It's God's Grace, Stupid! - Deuteronomy 9:5-6

"You are not going to take possession of their land because of your righteousness or your integrity. Instead, the Lord your God will drive out these nations before you because of their wickedness, in order to keep the promise He swore to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Understand that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stiff-necked people."

First, let me say that I'm not calling you (the reader) stupid. So please don't be offended by the title.

Remember, the basic premise of these Bible meditations is that I'm talking to myself--meditating.

So, yes, I guess I'm calling myself stupid. But sometimes I have to be harsh with myself because, like the ancient Israelites, I am a "stiff-necked" person. (Stiff-necked means willful.)

But if anything I say to myself you find you can apply to your life also, then that is my hope and my prayer.

"It's God's Grace, Stupid" states, more colloquially of course, what Moses was reminding the Israelites as they were about to experience great success in conquering and possessing the land of Canaan, the promised land. In fact, I like to think that these are the words Moses muttered under his breath to the rebellious and disobedient Israelites in this warning about self-righteousness!

Life's Not Fair - Ecclesiastes 9:11-12

"Again I saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift, or the battle to the strong, or bread to the wise, or riches to the discerning, or favor to the skillful; rather, time and chance happen to all of them. For man certainly does not know his time: like fish caught in a cruel net or like birds caught in a trap, so people are trapped in an evil time as it suddenly falls on them.

In a previous post I remarked that the Teacher, the writer of Ecclesiastes, is a deep thinker that has tried everything in life. If he hasn't tried it, then he has at least thought about it. And he has concluded that everything in this world is transient and that obedience to God is the only thing that gives life meaning.

That being the case, the Teacher then stipulates in Ecclesiastes 9 that all human beings share the same fate. The righteous and the wicked. The good and the bad. The saint and the sinner. They all die but don't know when it will happen or under what circumstances (vs. 2-3).

If you are a human being, you are subject to both the downturns and upturns of life. And just because you are a child of God doesn't exempt you from suffering tragedy and despair. You are a human being. Bad things happen to good people. Good things happen to bad people.

"That hardly seems fair," you complain. "Sorry, but life's not fair," the Teacher declares.

And the reality is that life isn't fair, at least from our point of view.

Listen - Deuteronomy 6:4-5

"Listen, Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is One. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength."

These two verses are commonly known as the Shema. They are titled after the first word of verse 4, the Hebrew word for "listen."

The Shema is the foundational principle for the Ten Commandments, which contain the essence of God's covenant with Israel. The Shema is considered to be the greatest commandment. When Jesus was asked which commandment was greatest, He cited this passage (Mark 12:28-30).

The Shema is God's Word, His command, that is worth hearing. It's an eternal truth which we should stop and listen to. It's like the television commercial that used to air advertising a certain stock investment firm by showing people stopping whatever they were doing to eavesdrop on a conversation about investing because "when [this firm] talks, people listen!"

Life: An Exercise in Futility? - Ecclesiastes 1:2-3; 6:17

"Everything is futile. What does a man gain for all his efforts that he labors at under the sun... For who knows what is good for man in life, in the few days of his futile life that he spends like a shadow? Who can tell man what will happen after him under the sun?"

It seems like the writer of Ecclesiastes, who calls himself the Teacher and is probably Solomon, had a jaundiced, even cynical outlook on life. Maybe it was really King Solomon rather than Soren Kierkegaard who was the first existentialist philosopher!

Solomon, whose God-given intelligence helped him become one of the wisest and richest people who ever lived, probably considered life and the universe in much more depth and detail than most of us do or are even capable of knowing.

So I find some comfort in being average and not looking too deeply into life's challenges. In fact, adhering to this proverb allows me to stay safe and secure in my comfort zone: "Give me neither poverty nor wealth; feed me with the food I need. Otherwise, I might have too much and deny You, saying, 'Who is the Lord?' or I might have nothing and steal, profaning the name of my God" (Proverbs 30:8-9).

God Fights For You - Deuteronomy 3:21-22

"I commanded Joshua at that time: Your own eyes have seen everything the Lord your God has done to these two kings. The Lord will do the same to all the kingdoms you are about to enter. Don’t be afraid of them, for the Lord your God fights for you."

These are words spoken by Moses when he transferred leadership over Israel to Joshua. There's no enemy that Joshua and the Israelites should fear because...

The Lord Your God fights for you!

Although Moses is referencing future battles and wars that Joshua will encounter as Israel begins its conquest of the land of Canaan, he speaks of God's enabling power in the present tense.

The Lord Your God fights for you!

What's the Message? - Luke 4:36-37

"Amazement came over them all, and they kept saying to one another, 'What is this message? For He commands the unclean spirits with authority and power, and they come out!' And news about Him began to go out to every place in the vicinity."

After Jesus was baptized by John and then tempted by the devil for forty days, He officially began His ministry. Jesus started out by teaching in synagogues in Galilee near His hometown of Nazareth..

