Do not worry when you cannot understand where your path is taking you. God is directing our steps and has a destination in mind for us. If we love Him and trust Him we will find joy at the end of our road.
This psalm is a call asking God to bring the wicked to justice. Additionally, the psalmist praises God for showing him mercy. Both aspects represent things we should model. However, there is an additional point the psalmist makes I want to take note of today. He says that if God remains silent he may as well die. I want to have a similar desire to hear God speak to me. I wish that every day I felt incomplete until I had heard God speak to me. There are days when I have that feeling, but not every day. I pray that God will make it so that I seek His voice each and every day.
In yesterday’s passage Paul told us that the Gospel is foolishness by human standards. In today’s passage he emphasizes that he did not say that it was actually foolishness. Instead, Paul tells us that the Gospel is wisdom, but not the sort of wisdom which will help you rule the world, or even a piece of it. The lesson in this passage is that the only way we can acquire the wisdom of God, the only way we can know God’s thoughts is by receiving His Spirit.
Then comes the part I struggle to remember. No matter how eloquently, no matter how clearly, we explain spiritual truths those who have not receive God’s Spirit will consider what we say to be foolish. We will never convince anyone to come to Christ by our grand words. It is only when the Spirit begins to move in their hearts that they will begin to understand the wisdom of the words which the Spirit speaks through our mouths.
I always struggle with the response of the leaders of the returned Exiles when those whom they now lived among asked to work with them to rebuild the Temple. They flatly rejected the offer of assistance. On the one hand, the rejection was flat out and cold. They told those who had offered that they could have no part in the effort. It seems to me that we should accept all who wish to worship God and welcome their assistance in building God’s Kingdom.
On the other hand, these people had been living in the area all during the Exile, and not once had they thought to rebuild the Temple. They claimed to be seeking God, but they had made no effort to dedicate themselves to serving God until the Jewish Exiles returned. There are dangers to accepting help in doing God’s work from those who are not truly dedicated to serving God. If they have been splitting their allegiance between serving God and other interests they are likely to attempt to bring this same mindset into the new task as well.
The proverb writer continues his focus on the importance of staying out of relationships with immoral people. He tells us that if we make wisdom and insight members of our family they will protect us from the immoral.
Do we feel as the psalmist, that if God is silent, we may as well give up and die? God is not silent, although we may have to be in order to hear His voice. Let us remember that while part of prayer is taking our concerns, fears, and needs to God, an even bigger part is listening to what He has to say to us. The wicked do not take time to listen to God because they do not care about what He has done. If we listen carefully to God, He will tell us how to make it through whatever troubles we face.
Jesus condemns hypocrites in this passage. He describes the various ways in which people set themselves up as being better than others, without actually holding themselves to a morally superior standard. Jesus gives examples of people focusing on the details of righteous behavior while overlooking the bigger picture. While it is valuable to sacrifice in little things, such as tithing on our vegetable garden, but it is worthless if we allow ourselves to operate selfishly and greedily in the bigger things, such as our business dealings.
When the Israelites camped at the foot of Mt Sinai, God came down upon the top of the mountain. Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God. He had the trumpeters (not the right word, but we don’t really have a word for this) blow on the ram’s horns in a loud call to the people. Moses spoke and God answered. There is a back and forth between God and Moses with the people included in the conversation, but the people were afraid. They stood back and asked Moses to speak for God. They requested that God not speak directly to them.
This is an all too human tendency. We seek someone to place between us and God. We are afraid to talk to God directly.
God directs the path our life will follow. This means that we will not understand why some things happen, but we can be sure that they serve God’s purposes in directing us to where He wants us to go.
When we cry out to the Lord for mercy, He will hear us and answer us. He will pay back the wicked, those who speak friendly words while plotting harm. Those who have no concern for God’s work nor His creation will answer to Him. He will hold them to account. If we trust the Lord with all of our heart and soul He will support us and defend us. Let us choose the latter rather than the former.
