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Chapter-a-Day

Explicit Sin, Explicit Message

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At every street corner you built your lofty shrines and degraded your beauty, spreading your legs with increasing promiscuity to anyone who passed by.
Ezekiel 16:25 (NIV)

Jerusalem is a fascinating city. It is a city filled with tensions. And it is amazing to experience. It’s crazy to think that a tiny little Canaanite town thousands of years old became, and remains to this day, the most political and religious hot spot of the entire world.

Today’s long chapter is a prophetic message God gave to Ezekiel specifically about the city of Jerusalem. To make sense of Ezekiel’s message, it helps to know a little about Jerusalem’s history.

Jerusalem began as a Canaanite village. It was David who made it his Capital city. At the time he did so, it was a Jebusite city. Only after David’s reign was it considered Israelite. Its multi-cultural history made it a city of political and religious tension from the beginning.

Ezekiel’s message is a long metaphorical story about a non-Jewish baby girl thrown into a field and left to die. God wills the girl to live, cares for her as she grows, and when she flowers into a woman He marries her. She, however, is unfaithful to God, her husband. She becomes an adulterer and a temple prostitute for pagan worship. She sacrifices her children in pagan rituals. Eventually, she then runs after her clients and freely gives herself to them seeking their protection.

If you read the chapter, and I encourage you to do so, it gets rather graphic in its descriptives of her “spreading her legs” for her neighbors and even describes one of them, Egypt, as having an – ahem – very large penis. I confess my curiosity this morning and, just for fun, I pulled up that verse in Bible Gateway and compared every English translation to see how translators handled the reference. Fascinating, some ignored it completely. Some disguised it in vague euphemisms such as “great of flesh” and “lustful.” Others went with a little more specific “well-endowed,” “large member,” or “large genitals.”

Of course, Ezekiel was pulling no punches and the people of his day would have known exactly what he was talking about. He was accurately describing actual Egyptian fertility idols, common in that day, depicting an Egyptian man with a protruding giant erect penis.

And this is the point. The prophets like Ezekiel get very graphic in their messages because the extreme nature of the sins that they were addressing, including ritualized sexual immorality and ritual child sacrifice.

I have to remember that Ezekiel is living in Babylon and the Babylonians had their own version of sex and fertility cults and rituals. The Ishtar Festival, in particular was known for its sexual and moral debauchery. This may very well have fueled the metaphorical rawness of his message.

The adulterous wife was an apt description of Jerusalem. While it had become the chosen city of God’s people, the city itself remained the hometown of both Jews and pagan Canaanites. The pagan residents may have politically gone along with prevailing wind of Jewish authority, but it would always struggle to be faithful to the God of David.

God’s judgment on Jerusalem is pronounced as the just consequences of her adultery, prostitution, infanticide, and social injustices. What is fascinating, however, is that this judgment is not final. God promises to remain faithful, to restore, and to redeem His bride. Not only that, but God declares that He will personally make atonement for her sins:

So I will establish my covenant with you, and you will know that I am the Lord. Then, when I make atonement for you for all you have done…

Fast forward about 500 years and this is exactly what Jesus did when He died on the cross outside the very city of Jerusalem, over which He lovingly laments:

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing. Look, your house is left to you desolate.”

With Jesus, the metaphor switches from Jerusalem being the bride to Jerusalem being the prodigal child. Jesus moves the bride metaphor and applies it to His followers. Which, for me, means that as the bride I find in Ezekiel’s explicit message to Jerusalem both a warning and a comforting truth. If I stray from Jesus, I can expect to experience the consequences of my thoughts, words, and actions. However, while it’s easy to focus on Jerusalem’s sins, the most amazing and important piece of the message is God’s sacrificial love and faithfulness in spite of those sins. This reminds me that no matter how much I stray or how deeply I may fall into sin, His sacrificial love and infinite grace will always extend further and deeper.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

The Difference

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The Difference (CaD Gal 3) – Wayfarer

I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by believing what you heard?
Galatians 3:2 (NIV)

I was a dormitory Resident Assistant (RA) through most of my college years. Being an RA came with the responsibility of checking on residents, making sure everyone was out for fire drills or fire alarms, doing room inspections, and making sure everyone was in by curfew. For these few responsibilities, I got my own room.

During my first year as an RA, I remember some stark differences in how other members of the team handled the rules. There was this one guy, in particular, who was rabid in enforcing the “letter of the law.” If a person was one second past curfew they were in trouble. He demanded that rooms be immaculate to pass inspection. He seemed to enjoy finding ways to catch rule breakers and punish them. As you can imagine, he quickly gained the reputation of being the worst RA in the dorm. No one wanted to live on his floor.

I have always generally been a rule follower, but I was a “spirit of the law” kind of guy as an RA. I figured that room inspections were intended to make sure nothing nasty was growing and no health hazards were being incubated. Likewise, when a guy came sprinting into the dorm a few minutes past curfew, I figured he was at least conscious enough of the rule to actually run back to the dorm. I let it slide.