When He came to Nazareth, the people of the town, His neighbors and friends, didn't like His teaching and drove Him out of town and tried to throw Him off a cliff. So Jesus went to Capernaum, a town in Galilee that seemed to become the home base for His ministry.

There Jesus taught in the synagogue on the Sabbath and the people "were astonished at His teaching because His message had authority" (vs. 32).

Now Dr. Luke does not elaborate on the exact nature of the authority that Jesus demonstrated through His teaching in Capernaum. So hold that thought and we will come back to it.

God's Know-It-Alls - Proverbs 28:5

"Evil men do not understand justice, but those who seek the Lord understand everything." Those who seek and know God bear the unique responsibility of assimilating God's spiritual kingdom, the Kingdom of God, into the reality in which they live because they are residents of both realms—the present created order and the future spiritual order.

But we live, think, and experience the world in which we live through our five senses. Unfortunately, according to the order of this world, if you cannot see it, hear it, touch it, feel it, or smell it, then it does not exist.

However, the Kingdom of God is an invisible reality and to experience its reality is beyond the scope of the five senses. Kingdom citizens must have a “sixth sense” that allows them to experience the reality of God and His Kingdom in their lives.

Irrevocable - Numbers 23:19

"God is not a man who lies, or a son of man who changes His mind. Does he speak and not act, or promise and not fulfill."

This verse was proclaimed over Israel in his second oracle by the diviner Balaam after Balak, king of Moab, hired him to pronounce a curse on the Israelites.

After their forty-year wandering in the wilderness was complete, Moses lead the Israelites toward Canaan, the promised land, following a northward route to the plains of Moab. Israel encamped in Moab on the east side of the Jordan River and across from the Canaanite city of Jericho.

Moab was occupied by what was probably a confederation of tribal people and Balak was called Moab's king. Upon seeing the great number of Israelites encamped in Moabite territory, Balak was deeply disturbed that the land could not support both Israel and the Moabites. If Balak started a war with Israel to drive them from the land, he feared that Israel's superior numbers could overpower the Moabite army.

Two Choices - Proverbs 18:10-11

"The name of Yahweh is a strong tower; the righteous run to it and are protected. A rich man’s wealth is his fortified city; in his imagination it is like a high wall."

At first glance, you may read these verses as two individual proverbs, each having its own meaning. Upon a closer look you will see that these two proverbs are like two sides of the same coin:
     two worldviews,
          two ways of life,
               two realities,
                    two choices for life!

A strong tower was a central place in an ancient city to which people could run when threatened by an enemy--a place of refuge. Yahweh's name implies God's character as the eternal, powerful, faithful, covenant-keeping God.

The Value of Death - Psalm 116:15

"The death of His faithful ones is valuable in the Lord's sight." A little over a month ago I wrote some reflections on this verse. After more reflection and meditation on this verse, I find I have some more to say about death and dying as I come to the first anniversary of the death of my wife, Diane.

You may think this is going to be another vexatious discussion trying to make sense of it all. Certainly my wife's death a year ago instigated an obsession with finding meaning to her life and death. But it has also jilted me into considering my own mortality (and immortality).

Undoubtedly, death is an uncomfortable subject to talk about and, thus, not a subject to which we give a whole lot of thought. So most of us aren't really looking for explanations about death until we are personally confronted by it through the death of a loved one.

We don't think much about death and dying and when we speak about it, we do so using terms like "tragic" or "untimely," which always gives death a negative connotation. To us, death is the Grim Reaper!

But the grief we suffer at the death of a loved one creates a unique opportunity for us to develop some real perspectives and convictions about death and dying.

Difficult Christians - 1 Peter 4:14-19

"If you are ridiculed for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. None of you, however, should suffer as a murderer, a thief, an evildoer, or a meddler. But if anyone suffers as a 'Christian,' he should not be ashamed but should glorify God in having that name. For the time has come for judgment to begin with God’s household, and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who disobey the gospel of God? And if a righteous person is saved with difficulty, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner? So those who suffer according to God’s will should, while doing what is good, entrust themselves to a faithful Creator."

Let me begin this post with a disclaimer: You might find something I say in this post offensive to you as a Christian (and/or sports fan). But please don't get mad at me because I want you to like me and read my blog.

Get mad at the Apostle Peter, because he's the one that originally said it! I'm only explaining what Peter said in the context of our post-modern lives.

If you don't agree with what I have to say, then write a comment and identify my errors. But please do it with love because I'm a sensitive guy!

So please forgive me if this particular post seems more like "preaching" than like "meditating."

For some time I've been disturbed by people, institutions, and ministries that bear the name of Christ and then live and operate the same way that everyone else in the world does (and sometimes worse). Recently, a well-known Christian university with a very successful sports program was sanctioned for recruiting violations. They broke the rules of good conduct and fair play in recruiting students to play sports at their university, and they did it repeatedly over a long period of time. But they won some championships!