This passage is one of the great expositions on the importance and value of faith. The writer here points out that faith was what motivated the people he refers to, Able, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, and Sarah. Without faith, their actions would have been meaningless. However, it is also worth noting that their faith led them to act. All of these people did things because of their faith. It is not enough to have “faith”. That faith must inspire us to take action.
This passage reminds me of a story my father told that illustrated faith (I think he told it to go along with this passage). Here is the story as I remember it:
A tightrope walker had strung a wire across the Niagara Falls and a crowd gathered to watch him walk across. They were impressed by his skill. He then blindfolded himself and walked across, impressing the crowd even more. Then he pushed a wheelbarrow across. Finally, he called out to the crowd, “Now I am going to push someone across in that wheelbarrow. Do you believe that I can do it?” The crowd cried out that yes, they believed he could do it. The walker then pointed to someone in the front of the crowd who had said they believed and told him, “Climb in.”
My father finished the story by saying, “Faith is getting into the wheelbarrow.”
God gives Ezekiel a message for Jerusalem and its people. He compares the city to a cooking pot filled with various cuts of meat. It has cooked over the fire until there is nothing to distinguish the good cuts from the bad. It is all equally bad. In much the same way, the people of Jerusalem had become equally bad. He continues the metaphor by suggesting trying to purify the pot by allowing it to sit on the fire until all of the water had boiled off. The time comes when the pot can no longer be cleaned and it must be thrown away. The same thing is happening today.
Today’s passage ends with a series of messages to Judah’s neighbors. God warns them that His judgment will fall upon them as well for their sins. Ezekiel lets them know that they are making a mistake to rejoice at the misfortunes of the people of Judah, for they will suffer a similar fate. We should never rejoice at the suffering of others because if we do so we may soon experience similar suffering.
It does not matter how big of a donation you make to good causes if your gained your wealth through evil acts. The prayers of a righteous person will make a bigger difference in the world than the billions of dollars spent on “good works” by the wicked.
While I am certain that the composer of this psalm was referring to King David, I am also certain that the New Testament references to this as a prophecy about Jesus are completely appropriate. This psalm is clearly a prophecy about the Messiah, God’s Anointed One.
In the story of the woman caught in adultery there is an interesting discrepancy. If she was caught in adultery, they must have caught the man as well, but he was not brought to be stoned. The Old Testament law calls for a man caught in adultery to be stoned as well as any woman so caught. This tendency to view a sin committed by one person differently than the same sin committed by a different person is something we need to examine in ourselves.
However Jesus does not address that issue. Instead, when the men asked His position on the Mosaic command was, He stooped down and wrote in the dust. He did not answer their question. They kept badgering Him, insisting He answer the question of whether or not she should be stoned. Finally He stood up and told them that they were right to stone her, but the first stone had to be throne by someone who was without sin. Then He returned to writing in the dust. I wish we knew what He was writing in the dust, but it probably does not matter. Perhaps He was writing out the Ten Commandments. Or perhaps He was playing tic-tac-toe with Himself. As I write this I realize that at least part of why Jesus wrote in the dust was to get the temper of the crowd to cool off. The reason the older men drifted off first was because they were the first to realize that no one was going to throw the first stone. The younger men were hoping that someone else would throw the first stone, then they could join in.
There is a final point to be made here. When the entire crowd had dispersed, Jesus asked the woman where her accusers were, if none of them had condemned her. When she replied that no one had, Jesus told her that He did not either. However, what He said next was at least as important as His lack of condemnation. He did not say, “Well, then, I guess you can go back to what you were doing.” No, He said, “Go, and sin no more.” When we come to Jesus, He does not condemn us. But He does tell us to go and sin no more. When sinners come to us, let us do likewise, both by refusing to condemn them and by calling on them to sin no more.
Samuel told Saul that God had instructed him to destroy the Amalekites and all of their livestock. So, Saul mobilized his army and attacked the Amalekites, wiping them out. However, he took their king captive and allowed his men to keep the best of the livestock. In doing this, Saul did what was politically expedient. Saul believed that if he allowed them to keep the livestock they found appealing they would be more loyal to him in the future. Saul chose political expedience over principle. Those who choose expedience over principle will always fail to build something which lasts.