The fact that we, as Christians, will seem foolish to those who have rejected the Gospel does not mean that we are foolish. We should not attempt to convince unbelievers by the wisdom of our words, nor by our well-crafted arguments. However, when we are speaking with our fellow believers we should seek to express God’s wisdom. Whether we are speaking or listening, let us let God’s Spirit guide us to wisdom. We will not be able to understand what is truly wise without God’s Spirit to guide us. The converse of that is true as well, we will only be able to speak with true wisdom if we allow God’s Spirit to guide our words. All of this leads to the conclusion that we are working from the world’s wisdom rather than God’s when we attempt to claim that we are wiser than others because we follow this or that particular teacher. Being a Mennonite, or a Baptist, or a Catholic, or a …, does not make us a better Christian than someone who practices a different denominational understanding of Christ’s teachings. Let us strive to uplift our fellow believers, no matter what denomination they are a part of. Let us listen to God’s wisdom, no matter what route He uses to communicate it to us.
As soon as the returned Exiles got settled into their new homes, they began work on the Temple. The very first thing they did was rebuild the altar. Notice their first priority was to be able to worship God. It was only after they had restored the altar, and with it their ability to worship God as they understood it, that they began rebuilding the Temple and the rest of the city.
When those who had been living in the land sought to work with the Exiles in rebuilding the Temple, their assistance was rejected. I always have a difficult time with this part of the passage. Perhaps, the returned Exiles rejected their assistance because they knew they would have demanded a say in the way things were done, thus making it harder to be faithful to God’s commands. However, I cannot help but think that the troubles which the Exiles later faced could have been avoided if they had welcomed these other seekers after God into their assembly. It is my belief that when we are working on God’s work we should accept the aid of any who are seeking to further that work.
I am trying something different. Previously, I have always placed my comments on the passage in the order Old Testament passage, New Testament passage, Psalm, Proverb. For the near future I am going to post them in the order in which I prepare the comments. This is likely to be the reverse of how I was doing it, but I foresee changing it up depending on what strikes me first. Please let me know what you think of this change.
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, or more. in advance. If you have any thoughts or comments regarding these verses or what I have written about them, please post them.
The psalmist gives a pretty good way to summarize who the evil are, “They care nothing for what the Lord has done or for what his hands have made.” Then he goes on to call on us to praise the Lord because He has heard his cry for mercy. I love verse 7:
The Lord is my strength and shield.
I trust him with all my heart.
He helps me, and my heart is filled with joy.
I burst out in songs of thanksgiving.
The Lord is my rock and my protector. He has heard my cry and had mercy on me.
Jesus condemns the Pharisees for their hypocrisy in this passage. He talks about how they split hairs in their various interpretations of the Law of Moses in order to determine that action A was OK, while action B was against the Law. The most important part for understanding how it applies to us is in verse 23. There he accuses them of being scrupulous about tithing every little thing while overlooking the important parts of the Law. Jesus makes it clear that tithing is a good thing but makes it clear that we should put a stronger emphasis on justice, mercy and faithfulness than whether someone gives the right amount to God. It is more important to love our neighbors and care for their hurts than it is to get the minor details of God’s commands correct. Jesus tells us that it is more important to be righteous on the inside, in our thoughts and attitude, in what we think about others, than it is to appear righteous on the outside, for others to think that we are righteous. Let us do what is right because it is right, not because it makes us look good in front of others.
I could do this about the Ten Commandments and what they each mean. Or perhaps what just a few of them mean. However, what inspires me today is how God gave the Ten Commandments to the children of Israel and how they reacted to that presentation. God spoke directly to the people of Israel from the mountain. The passage tells us that a dense cloud came down on to the top of the mountain, thunder roared and lightning flashed. God gave the commandments in thunder and lightning from the cloud of smoke billowing on the top of the mountain. The people of Israel were afraid and asked Moses to intercede. They asked that Moses speak to them for they were afraid of God speaking directly to them. Moses told them that God had done this so that their fear of Him would keep them from sinning.
Do we have sufficient fear of the Lord to keep from sinning? The people of Israel did not have metaphorical fear of God, they had “hide under the bed” fear of God. Before we can truly appreciate God’s love and His grace, we need to learn to fear Him as the people of Israel feared Him here.
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. If you have any thoughts or comments regarding these verses or what I have written about them, please post them.
In the fall after their return the returned exiles gathered in Jerusalem and rebuilt the altar of the Lord on its original location. They began holding the festivals prescribed in the Law of Moses. In the spring of the following year they began work on the foundation of the Temple. When they completed the foundation of the Temple, they had a celebration. Some of the older persons present, who remembered the first Temple, wept when they saw the completed foundation, but everyone else was overjoyed.
