Archives for 2011

Sheep, Wolves, Doves, Serpents, Matthew 10, Day 28, Jan 28,

Matthew 10

¹ Jesus called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive out impure spirits and to heal every disease and sickness.

Does every believer have the authority to heal every disease and sickness, or those to whom God gives the gift of faith to heal? Theology apart, in practice, I have observed that some people’s prayers heal the sick, and change things, which is not true of every prayer uttered for healing.

If I were sick, I would, of course, ask for prayer from someone with a track record of healing disease and sickness, because they are more likely to have the faith and authority.

² These are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon (who is called Peter) and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; ³ Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; ⁴ Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him.

⁵ These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Do not go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans. ⁶ Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel. ⁷ As you go, proclaim this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ ⁸ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons.

Salvation, because of God’s sovereign choice came from the Jews, and was preached first to the Jews.

These are the signs of the kingdom of heaven on earth—the sick healed, the dead raised, lepers cleansed, demons exorcised.

Healings, exorcisms, miracles. Signs of the Kingdom.

Are these the only signs of the Kingdom?

No. Because the Kingdom of God is also within us. Where one experiences and demonstrates love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness and self-control, whatever the provocation.

Freely you have received; freely give.

God freely gives spiritual power, and expects it to be shared freely.

⁹ “Do not get any gold or silver or copper to take with you in your belts— ¹⁰ no bag for the journey or extra shirt or sandals or a staff, for the worker is worth his keep.

While Jesus does not want his apostles to profiteer, or make a fortune off the spiritual gifts he has given them, he does expect those blessed by their endeavours to support them.

¹¹ Whatever town or village you enter, search there for some worthy person and stay at their house until you leave.

And what a blessing they would have been to their hosts!!

¹² As you enter the home, give it your greeting. ¹³ If the home is deserving, let your peace rest on it; if it is not, let your peace return to you.

Peace is the gift given to individuals, homes or cities which receive the good news of the kingdom.

¹⁴ If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet. ¹⁵ Truly I tell you, it will be more bearable for Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for that town.

They come non-coercively bearing blessing. If they and their blessing are not wanted, they move on.

¹⁶ “I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves.

ESV The serpent was the symbol of shrewdness and intellectual cunning, while the dove was emblematic of simple innocence.

What protection might a sheep, among the most tasty and most defenceless creatures in the animal kingdom (even more so than rabbits which have speed and sharp teeth) have when surrounded by ravenous wolves?

Or us when face to face with evil?

We can ask God for shrewdness, whether it is a natural quality of ours or not. We can think. We ask him for guidance in how to be shrewd enough when we suspect that we are out of our depth in miry situations.

Goodness, innocence, gentleness and naivete also have an immense power. People after all are made in the image of God.

The ultimate power however for a sheep among wolves is the fact that the eyes of the shepherd are on it.

¹⁷ Be on your guard;

Jesus was meek and humble, yet his advice was edgy.

Don’t trust too soon, too easily, and perhaps not too much. Be guarded, be careful.

This is hard advice for me, I am naturally sanguine, trusting, and open. But heeding it is part of growing up.

you will be handed over to the local councils and be flogged in the synagogues. ¹⁸ On my account you will be brought before governors and kings as witnesses to them and to the Gentiles. ¹⁹But when they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, ²⁰ for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.

Jesus tells his disciples not to be anxious because the spirit will guide them.

Jesus promises protection and infusion of wisdom when one lands up in tricky situations because of doing the right thing.

One needs to experience it to know its reality.

I will give you words and wisdom which your adversaries cannot withstand or contradict. Luke 21:15

²¹ “Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child; children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. ²² You will be hated by everyone because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. ²³ When you are persecuted in one place, flee to another. Truly I tell you, you will not finish going through the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.

Following Christ is always a divisive thing.

It may well lead to persecution—unfair, unjust targeting.

And sadly, not just from non-believers, but also from believers and church-goers, who, for instance, may prefer the status quo and power to anything which might rock the boat.

* * *

And here’s how the disciples would stack up if we were hiring.

TO: Jesus, Son of Joseph, Woodcrafters Carpenter Shop, Nazareth

FROM: Jordan Management Consultants, Jerusalem

Dear Sir:

Thank you for submitting the resumes of the twelve men you have picked for managerial positions in your new organization. All of them have now taken our battery of tests; and we have not only run the results through our computer, but also arranged personal interviews for each of them with our psychologist and vocational aptitude consultant. The profiles of all tests are included, and you will want to study each of them carefully.

