Medicine Hat Joe

Week 20  Matthew 2

The astronomers who came looking for The King of the Jews never went back to tell king Herod where he was. And so Herod – murderously trying to cover-his-bases – ordered all the little boys in Bethlehem to be killed.
For the third time in the chapter Matthew quoted an OT prophet: then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: “a voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more”.
I double-checked Jeremiah and that’s almost exactly what he said. And whenever I read about Rachel weeping for her children in Jeremiah I mentally connect that verse to Matthew’s slaughter-of-the-innocents story.
I looked at Jeremiah’s whole chapter. One version adds the title “Restoration of Israel’. Another one: ‘Return from Exile Promised’. Sure enough I found about 20-verses in Jeremiah 31 referring to the idea of restoration – assurances of an optimistic future. It’s a relatively upbeat section saying that good things were in-store. And what about Rachel weeping for her children right there in the middle of the chapter? A logical OT-reader would likely figure that Rachel wept over her children’s exile…but (thankfully) that would soon be over.
In a million years I don’t think an OT-reader would discover Matthew’s bolt-out-of-the-blue take on Jeremiah. Some prophecies do some unmistakable future-casting – things I know to look out for. But others are alarmingly enigmatic & unexpected.

Note: quotes from Matthew 2:17 18 (NIV). And see Jeremiah 31:15

Week 20  Psalm 44

The OT has quite a few cause-&-effect-type pledges: if you do X then Y will happen. So for instance: ‘if you obey the Lord then you will be benefitted’. Good health & advantageous prospects & smooth-sailing are big expectations in the OT scheme. Good-time forecasts. If I satisfy the prerequisites then there’ll be some pretty decent payoffs. But by contrast the NT tends to push that idea onto the back-burner. Living-long and prospering is way down on the NT priority list.
Anyway one of the reasons the Choir Director wrote psalm 44 was because current events weren’t working according to formula. His conundrum was: ‘we’re being obedient…but we’re still suffering!’
That isn’t exactly one of the dilemmas the NT is concerned about. In the NT anguish & hurt & adversity are part of the mix. There’s a shortage of happiness-and-good-times? No surprise.
In psalm 44 the Choir Director listed 8-verses of bad happenings. Then he says this:
all this came upon us, though we had not forgotten you; we had not been false to your covenant. Our hearts had not turned back; our feet had not strayed from your path. But you crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals; you covered us over with deep darkness.
Psalm 44 is a bit of an anomaly in the OT. But it’s a pretty realistic summary for a NT reader. 44 is an OT psalm with a NT feel.

Note: quote from Psalm 44:17-19 (NIV)

Week 19  Matthew 2

Matthew says: …and so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son”. Matthew was talking about Joseph Mary & Jesus returning home from Egypt and he says that trip fulfilled what Hosea had said. I flipped back to Hosea 11: when Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son (quite a few versions say fulfilled. Others say things like the Lord’s promise came true or that the trip gave full meaning to what Hosea said).
I scanned through Hosea’s chapter 11. On the surface his out-of-Egypt verse doesn’t sound like a prophecy at all – it sounds like a reference back to The Exodus in Exodus 1-15.
Personally I think that Hosea was talking about Israel escaping from Pharaoh.
I think that if I got 100 people to read Hosea 11:1 then at least 99 of them would say: “this refers back to The Exodus”.
I think Matthew would admit Hosea was referring to the Exodus story. But according to Matthew Hosea was also referred to JM&J leaving Egypt. (It’s possible that Hosea knew there was a hidden message. But it’s possible he didn’t either.)
I think a normal OT reader wouldn’t see a prophecy there in Hosea.
So Matthew suddenly extracting a surprise meaning from Hosea isn’t the kind of prophecy I like. I prefer the Micah forecast in Matthew 2:6. Micah says that Event A will happen. And then it does happen.

