And Moses the servant of the Lord died there in Moab, as the Lord had said. Deuteronomy 34:5 (NIV)
I mentioned in one of my posts last week that the third anniversary of my mom’s passing is approaching. The dark and cold of winter bring back sense memory of it for me. It is a moment I will forever hold dear; sitting there at her bed with my dad and sister as she slipped into eternity.
Death is a holy moment.
There is a genuine sobriety of spirit one experiences when, in an instant, there is one less life in the room.
Death is also an intimate moment.
My mother gave me the gift of life. To be with her as she stepped through the veil was meaningful in ways I can’t express.
Today’s short and final chapter of Deuteronomy tells the story of Moses. It is more than a simple retelling. Like the moment of death itself, it is holy. It is intimate.
Jewish tradition sees something in the text that is easily missed in the English translation.
al-pî YHWH
Word for word:
ʿal – “upon / by”
pî – “mouth”
YHWH – “the LORD”
So the literal rendering is unmistakable: “by the mouth of the LORD.”
The phrase in its usual and common context modifies a command. Priests act “by the mouth of the Lord.” Commands are give “by the mouth of Moses.”
But, Deuteronomy 34:5 is not your usual and common context. We’re not dealing with a command, but the death of God’s man. The chapter is careful to point out that Moses was not frail at the end. He had strong sight and plenty of vigor. He was not failing. He was simply finished with his earthly task.
Moses dies “by the mouth of the LORD.”
As God breathed life into Adam, He similarly receives Moses’ life.
A divine kiss.
Intimate.
Holy.
Then the text continues to amaze as God Himself buries Moses in an unmarked grave just short of the Promised Land to which he led the people but will not enter himself.
No shrine. No spectacle. No packed national assembly. It’s just God and His man Moses. Received with a kiss. God digs the grave. God prepares the body. God buries Moses. Alone.
In the quiet this morning, I find myself meditating on what I can learn from Moses in the end.
I will never see the full fruit of my work. I may not watch the final act of the story I helped God author. I may not get credit, closure, or an ovation. Yet, I can still finish this earthly journey fulfilled.
Moses teaches me to let go of outcomes without resentment. He encourages me to bless the next generation without envy. He whispers assurance that I can trust God with the ending I don’t get to choreograph.
God asks me to steward, not complete.
And then—I get to climb the mountain anyway. To look. To bless. To let go.
God will meet me there. He’ll take care of everything.
Tomorrow our chapter-a-day journey begins a quick trek through James.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession. Deuteronomy 7:6 (NIV)
One of the things I love about living in a small town is being known. I love walking into a restaurant, a coffee shop, or the pub and being greeted by name. I suppose some people like to be anonymous, but research consistently shows that most of us truly want to know and be known. And the beginning of that relational journey is simply knowing one another by name.
One of the things that I have learned about name-use over the years is that the deeper and more intimate the relationship the more likely we are to create nicknames and pet names for one another. Conversely, as relationships break down and marriages move toward divorce we stop using one another’s names and revert to using pronouns or impersonal descriptors like “my children’s mother.” Wendy is “my treasure.” From the very beginning of our relationship, it’s been a special moniker that is hers and only hers. Between the two of us it is a sign of affection, devotion, honor, and fidelity.
Today’s chapter is one of those chapters that is misunderstood in modern cultural context. It’s a love letter disguised as a battle plan. God reminds Israel that their chosenness isn’t about muscle or merit, but about affection and fidelity. They are to enter the land clear-eyed and clear-hearted—no half-measures, no flirtations with rival gods. Destruction of idols isn’t cruelty; it’s fidelity therapy.
God promises protection, fruitfulness, and flourishing—not as wages earned, but as the natural overflow of covenant intimacy. Obedience here is not stiff-backed compliance; it’s trust leaning its full weight into the arms of a faithful Lover.
In Jewish tradition, Deuteronomy 7 is foundational for the concept of segulah—Israel as God’s treasured possession (v.6). This chosenness is not superiority; it is purpose and calling. Israel is set apart for something: to bear God’s name and reveal Him and His character in the world.
