Just kill me now!

This is a picture taken at the Hubbard Glacier in Alaska, so it's not the dessert and these are not Israelites, but it is wilderness and there were a lot of people.

As I got ready to read Numbers I wasn't very excited, but I am loving the relationship between God and Moses. It reminds me of Fiddler On The Roof. They almost banter back and forth.

Reading this morning in chapter 11 the people are complaining because they have no meat and Moses goes to God and says,"Why have you dealt ill with your servant?  ... Did I conceive all these people? ...If you will treat me like this, kill me at once." I cracked up. I could just hear Moses, "Really God? Am I actually responsible for this crowd? If this is what you have in mind, just kill me now."

My favorite part comes in chapter 12:6 & 7 after Miriam and Aaron have been bad-mouthing Moses, God responds to them with this, "Hear my words; if there is a prophet among you, I the Lord make myself known to him in a vision; I speak with him in a dream. Not so with my servant Moses. He is faithful in all my house. With him I speak mouth to mouth, clearly and not in riddles, and he beholds the form of the Lord." Mouth to mouth with God. Picture that. It's close. Friends around the table, honest, real ... 

The guest of sinners

That's Jesus. Maybe it's the new version, but I hadn't seen it quite this way before. After Jesus calls Zacchaeus out of the tree, Luke 19:7 says, "And when they saw it, they all grumbled, 'He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.'"

I can hear the disgust and see the sneer. The spiritual people of the day judged both Jesus and Zacchaeus, because Jesus dared to be the guest of a sinner, not just a guest even, but a self invited guest.

I'm glad, because he could come to my house.

Jonah and Nineveh and me

This picture isn't Nineveh, but I figure Las Vegas fits.
I'm in Luke now and playing catch up this week. I am still sick and tired of being sick, but finally feeling some brain power returning, which is surprising as I am on three different forms of steroids, (I promised Steve he need not fear roid rage, as my energy is still lacking), a new antibiotic, (the Mercedes of antibiotics was a total disappointment) and some sort of narcotic that is meant to suppress my cough, (I wonder what it would be like without this).
I was reading one of Paul's letters yesterday, hence the run-on sentence, he inspired me.
Back to Luke. In chapter 11 Jesus brings up Jonah and Nineveh and I was struck by the contrast between the mercy of God and the judgement of Jonah.
In Jonah's eyes the people of Nineveh weren't worthy of mercy, in God's eyes they were.
Earlier, in Luke chapter 7 a sinful woman comes to anoint Jesus, weeping with every drop of scented oil, cleaning the dirt of the road with her tears and wiping it away with her hair. The comment of the host is, "Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, 'If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner.'" Luke 7:39.
Jesus knew exactly who and what sort of woman was touching him. He saw past her circumstance, her failings and right into her heart. She was a sinner, a repentant sinner, seeking mercy and forgiveness and receiving it.
I want to be like Jesus, but I still struggle with the Jonah in me.

Funny Father

The pictures really don't have anything to do with anything except that I think they are funny. These are part of the artwork that makes an average bridge in Perth, Scotland whimsical.
I have moved beyond Exodus in my reading now, but I keep thinking about a couple of verses in chapter 32. Moses is on the mountain with God and he has been up there a while. The people at the bottom of the mountain are apparently feeling deserted so they start building an idol. It's starts in verse 7, "And the Lord said to Moses, 'Go down, for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves.'" That struck me as an odd statement, and then I actually laughed when I got to verse 11. Please don't judge me, because the circumstances were anything but humorous, but really, don't you at least have to smile?
"But Moses implored the Lord his God and said, 'O LORD, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand?'"

The next time I hear one parent accuse the other with, "Look what your child did!" I will think of Moses and God on a mountain.

Curiosity

I have always asked, "Why?" or "Why not?" It can be annoying. My Mandarin teacher in Taiwan used to say, "Tchrin Un, (my Chinese name) there is no 'Why' there is only do!"  But I really like to know why.
Charlie and Caroline love to climb trees to see what they can see. Curiosity I think must be a godly trait. It drives us to explore and discover and press in to find answers.
What a surprise to find that my assumption is Biblical. While reading Exodus 3 this morning I found this passage (3:3-4) when Moses sees the burning bush. Somehow I always thought God sort of drew him to the bush, but it says, "And Moses said, 'I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.' When the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush."
Moses was curious and God called to him after he took the time to explore the mystery.
When Steve was in Israel last fall he asked Ray VanderLaan about questioning the Rabbi. Ray's answer was that questions were and are fine, but first you follow. It's while you are following the Rabbi that you ask your questions, but you don't wait to get your answers before you follow. The answers come while you are walking in obedience.
So, in my interpretation; Curiosity which provokes obedience ,followed by questions as we walk and talk with God, promotes greater faith, which increases our courage to pursue the next curiosity, which ....

Moses had lots of questions, but he started his adventure with God because he was curious, he wanted to know what was going on with that bush, and then God spoke.

Those amazing logs

This is my son-in-law Richie last year, standing next to a tree stump in the Redwood forest in California. I thought of it when I was reading Matthew 7:3 "Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?"
I love the drive up the coast from San Francisco heading north. Stopping for a stretch and standing next to one of these huge trees creates a sense of awe and wonder. They are huge, beautiful and amazing, and the reason I thought of them is this; they block out most of the sun.
It is dark in the Redwood forest. It's hard to see until you adjust to the little bit of light that finds it's way through the canopy of green above you.
It's like that when we try to see the faults in the life of another person. The lush canopy of our own faults, severely hampers our ability to see in order to do surgery on the target of our judgement. So, I think I will keep this picture in the back of my mind next time I rush to judgement. What, in my life, creates the shadows that make it hard to see? Maybe I need to take a few steps out into the light to look up and see what I need to work on myself first. I certainly need more light if I am going to, lovingly, remove the speck in the eye of another.

Happy 2010!

Christmas was a blast with a baby in the house. It started with Papa teaching Lucy one of the best parts of morning, the wonderful aroma of coffee.
Now the new year is already begun and I have begun again with Genesis, as promised. I noticed something a little disquieting. We have been looking forward to retiring some day, but as I read Genesis 2, two things caught my attention.
First was the comforting part. Adam and Eve didn't just wander into the garden, and it wasn't necessarily where they were when God hand crafted them. God intentionally put them in the garden and with a purpose. He planned that they would work. Work didn't come after sin was introduced; it got harder, but it was apparently always God's plan that man (and woman) work. So where did we come up with the concept of retirement? I wonder. Maybe I will keep my eyes focused to see the answer to that question as I go on this time through.
Just a heads up. Our church is switching to a new version of the Bible this year, so when I quote scripture it will be from the English Standard Version. I am learning to be compliant. We shall see how long that lasts.