Note: Matthew 2:15 Hosea 11:1 (NIV CEV ERV)

 

Week 19  Matthew 2

A delegation of astronomers / astrologists came to Jerusalem in search of the baby Jesus. When they arrived they asked king Herod: where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? (they obviously had some knowledge about the OT and had made a connection between their astronomical observations and the Jewish scriptures).
Herod also knew something about OT prophecy because he asked the priests where the Messiah was to be born. The Answer: Bethlehem. The priests knew the specific geographic location because Micah had said: you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.
Micah’s prophecy was pretty definitive. And it was testable. The Messiah (the Christ) – Israel’s heroic ruler – would be born in Bethlehem.
Micah’s prophecy is the kind that I like: Event A – an actual & specific & observable event – will happen at some future time. So what I have to do is wait around to see if Event A actually happens.
Not everything that Micah said was a future forecast (for example he told people: to act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God). But the thing about the Messiah being born in Bethlehem was an unqualified Event A prediction.

Note: quotes from Matthew 2:2 4 6 Micah 6:8 (NIV)

Week 18  Matthew 1

Last spring I was in a Philippians bible study group and by about the third week we landed on a pretty interesting paragraph where Paul described what had been going on behind-the-scenes when Jesus came to earth. Paul said Jesus:
though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
So starting in on Matthew I know that even though I’ve turned-the-page on the Old Testament (starting fresh on the New) Philippians is my reminder that I’m actually coming in at midstory. A reader naturally assumes that Jesus began his life there in Matthew when his mom discovered she was pregnant. But according to Paul there was a whole pre-Matthew-1 story of Jesus – a time when he already existed in the form of God.
Prior to Matthew 1 Jesus had never been physically conceived & had not had a human body & could not die. But all that changed. Jesus now could – and would – experience all of those things. So that’s a big part of the novelty of the New Testament. The mostly unknown God who was up-there (out-there) has been alchemized into a human being who is down-here (in-here).

Note: quotes from Philippians 2:5-8 (ESV) & 2:2 (NASB)

Week 18 Proverbs 22

One who is generous will be blessed, because he gives some of his food to the poor.
In my bible’s margin there’s a sidenote about the word generous. It says: Lit. has a good eye. The Abbreviation List says that Lit. is the shortform for a literal translation. Which means that generous should actually say has a good eye. It means that if I had a Hebrew bible (and if I could read it) it would say the person has a good eye would be blessed. That’s what Solomon actually said.
I know that even though Solomon used the phrase that a person with a good eye will be blessed that can’t be what he literally meant. If he did then a guy who had cataracts or macular degeneration or glaucoma wouldn’t ever be blessed.
I checked some other versions. More than a dozen used Solomon’s expression a good eye (or something similar). But quite a few exchanged the good eye phrase for words like generous or kindly.
So anyway it’s a reminder that the bible I’m using doesn’t necessarily give me the exact words that Solomon wrote. Which is okay since I don’t figure the translators are intentionally trying to pull-the-wool-over-my-eyes. But on balance I think I prefer a translated text that toes-the-line. One that says what the writer actually said. And that means it’s telling me it’ll be me that has to cope with figures of speech.

Note: quote from Proverbs 22:9 (NASB)

 

Week 17  Proverbs 3

Solomon talks quite a few times about life being like a road. A path. A highway. And his advice is that I get off my way and get onto the Lord’s way. Get onto the straight path. The way of Wisdom.
Someone who’s on-the-road might ask: how do I do that? And Solomon gives some good & specific advice in chapter 3: trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight (the footnote alternative says will direct your paths).
If  my objective is to get onto the right path there are these three ‘how-to’ elements:
1. Trust in the Lord
2. Don’t depend on myself
3. Submit to the Lord (or know him, or acknowledge him).
I don’t kid myself that any of these steps are easy but I think about which of them is most difficult. I figure that #2 is really very tough to put into practice. In the normal way of living my life and walking my path who else do I have to depend on except myself? Who’s better than me to decide?
So not depending on myself is a huge transition.

