again to get her to go home. But in verse 16, Ruth said,

Do not urge me to leave you or return from following you. For where you go, I'll go. Where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people and your God my God. Where you die, I will die and there I will be buried.

May the Lord do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you.

So Ruth swears this oath using the name of Yahweh, inviting punishment on herself if she were to break it.

She is serious about going with Naomi, but also about serving the one true God. And we see that in her using Yahweh, which is His personal divine name. So they come home, and as we get into this section, think about how the book of Judges seems to operate. If you do the bad thing long enough, God will bring judgment upon you. Naomi feels like that's what's happened to her

because she uses that language of the Lord testifying against me.

tells the women of the city, don't call me Naomi, call me Mara. Now, Naomi means pleasant and Mara means bitter. Now, I don't think she really meant call me Mara, Hebrew culture, your name was supposed to describe you and she no longer felt pleasant, but she felt bitter.

Naomi does not see God as distant or far off from her problems, but rather involved in everything as all Hebrews did. She doesn't say, don't call me Naomi because I'm falling on hard times, or I've had a run of bad luck, or because this is an attack of the enemy.

Now, while we do fall on hard times and we do have a real enemy fighting against us, think about how many times you've heard the enemy mentioned thus far in the Old Testament. Very few. Genesis, of course. And I think one time when the serpents were plaguing the Israelites in the wilderness.

And even then, you still have God in absolute, all sovereign control and contrary to punishing her for sin, what she will soon find out is that her troubles will provide the need for Ruth to glean for food. So let's move into chapter two and see what happens to these two ladies.

In chapter 2 verse 1, we are introduced to Boaz, who is a relative of Naomi's, and the Bible calls him a worthy man, or in Hebrew, a Haiel. This could be a warrior, a powerful person in the community,

or someone with excellent character. So in other words, this is not just your typical guy. And Boaz is going to be our type and shadow of Jesus through this story.

So in verse two, Ruth tells Naomi, let me glean in the fields. And remember, in the law, God said the corners of the field, which were not necessarily the good parts, by the way, were to be left for the people who are in Ruth's position. This is what Ruth was really thinking when she went out to do this.

Naomi agrees to this and in verse 3 it says she happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz. Now the Hebrew here is literally saying her chance chanced upon that field. So she just so happens to come to Boaz's field.

And Boaz tells her in verse eight, now listen, my daughter, do not go to glean in another field or leave this one, but keep close to my young women. Let your eyes be on the field that they are reaping and go after them. charged the young men not to touch you? And when you are thirsty, go to the vessels and drink what the young men have drawn. Remember our context that this is in the time of the judges. Gleaning was not exactly a safe practice, especially for women.

So Ruth asked him, why have I found favor in your eyes, especially since I'm a foreigner?

This gesture would have been gracious of Boaz if Ruth were an Israelite, much less a foreigner and even more a Moabite.

But Boaz had learned about Ruth's kindness to Naomi and therefore knew her intentions were good.

So he even invited her to dinner and offered her bread and wine, which that sounds familiar, doesn't it? You have a man of great worth serving someone who by all accounts shouldn't even be at the table, let alone in the house. In the same way, Christ did that for us on the cross. We were sinners and we were Gentiles,

and yet he offers us his body and his blood to welcome us into his house.

Ruth ate until she was satisfied, and then she had some left over.

And at this point, Boaz's kindness goes from courteous to flirtious, if you know what I mean. He tells his men to let her glean not just the corners, but among the sheaves too, and pull out some from the bundles and leave it for her.

And the Bible tells us that when she was done gleaning and beating out the barley, that it was an ifah of barley, or 22 liters, which would have been at least a two week supply for these two ladies.

Now Ruth comes home and Naomi sees what might as well have been two dozen roses. She sees this extravagant gift plus the leftovers from dinner and asks, where did you glean today? Blessed be the man who took notice of you. Of course, Ruth says, Boaz and the wheels start turning in Naomi's head. She says, the man is a close relative of ours, one of our redeemers.

So Ruth kept close to the young women of Boaz, gleaning until the end of the barley and wheat harvests, and she lived with her mother-in-law. For time purposes, this would have been at least a couple of months, because it says that they came back to Bethlehem at the beginning of barley harvest. Then she gleaned through barley harvest and through wheat harvest, which would have been several weeks after barley harvest ended. So next episode, when we pick up in chapter three,

Please know that this was not just the next week, okay? And we'll see more of how this story unfolds in the next episode. May His grace abound to you and to me as we study to find Jesus in the Old Testament.