The Fall of Dagon

This is a sermon given on the narrative in 1 Samuel 4-6

Israel Judged

If we are just dropping into the story it may seem confusing as to why God allowed Israel to be judged by being defeated by the Philistines, because in chapter 4 they bring the Ark of the Covenant into their camp and everyone gives a great shout and the Philistines are afraid – it seems like faith where Israel is turning to Yahweh for help. But if we know the larger backstory we know that God said that he was going to judge Israel via judgment on Eli’s household. That’s in chapter 2 and 3. 1 Samuel 2:12 says “the sons of Eli were worthless men. They did not know the LORD.” It tells us two of their great offenses. One that they had contempt for the offerings of the LORD in the way they fed themselves on it, and also that they laid with the women who served at the entrance to the tent of meeting. These were incredibly blasphemous and dangerous sins as they were committed not simply out in the camp, though that would be bad enough, but this was done in the house of the LORD and in the worship of the LORD. And we know how seriously God takes His own worship. We are told also that God had rejected Eli the priest and his household, because Eli knew about the sins of his sons and he did not restrain them. Eli, as a priest, did not protect the worship of God. And according to Old Covenant law, his sons were probably deserving of the punishment due to older rebellious sons, that of stoning. This isn’t for our purposes today, but just as an aside, while the covenant situation isn’t the same, there are some incredibly important and serious principles here to consider and apply for fathers and their households, and for the Church and the purity of her worship. Eli did not have his household in order, therefore God rejected Him as being able to be a priest in the household of God. So the purity of the worship of God was not protected in Israel, it was blasphemed and mocked.

So Yahweh out of great righteous jealousy for His name and zeal for the purity of worship pronounced judgement to come upon the house of Eli. So as God often did with Israel when He wanted to judge them, He saw fit to do so through the armies of their enemies. Israel goes into battle when they are not right with God, indeed when God had said that He was going to judge them. So they are initially defeated with 4,000 men being slain on the field of battle. Two things happened in this initial defeat. One, the Israelites did not learn the lesson of humility and repentance, realizing God did not aid them to victory. They did not see this and repent and so go back home and put their own households in order and put the worship of God back in order. But secondly, God had not yet judged the household of Eli as He saw fit to do. So Israel foolishly brings the Ark of the Covenant out to battle to fight for them. They did this without repentance first. There was no concern for dealing with Yahweh in purity. Thus the sins of Eli their priest being shown in them.

It was almost as if they were just flippantly calling upon their God when they were down and out and using the Ark of the Covenant as nothing more than a good luck charm, or a genie in a bottle. They were using it as something that could fulfill their wishes, not as a sovereign God whom they owed their faithful obedience to. So they foolishly go out to battle again in this way and Eli’s two sons are put to death, the ark of the Lord is captured, and Eli falls to his death upon hearing the news.

Israel, and Eli, and Eli’s house are judged by God in death and defeat and the glory departing from Israel.

While it is not a direct one to one, there is great wisdom in applying the basic principles here, that when the Church experiences judgment of some kind, or what is perceived as judgment, our first response should be to humble ourselves before God. We should seek to examine our lives for where we may have sinned before God and then repent of that sin and seek God’s mercy. In times of momentary loss we should be humbled to look where we were not right with God. We should look at our own homes and be sure that they are in order and get them in order before we foolishly double down. Now just because bad things may happen to us, does not necessarily mean God is judging us for some sin in our lives. He gives us trials of various kinds to test our faith and create endurance and strengthen our hope in God. This isn’t just a New Testament principle, if you take Job for example. Nevertheless, it is a sign of true wisdom and humility before God to let our first response be to confess any sin that needs to be confessed in our lives.

So let us know that when the worship of God is defiled, blasphemed, and mocked, God will not tolerate it. He will judge it. Because in judging His own people in such a situation, He does it with the design to defend and vindicate His own name. Just because Israel is judged, does not mean that God is mocked or made to look weak among the nations, as we will soon see and consider.

Dagon Falls

So Israel is judged and secondly, Dagon Falls. Upon capturing the Ark, the Philistines set up in the house of Dagon, their idol and false god, and set the Ark beside Dagon. This is what they would do upon capturing statues or things of other gods in battle, they would set it up in their god’s house as a sign that their god had defeated the one who was captured, and now the captured god was subservient to the other god, being placed in their house. But this of course is not at all what happened with Yahweh God of Israel.

