Slithering covetousness

Why is it that we never hear any preaching or teaching on the topic of covetousness?  It is a good source for plenty of discussion and exposition.  After all, who is exempt from this nasty little sin? 

Ooops!! Maybe I have found my answer.

Maybe it is TOO common and we prefer to pontificate on the sins we are not presently committing.  I hate to admit that the guy I work for has it made and I would love to have his easy job doing very nearly nothing and getting paid fat money.  Of course, the only thing that makes his job so easy is that I am so all-fired good that he can coast. 

Uh-oh! I felt that slithering begin around my feet and thought I heard a hiss of pride from somewhere.  Something wicked is proud to hear me agreeing with his favorite topic…the proud me.

Maybe this side of coveting is too easy to detect and turn to forgiveness.  I can tell you the side that is more difficult.  It is the side that is prompted by an overactive sense of justice.  I call it the Calvinist facet.  It works like this.  Joe Blow works in a factory and has a difficult job that he detests because it feels like a prison.  In walks a Barry Lewis who has the job he wants but Joe could never be qualified to do.  Suddenly, he is Barry’s worst enemy and joins forces with P.D. Coker (a guy that works for the same company as Barry) and they begin to feed each other “the poison of asps” that they tuck into their lips like a disgusting dip of snuff (Romans 3:13).  The problem with Blow and Coker is that they can never recognize that they are doing anything wrong.  After all, they are justified in their inferiority complex and the fact that Barry is too good (or smart or healthy or successful or powerful or connected or________) for them.  The Calvinist facet tempts them to set up exclusive parameters as to who is really “in” and who is out.  If you are in with Barry, then you are out with them.  Basically, the covetousness here doesn’t want what the other has…it wants the other to not have it because he does not deserve it.  Hidden from this Calvinist facet mentality is the devilish sleight of hand that Blow/Cokerism is measured by the smallness of its adherents and not by any truly objective standard (like, maybe, the cross?).  The deceitfulness works because we should all be quick to champion a just cause…and what more just cause is there than tearing down Barry and all those damned upstart Lewises.  There is no mere foot-rubbing slither in action here.  When I look in the mirror I see my snake’s forked tongue licking sin/dust and loving its lack of flavor!

This one gets us all…even preachers, teachers, deacons, ministerial types…maybe especially so.  The gravitational pull of “Pharisee” is working from another dimension! 

Meanwhile, perhaps it is too easy to turn to the other sins that I don’t commit and remind myself of how good I am, masking the fact that I am far too focused on me and my results instead of having the cross at the top of my eye chart.  If the cross is the place where I lay my burdens down, then I should shed my burden of wanting to be important and take up His cross of reconciliation. 

Numbers of Numbers

I began a study in the Old Testament book of Numbers this week and did something I don’t ordinarily do. I opened a commentary from a good Commentary series and began to work through some of the author’s ideas about the book. Everything seemed to be going along rather well for the first verse and I was hopeful that the work would be helpful.

Bam! Verse 2 and the author goes off into a long explanation of the inflated numbers (from his perspective and that of most credible scholars) in the census of chapter one. I started laughing out loud at the inability of scholars to read and understand what is being said. Somehow, the author (and his scholarly forebears) got hung up on the notion of the census as being primarily to enumerate the men who would be available to serve in a military capacity; signing them up for the draft, if you will. However, the best clues as to what is happening here begin with the instructions in verse 1.

Clue 1 = Moses and Aaron are given the task of numbering those eligible for the army.  This number is not revealed. The total numbers that are being counted (and recorded) relate to the households (Hebrew = toledah, a technical term that points to the first ancestor in a group. Numbers 1:20…KJV is “generations”) and is extensive. It extends all the way back to the 12 patriarchs.

Clue 2 = God instructs Moses to enlist particular men, called out by name (1:5-15), to stand for the poll (KJV…those of you using other translations may have difficulty here since most of those versions are inaccurate at this point). “Poll” is a good old word that means “skull.” The Hebrew here (1:18) is familiar to those who know their New Testament rendering of the crucifixion = gulgoletham…Greek transliteration = Golgotha, the place of the skull (John 19:17…by the way. You Calvinists who inaccurately think that you were enumerated in some magical Manicheean/Zoroastrian “spark of divinity” pre-existence before God made the stuff of creation need to understand that you must show up at the “place of the skull” to be numbered with Jesus. Come to the cross!). Why count skulls? Literally. The numbers of the census are predicated on the records (“…the books were opened…” Revelation 20:12) brought from Egypt along with the firstborn males that are standing before the Lord when the leaders of the tribes begin the count.

Clue 3 = The story continues to discuss the unique case of the daughters of Zelophelad (Numbers 27:11) who demanded an inheritance in the land. This part of the story stands in direct tension with the sidebar mention of Er and Onan (26:19) who died in Canaan…thus no inheritance allotment of land is ascribed to them. It is easy to see that the point of the census is primarily to establish the boundaries of the lands and the amount given to the families: the census is frozen at this juncture strictly in relation to the tribal allotments. You cannot go into the past and count anyone beyond the 12 and there will be no future adjustments in the allotments; no encroaching on the weaker clans.

