The Bible Project is a project that brings me great encouragement. It is high quality, crowd-funded and unencumbered for re-use. It is just an all-around great general resource for followers of Jesus who want to learn and help others learn God’s story from the Bible. Here’s a link to The Bible Project from which you can learn all about it and start using the resources it provides.
Author: Joseph Ginder (Page 14 of 23)
[Jesus] demands of his first followers a living witness to a simple life on the edge, because once you are at the visible center, once you are on the top, you have too much to prove and too much to protect… The only free positions in this world are at the bottom and at the edges of things. Everywhere else, there is too much to maintain – an image to promote and a fear of losing it all – which ends up controlling your whole life.
– Richard Rohr, in Dancing Standing Still; Healing the World from a Place of Prayer
Judah got in a lot of trouble for depending on Assyria to protect them from the Israel/Aram coalition. And then Judah got in a lot of trouble for looking to Babylon to protect them from the Assyrians. Later, Judah got in a lot of trouble for depending on Egypt to protect them from the Babylonians. And so it goes.
People of God, vote for whomever you can vote with a clear conscience and then stand by without shame as a leader without being an embarrassment to God. But remember: #WeDontNeedEitherOne
There is no candidate running who will usher in the kingdom of God or prevent its coming.
Finally, Isaiah 30:1-3 is apropos:
Woe to the obstinate children,â€
declares the LORD,
“to those who carry out plans that are not mine,
forming an alliance, but not by my Spirit,
heaping sin upon sin;
who go down to Egypt
without consulting me;
who look for help to Pharaoh’s protection,
to Egypt’s shade for refuge.
But Pharaoh’s protection will be to your shame,
Egypt’s shade will bring you disgrace.
[NIV]
Alan Jacobs, in his review of The Complete Words of W. H. Auden in the September/October 2016 issue of Books & Culture quotes an entry from a book written late in Auden’s life entitled A Certain World: A Commonplace Book:
Let me close with one more reflection by Auden, one of the longest in A Certain World, from the entry on “Friday, Good”; it exemplifies the wisdom and acuity of mind that this great man possessed, even in the somewhat diminished last years of his life:
Just as we were all, potentially, in Adam when he fell, so we were all, potentially, in Jerusalem on that first Good Friday before there was an Easter, a Pentecost, a Christian, or a Church. It seems to me worth while asking ourselves who we should have been and what we should have been doing. None of us, I’m certain, will imagine himself as one of the Disciples, cowering in an agony of spiritual despair and physical terror. Very few of us are big wheels enough to see ourselves as Pilate, or good churchmen enough to see ourselves as a member of the Sanhedrin. In my most optimistic mood I see myself as a Hellenized Jew from Alexandria visiting an intellectual friend. We are walking along, engaged in philosophical argument. Our path takes us past the base of Golgotha. Looking up, we see an all-too-familiar sight – three crosses surrounded by a jeering crowd. Frowning with prim distaste, I say, “It’s disgusting the way the mob enjoy such things. Why can’t the authorities execute criminals humanely and in private by giving them hemlock to drink, as they did with Socrates?” Then, averting my eyes from the disagreeable spectacle, I resume our fascinating discussion about the nature of the True, the Good, and the Beautiful.
Yow. I think that’s all too often how we walk through life. Or we look for miracles while creation proclaims all around us.
I’m not a particular fan of Bill Gates. However in this interview of Bill Gates from the Atlantic, Gates quite reasonably expresses the need to increase the rate of development for new energy sources (by a lot) because of climate change with less drama and more sense than is found in most such comments.
The interesting thing to me is that this article has created quite a buzz. But the buzz is not about the central ideas of the article. It’s about Bill Gates sidebar comments that he doesn’t think the free market is good at every kind of technological advance or every allocation of resources. The buzz is that Bill Gates is against free markets and has come out as a socialist!
Whether the article is meritorious on its own terms or not, this is sheer and utter nonsense. It prevents actual discussion of substance because the discussion is hijacked by hot button political issues. What Gates actually said isn’t being discussed. His comment on free markets is the only thing.