As part of our service, we make some general comments for your guidance, much as an auditor will include some general statements. This is given as a result of staff consultation, and comes without any additional fee.

It is the staff opinion that most of your nominees are lacking in background, education and vocational aptitude for the type of enterprise you are undertaking. They do not have the team concept. We would recommend that you continue your search for persons of experience in managerial ability and proven capability.

Simon Peter is emotionally unstable and given to fits of temper. Andrew has absolutely no qualities of leadership. The two brothers, James and John, the sons of Zebedee, place personal interest above company loyalty. Thomas demonstrates a questioning attitude that would tend to undermine morale. We feel that it is our duty to tell you that Matthew has been blacklisted by the Greater Jerusalem Better Business Bureau. James, the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus definitely have radical leanings, and they both registered a high score on the manic-depressive scale.

One of the candidates, however, shows great potential. He is a man of ability and resourcefulness, meets people well, has a keen business mind and has contacts in high places. He is highly motivated, ambitious and responsible. We recommend Judas Iscariot as your controller and right-hand man. All the other profiles are self-explanatory.

We wish you every success in your new venture.

Sincerely yours,

Jordan Management Consultants

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light

By Anita Mathias

Peter Adams, Sunrise over Cat Mountain

The most joyful and comforting and inspiring project of this young year has been Blogging Through the Bible.

For one, given that I am also a mum, and a writer, and a pet-owner, and an owner of a publishing company which solely supports our family, and a middle-aged woman who needs to exercise to preserve what strength I have, I have accepted it will not be as good as if I had Thomas Merton’s life, let’s say, and lived in a shed in the wilds of Kentucky, with endless hours of silence and leisure stretching in front of me.

And I don’t want to trade. I have won fellowships to artists’ colonies in America, where my breakfasts and lunch were brought to my studio and my dinner cooked, and all I had to do was read and write and think, and by the end of two weeks, I could not wait to return to my old tumble-drier of a life.

(And is liberating for me to release work that is not my very best. Because if every thing we did was our very best work, we would do very little. It is a daily exercise in humility!!)

But I do have enough of silence and solitude for my head to become an echo-chamber for the phrases and ideas I pick up in my reading.

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light. Mt. 4.

Imagine that. Walking in darkness, then seeing a great light.

And that is Christ.

When I first became a Christian, I had difficult years when I had to accept by faith that I was a new creation, because I was still struggling so much with sin. I had a dreadful temper, for instance. And so did Roy. For years, we found each other impossible to live with. Fortunately, we also found each other impossible to live without, and so, we are together 21 years later, much milder, much sweeter, and–who would have imagined it? almost miraculously–happy.

During those years, I would not support evangelistic missionaries financially. We happily tithed right for the first 15 or so years of our marriage (a practice we are no longer as good at) but to World Vision, Compassion and Samaritan’s Purse and the Heifer Project. I felt I needed to see faith transform me and the way I lived my daily life before I would financially support preachers rather than those involved in social action.

Re-reading Matthew this month, I realized that yes, faith has changed me and my life.

Jesus is a great light to me.

How?

I jotted down a list in any old order.

1. Guidance. Specific direction on what to do.

2. An assurance of spiritual protection when I am following directions.

3 Comfort in depression

4 Comfort from his word.

5 The waterfall of intense grace and joy which he can pour into my anxious fragmented spirit. His offer, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.”

6 The quite literal lifting of fear when I turn to him.

7 The sense that he loves me. That he is sometimes amused by me. That he accepts me as I am. That I make him smile.

8 I know my life is in his hands, and he can work out all things for good.

9 When sad, unjust, unfair things happen, in times of reverses or financial loss, I know my affairs are in his hands, and he can bring good out of these things.

10 I can trust my children and husband into his hands. And their futures. And my future. And old age.

11 I can trust my health, and my safety and my house when I travel into his hands.

12 He gives me ideas when I have none.

13 Oh, there is so much wisdom in his words. He teaches me how to do life.

14 I can talk to him during sleepless nights. And he talks right back. In fact, that’s when he’s most loquacious.

15 Talking to him calms me down when I am agitated.

16 I love him, and that brings much light into my life.

He tells me to stop blogging and go to sleep when it is nearly midnight, and I am rambling, and waxing over-lyrical.

