Rightly Responsible - Exodus 22:1-17

Well, good morning and welcome to Faith Bible Church. For announcements, next weekend we have Sunday service and Sunday school, but all the other events that normally happen on a weekend, we're going to pass on that because of the Fourth of July, so we can celebrate the Fourth as well.

So I wanted a special thanks for Lauren for being on the piano today and everyone else that gives of their time and their energies. So thank you, Richard and Kate. It takes a lot to get up here and to do what we take kind of becomes.

You're used to seeing it pointed this way when you're standing up here. You know, you remember every other word. Things don't you know, it's it's a so it's a it's a work of the Lord. So we thank God for that.

So another reason to celebrate. This is a victory for life this week with the overturning of Roe versus Wade. Pastor took this morning's message for a Bible study and went over the abortion issues. And what is how is it defined, how we can go forward, how we can defend our faith?

What is God's perspective on life? And just to very briefly summarize that God created and this is in Genesis 127. God created man and woman in his image. That's what's different. That's what for a believer.

That's what separates us from the world and their philosophy of what life is. God says that life is from inception. It's from the beginning because he created it from the beginning of time to have that birth, that life.

And if we take it, that is murder by definition. And we have to uphold God's desire for us to to honor what he has given us in that in his life. Psalm 139, 13 and 14. I think I read this at Mother's Day for you formed my inward parts.

You covered me in my mother's womb. I will praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are your works and that my soul knows very well. And I just love that passage of describing what God does in the womb of a woman, of a mother.

It's it's it's absolutely special. God is honored when we respect his image in one another and in life. So we thank God for that's going to save many lives. States still have their ability to do what they do, but many lives are going to be saved because of that.

And after 50 years of prayer, we thank God for that. So why don't we open up our service? Please join me in prayer. Lord God, we are so grateful, Father, for your goodness, for your faithfulness, for the work that you did this week with the overturning row versus Wade father and allowing believers in this country to to rejoice, to step forward and to praise you, Father, for giving the giver of life, the creator of all things.

God, we pray for those that are that are standing in the gap today. Lord, those that are on the front lines of of birth centers, places that that desire to help women in crisis situations, father, and many other ways.

Father, we pray for strength, for physical strength, for protection, for spiritual strength, Lord, because it is a spiritual battle going on around us. So, God, we thank you that you have given us the tools.

We thank you that you have given us your scriptures, father, that we can open up this morning and learn from you and that we can lift our voices, father, and singing praises to you because you are worthy of our praise.

So, God, we thank you for this day. We pray that we might honor you. We pray the Holy Spirit would would be innocent and guide us, father, as we learn more about how we are to to worship and honor you, father.

So we thank you for this day, for this morning. And we are just blessed abundantly. We pray these things in Jesus name. Amen.

Good morning. And let the redeemed of the Lord say so. I'm glad I'm a child of the king. And let's stand and sing to our heavenly father. Thank you.

Please be seated.

I choose a word for this morning is Matthew chapter five, verses thirty eight through forty two. You have heard that it hath been said, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say unto you that you resist not evil, but whosoever shall spite thee on thy right cheek, so will the others also.

And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that access thee, and from him that would borrow thee, turn not thou away.

May the Lord bless you to remember his word.

Let's stand and sing to our Lord.

Please be seated.

The children are now dismissed to children's church as our pastor Iljin Cho comes to preach.

God’s Mercy in the Overturning of Roe v. Wade

As Harold has mentioned, this has been a historic week. Where for the last forty nine years, this country has woken up to a nation that's legalized murder of the innocent babies in the womb. But today, we wake up to the second day in which certain states that are righteous have chosen to protect the unborn babies in the womb.

So it is such an important day, this Sunday, the first Sunday, to celebrate together the overturning of Roe v. Wade. And that is all because of God's mercy for us. Please turn to Exodus 22, verses 1 through 17.

Exodus 22, verses 1 through 17. If a man steals an ox or a sheep, and slaughters it or sells it, he shall restore five oxen for an ox, and four sheep for a sheep. If a thief is found breaking in, and he is struck so that he dies, there shall be no guilt for his bloodshed.

If the sun has risen on him, there shall be guilt for his bloodshed. He should make full restitution. If he has nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft. If the theft is certainly found alive in his hand, whether it is an ox or donkey or sheep, he shall restore double.

If a man causes a field or vineyard to be grazed, and lets loose his animal, and it feeds in another man's field, he shall make restitution from the best of his own field and the best of his own vineyard.

