Category: devotional

Psalm 19:8b

 

     the commandment of the Lord is pure,

       enlightening the eyes;

 

            Just for a moment, let’s take a look at the words here that help us grasp the perfection and impact of God’s word.

 

            The word for commandment is interesting.  In Exodus 24:12, it is combined with Torah to say what God gave Moses on the mountain.  It is the Hebrew word mitzvah, from which we get the word bar-mitzvah, son of the law, which is the Jewish boy’s right of passage from childhood to adulthood.  As the commandment of God, the scripture has authority.  It is not optional.  It is the command of God that we must follow, or we rebel against him.

 

            The commandments of God are pure.  The word for pure means just that, pure, clean, innocent, or choice as in a choice offering.  The 2 other times it occurs in the psalms, it refers to one who has a pure heart.  There is no evil, no blemish, no taint of sin in God’s word.  It is completely and perfectly pure. 

 

            And these pure commands of God enlighten our eyes.  There are two possible ideas behind this phrase, and I think both perfectly apply to what the word of God does.

 

Psalm 119:130

 

     The unfolding of your words gives light;

       it imparts understanding to the simple.

 

One idea is that the word of God gives us light, imparting to us understanding or wisdom.  Without question, God’s commands do that for us, as they teach us who God is and what he demands of us.

 

But there is also…

 

1 Samuel 14:27

 

But Jonathan had not heard his father charge the people with the oath, so he put out the tip of the staff that was in his hand and dipped it in the honeycomb and put his hand to his mouth, and his eyes became bright.

 

Ezra 9:8

 

But now for a brief moment favor has been shown by the Lord our God, to leave us a remnant and to give us a secure hold within his holy place, that our God may brighten our eyes and grant us a little reviving in our slavery.

 

Psalm 13:3

 

     Consider and answer me, O Lord my God;

       light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death,

 

In all three of these passages, where light is connected to your eyes, it means to refresh or rejuvenate you.  I honestly think this is more in view in our treatment of God’s word.  Yes, God’s word gives us wisdom.  But, it also gives us life.  It gives us strength to serve God.  When we, as believers, read, meditate on, and follow the pure commands of God, we are strengthened, energized, and empowered to follow our God.

Matthew 27:24

 

So when Pilate saw that he was gaining nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.”

 

            It’s funny how much bargaining has made its way into our basic mentality.  I’m not, of course, talking about the concept of haggling for prices in the marketplace—that belongs to a different culture than my own.  No, I’m talking about the concept of bargaining for atonement.

 

            Think about it.  If you know that you are about to do something wrong or hurtful, don’t you come up with things you might say or do to somehow make yourself right or at least OK?  Don’t you rearrange your words in your mind, find the reason behind your actions that excuses you, or perhaps even think of a few good deeds that you will do to counterbalance the bad?  This is pretty standard fare for the human mind.

 

            Here’s the problem:  Bargaining does not work.  We see that with Pilate in the verse above.  Pilate had discovered that Jesus was innocent of any crime.  He knew that the Jews had handed Jesus over out of envy and fear.  Pilate knew that Jesus was not threat to lead a lawless rebellion.  Yet, when the crowd got rowdy, Pilate went ahead and allowed them to condemn Jesus to a death that Jesus did not deserve.

 

            Watch Pilate bargain with his conscience.  He washes his hands and declares himself to be innocent of Jesus’ blood.  Well, Pilate, good for you.  Good that you can just pronounce your actions OK and make that true.  But wait, did he make his actions OK?  Of course he didn’t Pilate was cowardly.  He refused to stand for what was right.  He was warned by his wife not to harm Jesus.  Yet, when Pilate feared a loss of public opinion and perhaps public stability, Pilate caved.  Yet, as he caved, Pilate tried to say that is actions were OK simply because he displayed his disgust at what was happening.

