R.P. Nettelhorst's Blog, page 18

Angel Food

The Lord spoke to Moses, “I have heard the complaints of the Israelites. Tell them: At twilight you will eat meat, and in the morning you will eat bread until you are full. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God.”

So at evening quail came and covered the camp. In the morning there was a layer of dew all around the camp. When the layer of dew evaporated, there on the desert surface were fine flakes, as fine as frost on the ground. When the Israelites saw it, they asked one another, “What is it?” because they didn’t know what it was.

Moses told them, “It is the bread the Lord has given you to eat. This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Gather as much of it as each person needs to eat. You may take two quarts per individual, according to the number of people each of you has in his tent.’ ” (Exodus 16:11-16)

Hungry people are unhappy people. There’s nothing unusual in that. God’s response was not to let them starve, no matter that their words and concern grew out of disbelief and a distrust of God’s intentions toward them. They were quick to assume the worst—also a common human failing. It is one thing to ask God, “how much longer” in the midst of a crisis. It is something else to tell God, “you don’t love us and you want us to starve.” One attitude expresses a belief that God does care and will act, however long it might take. The other attitude expresses a belief that God doesn’t care at all or maybe isn’t even there in the first place. The second is the most common response to any crisis.

And yet God’s actions toward the people he loved was always the same. He can’t help but be good and loving toward them.

The Hebrew word for “what is it?” was pronounced “manna” and so that became the name of what was appearing on the ground six days a week. What began as strange and wonderful soon became as ordinary as gravity. People would quickly take it for granted, a part of nature no different than the daily rising and setting of the sun.

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But It Still Hurts

Then Moses went back to the LORD and protested, “Why have you brought all this trouble on your own people, Lord? Why did you send me? Ever since I came to Pharaoh as your spokesman, he has been even more brutal to your people. And you have done nothing to rescue them!”

Then the LORD told Moses, “Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh. When he feels the force of my strong hand, he will let the people go. In fact, he will force them to leave his land!”

And God said to Moses, “I am Yahweh—‘the LORD.’ I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as El-Shaddai—‘God Almighty’—but I did not reveal my name, Yahweh, to them. And I reaffirmed my covenant with them. Under its terms, I promised to give them the land of Canaan, where they were living as foreigners. You can be sure that I have heard the groans of the people of Israel, who are now slaves to the Egyptians. And I am well aware of my covenant with them.

“Therefore, say to the people of Israel: ‘I am the LORD. I will free you from your oppression and will rescue you from your slavery in Egypt. I will redeem you with a powerful arm and great acts of judgment.’” (Exodus 5:22-6:6)

What if you pray, do what God asks, and the problem still remains? When Moses reluctantly returned to Egypt he did exactly what God told him: he demanded the Egyptian Pharaoh allow the Israelites a holiday to worship God. The three-day retreat was a ruse designed to let the Israelites escape from slavery. To help Moses convince the Pharaoh, God had given him impressive miracles to perform.

His weak confidence was shattered, however, when Pharaoh not only turned down his request but also made life even more difficult for the Israelites. The Pharaoh punished his slaves for daring to request a vacation, and he made sure that they knew Moses was to blame. Angry and upset, Moses complained to God about the apparent defeat.

But God did not berate Moses. Instead, God reassured him. Just because the problem was still there—or had even gotten worse—did not mean God wasn’t on top of it. God was still going to rescue the slaves, but it would take ten plagues and at least a year. God’s methods and timing, Moses learned, are often different from our expectations.

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Send Someone Else

The LORD said, “If they do not believe you or pay attention to the first miraculous sign, they may believe the second. But if they do not believe these two signs or listen to you, take some water from the Nile and pour it on the dry ground. The water you take from the river will become blood on the ground.”

Moses said to the LORD, “O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.”

The LORD said to him, “Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the LORD ? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”

But Moses said, “O Lord, please send someone else to do it.”

