Tag Archives: Hebrew

Chapter-a-Day

The Text is a Tool

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Then the leaders of Israel, the heads of families who were the tribal leaders in charge of those who were counted, made offerings.
Numbers 7:2 (NIV)

This summer, I’ve been overseeing a production of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream at our local community theatre. As far as I know, it’s the first production of Shakespeare in our community in over a decade. One of the things that has excited me as I’ve watched dress rehearsals over the last few days is how well the cast is doing. Made of mostly young people, not one of the cast members had ever done Shakespeare on stage before. It’s a shame that so many people are intimidated and dismissive of Shakespeare. They a missing out on some amazing things.

Throughout my life journey, I’ve had to memorize lines for a lot of different parts in different productions. You might be surprised when I tell you that Shakespeare is among the easiest to memorize. There is a cadence to the iambic pentameter in which it is written. There are often rhymes included as well. One the joys of watching the cast of A Midsummer Night’s Dream in rehearsal is that these young people not only memorized the lines, they’ve come to understand them. That’s what happens when you memorize the lines and repeat them over, and over, and over again. It begins to sink in. All sorts of fun realization and understanding is unlocked, revealing hidden mental gems like finding Easter eggs in a video game. It’s obvious to me as I watch that they have fallen in love with the characters and story they are telling. I guarantee it has transformed the way they think about Shakespeare as they experience the power and meaning of his words, his characters, and his story.

Today’s chapter is, for most modern readers, a head-scratcher of aggravating proportions. It is the longest chapter in the ancient Hebrew scriptures known as the Law of Moses (the first five books, also known as The Torah or The Penteteuch). Not only is it long but it is repetitive. Leaders of all twelve Hebrew tribes bring an offering for the dedication of God’s traveling tent temple. They each bring the same offering. The same offering of the same things are recounted twelve times.

It’s chapters like today’s where many a New Year’s resolution to read the entire Bible hit the wall.

So, what’s up with this?

Two observations.

First, at the end of the last chapter, God gives Moses and Aaron a famous blessing with which to bless the Hebrew people:

The Lord bless you
    and keep you;
the Lord make his face shine on you
    and be gracious to you;
the Lord turn his face toward you
    and give you peace.

It’s known as the Aaronic blessing or benediction, and thousands of years later you’ll hear it used in countless synagogues and churches every week.

So, I have to step back and look at the larger picture of how the text is structured. Not just the text itself. God has delivered the Hebrews from slavery. He has agreed to live among them. He has given them thorough instructions for how to successfully experience life, health, and community with one another and with God. And, God has now given a perpetual blessing of protection, provision, favor, grace, and peace.

This blessing is immediately followed by the Hebrews offering gifts to God. The offerings are a response to God’s gracious and generous gifts and blessing. This chapter of offerings are a giant, national thank you card.

Which leaves me to meditate on the question, “What have I offered God for His gracious and generous gifts and blessings to me?” I suddenly think of my affluent culture in which we are so blessed with stuff we don’t need that we buy storage bins to put it on storage shelves in storage rooms. Even then we often need to rent extra storage spaces. God has been amazingly generous with me. How generous have I been with God?

The second observation has to do with the simplicity of the lesson in the repetition. This text was written in a time when only a select few people could read or write. Once again, it is the toddler stage of the development of human civilization. How is my toddler granddaughter, Sylvie, learning simple lessons? By having the same books read to her with the same text, the same rhymes over and over and over again…

Big A, little a, what begins with “a?”
Apples, ants, and animals. A, a, a.

God and the scribes of Numbers are making a point about who God is (gracious, ordered, detailed) and about the importance of how we are to respond to God (being generous with what we’ve been blessed, gratefully offering God back a portion of what we’ve been given, not just personally but corporately as God’s people). As the ancient Hebrews heard it read over, and over, and over the lesson was hopefully going to sink in. The repetition is both an object lesson and a training technique.

Which, in the quiet this morning, leads me back to Shakespeare, memorization, and understanding. One of the first disciplines I was taught as a disciple of Jesus was to memorize certain verses like a young actor learning his lines for playing the part of Puck. I’ve watched the cast unlock the understanding, meaning, and joy of Shakespeare’s words. But it had to get off the page and inside their minds and hearts to unlock its power. It is no different than what I have experienced with all of the verses and passages of God’s Words that I’ve memorized across my life journey.