And that is where our public discourse is today. It’s so ridden with land mine hot button issues that you can’t even discuss anything. And if you happen to miss one of the mines and some interest is offended, they throw you and all your good ideas and labor away because of the one thing you said that made you an offender. That’s a recipe for permanent social adolescence. One can make no mistakes (if they are mistakes) or we’ll replace you with someone else who hasn’t done anything we could possibly be upset about. That’s no way to live.
Paraphrasing a question from Susan Ramos:
In Luke 23:8, Herod is hoping Jesus will do something impressive so he can see it. Sometimes this is translated that he wanted Jesus to do a “sign” and other times that he wanted Jesus to do a “miracle”. You said that many recent translations are using the word “sign”. Could you explain please?
In the Bible, the Greek word sÄ“meÃon is usually translated these days as sign or wonder. Jesus was doing signs that pointed to the his identity as God. Herod wanted to see something spectacular – what we would call a miracle, even though Luke is careful to use the word “sign”. I’m not a Greek scholar and should let others handle explaining translation issues, but the reason I pointed this out was that I heard one translation in our reading use the “miracle” language and others use “sign”.
There are some significant ideas tied up in the choice of translation. In modern times, say, since the scientific revolution, nature has often been conceived as a big machine with regular workings. Atoms and molecules interact, chemical reactions take place, physical bodies move, and these workings take a regular order that can be described and predicted (if one knows enough). So, for example, it was predicted in advance that the today sun would shine directly on the equator of the earth (vernal equinox) and that there would be a solar eclipse visible over parts of northern Europe. There wasn’t anything miraculous about it even though a solar eclipse is very rare.
The concept of miracle came to be that sometimes God reaches into this big natural machine and does things which are not explained by the workings of nature and that cannot be predicted from natural knowledge no matter how much one knows. In this context, a miracle has no natural explanation. God has interrupted the regular working of nature and inserted a cause of events from outside of nature: God Himself. That is a technical definition of “miracle”. Sometimes people mean this when they say “miracle” today and sometimes they mean something less precise.
This division of things into “natural” and “miraculous” can be misleading from a biblical standpoint. In biblical teaching, God is responsible for creating and maintaining (upholding) the regular working of nature. For example, see Colossians 1:17. From a Christian perspective, it is because God is a powerful, intelligent, orderly god that nature has its order and can be studied and its working understood and even predicted. Nature and its regular working is an act of God. Every day; every moment. If God chooses to act in a way that is not his regular pattern then this would be what we might call a “miracle”, but it would not be any more or less that God was responsible for it than he is responsible for the regular working of the world.
OK, so what makes something a sign? It means something in God’s revelation of himself to us. For example, God could do what we would call a “miracle” down deep in the depths of the earth – say moving a rock that he intends to have some effect far in the future. It wouldn’t be a sign for us because we don’t know anything about it. God could cause the events of nature to coincide so that the eclipse today took place just as a Christian saint was passing away and by his Spirit speak to those attending the death of the saint and it be a sign for them. Nothing miraculous took place, in the sense that the working of nature was not interrupted and the eclipse took place exactly and for the physical reasons that humans understand, but the timing of events could make it a sign for those who trust God and hear from his Spirit.
For another example, what if God caused a strong wind to blow and divide the sea so that Israel could escape from Egyptian chariots? What if the wind could be explained by the weather patterns of the day and a low pressure system in the right place at the right time with the force of the resulting wind so strong that it made a dry passage appear in a way that has a natural explanation? Does that make it any less a sign that God has acted to save Israel? I think not. But we don’t know the explanation for the wind except to say that it was from God. And we thank God for it.
Finally, some might use the word “miracle” in a different way to mean that something unexpected happened. They might say that God’s timing of a naturally-explained wind or eclipse was a miracle. I get what they mean. It might not be a miracle in this technical sense, but I get what they mean. God did something that impressed then and that was perhaps even a sign for them.