Early the next morning the people go into the house of Dagon only to find him face down on the ground before the Ark of God. We know it couldn’t have been the wind that knocked him over, being inside the house and all. But we know that Yahweh likes to go idol tipping. The Philistines should’ve known that if they were going to mess with the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that they would find their own worthless idols cut from human hands, face down on the ground in a position of total submission and subservience to Yahweh. Dagon, as they so named this stone figure, was bowed down before the God of Israel. But they didn’t quite get the message at first so they put Dagon back up in his place, because of course he couldn’t help himself up off the ground. That’s sort of how false gods and idols work, isn’t it? You have to lug them around and set them up and help them do everything, because they can’t seem to do anything on their own or in their own power. So if you find yourself going after other idols, just remember who is responsible for propping it up in your life.

So the Philistines return again early the next day and behold, Dagon had fallen down again before the Ark of the LORD and his head and hands were cut off and lying in the doorway. Dagon had fallen and his head had been lopped off. Dagon is one letter away from being “dragon,” isn’t it? You see this is how God defeats Satan, that ancient dragon serpent: He gives him the fatal head wound. As anytime we see a head wound in the Bible it should bring our minds back to Genesis 3:15 where the gospel is promised in that the seed of the serpent would bruise the heel of the seed of the women, but that the seed of the women would bruise the head of the serpent. There are several times throughout the Bible where we see God’s enemies defeated with a head wound, and we can be sure that anytime we see a head separated from its body, that the gospel is present. The gospel is about Jesus stepping on the head of a snake. And in this great moment of defeat and humiliation for Israel and in this moment where the enemies of God may believe that they have somehow defeated Yahweh, God is quick to remind them of that ancient promise of victory over His enemies. The heel of the seed of the woman was bruised in the defeat of Israel, but that is because God put down His foot on the head of Dagon. Here we are reminded of Christ, as He was bruised as He hung upon the cross, yet, it was He who was doing the crushing for there He crushed that ancient serpent’s head, delivering the fatal blow.

But not only was Dagon’s head lopped off, but also his hands. The cutting off of his hands signifies his impotence to defend the Philistines from Yahweh. It symbolizes his inability to act or to fight or to do anything at all. He is left with nothing. He has no arm with which to save. I love the contrast in the text between the cut off hands of Dagon and the hand of the LORD that was heavy against the Philistines. Dagon is impotent and Yahweh God actively put His hand on the Philistines in judgment.

But who was Dagon anyway?  Obviously he was an idol and a false god, but what was he supposed to be, because we know some false gods, like what they were, like Zeus you know. Traditionally people have said that Dagon was some kind of fish god or something like that, because supposedly his body had some fish parts or something. But in recent times people are saying well no, the name actually means something to do with wheat. Some people say that we just don’t know. There is a lot of confusion and uncertainty and the point I am making is: see how thoroughly Yahweh defeated Dagon. We don’t even know for sure what he was supposed to be. It is total defeat that he is remembered no more, except as the guy was defeated by God by being knocked over and head and hands knocked off. And I believe that one day when history is all wrapped up and we are in eternity the only memory of other false gods that we will have is just simply that those are all the gods that were defeated by the one true God. Their only memory, if they are remembered at all, will be that that is the one that God did this too, and that’s the one that God did that too. Their only memory will be that of their defeat.

Not only does Dagon fall, but the Philistines also are afflicted. After all, they have no god with head or hands to help them or come to their aid.

The big thing that I want us to recognize here is that God does not only judge His own people, but will also judge the nations as He sees fit. God raises kings and kingdoms and He puts them down. And if we don’t think that He still does that today, then we are fooling ourselves. A sinful and wicked nation such as ours needs to know that God is judging them and will judge them, and if we don’t proclaim that and warn of that and call for our nation to come to Jesus Christ in repentance, then we are not being loving to our neighbor. To act as if everything is alright and to say “peace, peace,” when there is no peace, is only to ask for the furthering of the judgment of God. America has aborted over 60 million babies in the womb since the 1970s, we are an incredibly immoral people, we don’t know what a man or a woman is, we have profaned marriage and the family, we are destroying our children, the land is filled with clowns and apostate churches, and we have rejected the law of God in all areas of life so that there is more injustice and unequal weights and measures than there is justice and we think that we are exempt from God’s hand of judgment coming upon us? Folks, we’re already in judgment! 