The words are no longer on the page. They are in my head. They’ve penetrated my heart and soul. As I repeat the words over and over and over through the days, weeks, months, and years, they have become a part of me. In that process, something happens spiritually inside me. They start to change the way I think, the way I behave, and the way I respond to others. Because they are always there and always a part of me, they empower God’s Spirit work within me in unspeakable ways.

It’s a shame so many people are intimidated by, and dismissive of, the words of God’s Great Story. They are missing out on some amazing things. Even more amazing than Shakespeare.

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

For my local peeps, A Midsummer Night’s Dream is being performed July 24-27, 2025 at the Pella Community Center. You can get tickets online here and all the show information here.

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Chapter-a-Day

A Life in One Phrase

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A Life in One Phrase (CaD 1 Chr 26) – Wayfarer

The lot for the East Gate fell to Shelemiah. Then lots were cast for his son Zechariah, a wise counselor, and the lot for the North Gate fell to him.
1 Chronicles 26:14 (NIV)

Over the years, I have dug into my family’s history. Working on a family tree, you deal with a lot of names that have little or no meaning. They are just names without context, kind of like reading through the list of Hebrew names compiled by the Chronicler in today’s chapter.

I have found it interesting, however, that certain individuals in my family have a reputation that has always been passed down with the name. Typically, I’ve noticed that what gets remembered is not the good things.

“He was a drunk.”
“No one had a good word to say about him.”
“She was always mean.”

One of my great-grandfathers, William, was one of multiple ancestors whose name was rarely mentioned without being followed by the fact that he was a drunk. When I inherited my mother’s collection of family photos and ephemera, I found a book that my great-aunt had written about his life. It would seem that she personally took it upon herself to learn her father’s story to try and understand the man with whom she never had much of a relationship.

The story was heartbreaking. His mother had been hired out to a family on a farm miles away from her home when she was just a young girl. She was treated like a slave. One of the sons seduced her and promised her the moon to have his way with her, but broke every promise. When she wound up pregnant she was dismissed and destitute. Her sister, married off to a well-to-do businessman, finally took her in with the condition she was to stay out of sight and no one would ever know they were sisters. An unwanted pregnancy of an illicit affair to a man who wanted nothing to do with the destitute young mother and her offspring. Welcome to the world, little man.

William’s life was tragic from the beginning. Despite his best efforts, tragedy seemed to follow him like a stray dog. He certainly made a number of mistakes in life that compounded his troubles, but I certainly began to understand why he learned to drown his sorrows. Perhaps the crowning tragedy of his life was that a rather complex and compelling life story was reduced to a simple “He was a drunk” to all of his descendants.

In today’s chapter, the Chronicler lists all of the families in the ancient Hebrew tribe of Levi who were assigned to be gatekeepers and treasurers in Solomon’s Temple. As I read through the long string of rather meaningless names, I was struck when the Chronicler mentioned a gatekeeper named Zechariah and then followed the name with “a wise counselor.” He didn’t mention any positive or negative character qualities about any of the other names. What made Zechariah such a “wise counselor” that the Chronicler was compelled to mention it? How cool to think that Zac, an otherwise forgettable ancient gatekeeper, had a reputation for giving wise advice that would be remembered for over 3000 years.

In the quiet this morning, I find myself asking a simple question: When my great-grandchildren see a photo of me and ask, “Who’s that dad?” What words will follow “Oh, that’s your great-grandfather Tom. He….” What will my descendants remember about me? Into what short phrase will my life be reduced by those who knew me?

Every day I contribute to the reputation by which I will be remembered.

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

Chapter-a-Day

Genealogical Lessons

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Genealogical Lessons (CaD 1 Chr 2) – Wayfarer

These were the sons of Israel:
Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, Dan, Joseph, Benjamin, Naphtali, Gad and Asher.

The sons of Judah:
1 Chronicles 2:1-3a (NIV)

I have been the closest thing my family has to a genealogist. I’m not great at it because I don’t have the time and energy it takes to do it well, but I’ve learned a lot digging into my family history on both my mother’s and father’s sides of the family.

Our daughter Taylor works for a software company that does really cool things recording family stories for subsequent generations so she recently found herself repping their service at a giant conference on genealogy. Upon her return, we had a lot of fun digging into the tools she discovered and swapping tidbits we gleaned on family history. It had always been rumored that we were related to George Washington in some way, and I was excited to be able to firmly establish that I am George Washinton’s first cousin, ten generations removed. Taylor said she was more stoked by learning she was an 11th cousin of Grace Kelly. I guess we get excited about different things. I acknowledged to her that Cousin Grace is much easier on the eyes than Cousin George.