This covenant love is a foreshadowing of Jesus, who loved the world so much that He left heaven behind and became one of us. He treasured us so much that He suffered and died to pay the penalty for our sin. Then He called us to bear witness of God’s Kingdom through our love of Him and others.
The contrast could not be clearer.
The world chooses powerful. God prefers the weak. The world finds security in big numbers. God prefers faith in a few. The world indulges in surface sensual appetites. God prescribes deep, exclusive and intimate relationship. The world values self-centered personal ambition. God values faithfully putting others ahead of ourselves.
In both today’s chapter and Jesus’ example, it is God who loves first. It is God who makes the covenant. It is God who promises fidelity, provision, protection, and blessing. We are the object of His love and affection.
We are His treasure.
He whispers, “My life for yours.”
When God speaks of loving His people in verses 7 and 8, the Hebrew word is ‘ahav. It is not a giddy infatuation, it’s a choice and a volitional act. In verse 9 God’s ‘ahav blesses a thousand generations of those who ‘ahav Him. God’s love invites reciprocity. Not because it needs it, but because it awakens it. And notice: God’s covenant loyalty flows toward those who love him—not as payment, but as shared intimacy.
This is mutual devotion, not transactional obedience.
In the quiet this morning, I’m reminded that God says that those who choose to follow have their names written in the Book of Life. My name is there. God knows my name. But today’s chapter reminds me that my name being written in the Book of Life is far more than just a “Hello My Name Is” name tag knowledge. That’s just the record like Wendy’s and my marriage certificate in the safe downstairs. I am God’s “treasure.” He gave His life that I might live. That kind of love awakens love in me.
Less Hallmark card, more keeping marriage vows at 3 a.m.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he sufferedand, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him and was designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek. Hebrews 5:8-10 (NIV)
I have of late been making my way through all seven books of the Harry Potter epic. I just finished the fifth book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which I sometimes find to be the least enjoyable but have always found to be the most profound in its understanding and expression of the differences between good and evil.
The book concludes with a climactic battle. The evil antagonist, Voldemort, is doing everything in his power to escape death and achieve immortality. He even proclaims amidst the battle that “there is nothing worse than death.” To which the ever-wise sage, Dumbldore, replies, “Yes, there is.” Throughout the book, Harry suffers many things on many different levels from the agonies of a failed teen romance, to heinous oppression and physical suffering at the hands of institutional evil, to the death of the one person he cares for most in the world.
As Dumbledore debriefs with Harry at the conclusion of the book, he shares with Harry about a deep and ancient magic that the evil Voldemort fails to understand, the magic that Harry’s mother accessed the moment she sacrificed her own life for Harry’s when he was an infant. The wise headmaster then explains to Harry another paradoxical truth that evil fails to understand. It is Harry’s suffering that is his greatest strength.
Today’s very short chapter is so packed full of deep and important truths from the Great Story that I’ve sat in the quiet for a long time trying to discern how best to express them. The author speaks to his audience of Jewish believers in Jesus, themselves suffering at the hands of institutional evil, about Jesus who is the “Great High Priest.”
For the Jewish believers, the paradigm of a high priest was well-known to them. It was part of the religious ritual they’d known their whole lives. The high-priest was the only one who entered the most holy place in the temple once a year to make atonement for the sins of the people. The priests were always a descendant of Moses’ brother, Aaron.
But, the author reveals that there is mysterious, ancient priestly order that came before God gave the Law through Moses and the human priesthood was established. This mysterious ancient order is tied to an equally mysterious king-priest who appears momentarily in Genesis 14. His name was Melchizedek. Jesus, the Son of God, was not an earthly priest in the order of Aaron, but an eternal and royal high priest in the order of Melchizedek.
He then goes onto explain that what marked Jesus as the Great High Priest, was not power and glory. Power and glory are what evil and the Kingdoms of this world care about most. What marked Jesus as the Great High Priest of God’s Kingdom was his humility, obedience, and suffering.
