(It is interesting, that in the days when the judges ruled, even while great wickedness was going on, that three different men,

related to the same city of Bethlehemjudah, at about the same time, show two very different sides to this:)

Judges 17:6 In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes.

Judges 21:25 In those days there was no king in Israel: every man did that which was right in his own eyes.

(First, there are two accounts, toward the end of the book of Judges, where two Levites leave Bethlehem, and go on to terrible things:)

Judges 17:5a And the man Micah had an house of gods,

  7 And there was a young man out of Bethlehemjudah of the family of Judah, who was a Levite, and he sojourned there.

  8 And the man departed out of the city from Bethlehemjudah to sojourn where he could find a place: and he came to mount Ephraim to the house of Micah, as he journeyed.

  12 And Micah consecrated the Levite; and the young man became his priest, and was in the house of Micah.

(And it says that in those same days, another Levite goes out from Bethlehem:)

Judges 19:1 And it came to pass in those days, when there was no king in Israel, that there was a certain Levite sojourning on the side of mount Ephraim, who took to him a concubine out of Bethlehemjudah.

  2 And his concubine played the whore against him, and went away from him unto her father’s house to Bethlehemjudah, and was there four whole months.

  3c  and she brought him into her father’s house:

  4 And his father in law, the damsel’s father, retained him; and he abode with him three days: so they did eat and drink, and lodged there.

(He leaves Bethlehem with his concubine, turns into Gibeah, where an old man takes them in, and the men of the city surrounded the house, demanding to have the Levite for immoral purposes, when the old man tries to bargain with the men:)

Judges 19:25 But the men would not hearken to him: so the man took his concubine, and brought her forth unto them; and they knew her, and abused her all the night until the morning: and when the day began to spring, they let her go.

  28 And he said unto her, Up, and let us be going. But none answered. Then the man took her up upon an ass, and the man rose up, and gat him unto his place.

  29 And when he was come into his house, he took a knife, and laid hold on his concubine, and divided her, together with her bones, into twelve pieces, and sent her into all the coasts of Israel.

(In those days, when that wickedness was going on, something totally different was going on in the same Bethlehem.

First, Elimelech takes Naomi and his two sons to Moab, to avoid the famine, and they married two Moabite women, one was Ruth:)

Ruth 1:1 Now it came to pass in the days when the judges ruled, that there was a famine in the land. And a certain man of Bethlehemjudah went to sojourn in the country of Moab, he, and his wife, and his two sons.

(The men all die, Naomi hears that there was bread again, so she returns back home, and Ruth goes with her.)

Ruth 2:1 And Naomi had a kinsman of her husband’s, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech; and his name was Boaz.

  4 And, behold, Boaz came from Bethlehem, and said unto the reapers, The LORD be with you. And they answered him, The LORD bless thee.

(Here, Boaz, this man of Bethlehem, at the same time that all the other wickedness was going on, had land and employed reapers.

That was hard labor, and not the highest paying job, yet the reapers answered their boss by saying, "The LORD bless thee".)

(Boaz must have been a godly employer, and good to work for.

So even though that two other men could go out from that same city, to do terrible things,

yet at the same time, in that city, there was a place to work, where the peace and blessings of the LORD were.

We can, in our days, have the same situation, where although wickedness is all around, we can have the peace and blessings of the LORD, in our days.)