Paul instructed his fellow-worker Titus to find in Crete some men who could be elders for the churches on the island. Doing so is not a whimsical venture. So Paul lays out some things for Titus to look for to determine and gauge what these guys’ character should display. One trait he highlights is being a ‘lover of good.’
This seems simple enough, but what does it mean to be a lover of good? It is easy for me—and maybe you—to say, ‘Yes, I love good.’ But when I thought more and delved into the devotion of my own intentions, I became worried. For when I initially thought of if I love good I thought of something positive and then looked at the associated feeling or desire. Correct thinking soon followed: just because I like something when I think of it does not mean that I love it. I soon found that I root for good a lot, but it is often like cheering on your stock as it climbs higher and higher: the results are going to positively affect my bank account. But rooting for is nowhere in the vicinity of loving; unless I have some sad affection for money, I do not actually LOVE my stocks in the stock market; I do desire them to do well so I can have a good investment so I can earn more money so I can do more things with money, but I don’t love stocks or money; they are necessary and helpful. (This is when, in my thinking, my tranquil complexion started to grow into a frown.)
What does it mean to LOVE good? If we look at what love entails through the logic of the Bible—a good place to look since that is where the question arose—we have a helpful guide. To love something Biblically means everything. When Jesus talked about loving our enemies he talked about laying aside all our desires of self-promotion and vengeance for the sake of aiding their soul and even at times their ventures. When Jesus talked about the greatest love one could have for another he talked about the laying down of ones life: willingly giving up yourself totally for another. When Jesus talks about a husband and wife he talks about forbearance, patience, seeking the good of the other, humility, sacrifice, actions and inactions that positively promote the character and life of the other, intentions, dipping into every area and aspect of what it means to live.
So, do I, do you have this particular proclivity for good? Does your life wreak of promoting—for goodness’ sake—good?
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Prostitutes, Gangs, and Investing: Wisdom: some have it and some do not
For further inquiries ask me or be helped by the commentary on Proverbs by Duane A Garrett in the commentary series The New American Commentary. My words are an over-view of how to look at and study the book of Proverbs
‘The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge’ goes the proverb in the beginning of the book by the same name. Seems simple enough. Then why are most other verses in this book quip sayings or caveats about day-to-day living? Exactly.
What does it mean to ‘fear the LORD’? Should we cower in a corner as God emulates a drunken Father who walks about not knowing if He may or may not beat us to death? Is it that kind of crippling, disabling fear that is spoken of here? Should we be constantly looking over our shoulder wondering when the Almighty Creator of all things will, on a lark, decide to come down and be mean? Fortunately this does NOT entail what it means to ‘fear the LORD.’
To fear God is to take into account all that He is and is capable of and what He wills and with all that in mind soberly live in a way that honors Him. Fear can be healthy and good. When you are swimming in the ocean it is good to fear the power of the waves and the depths and darkness of its area, and even sometimes the creatures that live inside it; but you are still enjoying the swim. You have knowledge of the ocean, you know there are creatures that can eat you, you know there can be undertows that drag you out to places where you’d rather not be but you still swim in it. You still can enjoy it; you fear it but you respect it and are wise when you enter it. This is all that fearing God is; it is not living on eggshells but it is living with a knowledge of God and His good boundaries which He has given to us.
Then why are there so many sayings? You’ll notice in proverbs that many times there seems to be confusing as well as contradicting words: ‘answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes’ in Proverbs 26 immediately follows the verse that says, ‘answer NOT a fool according to his folly, lest you be like him yourself.’ Soooooo, what to do: verse 4 or 5? You decide! That’s right; walking according to the fear of the Lord means having discernment and wisdom--of people, the situation, the words spoken, etc.. God gives people the freedom and responsibility to use their brains to decide what is best in any particular instance.
If you just jump to all the ‘practical’ sayings in proverbs as many businessmen have done over the centuries without taking into account the first seven verses of the book you miss entirely the benefit and point of the book. Proverbs is not about having the best portfolio at the end of your life nor is it about having a Fu-Manchu, being bald, wearing a robe, and spouting off one-liners as you sit on a mat with your legs crossed; Proverbs is about God and about living a life that honors him, EVEN in the seemingly insignificant day-to-day decisions and parts of life. It offers wisdom on how to quell a hot-tempered person; how to think for the future; what it means to carry a good name; how to honor the poor; how to act in a king’s presence; how a king or ruler should act; how to look for a spouse; how to raise children; the responsibility of families to educate their children—not the State; it gives us active wisdom.
Proverbs are wise even in their makeup as they are short and fairly easy to remember—this being so you WILL remember and follow them. Some give advice; some make us reflect; some are more intense than others and some are specific and others grander. The Proverbs seem all muddled together, but this is how life is—different things come up at random times. A thousand things can be coming at once but a Proverbs-trained mind will be ready for such life-chaos. Unlike other parts of Scripture many of the sayings can be taken out if its context, because there rarely is context. When studying, though, you will notice some proverbs are intentionally grouped together so be mindful and be smart.
