The image of the first born son figures prominently in the Bible and so does their death. The death of the first born and God’s role is not something anyone wants to talk about (at least not something anyone should want to talk about) but often it is necessary to talk about things we would rather not.

I have a couple of major interpretive themes I have been pushing lately that I believe have been lacking in public biblical interpretive reading – the need to read the Bible holistically with the New Testament being read in the light of the Old, the Old in light of the New and a recognition that the tools of God in the hands of humanity tend to be destructive and deadly.

The reality however is that the tools of God in the hands of God have also proven to be deadly as well. My readings this week have revolved around these things.

Before we speak of death however let’s speak of the honor of the first born.

In Exodus chapter 13 God commands Moses:

“Consecrate to me every firstborn male. The first offspring of every womb among the Israelites belongs to me, whether human or animal…And it will be like a sign on your hand and a symbol on your forehead that the Lord brought us out of Egypt with his mighty hand.”

The point? Everything belongs to God…even us. Whether we like it or not is not the point…it is a simple and profound reality, one that we most often fail to live within. To consecrate the first born to God is not to give them to God so much as to acknowledge they are already God’s…they are already in God’s care along with all things.

Israel is God’s firstborn among the nations and God’s promise for Israel is God’s promise for the world…that of sonship, that of childhood.

Consider the following verse in light of the verses we just read from Exodus.

“A third angel followed them and said in a loud voice: “If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives its mark on their forehead or on their hand, they, too, will drink the wine of God’s fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath.”  – Revelation 14:9-10

Notice the parallels? If those marked on the hand and the forehead are God’s than those who knowingly mark themselves otherwise belong otherwise to this beast mentioned in Revelation…a creature of the world, a power that seeks to corrupt and disinherit those who belong to God. To knowingly deny one’s inheritance is to lose one’s saving heritage.

Reading the Bible in context of itself like this should also serve to encourage an understanding of how God often delivers truth in symbol and discourage people from assuming silly things like the mark being some sort of microchip in the hand or head etc.

Now to death.

There is much in the Bible I do not like. I have to be honest. The most distasteful elements of scripture have to do with God’s commands toward death. The final plague on Egypt that brings the death of all first born. Of course there are those who would point out that Pharaoh brought this on himself and his people but it was God who hardened Pharaoh’s heart and it is Paul’s letter to the Romans in the New Testament that speaks to this uncomfortable truth about God when he writes in Romans 9:14-24:

What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses,

It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. For Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.

One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?” But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?

What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory— even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?

The truth of this is that God is God and we are not. This is where terrible trust must take the place of offense. But we cannot simply say God is who God is in the place of difficulty and then conveniently assume God-like knowledge in other areas of morality and virtue…we either know God or we do not…and ultimately we do not know God except that we are known by God. This may or may not be enough for you but it is, ultimately enough.

So God demonstrates that the first born belong to God by taking their lives and sparing those who would knowingly come under God’s protection and a multitude die and a multitude live and I hate it…but God is God and I am not (thank God). This is the ultimate truth that we all live under and will come to learn one way or another.

Death in Exodus (and elsewhere) is a tool in God’s hand to demonstrate God’s will and authority and because it is God wielding it, it is righteous…that is the definition of righteousness.

Later in the New Testament we see what happens when a human attempts to wield a tool of God`s without the authority of God.

When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. – Matthew 2:16

There is much happening here in these verses when read in light of the Old Testament that has disturbing similarities to the final plague against the firstborn in Egypt all those years earlier. It is another reversal such as what we saw with Revelation in comparison to Exodus. King Herod orders the death of the babies of Bethlehem in order to wipe out the source of righteousness. While one might look at both incidents and see no difference there is a very clear one – in one circumstance God is acting and in the other God is not. Furthermore in another interesting reversal God seeks and delivers sanctuary for one very important son in this circumstance by sending him into Egypt…a new Moses that will not only deliver Israel but the entire world from bondage.

Further to Herod’s act it should be noted that this is the act of a King of Israel against his own people, an act filled with profound and sad irony. An act that should not surprise if taken in consideration of the following verses of the Old Testament in 1 Samuel 8:6-9:

But when they said, “Give us a king to lead us,” this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the Lord. And the Lord told him: “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king. As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will claim as his rights.”