Then the LORD’s anger burned against Moses and he said, “What about your brother, Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well. He is already on his way to meet you, and his heart will be glad when he sees you. You shall speak to him and put words in his mouth; I will help both of you speak and will teach you what to do. He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God to him. But take this staff in your hand so you can perform miraculous signs with it.” (Exodus 4:8-17)

God won’t take no for an answer. Just ask Moses! Although an Israelite, he had been raised by the daughter of Egypt’s Pharaoh. At the age of forty, angry at the mistreatment of his people by a slave master, he murdered the slave master and fled. He spent the next forty years living in exile as a shepherd. When he was eighty years old, God unexpectedly appeared to him in a burning bush and asked him to rescue the Israelite slaves from their Egyptian oppressors.

Moses doubted himself and he doubted God, even though he was standing in his presence. The task seemed impossible. When Moses tried to tell God to find someone else, God did not strike him down with a lightning bolt. Instead, God helped Moses recognize that he really could do the job. God removed Moses’ doubts, not by giving him faith, but by giving him certainty. Over time, Moses’ faith grew as he saw God consistently transform his hopes into reality. Rather than face each new crisis with hopelessness, Moses faced it secure despite the doubts. He knew that since God had helped him in the past, chances were he’d continue to help him.

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Signs

Then Moses answered and said, “But suppose they will not believe me or listen to my voice; suppose they say, ‘The LORD has not appeared to you.’ ”

So the LORD said to him, “What is that in your hand?”

He said, “A rod.”

And He said, “Cast it on the ground.” So he cast it on the ground, and it became a serpent; and Moses fled from it. Then the LORD said to Moses, “Reach out your hand and take it by the tail” (and he reached out his hand and caught it, and it became a rod in his hand), “that they may believe that the LORD God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you.”

Furthermore the LORD said to him, “Now put your hand in your bosom.” And he put his hand in his bosom, and when he took it out, behold, his hand was leprous, like snow. And He said, “Put your hand in your bosom again.” So he put his hand in his bosom again, and drew it out of his bosom, and behold, it was restored like his other flesh. (Exodus 4:1-7)

Moses was applying for the job of “rescuer from slavery” for the people of Israel. Both the slave master, Pharaoh, and the enslaved people would be wanting references. Neither would have any particular reason for believing Moses when he showed up and said, “Let my people go.” The references God gave Moses to prove that he was a legitimate spokesperson for God were therefore what you might expect: miracles.

Moses responded as any human being might to the unexpected appearance of a snake: he ran away from it. After all, the most common human phobia is a fear of snakes. Moses could now turn his shepherd’s staff into a snake, or pick it up and turn it back again. Likewise, he could take his hand and make it diseased with one of the most feared diseases in the ancient world and then, just as easily, make the disease go away. Leprosy scared people because of the consequences of the disease: disfigurement, banishment from one’s family and community, and the loss of any way to make a living. God had given Moses power over what people feared most. God was reiterating for Moses that he had nothing to be afraid of at all.

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Will That Be On The Test?

Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!”

And he said, “Here I am.”

Then He said, “Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.”

So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son; and he split the wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off. And Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you.”

So Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son; and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife, and the two of them went together. But Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, “My father!”

And he said, “Here I am, my son.”

Then he said, “Look, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?”

And Abraham said, “My son, God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering.” So the two of them went together. (Genesis 22:1-8)

Abraham should have gotten the willies. God asked Abraham to do something outrageous that contradicts all that we know about God (see Jeremiah 7:31). In the end, God prevented Abraham from killing his son and heir. But why would God ask Abraham to do something so evil in the first place?

It was a test. In the time of Abraham, particularly among the people Abraham was living with, the sacrifice of children to the gods was commonplace (see Leviticus 18:21, 20:2-5). God wanted to see if Abraham understood yet that his God was different. Although Abraham’s faith that God could restore Isaac was commendable (see Hebrews 11:17-19 and James 2:21), it was obviously never God’s will that Isaac should be sacrificed. Abraham should have responded to God’s request as Moses did when God told him to stand aside so he could wipe out all the Israelites and start over with just Moses (see Exodus 32:9-14). What we see in this test is that Abraham still didn’t understand who God was or how much he differed from the false gods he’d grown up with and that surrounded him in his culture. Moses understood God better than Abraham did. But Abraham learned from this experience.