Clue 4 = The scholarly difficulty in any story such as this comes when they forget that the rest of the story is already a known commodity. At the point of takeoff in Numbers 1, the people standing in front of Moses and Moses himself have no idea that they are about to fail a crucial test and follow the stupidity of democratic influence (10 spies vs. 2) instead of the direction of faith in the Lord. They are not aware of the report of the spies and their own foolishness that will result in 40 years of wandering and all the males over 20 years that have just been counted becoming gulgoletham on the last day of the 40 years. The numbering establishes what households receive property and, with the exception of Joshua and Caleb (26:65), who will be dead in 40 years…NOT who will serve in God’s army to invade the land.

Positively Bad!

An important Christian leader and author was recently describing a situation among people who needed to behave themselves with dignity and respect. The Christian leader concluded in several ways that the people were guilty of being negative and that they should be deliberate in finding positive ways of dealing with issues.

Some 30 to 40 years ago, the notions of positive thinking began to invade the vernacular of the church as those ideas simultaneously overwhelmed the minions of pop-psychology. As time went by, the language of the pulpit and the people of the ONE faith (there are not multiple “faiths” as is noised abroad in the media…Christianity is the one Faith – Ephesians 4:5) began to suffer from the inappropriate substitution of “positive” for “good” and “negative” for “bad.” Eventually, the condition became so acute that there are now people in leadership roles that have no capacity to say “good” or “evil/bad” since those terms are definitive of an old way of thinking. Positivism has won the day and Christians can no longer say what they mean.

Perhaps you are reading this and saying to yourself, “What difference does it make? After all, everyone KNOWS that I mean “good” when I say “positive.”” Perhaps you are right, when you are talking to people from the older frame of reference…anyone old enough to remember the 60’s. However, there are younger people that only know the more recent frame of reference; who only know the positive/negative referents. Should we Christians be vague in our communication and then expect them to make a clear decision about Jesus? (Those of you who practice vague communication should stop carping about the dominant movement of Calvinism with its strong and thoroughly inaccurate treatment of theology. At least they are strong enough to have a disciplined position…)

More importantly, this “positive” way of communicating was borrowed from evolutionary doctrine. Now we find ourselves in a diabolical frame of reference. Think about it. If evolutionary doctrine is true, then there can be no value judgments regarding good and evil. If evolutionary doctrine is true, then the first chapters of Genesis are a total fabrication and the tree of the knowledge of positive and negative should be more appropriate than the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Furthermore, the fruit juice of that tree has not been effective in the makeup of Adam’s progeny and there was no real need for Jesus to die for unguilty people (and, of course, if true, then the Calvinists win the day with their ridiculous notion of total depravity…another expression of evolutionary doctrine) since they could never understand when they did something wrong. Again, the terms “positive” and “negative” should be used in their technical capacity to show direction, not value. The very negative activity of digging a proper foundation is GOOD in relation to building a proper house (Matthew 7:26…notice that the man was a fool and not merely working from a negative disposition). The very positive activity of building a casino or brothel (see how the evolutionary terminology has embedded itself in your consciousness when you read this) is evil. Digging a foundation is negative because it removes and discovers (like criticism…so “constructive criticism” is impossible) what lies beneath. Erecting a building is positive because it adds material and purpose that was formerly missing. The value of the activity is established on the basis of its relationship to God (Luke 18:19).

Finally, positive thinking is evolutionary in origin and trajectory because it can be used for value judgment by those who want to join forces with evil and shift the basis of good and evil at will. If homosexuality is truly evil but positivism wins the day, then there is no basis for calling it bad. The minority opinion has to be absorbed into the majority opinion and the language shifted (the basis for this is the expansion of guilt-ridden democracy…Greek laden Americanism that feels guilty because it has departed from the one true God (Romans1:20-22)) to accommodate the “positive” aspect of existence. Evolution says, “All must be incorporated into the whole and we will see in the end which direction was the most positive.” It is another way of saying, “Existence is its own justification.” That idea is as stupid as the entire world in 1939 saying, “Hitler is a part of the whole and we must leave him alone to see whether his negativism is the force of the will to power that evolves and includes us all (Chamberlain).” Thank God that not all of the thinkers of that day had evolved in a positive way and made up their minds to crush evil with force when it was necessary (Churchill). The church of today would be confused as to what side it should be on. Leadership should only be allotted to those who think and speak clearly according to a cruciform frame of reference. The knowledge of good and evil embedded in each of us needs clear direction, not soft sell whoo haah based on Psalm 14.

Botanical Conundrum

I have been enjoying a lot of driving time through the hills of north Georgia and Tennessee for several weeks and have watched as the leaves have changed from green to all sorts of yellow, orange, red, and brown.   Yesterday, I found myself thinking about evolution and how it is such a thoroughly childish “scientific” idea.  The more I thought about it the more disappointed I became in the wasted years of the past century that many people have devoted to studying something so patently absurd and so easy to disprove.  The evolutionists are not even aware of the childlike nature of their position. 