Genealogy has also provided me with some interesting situations. A while back I received a random message from a stranger online. The person was looking for information on an individual and based on their online search they thought I might possibly be related. It turns out they were correct. This individual was a child of the family member. It was one of those family secrets that no one knew about. Now, decades later, this individual was in the precarious position of wanting to know more about this biological parent they never knew, but not being sure if they wanted the truth to be known and open the proverbial can of worms. The situation led to me learning a lot more about some of my family than I ever knew before.

Family is messy. It always has been. It always will be. Genealogy taught me to embrace this truth along with graciously embracing my messy family and its members with love.

Today’s chapter continues the Chronicler’s genealogy. I realize most people skip over these lists, but there are little tidbits in any genealogy that have lessons for me if I’m willing to observe. When reading these genealogies I always look for things that interrupt the order and flow. Why did the author choose to suddenly provide details about this one person when every other person in the family was simply named? Why is a woman named when this is clearly a patriarchal genealogy with 99.9% male family members listed? Why did things switch to a person I can’t connect to anyone just previously mentioned?

There’s actually a handful of these anomalies in the Chronicler’s genealogy in today’s chapter. He had hundreds of years more history to draw from and far more sources at his disposal. He had to make choices about what to include, what to leave out, and how to present it.

What struck me immediately in today’s chapter was the listing of the 12 sons of Jacob (aka Israel). As a patriarchal society that always favored the firstborn son, the natural thing to do would be to start with the firstborn (Reuben) and his descendants and then proceed in order.

The Chronicler cuts directly to the fourth-born, Judah. Judah was the forefather of David. The Chronicler is writing as a Jewish subject of the Persian empire. His generation has returned from exile. They have rebuilt their city and their temple from rubble. He is looking back at his people, his history, and his faith. He is trying to make sense of it all. And who is the most pivotal and celebrated historical figure in the minds of the Chronicler and his contemporaries?

King David. The giant-slayer. The man after God’s own heart. The general. The conqueror who established a great, united kingdom. The psalmist. The priestly king who envisioned the Temple. The man through whom the prophets declared a Messiah would someday come.

The Chronicler is establishing his priorities. The history he is going to revisit to try and make sense of where he and his people now fit into God’s Great Story is going to center on David, the key historical figure in that Story.

In the quiet this morning, this has me thinking about key figures in my family and my family’s story. I can quickly name key figures for good, and key figures for ill. What lasting consequences did these figures have on the family? How do those consequences connect to my story? I also can’t help but think about my life and my story as I consider Milo, Sylvie, and MJ. I sit in the quiet and envision their children and their children’s children. How can I channel God’s love in such a way that it positively impacts their stories?

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

Chapter-a-Day, Wayfarer Podcast

Tent to Temple to Table

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Tent to Temple to Table (CaD Ex 25) – Wayfarer

And have them make me a sanctuary, so that I may dwell among them.
Exodus 25:8 (NRSVCE)

Our children posted a rather hilarious video of Milo over the weekend. At first, we couldn’t figure out what he was doing shaking his bum towards daddy’s legs. As we listened to the audio it became more clear that Milo was making like the Stegosaurus on his shirt and shaking his spiky “tail” to protect himself from the predator, played by daddy, whom I presume was cast in the role of a T-Rex. Yesterday, on our Father’s Day FaceTime, we got to witness Milo reprise his role for us a shake his little dino-booty for Papa and Yaya’s enjoyment.

It’s a very natural thing for us to make word pictures and games for our children and grandchildren to introduce them to concepts, thoughts, and ideas that are still a little beyond their cognitive reach. Even with spiritual things we do this. Advent calendars with numbered doors help children mark the anticipation of celebrating Jesus’ birth. Christmas gifts remind us of the gifts the Magi brought the Christ child. Wendy often recalls the Nativity play she and her cousins and siblings performed each year with bathrobes and hastily collected props which helped to teach the story behind the season.

In leaving Egypt and striking out for the Promised Land, Moses and the twelve Hebrew tribes are a fledgling nation. Yahweh was introduced to Moses in the burning bush. Moses introduced the Tribes to Yahweh through interceding with Pharaoh on their behalf and delivering them from Egyptian slavery. Yahweh has already provided food in the form of Manna and led them to the mountain. In today’s chapter, God begins the process of providing a system of worship that will continue to develop a relationship of knowing and being known.