Note: quote from Proverbs 3:5-6 (NIV) (and CSB & ESV). I think that Advisories #1 & #2 could be collapsed into one since not-trusting-myself is really the flip-side of trusting-the-Lord. But it think I’ll stick with three points.

Week 16  Psalm 41

At some point in the past I underlined parts of paragraph #1 in red. I liked it then. And I still like it now.
In fact I think that those first three verses could be their own standalone psalm (it’d definitely be a short psalm – but longer than 117). The main reason I’d have for hiving it off is because it doesn’t seem to have any obvious connection to the rest of the psalm. That second section – verses 4-12 – is David’s prayer for help (he’s in the middle of a bunch of adversity where his enemies (and even his friends) are ganging-up on him).
Maybe I’m missing something. But the only correlation I can see is that: a) it’s a good thing for people to help people-in-need (1-3) and b) since David is currently in the people-in-need category the Lord could help bail him out (4-12). But I don’t like that explanation very much. It seems forced – a bit like trying to get a round peg into a square hole.
For me it makes just as much sense to treat paragraph #1 all by itself:
Blessed are those who have regard for the weak; the Lord delivers them in times of trouble. The Lord protects and preserves them – he does not give them over to the desire of their foes. The Lord sustains them on their sickbed and restores them from their bed of illness.

Note: quote from Psalm 41:1-3 (NIV)

Week 16  Psalm 38

Let’s say I’ve got a State of Mental & Spiritual Health & Wellbeing Index. Let’s say the scale registers a 10 (for positive wellbeing) and a 1 (for negative wellbeing). If I was assessing psalm 38 on that scale I’d rate it near the bottom – maybe a 2.
There are a couple of things going on with David.
On one hand he’s loaded down thinking about his own moral guilt & inadequacy. He says:
• there is no soundness in my bones because of my sin
• my guilt has overwhelmed me
• I groan in anguish of heart
• I confess my iniquity; I am troubled by my sin.
So David is facing an internal dilemma – a crushing sense of guilt that he can’t get rid of.
But then there’s a second thing going on – his relationships with people:
• My friends and companions avoid me
• Those who want to kill me set their traps (and) talk of my ruin.
However (and it’s a pretty big however) in spite of his adverse circumstances David takes the high road as best he can:
• All my longings lie open before you, Lord
• Lord, I wait for you
• I seek only to do what is good.
I’d give David high marks for doing what he can do in the face of his bad fortunes. So I’m surprised that by the end of the psalm – and this makes it an oddity – there’s no obvious resolution. David is left hanging.

Note: quotes from Psalm 38:3 4 8 18 11 12 9 15 20 (NIV)

Week 16  Psalm 37

David’s subject matter is Good people & Bad people. He splits his time roughly 50:50 between the two. But his most useful advice is for the Good ones.
Because self-interested Bad people tend to evolve toward taking hostile action against Good people David offers suggestions to Good people.
First…what not to do:
•  don’t fret about Bad people
•  don’t envy Bad people’s success
•  don’t get angry.
Then a couple of pieces of positive advice:
• first he says to trust in the Lord and do good (a bit later he adds: do good not evil)
• secondly he says to rest and wait patiently (and later: rest and keep to the Lord’s way).
David’s recommendations don’t really solve the obvious problem. There are still plenty of Bad people all around who might eventually prey on Good people. What David does do is give me a short Recommendation List – an action plan for dealing with adversity.
So…when I’m backed into a corner by evil opponents and when my fretfulness & anxiety & anger are getting jacked up and when I realize that I can’t manage my outside world…then what? Then I turn in.
Trust the Lord
Do what’s right & good
Be patient – settle-in & wait
Keep to the Lord’s way.
David’s recommendations are counterintuitive. And they’re difficult to practice routinely. They sound like exercises that are intended to help me start fundamentally reformatting my normal reactions to my external environment.

Note: quotes from Psalm 37:1 7 8 3 27 7 34 (NIV)