As a rule Proverbs are wise generalizations. There are exceptions to everything but on the whole, Proverbs says, this is how life goes. Proverbs are not ambiguous like other passages in the Bible often are—this is why they are attractive to many; instead, these are straight-forward easily applicable words. Don’t think, yea I get it that I should not be one to take bribes but what does it REALLY mean; it REALLY means what it actually says, so take the wisdom as it plainly is; the Bible is not a huge puzzle: God putting you through a strainer for no reason.
As far as authors go, for our purposes it does not really matter. Some are entitled in the Proverbs themselves. They are collected and compiled works. Many other cultured had similar saying—for example the Egyptians—so the style is not unique.
When studying Proverbs it is helpful to know some of the intended sections of the book:
Chapter 1 verse 8 – 9.18 is targeted mainly to young men. You see in the beginning, ‘Listen, my son . . . ‘ and the father goes on listing out things and teaching for the next few chapters. It is interesting to note the things that are talked about. Essentially the young man is taught to steer clear of gangs—companions who are out for self-fish gain, quick to shed blood and violence, those who are always devising evil; and also to stay away from women who lack moral integrity—prostitutes, sluts, and adulterous women. For a young man learning what it means to be a wise, godly man these issues hit the heart. As I have been able to work with some kids I know these tendencies, especially in the urban setting, are real and the instruction Proverbs yields is incredibly insightful. Also in this section the father figure tells how both wisdom and folly are present if sought; both are calling out from the street corners saying and promising the very same things. So WISDOM is needed to discern that right way.
After 9.18 Proverbs goes to what we are most familiar with as little sections providing wisdom in seemingly every area of life. The exception to note is a grouping from 22.17 – 24.22 and this section is simply called The Thirty Sayings and that is exactly what it is.
Perhaps the most famous section is the Sayings of Lemuel (31.1 – 31.31). The first of its two sections tells how a king should rule and what he should be doing. The second section (10 – 31) is the picture of the mid-aged exceptional wife: one that all women should aspire and men should imitate.
There is so much good from this book of sayings that it can easily be disregarded as ‘not the gospel’ and ‘not spiritual enough.’ But those who would ignore the book of Proverbs ignore the blessings of the Lord and know not what it means to be in awe and reverence. We cannot ignore that life is full of complexities and baffling situations. The lazy and ignorant and foolish will have a price to pay if wisdom is not sought. God is graciously helping us be who He designed us to be. He speaks to us, telling us how we can best honor Him even in the smallest of life’s places. He loves His children and THAT is why He teaches us.
‘Where is Jesus?’ some might ask. I would answer that he is coming—some books to the right—but here we are to be guided by the Word of God—which Jesus is—and by guided by Gods great gift to His followers, the Holy Spirit.
Proverbs 19.2: ‘Desire without knowledge is not good, and whoever makes haste with his feet misses his way.’ Don’t be found lacking. God says in the book of James if anyone lacks wisdom let him ask God for it. Be the wise son or daughter and listen to the instruction of Proverbs.
I leave you with a quote from the afore mentioned commentator: ‘Wisdom is not some hidden treasure that has to be dug from the depths of the earth . . . wisdom is not abstract, secular, or academic but personal and theological. To reject wisdom is to reject God. The wise are at ease because they have genuine security; the foolish are at ease out of carelessness.’
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
09-12-2008
If not you then who; if not you then what?
Are you the same: taking hope and giving pain?
No, you’re just wild and misunderstood
You do all you want and everything good.
The still steaming steal, I am;
Broken, deformed, harassed, gashed
Now cold, clumped, corroded: chaos.
Groans me from my bile.
You put me there when you left me here
You have unmade me.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Jesus Was Sick
I had the flu the week prior to Christmas. Having the flu or being in a sick state is no good. We often say while in a sick state that we are not our normal self; Why do we say that? We say this, obviously, because we cannot reason, think, speak, act with the capacity we regularly are able. But I might argue that we are, in some ways, MORE ourselves when we are sick or incapacitated. When we are ill we are unable to use our normal filters, our societal or self-governed restraints. I found saying things and thinking things that normally would not surface at all. When we are sick we are weakened and more prone to failure and sin. It was a startling thing to observe.
But what about Jesus? Jesus was not somehow free from all normal human sickness. He was born a screaming, slimy baby just like all of us; AND like all of us he got the sniffles, a headache, stubbed his toe, and, it was even possible, that Jesus Christ got the flu! Philippians 2 tells us that Jesus came to earth and when he did so he set aside his Godness, he willfully subjected himself to all the aspects of being human, this includes sickness. So Jesus must have felt like crap physically at times, but when his societal filters were dropped sin did not come out of him. When Jesus was sick he did not sin against his mom or sibling who bugged him or his friends who were being jerks. When Jesus was sick he was not self-fish. Jesus did not sin when he was sick because he wanted to do the will of the Father ALL the time; he was governed by the will of the Father not his own will.
