Out of Context God

Exodus 4:5

"This," said the LORD, "is so that they may believe that the LORD, the God of their fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has appeared to you."

Exodus 4:5

 

Exodus 4:5 – if this passage of Scripture was a “Friends” TV show episode, I think it would be titled, “The One Where God Throws Moses a Bone.”

Cause here in Exodus 4 we still see Moses asking God the “what if” questions. Even after God has Dura Flamed a Talking Bush, even after God has answered his questions, and now in this passage, even after God does some high level hocus pocus with reptiles and walking sticks.

God has spoken from the bush and told Moses:

1.       What to do(“Gather up the leaders of Israel,”)

2.        How He will do it (“I’ll do some crazy things and Pharaoh will say ‘take off.’”)

3.       How to get it started. (“You can use my name as your calling card…Tell them I AM WHO I AM.”)

4.       How it will end. (“And so you will plunder the Egyptians.”

(I must admit, I did not know that the word “plunder” was in the Bible. I thought it was primarily reserved for pirates.)

But even with all of this Moses is (still) looking for excuses. And saying “I’m not sure they’re gonna buy this…what if they do not believe me or listen to me?”

Did you get that part  “What if they do not believe me or listen to me?”

They.

They.

Not me.

It’s not Moses saying “yeah, all due respect their Burning Bush, but frankly this whole thing is freaking me out a bit and I am not sure that I am into all this ‘change the world’ stuff. Thanks for burning for me anyway. You might need to find another former murderer turned shepherd for this task.”

Instead Moses waffles a bit and says, “What if they do not believe me or listen to me?”

As in, “I am pretty sure this is wacked out and I don’t think I want to go too far down this road.”

To which God clears his throat (my interpretation) and is like, “alrighty then…I have tried the logical approach and the methodical approach and you did not get either one. So I am going to have to go back to tangible examples. What’s in your hand?”

To which I would suppose  “Uhm, God bush…it’s my staff. Duh.”

God must really be holding his temper on this one.

“Ok then…throw it on the ground.”

Moses shrugs and tosses the staff to the ground.

We all have seen the Ten Commandments and know where this is headed.

Slither, slither, slither.

“Go ahead,” says God. “Pick it up.”

GULP!

But (for the first time without fussing at a command of God) Moses reaches down and picks up the snake, which zaps back into a stick.

And here is where God throws Moses a bone.

“This,” said the Lord, “is so they may believe that the LORD, - the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob - has appeared to you.”

See…God told Moses that He was doing these things so that “they” would believe.

But who had to believe first?

Moses.

God threw Moses a bone.

He took the excuse of “they” that Moses used and turned it into a “wink wink nudge nudge” moment. “I know this is hard, and I know that it is especially hard to tell a burning bush that you are not ready to change the world, so I am going to help you out every way I can. And I am giving you something tangible and real that you can use to tell the world about Me.”

And that is how God threw Moses a bone.

Exodus 3:13

Exodus 3:13

 

Moses said to God, "Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' Then what shall I tell them?"

 

Let’s look at Moses’ resume:

1.       .Whacked an Egyptian

2.       Lucked into a wife because he ran off some shepherds at a well

3.       Got an entry level job from his father-in-law Jethro. (Insert Beverly Hillbillies joke here…)

4.       Spoke to by God out of a burning shrubbery. (insert Monty Python reference here.)

That’s it. Then somehow, just past the murder and patronage, we have the talking burning bush.

And Moses looking for excuses.

Interestingly after God begins his “this is what I’m thinking speech” Moses’ resposnse was not (at this point) “I can’t” or “I won’t.” He says “what if?”

“What  if Pharoah is mean to me?”

“What if the Israelites say ‘yeah, but I don’t think so….?”

Here’s the thing with this Burning Bush story that I am just now seeing.

God told Moses how the thing would start (“go see Pharoah”) AND how it would end (“the Israelites will get out of Egpyt and worship God on Mt. Burning Bush.”)

GOD TOLD HIM THE BEGINNING AND THE END!!!!

To which Moses says “Hey you God in the bush en fuego, I hear what you’re saying  but frankly I do not think this is such a good idea. Especially the part about going to see the Pharaoh... oh and the part about talking to to the Israelites.”