The author then issues a gentle rebuke to his readers. There is so much more depth and spiritual truth to unpack in this, but his readers aren’t ready for it because they “no longer try to understand.” The Greek word hints at being sluggish and lazy. Along my journey, I’ve come to realize that there are certain spiritual truths that require effort, pursuit, experience, and even suffering in order for them to be revealed. Jesus said, after all, that the things of God’s Kingdom are not for the sluggish and lazy, but for those who ask, seek, and knock — even suffer.
It is at the end of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix that the truth is finally revealed to Harry regarding his past, his scar, his place in the story that is unfolding, and the realities that await him in the battle against evil yet to come.
Sometimes the deepest and most important spiritual truths only reveal themselves in suffering.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
“From the rocky peaks I see them, from the heights I view them. I see a people who live apart and do not consider themselves one of the nations. Who can count the dust of Jacob or number even a fourth of Israel? Let me die the death of the righteous, and may my final end be like theirs!” Numbers 23:9-10 (NIV)
The other day I was flipping through the channels and happened up on some kind of dating game in which the young men and women who were “in play” where identified on their name tags by their astrological signs. It took me all of a few seconds to realize that astrology played a role in determining the outcome of which young people would end up as couples. So funny to think how ancient belief systems still resonate in our modern world.
In ancient Mesopotamia, where our chapter-a-day trek finds the ancient Hebrews on the road through the wilderness, “seers” or “diviners” like Balaam were common. Every king had seers at his side to speak for the gods in “oracles.” It was believed that a seer could spiritually influence the gods and therefore the earthly outcome of battles and circumstances. As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, Balaam was a popular seer for hire, and he’s been hired at great cost to curse the Hebrews for Balak, the king of Moab.
Instead of cursing the Hebrews, God demands that Balaam offer a blessing, which Balaam subsequently does. Balak demands a prophetic mulligan, dropping his religious ball in a different location hoping for a better outcome. Again, Balaam offers a blessing rather than a curse.
A couple of thoughts on Balaam’s first two “oracles” or messages in today’s chapter:
First, “I see a people who live apart and do not consider themselves one of the nations” speaks back to what God has been telling the people through Moses from the very beginning. They are going to be different. They are game changers. The priestly guidebook of Leviticus spoke of being a people unlike any other people, showing the world who God is and how God and His people operate differently.
Next, Balaam says, “Who can count the dust of Jacob or number even a fourth of Israel?” As Balak and Balaam view the Hebrew camp, it is so vast they can’t see it all. This echoes God’s promise to the childless Abraham and Sarah:
“I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”
These wandering tribes are the literal fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham.
Moving on, Balaam finishes his first oracle by saying something curious: “Let me die the death of the righteous, and may my final end be like theirs!” The wealthy and famous guru for hire wants the eternal blessing God has graciously bestowed on the Hebrew people, but he doesn’t want to live the life of daily obedience and fidelity God has required of His people in Leviticus. It reminds me of many people I observe today who want little or nothing to do with living for God but they certainly want to go to heaven when they die.
Finally, in Balaam’s second oracle, he states “God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind.” God is in the midst of fulfilling His promise to Abraham. He’s authoring a Great Story and He isn’t changing His mind. Even a non-Jewish Gentile seer is left completely impotent in his own divination. He’s been hired to curse, but instead he is forced to bless.
In the quiet this morning, my heart and mind flits back to the astrological dating game and the reality that the ancient is very much present in our every day world. Thousands of years later, the Hebrew people and the nation of Israel find themselves in the same land, surrounded on all sides by enemies perpetually cursing them and hell bent on their annihilation. Over the past two years, the rise of global antisemitism has modern day seers spewing oracles and curses against the descendants of the very same people in the very same land. God continues to author the same Great Story. I just happen to be in a very different chapter.
I want to be a part of God’s irrevocable blessing and promise that even Balaam acknowledged in his oracle “cannot be changed.”
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
Perhaps the reason he was separated from you for a little while was that you might have him back forever— no longer as a slave, but better than a slave, as a dear brother. He is very dear to me but even dearer to you, both as a fellow man and as a brother in the Lord. Philemon 1:15-16 (NIV)
Along this chapter-a-day journey I have gained a love and appreciation for the chapters in this Great Story that no one talks about. When was the last time you hear any one reference Philemon? And yet, the story of Philemon is one of the most beautifully powerful human dramas in the Great Story.