As I described in my podcast, Time (Part 1), we are still at the toddler stage of human history and development. The Ark of the Covenant (yes, the one from Raiders of the Lost Ark) and the plan for a giant traveling Tent to house God’s presence, are all tangible word pictures that their cognitive human brains could fathom revealing and expressing intangible spiritual truths about God.

Along my spiritual journey, I’ve observed that as humanity has matured so has God’s relationship with us. Jesus pushed our spiritual understanding of God. “You have heard it said,” he would begin before adding, “but I say….” I have come to believe that Jesus’ ministry, death, and resurrection were like the “age of accountability” in which we talk about when children become responsible adults. Jesus came to grow us up spiritually and to mature our understanding of what it means to become participants in the divine dance within the circle of love with Father, Son, and Spirit. On a grand scale, God is doing with humanity what Paul experienced in the microcosm of his own life:

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.

1 Corinthians 13:11

I have also observed, however, that human beings have a way of getting stuck in our development. Many adults I know are living life mired in adolescent patterns of thought and behavior. Many church institutions are, likewise, mired in childish religious practices designed to control human social behavior, but they do very little to fulfill Jesus’ mission of bringing God’s Kingdom to earth. Again, Paul was dealing with this same thing when he wrote to Jesus’ followers in Corinth:

And so, brothers and sisters, I could not speak to you as spiritual people, but rather as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for solid food. Even now you are still not ready, for you are still of the flesh.

1 Corinthians 3:1-3a

There is a great example of this from today’s chapter. God provided the Ark of the Covenant, and a traveling tent called the Tabernacle, as a word picture of His presence and dwelling with the wandering Hebrew people. It was a physical sign that God was with them. Once settled in the Promised land, the temple that Solomon built in Jerusalem became the central physical location of God’s presence. When Jesus came, however, He blew up the childish notion of the God of Creation residing in one place. Jesus matured our understanding of God’s very nature and the nature of God’s presence. With the pouring out of God’s Spirit to indwell every believer, Jesus transformed our understanding of God’s dwelling and presence. “Wherever two or three are gathered,” Jesus said, “I am among them.” The place of worship transitioned from the Temple to the dining room table. After the resurrection, Jesus was revealed during dinner in Emmaus, making shore-lunch for the disciples along the Sea of Galilee, and at the dinner table behind locked doors where the disciples were hiding.

Wendy and I have this quote from Brian Zahnd hanging on the fridge in our kitchen:

“The risen Christ did not appear at the temple but at meal tables. The center of God’s activity had shifted – it was no longer the temple but the table that was the holiest of all. The church would do well to think of itself, not so much as a kind of temple, but as a kind of table. This represents a fundamental shift. Consider the difference between the temple and the table. Temple is exclusive; Table is inclusive. Temple is hierarchical; Table is egalitarian. Temple is authoritarian; Table is affirming. Temple is uptight and status conscious; Table is relaxed and ‘family-style.’ Temple is rigorous enforcement of purity codes that prohibit the unclean; Table is a welcome home party celebrating the return of sinners. The temple was temporal. The table is eternal. We thought God was a diety in a temple. It turns out God is a father at a table.”

In the quiet this morning I find myself thinking about the ancient Hebrew people struggling to mature their understanding from a polytheistic society with over 1500 dieties to the one God who is trying to introduce Himself to them in ways they can understand. I am reminded of the ways Jesus tried to mature our understanding of God even further. I find myself confessing all of the ways through all of the years of my spiritual journey that I have refused to mature in some of the most basic things Jesus was teaching.

As Wendy and I sit down together to share a meal together this week, my desire is to acknowledge Jesus’ presence. To make our time of conversation, laughter, and daily bread a time of communion with God’s Spirit. I think that’s a good spiritual action step.

Bon a petite, my friend. May you find God’s Spirit at your table this week.

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

Chapter-a-Day

Into the Wilderness

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Into the Wilderness (CaD 2 Ki 25) – Wayfarer

So Judah went into captivity, away from her land.
2 Kings 25:21b (NIV)

Many years ago, I found myself in circumstances I could never have imagined. I found myself in the middle of a divorce and living in a new community. My world had suddenly turned upside down and inside out. It was a scary, tenuous, anxious, humbling, and stressful season of life.

Along this life journey, almost everyone experiences a period of wilderness. Life as we know it experiences a tectonic shift. Things get turned upside down and inside out. Wilderness could be brought on by unforeseen tragedy, the death of a loved one, war, natural disaster, divorce, loss of a job, financial loss, conflict, illness, or any number of similar life-changing events.