If fire breaks out and catches in thorns, so that stacked grain or standing grain or the field is consumed, he who kindled the fire shall surely make restitution. If a man delivers to his neighbor money or articles to keep, and it is stolen out of the man's house, if the thief is found, he shall pay double.

If the thief is not found, then the master of the house shall be brought to the judges to see whether he has put his hand into his neighbor's goods. For any kind of trespass, whether it concerns an ox, a donkey, a sheep, or clothing, or for any kind of lost thing which another claims to be his, the cause of both parties shall come before the judges, and whomever the judges condemn shall pay double to his neighbor.

If a man delivers to his neighbor a donkey, an ox, a sheep, or any animal to keep, and it dies, is hurt, or driven away, no one seeing it, then an oath of the Lord shall be between them both, that he shall not put his hand into his neighbor's goods, and the owner of it shall accept that, and he shall not make it good.

But if in fact it is stolen from him, he shall make restitution to the owner of it. If it is torn to pieces by a beast, then he shall bring it as evidence, and he shall not make good what was torn. And if a man borrows anything from his neighbor, and it becomes injured or dies, the owner of it not being with it, he shall surely make it good.

If its owner was with it, he shall not make it good. If it was hired, it came for its hire. If a man entices a virgin who is not betrothed, and lies with her, he shall surely pay the bride price for her to be his wife.

If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money according to the bride price of virgins. This is the word of the Lord. Let us pray. Father, we are thankful that you are powerful, your word is sure, and your word is effective in changing our hearts.

Father, we pray that the truth of your word would impact our souls, so that we may live differently, we may think differently, and we may love you more and more as we ought. In Jesus' name, amen. These 17 verses all have to do with our responsibility to another, whether it is the field, animal, or another person, God's law is very specific in how we ought to be responsible to another, especially when there is harm.

Although some of the verses with animals and virgins may be very different from our culture, the principle is the same, which is that God calls us to be faithfully responsible to one another. And this is such an important principle because in our culture, responsibility is all but dead, whether it's in the governmental level, where certain crimes are not prosecuted, which incentivizes petty theft to go on without any consequences, and the store owners are losing their goods and there's no restitution, or even responsibility among the families, fathers abandoning their wives and the children, or parents abandoning their kids for their hobbies rather than discipling them.

They might be physically present, but spiritually, they're not there. Responsibility, however, is an important aspect of Christian life because our God is responsible. He's so responsible that He goes even beyond His merciful because all of us are responsible for full obedience to God, yet all of us, being sinners, fail that.

However, God willingly makes the restitution, restoration possible by sending His Son, Jesus Christ, to die for our sin on the cross. God Himself takes on the debt that we owe because we couldn't be responsible for our own debt.

It was an impossible thing, but with God, He did it. Knowing that, the main point of our passage here is that God requires us to take full responsibility for any harm done to others. God requires us to take full responsibility for any harm done to others.

Restitution for Stolen Goods

First, we must fully restore every stolen good. We must fully restore every stolen good. The first scenario is when a person intentionally takes things that belong to another person. Verse 1, if a man steals an ox or a sheep and slaughters it or sells it, he shall restore it five oxen for an ox and four sheep for a sheep.

This verse specifically is about stolen livestock that is sold or slaughtered already. The punishment for the thief is compensating a fivefold for an ox and fourfold for a sheep. This is a tremendously high price that the thief has to pay.

It is not just okay to replace one for one, but the thief must reimburse multiple times of what he has stolen. In fact, this is greater than the reimbursement that's commanded in verse 4, which says double.

Now, why is that? As you have noticed from the previous law cases, case laws, God's law takes into account the intention of the heart, the intention behind the criminal action. For example, an unintentional homicide would not lead to death, but an intentional homicide would.

Here, in the same way, when the intention for theft is clear, God requires the thief to pay, repay multiple times of what he has stolen. So, this thief here took the extra steps to profit from the stolen goods by slaughtering the livestock, either for food or for selling, or he already sold the livestock for financial gain.

And this is evidence of a clearly wicked intention of the thief to benefit from the loss of another human being. So, God's law punishes according to evidence. The evidence is there because the thief intentionally took the animal for his own profit at the cost of his neighbor's well-being.

Again, God's law punishes according to facts, not feelings. Now, the difference in reimbursement between the ox and the sheep is slightly unclear, but my speculation is because the ox actually has a more crucial role on a daily livelihood in an agricultural business or agricultural life, which most of them were.