So this is a small reflection from one being sick reflecting on Jesus' perfection even in his weakness. I have no proof Jesus was ever sick, but I know he may have been. I do have historical evidence that he was tortured, betrayed, went without sleep, and gruesomely murdered and he still NEVER, not once, sinned.
But what about Jesus? Jesus was not somehow free from all normal human sickness. He was born a screaming, slimy baby just like all of us; AND like all of us he got the sniffles, a headache, stubbed his toe, and, it was even possible, that Jesus Christ got the flu! Philippians 2 tells us that Jesus came to earth and when he did so he set aside his Godness, he willfully subjected himself to all the aspects of being human, this includes sickness. So Jesus must have felt like crap physically at times, but when his societal filters were dropped sin did not come out of him. When Jesus was sick he did not sin against his mom or sibling who bugged him or his friends who were being jerks. When Jesus was sick he was not self-fish. Jesus did not sin when he was sick because he wanted to do the will of the Father ALL the time; he was governed by the will of the Father not his own will.
So this is a small reflection from one being sick reflecting on Jesus' perfection even in his weakness. I have no proof Jesus was ever sick, but I know he may have been. I do have historical evidence that he was tortured, betrayed, went without sleep, and gruesomely murdered and he still NEVER, not once, sinned.
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Patience, You Must Have: Jesus in the OT
There are multiple trucks literally filled with people who are laughably more qualified than myself to speak on the subject of Jesus in the OT . . . but I think that was understood long ago. Some I have been most helped by: The Ancient Love Song, The Unfolding Mystery: Discovering Christ in the Old Testament, Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament, The Meaning of the Pentateuch.
Are we supposed to play hide and go seek with Jesus as we read the OT? Is He everywhere and we just have to find Him? After all it is HE who said the Law and prophets spoke of Himself. In thinking about this we will look at some other general OT issues in passing.
Is our sequence of OT books the best? Most have never thought about the question and with good reason, its order has been the way it currently is for quite some time. What if there was a way to read the OT that might benefit us a little more, might give just a smidge more clarity or aide to our understanding. Currently we break the OT into the Law, History, Poetry, Major then Minor Prophets and, for the most part, they are lumped together categorically. This is very minor but in one way the OT is organized (Tanakh) Chronicles does not come right after Samuel and Kings--as we noted last time it was written well after the two; the love story of Ruth, making a more logical and manifested form, follows the intimate love of Song of Songs; Ecclesiastes, the existential, candid look at the sadness and core of life precedes the book of Lamentations which woefully recalls terrifying historical events with little hope, save for chapter 3—what’s the purpose of life; and this way ends with Ezra, Nehemiah, and then Chronicles, the point at which Israel is gathered back together and growing again. The final books build anticipation, desire, longing for a good king who will finally right the Nation. What does this have to do with our topic: the OT, by presenting human failure and incompleteness time after time over hundreds of years builds a groaning for the Messiah, for Christ Jesus to tear on the scene and make all things right. *
A big question when looking at the OT and Jesus must boil down to, what were the intentions of the people writing the OT at the time they were writing it? Thousands of years ago the stories of God’s interaction with people were told orally, by mouth. These were written down at some point. This means that these things are very old and the audience, then, was just as old. When we tell a story to a child we should emphasize certain things because stories convey, stories teach. Just the same with stories way back in days prior to almost everything we would recognize as culture: they told stories to relay history and ideas in a certain way, with intention.
For one, they were not a scientific based society; what I mean by this is that precision was not such a big deal as it is nowadays. So when you read Numbers or stories about how one army came out to fight another and it was like 10,000 million on one side and 1,000,000 on another we should not go, ah, someone was there counting, rather we should think, man, one army had a huge personnel advantage over the other army. It is simply saying there was a definite underdog. So we cannot get hung up on the numbers, take yourself out of the Western Scientific precision mode and throw a bone; different cultures speak in differing ways, they convey ideas differently from how we do and that is okay. It is not dishonesty, just different. (though some numbers obviously have symbolic meaning, we’re not talking about those here)
Secondly, as was mentioned last time, they and we write with certain bents and emphases (remember how Samuel and Chronicles differed?). Galileo is quoted as saying, “The Bible shows the way to get to Heaven, not the way the heavens go.” What he is saying is precisely my point: we should not look at Genesis, the first book in the OT, as some kind of proof or in depth description of what all took place at creation, instead we should draw that God spoke it all into existence and made it good. So we have to be careful in how we read the Bible because it is easy to interject our ideas based on our conclusions and understandings literally thousands of years after things were written. It is arrogant to conclude so and so must have been saying this BECAUSE we now know x and y. We must be careful because we know the OT was inspired by God but it does not mean it has to be neat and nice and always conform nicely to our present way of understanding.
