Exodus 16-18.
Exodus 16 Introducing MANNA (which means "What IS this???" in Hebrew).
Continuing the theme of the Israelites complaining.
The way that the manna was distributed purely provided people with enough to eat. The ambitious did not get ahead; the lazy did not starve, nor did their family members. (16:18ff) Nobody could sell excess; nobody could buy more. Amazing! All the things (other than need to eat good and satisfying food) that we think are important to keeping the engines of commerce running are cancelled out by God's distribution system here. The only day that the Israelites could gather more was the day before the Sabbath; and that was the only day that the food kept overnight, so the people could rest and observe the Sabbath.
Exodus 17 Water from the Rock--we just read this in church two Sundays ago. Neat to see it coming up in our daily readings! This is the site of the "Meribah" and "Massah" of the psalms. The theme of complaints continues.
Question: What kind of lesson can we take from 17:8ff? A need for community?
Exodus 18 Jethro gives good advice to Moses as he learns to be a leader.
Psalm 22--"The Holy Week Psalm" is what I always call this psalm. "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" The perception of being forsaken is so terrible and so pervasive that we have no way to remind ourselves that we aren't really forsaken…
People have frequently commented that by the end of the psalm, the mood is no longer so dark; and that Jesus knew the whole psalm. I generally find that, in reciting this psalm at bleak times in my own life, my perspective changes, and I am able to recognize again that God is present with me.
Matthew 23--We are still in Holy Week, and Jesus is saying, like some of the ancient prophets, to those who oppose or at least don't affirm his work: "Woe to you!"
Reformation Protestants got their idea that it was wicked to call their clergy "Father" from this passage (23:8). Jesus speaks it in the context of the prominent "Last shall be first and first shall be last" theme.
Note how closely Jesus' words in 23:33 parallel the words of John the Baptist just before Jesus began his ministry: "You snakes, you brood of vipers! How can you escape being sentenced to hell?"
And then Jesus weeps over Jerusalem, giving us the image of the Mother Hen who protects her brood with her very life--except these chickens won't come under the protection of her wings...
Monday, March 31, 2014
Thursday, March 27, 2014
March 29. Exodus 13-15; Psalm 21; Matthew 22
Exodus 13-15 We begin in these chapters to see why the Torah is sometimes called "The Law" as the rules/statutes/instructions for daily life and religious observance begin to be recorded in the context of the great narrative of freedom.
Notice, too, the repeated references to the "Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites" and to the "land flowing with milk and honey" (13:5)
Redemption of every first-born male related to the acts of the Passover.
Reference in summary fashion (13:17ff) to what will be narrated more fully in the subsequent chapters.
Notice the keeping of the promise to take the bones of Joseph back to the land of promise (13:19).
Then the Israelites finally leave! And Pharaoh asks "What have we done, letting Israel leave our service?" I guess the building was at a standstill and the scut-work jobs weren't getting done. (14:5)
And in 14:10ff we see the Israelites begin their pattern of complaining: "Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in this wilderness?" Freedom wasn't what it was advertised to be…Moses, a great leader, says in 14:13: "Do not be afraid, stand firm, and see the deliverance that the LORD will accomplish for you today."
Some of our best Easter songs are about this Exodus deliverance. "Come ye faithful, raise the strain" has a voice about Moses who "led them with unmoistened foot through the Red Sea waters." For Christians, the Great Vigil of Easter is organized around the twin climaxes of the deliverance of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt and the deliverance of humanity from the shackles of sin by the death and resurrection of Jesus. And the second deliverance is understood in terms of the first.
Chapter 15 has some of the oldest poetry in the entire Bible.
Psalm 21 Note how this psalm continues the theme of God giving (in this case, the king) one's heart's desire. (21:2 and 20:4). Psalm 21 is a kind of coronation psalm.
Matthew 22 We are in Holy Week. Jesus continues to teach via parables. Most of these parables are about what happens at the end--of time? of life? of an era?, about judgement.
What's with the man who got into the wedding banquet without the proper clothes? Scholars have had lots of different ideas over the centuries. (Matt. 22:12-14) What does it mean that many are called but few are chosen? Is that like a big casting call for a movie?
22:15ff is a reprise on the tax question. Previously, the question was about the temple tax; this time it is about taxes to Caesar. Interestingly, here Jesus has to ask for a coin. He's not carrying money, not carrying an image into the Temple ( which is forbidden by the Law), not in an obvious way sold out to the imperial powers of Rome as perhaps the temple is in some un-acknowledged ways.