In today’s chapter, Paul addresses the crux of a conflict that plagued the early years of the Jesus Movement. It’s about the rules God gave Moses and the Hebrew people after delivering them from Egypt. Known simply as “the Law,” there were those within the Jesus Movement who insisted that a person could not be a follower of Jesus without first being obedient to all the rules of the Law. God had already made clear to Peter, to Paul, and to the rest of the Apostles that non-Jewish Gentiles did not have to adhere to the Law to believe in Jesus and be filled with the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, rabid rule-keepers like my RA friend had visited the local gatherings of Jesus’ followers in Galatia and started insisting otherwise.

Paul does not mince words. He calls his Galatian friends fools for being influenced by the rule-keeping tyrants. Salvation, Paul points out, is about simply believing. This isn’t a new concept. Paul goes all the way back to the “father” of the Jewish people, Abraham. Abraham “believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.” Rule-keeping doesn’t produce righteousness. In fact, rule-keeping only results in proving that I’m imperfect. When religion becomes about rule-keeping it always results in powerful hypocrites tyrannizing weak followers in keeping up appearances of rule-keeping perfection.

Father Abraham, Paul argues, was the prototype that superseded the law. Abraham simply believed God and did what God told him. Abe was credited with righteousness, not by keeping rules but by believing and responding out of that belief. Because Jesus’ died for sin and rose from the dead, the tyranny of rule-keeping and the Law is over. The Abraham paradigm has been firmly established once and for all. As Paul would write to the believers in Rome: “If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

In the quiet this morning, I find myself reflecting on some of the more fundamentalist experiences I’ve had along my spiritual journey. The tyranny of rule-keeping continues to be a pillar of fundamentalist groups and cults. You can find several documentaries about such groups streaming on your favorite platform. A form of the core issue Paul is addressing in today’s chapter is still with us. The “letter of the law” paradigm seems so simple, It’s so black-and-white, and it provides an easy-to-understand framework of behavior. And, it is typically accompanied by rabid letter-of-the-law tyrants to police the behaviors and punish the rule-breakers.

The “spirit of the law” paradigm of Abraham and Jesus gets rather messy at times. It requires me to believe. Not just a mental acknowledgment, but believing in such a way that I am motivated to think, speak, and act out of that belief. I am compelled to do so by the love of Jesus, who sacrificed Himself for my sin. It’s not about guilt but about gratitude. It’s not rule-keeping but responding to Jesus’ kindness. Righteousness isn’t earned, it’s credited.

That makes all the difference.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

Paul v. The System

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Paul v. The System (CaD Acts 26) – Wayfarer

“They have known me for a long time and can testify, if they are willing, that I conformed to the strictest sect of our religion, living as a Pharisee.”
Acts 26:5 (NIV)

Over the last year or two, I have been listening to podcasts and watching documentaries about religious sects and mega-churches that have ended tragically in all manner of scandals and abuses both personal and corporate. I didn’t make some kind of conscious decision to do so. Looking back, it’s sort of fascinating that I found myself intrigued by the subject. I just finished another documentary series yesterday.

I have written in these chapter-a-day posts before about the common patterns of fundamentalism that can be found in more than just religious groups. Fundamentalism can be found in businesses, social groups, political groups, and family systems.

The Jewish religious system at the time of Jesus, and the time of Paul, bore all the marks of fundamentalism. In today’s chapter, Paul’s testimony before the Roman Governor Festus and King Agrippa describes it. It was a closed system with strict in-group and out-group distinctions. Stringent rules regarding thought and behavior were strictly dictated and enforced. Refusal to conform resulted in, at best, the threat of being ostracized and, at worst, the threat of death.

I found it fascinating that Paul states “They have known me for a long time.” As Paul stands before his accusers, he’s facing men whom he’s known almost his entire life. Paul was among the elite of this Jewish ruling class. He was a student of the greatest Jewish teacher of their time. He was on the fast track to leadership in this very ruling body. He drank the Kool-aid and conformed to the strictest of their religious rules. Had he not met Jesus on the road to Damascus, Paul might very well have been sitting among those accusing them.

Paul likely knew many of his accusers by name. He likely had dined in their homes, knew their families, and had shared memories from long-term relationships. He had been “in” with them, now he is “out.” Fundamentalist systems always turn on those who refuse to conform and comply. They want Paul dead in the same way Paul, when he was one of them, wanted Stephen dead back in chapter seven; In the same way they wanted Jesus dead. It’s the same system, operating in the same fundamentalist paradigm. Traitors to a fundamentalist system who threaten the power (and wealth) of the leaders of that system are systemically eradicated. The exact, same pattern can be seen in each of the podcasts and documentaries I’ve consumed regarding religious sects and megachurches in our own day.