Third, for the most part, the audience of the OT writers were people living at the time it was spoken. Peter Enns makes an intriguing point that in Deuteronomy 5.7 it reads “You shall have no other god’s before me.” He compares this to later writings such as Isaiah 45.5 that says, “I am the LORD, and there are no other, besides me there is no God . . .” Did you catch that? In the first part God seems to be acknowledging there are other gods and in Isaiah He does not. Dr. Enns suggests that in a way of speaking to the people so they understand he changes over time, not the reality of what He is saying to Israel but in the way they’ll best understand. He argues that at the time of Deuteronomy the wandering Israelites were very much poly-theistic—they believed in many gods—so god spoke to them in that way: “there are others but I’m supreme.” But over time, through circumstance God showed them that there were no other gods besides Him and thus He spoke more candidly to Israel in Isaiah about His supremacy: “categorically I am alone, none even comes close!” We see then that we cannot wear, entirely, our same thinking caps when reading the OT, it is very different.
Fourth, the Bible is incarnational, just like Jesus. I often forget that God did not have to do all this. He could have made the world and observed like the Greek gods, interjecting into events on a whim. God did not have to speak to us. Get a good image of a snooty person in your mind, this individual is high-browed, wears only the finest of cloths, is a billionaire who speaks to no one but his butler. Sadly the limo had a flat tire and for some reason this person decided to get out of the car, a smelly, dingy, and maybe dying hobo comes up asking for money. Nothing. Our nose-upper does not even acknowledge our hobo’s existence. In a sense, God could do that and it would be okay. But thankfully He decided to interject and speak to His people and not in some heavenly language but our own, our own full of bad grammar like this blog bountifully contains, language that could and would be twisted, language that is ordinary, not pompous but understandable; God spoke so that we could begin to understand who He is and who we are. This is amazing! So in this way we can compare the OT to Jesus and find the similarities: God interjected into the mess to bring mercy and grace.
Okay, so what about Jesus? Jesus is not playing hide-and-go-seek in the OT. And we should not stretch ideas and similarities and think we have found Him. He is spoken of prophetically—in the Psalms and Isaiah most abundantly but in many other books—or, as many believe, in the form of the Angel of the Lord—Jacob wrestled with him, he stood with the 3 in the furnace, he stood in the way of Balaam’s donkey, etc. So in this way we should not look to find Jesus because He is not there, He will not be until hundreds of years later.
But did Jesus not say that the Law and Prophets spoke of Him? I can tell a story about the attribute of courage without mentioning the word courage; we do not need to see Jesus to long for him. We can think simply but never simplistically about the things Jesus says. What some think of when they say that Jesus is in the OT is that there are people and events push us towards the expected Jesus, the Messiah to come. As Jesus Himself does at numerous points, he takes something from the past and compares it to Himself: Like Jonah descending for three days then being raised up so I will be buried and rise. Also, Jesus is called the second Adam, this compares Jesus to Adam in Genesis and it conveys that humanity, in Jesus Christ, has a second chance for fellowship with God. But even with the comparisons or types—those who have some attribute or action which Jesus will perfect in His existence—we can get too wrapped up in the Jesus part and fast-forward too quickly so that we lose what the point of the passage in the OT is getting at. The OT is doing a lot of things but a big thing it is doing is making us itch more and more for Jesus, it is creating the desire for the perfect One. Charles Drew, author of the helpful book The Ancient Love Song: Finding Jesus in the Old Testament, says, “Jesus Christ has to have context if he is to mean anything . . . Our God has [convinced us that we need His love] for us in the Old Testament. To be ignorant of those Scriptures is to be like the complacent husband, bored with his wife because he has never realized what life would be like without her.”
We want to get what is to be gotten from the OT but nothing more. If we can learn to approach the OT in a humble way in which we want to be informed by God’s word, patiently seeing what it is trying to do we will gain much. Is it hard? Yes. Is it boring at times? Yes. But it is also a gracious gift granted to us and there is a wonderful, joy-filled purpose in it. We see more and more WHAT Jesus’ reign would mean and imply on a sick and decadently destructive people as all humans are. In many parts of the OT it is Jesus’ absence that is to be felt, not His presence.
The Apostle Paul wanting to encourage his fellow believers in the city of Rome told them the following of the OT: “whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.” The Bible, the Christian life is an ongoing wrestling match, it is a struggle; but as the Christian struggles he hopes.
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Books_of_the_Bible
Are we supposed to play hide and go seek with Jesus as we read the OT? Is He everywhere and we just have to find Him? After all it is HE who said the Law and prophets spoke of Himself. In thinking about this we will look at some other general OT issues in passing.