When God provides for you, you may decide to call it a miracle if you want to. We know where the credit goes, don’t we? Whether there is a natural explanation or something happened that interrupted the natural flow of cause and effect, God gets the credit for blessing us. It comes as a sign of his goodness. Many people use the word “miracle” in this way. However, it is good to understand the more technical usage and why modern Bible translations use the word “sign” when that is more appropriate. God is behind natural events and miracles. There is nothing without the great “I am”.
Follow up… Is it a miracle when God answers prayer? I would say it is not necessarily a miracle in the technical sense. I believe God is outside of time as humans experience it and can see all of time at once in his perspective. If that is true, then God could hear your prayer today and act at the creation of the world to bring about the answer to your prayer through natural events with no need for any miracle; because God is outside of time and Lord over it. At least that’s what I think – that God can see all times at once in His knowledge of everything, also known as omniscience.
In his Journal, George Fox quotes Margaret Fell:
And so he went on, and said, “That Christ was the Light of the world, and lighteth every man that cometh into the world; and that by this light they might be gathered to God.” I stood up in my pew, and wondered at his doctrine, for I had never heard such before. And then he went on, and opened the scriptures, and said, “The scriptures were the prophets’ words, and Christ’s and the apostles’ words, and what, as they spoke, they enjoyed and possessed, and had it from the Lord,” and said, “Then what had any to do with the scriptures, but as they came to the Spirit that gave them forth? You will say, ‘Christ saith this, and the apostles say this’ but what canst thou say? Art thou a child of the Light, and hast thou walked in the Light, and what thou speakest, is it inwardly from God?” This opened me so, that it cut me to the heart; and then I saw clearly we were all wrong. So I sat down in my pew again, and cried bitterly: and I cried in my spirit to the Lord, “We are all thieves; we are all thieves; we have taken the scriptures in words, and know nothing of them in ourselves.”
I received a Nexus 5 for Christmas and retired my Samsung Galaxy S2. It has no SD card slot, but has 32gb built in. So far, the space has been enough – though I fill it to 27 or 28 gb pretty easily. Most of that is audio teaching and books that I really could keep somewhere else most of the time. I have had no reason to root or run anything other than the latest Android from Google. That’s the beauty of the Nexus line! I get the latest Android quickly. That’s a huge benefit, in my experience. The performance of the phone is so good and the screen so nice that I’m finding I rarely use my Nexus 7 tablet. Another really nice feature is the wireless charging. After having so much trouble with micro-USB connectors growing finicky in the past, I really like just being able to lay the phone down on a charging pad. I keep one for nighttime charging and one by my desk at work. The camera is quite good, too. The Nexus 5 is an excellent phone: as good today as the Nexus One was compared to the competition when it was new… maybe better!
As I wrote before… I started using Android when the G1 came out and have never looked back to my blackberry or to Windows Mobile. I have T-Mobile unlimited everything service. (Actually, my data is throttled after 2gb… I mostly use wi-fi and have not seen a need to upgrade to more high-speed data.) It’s cheap and T-Mobile phone reps are pleasant and helpful to talk to. Neither AT&T nor Verizon can make these claims today. (When I talk to their reps on the phone, my blood pressure is up for a week.)
T-Mobile service works well for me most of the time, but not on Balboa Island or other neighborhoods where mostly well-to-do people live. Evidently rich people don’t use T-Mobile, so T-Mobile coverage is often sketchy in higher-income neighborhoods. It works great where I normally hang out, though. (Note: it didn’t work so well in South Dakota, and AT&T roaming access had a low cap that I exceeded quickly. I really hated that.)
So, what do I run on my phone and why? Here’s the list as of May 13, 2014.
Air Droid – This app lets me connect to my phone as a web server using a web browser. I can get files from it, copy files to it, install apps, and more. Nice. However, the file browser does not handle large lists of files in one directory very well; it is far too slow. I find that I have been using file managers on my phone and an FTP server more than Air Droid. Still installed, though.
