Joshua

The week of spring break was VERY relaxing.
With no internet access I didn't have a chance to post and several have asked so we'll do a little catching up today.

Reading through the book of Joshua is a cool story...until you get to the end where they're dividing up the land...that bit is tedious.

A couple of the highlights that struck me:

• Joshua 1:6-9, as the people are getting ready to enter the land he says , THREE TIMES, "be strong and courageous"...you think maybe he was remembering his last trip into the land forty years prior when he came back with 10 out of 12 guys who were neither strong nor courageous?
• Joshua 2:1 he sends out spies to check out the land, "So they went and entered the house of a prostitute named Rahab and stayed there." This always cracks me up...the first place the spies go. Perhaps the correct translation was that he told them to "go and check out the lay of the land"? (Sorry, couldn't resist the bad pun.)
• Joshua 3 they cross the Jordan "on dry ground". They exited Egypt through the Red Sea and now enter the promised land through the Jordan both times "on dry ground". How cool is it that God provides the same symbol from one generation to the next.
• Joshua 7 Achan's failure. God's displays what looks like harsh justice in response to Achan's direct disobedience. Something He also did in response to the golden calf in Exodus. Once again His message, and His method are consistent.
• Joshua 8:26 the attack on Ai. Joshua is told by God, (vs. 18)"Hold out toward Ai the javelin that is in your hand, for into your hand I will deliver the city." and then we read in vs 26: For Joshua did not draw back the hand that held out his javelin until he had destroyed all who lived in Ai. Perhaps he was recalling the time he went out to battle the Amalekites in Exodus 17. When Moses stood on the top of the hill with his staff in his hands? Ex 17:11 As long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning...
• Joshua 14:10 Caleb claims his inheritence. I love this bit where Caleb comes back and recounts that he was forty when they spied out the land, that 45 years have passed since then and that he has come to claim his piece of the land.

I could further go into the setting up of the twelve stones of remembrance when the people cross the Jordan, the pile of stones over the body of the king of Ai, the alter of uncut stone on Mount Ebal, the alter built by the eastern tribes on he borders of Canaan, the stone under the oak at Shechem.

This whole book is about two things:
1. Remember who God is and what he has done
and as a result
2. Be strong and courageous

It might have been simpler to write just that, but it wouldn't have been anywhere near as interesting.

Protestant Guilt

I grew up in one of those homes that religiously attended church every Sunday.
No sleeping in for my brothers and I to finish the weekend. We'd be rousted and up early, dressed in less than comfortable clothes, the hair on one side of our heads, or the top, or the back plastered down with a combination of water, mom-spit and comb in an attempt to tame an unruly case of bedhead.
We could do the flannel graph version of David and Goliath almost from memory by the time we were five and had penciled many a pew inspired masterpiece on the back of visitor cards before we were old enough to read all of the words on the other side.
I can still clearly remember sitting in second grade Sunday school class when our teacher imparted wisdom to us that was much like this:

"There are some things that you do that are bad. We call those things 'sin'. The Bible tells us that sin gets in the way between us and God...it separates us from God. The Bible also tells us that the good things we do will never be good enough to get us back close to God."...and from there she went on the explain the need for Jesus to die on the cross.
Of course I had heard this before but this time I actually got it. I understood this gospel thing! And so I prayed, very deliberately, the prayer.
Then, being a curious and somewhat precocious seven year old, I asked, "Ummm...What now?"
"Well, " she enthusiastically informed me, " now you need to be sure to read your Bible and attend Sunday school, pray everyday, and sing songs to God." ('Worship' is a foreign concept to seven year olds and they sometimes think you're talking about war ships which takes the conversation in an entirely wrong direction.)
The teacher was still beaming as she handed each of us who had prayed a brand new crispy-paged bible. I made my way back to my tiny seat smiling the half-smile of being caught up in the moment and as I sat down...
I was completely lost.
If half of what I did was bad then of course I would end up doing these things bad half the time...and feel guilty.
and
If half of what I did was good, but not good enough, then I'd never be able to do these things good enough...and feel guilty.