Is our sequence of OT books the best? Most have never thought about the question and with good reason, its order has been the way it currently is for quite some time. What if there was a way to read the OT that might benefit us a little more, might give just a smidge more clarity or aide to our understanding. Currently we break the OT into the Law, History, Poetry, Major then Minor Prophets and, for the most part, they are lumped together categorically. This is very minor but in one way the OT is organized (Tanakh) Chronicles does not come right after Samuel and Kings--as we noted last time it was written well after the two; the love story of Ruth, making a more logical and manifested form, follows the intimate love of Song of Songs; Ecclesiastes, the existential, candid look at the sadness and core of life precedes the book of Lamentations which woefully recalls terrifying historical events with little hope, save for chapter 3—what’s the purpose of life; and this way ends with Ezra, Nehemiah, and then Chronicles, the point at which Israel is gathered back together and growing again. The final books build anticipation, desire, longing for a good king who will finally right the Nation. What does this have to do with our topic: the OT, by presenting human failure and incompleteness time after time over hundreds of years builds a groaning for the Messiah, for Christ Jesus to tear on the scene and make all things right. *
A big question when looking at the OT and Jesus must boil down to, what were the intentions of the people writing the OT at the time they were writing it? Thousands of years ago the stories of God’s interaction with people were told orally, by mouth. These were written down at some point. This means that these things are very old and the audience, then, was just as old. When we tell a story to a child we should emphasize certain things because stories convey, stories teach. Just the same with stories way back in days prior to almost everything we would recognize as culture: they told stories to relay history and ideas in a certain way, with intention.
For one, they were not a scientific based society; what I mean by this is that precision was not such a big deal as it is nowadays. So when you read Numbers or stories about how one army came out to fight another and it was like 10,000 million on one side and 1,000,000 on another we should not go, ah, someone was there counting, rather we should think, man, one army had a huge personnel advantage over the other army. It is simply saying there was a definite underdog. So we cannot get hung up on the numbers, take yourself out of the Western Scientific precision mode and throw a bone; different cultures speak in differing ways, they convey ideas differently from how we do and that is okay. It is not dishonesty, just different. (though some numbers obviously have symbolic meaning, we’re not talking about those here)
Secondly, as was mentioned last time, they and we write with certain bents and emphases (remember how Samuel and Chronicles differed?). Galileo is quoted as saying, “The Bible shows the way to get to Heaven, not the way the heavens go.” What he is saying is precisely my point: we should not look at Genesis, the first book in the OT, as some kind of proof or in depth description of what all took place at creation, instead we should draw that God spoke it all into existence and made it good. So we have to be careful in how we read the Bible because it is easy to interject our ideas based on our conclusions and understandings literally thousands of years after things were written. It is arrogant to conclude so and so must have been saying this BECAUSE we now know x and y. We must be careful because we know the OT was inspired by God but it does not mean it has to be neat and nice and always conform nicely to our present way of understanding.
Third, for the most part, the audience of the OT writers were people living at the time it was spoken. Peter Enns makes an intriguing point that in Deuteronomy 5.7 it reads “You shall have no other god’s before me.” He compares this to later writings such as Isaiah 45.5 that says, “I am the LORD, and there are no other, besides me there is no God . . .” Did you catch that? In the first part God seems to be acknowledging there are other gods and in Isaiah He does not. Dr. Enns suggests that in a way of speaking to the people so they understand he changes over time, not the reality of what He is saying to Israel but in the way they’ll best understand. He argues that at the time of Deuteronomy the wandering Israelites were very much poly-theistic—they believed in many gods—so god spoke to them in that way: “there are others but I’m supreme.” But over time, through circumstance God showed them that there were no other gods besides Him and thus He spoke more candidly to Israel in Isaiah about His supremacy: “categorically I am alone, none even comes close!” We see then that we cannot wear, entirely, our same thinking caps when reading the OT, it is very different.
Fourth, the Bible is incarnational, just like Jesus. I often forget that God did not have to do all this. He could have made the world and observed like the Greek gods, interjecting into events on a whim. God did not have to speak to us. Get a good image of a snooty person in your mind, this individual is high-browed, wears only the finest of cloths, is a billionaire who speaks to no one but his butler. Sadly the limo had a flat tire and for some reason this person decided to get out of the car, a smelly, dingy, and maybe dying hobo comes up asking for money. Nothing. Our nose-upper does not even acknowledge our hobo’s existence. In a sense, God could do that and it would be okay. But thankfully He decided to interject and speak to His people and not in some heavenly language but our own, our own full of bad grammar like this blog bountifully contains, language that could and would be twisted, language that is ordinary, not pompous but understandable; God spoke so that we could begin to understand who He is and who we are. This is amazing! So in this way we can compare the OT to Jesus and find the similarities: God interjected into the mess to bring mercy and grace.
Okay, so what about Jesus? Jesus is not playing hide-and-go-seek in the OT. And we should not stretch ideas and similarities and think we have found Him. He is spoken of prophetically—in the Psalms and Isaiah most abundantly but in many other books—or, as many believe, in the form of the Angel of the Lord—Jacob wrestled with him, he stood with the 3 in the furnace, he stood in the way of Balaam’s donkey, etc. So in this way we should not look to find Jesus because He is not there, He will not be until hundreds of years later.
