8/29/2007

Nineveh: Take two

Jonah 2:10-3:5 - And the LORD commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.

Then the word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time: "Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you."

Jonah obeyed the word of the LORD and went to Nineveh. Now Nineveh was a very important city—a visit required three days. On the first day, Jonah started into the city. He proclaimed: "Forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned." The Ninevites believed God. They declared a fast, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.

I wonder where the beach was that Jonah was spit up on. Was it far from Joppa where he had started? Was it right back in Joppa that he landed? I wonder if anyone saw him come out of the fish.

I wonder if the Ninevites had heard about Jonah before he got there. Had he told his story to others who spread the news? Did that maybe help in the spreading of his real message? Not that a word from God isn't powerful enough in and of itself, but they certainly seemed ready and willing to listen to Jonah. He didn't even have to go through the whole city himself. His first hearers did a lot of secondary evangelizing for him.

8/28/2007

Tarshish or bust

Jonah 1:1-3 - The word of the LORD came to Jonah son of Amittai: "Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me."

But Jonah ran away from the LORD and headed for Tarshish. He went down to Joppa, where he found a ship bound for that port. After paying the fare, he went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the LORD.

Why Tarshish? It seems to be in the opposite direction from where he was supposed to go, but why go somewhere that required sailing? I think I remember reading a generalization once that said something to the effect that Jews don't like being on the sea.

Did Jonah have friends in Tarshish? Or was that a distant place where he knew he didn't have any friends? Was it the farthest place from where he was that he'd ever heard of? For that matter, how had he heard of this distant place? Why was there even a ship going there? For trade, probably. Trading what? Was Tarshish the most ungodly place Jonah knew of?

If you were going to run away from God today, where would you go?

Did Jonah really think he could leave God behind?

8/26/2007

Improv

Amos 6:5 - You strum away on your harps like David
and improvise on musical instruments.

I wonder if jazz really wasn't "invented" in New Orleans. And I wonder if some of those harps were maybe more like guitars.

8/21/2007

Shepherd and prophet

Amos 1:1 - The words of Amos, one of the shepherds of Tekoa—what he saw concerning Israel two years before the earthquake, when Uzziah was king of Judah and Jeroboam son of Jehoash was king of Israel.

I wonder if Amos was surprised that he was given a prophetic vision. Assuming he wrote this introduction, he makes himself sound like just one of the guys -- just an ordinary shepherd from a little place up the road called Tekoa.

Makes you wonder what surprising things God might use you for someday, doesn't it?

8/14/2007

The suffering land

Hosea 4:1-3 - Hear the word of the LORD, you Israelites,
because the LORD has a charge to bring
against you who live in the land:
"There is no faithfulness, no love,
no acknowledgment of God in the land.

There is only cursing, lying and murder,
stealing and adultery;
they break all bounds,
and bloodshed follows bloodshed.

Because of this the land mourns,
and all who live in it waste away;
the beasts of the field and the birds of the air
and the fish of the sea are dying.

I may have officially wondered about something like this before, but I think it's worth mentioning more than once.

I wonder how many of today's "natural" problems -- droughts, famines, storms, "global warming"(?), etc. -- could be connected to the ungodliness of the people living in the land.

What cost?

Hosea 3:2-3 - So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and about a homer and a lethek of barley. Then I told her, "You are to live with me many days; you must not be a prostitute or be intimate with any man, and I will live with you."

Gomer was still Hosea's wife. Why did he have to pay for her? Had she gone (back) into prostitution? Had her pimp come to reclaim her? Was she expensive? Had Hosea paid for her the first time too?

It sounds like Hosea didn't expect Gomer to stick around till death did them part. Oi! What must day to day life have been like for the two of them?

8/12/2007

The sacred raisin-cakes

Hosea 3:1 - The LORD said to me, "Go, show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another and is an adulteress. Love her as the LORD loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin-cakes."

I wonder who first decided to make raisin-cakes a sacred object. [Insert your favorite Monty Python sketch here and substitute raisin-cakes for the main topic.] Or...

Shekaniah: Rules, rules, rules. What's next...holy raisin-cakes?

[silence]

Shekaniah: No, I was kidding. Kid-ding!

I'm curious. Could you please tell me what brought you to this page by mentioning it in a comment? I won't publish the comment, if you ask me not to.