Later, when God had sent Samuel to Jesse to anoint one of his sons as the next king of Israel, Samuel immediately thought that it would be Jesse’s eldest son, Eliab. However, God told him not to judge by appearance or height, Eliab was not God’s chosen. This contains an important lesson for us, we tend to judge others by their outward appearance. God judges people by their hearts. We would do well to seek the Holy Spirit’s guidance to do the same, not just in those we choose to follow, but in all of our interactions with others.
For today, One Year Bible Online links here. I am out of town on business for a few days. I expect to be able to get these completed each day, but may be a little later than usual in getting them published.
I have spent the last several days studying how the writer of Hebrews sees this psalm as applying to Jesus. As a result I find it hard to see it any other way. As I read this, I realized that the world is divided into two camps; those who serve the Lord willingly and those who oppose Him. Christ will be victorious and those who serve Him willingly will join Him in glory. Those who oppose Him will be struck down and destroyed.
Here the writer makes a stab at defining faith, and does a pretty good job of it. Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. Faith is the confidence and assurance that not everything can be explained by what we can experience with our five physical senses, that science does not answer all of the questions about the universe.
It was because of their faith that the great figures of the Bible were commended. Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, and Sarah were all commended because of their faith. It was because of their faith that they did the things which lead us to hold them up as examples. It is impossible to please God without faith because in order to please God we must seek Him. But we will not seek Him if we do not believe that He exists. These forerunners in faith considered themselves foreigners upon the earth, waiting for their heavenly homeland. We, too, are foreigners in the land in which we live, citizens of God’s kingdom. Let us always remember that this is not our home.
God sends troubles and trials to us and to our society to cleanse us from our sins, from our impurity. If we refuse to allow these things to cleanse us, God will have no choice but to throw us on to the fire for complete destruction. As a society, and as individuals, our impurity is lewdness and idolatry. Will we allow God to cleanse us of these impurities? Will we allow Him to remove the lewdness and idolatry from our lives?
We cannot buy God off. We will not deflect His judgement by making offerings and giving our money to help the poor. If we became wealthy by oppressing the poor, giving from that wealth by assisting the poor will not count in our favor. If we choose to follow the wrong path in life, God will send things to direct us back to His path for us. If we refuse to allow God’s discipline to guide us back to Him, we will die.
This psalm was interpreted as referring to Jesus by several New Testament writers. It declares that Jesus will rule over all of the earth and those who choose to be His enemies will be forced to submit. Those who follow Jesus will willingly go into battle for Him, but God will be all of the army which He needs.
The earliest manuscript copies that we have of the Gospel of John do not contain the story of the woman caught in adultery, but this story contains many lessons for us. We have the fact that the accusers say that they caught the woman in the act of adultery. Adultery involves two people. Where is the other one? Jesus could have gone there, but He did not. When the accusers demanded an answer from Jesus, He did not respond immediately. When they insisted the He give them a judgement against the woman, He accepted that they had interpreted the Law correctly. Then He told them that the one among them who was not equally guilty of breaking the Law should start the punishment. This is perhaps the second most important lesson of this story: when we look at the sins of others we should first consider the ways in which we have sinned. We are no less guilty of breaking God’s law than anyone else.
However, the most important lesson of this story is Jesus’ final statement to the woman, “Go, and sin no more.” Jesus does not condemn us for our sins, but He tells us to go and sin no more. Let us follow this command from Him. Let us also follow His example. When we are asked to condemn sinners, let us not condemn them. But that does not mean that we should encourage them to continue in their sin either.
In yesterday’s passage, Saul became impatient and offered sacrifices to God for his success rather than wait for Samuel to arrive as he had been instructed. Now today, Saul was told to destroy the Amalekites completely, both the people and all of their goods. He gathered his army and attacked them completely destroying the people, except for their king. Saul took the king captive and allowed his men to gather the best of the plunder from the wealth of the Amalekites. When confronted about his failure to do as God had commanded, Saul claimed that they had only kept the plunder in order to offer it as a sacrifice to God. How often are we like Saul? When we are caught doing wrong, we claim that we had the best of intentions. Rather than acknowledge his failure to obey, Saul made excuses.