In the quiet this morning, I find myself meditating on Jesus’ words in John 8:31-32: “To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” Fascinating that I’ve never paid much attention to the beginning of verse 31: “To the Jews who had believed him.” The religious system had people trapped, one might even argue “enslaved,” in strict religious rule-keeping and blind obedience to leadership through the threat of top-down intimidation and social ostracism. Jesus wanted to free them.

Paul had been spiritually freed from the system. Now he wants his old friends and comrades to experience the same freedom. He wants Agrippa to experience it, too. He even tells Agrippa and the entire courtroom: “I pray to God that not only you but all who are listening to me today may become what I am, except for these chains.”

Along my life journey, I have experienced both unhealthy fundamentalist systems and the spiritual freedom of being Jesus’ disciple. I will always steer clear of the former as I daily embrace the latter.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

Of Rules and Appetites

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Of Rules and Appetites (CaD Ps 24) – Wayfarer

Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord?
    And who shall stand in his holy place?
Those who have clean hands and pure hearts,
    who do not lift up their souls to what is false…
Psalm 24:3-4b (NRSVCE)

The further I get in my life journey, the more I’ve come to understand that the black-and-white behavioral rules of the most strictly religious groups are really about social control in which an institution or group exercise authority over another. The goal and benefit is a sense of order, collective security, and control. Within this type of system, the individual’s role is simple and strict obedience to the group’s behavioral rules (those written, and those insidiously unwritten but understood) under the threat of public shaming and being socially ostracized from the group. This type of system exists as religious fundamentalist sects and denominations, fraternal organizations, gangs, cults, secret societies, and the systemic equivalent can even exist in businesses, corporations, sports teams, and community organizations.

Systems like this have existed throughout history and continue to this day. It is this type of system with which Jesus conflicted in the Temple when he overturned the moneychangers’ tables and railed against the Temple’s religious cabal. It was this conflict that led them to treat Jesus as a threat who was to be ostracized and executed. It is the same system out of which Paul transitioned to becoming a follower of Jesus. Paul also was considered a threat they needed to ostracize and execute.

Please don’t read what I’m not writing. Don’t hear what I’m not saying. It doesn’t really matter which system we’re talking about. They all operate the same way and follow the same basic systemic rules.

The problem with this type of system is that it chains the individual to the group rather than freeing the individual from self. Behavior modification is not about spiritual health but of social order. The individual tries to control behaviors rather than be spiritually transformed. Paul recognized that all the behavioral rules of the system only created more rulebreakers sneaking around in the dark breaking the rules and trying not to get caught.

Scholars believe that today’s psalm was a song David wrote to be sung as the people entered God’s Temple in Jerusalem. If you read it and imagine the Hebrews carrying the Ark of the Covenant (cue: Raiders of the Ark Theme) into the Temple as they sing this song you get the gist. It starts by asking the question: “Who can ascend the hill of the Lord?” (That refers to Zion, on which the Temple was built) and then “Who can stand in his holy place?” (That would refer to the “Holy Place” within the Temple as designed and prescribed through Moses).

The lyric of the song then describes who may do these things. The description is that of a good person, but here’s where translation from the original language (Hebrew) to English can make a huge difference. In verse 4 the English phrase “do not lift up their souls” has an original Hebrew physiological imagery that references the throat. Some scholars argue that the word picture here is more like “nursing an appetite” and the Hebrew word translated “false” is rooted in the idea of “empty” or “vain.” So it’s really about those who don’t nurse their appetites for things that are empty.

In the quiet this morning, that’s what really struck me. What I’ve learned along my journey is that all the religious and systemic rule keeping does not address the real issues of Spirit that lead to transformation. Keeping the rules so as to appease my church leaders, parents, college, pastors, teachers, and peer group in the attempt to avoid being shamed and ostracized did not transform my soul.

What really led to transformation for me was when I realized that all my human appetites were good and created within in me by God. Paul realized it too when he said “Nothing is unlawful for me. It’s just that some things aren’t beneficial.” My appetite for food, for drink, for pleasure, for rest, for sex, for relationship, for security, for peace, for affirmation…all of them are good and part of what God created in me. It’s when I “nurse my appetite,” any one of them, and indulge my good and healthy appetites in empty and unhealthy ways that I hurt myself. And, I bring the unhealthy results to every relationship and system in which I am a part.

It’s not about me behaving for acceptance in a system. It’s about me being the person, the true and healthy self, God created me to be. It’s about what Jesus said when He told His followers to nurse their appetites for the things of God, and not for the things of this earth (including the safety and acceptance of a human system). How can I “love my neighbor as myself” if my unhealthy indulgence of natural appetites is leading to my continual self-injury and disrupting my relationships, my work, my family, and my life?

What appetite am I going to nurse today? That’s the question as I head into the weekend.

Have a great weekend.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.