So, usually, sheep do not help with tilling of the soil. They don't carry heavy objects. They're just grazing. Now, they're not useful until a specific season when the wool gets collected or the sheep needs to be milked.

But other than that, a stolen sheep is not too costly until that season. However, an ox is essential for daily work, especially if you own a lot of farmland. The person who lost his ox would be more heavily impacted and burdened than a person who lost a sheep.

And therefore, the thief would have to pay in proportion to the damage he has caused. Five oxen for an ox and four sheep for a sheep. Now, verses 2 to 3 go over what happens if a thief is caught during his criminal action.

And each scenario is different depending on the time of the day. First, verse 2 considers the evening. If the thief is found breaking in and he is struck so that he dies, there shall be no guilt for his bloodshed.

Now, if a thief breaks in at night and is struck by the homeowner and dies, the homeowner is not guilty of the bloodshed of the thief. Now, this is because in the ancient times, visibility at night was pretty low.

There was no lamp outside. There was no light switch you could turn on. And candles were even limited too. So, hence, if a homeowner in self-defense strikes an intruder to defend himself, after all, he doesn't know what the purpose of a stranger is doing at his house in the middle of the night.

He can't take his chances. It's either he strikes or he gets struck and he gets killed. In that case, the law and the Lord would not hold him guilty for self-defense. This is important because some claim in the Christian circle that self-defense is not allowed.

And we've just heard Jim read from the Sermon on the Mount about turning the other cheek. Now, turning the other cheek is not to say that you don't defend yourself when you're threatened with life. Turning the other cheek is the forfeiture of vengeance.

It's about letting God avenge you rather than you avenging yourself. After when you're slapped, that's not life-threatening, but it is reputationally and emotionally infuriating. And what's the most common response?

You slap back.

Christians ought not to take vengeance. However, Christians ought to protect themselves, even if it means it can harm the other person. Verse 3 limits the owner's freedom to retaliate. Verse 3 is actually more relatable to turn the other cheek.

If sun has risen on him, there shall be guilt for his bloodshed. When there is light out, it is less threatening for the owner. He can actually tell who it is, maybe what his purpose is if he's holding on to some material goods.

Now you know, oh, he's just stealing. He's not trying to take away my life. In that case, the owner cannot just kill the thief out of anger. That would be vengeance. How dare you try to steal my stuff?

I'm going to kill you. No, actually, the law prevents that. The law actually protects the thief. The law protects and honors the life of even a theft, thief. The punishment has to fit the crime. So self-defense, in this case, does not justify killing another human being when there's enough evidence to know that it is theft, not murder.

Now the latter half of verse 3 to verse 4 deal with the responsibility of the thief. He should make full restitution. If he has nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft. If the theft is certainly found alive in his hand, whether it is an ox or donkey or sheep, he shall restore double.

Here, if the thief is caught, he is required to make restitution. And that's actually for the benefit of the owner and the thief. The owner actually does not lose his wealth, and the thief doesn't lose more wealth than he would have if he had benefited from the stolen goods.

And if the animal is found alive, the repayment is slightly less than discussed above because maybe, just maybe, there's a chance that the thief would have repented and returned the living animals. The Bible takes into account of a possible, a small potential of a change of heart that a thief could repent and decide to return the animals back.

After all, he didn't immediately consume them or sell them off for his benefit. This shows that God's law brilliantly takes an opportunity to repent into account. It is much more merciful than what we'd like.

And this is because God is much more merciful than us. In our culture, restitution is often not sought out by the justice system in this country. Whether it's not even prosecuted, but more often than not, if someone loses their wealth, oftentimes it's not really returned back.

Store owners may not get their stolen goods back even if the thief is caught. And I think that does a huge disservice to both the thief and the store owner, mainly because the store owner still loses what was rightfully his.

And the thief doesn't get to experience the opportunity to return what he has wrongfully taken. I think when we miss that experience of giving back more than what we've taken, we don't get to experience what the other person experienced.

We don't get to empathize the pain that the other person went through when I took some of his money. And that's a huge problem in our culture because we have a culture that can't empathize. It's so self-centered.

It can't see the other person's pain. It can't view the other person's damage. Well, it didn't happen to me, so what? But God's law takes that into account. Even if the thief has slaughtered and benefited from the ox, oh, he's going to have to return fivefold.