Philemon was a member of the local gathering of of Jesus’ followers in the city of Colossae in Greece. He became a follower of Jesus when Paul visited, shared Jesus’ love and message there, and established the local gathering. Philemon was a man of means, with a household large enough to host the church in his home. His means and his large household included slaves.
Among the slaves in Philemon’s household was a man named Onesimus. Reading between the lines Paul’s very short, intimate letter, Onesimus stole money from Philemon and ran away. Eventually, Onesimus made his way to Rome. In Rome, the runaway slave runs into none other than his former master’s friend Paul who is now under house arrest awaiting trial before Caesar.
We don’t know the details, but the bottom line is that Paul shared Jesus’ love and message with Onesimus, and the runaway slave became a sincere believer. Now, Paul tells Onesimus that he must make things right with Philemon, not as slave and slave-master but as brothers in Christ. He sends the runaway slave back to his master with this letter in hand in order to reconcile the relationship and make things right.
Over the last several years, I have shared with my own local gathering a graphic and a concept that depicts the way of Jesus and how different it is from the way the world operates. The world operates through the force of top-down power and authority. From the childhood game of “king of the mountain” to the power structures of politics, business, commerce, and crime. Whoever has the wealth, influence, and power dictates how things are going to work in this world whether it’s through law, rules, regulations, coercion, domination, leverage, or threat.
Jesus, however, did the opposite. He left the power of heaven itself, came to earth to live as a human being. Through faith, obedience, and sacrificial love He changed the hearts of individuals. He then tasked those of us who are His followers to utilize that same faith, obedience, and sacrificial love to carry His message so that it might change the lives of individuals in our circles of influence. As more and more lives are changed and more and more individuals are operating out of faith, obedience, and sacrificial love, the world itself is impacted.
It’s not top-down power and domination but bottom-up love and generosity.
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. Isaiah 55:8 (NIV)
Here’s how I’ve depicted it graphically:
The thing that I love about the story of Philemon is that it perfectly illustrates this entire paradigm.
Level 1: Jesus changes Paul’s life from the inside out.
Level 2: Paul shares Jesus’ love and message with people in Colossae.
Level 1: Jesus changes Philemon’s life from the inside out.
Level 2: Philemon’s community is changed as members of his household and community become believers and meet in his home.
Level 2: Onesimus the runaway slave from Philemon’s household stumbles into Paul, his former master’s friend and member of his former master’s circle of influence, in Rome of all places.
Level 1: Onesimus becomes a believer and Jesus changes him from the inside out.
Level 2: Changed by the love of Jesus, Onesimus returns to Philemon to be reconciled and make things right, their relationship now transformed by the love of Jesus that has transformed each of them.
Level 3: The world is still being impacted by their lives and story. This very blog post and podcast are living proof.
What is beautiful about the letter is the fact that it is all about transformation. The transformation of Philemon and his household into a center of God’s love in their community. The transformation of Onesimus from thief and runaway slave to brother in Christ. The transformation of the relationship between Philemon and Onesimus in which the love and power of Jesus tears down the socio-economic power structure of the world’s paradigm of slavery and replaces it with the love, joy, and peace of spiritual family.
In the quiet this morning, I find myself moved spiritually and emotionally as I imagine the moment when Onesimus arrives to face his master. I imagine the mixture of emotions that each of them were feeling in that moment. I imagine the runaway slave handing Philemon Paul’s letter. The shock and surprise as Philemon reads it. The conflicting emotions in Philemon’s heart as anger gives way to forgiveness, resentment yields to kindness, and the world’s paradigms crumble to the transformational, life-changing power of Jesus’ love.