22:23ff The first biblical "shaggy dog" story, about the woman who is widowed seven times… The scholars who pose the question to push the idea of resurrection to absurdity ask "Whose wife of the seven will she be?" Jesus does not answer their question directly. He simply starts out: "YOU are wrong, because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God." Jesus doesn't play their game. He talks about the resurrection as being about life in the presence of the "God of the living."
22:34ff Question about the Greatest Commandment. I'd forgotten that Jesus made this response according to Matthew, in Holy Week.
Notice, too, the repeated references to the "Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites" and to the "land flowing with milk and honey" (13:5)
Redemption of every first-born male related to the acts of the Passover.
Reference in summary fashion (13:17ff) to what will be narrated more fully in the subsequent chapters.
Notice the keeping of the promise to take the bones of Joseph back to the land of promise (13:19).
Then the Israelites finally leave! And Pharaoh asks "What have we done, letting Israel leave our service?" I guess the building was at a standstill and the scut-work jobs weren't getting done. (14:5)
And in 14:10ff we see the Israelites begin their pattern of complaining: "Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in this wilderness?" Freedom wasn't what it was advertised to be…Moses, a great leader, says in 14:13: "Do not be afraid, stand firm, and see the deliverance that the LORD will accomplish for you today."
Some of our best Easter songs are about this Exodus deliverance. "Come ye faithful, raise the strain" has a voice about Moses who "led them with unmoistened foot through the Red Sea waters." For Christians, the Great Vigil of Easter is organized around the twin climaxes of the deliverance of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt and the deliverance of humanity from the shackles of sin by the death and resurrection of Jesus. And the second deliverance is understood in terms of the first.
Chapter 15 has some of the oldest poetry in the entire Bible.
Psalm 21 Note how this psalm continues the theme of God giving (in this case, the king) one's heart's desire. (21:2 and 20:4). Psalm 21 is a kind of coronation psalm.
Matthew 22 We are in Holy Week. Jesus continues to teach via parables. Most of these parables are about what happens at the end--of time? of life? of an era?, about judgement.
What's with the man who got into the wedding banquet without the proper clothes? Scholars have had lots of different ideas over the centuries. (Matt. 22:12-14) What does it mean that many are called but few are chosen? Is that like a big casting call for a movie?
22:15ff is a reprise on the tax question. Previously, the question was about the temple tax; this time it is about taxes to Caesar. Interestingly, here Jesus has to ask for a coin. He's not carrying money, not carrying an image into the Temple ( which is forbidden by the Law), not in an obvious way sold out to the imperial powers of Rome as perhaps the temple is in some un-acknowledged ways.
22:23ff The first biblical "shaggy dog" story, about the woman who is widowed seven times… The scholars who pose the question to push the idea of resurrection to absurdity ask "Whose wife of the seven will she be?" Jesus does not answer their question directly. He simply starts out: "YOU are wrong, because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God." Jesus doesn't play their game. He talks about the resurrection as being about life in the presence of the "God of the living."
22:34ff Question about the Greatest Commandment. I'd forgotten that Jesus made this response according to Matthew, in Holy Week.
Wednesday, March 26, 2014
March 28: Exodus 10-12; Psalm 20; Matthew 21
Exodus 10-12: 10:3 gives us a good sense of what, according to the author, most annoyed God about the Egyptians: ""Thus says the LORD, the God of the Hebrews, 'How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go, so that they may worship me"
And the plagues continue; and there's a wonderful articulation of the inclusiveness of the community that the Israelites comprise: 10:9--We will go with our young and our old; we will go with our sons and daughters and with our flocks and herds, because we have the LORD's festival to celebrate"
Pharaoh keeps saying "I have sinned" and then showing by his behavior that he really doesn't get it yet.
The locusts are the 8th plague.
The 9th plague is darkness, a withdrawal of light, in a sense a return to what things were before God created light, when "the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep." Darkness and chaos.
It takes more than 2 chapters to tell how the final (tenth) plague plays out. It is actually the beginning of the departure of the Israelites, and very important because the Passover is a key event in the Jewish liturgical year. Rules are given in ch. 12 for how the Passover will be celebrated in the future. It is also known as the Festival of "unleavened bread."
Psalm 20--a prayer "for victory" I love 20:4:
May he grant you your heart's desire,
and fulfill all your plans.
I think that is why I pray for God to draw me via my desires. When our desire is for God alone and above all, we shall surely receive our heart's desire.
Matthew 21--And so we find ourselves, in Matthew's Gospel, in Holy Week. The Triumphal entry into Jerusalem is here at the beginning of the chapter--and in answer to the perennial question of the Gospels: 'Who IS this???' we see the answer "This is the PROPHET Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee" (21:11).
There quickly follow the cleansing of the Temple (so far from "gentle Jesus, meek and mild"), and the cursing of the fig tree, surely one of the weirdest and most curious of passages in the entire gospel.