 

            The truth of the matter is that God is our ultimate Judge.  We cannot tell God how he will deal with us.  We cannot tell God, “This will all be fine so long as I give some extra money.”  No, God will not be bought by our actions.  Neither will God be swayed by our moral compass.  If we say something is OK just because we say so, we assume that we have the same right as God to declare right and wrong.  This is simply untrue.  We do not have the right to declare our actions innocent or acceptable.  It is before the King we either stand or fall.  It is before the Lord that our actions are laid bare.  We have no right to tell God that we will do X and our actions will become acceptable.  He is the one we serve; and he determines the rightness or wrongness of all that we think and do.

 

            No, you can’t bargain with God.  You can’t tell him how things ought to be handled when it comes to moral judgment.  The better way, the only way, is to surrender to the Lordship of God.  Cry out to Jesus for mercy.  Yield yourself to his judgment.  Then you will not need to go through any false hand-washing ceremonies in order to make yourself feel righteous when really nothing has changed.

2 Kings 2:23-24

 

23 He went up from there to Bethel, and while he was going up on the way, some small boys came out of the city and jeered at him, saying, “Go up, you baldhead! Go up, you baldhead!” 24 And he turned around, and when he saw them, he cursed them in the name of the Lord. And two she-bears came out of the woods and tore forty-two of the boys.

 

            The above passage is just plain weird.  IN fact, the only time I have ever really heard it referenced is when making a joke about this being the only “youth group” in the Bible.  But, is there not something more for us to learn from this passage than that kids who made fun of the prophet got mauled by bears?

 

            I think that there is something very important for us to grasp here.  Elisha was the man of God.  He was the prophet.  HE was the man who was charged with communicating to Israel the words of the living God. 

 

            The young men in the story were not at all concerned about Elisha’s role of spiritual leadership.  They were happy to make fun of him.  They called him to “Go on up.”  Perhaps they were making fun of the loss of Elijah while telling Elisha to get away too. 

 

            Be careful what you say about the men of God and the word of God.  It is no trivial thing to put down and taunt those who serve the Lord faithfully.  Perhaps you are in a church in which you don’t personally like your pastor.  What do you do?  Do you make fun of him?  Do you take cheap shots at him?  Do you criticize him to others behind the pastor’s back?  If so, I wonder how much different you sound in the ears of the Lord than those youths who made fun of God’s prophet.

 

            OH, I know, pastors are flawed.  I’m terribly flawed in far more ways than I would comfortably blog.  And, if we think clearly, we can assume Elisha was flawed too.  But Elisha was still the man of God for the people of God at that time in Israel’s history.  To mock him was to commit a very serious offense against the God who set Elisha up as prophet.  Similarly, to mock and take cheap shots at your pastor is to commit a very serious offense against the very same God.

 

            I understand that some pastors are unbiblical and dangerous.  You should do what you can to talk to such men.  IF you see your pastor failing to handle Scripture rightly, you should talk to him personally.  You should, with all love and grace, try to help him to see your point.  You should be willing to pray with the pastor and work with him to help him to serve the Lord better.  But don’t, for the love of God and his church, go out and try to hurt the ministry without you first trying to find out the heart and reasoning of the pastor. 

 

            If the pastor is in sin in some way, it is your loving job as a Christian to graciously confront him and try to help him to repent.  This is the call of Jesus from Mathew 18:15-17 that all Christians are to follow.  But if you are not willing to first follow Scripture’s call to confront the man in his sin, don’t think you will be righteous and honoring to God if you go around and gossip about someone you are unwilling to sit down and talk with.  If the pastor is doing something illegal, go through the proper channels to expose it and to put a stop to it in order to protect others.  This is by no means a shield for clergy abuse.  But it is a call for those who would make an accusation to do so properly, wisely, and in a godly way.

 

            There are always difficulties with making a blanket statement about how we are to handle any situation.  It is hard to tell somebody how to deal with a situation that you are not experiencing yourself.  But, let’s learn something from this weird passage in 2 Kings.  Let’s learn to guard the way that we speak about those who are serving God.  Let’s be careful not to mock those who have been charged with delivering to us God’s word, especially if they actually do their job and deliver that word.  No, never tolerate sin or abuse.  But be circumspect as you speak regarding those who serve the Lord.