The desire for a king is a human desire. God says I am in charge even when it does feel or look that way and that to set up another authority has consequences…although God allows it…fast-forward to Herod who like so many rulers before and since has proven the point.

Death in the hands of humanity is death…always. Death in the hands of God can become redemption…it can become salvation…when God takes it upon God’s self in the death of a son; a first born…it can become life.

words should shoot
like images projected
through the eyes
to walls beyond
in black
in white
telling the story
of a life
from the inside out

What is morality?

Oxford provides the following:

“noun (plural moralities) [mass noun] principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong or good and bad behaviour: the matter boiled down to simple morality: innocent prisoners ought to be freed. [count noun] a particular system of values and principles of conduct:a bourgeois morality; the extent to which an action is right or wrong: the issue of the morality of the possession of nuclear weapons”

What is Christian morality? Where does it come from and, more importantly, can it and should it be legislated and enforced?

The Bible states clearly that God’s law is written on the hearts of people. One might take this as a statement regarding the source of human general morality…thou shalt not kill, etc. In response we have, as a group, by and large created legislation to enforce laws binding us to a large (but increasingly shrinking) set of general moralities such as those against murder etc.

Is a Christian morality different than a general morality? I think it is.

It became clear during Christ’s lifetime that he was doing something different with the law as it was understood. When he challenged the age-old assumption that murder is murder by pointing out that even those who hate have committed murder he was announcing something new was arriving. When he challenged age-old assumptions that arose from general morality, the law of God written on our hearts, that killing another as punishment for killing needed to be replaced with the counter-intuitive “love thy  enemy” he was pointing to something different…or perhaps he was simply pointing to the rest of the law hidden beneath the surface of time like the bulk of an iceberg.

Something new was ushered in by Christ, a new morality, a complete, kingdom-oriented morality that did not abolish the old but stripped away poor human interpretation of it, built upon it, to offer a bright example of a loving morality…a kingdom morality.

But there was a catch…this morality does not rise up naturally in people because of our own condition, this morality required a helper…the promised spirit of God (and even with the spirit Christians struggle and are at war with themselves as we await the end of all things and the destruction of our broken natures for something better).

This new kingdom morality is a compelling hint, a gift that arises from within out of a natural inclination of the kingdom to burst forth and spread through the world. This morality is summed up in one word – LOVE.

As a result of its very nature you CANNOT legislate a Christian morality. You CANNOT enforce a Christian morality. To legislate it is to deny its efficacious nature and its purpose which is to transform the world inside and out…law does not transform, law contains…law is a cage. To legislate Christian morality is to deny its source rather than honour it. It is to stubbornly crown a human as king when you have already been told that God is king even though you cannot see it yet.

To legislate Christian morality is to corrupt it into law, turn it into a cage and rebuild the dividing wall of hostility which Christ died to tear down. It is wrong.

This post is a work in progress…it will grow and evolve. Stay tuned.

Context.

Context is everything.

It really is. Words taken out of context are left at the mercy of the imagination of the mind absorbing them…not always a good thing. Worse – the Word taken out of context is a disaster waiting to happen. It should be a principal of interpretation taught in Sunday school to the youngest…lessons in context to avoid some of the pain of taking a tool of God into the world with no clue on how to wield it.

One should never take a single verse and assume its meaning independent of the paragraph it is in. One should never take a paragraph and assume its meaning independent of the chapter; one should never take a chapter and assume its meaning independent of the book; one should never take a book and assume its meaning independent of its testament; one should never take a testament and assume its meaning independent of the whole of scripture…

Sound tiresome? It can be which is why it does not happen often. But wait there’s more – 

One has to consider that the perfect, inerrant truth of God is revealed to imperfect errant people. That it is then recorded by these imperfect, errant people using imperfect, errant human language and then re-translated by imperfect, errant albeit faithful, translators. This is the point of being given the Spirit of God as a helper (same word used to describe Eve by the way)…because Lord knows we need a helper.

But wait there’s more…

One must never interpret scripture and assume its meaning independent of the original audience it was delivered and its cultural context – its place in the world in its time.