Amazon Kindle – I use my phone as my kindle. It works well enough to read books on my phone.
Amazon MP3 – This would be a waste for me save for the Amazon Cloud Player features. It is nice to be able to store music in the Amazon cloud and play it anywhere. I have the unlimited audio track storage service from Amazon.
America’s National Parks – An info app.
APG – There are certain files on my phone that I don’t want others to be able to read – like files that have personal data in them that would be useful for identity theft. So, I encrypt them. This is a tool that does that. You can encrypt your entire phone file system, but I think that would be so invasive that it would be self-compromising. This allows me to pick and choose so that stuff I protect is really protected without slowing down access to other stuff.
Audible – I am an audiobook junkie. Folks who say reading is not the same as listening are right. I usually do better listening, even though I love to read. Good for the gym and for walking. And driving.
Authenticator – This is a way to use the Google two-factor authentication system for many other security purposes. It is not useful unless you use stuff that supports it. My ISP supports it and I use it.
Barcode Scanner – Scans bar codes. Useful for many things, but I don’t use it as frequently as one might expect.
Battery Solo Widget – For displaying battery status on a home screen.
BatteryGuru – If you have a SnapDragon processor, you probably want this. It learns how you use your phone and then configures the system to conserve battery life. I have found it to be effective.
Beautiful Widgets and Beautiful Widgets Animation add-on – Very nice home screen information display. I use it for time and weather and battery status with nice appearance. This hasn’t changed much in several years. But I have not found a better alternative.
BeyondPod – This is an excellent podcast app. If you listen to regular podcasts, consider it. I paid for the unlocked version.
Bible – This is the Android app from Logos. I use it almost exclusively for Bible study. I have some Kindle bibles, also. Logos has deep features but doesn’t do simple reading well since Libronix 3 on the PC.
Bible Gateway – This is a nice fast lightweight app for Bible reading. I find it is crisper and easier to bring up quickly than the Logos app. So I use it for simple Bible reading.
Camera Zoom FX – This is a highly-rated camera app for Android that purchased to overcome the weak cyanogenmod camera app. However, the Nexus 5 native camera app is fine, so I don’t use it any more. Still installed because I paid for it, just in case.
CamScanner – This is a convenience app that packages up using your camera to capture images of receipts and labels and business cards and so on. It straightens, crops, processes, and turns them into nice images in a pdf. The images and pdf can be shared gmail and and other means. I use this to capture handwritten notes, nutrition info from labels, and any written material I want to save and not have to carry with me on paper. It’s quite nice for straightening and flattening pictures of flat things taken with weird perspective.
Carbon – This is the Twitter app I use.
Circa – a news reader that I rarely use.
Chrome – The Chrome web browser for Android phones. I use this almost all the time now, after recent performance improvements. The time I don’t use it is when I need flash, as when watching Amazon video. (Amazon, why not have your video app on Android? This is silly.)
Clojure – A Lisp for your phone. How cool is that?
ConnectBot – I am geeky enough to need an ssh client on my phone. If you know what that is, this is a good free version.
DashClock Widget, Moon Extension, Sunrise Extension, Battery Extension – This is a good lock screen display widget plus modules that I use.
DMAC Screen Lock – This is a widget that you can put on your home screen to turn off the screen and lock your phone. It’s much nicer than finding the power button.
DropBox – Cloud storage app.
Duolingo – I’m kind of sort of attempting to learn some Spanish.
Easy Screenshot – This is an app that lets you capture what’s on the screen of your phone and save it as a picture.
Earth – Explore the earth using Google’s software.
Elixir 2 and various add-on modules – Excellent window into everything on your phone. High nerd appeal. I install some of the extra modules; but not what requires rooting (so far).
Email My Texts – Does what it says. It’s a way to backup or save your text messages.
ES File Explorer – An excellent file system browser with root capability and good SMB support for network browsing.
