Redefining Reality

Readings

Ps 27; Lamentations 2:8-19; 2 Corinthians 1:8-22; Mark 11:27-33

Discussion & Study

1. Do you think the leaders who questioned Jesus’ authority really couldn’t tell where John’s authority came from?
2. Why do you think they questioned Jesus on this point at this time?
3. At whose behest did Paul change his plans according to the 2 Corinthians passage? For what reason(s) did the Corinthians believe Paul made his plans and his message?
4. According to Ps 27, when one purposes to seek God’s face, what can that one expect?
5. What does the Lamentations passage say is the result of following human “prophets” rather than God?

Comments
Have you ever noticed that when you are dealing with difficult realities by laboring to respond only to God’s leading rather than to present provocations that you are often criticized for circumventing present authority? Israel’s spiritual leaders were doing precisely that when they confronted Jesus in the Temple the day after He cleansed it. Essentially, they were requiring Jesus to live in the reality they had created rather than in the Reality of the Father. Their reality placed their own authority squarely in the center, allowing them to redefine worship, to regulate the people’s behavior, and (most importantly) to ignore God’s assessment of their leadership.

This was nothing new. False prophets in Jeremiah’s day had redefined reality for Israel, comforting her cheaply and pandering to her sins, so that she could not respond to God’s correction. Nor would it be the last time that self-interested leaders would try it. Paul faced similar criticism when concern that a second visit to Corinth would only pain the Christians there rather than encourage them, caused Paul to change his travel plans. The leaders at Corinth apparently accused Paul of being worldly and unreliable, because he thwarted their plans.

Interestingly, both Paul and Jeremiah seek to comfort those who have been deceived by false redefinitions of reality by directing the focus of God’s people back to His utter constancy of purpose. ‘He has done what He said he would do,’ says Jeremiah. ‘I will continue to do whatever benefits you most,’ says Paul. God’s reality is the only comfort, the only cure. Jesus’ response to the leaders of His day was an invitation to consider a reality that they could not escape. ‘God has spoken by John the Baptist, who confirmed My divine appointment, and everyone knows it.’

Reorienting towards God’s purpose does not remove the tension or danger. However, it does offer a way to look beyond the present difficulty. The Psalmist urges himself to “wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage…” Ultimately, the Lord’s reality breaks through the comfortable illusions and the one who has insisted upon living in the Lord’s reality will find himself sheltered in the day of trouble.

Holy Week Bible Study: Subsititutions

Readings
Ps 41; Lamentations 1:1-12a; 2 Corinthians 1:1-7; Mark 11:12-26

Discussion & Study

1. Lamentation’s author writes during the exile period, while the horrific events of the fall of Jerusalem are within living memory. Verse 12 asks, “Is there any sorrow like my sorrow?” Do you think that the exiles’ grief was unique in history?
2. Compare Ps 41 and the Lamentations passage. What are the sources of the writers’ afflictions? Are the afflictions deserved?
3. According to the 2 Corinthians passage, what bearing does the guilt or innocence of the believer have upon God’s purposes for the suffering of believers?

Comments

How shall we make sense of Christ’s sufferings? How shall we make sense of our own? He, who deserved only blessing and glory, endured the most devastating losses, the most hideous sufferings imaginable. We, who deserve punishment, receive forgiveness, release from retribution, but often we suffer where we have given no offense.

What does it mean? God’s Word indicates that, as believers, our sufferings have less to do with punishing us for our misdeeds and more to do with expanding our usefulness in Christ’s Kingdom. Christ’s sufferings were categorically undeserved. Yet He expected to suffer, indeed it was his purpose to suffer. Why? In order to become more useful to His Father. By suffering, Jesus opened fellowship between sinful humans and God. He satisfied the just penalty for all His people’s transgressions of God’s righteous law. Having experienced sorrows Himself, He became able to sympathize with ours. He became our comfort, and offers a dignity and a purpose for our own suffering.

Today’s Lamentations passage gives us a perplexing example. In Jeremiah’s time (the author of Lamentations), Jerusalem fell to Babylon. Solomon’s Temple was destroyed and invaded by foreign pagans. The imagery here compares the Temple to a virgin forcibly taken. Yet it was through Israel’s disobedience that the entrance of Gentiles into the Temple was a violent, shameful thing, a rape rather than a wedding. Israel’s commission from God was to disciple the nations, to bring them into God’s presence properly, not simply to exclude everyone born outside of Israel. Jesus’ words as he cursed the fig tree symbolic of Israel bear this out: “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations? But you have made it a den of robbers.” By Jeremiah’s day, Israel had rejected God’s commission by mixing the true worship of YHWH with the religions of the Canaanite nations around them. Allowing the destruction of the Temple was God bringing physical reality to reflect the spiritual reality that Judah’s worship had already been corrupted.