Think about it for a moment.  Why is all evolution centered on animal life?  Look at the way all evolutionary doctrine presupposes a certain botanical background.  Never mind that (if evolutionists are correct) it would be necessary for the botanical background to come up from an evolutionary process as well.  The evolutionist establishes his workshop of development squarely in the midst of trees and grass and shrubs and a fruity/nutty environment that just so happens to agree with the digestive systems of the animal things. And what a lucky coincidence that the carbohydrates and proteins are already properly developed and stable in their abundant support for the MILLIONS of years that it takes to get animals to the upright and rational stage.  It’s as if someone coordinated the effort on the part of plants to be wholesome for the benefit of the animals that would come along.  Sounds suspiciously like the order of creation in Genesis 1.

 And then we have the same absurdity in the realm of theology.  Calvinists think they are so grown up in their understanding of God vs. most of mankind.  Their development of the limited and limiting notions of pre-determination is all processed in a framework of love.  It’s very much like the botanical background above.  Calvinists skip over the part about God caring for that which He created to try and advise Him on what few things in His workshop are worthy of Him.  They want to get all the developmental details of what is worth having in the Eternal Realm firmed up without noticing that God’s love was put into operation before there was any sense of what is worthwhile.  And then, of course, all the Calvinist hype is designed to avoid the crazy notion that God/Jesus (Jesus IS God) is willing to BECOME sin itself in order to cleanse that for which He declared His love.  We are all better off continuing to be confessing sinners while we remain in the workshop of Grace (1 Corinthians 3:10-11).  Our only alternative, it would seem, is to become so “good” that we turn Pharisee and lock in our homeland as Hell (John 8:33).  There is one remedy: cling to the cross.

God doesn't grade on the curve.

I have never done the research to find if the works of Clarence Larkin were impacted by real scholars or others with influence in Biblical Studies.  Larkin, heavily influential over the flawed thinking of modern End Times prognosticators like Tim LaHaye, John Walvoord and Hal Lindsey, self-published a book in 1918 with lots of charts and pictures of his own that illustrated his ideas of the biblical messages in Revelation, Daniel, etc.  Between page 127 and 128 is a chart that I ran across a few years ago when doing research on the ridiculous notion that the fig tree of Matthew 24 represents Israel (many of the end times “experts” have whipped up foolish frenzies over this passage by their calculations regarding Israel becoming a nation in 1948).  This chart of Larkin’s shows the 7 church “ages” he has calculated on the basis of his notion of each of the seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3 being representative of that idea.  When you do the math, his system comes out to be a Bell curve.  100 years of Ephesus, 150 years of Smyrna, 300 years of Pergamos, 900 years of Thyatira, 250 years of Sardis, 150 years of Philadelphia, and 100 years of Laodicea (years are approximate… Note that Larkin’s perspective is the old school notion that there was no overlap between the eras. This overlap idea is a more modern development (from the 70’s…probably invented by LaHaye) that overlaps Philadelphia and Laodicea in order to claim that there can be some “true Christians” in what they are designating as the “Laodicea” era). 

A Bell curve is a measurement of human conditions or activities and largely anti-biblical (Good example of a Bell curve in operation is to survey a busy Wal-Mart parking lot in relation to the entry doors…most people gather in the middle lanes instead of on the fringe where they may actually be closer to the door according to proximity absolute). When the Holy Spirit wrote the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew, there was no Bell curve of 6 generations, 12 generations, 58 generations, 12 generations and 6…or some such nonsense.  Larkin’s interpretative overlay is a purely human construct and should be discarded as unsupportable.  A good test for it would be: can we make it work in Ethiopia?  What do we know about the history of the church in Africa from 33 AD to the present?  Does the biblical message apply to Christians throughout the world at all times or only to select persons who are in an area where some measure of history was recorded and preserved (Calvin’s ridiculous notion of the elect…another Bell curve dynamic)?  If the YES goes to the universality of the message, then we have to reject Larkin’s work and his heir apparent in “End Times” studies, Tim LaHaye.

The Spiritual Gift of Suffering Philippians 1:29

Jesus can fill you with the fruit of righteousness no matter what your situation, if you follow Him.  Paul was in chains in prison, but he did not let that stop his service to God.  One thing is always certain in this life, it will get messy, you will have trouble and there will be suffering.  Through Jesus you can be the person that shines His light whatever happens to you! It is your choice to not fall way from God during hard times but to lean into God, not away from God.  Your spiritual welfare depends on your spiritual warfare!  Read the first chapter of the letter to the Philippians and remember that you are reading someone else's mail!

Paul is very confident that God can begin a good work in everyone, whatever happens to them.  If we want our love to abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight we have to look at things as God looks at them.  If we are believers we should have the same attitude as Paul about living and dying.  We are to advance the gospel no matter what! 

How we handle the inevitable struggles that come our way in life depends on our faith in Jesus and our relationship with Him.  Pastor Chris Rygh says, ‘don’t waste a crisis’.  This is the type of attitude that fully trusts in whatever happens to us can bring glory to God! Put on the full armor of God: work, prayer, sacrifice and preparation.  Through His strength we can be the person that never falls away, always leans into God, with the attitude of ‘make it as bad as it needs to be’ so we can suffer for the sake of Jesus and consider suffering a gift when it comes from God!