EverNote – I am using this as my standard way to take notes and save them. I don’t like that it is not integrated into the rest of my filing system. But it is very good. Still considering where this goes long term. I think Google should buy them and integrate it with Google Drive instead of pursuing Google Keep.
EveryTrail – Cool software that allows you to download maps of hiking trails to carry and access from your phone. Also capable of tracking hikes and saving the tracks in the cloud.
ezPDF Reader – I want to read PDF files. This was my solution. So far, so good.
Feedly – a news aggregator – but I don’t read it much
Fing Network Tools – an excellent tool for exploring LAN’s. Wish it were this simple on my PC!
FIOS Mobile – Verizon finally found someone who can write an adequate Android app. Previous versions were very frustrating. This one is so much better it has reaching OK status.
Firefox – I only use this for flash content. That’s all. Rarely used these days at all.
First Aid – An info app that is a first aid guide.
Flickr Folio – the new Flickr app may be slick, but it doesn’t let me set the title, description, tags, and album of photos to upload as easily as this app.
Flickr – nice for looking at Flickr, but not as nice as the old version for uploading.
Flickr Mobile – Another Flickr app that I am experimenting with.
FlightAware – nice app for tracking flights
FlightTrack – Easy real-time flight tracking for all the flights that matter to you. Not free.
Friend Locator – Share locations between friends.
FTP Droid – An FTP server for Android. Works well and does fast file transfer. I use the paid version.
FX – This is the best file manager for Android now. SMB access works well.
Gas Buddy – Find the location and price of gas nearby.
Gmail – Indispensable. I recommend the two-factor authentication for Gmail and Drive, but only if you take the time to understand it in advance. Be sure and get the emergency access codes for your account if you set two-factor up, even if you don’t know how to use them. And be sure and set up an emergency contact number for backup delivery of access codes. If you ever need them, you will be very glad to have them. Also, you should find a way to backup your messages locally. I use Mozilla Thunderbird.
[NOT] Go – I have removed all things from Go. They were free and worked pretty well, but became too invasive with too many messages trying to sell me things. The invasive messages require me to dismiss them, too!. So, no Go. Gone. Not missed.
Google Drive, Docs, Sheets – Google Drive is very convenient. This is usually better than using it from the web browser; at times the web browser can display tables that the app cannot.
Google Sky Map – Cool map of the sky… “Where’s Orion’s belt again? Oh, over there.”
Google Voice – Stop using your phone service’s voice mail and start using Google Voice. It will transcribe your messages and email them to you. T-mobile’s visual voice mail is problematic; I gave up on it.
GPS Status – A way to find your GPS coordinates.
Groupon – I don’t like the app for anything except saving the offers I purchase and showing them to vendors.
GPS Share – Decide to share your location with other people of your choice. “Where are you? I’m HERE! (send location)”
Hacker’s Keyboard – You too can type like a programmer! If you ever want to run emacs or its ilk on your phone, you need this. If you never heard of emacs, then you probably don’t need this. It’s kind of a full function keyboard instead of the stripped down keyboard for texting and data entry.
HBO Go – If you have HBO, you can watch HBO programs and movies on your phone. On demand. Cool. I login with my Verizon FIOS ID.
History Here – An app that lets you find sites of historical interest wherever you are. Great for history nerd vacationing.
iBird Pro – Want to know what that bird is in your North American yard?
Instagram – Easily share pix on social media sites. Very popular, but has limitations.
KD Collage – Make those photo collages on your phone. This is an OK app for that.
KeePassDroid – This is a password keeper that supports Android and Windows and more. It provides a good way to keep track of your passwords and use different passwords for your various logins.
Kingsoft Office – the free version reads Office docs on your phone – but without editing.
Lookout – This was the best security software for Android when I needed some and checked it out thoroughly, which was years ago. Still working well. It scans apps for safety. It can track down your phone from the web when it is lost and lock it or wipe it clean if it is in someone hands who shouldn’t have it. It also does backups; but I don’t use it for backup.