By Jesus’ time, the Jews no longer mixed their worship with pagan rites. Instead they had invented their own regulations, which were not intended to disciple the nations, but were designed to keep Gentiles out. They had substituted their ways for God’s ways, their purposes for God’s purposes. They looked like a fruitful tree. A fig tree puts out leaves after its fruit is ripe, so even though "it was not the season for figs”, Jesus reasonably expected to find fruit there. But the tree, like Israel in Jesus’ day, had perverted the order of their Creator. At the crucifixion, the Temple was forcibly opened to the whole world, the separating veil ripped, not by invading pagans, but by the mighty hands of the God who will not be thwarted by man’s pettiness or sin. Jesus’ suffering ushered the Gentiles into the Temple on the arm of the tender Bridegroom who knows what it is to be rejected.

We are called to imitate Christ. It is clear that we must expect to suffer in a fallen world. So we ought to learn to view our afflictions as we view His. Having experienced our Lord’s comfort in trouble, we suffer so that we may become comforters. Enduring trials as He did, we earn not justification, but glory which reflects upon Christ’s worthiness.

Lenten Bible Study: Sacrificial Smoke

As promised, a taste of the Bible study I'm working on. To get the most out of it, read what God has to say before you take a look at what I have to say. Use the questions to help yourself to focus on some of the themes in the readings. Then take a look at my comments.

I aim to make these as accessible as possible, so your comments will help me to refine these studies. Enjoy!

Readings

Ps 38, 65, 150; Romans 12:9-21; Deuteronomy 31:9-13

Discussion & Study

1. How do Paul’s specific injunctions in the last half of chapter 12 fit with the command in 12: 1 & 2?
2. Why do you think it would be important for the Law to be read aloud to Israel regularly? (Deut. 31:9-13)
3. David’s dedication of Ps 38 specifies that it is to be sung during the Memorial Offering (Lev. 2). What imagery does he use in the Psalm that helps the worshipper identify with the offering?

Comments
The grain has been crushed beyond recognition. It’s powder. The altar shimmers with the heat of its internal fire. The priest thrusts his hand into the sack and, flour and salt in one hand, frankincense in the other, flings them all on the snapping altar. The flour goes up in a flash of glory. The frankincense glows and sizzles into perfumed curls of smoke that swirl up and up. “Remember!” whispers the priest.

Like the rainbow (Gen. 9:12 – 17), the grain offering is a memorial to God’s mercy. God in His mercy, does not allow the crushing and the fire we encounter in life to destroy us. Instead, we become glorious; we ascend to commune with Him in prayer and, ultimately, in person.

David describes himself as crushed by his sin and his enemies. He dreads the gleeful fire of his enemies’ gloating. He acknowledges that the only way he will escape is through God’s mercy. Like flour thrown above the altar, he will never languish in those flames. God will make haste to save him, to snatch him up gloriously into His company.

Paul gives us a sort of slow-motion view of the sacrifice. What does it look like to become a “living sacrifice”? Bless your persecutors. Love your enemies. Live in harmony. Pray. Hope. Rejoice. All of these are painful in a fallen world. But, contrary to our expectations, they will not destroy us; instead, by God’s mercy they will make us glorious. We will ascend into mysterious fellowship with Him even while we walk this earth. This is not intuitively obvious to the fallen mind.

As Moses prepared to die, he wanted God’s people to have the keys to the mysteries of God’s working. So he instructed that the Law, including the detailed descriptions of the sacrifices and their purposes be read aloud to the congregated people on a regular basis, so that they could remember.

These images will comfort and sustain us, too, when we feel the crushing of life, smell the smoke of destruction and sense the scorn of encircling enemies. Because of these God-given clues, we can face these fears with dignity, even with triumph, for as we pass through the fire, we will rise to His embrace, singing with David, “Let everything that has breath praise the Lord”.

Lenten Bible Study

Often Lent is viewed as a time to put away luxuries of life for a little while or to put aside self-indulgence - but not too seriously. Chocolate goes for a few weeks, but is back again permanently after Easter. Seems to me this does us little real benefit.

Lent is a good time to consider our ways and to form new habits more conformed to the image of Christ. Prune back the thorns that choke out your productive branches. If you want to lose weight, don't just fast frequently during Lent. Form a habit of eating less, and remind yourself when the hunger pangs come, that your strength for the day comes from God, not simply from the food you eat.

One of my Lenten observances this year is to become more regular in my communications with you. I'd like to begin by offering a preview of the Lenten series of devotions I'm writing. So here's installment one, a little background on Lent and the use of the Lectionary on which these Bible Studies are based.

My writing will improve if you comment. Perhaps that could be one of your Lenten observances: cease lurking and speak up!

Beauty for Ashes

Daily Devotions for the Lenten Season

These devotional meditations are based on the readings organized in the lectionary found at www.oremus.org. The lectionary is perhaps the first Christian Bible study manual, compiling parallel and thematically related passages of Scripture from the Psalms, the Old Testament and the New Testament in a daily reading regimen that covers the entire Bible in a three-year cycle. This tradition of readings stretches all the way back to the ancient synagogues’ practice of reading through the Torah, so as to acquaint the people with as much of the Scripture as possible.