At which point I think God should be thinking, “Dude, I have told you two parts of the plan, and you don’t like either one of them. Pardon me for just a minute, but have you seen your resume…murderer, lucky married guy, father-in-law’s long distance shepherd? There is not much in there that would indicate ‘world-changer.’”

But He doesn’t .

God keeps going with his explanation.

And gives Moses all he needs.

Even if he doesn’t get it, or understand, or appreciate it.

Exodus 2:12

Exodus 2:3

11 One day, after Moses had grown up, he went out to where his own people were and watched them at their hard labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people. 12 Glancing this way and that and seeing no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.

In terms of Bible people, Moses is as much of a rock star as you are going to find.

And here, a handful of verses into his grown up life, we see him losing his temper and killing an Egyptian.  And then he buried the dead guy in the sand.

Amazing how a few thousand years changes things because I am pretty sure that Moses could never pass the background check needed to work (or even volunteer) at a church today.

Imagine this conversation if he showed up at the local mega-church and said “I’d like to help.”

                Interview guy    “So, are you new to this area.”

                Moses             “Yup, I grew up on the water.

                Interview guy    “Ok…so tell me about your life.”

                Moses             “Well, I am not a great talker, so bear with me…”

                Interview Guy   “No problem, at SuperMega Cathedral we are open to all kinds of people.”

                Moses             “Great…let’s see…I guess it all started just after I killed the Egyptian guy.”

    Interview Guy   “I’m sorry, I must have heard you wrong. It sounded to me like you said              something about ‘killing an Egyptian guy.’”

Moses                “That’s right.

Interview Guy      (scratches his head)

Moses               "And then I buried him. In the sand.”

           Interview Guy      “Hey...we’re gonna need to get back to you on this. Have you thought about          checking                        with the Methodists?”

 

Not sure why God has this murder by a rock star right at the beginning of Moses’ mission, thought I am glad that even a trainwreck of  a start didn’t derail him forever. Good to know that “past performance is not always an indicator of future failure (or success.)

Exodus 2

Exodus 2

1 Now a man of the house of Levi married a Levite woman, 2 and she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him for three months. 3 But when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch. Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile.

So I finally made it to Exodus

And here we have the Bible go all Charleston Heston on us.

(And as a sidebar, I do think it is incredibly curious that the TV networks insist on scheduling "The Ten Commandments" on Easter. As if it has anything to do with Easter, but rather some programming vp says to another, "hey we have this religious holiday coming up, do you have anything religious in the archives that the religious people would like to watch on the religious holiday? And if we get lucky, it will become a habit and they will watch it religiously...")

Some thoughts about this passage:

    -    a man of the house of Levi - no name, just "a man"    -    and interestingly enough, the             "man" married a "woman."    -    That's it - no "from the line of....blah, blah, blah," or a bushel         of begats, just (cue the Brady   Bunch theme song..."here's the story, of a....man...."  

    -   "...she hid him for three months" - The Bible is full of all kinds of miracles, but I think this             verse, where the anonymous Momma was able to somehow hide a baby for 90 days. I             have had three different newborns around my house, and frankly I find it nearly impossible,         yea verily miraculous, that she could hide a fussy baby for three months. I think it is much         easier to explain walking on water or Jonah and the Whale than this one.   

-    "she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch." - this goes back to the          earlier thought. How does a woman with a newborn possible have time to run down to the          early Egyptian verison of Hobby Lobby and pick up a "Pitch your own basket kit." Seriously?      You barely have time to eat, sleep, and well nothing else with a baby, let alone try and get         your inner Martha Stewart on.

    -    "Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile." -         Don't think I could do it. Not that there haven't been times, where I thought 'is it legal to put the     girls in long lasting Rapid Rive Rampage ride' but I just don;t think I could put my baby in the     basket of the Nile, which I imagine to be teeming with snakes and crocodiles and all sorts of     vermin. It would be tough to do this.

Though I am glad the "woman" did because otherwise, what would we watch on Easter? 

Genesis 50

Genesis 50

So Joseph died at the age of a hundred and ten. And after they embalmed him, he was placed in a coffin in Egypt.