Then we have parables
And the plagues continue; and there's a wonderful articulation of the inclusiveness of the community that the Israelites comprise: 10:9--We will go with our young and our old; we will go with our sons and daughters and with our flocks and herds, because we have the LORD's festival to celebrate"
Pharaoh keeps saying "I have sinned" and then showing by his behavior that he really doesn't get it yet.
The locusts are the 8th plague.
The 9th plague is darkness, a withdrawal of light, in a sense a return to what things were before God created light, when "the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep." Darkness and chaos.
It takes more than 2 chapters to tell how the final (tenth) plague plays out. It is actually the beginning of the departure of the Israelites, and very important because the Passover is a key event in the Jewish liturgical year. Rules are given in ch. 12 for how the Passover will be celebrated in the future. It is also known as the Festival of "unleavened bread."
Psalm 20--a prayer "for victory" I love 20:4:
May he grant you your heart's desire,
and fulfill all your plans.
I think that is why I pray for God to draw me via my desires. When our desire is for God alone and above all, we shall surely receive our heart's desire.
Matthew 21--And so we find ourselves, in Matthew's Gospel, in Holy Week. The Triumphal entry into Jerusalem is here at the beginning of the chapter--and in answer to the perennial question of the Gospels: 'Who IS this???' we see the answer "This is the PROPHET Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee" (21:11).
There quickly follow the cleansing of the Temple (so far from "gentle Jesus, meek and mild"), and the cursing of the fig tree, surely one of the weirdest and most curious of passages in the entire gospel.
Then we have parables
- of two sons: "I will go, sure thing, Dad!" vs. "No!"; not quite getting around to keeping our commitments vs. sighing after complaining and just doing the right thing…
- Of the Wicked Tenants, with the heartbreaking words of the Father: "They will respect my Son" (v. 37). Note: We need to talk about "supercessionism" and the tendency that Christians have had over the years to cast "The Jews" of their day as "The wicked tenants" and thereby justify terrible persecution.
Saturday, March 22, 2014
March 27 Exodus 7-9; Psalm 19; Matthew 20
Exodus 7-9 "I will harden Pharaoh's heart"--problematic on many levels… (7:3 and frequently).
"Moses was 80 years old and Aaron 83 when they spoke to Pharaoh" (7:7) Don't underestimate the power of elders!
We then get 7 of the 10 plagues.
Pharaoh continues not to let the Israelites go. His heart gets harder and harder.
Psalm 19 (Note: if you've been following the readings from the Sunday bulletin at All Saints', you got one psalm ahead because I didn't notice that Fr. Zabriskie's scheme divided Psalm 18 across 2 days.)
This is one of my favorite psalms, and I first learned to love it as a chorister. You can hear a version of it here.
Matthew 20 One of my favorite parables: The Laborers and the vineyard! It has much to say about the dignity of work and its importance in human life. And the amazing words of the owner at the end: "Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?" (20: 15)
And once again, Jesus says: "The last will be first and the first will be last."
"Moses was 80 years old and Aaron 83 when they spoke to Pharaoh" (7:7) Don't underestimate the power of elders!
We then get 7 of the 10 plagues.
Pharaoh continues not to let the Israelites go. His heart gets harder and harder.
Psalm 19 (Note: if you've been following the readings from the Sunday bulletin at All Saints', you got one psalm ahead because I didn't notice that Fr. Zabriskie's scheme divided Psalm 18 across 2 days.)
Matthew 20 One of my favorite parables: The Laborers and the vineyard! It has much to say about the dignity of work and its importance in human life. And the amazing words of the owner at the end: "Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?" (20: 15)
And once again, Jesus says: "The last will be first and the first will be last."
Friday, March 21, 2014
March 26: Exodus 4-6; Psalm 18:20-50; Matthew 19.
Exodus 4-6 Moses really can't envision himself as the leader of the Israelites. God has to remind him who is really in charge (4:11) Then the LORD said to him, "Who gives speech to mortals? Who makes them mute or deaf, seeing or blind? Is it not I, the LORD? Now go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you are to speak." Then Moses is really frank with God: PLEASE SEND SOMEONE ELSE!!!!!! Can you think of a time in your life when you really wanted to pass the buck and simply decline to do what you sense God might be calling you to do?
What are we to make of God hardening the hearts of Pharaoh and the Egyptians? (4:21 and many other places)
Moses got a better reception this time than he had the previous time from the Israelites: "The people believed; and when they heard that the LORD had given heed to the Israelites and that he had seen their misery, they bowed down and worshiped" (4:31).