See what it felt like for the homeowner you stole from. God's law righteously allowed that experience so that maybe the thief would experience the pain and not do it again. It deterred future theft. In our city, in our culture, a thief is let go, and he does it again.

As long as he doesn't steal a certain amount of money, just a slap on the wrist. And it causes just a cycle of sin against the Lord. And at the core of stealing is a spiritual problem. It's a sin dilemma.

It's a sin issue. At the core of stealing is the doubt of God's goodness and faithfulness. And out of such a doubt, a thief takes something that does not belong to her. At the cost of someone else's livelihood, the thief benefits.

It is self-centered and drenched in self-entitlement. Well, I deserve this more than you. And that is all throughout the culture. And that is distressing. How can you justify taking someone else's hard-earned goods because you believe you deserve more than that person?

And in the church, if stealing does occur, I believe repentance through restoration is the godly path. Return what you have stolen and see if you can make up for any harm that was caused through the theft.

If it is stolen money, pay back what you've stolen in any amount that the money would have accrued in interest during that time. If it's in electronic, buy the newer version for it. We got to restore back what we have stolen.

And of course, confess to God that we have stolen something that doesn't belong to us. Confess to God that we didn't trust God enough to provide for our needs, our desires. Confess to God that we doubted His faithfulness.

Restitution for Negligent Damage

Now, what happens if an unintentional harm is done to another being? The second section goes over that we must restore any unintended damage with our best. We must restore any unintended damage with our best.

From the intentional theft of other people's goods, God's law deals with unintentional damage caused by one's negligence. Verse 5, If a man causes a field or vineyard to be grazed and lets loose his animal and it feeds in another man's field, he shall make restitution from the best of his own field and the best of his own vineyard.

The first scenario is negligence where the livestock of one owner goes beyond the territory and feeds on another man's field. Now, even though the owner did not do that on purpose, you know, he didn't lead the beast to the neighbor's yard and say, now you graze on this.

The neighbor's livelihood is still harmed. If my sheep graze on your land, then your sheep will have less to graze from. And this is an economic harm. It's a financial harm. Even if there's no intention to the harm done, God's law seriously cares about the harmed.

God's law takes care of the victim. Here, the restitution is not just from the equal amount. The restitution is not just from the equal quality, but rather the best. It is not enough to let your neighbor's livestock graze anywhere, but you got to give them the best.

This is the same word used in Genesis 47, 11 when Joseph settled his family in Goshen. Now, Joseph settled his father and his brothers and gave them property in the land of Egypt, in the best of the land, in the land of Ramses, as Pharaoh had ordered.

The land is the highest honor that Pharaoh gave to his prime minister, Joseph, for saving Egypt from a dreadful famine. It was the best of the best, the most fertile land of Egypt. And with that in mind, when someone's property is damaged even unintentionally, God's people are expected to offer their best, the cream of the crop.

The second scenario is similar, an unintentional negligence that causes great harm to another. If fire breaks out and catches in thorns so that stacked grain and standing grain or the field is consumed, he who kindled the fire shall surely make restitution.

Whether it's one's livestock or one's action, God required His people to make restitution. God's people were to be known for placing the damage of the other person at their first interest, as their priority.

God's people were to be responsible for their action in the best way possible. This case law shows us the often common excuse when we unintentionally harm others. I didn't mean it. Or I didn't do it on purpose.

Those excuses will not fly before God. If there is harm due to our negligence, God commands His people to make right with the best that we have. This is a comical Internet post I found, but I say it mainly because it illustrates not following this well.

An owner of an expensive car posts a picture of his damaged car. Very expensive sports car. And he writes a full paragraph about how an anonymous person hit the car, that it was a parked car, anonymously hit it, left a note and some chocolate bars, and put them on the windshield saying, I cannot pay for it because my life is hard, but here's the chocolate bars.

I hope it makes it right. For God's people, this is how we do not respond to our unintentional harm. We have to make it right to the best of our abilities. We have to fully restore the damage that we have caused, even if the damage is done unintentionally.

It does not lessen the damage. For the owner of the damaged good, it doesn't help to hear, I didn't do it on purpose. It's still the damaged good that the owner has to deal with. And if we cannot financially do so, that's a possibility.

Make some arrangement with the owner of the item to repay it over time. It could take a month, two months, even years. But be faithful in restoring to the best of your ability. And that's because we worship a God who makes all things right, not because He has done wrong, but despite the fact that we have done wrong.