Hearing the antiphonal voices of Old Testament echoing New Testament themes gives extraordinary richness to familiar passages. We are enabled to capture the reverberations of Old Testament stories in the nuances of those densely-packed New Testament narratives and analyses. Seeing what those Old Testament events foreshadowed in the New Testament helps to make sense of some of the odd consequences of seemingly minor events in those first events (For instance, why was it so important for Moses not to strike the rock that poured out water for Israel in the wilderness, so important that because he disobeyed, he was barred from entering the Promised Land?).

This particular series of readings is from Year C of the Revised Common Lectionary, which pairs Luke’s Gospel with the Old Testament prophets. The Revised Common Lectionary is used by Protestant churches across the English-speaking world.

Be Careful What You Pray For...

You really might get it. In October, I began to pray for God's direction for the phase of life I'll be entering in a big way as my second daughter graduates this spring, leaving only my son at home and decades of Empty Nest stretching out before me. By the time the 40-day season of prayer was over, God had completely wrecked and rebuilt my life.

I feel like the burned-over field ready for new spring growth. Still smoking.

But instead of heavy (& gorgeous) administrative offices, God has given a wind-&-fire public-speaking and writing ministry. And instead of the glad frenzy of keeping everybody's balls in the air, God is giving me the joy of going deep with the last phases of my son's education. Instead of me initiating projects in which I'd involve my children, my children are initiating projects in which they involve me!

I am moving from effecting change by the strength of my hands to effecting change by the strength of my word. It is a subtle and profound promotion. A new way of imitating Christ.

At the end of the day, I see. He has only burned my bonds.

Stock up for School

Over at Dewey's Treehouse, the Carnival of Homeschooling is having a big blowout sale on fresh ideas for the new school year.

And my friend Arden has an interesting series going about reading hard books with your children. See her dumbed-down-resistant reading list at Woman Come Home.

Me? I'm writing personalized PowerPoint presentations for two different value debate camps, a college prep workshop and a book fair. Well, and a Bible study for publication. Wanna peek? Come back tomorrow!

Taking the Battle to the Enemy

God inhabits the praises of His people. By praises, battles were won and cities were overthrown. By praises, David established the kingdom of Israel, Paul freed prisoners and won the Praetorian Guard.

Recently, I have had occasion to witness how much the Evil One fears and resists the praise of God.

Anne spent most of the summer at the famous Interlochen Arts Camp, studying music composition. Throughout her work there she made no secret of the religious impulse for her pursuit of music. For the culmination of her six weeks of work there, she set a portion of the psalm David composed for the inauguration of his tabernacle at Jerusalem, the forerunner of the Temple proper. (The text is found in IChron. 16: 8-36) She was the only composer to set text for the human voice and hers was the only Scripture slated to be sung by any of the nearly 2,500 music students over the entire summer.

Well, composition students at Interlochen are responsible to recruit and to rehearse musicians to perform their pieces at the three New Composers' Forums. And the quality of the performance has to be approved by their composition faculty.

Throughout the summer, Anne was particularly plagued by difficulties with getting everybody to the right place at the right times. First, one cellist after another forgot or double-booked the faculty demonstration hour or didn't have time to practice. Then the harpist forgot to reserve a harp for the Forum hour. None of her early pieces appeared on the Forums for which they were scheduled. And these were the non-religious instrumental pieces.

For the Chronicles piece, she kept the musicians required to a minimum: two sopranos, a baritone and a piano. Things went along swimmingly until the pianist failed to show up for the warm-up rehearsal for the faculty. Her professor graciously gave her an extra hour to find her pianist before the professor went home for the day.

Anne covered the large Interlochen campus personally and with the help of friends. She called me at Winston's Shakespeare play in great distress. And the whole cast did the only thing we could; we prayed. But the pianist seemed to have disappeared from the face of the earth (as far as we know, he was never seen at camp again. But this was the last two days...).

Finally, she was sitting outside her professor's office waiting to tell him the sad news, when another student saw her long face and asked if she was OK. She looked up and realized that this young man was a piano/organ major who is the music minister at his home church.

"How's your sightreading?" she asked. "Pretty good," he shrugged modestly.

'Pretty good' (Ha! I've seen the music. It's challenging.) was good enough. Not only did this young man con the score in 15 minutes, but he had it well enough in hand to help cue the singers from the keyboard - as he so often did back at his church.

So on the last Forum on the the last day of camp on the last Sunday of Interlochen, the praise of the Lord rang from a bastion of secular arts. And I got to hear it!

Whenever God promised Abraham a part of Canaan, Abraham built an altar there and offered the sacrifices pleasing to the Lord. It was a declaration that this land was marked for conquest by God. Interlochen has been so marked by the sacrifice of praise. Won't it be interesting to see the conquest?!