God is not a coward.

Three things converged on me this weekend to launch this piece. 

The first was a review of some of the work I had done on biblical genealogies in preparation for a PhD thesis.  The Holy Spirit has chosen to lace up the scriptures with genealogies that establish a certain tone.  In one sense, if they were missing, it would be as if we wandered into a very old city that still had a vibrant community, only to find that there was no graveyard anywhere.

The second was a reading I did in the classic historical work of Will Durant, Christ and Caesar.  Some of Durant’s perspective is less elaborate than even that of Edersheim (The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah) in that he, like Josephus, leans heavily on the biblical record for his material.  However, Durant points out that there never was a serious challenge from the Jews to the early documents that supported the Christian faith.  

The third was that I read a short devotional by a popular Christian author that pointed out that the earliest gospel was that of Mark and it was written in 50 to 60 AD.

My response to these converging points is this:

My God is not a coward.  My God has no difficulty laying His cards on the table and challenging anyone to show Him up (John 8:46…might as well read to the end of the chapter).  My God would not write a book and withhold it from circulation until His enemies no longer had access to the material needed to research His claims.  Anyone who believes that, at the very least, the gospels of Luke and Matthew, were written down and available for examination later than a time contemporary with Jesus ministry is calling my God a coward.  The fact that not one assault upon the accuracy of the genealogies of Matthew and Luke together was ever established in antiquity indicates that the Jewish cult of power of that time could not deny the validity of BOTH.  It also points out that Jesus personally commissioned the gospel works of these 2 writers and told them how they were to shape their perspective on what He was on earth to accomplish.

The time has come for Christianity to shake off the hideous strength of the lies of the ancient church leaders who reinvented the truth of who Jesus was and how He lived.  The ridiculous and insulting pictures of Joseph and Mary barely making ends meet in a rude shop where crude articles of furniture were made is romantic…made up by Roman liars!  What did Joseph do with the investment of gold given him by the Magi? Why does Jesus know a lot more about banking and running a business than He does about carpentry?  Why is it difficult to conceive that Jesus would call someone who had a ready supply of writing materials and implements (Matthew, the tax collector) so that his ministry and mission could be recorded as it happened?

Jesus made sure that the Jews could get their hands on what was written and have plenty of time to deal with it if they could.  They never raised an objection.  “This thing was not done in a CORNER!” (Acts 26:26)

Prequel

Thought maybe it would be appropriate to backtrack and give my theory on the "epistle" to the Hebrews.
I was reading J.B. Phillips some years ago and, as he usually did, he rearranged my status quo thinking about biblical events.
  Just before Stephen makes his mark as the first martyr to the faith, there is one verse in Acts 6:7 that points out that a large number of the Jerusalem priests followed Jesus.  (The obvious reason, as my dad pointed out, was "because they knew good and well that the Holy of Holies was empty..."  I would add a corollary to that: the High Priest knew it had been empty for 400+ years.)  So what are you going to do with a company of priests that are no longer on the payroll of the Temple coffers?  Put the book of Hebrews in their hands and send them out to all the synagogues in Judea and Samaria.  If all goes well, they will follow Jesus and Stephen (and establish a precedent for Paul) by being beaten or run out of town.  The synagogue will split and a new church will be born.  Hard to imagine such a "church planting" method in our way of doing things.

Squeezing Paul

  

   I was reading in the book of Acts this week and came upon something that fascinated me.  The scene is approximately 17 to 18 years after the resurrection.  Saul (soon to be Paul), who had apparently decided that having his membership at the Jerusalem church was not for the best, has been at a church in the city of Antioch.  The time is right for the Holy Spirit to send another team on a missionary journey and Saul is paired up with the great hearted Barnabas.  Off they go and spend a lot of time traveling from one end of Cyprus to the other with a minimum of conflict. Then, after sailing to the mainland, they work their way back toward home.

   When the two men arrive in Antioch of Pisidia (not their hometown of Antioch in Syria) the writer of Acts shows us what developed as their missionary method from this point on in their journey.  When invited to give a word of encouragement, Saul elaborates on the truth of the gospel that is based firmly on the resurrection of Jesus, the Messiah, and son of David (Acts 13:16-41). In so doing, he repudiates his own heritage and Pharisaical preference as a son of Saul the first king of Israel.  In doing this, he casts off the burden of using the epistle of the Hebrews that was developed by the early church to be used under these same circumstances at synagogues in Judea. 

   The thing that caught my eye in Paul’s word of encouragement was that he uses the name “David” four times.  I read through the entire book of Hebrews to see how often “David” is used: two times. It is easy to discount the first usage (Heb. 4:7) as euphemistic (something found “in David” would be a reference to finding it in the Psalms) and not indicative of the writer’s attitude toward David.

   We are left with the one instance of “David” being used in 11:32. Notice that the author of Hebrews has written largely of the patriarchs and other figures in Hebrew history. When he comes to the closing part of this section, he names some of the judges and lumps David in with them, contrary to the historical order. This contrary position is made worse by the fact that David is placed in a subordinate relationship to Samuel and not included in the prophets. He is never given due honor as King David. This position could have no function other than to soften the message and make it palatable to the party of the Pharisees (note the political power of the Pharisees within the church in Acts 15:1-5).