It cost Him, Jesus His Son, His life on the cross to restore our broken, alienated relationship with us. To redeem all creation for Himself. As people who worship Jesus, we must represent Him as such.

As Christians, we are a people who have been restored at such a high cost. And we ought to seek to restore anything that's broken due to our negligence. Third, we're accountable to God for how we treat our entrusted goods.

The following cases from verses 7 through 15 deal with the guardianship of another person's good. Someone is entrusting you with his property or his goods so that you take care of it. Now, verses 7 to 9 deal with the theft of the entrusted goods.

First, verse 7, if a man delivers to his neighbor money or articles to keep and it is stolen out of the man's house, if the theft is found, he shall pay double. Verse 7 is quite simple. If the thief is found, then the thief who is the one culpable has to pay double, not the one who is entrusted with it.

And this is very similar to the first part of the chapter. However, verses 8 to 9 become more complicated. If the thief is not found, then the master of the house shall be brought to the judges to see whether he has put his hand on his neighbor's goods.

For any kind of trespass, whether it concerns an ox, a donkey, a sheep, or clothing, or for any kind of lost thing which another claims to be his, the cause of both parties shall come before the judges, and whomever the judges condemn shall pay double to his neighbor.

Certain translations render the word here as judges because the context of the oath. After all, God authorizes human judges to hear the disputes and decide on the punishment, depending on the cases. However, the direct translation for the word judges here is actually God.

So, in another sense, both parties shall come before God, and whomever God condemns shall pay double to his neighbor. In fact, ESV actually keeps it as God. Now, of course, if we read it that way, it is mysterious as to how God will determine who did what wrong, who is at fault.

But the verse still shows that Israel is accountable to God. When there is a dispute, ultimately God will decide who is culpable, whether He uses judges or whether He uses a prophet, but He will decide who's culpable.

That means when there is sin involved, God is involved. It doesn't... Sin does not stay private. God is always involved, and He will 100 accurately know.

Who's culpable.

Now, verses 10 to 13 deal with the case of damaged, entrusted goods. If a man delivers to his neighbor a donkey, an ox, a sheep, or any animal to keep, and it dies, is hurt, or driven away, no one seeing it.

Now, the scenario here is that the animal is damaged in some way, and there's no witness. Similar to the previous case, verse 11 leads the involved parties back to God. Then an oath of the Lord shall be between them both, that He has not put His hand into His neighbor's goods, and the owner of it shall accept that, and he shall not make it good.

It is important to note that the owner cannot take judgment into his own hand after the neighbor's oath to the Lord. The owner has to accept the loss because the Lord is involved now. If the neighbor was lying in his oath, then that neighbor has a bigger problem to worry about than a case of theft.

He just lied to the Lord. And because of that, the owner of the lost goods can rest at ease. It doesn't matter if I think that he actually stole my goods. The Lord will deal with him. It doesn't matter whether I think that tone sounded a bit off.

Did you see his eyes? His eyes, it was switching. He couldn't look at me in the eyes to say, oh, I didn't steal the ox. No, that doesn't matter. It's between him and the Lord now. And the Lord knows the truth.

And He will deal with the theft.

Now, lastly,.

The last case of the entrusted goods is when the good came with a borrowing fee. And if a man borrows anything from his neighbor and it becomes injured or dies, the owner of it not being with it, he shall surely make it good.

If its owner was with it, he shall not make it good. If it was hired, it came for its hire. So if the owner is not with it, then the borrower has to make up for the lost. But if the owner is with it, because the good is in the presence of the owner, the owner has the ultimate responsibility to protect that good, whatever it is.

So the neighbor who borrowed it doesn't have to pay it back. And lastly, if it came with a hiring fee, then the potential for loss is calculated into the hiring fee. Therefore, the owner will bear the burden.

Pretty straightforward here. And this would have put God's people in a smooth society where they wouldn't be taking vengeance upon another for the stolen or damaged good, knowing that the law will govern how they act and knowing that, ultimately, God is in charge.

They don't have to worry about whether they know the truth of the matter or not, because God knows. We can trust God. That's all that matters. Yeah, I lost my ox, but God will deal with it. These case laws allowed God's people to just fully trust God and surrender the outcome to Him no matter how unfortunate and damaging the circumstances were.

You lose an ox, you lose a huge workforce. Expensive. But God, I surrender it to you because you're involved in our lives. Fourth, we must take responsibility for the relational damage to another person.

From the physical goods that get damaged or stolen, we move on to relational damage. One old rabbi called this transition, seemingly awkward transition, from the case of stolen property to that of a stolen heart.