People chafe at this. They believe that somehow this is compromising the eternal truth and God inspired inerrant of the Word because they have always assumed it was revealed solely for them in their 21st century Canadian (INSERT COUNTRY AND TIME HERE) context.

On the contrary understanding scripture within the context of when it was revealed; to whom it was revealed; the genre (literary format it took shape in – song, poetry, revelation, etc) revelation was recorded in – this is all the height of faithfulness to the Word.

But wait there’s more..

There is discerning the truth as it was revealed and the point of it in the context of the whole. There is a need to understand the point of the exodus of Israel from Egypt in light of the death of Christ and of understanding the death of Christ in light of the exodus. 

But wait there’s more…

All of scripture must be read through the lens of Christ as he is revealed in scripture…Leviticus cannot be read properly unless it is read through the lens that is Christ’s life and experience as we have it and understand it within the context of first century Israel.

Tired? I am. 

It is not easy to interpret scripture let alone apply it…heck we have not even talked about applying it.

Taking verses from scripture and cramming them into other people’s faces is not applying them. Writing John 3:16 on a placard at a baseball game is not applying it…it’s a little like taking a baseball and putting it on the ground and then beating the shit out of it with a bat and saying you are playing baseball…no…no you are not…you may have the tools and you may be using them but you are not playing baseball…there is much more to it.

The Pharisees were like this. They liked to put the uniform on and complain about how Christ and his disciples were picking grain on the Sabbath…they called it work and cited nice verses in Scripture. Christ would respond – “you think you are applying the word; you think you are being faithful…but you are not…there is more to it than that…watch me and I will show you what it looks like when the Word lives among you.”

Once the righteous gathered around a woman accused of adultery and were preparing to administer the God-sanctioned punishment of stoning her to death. After all it was right there in Leviticus…stone the adulteress…God said so.

And He did…you can read it yourself…but somehow despite correctly reading and applying the Word they were wrong.

The God stood in front of them and said…”nope…no you don’t…unless you are without sin…then go ahead…otherwise don’t because you missed the point and I am here to help you understand that you are all this woman and you all deserve to be stoned to death – now watch what I do.”

Context.

Context is everything.

we are uncoverers of thoughtful thoughtless things
pointed revealers of light and dark and everythings
gatherers, piecemakers and pilers-on of words and glowing ideas
stilted collectors of rain-washed truth left sodden by the road
tinkerers with the bits of brokenness felled by our hammer

what new life has left the lips of these and theirs
each step forward is a fitting stumble up a fitting stairs
we do not create but rather take the monstrous mess
string it all together claiming the status of protagonist
while tripping on our ingenue skirts frantic for praise

will a masterpiece arise from our hackneyed ham-hands
a work that welded, shattered, still can onlooker entrance
what end to the efforts of a blind mob building a mountain
that they might climb to the unseen sights of brighter places
eternal places that do not make the life run ragged down so

will mercy rain rich upon our self-seeking glory-monging head
will fire fall and finish the frenzied God-born and Godless instead

One thing I have come to believe in life is that there is an absolute truth…that was the easy part for me; Coming to the awareness that I am not it…that was hard.

I have been involved in some very stimulating Facebook dialogue lately…so much so that I really don’t feel like I have a lot to add frankly. What I have noticed is there is a thin edge to dialogue that centres around absolutes…a knife-like edge that can cut in a second if we’re not careful.

Sometimes we think we stand as righteous beacons holding the sword of truth aloft for the world to see and be corrected (I do this all the time) when really we are children at play with a weapon too dangerous for us to handle without hacking up the ones we seek to defend, the ones we love…and in the process we kill ourselves as well.

What is truth?

Again with the Quod est veritas?

I think I would have made an excellent Pilate…too cowardly to act according to my gut…too cowardly to do anything but wash my hands and leave the dirty work to others convinced they know the answer.

Truth…it is like Excalibur to me but I cannot pull it from the stone. It remains rooted in place affirming one thing – I am not the King.

we are thinmen –
sheer cracked glass
heated too much
shamed silica blisters
filled with the past
pounding sharp-edged fists
into friend’s faces
bleeding the hatred
a breaking awareness
that they look so much like us…