   My point here is not to impugn the Epistle to the Hebrews as being inferior to Paul and his method.  My point is to demonstrate that Paul was being saddled with something that would not work for him in the places where he was to minister the Word (clearly an inversion of the ancient story of David being saddled with the armor of King Saul! 1Samuel 17:38-39).  The great bible scholar, F.F. Bruce, points out that this homily of Saul/Paul in Acts 13 has the same homiletic character as the Epistle to the Hebrews (NICT revised, p.25). What Bruce misses is that Paul’s rejection of using Hebrews, even though it had been so effective throughout the synagogues in Judea and possibly Samaria, is the mandate of the Holy Spirit to launch a new mission method that shakes off the work of the Jerusalem church as the guiding force for the future. Something like what Hebrews 5 describes as moving from milk to meat.

   Paul and Barnabas have a new experience based on the new approach to the gospel. The Gentiles flock to the Synagogue and many of the Jewish people side with Paul and the gospel.  Paul and Barnabas are persecuted and, in the uproar, a new church is founded.  When they move to the next city, the same thing happens (Acts 14).  The missionary team arrives in their hometown for rest, only to be confronted with Pharisees demanding foreskins.  Everyone goes to the Jerusalem church to get a judgment on whether the Gentiles are required to be circumcised.  Paul takes Titus along (Galatians 2:1-3) and adamantly refuses to have him endure circumcision.

   When Paul finally makes his case to the apostles in Jerusalem, notice the judgment given by James in Acts 15:13-21. Quoting scripture (Amos 9:11-12), James introduces the position of David as being the highest consideration.  The movement of the Holy Spirit in foreign lands is directly linked to David, not Moses. The subordination of David in the earlier church document, the “epistle” to the Hebrews, is reversed and the attitude of the Pharisees is officially declared to be untenable. Paul and Barnabas have won the day on behalf of their approach to “foreign missions.”  Paul claims his apostolic office and moves to fulfill the promise of Jesus concerning him; “I will show him the many things he must suffer for My name’s sake.” (Acts 9:16)

"Flying from the scarlet city where a Lord that knows no pity / Mocks the broken people praying round his iron throne," C.S. Lewis

Jonah 4

1  But Jonah was ill and distressed beyond measure, fuming and fretting at the outcome.

2  So he prayed unto the Lord and kept saying to Him:

O Lord,

O Lord,

O Lord,

“I knew you would do this when I was still at home.  Wasn’t that what I said?  That was why I ran away to Tarshish, because I knew that, of all things, You and You alone are a gracious and compassionate God.  You are slow to get angry and full of loving kindness – even pitying those who are miserable and distressed.”

3  “And now, O Lord, I pray that you will take my life from me so that some good will come from my death; since I prefer death to life.”

4  And the Lord said, “How good of you to be so angry for Me!”

5  So Jonah walked out and left the city and camped out on the east side of the city. He made for himself a shed and sat in the scanty shade it gave so that he could watch the show of what the Lord was going to do to the city.

6  So the Lord God chose to make a gourd to climb up over Jonah’s head to give more shade to his head. And Jonah was relieved from his distress and rejoiced over the great blessing of the gourd plant.

7  Then God chose a worm to work at eating away the inside of the gourd until the dawn of the next morning. So the worm destroyed the gourd and it withered away to nothing. 

8  And so it was when the sun rose, God made the east wind particularly hot.  Jonah was overheated by the blazing sun.  Jonah felt faint as he prayed that he preferred to die.  Over and over he kept saying, “Death! Death! I would be better off dead!”

9  And God said unto Jonah, “Is it a good thing that you are angry about the gourd?” and Jonah said “I have a right to be angry, even if it kills me!”

10  And the Lord said, “You have loving kindness toward a gourd, which you did nothing to bring about and in no way caused it to grow. A gourd, mind you, which I made to last from one night to the next without any help from you. Should not I especially have pity upon Nineveh, that great city in which there are many more than 120,000 men who do not know their right hand from their left hand, along with many cattle?

World's shortest sermon.

Jonah 3

1 And that is where Jonah was when the Word of the Lord found him the second time and began to say to him,

2 "Get your things together, Jonah, and get going toward the great city Nineveh.  When you arrive there you will proclaim my message, preach unto her the sermon which I have been telling you.

3  So Jonah pulled himself together and began walking toward Nineveh following after the Word of the Lord.  Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city unto the gods.  It is questionable whether someone could walk from one end of it to the other in three days.

4  Now Jonah waited until he had come into the city about a days walk and then he cried out and said, “Nineveh has 40 days before it will be overthrown.”

5  And all the people of Nineveh trusted God and they declared a fast and put on sackcloth. All of them, from the greatest to the least of them, put on sackcloth.

6  When the word going around the city came to the king’s attention, he rose up from his throne and laid aside his royal robes. Then the king covered himself from head to toe in sackcloth and sat down in an ash pit to fast with his people.