When the people living in the surrounding territory (the passage calls them the enemies of the exiles) heard that the exiles were rebuilding the Temple, they asked for permission to help with the rebuilding. The leaders of the exiles rejected their request to help with rebuilding the Temple. From that time forward the people in the surrounding territories truly were the enemies of the exiles and began making efforts to stop them from rebuilding Jerusalem. When Xerxes took the throne of Persia they sent him a letter of accusation against the people of Judah and again when Artaxerxes took the throne. Artaxerxes responded to their letter by giving orders that Jerusalem only be rebuilt if he gave his express command for that to happen. The leaders of the surrounding peoples then went in force to Jerusalem and forced the people of Judah to stop their rebuilding project.
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It is never explained why the returned exiles refused to allow the people who were living in the land around them to help in the rebuilding of the Temple. My inclination is to consider that refusal a mistake. Certainly it is possible that the help was conditional on having a say on how worship would be conducted in the rebuilt Temple, which would have been a legitimate basis for refusal, the pattern of worship was laid out in the Law of Moses. Even if the leaders of the surrounding peoples did not demand a say in how Temple worship would be conducted, I can see a legitimate fear that they would later demand such a role. However, considering how things turned out, I do not see how accepting their help and avoiding alienating them would have been any worse.
As I said, the passage takes it as a given that the leaders of the exiles did the right thing by rejecting the help of the surrounding peoples, but the only justification it provides for that is their later enmity towards the Jewish people rebuilding the Temple.
Red roses up close
Today, Paul tells us that while he does not attempt to use wisdom to introduce the Gospel to people, there is a message of wisdom for mature believers. But God’s wisdom is not the same as the world’s wisdom. God reveals His wisdom through the Holy Spirit. We have received the Spirit of God, not the spirit of this world. The Spirit of God allows us to understand the wisdom of God.
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Once more I find that writing a synopsis of what Paul wrote was not working for me today. I summed up yesterday’s passage as saying that we will never convert anyone by the wisdom of our arguments for the Gospel. Toady’s passage tells us that that does not mean that there is not wisdom in the Gospel. On the contrary, there is wisdom which dwarfs that of the world. However, we can never learn to understand that wisdom until God’s Spirit comes to dwell within us. The only way to understand God’s will is for God’s Spirit to reveal it to us. To those without God’s Spirit the wisdom of God seems foolishness. That is because they do not start with an understanding of God. It is possible for someone in whom the Holy Spirit resides to evaluate the wisdom of the actions of those of the world, but it is not possible for those without the Holy Spirit to evaluate the wisdom of the actions of those with the Holy Spirit.
This is an important point for us to remember. It is possible for Christians to understand the priorities of non-Christians, no matter how misguided we think they are. This allows us to judge whether their actions can be reasonably expected to accomplish what they want out of life (that is whether those actions are wise by the standards the non-Christians use to judge wisdom). On the other hand, it is impossible for non-Christians to understand the priorities of Christians. This means that they always see our actions as foolish because they cannot understand what our goals are.
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Paul continues by telling the believers in Corinth that he had been unable to share the wisdom of God with them when he was last there. He had been forced to give them nothing but the most basic spiritual food because they were as unbelievers or spiritual infants, they were not ready for anything more advanced. In fact, he says, they still are not ready for the more advanced teachings of Christ because they are quarreling with each other. They are busy trying to make themselves more important than others by claiming to be followers of this, or that, teacher, who they claimed was the greater authority on Christianity.
Am I ready for spiritual food that is solid? Or am I still only willing to drink spiritual milk?
Red roses up close
The psalmist cries out to the Lord and begs Him to show him mercy. Later the psalmist says that he will praise the Lord because He has heard his cry for mercy. What is the difference between those whom God tears down and destroys and those whom He shields and to whom He grants mercy?
The psalmist tells us this about those whom God will tear down:
They care nothing for what the Lord has done
or for what his hands have made.
But as for himself he says:
The Lord is my strength and shield.
I trust him with all my heart.
If we are willing to trust God with all of our hearts, He will grant us mercy and shield us from all troubles that this world brings.
Our steps are directed by God, which makes it hard for us to understand how we end up in some of the places He puts us. We should not strive to understand how we arrived at our destination, rather we should seek to understand what God wants us to do now that we are here.