The psychologist Carl Jung and the scholar Joseph Cambell did a lot of work in the 20th century studying and revealing the archetypes and patterns in the epic stories of humanity. Our greatest stories reflect the core of our human experience. They resonate with us because there is something in the story that connects deeply with our human experience. I would submit that the patterns and archetypes are found in our stories because they are found in our lives.

Wilderness is one of these common themes. Here are the first five steps of the hero’s wilderness journey as Jung and Campbell outline it:

  1. The hero’s journey starts in the Ordinary World. The hero—male or female—is “stuck,” but he or she senses some powerful, tectonic energy moving beneath the surface.
  2. The hero receives a “call.” This may be positive—an invitation to climb Annapurna—or negative … we’re arrested and thrown in jail. Or, like Odysseus, the hero commits a crime against heaven and is “made to” undergo an ordeal of expiation. But one way or another, you and I are ejected from Normal Life and flung, willy-nilly, into Something Totally New.
  3. The hero “crosses the threshold.” She moves from the Ordinary World to the Extraordinary World (also known as the Inverted World.) Like the children in The Chronicles of Narnia, we pass through a portal and enter a realm unlike any we have known.
  4. The hero encounters allies and enemies, undergoes challenges and heartbreaks, temptations and overthrows. The hero suffers. The hero loses her way. The hero has been caught up in an often hellish adventure (though with some good moments too), from which no escape seems possible. The stakes are clearly life and death.
  5. The hero perseveres. Reckoning that there’s no turning back, the hero pushes on, often blindly, almost always wracked by despair and self-doubt, seeking he or she knows not what. Escape? Redemption? A conclusion of some kind to this crazy, upside-down enterprise?

It may be lost on modern American readers, but today’s chapter is one of the most life-changing historical events in the history of the Hebrew people. The Babylonian siege of Jerusalem was a violent, horrific event. Jeremiah, who lived through it, poetically describes the carnage in the five short chapters of Lamentations. The entire nation, the King and the priests, are taken into captivity and exile in Babylon. Among the exiles were the prophet Ezekiel and a young man named Daniel. Their stories, respectively, are rooted in their experiences in the Babylonian wilderness, along with the story of Esther.

The wilderness, Jung and Campbell explain, always has a purpose in making the hero the hero. It is in the wilderness the hero faces the darkness, the villain, their own fear, and/or seemingly insurmountable odds. It is in the wilderness that the hero experiences an “all is lost” moment, and it is in the wilderness that the hero eventually experiences an important epiphany and is ultimately led back home, a different person with a “gift.” Judah’s return from wilderness and exile is told in the books of Nehemiah and Ezra.

In the quiet this morning, God’s Spirit has brought to mind people I know who are experiencing seasons of wilderness in their own life journeys. I look back on my own season of wilderness and I can see the things I had to face, the lessons God had for me in it, and what a positive difference it ultimately made in my life and my spiritual journey. If I could write a letter to my past self in the midst of that wilderness, I would tell my struggling self to trust the story God is authoring in my story, to persevere one step at a time, and to know that good things, redemptive things, lie ahead.

My seasons of wilderness have taught me that God is more interested in developing my character than in facilitating my comfort.

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

Chapter-a-Day

Adding it Up

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Adding it Up (CaD Matt 1) – Wayfarer

Thus there were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Messiah.
Matthew 1:17 (NIV)

I was good at math as a kid. I was always pretty good with numbers. I was mid-semester in the eighth grade when my teacher suggested that I switch to advanced math. She thought I was bored with class (probably) and really needed to be challenged (probably not). Despite my protestations of not wanting to switch classes, she kept at it until I agreed to make the switch.

As I recalled this memory in the quiet this morning, Pippin’s words to Frodo in The Fellowship of the Ring echoed within: “Short cuts make long delays.”

The shortcut I took to advanced math, created a long delay in my love of math. It was a waypoint in my education. By the time I switched to the advanced math class, I had already missed out on a number of foundational lessons. Without those foundational lessons, I was suddenly lost and confused. I may have been bored with the basic class, but now I was discouraged and felt stupid. Looking back, I realize that it was at this waypoint that I abandoned math as a subject I enjoyed. Through the rest of my education, I avoided math like the plague. I graduated from High School with only one year of math, and I graduated college with one remedial semester of the subject.