Well this took longer than I thought...I stared reading reading through the Bible, to get a little context on th e whole thing on August 25,2009. And now five months later I have made it through one whole book.

At this pace I am going to have to live as long as Methuselah to make it through to Revelation.

The good (and bad, I guess) news about Genesis is that is have some of the greatest hits of the Bible:

• Creation
• Adam and Eve
• The fall of Man
• Cain and Abel
• Noah
• The flood
• Abraham
• Issac
• Jacob
• Joseph

So what have I learned in my very poky parade through Genesis:

• God is patient
• God has limits (not in what he can do, but in what he will tolerate.)
• God is very loving
• God is very creative.
• The Bible is interesting
• And sometimes weird
• And sometime confusing
• And every now and then seems to not make sense.
• God has a pretty strong opinion of what needs to happen.
• God did not make us all robots.
• God did make us to be very messy.

And perhaps most importantly, i have learned some things I did not know before August 25.

Exodus here I come...

Genesis 48:14

Genesis 48:14

But Israel reached out his right hand and put it on Ephraim's head, though he

was the younger, and crossing his arms, he put his left hand on Manasseh's head, even though Manasseh was the firstborn. 

God is God and I am not.

I have trouble with that sometimes.

Because I am so smart, and so clever, and so funny, and so talented, and so totally awesome...

Or so I think.

As i read this verse about Israel doing the old crosser-oo and giving Ephraim the super-cool first blessing and giving Manasseh the leftover blessing, I was reminded of all the times in Genesis I have read about "first born getting the blessing...first born getting the blessing."

It happens all the time.

Except for when it doesn't.

In situations like this.

Or with Israel/Jacob loving Joseph the most and giving him the blessing. Or when Jacob scammed Esau. Or other times I'm sure, but I just can't remember right now.

The point is that God often has "a thing" that looks it always is ro always will be, except sometime that "thing" just isn't or doesn't. Like with the last minute super cross here in Genesis 48.

I used to/often do/probably most always will get a little sideways at God about stuff that doesn't go the way I want. The way I think it ought to go. The way "it has always gone before for everyone else and I really think it should go that way for me because it's fair, yeah know God..."

Especially with Madison. Our 13-year-old-daughter with the brain injury and seizure disorder and a litany of other problems. Because Madison was born "normal."

She did not have a hard birth or problems in utero. There was no "uh-oh" ultrasound or a ob/gyn saying "I think we need to talk."

Just the opposite. It was bells and whistles and showers and paint the nursery and "I wonder what he/she will look like" and (this is the biggest of all) "We don't care what sex of baby we have, we just want him.her to be healthy."

And she was.

Big and bright and beautiful as a button.

Until she was five months old. And a germ from her first ear infection somehow found its way into her bloodstream and then into the lining of her brain and before you could say "what's going on" she was on life support with bacterial meningitis.

And that sucked.

But here is the thing I have (often painfully) learned in the last dozen years.

God is God.

And just because nearly all healthy babies become healthy kids doesn't mean mine will. And just because  kids hardly ever have traumatic brain injury doesn't mean mine won't. And because that most kids born with normal intelligence and faculties will proceed through life like that doesn't mean that mine will.

And that is (mostly) ok.

Because God is God.

I have not always felt that way. I may not entirely feel that way tomorrow.

But most days, I am thrilled that God decided to toss aside the "most of the time" stuff for Madison. And I can have a whole new set of unique life experiences and outlook and hope and joy that I very well could have missed if He had not done the big "'God is God and I know the best for everything every time crosser-oo" (like with Ephraim and Manasseh and the blessing) with her.

Genesis 46:10

Genesis 46:10

The sons of Simeon: Jemuel, Jamin, Ohad, Jakin, Zohar and Shaul the son of a Canaanite woman.

These were the sons Leah bore to Jacob in Paddan Aram, [a] besides his daughter Dinah. These sons and daughters of his were thirty-three in all.

In my big black leatehr Bible (NIV Study Bible by Zondervan) there is a note about Genesis 46:15. It says "There are 34 names in vv. 8-15. To bring the number to 33, the name Ohad in v.10 should probably be removed, since it does not appear in the parallel lists in Nu 26:12-13; 1Ch 4:24. The Hebrew form of 'Ohad' looks very much like that of the nearby 'Zohar' (see Ex. 6:15) and a later scribe probably added Ohad to the text accidentally." 