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Belief is Hard

Abraham hurried into the tent to Sarah. He said, “Hurry. Get three cups of our best flour; knead it and make bread.”

Then Abraham ran to the cattle pen and picked out a nice plump calf and gave it to the servant who lost no time getting it ready. Then he got curds and milk, brought them with the calf that had been roasted, set the meal before the men, and stood there under the tree while they ate.

The men said to him, “Where is Sarah your wife?”

He said, “In the tent.”

One of them said, “I’m coming back about this time next year. When I arrive, your wife Sarah will have a son.” Sarah was listening at the tent opening, just behind the man.

Abraham and Sarah were old by this time, very old. Sarah was far past the age for having babies. Sarah laughed within herself, “An old woman like me? Get pregnant? With this old man of a husband?”

God said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh saying, ‘Me? Have a baby? An old woman like me?’ Is anything too hard for God? I’ll be back about this time next year and Sarah will have a baby.”

Sarah lied. She said, “I didn’t laugh,” because she was afraid.

But he said, “Yes you did; you laughed.” (Genesis 18:6-15)

One day three men showed up and Abraham invited them to his home. As was customary, he offered them food and drink, and they accepted his hospitality. Abraham asked Sarah to make some bread, while he hurried and selected a calf from his pen, then got a servant to slaughter, butcher and cook it. It was a very time consuming process and so the three visitors were there for several hours before the meal was finally served.

Though Sarah had not joined them in the meal, she was listening to what was going on. Doubt is easier than faith. Even if you’re standing close to God when he tells you what he’s going to do. Sarah was appalled that the visitors knew she had laughed and her first instinct was to lie: it was rude to laugh at guests like that. She was afraid of what they would think, and of how her husband would react.

What did God do in the face of her derisive laugh? Did he berate her, condemn her, strike her down? Take back the promised blessing? No, he simply reminded her that nothing was beyond God’s capabilities. God will bless us even if we can’t believe it.

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How God Signs a Contract

But Abram said, “O Sovereign LORD, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?”

So the LORD said to him, “Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.”

Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in half.

Then birds of prey came down on the carcasses, but Abram drove them away.

As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him. Then the LORD said to him, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years. But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions. You, however, will go to your fathers in peace and be buried at a good old age. In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure.”

When the sun had set and darkness had fallen, a smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces. On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram and said, “To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates— (Genesis 15:8-18)

Abraham decorated the ground with the dead carcasses of animals and birds that he had cut in half. How come? God made Abram a promise that he would have a child. But right after Abram “believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness” Abram wonders how he can know for sure that God will actually do what he said he would do.

Right on the heels of Abram’s belief, came doubt. But God did not berate Abram. Instead, he granted Abram’s request for certainty.

In Abram’s day, when kings made treaties with one another, they would take some animals and cut them in half. They would then lay the pieces out in parallel rows. Together, the two kings would then walk between the carcasses. It was a piece of performance art: the kings were announcing that if they didn’t fulfill the treaty they had just made, then what had happened to the animals would happen to them. So after God passed between the dead animals, Abram knew God would do what he had promised. He’d put his name on the dotted line.

If God and Abram were making a treaty like this today, God would have called in a notary public and signed a thick contract for Abram.

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No Joke

Then God said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. And I will bless her and also give you a son by her; then I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of peoples shall be from her.”

Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed, and said in his heart, “Shall a child be born to a man who is one hundred years old? And shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?” And Abraham said to God, “Oh, that Ishmael might live before You!”