I have been waiting to write today’s date since last year on December 12 (12/12/12) when lots of articles were written saying that it was the last of the “special” dates until next century. They were mistaken. I am pretty sure that today is (11/12/13). I find this date just as interesting as the repeating ones.
I am using One Year Bible Online for my daily Bible study. For today, One Year Bible Online links here. I have found that by writing this daily blog of what I see when I read these scriptures, I get more out of them. I hope that by posting these ruminations others may get some benefit as well. In order to make that possible I read the passages and write my thoughts a day in advance. If you have any thoughts or comments regarding these verses or what I have written about them, please post them.
Ezekiel placed various cuts of meat in a pot with water and cooked it over an open fire to symbolize Jerusalem under siege by the Babylonian army. God instructed him to remove the meat from the pot in random order because no piece of meat was better than another, symbolizing that no one inside Jerusalem during the siege was better than any one else. Now it may be that this was a reference to no one in Jerusalem being more righteous than any one else, but I believe it was a reference that the nobles and well-to-do in the city would not fare any better in the siege and its aftermath than the poor and powerless. The prophecy associated with this metaphor concludes by saying that the people in Jerusalem will be according to their conduct.
Shortly after this God tells Ezekiel that his wife, whom he loves dearly, will die, but that he must not mourn her. This strikes me as a very difficult command, yet Ezekiel kept this command as an illustration to the exiles as to how they would need to act when Jerusalem fell to the Babylonian army. He told them that in a similar fashion the exiles would be unable to express their grief when they received the news that Jerusalem had fallen, the Temple been destroyed, and their sons and daughters remaining there killed.
Faith is having confidence in that which we hope for. We hope for many things, but rarely act on that hope. However, when we have faith we act on that hope. Over the course of my life, I hoped that many different women would find me attractive and interesting, but I did not ask one of them to marry me until I had faith that the woman who became my wife would say “Yes”. But my faith was in more than that. I hoped that we would have a good, happy marriage, but it was not my hope in that good, happy marriage that led to it. It was my faith that such would happen and my willingness to act on that faith (not just my faith and actions, but hers as well). In the same manner, I hope that God will forgive my sins, but it is not my hope that allows me to accept His forgiveness. Rather it is my faith that He will do so. Because I have that faith, I act accordingly. In the same way, the writer points out that the great saints of the Old Testament acted on the basis of their faith in God. They never saw what they had faith in come to pass, but they maintained their faith and acted on it.
A psalm that has been traditionally interpreted by Christians as a prophecy concerning Jesus. The writer of Hebrews makes a fairly lengthy exposition on the meaning of the phrase contained here, “You are a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.” However, it is also a promise to those who faithfully serve God. We do not need to take action against our enemies. If we faithfully obey God, He will humble them before us.
I want to say up front that today was a challenging day for me to complete this blog. I had a lot of things that I needed to get done and was not able to dedicate the amount of time to this as I believe today’s passages deserve. I am going to need to work on how I prioritize my day so as to give my writing on here the effort it deserves.
I have been using One Year Bible Online for my daily Bible study for almost a year. For today, One Year Bible Online links here. I started writing this blog because the only way I can get myself to read the Bible everyday is to pretend that I am teaching someone about what it says to me. I hope that by posting these ruminations others may get some benefit as well. If you have any thoughts or comments regarding these verses or what I have written about them, please post them. I hope that the Spirit is moving in others through these posts as the Spirit has definitely been convicting me.
Samuel delivered a message to Saul in which he told Saul that God wanted him to destroy the Amalekites. Samuel told Saul that he was to destroy all of the Amalekites and all of their livestock. In response to this command from God through Samuel Saul mustered the armies of Israel. Before beginning his attack on the Amalekites, Saul sent word to the Kenites living among them warning them to move away from the Amalekites. The passage tells us that the Kenites packed up and left. Saul then attacked the Amalekites and killed all of them, except that he took their king captive. In addition, rather than destroying all of their livestock, the Israelite army spared the best of the Amalekites livestock. They only destroyed those animals which were undesirable.