Jacob, the Deceiver is Blessed. Genesis 29-30, Day 27, Jan 27

By Anita Mathias

Genesis 30

¹ When Rachel saw that she was not bearing Jacob any children, she became jealous of her sister. So she said to Jacob, “Give me children, or I’ll die!”
² Jacob became angry with her and said, “Am I in the place of God, who has kept you from having children?”
Jacob recognized there are limits to his powers to manipulate.
He was always trying to wrest blessing by his own efforts. Here he acknowledges that blessing can only come from God.
³ Then she said, “Here is Bilhah, my servant. Sleep with her so that she can bear children for me and I too can build a family through her.”
Ancient familial ways of coping become our default reaction. Rachel takes matters into her own hands as Sarah did.
⁴ So she gave him her servant Bilhah as a wife. Jacob slept with her, ⁵ and she became pregnant and bore him a son. ⁶ Then Rachel said, “God has vindicated me; he has listened to my plea and given me a son.” Because of this she named him Dan.
⁷ Rachel’s servant Bilhah conceived again and bore Jacob a second son. ⁸ Then Rachel said, “I have had a great struggle with my sister, and I have won.” So she named him Naphtali.
⁹ When Leah saw that she had stopped having children, she took her servant Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife. ¹⁰ Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a son. ¹¹ Then Leah said, “What good fortune!” So she named him Gad.
¹² Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a second son. ¹³ Then Leah said, “How happy I am! The women will call me happy.” So she named him Asher.
¹⁴ During wheat harvest, Reuben went out into the fields and found some mandrake plants, which he brought to his mother Leah. Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son’s mandrakes.”
¹⁵ But she said to her, “Wasn’t it enough that you took away my husband? Will you take my son’s mandrakes too?”
“Very well,” Rachel said, “he can sleep with you tonight in return for your son’s mandrakes.”
¹⁶ So when Jacob came in from the fields that evening, Leah went out to meet him. “You must sleep with me,” she said. “I have hired you with my son’s mandrakes.” So he slept with her that night.
¹⁷ God listened to Leah, and she became pregnant and bore Jacob a fifth son. ¹⁸ Then Leah said, “God has rewarded me for giving my servant to my husband.” So she named him Issachar.
¹⁹ Leah conceived again and bore Jacob a sixth son. ²⁰ Then Leah said, “God has presented me with a precious gift. This time my husband will treat me with honor, because I have borne him six sons.” So she named him Zebulun.
²¹ Some time later she gave birth to a daughter and named her Dinah.
²² Then God remembered Rachel; he listened to her and enabled her to conceive. ²³ She became pregnant and gave birth to a son and said, “God has taken away my disgrace.” ²⁴ She named him Joseph, and said, “May the LORD add to me another son.”

Jacob’s Flocks Increase

²⁵ After Rachel gave birth to Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me on my way so I can go back to my own homeland. ²⁶ Give me my wives and children, for whom I have served you, and I will be on my way. You know how much work I’ve done for you.” ²⁷ But Laban said to him, “If I have found favor in your eyes, please stay. I have learned by divination that the LORD has blessed me because of you.” ²⁸ He added, “Name your wages, and I will pay them.”
²⁹ Jacob said to him, “You know how I have worked for you and how your livestock has fared under my care. ³⁰ The little you had before I came has increased greatly, and the LORD has blessed you wherever I have been. But now, when may I do something for my own household?”
God’s inalienable blessing because of his great mercy–unlinked to Jacob’s deserving.
³¹ “What shall I give you?” he asked.
“Don’t give me anything,” Jacob replied. “But if you will do this one thing for me, I will go on tending your flocks and watching over them: ³² Let me go through all your flocks today and remove from them every speckled or spotted sheep, every dark-colored lamb and every spotted or speckled goat. They will be my wages. ³³ And my honesty will testify for me in the future, whenever you check on the wages you have paid me. Any goat in my possession that is not speckled or spotted, or any lamb that is not dark-colored, will be considered stolen.”
Most commonly the sheep were all white, and the goats all black. So on the face of it, this was a very modest request.
³⁴ “Agreed,” said Laban. “Let it be as you have said.” ³⁵ That same day he removed all the male goats that were streaked or spotted, and all the speckled or spotted female goats (all that had white on them) and all the dark-colored lambs, and he placed them in the care of his sons. ³⁶ Then he put a three-day journey between himself and Jacob, while Jacob continued to tend the rest of Laban’s flocks.
A shocking deception. Though Jacob is under God’s protection and blessing, he is still reaping what he has sown.
³⁷ Jacob, however, took fresh-cut branches from poplar, almond and plane trees and made white stripes on them by peeling the bark and exposing the white inner wood of the branches. ³⁸ Then he placed the peeled branches in all the watering troughs, so that they would be directly in front of the flocks when they came to drink. When the flocks were in heat and came to drink, ³⁹ they mated in front of the branches. And they bore young that were streaked or speckled or spotted. ⁴⁰ Jacob set apart the young of the flock by themselves, but made the rest face the streaked and dark-colored animals that belonged to Laban. Thus he made separate flocks for himself and did not put them with Laban’s animals. ⁴¹ Whenever the stronger females were in heat, Jacob would place the branches in the troughs in front of the animals so they would mate near the branches, ⁴² but if the animals were weak, he would not place them there. So the weak animals went to Laban and the strong ones to Jacob. ⁴³ In this way the man grew exceedingly prosperous and came to own large flocks, and female and male servants, and camels and donkeys.
Like Laban, Jacob uses deception of his own. And the scheme worked, but only because of God’s intervention, not because of Jacob’s attempts at genetics!!

