This morning I begin 1-2 Kings. Here’s how the book looks in Wordle.
Today is the first day since I started this project that I have been on schedule. That won’t last long if I continue to find distractions like Wordle.
March 5
If you’ve ever wondered how much a book costs, you ‘ll want to read this NY Times article.
If you like Amazon and have time to wait for the price to drop, you might find this site useful: http://www.camelcamelcamel.com/
Krauthammer is good again.
Thomas Sowell on the health care cost problem:
Nothing would lower costs more than having each patient pay those costs. And nothing is less likely to happen….
What politicians want to do is look good by imposing mandates, and then let the insurance companies look bad by raising the premiums to cover the additional costs.
March 2
What would I know about you if I knew the Google searches you made in the last month? What does God think, since he does know. This is worth considering.
BTW, how does Google always know exactly what you want? It’s all about algorithms.
Since I’m talking Google, did you know that the best man in my wedding works for them? (I bet that he never brags about me.)
Does the world need more theology/Bible professors? I don’t agree with everything this blogger says, but it may stimulate your thinking if you ‘re in or heading for this field.
I bet that some of my readers would be interested in this online Bible video project. I’m signed up. (I drew 1 Sam 22:1-4, where David hides in the Cave of Adullam. Too bad I can’t do it on location. Part of me is thinking about switching to something in Isaiah, but you can’t exactly choose the passage you want.)
Tomorrow our oldest turns 12.
Salvation in Judges
I was reading a chapter on the book of Judges today and I came across a sentence that stopped me in my tracks.
God did not wait until His people had cleaned up their lives (i.e., repented) before He saved them. He delivered them when they cried to Him for help ([Judges] 3:9, 15; 4:3; 6:6-9; 10:10, 12; 16:28; cf. Rom. 10:3).
Upon reflection, I recalled that this writer rejects the view that is sometimes called “Lordship Salvation” in favor of “Free Grace.” But I am mystified that he would find in Judges support for his position!
Before you race through to read my comments, you might want to go back and think through what this guy is saying. Do you agree? What are the problems with his statement? [Don’t worry, I ‘ll wait.]
A salient point that may not be so fresh in your mind is the cyclical nature of the events in Judges. The people are saved from external oppression only until the judge dies. Then they go back to their wicked ways.
Now if I’m going to see a paradigm for salvation today in the deliverances described in Judges, I would apply it this way: dear visitor to church, please walk down the aisle and say you love Jesus. He ‘ll stop your boss from harassing you and he ‘ll help you to quit smoking but your heart will be unchanged and you ‘ll still go to hell.
There is no doubt that God is a God of grace and he gives what his people don’t deserve. This is very clear from Judges and elsewhere. But I wouldn’t want to use that as an argument that a new heart is not required.
As an aside, I reject the silly equation of “cleaned up their lives” with “repented” in the above quotation as well, though I’ve heard it more than once as a characterization of “Lordship Salvation.”
[Note: this chapter was in a book published in 1991 by a seminary faculty that (at that time) was very much against “Lordship Salvation.” MacArthur’s first book on the subject came out in 1988. That it was a hot issue at the time may have contributed to some indefensible statements.]
On Judges and Reading Whole Books
Today I read Judges. I don’t know exactly, but I estimate that I spent about five hours reading through the book (once). It was an exceptional journey. I’ve suggested here before that we need to read more books (and less stories and chapters). Things come to life in a different way if you read the whole book. Stories that don’t seem related actually are. Incidental comments aren’t incidental when you remember what happened six chapters back. You see threads and themes. You see the big picture. It’s a wonderful privilege. If you have a Bible at home, I recommend that you try this. And not just for Philippians, but for Judges or Deuteronomy or Genesis. I could write twenty posts on things I learned and observations I made today.
I can only comment briefly, but here are a few fresh things that come from reading the whole book.
The Ephraimites are jerks. They don’t show up for the battle, but they show up after the victory has been won. And they want the spoils. And if you ‘re not ready to share, they ‘re ready to fight you. This is their character. You see it in both the stories of Gideon (where he is nice) and Jephthah (where he is not).
Leadership is a good thing. The people do well when they have a leader, but as soon as he dies, the people turn wicked again. Judges is an apologetic for the monarchy. Maybe one of the elders who came to Samuel when he was getting old wrote the book. (Not really, but you see my point.)
God put the Levites throughout the land so that they would witness to all the tribes for him. Instead they decided to be entrepreneurs, serving at idolatrous shrines for whoever paid the most.
The Abimelech story sticks out like a sore thumb. Unlike the stories before and after it, there’s no judge, there’s no deliverance from oppression, and there’s no peace. It is the story of a curse fulfilled, of God getting revenge.
If you read the whole book straight through, when you start chapter 20, this verse will blow you out of the water: “Then all the Israelites from Dan to Beersheba and from the land of Gilead came out as one man.”
I have a problem with Jabesh Gilead. If all of the people were killed, why does Saul’s family celebrate Thanksgiving here each year? How does he have family there that he is interested in saving (1 Sam 11) and that later save him (1 Sam 31)?
Judah looks good; Benjamin looks bad. But Benjamin defeats Judah in the first (and maybe second) battles.
The Levite who turned his concubine over to the Benjamites is a wretched man. Why did he ever go to rescue her from dad in the first place? (Don’t try to answer my questions without reading the stories carefully; I’m not putting all of the details into my descriptions or questions.)
Was the tabernacle and ark always at Shiloh? I’ve always thought so. But it doesn’t seem like it in chapters 19-21, especially when we get directions to Shiloh at the end.
So that’s a few thoughts at the end of a long day. I’ve read and taught these stories (most of them) many dozens of times. But this is the first time that I’ve ever carefully read through the whole book. All I did was read the book itself; I didn’t look at study notes or commentaries. Tomorrow I ‘ll do some reading in other books. I may change my mind on some things, I ‘ll certainly gain some understanding in some areas, and I may come up with new questions.