But did Jesus not say that the Law and Prophets spoke of Him? I can tell a story about the attribute of courage without mentioning the word courage; we do not need to see Jesus to long for him. We can think simply but never simplistically about the things Jesus says. What some think of when they say that Jesus is in the OT is that there are people and events push us towards the expected Jesus, the Messiah to come. As Jesus Himself does at numerous points, he takes something from the past and compares it to Himself: Like Jonah descending for three days then being raised up so I will be buried and rise. Also, Jesus is called the second Adam, this compares Jesus to Adam in Genesis and it conveys that humanity, in Jesus Christ, has a second chance for fellowship with God. But even with the comparisons or types—those who have some attribute or action which Jesus will perfect in His existence—we can get too wrapped up in the Jesus part and fast-forward too quickly so that we lose what the point of the passage in the OT is getting at. The OT is doing a lot of things but a big thing it is doing is making us itch more and more for Jesus, it is creating the desire for the perfect One. Charles Drew, author of the helpful book The Ancient Love Song: Finding Jesus in the Old Testament, says, “Jesus Christ has to have context if he is to mean anything . . . Our God has [convinced us that we need His love] for us in the Old Testament. To be ignorant of those Scriptures is to be like the complacent husband, bored with his wife because he has never realized what life would be like without her.”
We want to get what is to be gotten from the OT but nothing more. If we can learn to approach the OT in a humble way in which we want to be informed by God’s word, patiently seeing what it is trying to do we will gain much. Is it hard? Yes. Is it boring at times? Yes. But it is also a gracious gift granted to us and there is a wonderful, joy-filled purpose in it. We see more and more WHAT Jesus’ reign would mean and imply on a sick and decadently destructive people as all humans are. In many parts of the OT it is Jesus’ absence that is to be felt, not His presence.
The Apostle Paul wanting to encourage his fellow believers in the city of Rome told them the following of the OT: “whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.” The Bible, the Christian life is an ongoing wrestling match, it is a struggle; but as the Christian struggles he hopes.
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Books_of_the_Bible
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
10-22-08
I.
You bright light
You bright light
Some suns sloth to be seen
But you burst forth like a beam
You joined and joyed
I knew your warmth
Were we not walking together
Did we not help one another?
II.
I cannot afford a smile
my soul is broke
I know what you forgot
You came and ate then left,
You were meant to stay
There was more, much more
But a heart-driven ignorance
. . . O your tears are life-less
Your teas are fools
Your tears are damned!
Come, come return!
III.
The end tells the truth
All was a flux,
The words were echoes,
The difference a temporal gale;
How could we have known
There is nothing to be done.
IV.
Like water in the heat
Like a flame in the wind
You bright light
You bright light have dimmed,
dimmed,
dark.
You bright light
You bright light
Some suns sloth to be seen
But you burst forth like a beam
You joined and joyed
I knew your warmth
Were we not walking together
Did we not help one another?
II.
I cannot afford a smile
my soul is broke
I know what you forgot
You came and ate then left,
You were meant to stay
There was more, much more
But a heart-driven ignorance
. . . O your tears are life-less
Your teas are fools
Your tears are damned!
Come, come return!
III.
The end tells the truth
All was a flux,
The words were echoes,
The difference a temporal gale;
How could we have known
There is nothing to be done.
IV.
Like water in the heat
Like a flame in the wind
You bright light
You bright light have dimmed,
dimmed,
dark.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
You're Lazy and a Mystic: Why You Stink at Studying the OT. Part 1
To begin, the first couple of posts will more than likely be more broad and less pointing to a specific book of the Old Testament (OT).
Most would agree that magic is left to J.K Rowling or the once famous game Dungeons and Dragons. When taking the Bible and magic and comparing the two most would prepare their mind for a study of contrast. I mean God doesn’t need magic, supernatural activity sure, but magic is weird and chaotic and learned, God and his ways just . . . are. Okay, fair enough, though not a satisfactory argument by any stretch of the imagination. But what about how you and I interact with the Bible? What about how we approach studying the Bible? A good descriptive for people who ‘study’ the Bible and most assuredly the OT is lazy. Exhale you gaspers. The average Christian in America studies the Bible in a laughable manor and I think the birth that this monstrosity occurs is a sense of magic. I know you are thinking, in the words of Lucille’s husband Ricky in the television show I Love Lucy, ‘You have some splaning to do!!’