Verse 16, If a man entices a virgin who is not betrothed, not engaged, and lies with her, he shall surely pay the bride price for her to be his wife. This scenario requires some explanation for the modern audience.

In ancient Israel, the custom was that the man would pay a large sum of money to the bride-to-be's father. And when a modern reader hears this, they may think, how degrading. How dare you put a price on a woman?

But it was actually honoring of woman that the bride price would be paid. Consider this. The future husband had to put in a tremendous effort to prepare for and arrange his future covenant relationship with his bride by earning a lot of money to show that he can provide for this bride.

The father, of course, would not give her away, give his precious daughter away just to anyone. How is he going to be sure that this young man will take care of my daughter? He's not. So the bride price would actually show that this young man could be trusted.

After all, he went through all the effort to make an arrangement with me so that the daughter is well taken care of. And in some cases, bride price was returned to the bride. So it was her money. This shows that unlike our culture where you can just get married in one day out on a whim, right?

They took marriage covenant really seriously. It involved the whole family. And I'm not trying to argue for arranged marriages. But in one sense, that was healthier because the family had a say. Hey, I really think this guy is good for you.

I think this guy can provide well for you. I think this guy has the right integrity and manly character to protect you and provide for your offspring. Or in another sense, I don't think this guy is good news at all.

I think he will use you, manipulate you, blame you, and leave you behind. With the ancient culture, that was possible because the family was heavily involved. Now, that was the normal way of courtship back then.

And that was with the presupposition that, that was with the premise that the girl was a virgin because purity was highly regarded. Men would not ask a woman who is no longer a virgin to be married at a high bride price.

And this is what's happening in verse 16. A man entices a virgin. A man deceives a virgin. A man persuades a virgin to sleep with her. And this is a common occurrence in a morally corrupt and degenerate culture like ours.

But such an action would have devastated the future of that woman. Without marrying, her father would not receive the bride price and her family would have to take care of her, possibly for the rest of her life.

She was no longer a qualified bride. And because of that man's dishonorable, selfish action, he ruined not only the future of the young woman to be an eligible bride for a young man who would have taken care of her well, economically, it harmed the family, her family as well.

In such a case, the man has to take responsibility for his action to take her as his wife honorably, following the existing tradition. He had to make sure that the young woman is treated just as a normal bride would.

He had to go through the same process. In fact, there would be no difference between a virgin bride being courted and a woman who's just lost her virginity because the law required the same bride price had to be paid to the father.

You better treat her the same way if you violated her like that. In fact, this law is not degrading to women at all, but it prevented the men of Israel from taking advantage of young women. It prevented men from treating young women just as tools for their pleasure.

But the law viewed the young women as human beings whose future needs have to be honored and secured. This law showed that women aren't disposable, but need to be treated as human beings. And this type of law, not that I'm arguing for same one-to-one correlation, this type of law where men are held accountable from sleeping around with any women they'd like would prevent so much heartbreaks.

Even in a hyper-sexualized culture, there is harm done, and especially to women. And they feel like they've been treated as just disposable tools. What they're looking for is committed relationship, but they were just used for one night of that pleasure.

And this principle would save this culture from further degeneration, because this law showed that women aren't disposable, but they need to be treasured and treated right. Verse 17, however, guarantees the right of the father to protect his daughter if he does not want her married off to that man.

If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money according to the bride price of virgins. If her father does not find the man to be a suitable husband to his dear daughter, he may refuse and still receive the bride price.

And this is because the father may not want to entrust his daughter to a man who seduced her. Many fathers may not welcome that idea. I don't trust that guy. He used her. He deceived her. But the law still required the father to be paid for that sleazy young man to make restitution, compensation, because the father lost the opportunity to obtain the bride price.

And this is important today because we live in a world where people make huge social and relational decisions without considering the consequences. Not every romantic relationship leads to marriage. A period of courtship is to discern whether they are right for one another.

And until they make that vow and say, I do before the witnesses and God himself, they can still say, I don't think you're the one. And I think that's actually good. It's better to go slowly and patiently and discern whether it's the right relationship than to rush into marriage to find out that it's not right.

If men are not pursuing the women as they ought before the wedding, there's no reason to think that the men will lead and pursue their wives after the wedding. That's something to consider. Sadly, even among God's people, we lack mature men who will take responsibility in courtship, who will take responsibility in marriage, who will take responsibility as fathers.