LoseIt! – a calorie tracker
Maps – Google Maps is great. Who needs a separate GPS? This is one of the best features of a good Android phone.
Meridian Player – This is a good media player. No EQ. Great features and stability for people who have their own media files and want to manipulate and play them. Updated frequently.
Messaging – I don’t like using Google Hangouts for text messaging. So I loaded this.
MoboPlayer – plays the most video formats of any video player I know of.
Ol File Manager – This file manager was required in order to select files in some other app. I don’t use it otherwise.
Photo Grid – Make photo collages on your phone. Lots of features. Works very well. I use this one.
Pinterest – Occasionally I use this app instead of the web browser.
Pixlr Express – A reasonable picture editor.
PowerAmp – This is a really nice audio app. I find that I use different apps for different listening or watching contexts. This allows me to resume one context while leaving another context in place. I listen to audio on PowerAmp. Then I can stop and watch video on Meridian. Then I finish listening to audio on PowerAmp from where I left off without searching. This should just work in one media app! Context is lost too easily. Poweramp gives much of control over the sound. I purchased the full version.
QuickPic – Fast gallery replacement for viewing photos. Not so necessary in the latest Android but habits die hard…
RadarNow! – A weather radar app. That is all.
Screen Filter – If you use your phone at night and want it to be less bright, use this.
SlingPlayer – Watch your Slingbox on your phone.
Smart Tools – Measuring tools for your phone. Very cool to play with. Useful? Hmmm. Soft of, if you don’t need precision. “It’s about 12 feet to that wall over there.” But it has a nice LED flashlight feature.
Snapseed – This is my preferred phone editor on Android.
StopWatch & Timer – Just what it says it is.
Storage Analyzer – a good tool for figuring out what files are using up your memory.
Study Bible – A Logos study Bible
Subsonic – I am such a nerd that I run a freeware subsonic server on linux to serve my entire library of audio and video. This is the client for Android. So why do I use the Amazon Cloud, you ask? I do. But, redundancy. (FYI, you must restart the linux server with a cron job every few hours or it will go belly up and stop responding.)
Swype + Dragon – Was the best keyboard for Android. Now I’m having problems with freezing. The stock keyboard swipes now, so less critical. Until it starts working better, I’m using stock.
Sygic – This is navigation software from eastern Europe. Cheaper than other offline alternatives and works OK. I prefer Google Maps and Nav when available, but they are not operable offline. Yes, I know about downloading Google maps for offline access. That’s nice, but not good enough.
SystemPanel – A very nice app backup and management tool. Somewhat redundant with Elixir. Will also do app backup.
T-Mobile My Account – check how much you’re using your features. The health status of your phone is junk; it assumes you are a dweeb.
Tape-a-Talk Pro – Record extended audio with this app.
TextWarrior – Geeky test editor. Not super fast, but works well enough for me to search files and update my text file notes.
TiVo – This is the remote from my Tivo. Very nice. Not from the Tivo company; not free.
TVFoodie, TVFoodMaps – This is how you remember and find all those cool places to eat that you saw on the Food Channel. It is easier than the web.
Tumblr – Micro-blogging app. I have it but have not started using it.
TuneIn Radio – For listening to radio broadcasts over the internet.
US Army Survival Guide – another info app
USB Host Diagnostics, USB Stick Plugin – trying to use external USB sticks from my phone.
Ustream – a Ustream client. I watched the Mars Curiosity landing coverage from NASA using this, for example. And this is how you check what is going on in the LBFC sanctuary on Sunday.
Wifi Analyzer and Wifi Connector Library – I maintain wifi networks. I like being able to find out what is happening in wifiland around me. And so…
Wunderground – a nice weather app – lots of info.
Yahoo Weather – another nice weather app. Pretty.
Yelp – Find good places to eat.
YouTube
Zoom Camera Pro – Another replacement for the weak Cyanogenmod camera that I paid for but don’t use much any longer.
The question, from Sitha, is, “Why did Israel seem so separate if God intended to bless all people?”