After Saul’s victory, Samuel received word from God that Saul had not obeyed the command that he had been given. Samuel went looking for Saul. When Samuel found Saul the first thing Saul said to Samuel was to claim to have followed the command from God that Samuel had given him. When Saul said that, Samuel said, “If that’s true, why do I hear the sounds of livestock?” Saul responded, “Oh, we only kept the best of the livestock in order to offer them as a sacrifice to God, but we destroyed all the rest.”
Samuel pointed out to Saul that at one time Saul was humble but God made him leader and king over Israel. Now Samuel asked Saul why he had failed to obey God’s command to completely destroy the Amalekites and their livestock. Rather than at that moment confessing his sin and begging for forgiveness, Saul claimed that he had followed God’s commands and his troops had only kept the best of the livestock in order to offer them as a sacrifice to God at Gilgal. Notice the deflection of blame; Saul said that he hadn’t done anything wrong and if it was wrong not to destroy the livestock it was his men who did it, not him. And they only did it in order to offer sacrifices to God.
Samuel rejected Saul’s defense of his actions and told Saul that God had rejected him as king. And at this point we begin to see Saul’s error more clearly. Only now when Samuel refused to accept Saul’s attempts to justify his actions does Saul admit that he had done wrong. But even now, he attempted to blame others for his own shortcomings, Saul claimed that he only did it because he was afraid of the men and gave in to them. Saul asked Samuel to forgive him and come back with him to the victory celebration. Samuel initially refused and began to leave. Saul grabbed Samuel and begged him to come back. Saul asked Samuel to honor him before the elders and people of Israel. In this passage we see summed up the error that Saul made throughout his reign. Throughout his reign, Saul first consideration was the politically expedient. Saul’s remorse was not because he had sinned, but because Samuel would no longer lend him his support. Saul judged actions on the basis of what would increase his hold on power, rather than on the basis of what was the right thing to do.
Today’s passage begins with the story of the woman caught in adultery. This story is not in the oldest manuscript copies of John that we have, which suggests that it was a later addition (although not necessarily). Nevertheless the story is to my eyes consistent with the rest of the book of John. In this story, when the religious leaders brought the woman caught in adultery to Jesus for Him to pass judgment, Jesus does not ask, if they caught her in adultery, where is the man she was having adultery with? No, he points out their hypocrisy in an even more personal way. When they first ask Him whether He agrees with the Mosaic Law command that she be stoned, He does not answer. Jesus merely stooped down and wrote something in the dust. They kept demanding an answer, so finally Jesus told them, “Sure, go ahead, but the one of you who has not broken the Mosaic Law goes first.” Then He stooped down and wrote something else in the dust. We don’t know what Jesus wrote in the dust, but I imagine He was writing references to the Laws of Moses. One by one those who had come to accuse the woman (and to trap Jesus) slipped away. Jesus then turned to the woman, asked her where her accusers were and then told her that He would not accuse her either. But He did not give her a free pass, He told her to go and sin no more. This very definitely applies to each of us. Jesus tells us that He does not accuse us, but He also tells us to go and sin no more. Jesus calls us to repent of our sins and turn from them.
I was not going to touch on the next section. However, I felt the need to touch on Jesus’ statement, “I am the light of the world.” He tells us that if we follow Him, we will not be walking in the darkness, rather we will be working in the light. If you want to have a clear light on how to know right from wrong, follow Jesus.
This psalm is a clear Messianic prophecy. Everyone will acknowledge that Jesus is Lord. Those who refuse to accept His Lordship willingly will be subdued by the force of God’s glory.
Today’s proverbs warn us that God despises those who think they can do wrong and then later make restitution. If we wish to be righteous, we must seek after righteousness. We cannot excuse our bad behavior by saying, “Well, yes, I know that is wrong, but I give to the Church (or whatever other ‘good’ thing we think offsets our sin).”