Was I now doomed to a life of cyclical guilt?

At this point allow me to meekly confess that I did NOT think all of that when I sat down in my small wooden Sunday school chair. In truth it has taken me years of study and striving to come to this conclusion.

And now I get it.

This "list of things to do" creates what I have come to recognize as Protestant guilt.
It's quite different from Catholic guilt.
Catholics have original guilt, they're born with it.
We Protestants earn our guilt. We have the seeds of it bestowed upon us as part and parcel of the Protestant work-ethic; seeds which are nurtured by well meaning Sunday school teachers armed with vacation bible school curricula.
It is coaxed into full bloom by various evangelism methodologies and somewhere between 25 and 50 days of either purpose, prayer, or spiritual adventure.

Interestingly original guilt can be cleansed through weekly ritual.
Protestant guilt is sticky stuff that clings and hangs around for years infusing its tendrils into the soul at an almost subatomic level.

For those suffering from Protestant guilt I offer this ancient prescription:

• Stop shoulding on yourself.
• Spend 30 days just hanging out with God listening.
• See where He takes you.

Listen close though. When it comes to the mightiest truths, He tends to whisper.

(If you need further assistance might I suggest renting the film, "Evan Almighty" and imagine hanging out with Morgan Freeman's character.)

Confessions of a former youth pastor

Deuteronomy 23:1 - 26:19

We used to do an annual breakfast event with our youth groups, just kind of a family time to talk about the year gone by and the year to come.

As part of that event I would give kids seemingly random scripture references, have them look up the passage, read aloud, and provide interpretation of what they'd read. Several of the verses in this section of Deuteronomy were amongst my favorites. Imagine a middle school kid asked to read out loud and then provide the meaning of the following:

Deut 23:1
No one who has been emasculated by crushing or cutting may enter the assembly of the Lord.

Deut 23:10-11
If one of your men is unclean because of a nocturnal emission, he is to go outside the camp and stay there. But as evening approaches he is to wash himself, and at sunset he may return to the camp.

Deut 23:12-14
Designate a place outside the camp where you can go to relieve yourself. As a part of your equipment have something to dig with, and when you relieve yourself, dig a hole and cover up your excrement. For the Lord your God moves about in your camp to protect you and to deliver your enemies to you...
(I had a kid once say, "This means God doesn't want to step in your poop.")

Deut 25:9-10
...his brothers widow shall go up to him in the presence of the elders, take off one of his sandals, spit in his face and say, "This is what is done to the man who will not build up his brother's family line." That man's line shall be known in Israel as The Family of the Unsandaled.

Deut 25:11
If two men are fighting and the wife of one of them comes up to rescue her husband from his assailant, and she reaches out and seizes him by his private parts, you shall cut off her hand. Show her no pity.

I suppose if I believed in purgatory I would have earned several extra years there...but it did have the effect of making the kids more interested in reading the old testament!!

The book of "dude you're on to me"

Deuteronomy 1:1 - 26:19

It is very easy to want to skip right by this book. It starts with Moses recounting everything that happened in the book of Numbers and then goes in to quite some level of detail regarding everything from which fish and birds the Israelites could eat to how to handle cases of rape in town vs out in the country.
Read closely and you'll see the basis upon which many of our modern laws were built. The notion of extradition, the importance of requiring multiple witnesses to a crime, the distinction between premeditated murder and manslaughter...all found here.

For me it is a sad book.

As I read it I see Moses, a man we recognize today as a great leader but who probably would rather have been a quiet shepherd in the wilderness, giving his last words of advice and encouragement to the people God has asked him to lead. He has been at it for more than forty years. He is not going to cross the Jordan into the promised land, he knows his days are at an end.
We read his words and we see the tragically prophetic nature of his warnings. Tragic because we can read what happens later in the story and see that the things he warns about do come to pass. Tragic because had the Israelites made other choices we see quite clearly what blessings would have been bestowed upon them.
I read those warnings with a knowledge of what comes later and I think, "If only you had listened, or remembered. If only you had chosen otherwise...what effects would we feel from those choices even today?"
And then it makes me wonder how my story will be read after I'm gone. Will my children look back on it and say, "If only my dad had listened or remembered...how different would things be for us today had he chosen differently?"
It is a sobering thought.
One well worthy of diligent prayer.