It’s ironic that my vocational career has been largely spent around numbers, data, and statistics. That which I was too discouraged to learn in the classroom I found I enjoyed learning on the job. I rediscovered my joy of numbers that withered in me all those years before. I grieve that it happened. The further I get in my spiritual journey, the more I’ve discovered that math is a core way God reveals and expresses Himself in Creation.

This came to mind in the quiet this morning as I begin a journey through Matthew’s biography of Jesus. Matthew was a tax collector. He was a numbers guy, so it makes perfect sense that he, just like God, uses numbers to express his purpose and reveal his themes. This, however, is largely hidden from a cursory reading of the text of the first chapter, which is mostly a genealogy (which, let’s be honest, most people skip over).

A couple of things to point out:

Three times Matthew refers to “Jesus the Messiah.” Three is a number of God (e.g. Trinity, three days in the grave, and etc.). Matt’s purpose in writing this biography was largely to explain to his fellow Hebrews that Jesus was the Messiah they had been waiting for. He makes this purpose blatantly clear in the first chapter in multiple layers. He says it not only with text but also with the number three.

The Hebrew people knew from the prophets that the Messiah would be a King from the line of David. Not only does the genealogy make this clear, but Matthew chooses to list fourteen generations from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the Babylonian exile, and fourteen from the exile to Jesus. In the Hebrew alphabet, letters perform double duty as numbers. If you take the Hebrew letters that spell “David” and add them together, they total fourteen. Three times Matthew numerically communicates to his Hebrew readers that Jesus was the “son of David” they knew the Messiah would be.

Time and time again in the Great Story I find that God is not who humans expect Him to be. He even says that through the prophet Isaiah: “My ways are not your ways.” The Hebrews of Matthew’s day expected the Messiah to be like human kings who lord over others through power and conscription. With his opening words, Matthew lays the foundation for revealing the Messiah that doesn’t look like the Messiah his fellow Hebrews expected. Jesus, the Messiah Matthew is going to reveal, came to be Lord of those willing to follow through love, servant-heartedness, and suffering. From the very beginning, Matthew expresses clearly that Jesus is the Messiah. From His family tree to His story to the words of prophets, it all adds up.

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

Chapter-a-Day

“Yet This I Call to Mind”

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"Yet This I Call to Mind" (CaD Lam 3) – Wayfarer

Yet this I call to mind
    and therefore I have hope:
Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
    for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
    great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion;
    therefore I will wait for him.”
Lamentations 3:21-24 (NIV)

Jeremiah shows all the signs of being an Enneagram Type Four. The constant brooding. The wallowing in melancholy. The ability to wax eloquent and hyperbolic on his suffering and affliction. Of course, Jeremiah has far more reason than I to brood. When, in today’s poetic chapter, he states “I called on your name, Lord, from the depths of the pit” it wasn’t just hyperbole. In Jeremiah 38, his enemies literally threw the prophet into an empty well and left him to die in the muddy slime at the bottom.

And I think I’ve seen some bad days.

One of the things lost on most readers of Lamentations is the intricate way in which it is written. Each chapter is its own separate Hebrew poem. Each poem (chapter) is a Hebrew acrostic, meaning that every verse begins with a different letter in the Hebrew alphabet. Today’s chapter is the middle poem, and those who joined me for last year’s journey through the book of Psalms might remember that in Hebrew poetry, the very middle verse or stanza or poem tends to contain the central theme. The way that Jeremiah structured this cycle of poems, the first verse of today’s chapter is the central verse of the book:

I am the man who has seen affliction
    by the rod of the Lord’s wrath.

[cue: I Am a Man of Constant Sorrows by the Soggy Bottom Boys]

Yesterday, I wrote about the very human need to grieve, and the permission that God gives throughout the Great Story to do so. I believe it is healthy on all levels to process and express sorrow and grief, and God gives consistent permission to do so. Jesus even sweat blood as He expressed His despair at the suffering He was about to face on the final day of his earthly journey. Singing the blues is good for the soul.

Along the journey, however, I’ve also learned that there’s a point at which the healthy expression of my sorrow becomes an unhealthy victim status. Jeremiah didn’t die in the pit. Jesus didn’t stay in the grave. Choosing to mire myself in despair and refuse hope is to deny the very core of my faith.

Jeremiah quite obviously was a student of David’s lyrics in the Psalms. He follows David’s example both in shamelessly singing the blues, but also in finding the inflection point at which a ray of light shines in the darkness. There’s always that moment when the free-fall ends and the road begins to ascend. It’s the moment of eucatastrophe when the winds shift, the lighthouse appears on the horizon, and the seeds of hope bear fruit in the midst of despair. Jeremiah, writing from the depths of death, starvation, and devastation more extreme than David ever faces, makes the turn to hope more eloquently than David ever did:

Yet this I call to mind
    and therefore I have hope:
Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
    for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
    great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion;
    therefore I will wait for him.”