Update January 9, 2021…. I’ve recently listened to the Bible Project podcast series called The Family of God. They cover this issue in a more helpful way, I think, than my treatment below. I recommend this podcast series as a better and deeper treatment of this question. Frankly, all of the Bible Project podcast series are excellent. I mean really excellent! I’ve listened to them all, many more than once. [That’s the update; but if you want to read my old thoughts, they remain below.]
There are several ways to approach this question. One is to consider how the separation of the Israelites was as God intended versus their being separate out of their own sense of nationalism or pride. Both factors seem to be a part of the picture. From the law of Moses, we can see that aspects of the law were intended to keep Israel separated from the surrounding people. That is, God was unhappy with the actions and attitudes of humans and intended for the Israelites to be different. The lack of care for the poor and unfortunate, the violation of hospitality, the sexual licentiousness, idolatry, and violence of many cultures were evils. God intended Israel to be separate in these matters.
We can read from the prophet Ezekiel how God viewed the Canaanite people and how the Israelites became just like them in Ezekiel 16:49-51. It would be fair to say, from the perspective of Jesus and Paul in the New Testament, that the Israelites lost much of the separation that God wanted and instead adopted a prideful nationalistic sense of separation from Gentiles that was far from God’s heart.
There are many passages in the five books of Moses that indicate God’s intention to bless all people through the descendants of Abraham. If we are to take these books at face value, they present themselves as coming from the time of the Exodus. Genesis makes a lot of sense when interpreted in light of Israel coming out of Egypt into a new land where God will live in their midst. Much of Genesis can be makes sense in this light. For purposes of this question, though, allow me to consider just a few passages from Genesis.
What is coming to be seen by many as a key passage for understanding the mission of Israel is Genesis 9:18-27. This passage related a “fall” after Noah and his family are saved from the flood. Noah’s son Ham disrespectfully sees Noah naked. Shem and Japheth cover Noah. Then Canaan, the youngest son of Ham, is cursed. (Note the interesting structural and detail parallels with Genesis 2 and 3!)
I always wondered why, if Ham was the disrespectful one, that Canaan, his youngest son, was cursed instead of Ham. I don’t think I really know the answer to that question, but perhaps the text isn’t really trying to answer that question so much as to position the Canaanites as cursed. God is about to dispossess the Canaanites of their land, for cause! Some speculate that since Ham was Noah’s youngest son, that as Ham’s youngest son Canaan received the curse. It certainly doesn’t fit with our sense of justice if the curse on Canaan is seen as cause rather than part of a story describing a people cursed because of their sin. I have to fall back on the genre of ancient mythology, where past events are often symbolically related to explain a reality in the present.
In any case, Canaan, the son of Ham, is cursed. God is said to be the God of Shem, from whom the Israelites of Moses’ time are descended. And then there is this interesting little nugget: “may Japheth live in the tents of Shem”. What’s that about? The explanation that I have landed on is that Canaan is a type for those who have rejected God and are pursuing their own autonomy. Shem is a type of those who have accepted that they are God’s people with a mission to bless the nations. They are to lead others into a right relationship to God. And Japheth is a type of those non-Abrahamic people whom the people of God are restoring.
Consider that may scholars believe that a great many of the multitude leaving Egypt with the Israelites were not Abraham’s descendants, but rather others who took advantage of the opportunity to leave Egypt. Thus, “May Japheth live in the tents of Shem” could be seen as an instruction for how the Semitic descendants of Jacob, Abraham, and Shem should take in those who came out of Egypt with them – blessing the peoples of all nations.
In support of this interpretation we could think of Rahab of Jericho and Ruth of the Moabites – even the Gibeonites. The Gibeonites deceptively made a treaty with Joshua, but became a part of Israel! Perhaps this parallels the story of many who come to God’s people for personal advantage and then find a home through God’s grace as they come into truth.