Genesis 31

¹ Jacob heard that Laban’s sons were saying, “Jacob has taken everything our father owned and has gained all this wealth from what belonged to our father.” ² And Jacob noticed that Laban’s attitude toward him was not what it had been. ³ Then the LORD said to Jacob, “Go back to the land of your fathers and to your relatives, and I will be with you.”

Every signal–from God, Laban, Laban’s son, and his own wives warned Jacob that it was now time to return to Canaan.

⁴ So Jacob sent word to Rachel and Leah to come out to the fields where his flocks were. ⁵ He said to them, “I see that your father’s attitude toward me is not what it was before, but the God of my father has been with me. ⁶ You know that I’ve worked for your father with all my strength, ⁷ yet your father has cheated me by changing my wages ten times. However, God has not allowed him to harm me. ⁸ If he said, ‘The speckled ones will be your wages,’ then all the flocks gave birth to speckled young; and if he said, ‘The streaked ones will be your wages,’ then all the flocks bore streaked young. ⁹ So God has taken away your father’s livestock and has given them to me.
God’s inalienable blessing.
¹⁰ “In breeding season I once had a dream in which I looked up and saw that the male goats mating with the flock were streaked, speckled or spotted. ¹¹ The angel of God said to me in the dream, ‘Jacob.’ I answered, ‘Here I am.’ ¹² And he said, ‘Look up and see that all the male goats mating with the flock are streaked, speckled or spotted, for I have seen all that Laban has been doing to you. ¹³ I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar and where you made a vow to me. Now leave this land at once and go back to your native land.’”
While Laban has exploited Jacob for his own advantage, God has consistently worked against Laban’s schemes.
¹⁴ Then Rachel and Leah replied, “Do we still have any share in the inheritance of our father’s estate? ¹⁵ Does he not regard us as foreigners? Not only has he sold us, but he has used up what was paid for us. ¹⁶ Surely all the wealth that God took away from our father belongs to us and our children. So do whatever God has told you.”
¹⁷ Then Jacob put his children and his wives on camels, ¹⁸ and he drove all his livestock ahead of him, along with all the goods he had accumulated in Paddan Aram, to go to his father Isaac in the land of Canaan.
¹⁹ When Laban had gone to shear his sheep, Rachel stole her father’s household gods. ²⁰ Moreover, Jacob deceived Laban the Aramean by not telling him he was running away. ²¹ So he fled with all he had, crossed the Euphrates River, and headed for the hill country of Gilead.

NIV–As he had to flee from Esau earlier. Jacob’s devious dealings produced only hostility from which he had to flee.
Devious dealings can get your own way in the short run, and the unremitting hostility of those you have deceived in the long run.

Laban Pursues Jacob

²² On the third day Laban was told that Jacob had fled. ²³ Taking his relatives with him, he pursued Jacob for seven days and caught up with him in the hill country of Gilead. ²⁴ Then God came to Laban the Aramean in a dream at night and said to him, “Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.”

God intervenes with warnings, speaking even to people who were not yet his covenant people.

²⁵ Jacob had pitched his tent in the hill country of Gilead when Laban overtook him, and Laban and his relatives camped there too. ²⁶ Then Laban said to Jacob, “What have you done? You’ve deceived me, and you’ve carried off my daughters like captives in war. ²⁷ Why did you run off secretly and deceive me?

Jacob’s character, reflected in his name, the deceiver, is emphasized again and again.

Why didn’t you tell me, so I could send you away with joy and singing to the music of timbrels and harps? ²⁸ You didn’t even let me kiss my grandchildren and my daughters goodbye. You have done a foolish thing. ²⁹ I have the power to harm you; but last night the God of your father said to me, ‘Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.’ ³⁰ Now you have gone off because you longed to return to your father’s household. But why did you steal my gods?”