Unusual commands

Hosea 1:2-9 - When the LORD began to speak through Hosea, the LORD said to him, "Go, take to yourself an adulterous wife and children of unfaithfulness, because the land is guilty of the vilest adultery in departing from the LORD." So he married Gomer daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son.

Then the LORD said to Hosea, "Call him Jezreel, because I will soon punish the house of Jehu for the massacre at Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of Israel. In that day I will break Israel's bow in the Valley of Jezreel."

Gomer conceived again and gave birth to a daughter. Then the LORD said to Hosea, "Call her Lo-Ruhamah, for I will no longer show love to the house of Israel, that I should at all forgive them. Yet I will show love to the house of Judah; and I will save them—not by bow, sword or battle, or by horses and horsemen, but by the LORD their God."

After she had weaned Lo-Ruhamah, Gomer had another son. Then the LORD said, "Call him Lo-Ammi, for you are not my people, and I am not your God.

I wonder what the relatives thought. It probably depended on whether they were godly folk or not. Or would it? I could see even the ungodly (today, non-Christians) being "nice people" who would object to Hosea's marrying Gomer. And they all probably wondered at first how Hosea came up with the strange names. I wonder if their attitudes changed after he explained where he got all these ideas from.

8/08/2007

Who is wise?

Daniel 12:10 - None of the wicked will understand, but those who are wise will understand.

I understand some parts of Daniel's vision. Does that make me a little bit wise?

8/07/2007

A deep sleep

Daniel 10:9 - Then I heard him speaking, and as I listened to him, I fell into a deep sleep, my face to the ground.

I think there are several instances in the Bible similar to this where humans fall asleep during a time when you'd think they'd want to be wide awake -- like during the chase or the fight scene of a sci-fi flick -- so as not to miss anything important. I wonder if that's the body's natural reaction to something as intense as this. Or maybe God actively brought about the sleep to protect the sleeper physically and/or emotionally and/or some other way-ally.

8/06/2007

At the Tigris

Daniel 10:4-8 - On the twenty-fourth day of the first month, as I was standing on the bank of the great river, the Tigris, I looked up and there before me was a man dressed in linen, with a belt of the finest gold around his waist. His body was like chrysolite, his face like lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze, and his voice like the sound of a multitude.

I, Daniel, was the only one who saw the vision; the men with me did not see it, but such terror overwhelmed them that they fled and hid themselves. So I was left alone, gazing at this great vision; I had no strength left, my face turned deathly pale and I was helpless.

If only Daniel saw the frightening vision, what made his companions so terrified that they ran away? Daniel had seen visions of this magnitude (or greater?) before. What made this one so scary?

I wonder how Daniel knew his face "turned deathly pale."

8/05/2007

Understand the vision

Daniel 9:20-27 - While I was speaking and praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel and making my request to the LORD my God for his holy hill - while I was still in prayer, Gabriel, the man I had seen in the earlier vision, came to me in swift flight about the time of the evening sacrifice. He instructed me and said to me, "Daniel, I have now come to give you insight and understanding. As soon as you began to pray, an answer was given, which I have come to tell you, for you are highly esteemed. Therefore, consider the message and understand the vision:

"Seventy 'sevens' are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy.

"Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven 'sevens,' and sixty-two 'sevens.' It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble. After the sixty-two 'sevens,' the Anointed One will be cut off and will have nothing. The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed. He will confirm a covenant with many for one 'seven.' In the middle of the 'seven' he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on a wing of the temple he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him."

I wonder if Daniel really did understand all he was told. It seems cryptic to us, but maybe he "got it." After all, Gabriel said that's why he was delivering the message in the first place -- to give Daniel "insight and understanding."

I wonder if "in swift flight" means Gabriel was literally flying or if it simply means he was running at top speed. If Daniel got to see him flying through the air...what a sight!

8/01/2007

Angels and lions

Daniel 6:21-22 - Daniel answered, "O king, live forever! My God sent his angel, and he shut the mouths of the lions. They have not hurt me, because I was found innocent in his sight. Nor have I ever done any wrong before you, O king."

I wonder if Daniel actually got to see the angels protecting him, keeping the lions at bay, or if he simply surmised that that is how God saved him from begin killed by them.