7  When he had everyone that he needed with him at the ash pit, he spoke the following words to his nobles so that they would tell all the people, “People of Nineveh - Do not eat or drink any food or water, do not let your animals ear or drink and take your cattle and sheep out of the pastures.”

8  “Sackcloth is all that we will wear and the animals shall wear the same.  Make as much noise as you can and cry out to God. Every man is to turn away from evil and from the cruel things you do and the places you go.”

9  “Who knows whether God will pity us and look at us again so that harm will be turned away from us. Perhaps His burning anger will not consume us so that we all perish.”

10  So God saw all that they did and how they truly turned away from the path of destruction.  And God felt sorry for them because of the panic and distress that came from the proclamation He had made against them. He did not destroy them as He had declared He would.

Jonah lived in a special submarine...

Jonah 2

1 Now the Lord chose a huge fish that could swallow up Jonah and that is how Jonah came to be in the belly of the fish for three days and for three nights.

2 While he was inside the fish, Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God and this is what he said:

3          I called out unto the Lord from within my time of trouble

                        and he listened to me;

            From the very depths of Hell I hailed you.

                        You heard my cry for Help,

4          Since it was you who cast me down

                        into the depths,

                        into the heart of the sea;

                        (The flood of waters would not let me go.)

            all of your crashing waves

            and all of your rolling waves

                        washed over me.

5          That's when I heard myself say,            

            "Even though I cannot be in your presence right now,

            I will be able to feast my eyes on your Holy Temple again."

6          Unto the depths of my soul itself,

                        the waters surrounded me;

            In the heart of the great deep,

                        is where I drowned,

                            pressed to my brow,

                            the seaweed wound.

7          To the place where the mountains rest,

                        I sank that low;

            The doors in the lowest parts of the earth,

                        were closed upon me

                            by an eternal hand.

            But before my life slipped forever away,

                        You raised me up,

                            O Lord my God!

8          When my soul was shrouded within me,

                        I remembered the Lord;

            And I sent to your Holy Temple,

                        the offering of my prayer.

9 There are many who forsake kindness.

            The cause of this?

            Being all too ready to depend on lies.

10 But as for me?

            I will be singing God's praises,

            putting my tongue to good use,

               as I get ready to sacrifice and

               as I prepare to pay my vows:

            There is Salvation in the Lord!

11 So the Lord directed the fish and made him throw up at just the right place; and Jonah found himself on dry ground.

Side trip with Jonah.

Thought I would put up an original translation of Jonah I worked on a few years ago while I am getting some other things together. Enjoy the journey.

Jonah 1

1. There came a time in the history of Israel when the Word of the Lord made Himself known unto the son of Amitay, who was the prophet, Jonah. This is what the Word said to him:

2. "Get your things together, Jonah, and get going toward the great city Nineveh.  When you arrive there you will proclaim my message, pronounce my word upon her because her wickedness has risen through the heavens and is right in front of me."

3. But, instead of following the Word, Jonah got his things together and headed out toward Tarshish which was on the other side of the Great Sea from Nineveh. He first went away from Nineveh as far as Joppa and there he found a small ship that would sell him a bunk on their voyage toward Tarshish. So he paid the fare and climbed down into the tiny berth and sailed away with the men toward Tarshish; with their backs to Nineveh.

4. Somewhere along the way, the Lord Himself blasted the sea with a powerful wind and stirred up a hurricane. The small ship was tossed about by the terrible storm until it seemed as though she would be broken to pieces.

5. All of the sailors were terrified and helpless to bring their ship under control. They began to pray and shout to their gods and shouted out to the god of the sea. They also started throwing their cargo overboard to try and appease the gods and to make the small ship lighter. But Jonah, who knew that there was no sea god, decided to find himself a comfortable place in the back of the boat where he could bed down during the brief calm that was coming. In a few moments, he was fast asleep.

6. When the ship's captain found out that Jonah was napping below decks, he could hardly believe it. When he found Jonah, the captain shook him and called his name, "Jonah. Jonah! What are you doing? How can you be the only one sleeping? Get yourself up and do what we are all doing. Cry out to your god and ask for help. Perhaps he will be considerate and save us from death, from perishing in the sea!"

7. Meanwhile, all the others on board got together to decide what to do when the calm was over and the other side of the storm came over them. Someone shouted more loudly than the rest, "Come on, let's draw straws and find out on whose account this disaster is happening to us." When the captain came back on deck with Jonah, they drew straws and Jonah had the short straw.

8. Everyone stared at the short straw in Jonah's hand for a moment. The captain finally began to ask him questions, one right after the other: "Tell us why this harm has come upon us." "What sort of business are you in? What is your trade?" "Where do you come from?" "Who are your people?" "What land are you from?"

9. Jonah held up his hand. "Hebrew." Everyone stared at the short straw in his hand as he said, " I am Hebrew, from the land of the Hebrews, the people who crossed over the sea upon the dry land by the hand of God. I am one of those who fear the Lord, the God of the heavens. He is the Creator; It is He who has made the sea and it is He who has made the dry land. The sea does as he commands and obeys his will.

10. When they heard the words of Jonah, every man was gripped with fear as they remembered that he had told them before that he was running away from the presence of  the Lord. "What is this that you have done to us?" they exclaimed in one voice. "How could you bring this disaster upon us?"