Exodus 5--As is often the case when big changes are afoot, things get much worse before they get better. The Israelites suffer more intensely and this occasions Moses' first argument with God (5:22ff): "O LORD, why have you mistreated this people? Why did you ever send me? Since I first came to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has mistreated this people, and you have done nothing at all to deliver your people."
Exodus 6-- God's response is "Just watch!" In this chapter we have another of those often-repeated phrases: God says: "Say therefore to the Israelites, 'I am the LORD, and I will free you from the burdens of the Egyptians and deliver you from slavery to them. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. I will take you as my people, and I will be your God."(6:6-7)
The chapter ends with a genealogy.
Psalm 18:20-50
18:20--"The LORD rewarded me according to my righteousness"--This is a perspective we find often in the psalms and it seems to be in contradiction to what we read in the NT. Is the psalmist wrong?
But keep reading! The psalmist delights in the help that he humbly acknowledges is God's gift to him (vss. 31-35)
Matthew 19: About divorce--Jesus has also spoken about divorce in the Sermon on the Mount. In Jesus' day as in ours marriage is challenging and sometimes people fail in lifelong commitments that they make in good faith. Jesus goes back to Genesis and then adds: "What God has joined together, let no one separate" (19:6). If we believe that Jesus said this, then what are we to do about the failures in our marriages? Is it always a sin to divorce? What do you think? I think it is helpful in answering to note that Jesus says "It was because you were so hard-hearted that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so." While you and I may not naturally be inclined to call the result of divorce "adultery," as Jesus did, I think we would all acknowledge that sin is always involved in divorce in some way or other.
19:13ff Jesus blesses children. (Matthew seems to group "domestic" subjects together here.)
19:16ff Then Jesus speaks about the challenges of wealth. It is ironic in the extreme that people use the language about "with God all things are possible" to "prove" that they can grow rich and be successful by the measures of the world. Jesus has just said "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God." The disciples ask: "Then who can be saved?" (Apparently they thought of the rich as those who had been blessed by God.) 19:26 reads: "For mortals it is impossible, but for God all things are possible."
19:30 Jesus' concluding words express a recurrent theme of the Gospel: "Many who are first will be last, and the last will be first."
What are we to make of God hardening the hearts of Pharaoh and the Egyptians? (4:21 and many other places)
Moses got a better reception this time than he had the previous time from the Israelites: "The people believed; and when they heard that the LORD had given heed to the Israelites and that he had seen their misery, they bowed down and worshiped" (4:31).
Exodus 5--As is often the case when big changes are afoot, things get much worse before they get better. The Israelites suffer more intensely and this occasions Moses' first argument with God (5:22ff): "O LORD, why have you mistreated this people? Why did you ever send me? Since I first came to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has mistreated this people, and you have done nothing at all to deliver your people."
Exodus 6-- God's response is "Just watch!" In this chapter we have another of those often-repeated phrases: God says: "Say therefore to the Israelites, 'I am the LORD, and I will free you from the burdens of the Egyptians and deliver you from slavery to them. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. I will take you as my people, and I will be your God."(6:6-7)
The chapter ends with a genealogy.
Psalm 18:20-50
18:20--"The LORD rewarded me according to my righteousness"--This is a perspective we find often in the psalms and it seems to be in contradiction to what we read in the NT. Is the psalmist wrong?
But keep reading! The psalmist delights in the help that he humbly acknowledges is God's gift to him (vss. 31-35)
Matthew 19: About divorce--Jesus has also spoken about divorce in the Sermon on the Mount. In Jesus' day as in ours marriage is challenging and sometimes people fail in lifelong commitments that they make in good faith. Jesus goes back to Genesis and then adds: "What God has joined together, let no one separate" (19:6). If we believe that Jesus said this, then what are we to do about the failures in our marriages? Is it always a sin to divorce? What do you think? I think it is helpful in answering to note that Jesus says "It was because you were so hard-hearted that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so." While you and I may not naturally be inclined to call the result of divorce "adultery," as Jesus did, I think we would all acknowledge that sin is always involved in divorce in some way or other.
19:13ff Jesus blesses children. (Matthew seems to group "domestic" subjects together here.)
19:16ff Then Jesus speaks about the challenges of wealth. It is ironic in the extreme that people use the language about "with God all things are possible" to "prove" that they can grow rich and be successful by the measures of the world. Jesus has just said "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God." The disciples ask: "Then who can be saved?" (Apparently they thought of the rich as those who had been blessed by God.) 19:26 reads: "For mortals it is impossible, but for God all things are possible."
19:30 Jesus' concluding words express a recurrent theme of the Gospel: "Many who are first will be last, and the last will be first."