The failure at Peor

...sounds like an episode of the Star Wars saga

Numbers 30:1 - 31:54

This story really has it's roots back in chapter 25 but I wanted to look at it here because this is where it comes to a conclusion.

While Israel was staying in Shittim, the men began to indulge in sexual immorality with Moabite women, who invited them to the sacrifices to their gods. The people ate and bowed down before these gods. So Israel joined in worshiping Baal of Peor. And the Lord's anger burned against them.
(Num 25:1-3)

Now, here's where it ties together in chapter 31:15
Moses speaking:
"Have you allowed all the women to live?" he asked them. "They were the ones who followed Balaam's advie and were the means of turning the Israelites away from the Lord in what happened at Peor, so that the plague struck the Lord's people."

So apparently Balaam, after pronouncing a blessing on the Hebrews three times, made a couple suggestions to the Moabites as to how they might corrupt the Israelites through immorality and idolatry. We don't have that explicitly from his story but we see the connection here.
There are several crucial things happening here all at once:

• Balaam has had direct revelation, a direct prophetic message from God, which he then puts behind him to scheme with the Moabites, ostensibly for profit.
• The Israelites are being tested. They've been instructed to be a "people apart" but they give in to temptation and the text says they became "joined" with Baal Peor.
• This is the kind of thing that will haunt them , almost generational sin, once they enter the land.
• I think there is something symbolic here too. The Moabites sought to bring about the direct destruction of Israel through what they hoped would be a curse from Balaam that would allow them to win in battle. The win in battle and destruction of the Hebrews being their aim. That fails. When the direct frontal assault approach fails they result to seduction, deception and subtle corruption...that succeeds and sets the stage for a struggle the nation of Israel will have throughout their history. Their flirtation with and falling into sin with Baal worship will be a constant theme and struggle.

How easy it is at times for us to dodge the direct assault only to turn around and fall prey to the subtle seduction, the sly temptation. And then how hard it is to completely rid ourselves of the effects and influence of those failings. Praise God that He can and does redeem us completely from those moments, but it is the sly aside that we have to be constantly vigilant against lest we, like Israel, fall into patterns of struggle which none of us want.

Balaam...who IS this guy?

Numbers 22:1 - 29:40

I have to confess that reading through the story of Balaam over the weekend threw me off track a bit. I was totally confused by several points in the story:

• Who is this guy that claims to have a prophetic relationship to God?
• How is it that he knows something about which animals to sacrifice?
• Why does God tell him to go then get mad that he goes?

So I took some time to do a little digging. A couple of facts to add to the biblical narrative to help set the stage:

• Although it seems like just yesterday that the twelve spies were sent out we've come almost to the end of the 40 years in the wilderness at this point. Israel is across the Jordan from Jericho.
• Balak, king of Moab, is obviously worried about the damage the Israelites might do to him so he is looking for advantage in battle when he sends for Balaam. Balaam must have had quite a reputation because the kings men travel nearly 400 miles to get him and then another 400 to bring him back. Of course this doesn't happen overnight so you can imagine the Israelite camp is here for quite some time. At least two back and forth trips worth...
• Balaam's name translates as something akin to "destroyer" and his father's name, Beor, as burning. It is widely believed that Balaam's family business was that of "divination" and distributor of curses for hire. Also, Balaam's home, Pethor, is near the region of Haran in which Abraham spend some time. So Balaam, as a religious generalist and purveyor of all bleesing and cursings of all dieties, probably knew something of the history of of the Hebrews. (Numbers 24:1 seems to indicate that Balaam was practicing sorcery with his first few attempts at "cursing" but that the last attempt he truly utters prophecy.)

