Today, I am reading and commenting on  Judges 20-21.

When the Israelites mustered to punish the men of Gibeah, who were part of the tribe of Benjamin, the Benjamites rallied to their defense.  The Israelite army initially only asked of God who should take the lead in their assault on the men of Benjamin defending Gibeah.  After a terrible loss on the first day, they asked God if they should continue their assault.  God answered that they should.  After terrible losses on the second day of battle, they once more requested direction from God.  After receiving support a positive answer once more, they returned to battle on the third day with a new tactic.  This time they were victorious.  The army of Israel, excluding the Benjamites, numbered approximately 400,000.  Of those, 10 percent were killed in the first two days of battle.  In the entire battle, over 25,000 Benjamites were killed.  This ended up being a tragedy for all of Israel.  The failure of the people of Israel to address the problem of Gibeah when it was a small issue led to this tragedy.  We need to hold people accountable before the problem gets out of hand.  We need to offer ourselves up for accountability before we get too far from doing the right thing.  Otherwise, tragedy will eventually ensue.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.