Jesus, I pray that your love continues to change me today from the inside out, so that your love through me might change those around me, that your love through us might positively impact the world for your Kingdom.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
On the eighth day Moses summoned Aaron and his sons and the elders of Israel. Leviticus 9:1 (NIV)
I have learned over almost 45 years as a disciple of Jesus that this spiritual journey as His follower is all about my transformation. It’s the gradual migration from my earthly and worldly mindset into having my mind fixed on the things of God. Treasures on earth lose their perceived value for me as spiritual treasures are considered increasingly more priceless in my mind. What I desire becomes less significant (in fact I desire things less) and what God desires of me becomes more of a priority. This is literally what Paul was writing about when he told the Corinthian believers: “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”
In today’s chapter, Aaron and his sons are facing an abrupt transformation. The chapter begins by describing the events as taking place on the eighth day. In yesterday’s chapter, God told Aaron and the boys to camp out at the entrance of His tent for seven days. Granted, this seems like a strange request to our logical sensibilities. Today’s events take place on the eighth day. God is using His base language of metaphor again. What does everyone know, from the very beginning of the Great Story in Genesis took place in seven days? Yep, creation. How long were the dudes camping with God? Yep, seven. It is now the eighth day. Something is new. A spiritual transformation has taken place. Something new has been created in Aaron and His sons. The dudes are now priests of the Most High God.
In today’s chapter, Aaron performs the priestly duties and sacrifices for the first time. This is new. Another thing that is abundantly clear is that Aaron performs the offerings exactly as prescribed by God through Moses. The text is painfully repetitive as it recounts Aaron’s exact actions detail for detail. In fact, it’s one of the strange things about Leviticus that drives modern readers bonkers. As I meditated on this in the quiet this morning, two things came to mind.
First, I returned to the reality that these are events are taking place in the toddler stage of humanity thousands of years ago. Writing is a relatively new technology that few know and reading isn’t even a thing for the masses. Things were passed down orally and as an actor currently working on my lines for a role in a play I am reminded that repetition is the key to memorization. When toddlers watch Sesame Street they are introduced to a letter and a number and those are repeated over and over and over again in that episode. The repetition was likely helpful and necessary to the ancient Hebrews learning these detailed instructions.
Second, there is a spiritual lesson taking place even in Aaron’s exacting conformity to God’s instructions. Five hundred years or so later, the Hebrews will decide they want a king and they will choose a guy named Saul. Saul will subsequently decide that he can perform these offerings even though he’s not a son of Aaron as prescribed. Samuel tells him:
“Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the Lord? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams.”
One of the spiritual lessons God is attempting to teach His fledgling people through this sacrificial system is the importance of obedience. The obedience is more important than the sacrifices themselves. In fact, God makes this abundantly clear in Psalm 50:
“Listen, my people, and I will speak; I will testify against you, Israel: I am God, your God. I bring no charges against you concerning your sacrifices or concerning your burnt offerings, which are ever before me. I have no need of a bull from your stall or of goats from your pens, for every animal of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills. I know every bird in the mountains, and the insects in the fields are mine. If I were hungry I would not tell you, for the world is mine, and all that is in it. Do I eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood of goats?“
At the end of the chapter, as a result of Aaron’s obedience in presenting the offerings according to the instructions, the “glory of the LORD” shows up in the form of fire. So this spiritually transformed dude who is now a priest obeys God, does as instructed, and God responds. It’s the eighth day. It is a new beginning for Aaron and the boys. Old things have passed away. New things have come.
Which is exactly what God has spiritually done in me through being joined with Christ thousands of years later. In fact, spiritually speaking that transformation includes making me a priest of the Most High God, as well (see 1 Peter 2:9).
In the quiet this morning, I find myself marveling once again at how God’s message is consistent even as He communicates it differently at different points of the Great Story, even as I communicate about these same things differently to my toddler granddaughter than I do to her adult parents.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
“If, however, I am guilty of doing anything deserving death, I do not refuse to die. But if the charges brought against me by these Jews are not true, no one has the right to hand me over to them. I appeal to Caesar!” Acts 25:11 (NIV)
Paul has been imprisoned for two years. He had been a political blue-chip for the Roman Governor, Felix, who wanted to stay on the good side of the Jewish rulers who wanted Paul dead. Paul gave him leverage. Felix gets recalled to Rome and a new Governor named Festus arrives. As Festus gets the political lay of the land, he quickly understands that the trial and fate of Paul is a political hot potato.