Genesis 45:4-9

 

4 So Joseph said to his brothers, “Come near to me, please.” And they came near. And he said, “I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. 5 And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. 6 For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. 7 And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. 8 So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt.

 

            Which is ultimate, God’s sovereignty or man’s freedom?  If we believe that Joseph knows what he is talking about, the answer is that God’s will is ultimate.  Mysteriously, this is not to say that God’s will does not involve human freedom.  However, at the end of the day, when all is said and done, God is sovereign and man, even man’s freedom, is subject to the decree of the Lord.

 

            You know the story of Joseph.  His brothers sold him as a slave and shipped him off to Egypt.  Everything in that account would show us that his brothers acted of their own accord, in concert with their freedom.  The brothers would have had no way of recognizing the sovereign hand of God at work.  They did what they wanted to do.

 

            Yet, when they stand before Joseph, God pulls back the curtain.  Yes, they acted freely, but God was the one at work.  The brothers cannot receive any of the credit for the outcome of their actions.  In fact, their actions were sinful; and, in fact, the brothers bear personal moral responsibility for those actions.  Yet, if the scene can be understood by us mere mortals, we understand that, somehow, God was the ultimate actor from start to finish, though God is in no way guilty of sin.

 

            Can your view of God’s sovereignty and man’s freedom handle the words of the Scripture here?  Can you see that, while the brothers acted freely, it was ultimately God who was in control?  Can you handle that, even though hard things were done, God drove all the circumstances to work out his will for his glory?  Can you live with the fact that we are free, but that our freedom is limited by God’s sovereignty and not the other way around?

 

            It is wonderful to know that God is sovereign.  It is glorious to know that his will is always going to be ultimately accomplished.  God will not be eternally wishing that things had turned out differently.  God will never be defeated.  God’s plan will never be thwarted.  He will use man, even the sinful free choices of men, to accomplish his perfect plan; all the while God will never be guilty of sin in any form.  God will move in our desires to help us accomplish his plan, but we will never know that it was his hand moving our desires until he shows us that in eternity.  God is magnificent, and worthy of our fear, our awe, our love, and our praise.       

Genesis 44:30-34

 

30 “Now therefore, as soon as I come to your servant my father, and the boy is not with us, then, as his life is bound up in the boy’s life, 31 as soon as he sees that the boy is not with us, he will die, and your servants will bring down the gray hairs of your servant our father with sorrow to Sheol. 32 For your servant became a pledge of safety for the boy to my father, saying, ‘If I do not bring him back to you, then I shall bear the blame before my father all my life.’ 33 Now therefore, please let your servant remain instead of the boy as a servant to my lord, and let the boy go back with his brothers. 34 For how can I go back to my father if the boy is not with me? I fear to see the evil that would find my father.”

 

            One of the key, running themes in the Bible is substitution.  Though the men in the days of Jacob and his 12 sons may not have realized it, God’s plan for humanity’s rescue had always been comprised of a sacrificial substitute.  God planned, from before creation, that he would send Jesus to become the sacrificial substitute for the sins of God’s children.  Jesus would receive in himself the punishment that others deserved.

 

            That the theme of substitution is central to the Scripture’s tale is evident in what we see Judah do here in Genesis 44.  Judah, from whose line the Christ will come, stands before Joseph.  Benjamin has been found guilty of a crime before Joseph.  Judah, however, pleads with Joseph to allow him to bear the punishment in Benjamin’s stead.

  Judah will take Benjamin’s penalty in order to spare Benjamin and Jacob the pain.

 

            I love to read The Jesus Storybook Bible with my children.  The subtitle, “Every story whispers his name,” is so fitting and so glorious.  Here, in Judah, we again see the name of Jesus whispered.  Yes, Judah acted selflessly.  Yes, Judah offered to sacrifice himself for the sake of his brother.  But even more, Judah points us to the greater sacrifice.  Judah reminds us of the ultimate substitute.  Judah shows us what it will be like when Jesus walks to the cross and bears God’s wrath for the sins of those who will be saved.