Excuse number one: I have the Holy Spirit. The argument goes like this: since I have the Holy Spirit (HS) now I do not have to study the Bible so hard. The HS was given, among other things, to Christians to enlighten and illumine them as they ponder God’s Word. So since I am at a great advantage I do not need to study like those who did not have the HS studied prior. It is almost like a higher level of osmosis, I just have to read over the Bible and application and understanding will flood my inner self. This is ridiculous. Jesus was God and still went to temple, still prayed a lot for wisdom and discernment and pondered deeply and at a young age the Bible, as He had it then of course. While the HS is a great and wonderful gift it is not a crutch but a greater reason to study more in depth the things of God because we now know something that those who did not have the HS knew, namely, we will be guided by Him as we study. In his second letter to Timothy Paul said to his young pastor friend, ‘Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything.’ You see it? Paul says as you use the gift of thinking and pondering, the gift God has given to you, He will give you understanding in everything, He will lead you to what is correct and true and right. In Acts the church would meet together to break bread and to devote themselves to the apostles teaching and pray together. Jesus--have fun arguing with Him--said if you love me you will skim around and kinda know, generally, what the Bible says? NO!! Jesus Christ said if you love me you will abide in my Word—and we know that essentially the whole OT was speaking of Him. Abiding is actively placing yourself in the midst of, not resisting but going towards. There is no flashy Greek to get you out of this one. You love Jesus? You’ll study and know Him and He is found only in the Bible, for our purposes here.
Excuse number two: The OT is confusing and does not make sense. Math does not make sense, until you familiarize yourself with its language, terms and purposes. A sheet of music is confusing until you devote yourself to learning what it is doing, what the symbols mean and the placements convey. When I first started running a specific trail in college I got lost a lot but after a few runs I began to recognize things and I was familiarized with where I was going. I could go on. My point is if you are not actively reading and familiarizing yourself with the books of the Bible how in the world do you expect them not to be confusing? Some people in the past would read the book they wanted to better understand and study 30 times before actually breaking it down. It is best to study as an Eagle—looking broadly and seeing the whole picture—and as a badger—in depth digging. Many people now purposely put themselves on reading plans to get through the OT once and the NT twice in a year. John Sailhamer, who wrote large, helpful volumes of thinking and commentary on the first five books of the OT, said of studying the first five books of the OT that the most essential key to study is reading the text over and over. This takes time but hey, if you want to understand it you need to take the time to do so.
Excuse number three: I’ve read some of the books front to back, mostly the minor prophets because they are short, and they are still confusing. The Bible is a story, all of it. It is a story, a story formed in the same way The Chronicles of Narnia is a series of story culminating into one big story. Books fill in the blanks and have differing viewpoints. Do you ever wonder why there is so much overlap between 1 & 2 Samuel, 1 & 2 Kings and 1 & 2 Chronicles but there are differing and almost contradictory words about the same events and lives? Two were written before both kingdoms were taken in captivity (Samuel and Kings) while one was written after the kingdoms were taken captive and some were brought back to the land of the Israel (Chronicles). Because of this there are different things that they authors of each want to emphasize. For example, David in Samuel—written before the kingdoms were taken from the Land—is seen in a very candid way; his sins are before the audience: coveting, adultery, murder, pride, etc. People were close enough to him to know the sins David committed, people were still alive possibly who could say, yup, he did that. But in the Chronicles version the sins of most of the leaders, including David, are omitted. Some have said that the nation of Israel was remembering their history in a positive and less candid fashion, their history and lineage of great men. Maybe they wanted their audiences to say, ‘Hey, look what God did among us, what leaders he gave, He can do it again!’ My point, each story and book is not to stand-alone, they build upon and fill in for one another.
So, have you been approaching the OT study in a magical or mystical way? Are you waiting for understanding just to come to you without study, contemplation, and prayer? Maybe you have not and you are simply lazy and you know it. You can change the times my friend.
I think that you are getting the picture that study is work. (Nooooooooooo!!) It is true. Paul says we can glorify God by working so working is not an evil thing, remember work was cursed; work was made toilsome as a punishment for sin but it was in existence prior to the sin of Adam and Eve. But think of this, as you study and meditate on the OT you will begin to understand it more, the fog will begin to lift a little more and the glory and character of God and Christ and the HS will be more fierce, more terrifying, more great and something you’ll crave. A great advantage of the OT over the New is that it is filled with exciting and interesting stories which are easier and at times more enjoyable to study. The OT is not something that you might break-down like one of Paul’s letters. It is a big chunk of reading but intriguing and helpful for your soul and others’ souls. Someone told me when I first became a Christian that if you rake you’ll get leaves but if you are patient and dig you’ll get diamonds and gold. ‘I want tha gold.’
Next time I hope to look at the problem OT studiers have of running too quickly to Jesus: is Jesus playing hide-and-go-seek in the OT; is he to be found everywhere?
Most would agree that magic is left to J.K Rowling or the once famous game Dungeons and Dragons. When taking the Bible and magic and comparing the two most would prepare their mind for a study of contrast. I mean God doesn’t need magic, supernatural activity sure, but magic is weird and chaotic and learned, God and his ways just . . . are. Okay, fair enough, though not a satisfactory argument by any stretch of the imagination. But what about how you and I interact with the Bible? What about how we approach studying the Bible? A good descriptive for people who ‘study’ the Bible and most assuredly the OT is lazy. Exhale you gaspers. The average Christian in America studies the Bible in a laughable manor and I think the birth that this monstrosity occurs is a sense of magic. I know you are thinking, in the words of Lucille’s husband Ricky in the television show I Love Lucy, ‘You have some splaning to do!!’