March 25: Exodus 1-3; Psalm 18:1-19; Matthew 18
Exodus 1-3 So we are on to the second book of the Torah. The name "Exodus" comes from the Greek, meaning "The Way Out." This is the story of how God's people are rescued from slavery in Egypt.
There are several centuries of time packed between the last verse of Genesis and the 8th verse of Exodus. "Now a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph." Times change, and memories fade. The Israelites are no longer in a place of honor. They have grown too numerous to be anything but a threat to the Egyptians. So policies changed and the Israelites became slaves of the Egyptians. 1:10 reads: "Come, let us deal shrewdly with [the Israelites], or they will increase and, in the event of war, join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land." This is really quite interesting in light of Joseph's dealings with the Egyptians in the time of their famine when he nationalized the Egyptian farmers' lands in exchange for giving them back the grain he had "saved" for them during the seven years of plenty. The rich always find ways to exploit the rest of the populace. Greed is an endemic sin...
Look at the words used to describe how the Israelites were treated: "oppress them with forced labor," "ruthless in imposing tasks," "[the Egyptians] made their lives bitter with hard service."
Then we have the brave Israelite midwives. (If anybody is looking for brave and uncommon girls' names, I'd suggest "Shiphrah" and "Puah"!) And the scene is set for Moses to be the survivor. Another instance of the fate of the Israelites hanging by a thread, a theme we see recurring through the entire Bible...
It is important later in the narrative that Moses is of the family of Levi (2:1), the tribe of Israel from which the priests and temple workers come. New Testament commentators have tied Moses' ride in the basket in the bullrushes (and also Noah's ride in the Ark!) to baptism, by which God saves us from drowning in sin.
2:11 "One day after Moses had grown up".... and more time passes! Moses accepts and owns his Israelite heritage, but discovers he's not really thought of as "one of them" by the Israelites. He flees, after committing a hot-headed murder, to the land of Midian. And he sits down "by a well" (2:15) where, in ways reminiscent of Isaac and Jacob, he meets his wife.
2:23 Then our attention is drawn back to the plight of the Israelites. "After a long time the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned under their slavery, and cried out. Out of the slavery their cry for help rose up to God. God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God looked upon the Israelites, and God took notice of them."
And God begins his plan to rescue them by making Moses notice God at the burning bush in 3:1ff.
This is where God mysteriously self identifies with the words: "I will be who I will be" or "I am who I am" And the name, related in Hebrew to the verb for being, represented by four Hebrew consonants, YHWH, is never pronounced by traditional Jews, because God's name is sacred, holy, mysterious.
Very Orthodox Jews won't even write the word "God" with a capital letter, but prefer "G_d." In our English Bibles, whenever you see the "LORD" in all capitals, you are reading a translation of this unpronounced name for God, YHWH. It is an important reminder for us, who are often on really rather intimate terms with God, that it is also true that God is utterly transcendent, and a response of utter awe and amazement is also appropriate.
The LORD gives Moses an assignment, and the language that the Exodus writer uses reminds us of the language of the great Greek poet, Homer, who has certain poetic stock phrases (rosy-fingered dawn, the wine-dark sea among the best-known) that appear again and again. The LORD says in 3:17: "I will bring you up out of the misery of Egypt, to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, a land flowing with Milk and honey."
Psalm 18:1-19 A psalm that speaks of God's act of delivery--quite a lot of resonances with the delivery from Egypt--though this act of delivery, according to the traditional comments that we don't see in our BCP presentations of the Psalms, was God's delivery of David from the hand of Saul.
It is a wonderful thing to be able to read and pray these psalms in the context of our own struggles. 18:6 "In my distress I called upon the LORD;
to my God I cried for help.
From his temple he heard my voice
and my cry to him reached his ears.
God's response shakes the earth to its very core. Yet it was gentle enough to pull out the suffering psalmist from his suffering:
18:16ff "He reached down from on high, he took me;
he drew me out of mighty waters.
He delivered me from my strong enemy,
and from those who hated me;
for they were too might for me.
They confronted me in the day of my calamity;
but the LORD was my support.
He brought me out into a broad place;
he delivered me, because he delighted in me.
Matthew 18 A child is an example of greatness in the Kingdom of Heaven. Children did not have the same social status that they do in our time. I'm looking at a current copy of The Atlantic (April 2014) featuring an article on "The Over-protected Kid." And I'm aware of all kinds of articles recently on "helicopter parenting." Children did not always confer social status upon their parents, or rule their parents' homes like young tyrants. When Jesus talks of being like a child, he had the first-century status of children more in mind.