My plea to you is this: find 3 or 4 hours in your life and do this. Pick a book you want to “crack” and just work through it, writing (or typing) notes as you go (I have about 15 pages of typed notes from today). If you aren’t delighted with the results, I ‘ll give you your money back. If you do it and you ‘re inclined to send me an email or comment here, please do. The Bible is a better book than any other you have read, are reading, or will read. It’s worth more than a 10-minute devotional in the morning.
Redating the Conquest
I read this today and couldn’t figure out if the guy is trying to rewrite history or if he is just ignorant.
“It is widely argued that Joshua’s account of the conquest does not match what is known from archaeology about the patterns of occupation and destruction of the cities in Canaan….Conservative explanations for these disharmonies include redating the conquest from the generally accepted thirteenth century to the fifteenth century….” (J. G. McConville, “Joshua, Book of,” Dictionary for Theological Interpretation of the Bible, 405).
February 18
We had almost a foot of snow at our home in Dallas last week. It snowed for about 24 hours straight. That apparently set a record. The kids got an extra day off school (thus a four-day weekend) and everyone had lots of fun. Unfortunately it’s staying cold; the neighbor’s snowman is still standing a week later.
If you buy your own health insurance, or expect to one day, you might find this article of interest. It’s an inside look at what BlueCross of Texas will refuse coverage for. I’m not an advocate of ObamaCare, but there is a real problem when relatively healthy people cannot buy health insurance. You don’t have that problem with socialized medicine.
If you buy electronic books, you ‘re buying only a license. I’ve said it before, but this is more evidence. People who shelled out up to thousands of dollars for Zondervan books on Zondervan software now have…nothing. Well, you can continue to use the software on your computer, but it ‘ll never be updated, and no new books will ever be added. Zondervan is moving their books over to Logos. If you own a Zondervan book already, you get to pay an extra 60% to buy those books again (100% extra if you don’t follow the restrictive conditions). Electronic books in proprietary format are a bonanza for publishers. You think you ‘re buying, but you ‘re just renting. And you never know when you ‘ll lose all you’ve got.
Here’s something I don’t understand: you pay hundreds of dollars for this gadget and then $70+ every single month. And yet every email you send is an advertisement for the company, and oftentimes the ad is longer than your email. I’d say it’s a brilliant strategy, except I can’t imagine why anyone would fall for it.
If you’ve ever wondered what the digits in your credit card number mean, here’s the answer.
If you ‘re familiar with the “five love languages,” you might find this response helpful.
Ah! You See!
You probably are familiar with the story of Jim Elliot and the five missionaries who were killed by the Aucas in South America in the 1950s. I recently read the story of their work by Elisabeth Elliot and I thought that she made a valuable observation in the second epilogue (written in 1996). She considers how we assess whether something was “worthwhile.” With the death of these five remarkable young men, the world (and the cause of Christ) lost a lot. But their deaths would be “worthwhile,” we think, if five, ten, twenty (pick your number) Aucas came to Christ. Her thoughts on this reflect her contemplation of this question for decades.
The massacre was a hard fact, widely reported at the time, surprisingly well remembered by many even today. It was interpreted according to the measure of one’s faith or faithlessness—full of meaning or empty. A triumph or a tragedy. An example of brave obedience or a case of fathomless foolishness. The beginning of a great work, a demonstration of the power of God, a sorrowful first act that would lead to a beautifully predictable third act in which all puzzles would be solved, God would vindicate Himself, Waoranis [Aucas] would be converted, and we could all ‘feel good ‘ about our faith. Bulletins about progress were hailed with joy and a certain amount of ‘Ah! you see! ‘ But the danger lies in seizing upon the immediate and hoped-for, as though God’s justice is thereby verified, and glossing over as neatly as possible certain other consequences, some of them inevitable, others simply the result of a botched job. In short, in the Waorani story as in other stories, we are consoled as long as we do not examine too closely the unpalatable data. By this evasion we are willing still to call the work ‘ours, ‘ to arrogate to ourselves whatever there is of success, and to deny all failure.
A healthier faith seeks a reference point outside all human experience, the Polestar which marks the course of all human events, not forgetting that impenetrable mystery of the interplay of God’s will and man’s (1996 ed., 265-66).
For this alone the book was worth reading.
Deuteronomy
I have a strict schedule for my arguments project this year, but unfortunately I got a couple of days behind right at the start with the Israel return and illness. This past week I’ve been working on Deuteronomy, but when I woke up this morning I had not written any of my argument proper (I had finished my outline and another section). I was threatened with the possibility of getting another day behind, with no hope of catching up, ever. So I kept my seat in the chair from 8 to 6 and wrote through the entire book. I have about an hour of clean-up to do, but I think I ‘ll make it so that I can wake up in the morning fresh to tackle Joshua.
For a break, I thought I’d take a look at how my writing looks in Wordle. If you don’t know, Wordle makes a word cloud based upon the frequency of word use. Thus a larger word was used more times. Here’s how my 21 pages look:
Deuteronomy from my perspective
Then I thought I’d see what the book of Deuteronomy itself looks like. Naturally they ‘ll come out differently, as, to use one example, Deuteronomy never uses the word “Deuteronomy.” I use the word “covenant” a lot, but the idea is implicit throughout the book. There may be some other interesting differences, but my break time is over.
Deuteronomy from Moses ‘ perspective
Nahal Paran
I’d love to do a “favorite days in my life” series, but I doubt anyone would be interested but me. But I came across this photo tonight and it reminded me of a very good day that ended in Nahal Paran. Spectacular scenery, a gazillion stars at night, and good friends.
April 20, 2007