³¹ Jacob answered Laban, “I was afraid, because I thought you would take your daughters away from me by force. ³² But if you find anyone who has your gods, that person shall not live. In the presence of our relatives, see for yourself whether there is anything of yours here with me; and if so, take it.” Now Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen the gods.

Jacob, the deceiver was deceived even by his beloved wife.

A rash vow, which contributed to Rachel’s early death, perhaps.
³³ So Laban went into Jacob’s tent and into Leah’s tent and into the tent of the two female servants, but he found nothing. After he came out of Leah’s tent, he entered Rachel’s tent. ³⁴ Now Rachel had taken the household gods and put them inside her camel’s saddle and was sitting on them. Laban searched through everything in the tent but found nothing.
³⁵ Rachel said to her father, “Don’t be angry, my lord, that I cannot stand up in your presence; I’m having my period.” So he searched but could not find the household gods.
³⁶ Jacob was angry and took Laban to task. “What is my crime?” he asked Laban. “How have I wronged you that you hunt me down? ³⁷ Now that you have searched through all my goods, what have you found that belongs to your household? Put it here in front of your relatives and mine, and let them judge between the two of us.
³⁸ “I have been with you for twenty years now. Your sheep and goats have not miscarried, nor have I eaten rams from your flocks. ³⁹ I did not bring you animals torn by wild beasts; I bore the loss myself. And you demanded payment from me for whatever was stolen by day or night. ⁴⁰ This was my situation: The heat consumed me in the daytime and the cold at night, and sleep fled from my eyes. ⁴¹ It was like this for the twenty years I was in your household. I worked for you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks, and you changed my wages ten times. ⁴² If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not been with me, you would surely have sent me away empty-handed. But God has seen my hardship and the toil of my hands, and last night he rebuked you.”
⁴³ Laban answered Jacob, “The women are my daughters, the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks. All you see is mine. Yet what can I do today about these daughters of mine, or about the children they have borne? ⁴⁴ Come now, let’s make a covenant, you and I, and let it serve as a witness between us.”
⁴⁵ So Jacob took a stone and set it up as a pillar. ⁴⁶ He said to his relatives, “Gather some stones.” So they took stones and piled them in a heap, and they ate there by the heap. ⁴⁷ Laban called it Jegar Sahadutha, and Jacob called it Galeed.^[b]
⁴⁸ Laban said, “This heap is a witness between you and me today.” That is why it was called Galeed. ⁴⁹ It was also called Mizpah,^[c] because he said, “May the LORD keep watch between you and me when we are away from each other. ⁵⁰ If you mistreat my daughters or if you take any wives besides my daughters, even though no one is with us, remember that God is a witness between you and me.”
⁵¹ Laban also said to Jacob, “Here is this heap, and here is this pillar I have set up between you and me. ⁵² This heap is a witness, and this pillar is a witness, that I will not go past this heap to your side to harm you and that you will not go past this heap and pillar to my side to harm me. ⁵³ May the God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.”
So Jacob took an oath in the name of the Fear of his father Isaac. ⁵⁴ He offered a sacrifice there in the hill country and invited his relatives to a meal. After they had eaten, they spent the night there.
⁵⁵ Early the next morning Laban kissed his grandchildren and his daughters and blessed them. Then he left and returned home.

God intervenes to secure Jacob from Laban’s designs to keep Jacob’s family under his control.

Blessing and Protection, Psalm 11, Genesis 30-31, Day 27, Jan 27

By Anita Mathias

Relax, The Lord is in his Temple. Psalm 11, Day 26, Jan 26

The light of God surrounds me,

The love of God enfolds me,

The power of God protects me,

The presence of God watches over me.

Wherever I am God is

And all is well.

One of the unexpected side-effects of blogging through the Bible is that it calms me down. Especially when I attempt to blog a Psalm.

The message of this Psalm is Relax. God is in charge, and he has got it all under control.

Psalm 11

¹ In the LORD I take refuge.

Just the very words are calming.

   How then can you say to me:
   “Flee like a bird to your mountain.
² For look, the wicked bend their bows;
   they set their arrows against the strings
to shoot from the shadows
   at the upright in heart.

When he considers the might of the opposition, everything seems hopeless. However, we are always under God’s protection, and no arrows can reach us unless he decides to let them reach us.

Hannah Whitall Smith’s “The Christian’s Secret of a Happy Life.”