   11) No one spoke for a short time. The boat began to move about as the waves began to swell again. The captain looked out to sea and then looked at Jonah. "What can we do unto you that will make him be quiet? The sea is starting to walk and toss again and the ship cannot bear up under the crushing waves."

   12) And Jonah said to the men, "You must lift me up and toss me overboard. Throw me down into the sea and he will be quiet, you will be safe. I know this is true because I know that this tempest is sent against you on my account."

   13) Without a word, the men ran to their oars and began to pull as hard as they could toward the shoreline that was still visible on the horizon. They rowed until they were exhausted and weak but the sea was tossing them back two lengths for every ship's length they gained.

    14) Finally, they succumbed to their fears and impotence and they cried out to the Lord as they lifted Jonah up to the side of the ship, "O Lord, we don't want to die here because of the life of this man. We beg that you will not let us perish and that you will not hold us to account for the blood of this innocent man. We are trusting in the words of this man that you have done this thing, O Lord!"

    15) So they lifted Jonah and cast him down into the sea. Immediately, the sea became calm and was not raging against them as it had been.

  16) When the men reached the shore, they were still overwhelmed by the things that had happened and by the fear of the Lord that was unshakeable. They got together and made sacrifices and made promises and vows to do things that were good.

Not a do-over... New Creation

Revelation 1:14

White wool is a very interesting symbol.  It is certainly alluded to in Daniel 7:9.  However, the earlier picture that is given that has authority here is that of Isaiah 1:18, though your sins are “red as crimson, they shall be as wool”.  There is no doubt that the wool is the whitest since the earlier parallel in the verse is that sins will be white as snow.  So the white wool hair of Jesus indicates that He who became sin for us (2 Cor. 5:21) has dealt with all sin in His own body and turned it into spiritual purity and cleanliness. 

This purity He provides as a gift to those who will come to Him and receive that gift of life.  The gift is available for the asking.  No one has had it injected into him or her in advance.  God worked out the details of His plan for dealing with evil by providing the cleansing blood transfusion we all need at the cross.  He did not provide it before that point in time.  ALL are welcome to come to the cross and receive life from Life Himself (John 1:4).  Come to Jesus Christ and live.

"I looked in vain and bought it / I looked for recompense." stolen from Wesley Price, that great poet of grace

Having written on Calvinist/Augustinian doctrine in the past 6 months, it came to me that perhaps I should describe my journey through Calvinism...and back again.
I had heard of Calvinism in my teen years at school but didn't pay much attention to the principles or ideas that formed this school of thought.  Growing up Southern Baptist in the 60's and 70's, one heard little of doctrine that was outside the practical walls of the church.  Jesus died for our sins and expected us to behave ourselves.  If I had been given any other parents than those God gave me, I dare say I would have heard little more than the above with a blending of Bible stories.  By and large, Southern Baptists are not overwhelmed with great brilliant minds...they have always been blessed with people of great, loving hearts.  At any rate, my dad was not a Calvinist and focused his attention on Jesus and salvation and trying (painfully at times) to understand what the Bible was trying to say from one end to the other.
I had been listening to Chuck Swindoll for a few years in the late 70's and kept feeling a stirring in my heart.  I spent a lot of time at church and listened to some powerful preaching and great music in the early 80's.  I was reading a lot and trying to understand why I felt an emptiness in my heart.  I knew a lot about the Bible and had begun to read more widely than Swindoll and those who were popular evangelicals in those days.  I was introduced to Arthur Pink's works (afraid I cannot remember the name of any of them--and don't care to try to find out what they were!), that outlined the Calvinist position.  I took to the ideas like a duck to water and ran the gamut...all the way to Warfield.  Interestingly enough, I had begun to read the works of C.S. Lewis at the same time.  I was working my way very slowly through the essays in the collection God in the Dock when one day I realized that the intellect of Lewis was so great that I had to reread most of his stuff 2, 3 maybe 5 times before I got what he was saying.  The Calvinist stuff was boring.  I had already reached the place where I realized that they all repeat the same propaganda over and over again.  There was NO "further up and further in."
C.S. Lewis did not lead me out.  He just made it clear to me that if I stayed, I would be a fool and not trustworthy in any intellectual or spiritual way.  Jesus led me out with His word...the book of Esther (yes, Calvinists, scoff.  Too bad no one asked YOU how to arrange the canon of Scripture!).  Basic to Calvinist doctrine is the unbiblical lie that there is a single decree of God by which He establishes who are the saved (elect) and the lost (reprobate).  The picture that unfolds to anyone who reads Esther is that there are two separate decrees that converge upon the same day.  The day of damnation IS the day of salvation.  You choose which camp you want to be in on that day.  Once I got the picture, I never looked back; realizing that Calvinism leaves out a key element that is woven throughout the Old Testament and is fulfilled on the cross: Salvation is spiritual warfare under the command of the LORD of Hosts.  Good luck trying to work out any other kind, especially the "I am so special--look at me" kind. 
It took a few more years to get past the intellectual understanding and come to the place of surrendering my heart to Jesus.  I met Him at the cross.  He made it plain that I was rejected and wandering unless I gave up my sinful self and accepted Him personally.  It was a choice.  I could have continued to choose self-deception and self-satisfaction in the army of the devil.  I figured that the Lord of Jude 9 was a safer option and went with Jesus.
When I tell people to meet Jesus at the cross, it is not hyperbolic.  It is the only method of time travel you can experience on this earth.  Jesus will meet you there.  It's guaranteed.