That’s the moment I seek in every dark valley of my journey. The moment that comes after I’ve cried a river of tears, screamed like King Lear and his fool into the winds of misfortune, written endless pages of guttural lament, and feasted on every angry growl of my blues collection. The moment when I lay spent from the rage and my soul can finally hear the whisper:

“Yet this I call to mind…”

Wait for it.

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

Chapter-a-Day

Beneath the Text

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Beneath the Text (CaD Gen 5) – Wayfarer

Enoch walked faithfully with God.
Genesis 5:24

I’ve always been interested in family history. Over the years I’ve learned a great deal, but there’s a point at which the scant evidence of names and dates leave a lot to be desired from a story perspective. My “van der Wel” surname seems to spring from one particular neighborhood in Rotterdam, while the Bloem genes trace back to Gronigen. I have McCoy genes that likely lead back to the McKay clan in Scotland. My Hamblen genes trace back to Virginia during the American Revolution, and then back to England where there’s a knight entombed in effigy in eastern England. Informational clues that leave a lot to the mystery of history.

In the same way, the first 11 chapters of the Great Story are considered “primeval” history. They provide a broad brush sketch of creation and God’s relationship with all of humanity with scant information and a lot of mystery, but there’s plenty of good stuff to mine in the mystery.

For example, numbers and patterns play a role in the telling. The letters of the Hebrew alphabet do double-duty as numbers, and the authors of ancient Hebrew often hide numerical patterns in the writing. The number 10 is associated with harmony and completeness, especially related to humanity. The book of Genesis is divided into ten sections. Ten times in Genesis the phrase “God said…” is used. The genealogies in today’s chapter and again in chapter 11 both list ten generations. God will later deliver the Hebrews from slavery in Egypt through ten plagues, and subsequently provide humanity with ten commandments.

Yesterday’s chapter told of the sin and curse of Cain and then traced his family line to the 7th generation after Adam. Seven is also a number associated with “completeness” but it is more associated with the divine, as in the seven days of Creation. The seven generations of Cain’s line hint at the completeness of God’s divine judgement on the family which remained rebellious toward God in the 7th generation. The 10 generations listed in today’s chapter hint at the complete human family line of Adam that will perpetuate humanity to, and after, the flood.

Then there are the patterns that emerge in the telling. The seventh generation in the line of Cain was Lamech who continued his ancestor’s murderous and rebellious ways. The seventh generation on Seth’s line is Enoch who “walked faithfully with God.” There’s also the fact that Cain, the first born son, was cursed and it was through a younger son, Seth, that humanity was blessed and perpetuated. In human terms, the blessing, power, and position always go to the first-born son, but God’s blessing through the younger son is a pattern repeated through Genesis as well as the Great Story:

Seth over Cain.
Shem over Japheth
Isaac over Ishmael
Jacob over Esau
Judah and Joseph over their brothers
Ephraim over Manasseh
David over his brothers
Solomon over his brothers

The pattern of going against human tradition is a continuous reminder of what God would later say plainly through the prophet Isaiah:

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
    neither are your ways my ways,”
declares the Lord.

As I always say, God’s base language is metaphor. Today’s chapter is more than a genealogy. It is layered with numbers and patterns that metaphorically speak to the moral contrast between Cain’s family line and Seth’s family, the contrast of divine judgement and blessing, and the contrast of death and life.

On Sunday, I’m giving a message among my local gathering of Jesus’ followers from Ecclesiastes 3, the passage made familiar to millions by the Byrds: “To everything there is a time and season.” One of the things I plan to discuss is that my own life contains patterns that lead to deeper understanding of self, of family, of life, if I’m willing to search under the surface of simple dates and memories.

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

Chapter-a-Day

Brewing Interpretation

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Brewing Interpretation (CaD Ecc 11) – Wayfarer

Ship your grain across the sea;
    after many days you may receive a return.
Invest in seven ventures, yes, in eight;
    you do not know what disaster may come upon the land.
Ecclesiastes 11:1-2 (NIV)

A couple of chapters ago, I discussed the challenges and mysteries that accompany the translation of ancient Hebrew text into modern English. As I spent some time in today’s chapter, I encountered another mysterious challenge that has spawned a very interesting interpretation.