OK, here's the question...

For along time I have heard that the Bible is perfect, infallible word of God. And yet here there is a clear (i hesitate to say discrepancy for fear of lightening form the sky) but rather an "issue" with v. 15 saying there are "33" sons and daughters of Jacob, and yet the list in verses 8-15 shows 34 names.

The note from the study Bible gives some context to this, but I am still confused.

If the "scribe" made a typo, why has it not been fixed, or if it is not a typo, what then?

where does this leave the perfect Bible discussion?

I know it is not a big, giant,end of the world issue, but it is a bit unsettling.

(And if it is neither, I think Ohad has a right to be really mad about being dismissed, left off the list, and out of the other chapters...)

Genesis 42:1

Genesis 42:1

When Jacob learned that there was grain in Egypt, he said to his sons,

"Why do you just keep looking at each other?" 

I may have just found my favorite passage in the Bible.

Or at lest my favorite passage in the first 42 chapters and 1 verse of the Bible.

To reset the scene, Jacob's favorite son, Joseph is the Pharaoh's's right hand guy, interpreter of dreams, manager of the empire, keeper of the food. And just as he explained would happen to Pharaoh, there is a severe famine all around. Yet because of good planning and foresight, Egypt has become the storehouse for the region.

Jacob and his other sons were living in the land of Canaan, and like all the others there were starving.

I can imagine a scene where the 10 brothers are sitting around fussing about their situation. "Oh I'm hungry...anyone got a rock to chew on...this is not fair...let's put together a committee to solve the food situation...why isn't anyone doing something about this...blah, blah, blah..."

At which point Jacob walks in, looks around at his boys, strokes his beard, shakes his head, taps his foot to get their attention and says, "why do you just keep looking at each other?"

As in "what is your problem, this thing is not going to solve itself by just sitting here and whining. You know where the food is, so get off your butts and go get some food."

This is a great challenge for me.

No need to worry about things or fuss about the situation at hand or how unfair it is(or might seem) just stop sitting there "looking at each other" and do something.

Anything.

Action trumps inaction every time.

I have always told my girls that God does not require us to be perfect in everything (anything) we do, he just wants us to SHOW UP.Seems like we always are looking for what might be instead of acting on what is. 

God does not want the "what if" or the "maybe someday."

He wants the "follow me right now."

This is what Jacob told his sons. Stop looking, stop wondering, stop worrying, stop looking at each other and do something.

Genesis 40:23 - Genesis 41:9

Genesis 40:23 - Genesis 41:9

23 The chief cupbearer, however, did not remember Joseph; he forgot him.

When two full years had passed, Pharaoh had a dream:

9 Then the chief cupbearer said to Pharaoh, "Today I am reminded of my shortcomings. 

I am a forgetful person. Anyone who knows me will tell you that. I forget things to do and what I am at the store to buy and where I parked my car. And I do not discriminate between forgetting important things and forgetting insignificant things. I forget them all the same. I am an equal opportunity forgetter.

And yet, I am strangely comforted by these three verses.

If you'll remember, Joseph has been (wrongly) thrown in prison. While in prison he meets two of the Pharaohs's  key guys; the baker and the cupbearer.

(I must admit, every time I read about these guys I think of Beauty and the Beast. Or the nursery rhyme about the "butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker.")

While in prison, both of these guys had a dream. And Joseph was able to interpret the dream for them. Good news for the cupbearer, the baker...well....he was done. 

And so the cupbearer promised that he wwould put in a good for for Joe with the Pharaoh.

Or rather I am sure he meant to...

But he did...

TWO (JOSEPH SITTING IN A FUNKY PRISON) YEARS LATER...

Better late than never right?

Try that one on Joseph.

Thought it is curious how God uses every person Joseph meets and every bit of time for the end good in Joe's life and his purpose.

So today I will try to doa  better job of remembering things. Especially if I end up in jail with a cupbearer...

Genesis 39

Genesis 39

Now Joseph had been taken down to Egypt. 

A Genesis 39 haiku.

Joe went to Egypt.

Mrs. Potiphar "wink, wink."

Joe said "no!" Uh-oh...