Then God said: “No, Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his descendants after him. And as for Ishmael, I have heard you. Behold, I have blessed him, and will make him fruitful, and will multiply him exceedingly. He shall beget twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation. But My covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you at this set time next year.” Then He finished talking with him, and God went up from Abraham. (Genesis 17:15-22)

Sarah did not believe it when she overheard God tell her husband that within a year she’d be pregnant; so much did she disbelieve, that she laughed out loud. But she was not alone in her laughter. Abraham laughed as well. And they had good reason to laugh. They were both past the time when people could have children. What God suggested to them was simply not a possibility.

Their disbelieving laughter would be transformed, in less than a year, to the laughter of joy. They called their son “Laughter,” the meaning of the name “Isaac,” because we commonly laugh at the unexpected and the incongruous, and what could be more unexpected and incongruous than a ninety year old woman giving birth to a healthy baby boy?

God promised that the contract that God had made with Abraham would be extended to Isaac, not to Ishmael or anyone else. The line of promise was being narrowed. Ultimately it would focus on the Jewish people exclusively, who would have a special relationship with God and from whom the Messiah was destined to come.

God acted despite their reasonable doubts, despite their lack of faith. In fact, he did not even wait for Abraham to believe his words. He just told Abraham how it would be.

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Don’t Go Anywhere

There was another famine in the land in addition to the one that had occurred in Abraham’s time. And Isaac went to Abimelech, king of the Philistines, at Gerar. The Lord appeared to him and said, “Do not go down to Egypt. Live in the land that I tell you about; stay in this land as a foreigner, and I will be with you and bless you. For I will give all these lands to you and your offspring, and I will confirm the oath that I swore to your father Abraham. I will make your offspring as numerous as the stars of the sky, I will give your offspring all these lands, and all the nations of the earth will be blessed by your offspring, because Abraham listened to My voice and kept My mandate, My commands, My statutes, and My instructions.” So Isaac settled in Gerar. (Genesis 26:1-6)

Famine was common in the ancient world, and was in fact very common through most of human history. Obesity was certainly not an epidemic. Rather, people regularly worried about starving to death.

As famine came once again to the land where Isaac was living, it was only natural for him to think about traveling to a place where food was more abundant. Such a choice was common and the smart thing to do; people moved all the time for just that reason. But when God told Isaac to stay where he was, he believed God and acted on that belief. The time had not yet come for the Israelites to go down to Egypt. Not until the famine during the life of Isaac’s son Jacob (renamed Israel) would God send his people into Egypt, a place where they would, in the end, suffer as slaves for four hundred years. Isaac did not know what the future held; but he accepted that God knew what he was doing and that things would work out according to God’s own timing. The promise that God made with Isaac was the same one he had made with Abraham earlier (see Genesis 12:1-3).

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Heir Apparent

After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward.”

But Abram said, “Lord God, what will You give me, seeing I go childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” Then Abram said, “Look, You have given me no offspring; indeed one born in my house is my heir!”

And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “This one shall not be your heir, but one who will come from your own body shall be your heir.” Then He brought him outside and said, “Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them.” And He said to him, “So shall your descendants be.”

And he believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.

Then He said to him, “I am the Lord, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to inherit it.” (Genesis 15:1-7)

Abram was an old man; his wife was an old woman. Despite a successful and prosperous life, something important was lacking. Abram was not slow to let God know his disappointment. For the ancient Jewish people, nothing was more important to them than having heirs to carry on their names. Abraham would do anything for a proper heir.

Therefore, given the customs and laws in the place where Abram lived, Abram had acted. A childless couple could designate one of their servants as their heir, giving that servant what amounted to the rights and privileges of a firstborn son, until and unless they had their own child, in which case the rights and privileges of a firstborn son would revert to the actual biological child.

When God tells Abram that the designated heir would be unnecessary because Abraham would have a flesh and blood son, Abram’s reaction was joy and to believe what God had told him.

Because he believed, God considered Abraham to be righteous. In the New Testament, Paul makes much of this incident, explaining in Galatians 3:1-6 that righteousness is not in how people act, but in their belief in what Jesus accomplished on the cross.

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