After speaking about a child, and welcoming a child in Jesus' name, Jesus speaks of "little ones" in two more passages. Mental hospitals used to have people who had taken Jesus' words literally about "tearing out" their eyes, or cutting off their hands. But if we don't take Jesus literally here, we still need to ask: what do we need to leave behind that may feel essential to our self-identity if we are serious about being children of the Kingdom of Heaven? And are we ready perhaps to carry some wounds that won't be healed in this life?
Then we have the parable about the crazy shepherd who goes after the one lost sheep. (vss. 1-14)
And some practical advice about handling conflict in "the church"--is this an anachronism? or is this just a way of speaking of the "synagogue"?
Then the question about forgiving again and again and again and again... How does this advice from Jesus fit with our little saying of our time: "Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me"?
Then the amazing parable of the unforgiving slave/manager. There is soooooooooo much to think about in this one chapter of Matthew's gospel! It is hard to read so fast sometimes!
There are several centuries of time packed between the last verse of Genesis and the 8th verse of Exodus. "Now a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph." Times change, and memories fade. The Israelites are no longer in a place of honor. They have grown too numerous to be anything but a threat to the Egyptians. So policies changed and the Israelites became slaves of the Egyptians. 1:10 reads: "Come, let us deal shrewdly with [the Israelites], or they will increase and, in the event of war, join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land." This is really quite interesting in light of Joseph's dealings with the Egyptians in the time of their famine when he nationalized the Egyptian farmers' lands in exchange for giving them back the grain he had "saved" for them during the seven years of plenty. The rich always find ways to exploit the rest of the populace. Greed is an endemic sin...
Look at the words used to describe how the Israelites were treated: "oppress them with forced labor," "ruthless in imposing tasks," "[the Egyptians] made their lives bitter with hard service."
Then we have the brave Israelite midwives. (If anybody is looking for brave and uncommon girls' names, I'd suggest "Shiphrah" and "Puah"!) And the scene is set for Moses to be the survivor. Another instance of the fate of the Israelites hanging by a thread, a theme we see recurring through the entire Bible...
It is important later in the narrative that Moses is of the family of Levi (2:1), the tribe of Israel from which the priests and temple workers come. New Testament commentators have tied Moses' ride in the basket in the bullrushes (and also Noah's ride in the Ark!) to baptism, by which God saves us from drowning in sin.
2:11 "One day after Moses had grown up".... and more time passes! Moses accepts and owns his Israelite heritage, but discovers he's not really thought of as "one of them" by the Israelites. He flees, after committing a hot-headed murder, to the land of Midian. And he sits down "by a well" (2:15) where, in ways reminiscent of Isaac and Jacob, he meets his wife.
2:23 Then our attention is drawn back to the plight of the Israelites. "After a long time the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned under their slavery, and cried out. Out of the slavery their cry for help rose up to God. God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God looked upon the Israelites, and God took notice of them."
And God begins his plan to rescue them by making Moses notice God at the burning bush in 3:1ff.
This is where God mysteriously self identifies with the words: "I will be who I will be" or "I am who I am" And the name, related in Hebrew to the verb for being, represented by four Hebrew consonants, YHWH, is never pronounced by traditional Jews, because God's name is sacred, holy, mysterious.
Very Orthodox Jews won't even write the word "God" with a capital letter, but prefer "G_d." In our English Bibles, whenever you see the "LORD" in all capitals, you are reading a translation of this unpronounced name for God, YHWH. It is an important reminder for us, who are often on really rather intimate terms with God, that it is also true that God is utterly transcendent, and a response of utter awe and amazement is also appropriate.
The LORD gives Moses an assignment, and the language that the Exodus writer uses reminds us of the language of the great Greek poet, Homer, who has certain poetic stock phrases (rosy-fingered dawn, the wine-dark sea among the best-known) that appear again and again. The LORD says in 3:17: "I will bring you up out of the misery of Egypt, to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, a land flowing with Milk and honey."
Psalm 18:1-19 A psalm that speaks of God's act of delivery--quite a lot of resonances with the delivery from Egypt--though this act of delivery, according to the traditional comments that we don't see in our BCP presentations of the Psalms, was God's delivery of David from the hand of Saul.
It is a wonderful thing to be able to read and pray these psalms in the context of our own struggles. 18:6 "In my distress I called upon the LORD;
to my God I cried for help.
From his temple he heard my voice
and my cry to him reached his ears.
God's response shakes the earth to its very core. Yet it was gentle enough to pull out the suffering psalmist from his suffering:
18:16ff "He reached down from on high, he took me;
he drew me out of mighty waters.
He delivered me from my strong enemy,
and from those who hated me;
for they were too might for me.
They confronted me in the day of my calamity;
but the LORD was my support.
He brought me out into a broad place;
he delivered me, because he delighted in me.