We see a dim reflection.

Still on a bit of a detour from the usual.
In Kenya, as in Ireland, England, etc., they drive on the left side of the road. Anyone who has ever driven under these conditions has some dificulty adjusting to making right turns and responding to a threat that is coming in your direction; your tendency is to respond to the right as the safe place of escape. My personal belief is that this condition points out that, to some degree, all humans suffer from some form of left/right confusion. (Here is a test...try cutting your own hair using a mirror...then 2 mirrors! Thank your dentist that he has this issue trained out of him!) The really interesting thing that is revealed by driving on the wrong side of the car when the 5-speed gear shift pattern is the same as ours is that we are not as rational as we think we are...or ought to be. The shift pattern appears to have a schematic logic which we think is put into play as we use it daily. We soon forget that it took a few minutes (or days for some) to master the pattern because we are more concerned with the obvious difficulty of higher priority = stalling the vehicle. Clutch and gas and brake and shift and turn all have to be worked in concert so we misunderstand how the process came to fruition. Once it is done, it seems to be a thing that was pre-destined.
Driving on the wrong side of the car is an oblique commentary on this supposed sense of destiny. If asked, we would probably say that we are folowing after the prescribed logical pattern of shifting gears that is outlined on the shift knob -- 1 up, 2 down, 3 over/up, etc. Drive on the wrong side of the car and the pedals remain the same, as does the shifter. The prescribed pattern is the same. The logic of your brain is the same. Guess what you will do more than once?? You will down-shift when you want to up-shift or vice versa. You will! Shifting gears like this demonstrates that you store the activity in your mind in relation to your body core, not because it makes sense. I assure you that you feel very helpless when you are passing a farm tractor with a truck approaching from over the hill ahead and you senselessly (irrationally, stupidly, maniacally) up-shift and feel the vehicle speed slump when you needed Pep, pizzzaz, Go-get-em (as my dad would say.)!
Pre-destined, Calvinist type people seem to be mostly right-handed people in a right-handed world of their own making or choosing. God forbid they be put into a simple test condition of left-handed consciousness (in other words, give up their Augustinian nonsense about a Greek style ball of fire they CALL God and accept the Old Testament Jesus as really, fully God Himself...the LIVING Word!) to see whether there may be some right/left confusion they have avoided by refusing to use mirrors.
Another solution might be to try the hair-cutting test above and laugh uproariously at the results. Absurd, little provisional creature. Your only eternal hope is to trade in your sin as raw material for new creation (2 Cor. 5:21...you weren't made righteous in advance). Come to the cross!

"White man's burden" ...a detour into the green fly zone

Kenya is a surprising place.  Leaving behind (July 8) a heat wave in Atlanta with temperatures in the high 90's each day, the equatorial environment of this African country was cool - even chilly at night with daytime temperatures in the middle 70's.
Ministry, there, was extraordinary - to be described elsewhere.  Many people were helped with physical and spiritual vision - a week of good works and service.
One question continues to force itself upon me: Are Kenyan orphanages a means of reviving an inverted feudalism? 
"Orphan!"  the word melts the heart and opens the bank accounts of Christian America (and elsewhere, I am sure...).  And well it should.  The apostolic command of James should resonate in our hearts at all times. "The fatherless and widows are to be helped in their difficult circumstances." James 1:27.  However, it appears that there is evidence that the word "orphan" has become the means for some in Kenya to gain wealth and power and large tracts of land that can be used to leverage their government.  Of course, the "investor" mentality of many wealthy people in this country maintains the steady stream of money flowing through the fingers of these feudal lords.  Interesting that the word "orphan" blinds the "investors" to the fundamental investment safeguard...diversified portfolio!
It is certainly too soon to tell how the new feudal system will develop.  The old narrow gauge railroad tracks of 19th century British East Africa are no longer useful as they stitch together the districts of this surprising country.  However, they are a testimony to the power of feudalism in a land and among a people that is very susceptible to this style of exploitation.  Some of the new landed aristocracy in Kenya has a cash crop that appeals to the modern people groups that have traded human fertility for gadgetry and wealth; have abandoned large families in favor of comfort and variety of entertainment.  Ultimately, is the support of this feudalism a way to assuage the guilt of contraception?
Yes, thank you Jesus, there are children being rescued from terrible circumstances.  Yes, thy are being fed and clothed and housed...schooled and loved and worked.  Who will they be when they grow up?  Grist for the mill of feudalism or free workers in a free nation?
Kenya is a surprising place.  They grow beautiful fences of cane and bougainvillea.  They grow children with large hearts and wonderful smiles.  Above all else, they need to grow in wisdom through the power of the cross of Jesus.  They have their own wealth in their land and in their people.