So, a second perspective is to consider just how separated the Israelites were. Perhaps there was more accommodation made for the “sons of Japheth” than we often imagine. Certainly Israel is considered in the biblical text as being God’s people. But they are never God’s only people. In Jeremiah 2:3, Israel is portrayed as set apart for God’s own use, “the firstfruits of his harvest.†Many places in scripture Israel is called the “firstborn son” of God, beginning in Exodus. (Consider Exodus 4:22, for example.) The very term firstborn implies that other children will follow!
Yet we must regard carefully that God intended to give birth to a people who were different, and separate, in order to embody his ways and his redemptive purpose culminating in Jesus. In some ways, the Israelite separation is a necessary distinction through which God communicates. He has another way to live. He has a purpose and direction in history. The world is going somewhere! These are communicated through the people and culture and religion of Israel until, at just the right time, Jesus comes – God incarnate – as the Christ. He comes not only as Messiah, but as the perfect sacrifice for sin, the scapegoat, the great new high priest, the king in the line of David… all concepts developed through time as God formed Israel and the Israelite culture, story, and religion.
By New Testament times, the Jewish people of Israel have been scattered across much of the world. We read in Acts how the early church was to respect Jewish sensibilities “For Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath.†(Acts 15:21) So it seems that the Jews – Israel – was not as separate in the diaspora as we might suppose. There had been other people incorporated – Japheth sheltering in Shem’s tent. And there were many God-fearing Gentiles just waiting, primed for the good news of Jesus through contact with the Jews. Jews who accepted Jesus, along with many of these God-fearing Gentiles, formed the core of the early Church!
Consider the Jewish context of the Christian scriptures. The narratives of Jesus in the gospels take a structural form that parallels the Jewish Exodus story, and through which the identity of Jesus as Yahweh incarnate is communicated. All of the original apostles who formed the early church and from whom we received the books in the New Testament were Jewish followers of Jesus. Then there is Jesus, our Lord, the consummate Jew. The blessings that have come to those of us who are Gentiles have come to us through Israel.
Finally, I’ve not even mentioned the reconstitution of Israel as the church – the wild olive branches grafted onto the root of Israel! Just how separate are we, in God’s eyes?
Proclamation is a way of saying what God has done and will be doing, and what it means to you and the community of which you are a part. It included three components.
1. It starts our personal, then moves toward being more inclusive of the larger community. It could be that your experience has an impact on the community or is an example of what God does for the community, or something else.
2. Proclamations start out in the present, but then move to declare what the future will be like.
3. Proclamation is God-centered. It is about God. You may start out talking about yourself and then move to your community, but it is the action and glory of God that you are proclaiming.
How do you go about creating your proclamation? First, read some that others have done. Mary does a proclamation in Luke 1:46-44. Her proclamation may be confusing in terms of the future component, because she sometimes uses the past tense to describe what will be done. Another proclamation, in Luke 1:67-79 is by Zechariah when his son John is born. There is a third in Luke 2:28-32 by Simeon as he saw Jesus at the temple eight days after his birth. As we get into this more, there may be others from our worship that may inspire you.
About that… inspire. I wouldn’t recommend that you imitate other proclamations but rather that they would inspire you. You may note that in scripture, the proclamations are done as people are “filled with the Holy Spirit”. That means that God touched them with his Spirit to guide their words. It’s an amazing thing when God touches a human being to inspire them to write using their own personality and gifts to proclaim in the way that God guides them. That’s what we desire – for God to inspire us to proclaim what he desires that we proclaim. We take our own experience of God and build on it as He guides to speak to the community and about the future for his glory. It is important to really highlight God. You express what He is like and proclaim what He has done. That’s vital to proclamation.
So, as you seek God to let him inspire you to proclaim Him, start by praying and asking God to guide you. You may consider things for which you are particularly grateful to God, your relationship with Him, how he has cared for you or guided you, and so on. Then consider what that means for others and into the future. There’s not really only one way to proclaim God’s greatness, is there? The heavens do it without words. So be creative and let God shine!