God can judge a nation in many ways, but there are two ways that He often does that we see Him do to the Philistines here: Plague and Panic.

Application

The fact is that we in these United States, have good reason to believe that God is judging our nation. As a nation we have rebelled against God in many ways that are deserving of God’s just wrath.

Our nation has sought to make God subservient and subject to the other gods of the age, and masquerades it as pluralism or equality.

Yahweh will not be placed in another god’s house. 

We can’t expect to worship at the house of statism or humanist education, etc. and think we can just set Jesus up in that house. He will not coexist. He will start tipping things over. The people that attempt this will be judged. “The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof.”

Pluralism brings the judgment of God.

Coexist stickers are wrong, not just because the non-Christians are lying, but also because God will not allow it. He will not coexist with our other idols as if He was not the one true God of Heaven and Earth and Lord over all.

Presently, God has pushed over the other gods and the people are panicking as they are beginning to notice that their gods are impotent.

Pluralism particularly brings panic because with conflicting gods, the people see that their gods are not sovereign and not in control, and so they descend into chaos. So the two options for our society are either Christ or chaos.

This we are seeing as the god of comfort, the god of security, the god of mammon, etc. – those gods are being disturbed. Comforts, security, and money are being shown to be not so stable. The people are beginning to see how much their gods are not in control and they are panicking.

God sends such judgements as plagues to drive people to Christ, to see that all other gods are impotent to come to their aid. The only way out of judgment is through repentance.

But for those whose God is the One True Triune God of Heaven and Earth who is the total sovereign over all and who sent His Son to reconcile us to Himself, we can remain calm, and trust, and know that our God is in control, and is not threatened by any other god or man.

Yahweh Vindicated

Despite this judgment on Israel, God was yet merciful. It was a merciful judgment. In one sense, Israel was saved through this judgment of them, and of the Philistines. Because despite being defeated and having the ark captured, it was not the people of Israel who went into captivity. They were not taken captive by the Philistines. Instead, God goes into captivity in the place of His people. They deserved it, but God went in their stead. And when God went into captivity for His people, He toppled the enemy’s gods, defeated His enemies, and then plundered them on the way out. Dagon was left headless, handless, and penniless. God was vindicated in His gospel type work.

This is what Jesus does for us. God Himself, in the person of Christ went into the captivity of death, in the stead of His people. While there He lopped of its head, cut off it’s hands, and plundered it by freeing the dead and securing the resurrection of the dead. All of death’s prize captives are released in Christ.

Even as America undergoes judgment, we know that it is working toward the purifying, sanctifying, and growing of the Church of Jesus Christ.

This is one of the ways God defeats His enemies: He infiltrates and conquers from the inside out. In the New Covenant era, His conquering will often look like conversion, and those converted people, living differently that affects change in the world on the outside. God has toppled empires, barbarism, idol worship, and immoral practices by converting a people. Inside out infiltration.

I’m sure you’ve heard stories of people committing theft, and among the loot happens to be a Bible, that is then read by the criminal and they are converted. God infiltrated that person’s life. Or I’m sure you’ve heard many stories of Christians being imprisoned and the prisoners and guards end up converted.

Or, this is also like the story of St. Patrick. He is kidnapped as slave by the pagan unevangelized Irish people in the 300’s. While in captivity he remembers the Christian religion of his homeland and is converted. He then escapes back to Britain, from where he was taken, and then is convicted that he ought to return to Ireland to preach the gospel to those who enslaved him. He does this and the island is converted. Sadly Ireland has been secularized in our day, but it has an incredibly rich Christian history.

When the world kidnaps, imprisons, or enslaves Christians, or steals from them, it is like stealing the Ark. The Holy Spirit of this same God is indwelt in that person, and you are in great risk.

Conclusion

So let us humble ourselves before the mighty hand of God, and take comfort in knowing that whatever things might look like on the horizon, it is God who is moving and shaking things to the advance and growth of His Kingdom, the good of His people, and glory of His name. Let us have courage and be confident that whatever may happen to us that God is faithful to us in Jesus Christ and so let us be determined to remain faithful and steadfast and God will do what is right.