Matthew 18 A child is an example of greatness in the Kingdom of Heaven. Children did not have the same social status that they do in our time. I'm looking at a current copy of The Atlantic (April 2014) featuring an article on "The Over-protected Kid." And I'm aware of all kinds of articles recently on "helicopter parenting." Children did not always confer social status upon their parents, or rule their parents' homes like young tyrants. When Jesus talks of being like a child, he had the first-century status of children more in mind.
After speaking about a child, and welcoming a child in Jesus' name, Jesus speaks of "little ones" in two more passages. Mental hospitals used to have people who had taken Jesus' words literally about "tearing out" their eyes, or cutting off their hands. But if we don't take Jesus literally here, we still need to ask: what do we need to leave behind that may feel essential to our self-identity if we are serious about being children of the Kingdom of Heaven? And are we ready perhaps to carry some wounds that won't be healed in this life?
Then we have the parable about the crazy shepherd who goes after the one lost sheep. (vss. 1-14)
And some practical advice about handling conflict in "the church"--is this an anachronism? or is this just a way of speaking of the "synagogue"?
Then the question about forgiving again and again and again and again... How does this advice from Jesus fit with our little saying of our time: "Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me"?
Then the amazing parable of the unforgiving slave/manager. There is soooooooooo much to think about in this one chapter of Matthew's gospel! It is hard to read so fast sometimes!
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
March 24 Genesis 49-50; Psalm 17, Matthew 17.
Genesis 49-50: Well, we've reached the end of one of the longest books of the Bible! Good job! What a story it is. As you continue to read, watch for themes that you've met in this book that will continue to re-appear in later books of the Bible. God is good, created a good and beautiful world; created humans in the Divine Image; preserves life from a remnant; forgives sinners; initiates relationship with human beings; seems at times mysterious and inscrutable. Have you seen others?
Matthew 17: Trans-Figuration; Meta-Morphosis. Latin and Greek words for what happens to a butterfly and that the New Testament writers used to describe what happened to Jesus on a mountain top where Jesus met with Moses and Elijah and where the 3 disciples who were present were in a state that was visionary: exciting and scary and mysterious. Peter wants to keep things just like that. They never stay that way. But they remembered for the rest of their lives what they experienced on that mountain. It gave them a new important vision of Jesus that would be severely tested as they experienced the realities of the journey to Jerusalem and Jesus' subsequent suffering and death.
Once again, the Voice identifies Jesus as "My Son, the Beloved" and commands them to "Listen to him!"
17:14-21... raises many questions for post-modern Christians. What do we do with the language about demons? If we don't believe in demons does that make us unfaithful Christians? If we don't have "faith the size of this mustard seed" because we know it is impossible to move mountains, and we believe it would be unethical to move mountains just to show off, are we missing out on a fuller kind of trust and faith that we would have if we did or could believe?
17:12 and 17:22 are both predictions of Jesus' own suffering and death. He himself did not "move the mountain" of his crucifixion. He died in agony in a public execution. Jesus really can't be taken literally, can he?
17:24ff. I think most of us are more familiar with the account that comes from later in Matthew where Jesus has to ask one of the temple officials to show him a coin and when he says "Render to Caesar what belongs to Caesar" (22:15ff). Interesting that this somewhat parallel passage appears here. Kind of like the multiple feedings (5000 and 4000).
Psalm 17: a beautiful prayer: "Guard me as the apple of the eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings" (17:8). We quote this psalm in prayer as part of our Compline service.
Saturday, March 8, 2014
March 22: Genesis 46-48; Psalm 16; Matthew 16
Genesis 46-48 God speaks to Jacob. And as so often, in the OT, Jacob's response is "Here I am."
The message is really very tender and full of encouragement. But also realistic. "I myself will go down with you to Egypt, and I will also bring you up again; and Joseph's own hand shall close your eyes." (46:4) Jacob will die in the presence of his beloved son. But also, don't overlook God's promise to "go down with you to Egypt" and to bring "you"--though it is in point of fact Jacob's descendants many generations later--up again.
When they finally meet, Jacob says: "I can die now, having seen for myself that you are still alive" (46:30). This is somehow reminiscent of Simeon's words in the Gospel of Luke: "Lord you now have set your servant free to go in peace as you have promised; for these eyes of mine have seen the Savior..."
As aliens in the land of Egypt, they settle in Goshen where they can raise animals. Interesting to see the little bit of tension implied between farmers who raise crops and irrigate and farmers who graze animals...
Also note the delicious irony and humor of Jacob's words in his audience before Pharaoh in 47:8. "The years of my earthly sojourn are one hundred thirty; few and hard have been the years of my life..."