The translators of the NIV have given the interpretation of the first two verses of today’s chapter a decidedly commerce-driven slant. The Hebrew does not so much allude to shipping grain across the sea, but more simply says to throw/cast ones bread/grain on water. The interpretation of invest is also a choice for a Hebrew word that is more simply translated as give. Here are a couple of other ways other translations or paraphrases say these same verses:

Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.
Give a portion to seven, and also to eight; for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the earth. (KJV)

Don’t be afraid to release your bread upon the waters,
        for in due time you will find it.
    Divide your portion—put seven here, maybe eight there—
        for you can never be sure when or where disaster will strike. (Voice)

Cast your bread upon the waters,
    for you will find it after many days.
Give a portion to seven, or even eight,
    for you do not know what calamity may happen on the earth. (CEV)

Over the past couple of decades, the craft of brewing beer has exploded into a 22 billion dollar industry with about 9,000 different breweries. I know several individuals who enjoy making their own home brews to share, and I always enjoy sampling when I’m invited to do so. Along with this heightened interest, some craft brewers have delved into investigating the ancient brewing practices of different cultures. For example, there’s an ancient Akkadian text that describes the process of brewing beer in which dates and bread are “thrown into water” as part of the mix of ingredients.

This has led a few scholars (whom I suspect might be craft beer lovers themselves) to consider that the interpretation of these verses of Ecclesiastes may mean that when you throw your bread into the water and it comes back to you in a barrel of beer, be sure to share it with seven or eight others, so that when tough times come they will share their beer with you.

As I consider these translations and interpretations in the quiet this morning, I humbly conclude that I can’t be certain either way. Both the NIV’s decidedly pointed interpretation in favor of commerce and the beer-lovers decidedly pointed interpretation in favor of sharing your beer could be what the Sage of Ecclesiastes intended.

What is clear to me is the general spiritual principle the Sage was getting at, to which all the various translations and paraphrases point: invest, produce, and generously share the profitable returns with many. In doing so, I’m insuring myself for lean times which may certainly come.

I never know where this chapter-a-day journey is going to lead me each morning, and sometimes I’m genuinely surprised at where I end up. Today, I not only have a good spiritual principle on which to meditate and apply to my life, but I also have a pleasant bit of trivia about Akkadian brewing and Hebrew wisdom to share with some unsuspecting new friend over a pint. Cheers!

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

Chapter-a-Day

What in the “Hebel?”

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What in the Hebel? (CaD Ecc 9) – Wayfarer

Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun—all your meaningless days.
Ecclesiastes 9:9 (NIV)

Earlier this year Wendy and I were working from the lake. Often we’ll work from a table where we can look out three large windows at the lake. It was a particularly calm, overcast day, and we watched as fog rolled into the bay and descended like a cloud. In a matter of minutes we went from a crystal clear view to impenetrable mist. It was so fascinating to watch. Then, a short time later, it faded as quickly as it. One minute it was there. Then next it was gone.

This past Saturday I was reading a book review in which the writer spoke of the difficulties of translating certain American ideas into other languages. He cited the example of a team being an “underdog” which he saw translated into French as literally the “belly of a dog.” Welcome to the challenge of translation. One of the struggles a modern reader has with the wisdom of Ecclesiastes is also that of translation. Hebrew is an ancient language and there are Hebrew words that can’t be defined with certainty. This adds a certain level of mystery on top of the challenge.

The challenge and mystery is front-and-center in Ecclesiastes because the Hebrew word translated as “meaningless” (or “vanity” in traditional translations like the King James Version) is hebel, and it’s a tough one to translate like translating “underdog” into French. The root of the word hebel is that of vapor, mist, wind, or breath. One can think of futility, insubstantial, or empty. One source I found discussing this same subject landed on the word fleeting like the fog that rolled in and out of our bay at the lake. I like it. I think it gets nearer the mark:

Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this fleeting mist of a life that God has given you under the sun—all your fleeting days.

It brings me right back to the subject of numbering my days. Suddenly the Sage is not so much as saying that everything is nihilistically void, but more like reminding me to seize the day, to be fully present, and to find joy even in things redundant. Before I know it, perhaps sooner than I think, life will roll out like the fog. Enjoy the moment.

In the quiet this morning I find that to be a good thought as the weekend was a vapor. Where did it go? A new work week has rolled in.

In a few hours I will be muttering to myself, “Where did the day go?”

Today will be fleeting, gone like the mist.

Be present.

Be mindful.

En-joy each moment.

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