Festus begins with a political gesture to his Jewish constituents by traveling to Jerusalem to visit them on their home turf for a little over a week. Obviously, there were a number of political issues to discuss, but Paul’s fate was certainly on the list of Jewish demands.
Upon arriving back in his seat of power in Caesarea, Festus convenes the court and brings in Paul to hear Paul plead his case. Festus, still in a conciliatory mood with the powerful Jewish faction under his rule, asks Paul if he’s willing to be tried by the Governor in Jerusalem.
In this moment, Paul makes a decision that will seal his fate and determine the rest of his earthly journey. We know that Jesus had appeared to Paul and told him he must testify about Him in Rome (Acts 23:11). It is entirely possible that Paul was afraid that the new Governor, clearly trying to appease the Jewish rulers, would take him to Jerusalem and hand him over to them. To ensure that he would testify in Rome, Paul used his legal right under Roman law to appeal his case to Caesar in Rome itself. In doing so, Paul ties Festus’ hands politically. Festus is bound by duty to send Paul to Rome.
Along my life journey, I have encountered followers of Jesus who believe that God has called them to do this or that. Subsequently, I have watched individuals try to make it happen. In some cases, the results have been disastrous, much like Shakespeare’s Macbeth. It has left me believing that if God’s purpose is for me to go here or there and do this or that, then nothing can stop it from happening.
Was Paul’s appeal to Rome necessary or not? If God wanted Paul to testify in Rome, could/should Paul have trusted that God would see to it he won his trial in Jerusalem so he could travel to Rome of his own free will? Was his appeal to Caesar an act of obedience or an act of doubt? We’ll never know.
I have found along the way that God’s purposes and my free will are a lot like the mysterious circle dance of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in which One is Three and Three are One. There’s a tension. On one hand I can be too passive and think I’m trusting God to make things happen. On the other hand, I can willfully try too hard to make things happen and think I’m being obedient to what God has purposed for me.
Life is a bit like the Waverunner we have at the lake. If you don’t have your finger on the accelerator and are propelling yourself forward, you can’t steer the thing. My part is to willfully and obediently walk in discipleship (propelling myself spiritually forward). Then, I can trust God to steer me where He ultimately purposes for me to be.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food.
Opposition arose, however, from members of the Synagogue of the Freedmen (as it was called)—Jews of Cyrene and Alexandria as well as the provinces of Cilicia and Asia—who began to argue with Stephen. Acts 6:1,9 (NIV)
I saw a funny meme the other day of a father holding his three-month-old baby. The baby had doubled in weight in the three months since birth. At this rate of growth, the father calculated, the kid would weigh trillions of pounds by the time it was ten years old.
Healthy things grow… Growing things change… Change challenges me… Challenge leads me to trust God… Trusting God leads to obedience… Obedience leads to health… Healthy things grow…
A friend shared this with me many years ago, and I know that I have referenced it at least once before (After blogging for 17 years, I’m bound to repeat a few things!). I have always loved this little mantra because I have experienced it to be true in my life, and I have observed it to be true in both others and in healthy and growing human systems.
The early Jesus Movement was an organic, growing human system. In the first six chapters of Acts, Luke references the growing number of believers five times. At the beginning of the book, Luke records the number of believers right after Jesus’ ascension as about 120. In chapter 4, Luke numbers the believers at 5,000. He’s mentioned rapid growth twice since mentioning the 5,000.
Growing things change…
Having been a leader in a number of different systems and organizations along my life journey, I can only imagine the changes required by the Apostles to accommodate the rapid pace of growth. It was not only a change in numbers, but in geography too. Many of the first believers on the day of Pentecost in the second chapter were from all over the known world. In today’s chapter, Stephen is sharing Jesus’ teaching with a synagogue outside the Temple. The cozy little group of early believers sharing all things in common wouldn’t have been cozy for long.