Excuse number one: I have the Holy Spirit. The argument goes like this: since I have the Holy Spirit (HS) now I do not have to study the Bible so hard. The HS was given, among other things, to Christians to enlighten and illumine them as they ponder God’s Word. So since I am at a great advantage I do not need to study like those who did not have the HS studied prior. It is almost like a higher level of osmosis, I just have to read over the Bible and application and understanding will flood my inner self. This is ridiculous. Jesus was God and still went to temple, still prayed a lot for wisdom and discernment and pondered deeply and at a young age the Bible, as He had it then of course. While the HS is a great and wonderful gift it is not a crutch but a greater reason to study more in depth the things of God because we now know something that those who did not have the HS knew, namely, we will be guided by Him as we study. In his second letter to Timothy Paul said to his young pastor friend, ‘Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything.’ You see it? Paul says as you use the gift of thinking and pondering, the gift God has given to you, He will give you understanding in everything, He will lead you to what is correct and true and right. In Acts the church would meet together to break bread and to devote themselves to the apostles teaching and pray together. Jesus--have fun arguing with Him--said if you love me you will skim around and kinda know, generally, what the Bible says? NO!! Jesus Christ said if you love me you will abide in my Word—and we know that essentially the whole OT was speaking of Him. Abiding is actively placing yourself in the midst of, not resisting but going towards. There is no flashy Greek to get you out of this one. You love Jesus? You’ll study and know Him and He is found only in the Bible, for our purposes here.
Excuse number two: The OT is confusing and does not make sense. Math does not make sense, until you familiarize yourself with its language, terms and purposes. A sheet of music is confusing until you devote yourself to learning what it is doing, what the symbols mean and the placements convey. When I first started running a specific trail in college I got lost a lot but after a few runs I began to recognize things and I was familiarized with where I was going. I could go on. My point is if you are not actively reading and familiarizing yourself with the books of the Bible how in the world do you expect them not to be confusing? Some people in the past would read the book they wanted to better understand and study 30 times before actually breaking it down. It is best to study as an Eagle—looking broadly and seeing the whole picture—and as a badger—in depth digging. Many people now purposely put themselves on reading plans to get through the OT once and the NT twice in a year. John Sailhamer, who wrote large, helpful volumes of thinking and commentary on the first five books of the OT, said of studying the first five books of the OT that the most essential key to study is reading the text over and over. This takes time but hey, if you want to understand it you need to take the time to do so.
Excuse number three: I’ve read some of the books front to back, mostly the minor prophets because they are short, and they are still confusing. The Bible is a story, all of it. It is a story, a story formed in the same way The Chronicles of Narnia is a series of story culminating into one big story. Books fill in the blanks and have differing viewpoints. Do you ever wonder why there is so much overlap between 1 & 2 Samuel, 1 & 2 Kings and 1 & 2 Chronicles but there are differing and almost contradictory words about the same events and lives? Two were written before both kingdoms were taken in captivity (Samuel and Kings) while one was written after the kingdoms were taken captive and some were brought back to the land of the Israel (Chronicles). Because of this there are different things that they authors of each want to emphasize. For example, David in Samuel—written before the kingdoms were taken from the Land—is seen in a very candid way; his sins are before the audience: coveting, adultery, murder, pride, etc. People were close enough to him to know the sins David committed, people were still alive possibly who could say, yup, he did that. But in the Chronicles version the sins of most of the leaders, including David, are omitted. Some have said that the nation of Israel was remembering their history in a positive and less candid fashion, their history and lineage of great men. Maybe they wanted their audiences to say, ‘Hey, look what God did among us, what leaders he gave, He can do it again!’ My point, each story and book is not to stand-alone, they build upon and fill in for one another.
So, have you been approaching the OT study in a magical or mystical way? Are you waiting for understanding just to come to you without study, contemplation, and prayer? Maybe you have not and you are simply lazy and you know it. You can change the times my friend.
I think that you are getting the picture that study is work. (Nooooooooooo!!) It is true. Paul says we can glorify God by working so working is not an evil thing, remember work was cursed; work was made toilsome as a punishment for sin but it was in existence prior to the sin of Adam and Eve. But think of this, as you study and meditate on the OT you will begin to understand it more, the fog will begin to lift a little more and the glory and character of God and Christ and the HS will be more fierce, more terrifying, more great and something you’ll crave. A great advantage of the OT over the New is that it is filled with exciting and interesting stories which are easier and at times more enjoyable to study. The OT is not something that you might break-down like one of Paul’s letters. It is a big chunk of reading but intriguing and helpful for your soul and others’ souls. Someone told me when I first became a Christian that if you rake you’ll get leaves but if you are patient and dig you’ll get diamonds and gold. ‘I want tha gold.’
Next time I hope to look at the problem OT studiers have of running too quickly to Jesus: is Jesus playing hide-and-go-seek in the OT; is he to be found everywhere?
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