And note the description of what happens when the famine hits Egypt and how Pharaoh benefits from the suffering of his people, selling them back the grain they had raised and then selling the land and becoming essentially serfs. While this might have been considered brilliant business planning on Joseph's part, it is so obviously counter to the commandments of the Torah and the words of the prophets that will appear in later parts of the scriptures.
Finally, note how when Jacob confers his blessing upon Joseph's sons, he gives priority to younger before the elder. This is a recurring theme in Genesis!
Psalm 16 This psalm contains one of the verses that I most loved when I was a child. I read a book, one of those evangelical Christian fiction paperbacks for children, that first put the spotlight on 16:11. I still love it:
You show me the path of life.
In your presence there is fullness of joy;
in your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
Matthew 16 "Pharisees and Sadducees" feature importantly in this chapter. Jesus reserves some of his most unflattering language for them, often labeling them "hypocrites."
This is the chapter with what is called often "Peter's confession." Peter is the first of the disciples, in Matthew's gospel, to see Jesus as "The Son of the living God." 16:17-19 is the passage on which the Roman Catholic church builds much of its tradition about Peter being the head of the Church, the first in the line of popes up to this very day.
Immediately after Peter recognizes Jesus, Jesus calls to those who would follow him to "take up their cross and follow" him. And so the road to Jerusalem and Christ's crucifixion begins in earnest...
The message is really very tender and full of encouragement. But also realistic. "I myself will go down with you to Egypt, and I will also bring you up again; and Joseph's own hand shall close your eyes." (46:4) Jacob will die in the presence of his beloved son. But also, don't overlook God's promise to "go down with you to Egypt" and to bring "you"--though it is in point of fact Jacob's descendants many generations later--up again.
When they finally meet, Jacob says: "I can die now, having seen for myself that you are still alive" (46:30). This is somehow reminiscent of Simeon's words in the Gospel of Luke: "Lord you now have set your servant free to go in peace as you have promised; for these eyes of mine have seen the Savior..."
As aliens in the land of Egypt, they settle in Goshen where they can raise animals. Interesting to see the little bit of tension implied between farmers who raise crops and irrigate and farmers who graze animals...
Also note the delicious irony and humor of Jacob's words in his audience before Pharaoh in 47:8. "The years of my earthly sojourn are one hundred thirty; few and hard have been the years of my life..."
And note the description of what happens when the famine hits Egypt and how Pharaoh benefits from the suffering of his people, selling them back the grain they had raised and then selling the land and becoming essentially serfs. While this might have been considered brilliant business planning on Joseph's part, it is so obviously counter to the commandments of the Torah and the words of the prophets that will appear in later parts of the scriptures.
Finally, note how when Jacob confers his blessing upon Joseph's sons, he gives priority to younger before the elder. This is a recurring theme in Genesis!
Psalm 16 This psalm contains one of the verses that I most loved when I was a child. I read a book, one of those evangelical Christian fiction paperbacks for children, that first put the spotlight on 16:11. I still love it:
You show me the path of life.
In your presence there is fullness of joy;
in your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
Matthew 16 "Pharisees and Sadducees" feature importantly in this chapter. Jesus reserves some of his most unflattering language for them, often labeling them "hypocrites."
This is the chapter with what is called often "Peter's confession." Peter is the first of the disciples, in Matthew's gospel, to see Jesus as "The Son of the living God." 16:17-19 is the passage on which the Roman Catholic church builds much of its tradition about Peter being the head of the Church, the first in the line of popes up to this very day.
Immediately after Peter recognizes Jesus, Jesus calls to those who would follow him to "take up their cross and follow" him. And so the road to Jerusalem and Christ's crucifixion begins in earnest...
March 21: Genesis 43-45; Psalm 15; Matthew 15
Genesis 43-45 The climax of the Joseph story! Joseph saying: God sent me before you to preserve life" (45:5); "God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here; but God"(45:7-8). And how telling, as Joseph sends his brothers back to retrieve their father, that he says to them: "Do not quarrel along the way!" (45:24).
Psalm 15: Notice the verbs "abide," "dwell," and "walk"! This is a psalm in the wisdom tradition, advocating a way of life that is based on honoring and fearing the LORD.
Matthew 15: What do you think about the story about the Canaanite woman? This is a challenging passage on several levels. It's one we should profitably discuss when we gather on Sundays after church during Lent to discuss our experience of reading together.
Psalm 15: Notice the verbs "abide," "dwell," and "walk"! This is a psalm in the wisdom tradition, advocating a way of life that is based on honoring and fearing the LORD.
Matthew 15: What do you think about the story about the Canaanite woman? This is a challenging passage on several levels. It's one we should profitably discuss when we gather on Sundays after church during Lent to discuss our experience of reading together.
A little Digression
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