Change challenges me…
Luke records the first challenges faced by the growing Movement in today’s chapter. There is a challenge from within in the form of anger between ethnic factions within the Movement. There were also challenges from without in the form of false accusations made against them to the Temple rulers who had already persecuted the Apostles.
Challenge leads me to trust God…
Luke also records in today’s chapter that the Apostles appointed more men to help with the daily duties the Movement had established for caring for the daily needs of its members. The needs of the system are expanding, and with it the system has to distribute responsibilities to more members of the system. This, in itself, requires trust not only in the members taking on the responsibilities but also in God to provide for and enable a rapidly growing organism.
In the quiet this morning, my meditation on the changes in the early Jesus Movement has me thinking about change in general. Life never stops changing. I’m facing some life changes right now, in fact. This means there will always be challenges. How I handle the change is, I believe, a barometer of my spiritual health. I can follow the path of trust and obedience to greater levels of spiritual health and growth, or I can follow the path of anger, resentment, complaint, and depression which becomes an unhealthy cycle for me and everyone around me.
Lord, help me trust and obey that I might spiritually grow with every challenge.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
Dictates Don't Change Hearts (CaD Jer 11) –
Wayfarer
Then the Lord said to me, “There is a conspiracy among the people of Judah and those who live in Jerusalem. They have returned to the sins of their ancestors, who refused to listen to my words. Jeremiah 11:9-10 (NIV)
The prophet Jeremiah rose to prominence during the reign of King Josiah of Judah. Have just trekked my way through 2 Kings on this chapter-a-day, I think a little context is in order as I read Jeremiah’s words this morning.
For more than a generation, along with King Josiah’s two most recent predecessors, the people of Judah had practiced polytheism. It’s not that they didn’t give a nod to YHWH, the God of Abraham, Moses, and David, but their hearts were divided with a plethora of idols and gods. Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem had become a spiritual marketplace with altars and shrines to various idols, astrological constellations, and pagan gods of the region.
During Josiah’s reign, the Law of Moses (that is, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy), was discovered in a storage closet in the temple (See 2 Kings 22). The Law of Moses, which lays out the covenant between God and the Hebrew people, was given through Moses after God had delivered them from slavery in Egypt about 1,000 years before Josiah’s reign. It includes God’s Top Ten rules of life, the first two of which state no other gods, and no making of a graven image (a.k.a. an idol). But this had not been read, generally remembered, or publicly taught for at least 60 years and perhaps longer.
When Josiah heard the Law of Moses, he had the Law of Moses read publicly. He then called on the people to return to the God of their ancestors and enacted strict reforms. All pagan altars and shrines were removed from the temple and burned. All other gods were outlawed throughout Judah and destroyed. It was during this period of reform that a young Jeremiah found his way to Josiah’s royal court and began his prophetic ministry.
Along my life journey, and as I study history, I’ve observed that faith is a matter of the human heart. Governments and religious institutions (Judah’s monarchy was both) are technically kingdoms and institutions of this world. Despite the description of revival during Josiah’s reforms back in 2 Kings, it was not as if the people had any choice but to obey King Josiah’s commands and edicts. That’s how ancient monarchy’s worked. There was no representation, political parties, or recourse. You do what the King (and his army) tell you to do. So the entire nation went along with Josiah’s reforms because they had to do so, not because they all had a change of heart.
Knowing human behavior, I’m quite sure that the worship of Baal, Asherah, and other idols simply moved underground. You can legislate behavior, you can forcefully suppress dissent and demand obedience. I only have to look at any of a number of tyrannical political or religious system around the globe. However, a person’s heart can’t be changed with a government edict or an institutional dictate.
It is into this spiritual landscape that Jeremiah is writing and preaching in today’s chapter. We don’t know exactly when today’s prophetic word was given and delivered in Jeremiah’s ministry, but given the message I could easily place it towards the back-end of Josiah’s reign when people’s secret, underground worship of other gods is growing into a political hot-button. it’s obvious that Josiah’s dictated reforms have not changed the hearts of the Hebrew people. There is a “conspiracy” brewing to “return to the sins of their ancestors.” All of Josiah’s four successors will give in to the idolatrous desires of the people.