So basically we have this diviner/sorceror of some repute who is sought out by the king of Moab. He tells the envoy to spend the night so he can check in with God...and apparently God DOES talk to him?!?!? This seems crazy on the surface of things, almost as though it ratifies the practice of sorcery. But it seems to me having done some more reading that perhaps God is, instead, showing up on behalf of His people, willing to work through even the most unlikely of channels to wortk His will.

So the first group of guys ask Balaam to come back with them and his answer is...wait here and I will bring you back the answer "the Lord" gives me. Theye are sent way essentially empty handed.
The second group comes back and now, I think, Balaam is negotiating price.
(Numbers 22:18-19)
"Even if Balak gave me his palace filled with silver and gold, I could not do anything great or small to go beyond the command of the Lord my God. Now stay here tonight as the others did, and I will find out what else the Lord will tell me."
Balaam is intimating that he has a direct line communication, a relationship with God that may allow him to change God's mind from the original answer.

I got stuck a bit on the next part which seems to say that God tells Balaam to go, then gets angry with him for going. I think God has communicated clearly that Balaam is not to go, then allows him to go because of his persistant lack of understanding with the intent all along of using the trip as a teaching moment.

This of course leads to the famous story of the talking donkey. The story is a great one but, to my way of thinking, the craziest line in the whole story has nothing to do with donkey but it is this line:
"Balaam answered the donkey, "!!!!!

So we have God, speaking to a well known sorceror, a "wise man" or "seer", who fails to see, opening up the eyes and mouth of donkey, who sees more clearly and speaks more truthfully, all within the scope of His plan for His people.

We'll get more on this guy later in scripture so I'll let him off the hook for now.

I'm sure everyone was excited to read the second census of the tribes!!!
Let me sum up...the are only about 1820 fighting men shy of where they were when they took the first census.

The feast of trumpets bit was a tough read too. Did anyone else feel like they were hearing, faintly in the background, the tune from the Twelve Days of Christmas?

Joshua being confirmed as the heir to Moses leadership is the clear sign Mose is on his way out.
Stay tuned for more action tomorrow!!!

p.s.
For a good look at some thoughts on Balaam see this link:
http://bibletools.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Topical.show/RTD/cgg/ID/2089/Balaam.htm

Moving on out

Numbers 19:1 - 21:35

Having quelled the rebellion of the Kohathites and Reubenites the people of Israel move out to begin their forty years of wandering. They have no idea where they're going to go but they know they'll be back at this spot forty years from now...unless they're over 20, then they'll be dead.

I used to think they just wandered around for forty years but as we find out today that isn't the case. A couple interesting points from today's reading that struck me:

God starts cleaning out the adults by removing those who were rebelling and as I mentioned yesterday He does it as a display of His power. What struck me last night is that when they left Egypt he parted the sea and they all went across on dry ground. As they leave to go into the wilderness he parts the dry ground and it swallows up the rebellious crew just like the sea swallowed the Egyptians.

The next bits we're shown concerning those dying off involves some of the leaders. We're shown Miriam's death and then as a result of disobedience Aaron's death. I wonder if there weren't maybe a handful of teenagres who were starting to wonder if maybe all the adults would die sooner and they'd get back to the promised land sooner.

The cool bit to me though is where we see Moses trying to negotiate passage through the neighboring kingdoms. They all come out to attack and eventually the Israelites take over the towns of the Amorites. In this process God is teaching his people how to wage warfare against attacking kingdoms and fortified towns. He doesn't "wipe out" the inhabitants with plagues or snakes...which we know He could easily have done...he uses the ire of the petty kings to provide a training ground for His people who will soon (in 40 years) have to wage the very same type of warfare in order to conquer the promised land.

As my wife pointed out to me last night...we need to read these stories all the while remembering that God is the point, not the folks themselves. It is God who is holy and worthy of praise and respect...even if a custom seems odd, a miracle seems bizarre, or a punishment seems harsh.

I love the fact that in the midst of the "punishement" God is growing His people up so they'll be ready to do the job at hand when they get back to the promised land.