In the quiet this morning, I thought of the number of times in the Great Story that God reminds us that it’s my heart’s desire that He wants, not just my mindless observance of dictated moral or religious behaviors and traditions. If I truly give Jesus my heart, then I will be motivated to follow Him into the behaviors He exemplified and requests of me. If Jesus doesn’t have my heart, then all of my religious behavior is as empty as the idolatrous Hebrews who Jeremiah addresses in today’s chapter.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the man of God, said to himself, “My master was too easy on Naaman, this Aramean, by not accepting from him what he brought. As surely as the Lord lives, I will run after him and get something from him.” 2 Kings 5:20 (NIV)
I’ve been working on a message I’m scheduled to give this Sunday morning among my local gathering of Jesus followers. One of the concepts on which I’ve been meditating is the idea of “consideration.” There is a subtle theme in the Jesus story and the Great Story’s teaching regarding what disciples of Jesus are to “consider” and what we are not to “consider.”
Today’s chapter is a fantastic example.
An Aramean military officer had some kind of incurable skin disease (FYI: The Hebrew word that gets translated into English as “leprosy” has a much broader meaning and could mean any number of skin issues or diseases). He comes bearing an extraordinary amount of money and gifts and visits Elisha, asking to be healed. Through intermediaries, Elisha instructs him to dip himself in the Jordan River seven times, which he eventually does, and he is healed. Elisha sends word to the man to keep his gifts and go home.
As I meditated on the story, I thought about what Elisha was considering that motivated his words and actions. Elisha, considering the big picture of what God is trying to do at that moment, wants this Aramean (a foreigner dedicated to Aramean pagan gods) to know that the God of Abraham, Moses, David, and Israel is the one true God. He chooses not to even meet the man in person because he wants no credit for the miracle, and he doesn’t want the man to focus on Elisha, but on the God of Elisha. Finally, Elisha refuses any gifts or payment because he considers that he has done nothing to earn these things, and he’s not in the business of miracles-r-us. He was just doing what the Lord instructed. He considers God his master. He is just a servant doing what he’s been told.
The officer leaves, and the scene switches to focus on Elisha’s servant Gehazi.
First, Gehazi considers to himself all of the silver and fine clothes that the Aramean had brought. He then considers that this Aramean is a foreigner and an enemy. He considers why this pagan Aramean should have such wealth and fine things instead one of God’s chosen people. In his considerations, Gehazi comes to the conclusion that he deserves a little bit of the spoils for himself.
Gehazi then runs after the Aramean. He lies to the Aramean about prophets arriving from a distance and his master Elisha commanding him to ask for silver and clothes for the two prophets.
Gehazi then takes the ill-gotten plunder and hides it.
Finally, when asked where he’s been, Gehazi lies to his master and claims not to have gone anywhere.
What a contrast. Elisha’s words and actions were in consideration of what God, his Lord, is doing and desiring in the larger context of the political and spiritual landscape of the people of Israel and their rulers. Elisha acts as a humble servant who sees everything through consideration of his master and what his master desires.
Gehazi, on the other hand, reflects the original sin:
When the Woman [Eve] saw that the tree looked like good eating and realized what she would get out of it—she’d know everything!—she took and ate the fruit and then gave some to her husband, and he ate. Genesis 3:6 (MSG)
He sees the silver and fine things that the Aramean brought with him. He considers how awesome it would be to have some for himself. In doing so he does not consider his master’s intentions, his master’s wishes, or what his master will do if he finds out what he has done. Gehazi considers his own selfish desires as everything while considering his master Elisha’s desires nothing.
Welcome to the human condition.
In the quiet this morning, I find myself convicted. How often are my daily, moment-by-moment considerations about myself, from my lizard brain survival instincts to my envy of others, my desire to have what others have, and my lust after the things of this world? How different was Jesus’ example:
In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross! Philippians 2:5-8 (NIV)
And so, I find myself sitting in the quiet considering the day ahead. Will I consider this day about me and my personal needs, wants, and desires? Or will I consider Jesus’ example, humble myself, act as a servant, and consider others’ needs ahead of my own?
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
