Medicine Hat Joe

Week 31  Mark 3

Jesus wasn’t universally popular.  The gospels agree on that.
Early on in his account Mark piled several stories one on top of the other where people reacted against what Jesus was doing. I started looking for other examples of hostility & opposition.
Not counting borderline cases where people were uncertain or suspicious or fearful or skeptical I found nine incidents where there was serious opposition. In three of those cases people didn’t just disagree. They started formulating plans to assassinate Jesus.
The Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus
The chief priests and the teachers of the law…began looking for a way to kill him, for they feared him
The chief priests and the teachers of the law were scheming to arrest Jesus secretly and kill him.
If Mark wrote his gospel in any kind of chronological order of events then that first Pharisee-Herodian murder plan showed up almost as soon as Jesus began his public activity. Meaning that during most of his public life he was not only loved & revered but at the same time schemers were plotting his death.
Near the end when Jesus went to Jerusalem for the last time he predicted to his disciples that: the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death. But that was a future he’d likely lived with for quite awhile.

Note: quotes from Mark 3:6 11:18 14:1 10:33 (NIV)

Week 31  Psalm 67

The OT is normally Israel-centric. So when the writer begins this psalm by asking the Lord to bless Israel – he says ‘us’ three times – it’s no real surprise. But his request isn’t for a national blessing-for-blessing’s-sake. There’s a different (or maybe additional) reason: then those living on earth will know what you are like .
The idea is that the Lord is gracious to Israel and so Israel is blessed. But the spillover effect is that other nations see this happen and they (somehow) figure-out something about the Lord. Foreign people will know what you are like.
[The version I’m reading adds a technical linguistic footnote saying that the language expresses purpose/result. When God demonstrates his favor to his people, all nations will recognize his character. They say that another way to express the idea is that the other nations will know your way (but ‘way’ – they say – refers to God’s character.]
Anyway I know that I need to keep the basic notion in mind. The easy default for a bible reader is that the OT’s only concern is Israel. But 67 says it isn’t exclusively about Israel (for-Israel’s-sake). It’s about Israel-for-everybody-else’s-sake too.
Israel lived out it’s own introspective & self-interested life. But it was also a test case. A prototype. A real-life first-case experiment that outsiders could evaluate for functionality. Workability. Utility. Desirability. Preferability. An inaugural experiment in state-building based on a specific set of religious norms. And outsiders got to assess it.

Note: quote from Psalm 67:2 (NET)

Week 30  Psalm 66

Psalm 66 has four paragraphs and even though there’s probably a unifying theme tying them together I think each one of them could be it’s own individual psalm.
Of the four I like the last paragraph the most (verses sixteen to twenty). It’s a short testimonial: I will tell of what (the Lord) has done for my soul.
One of the things the writer says is: if I regard wickedness in my heart, the Lord will not hear. A lot of other things in the bible agree with this idea and I accept it as a basic rule or principle.
In my bible there’s a little number beside the word ‘regard’ and I wonder if it will give me a synonym for ‘regard’ (like if-I-embrace sin or if-I-practice sin). But instead the note in the margin changes the tense of the sentence: if I had regarded wickedness in my heart, the Lord would not have heard.
I check to see what a few other versions say. I don’t do a statistical count but quite a few of them also put the sentence in the past. For instance: if I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.
Even though it doesn’t make too much difference to the sentence I wish the translators could agree.
But either way the basic idea is pretty clear – that figuratively-speaking the Lord is deaf to the voice of people who embrace evilness.

Note: quotes from Psalm 66:16 18 (NASB NIV)

Week 30  Psalm 66

The bible I’m reading says that God keeps us in life, and does not allow our feet to slip. I’m interested in that first phrase about the Lord keeping-us-in-life (the note in the margin says puts our soul in life).
I check a couple of other versions. They say that the Lord:
put and kept us among the living
keeps us alive
protects us from death
has kept our soul among the living
preserves our lives
Even though the phrase is translated in slightly different ways I come away with the fundamental idea that God keeps me alive. I don’t know how many things in total that the Lord does for me. But keeping me alive might be the most basic & necessary.
I tend to operate with the idea that the Lord engages with people in their regular life activities. For instance right here in this psalm the writer says that the Lord turned the sea into dry land – Israel’s Red Sea miracle in Exodus. And right near the end of the psalm he says that the Lord hears his prayer.
So the Lord is kind of knee-deep in what’s going on – the events & activities & ins-and-outs of my life. But those all assume that I’m actually alive. And Psalm 66 says that even the life I’m living is being propped-up by the Lord. The Lord has me on life-support.

Note: quotes from Psalm 66:9 (NASB AMPC CSV CEV ESV NET) & 66:6 (NIV)

Week 30  Mark 2-3

I don’t think I’d necessarily title Mark 1 Jesus’ Salad Days but in general the beginning of the story is pretty nice. People are surprised & amazed & impressed by Jesus. Things are fairly smooth and mostly trouble-free. But that soon changes.
Starting in chapter two Mark tells five consecutive stories and in each of them there’s some element of backlash:
• Jesus tells a paralyzed man: your sins are forgiven. Reaction: some teachers of the law were…thinking to themselves…he’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?
• Jesus socialized with disreputable people. Reaction: the Pharisees…asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
• Jesus’ disciples didn’t fast. Reaction: people…asked Jesus, “How is it that John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees are fasting, but yours are not?”
• The disciples picked grain on the Sabbath. Reaction: Pharisees said to (Jesus), “Why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?”
• Jesus healed a man on the Sabbath. Reaction: Pharisees were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath.
In rapid succession Mark lists five events where the Lord is criticized or second-guessed. Mark doesn’t sustain that same rapid rate of reporting – I only found about a dozen other places where he highlights adversity against the Lord. But he makes an emphatic point early-on that Jesus was both a) Popular & Liked and b) Popular & Disliked.

Note: quotes from Mark 2:6-7 2:16 2:18 2:24 3:1-2 (NIV)

Week 29  Matthew 22

The parable of the wedding feast is fourteen-verses long and has some complexifying details. I wanted to pare it down to just the main story:
The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son. He sent his servants to those who had been invited to the banquet to tell them to come, but they refused…
Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited did not deserve to come. So go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find’.
So that’s the parable at face-value. A king planned a wedding celebration. His invited guests declined. So he invited a completely different group of people. The literal story. But with parables people and events are facsimiles of someone or something else.
An OT-reader doesn’t need too much imagination to figure out what the elements represent. The king is the Lord. The invitation is God choosing Israel. The refusal is Israel turning down God. The second invitation is God extending the invitation to non-Israelites.
That’s the main idea. Details wispy enough to not be incriminating. But a forecast that could unsettle some of the people in Jesus’ audience.

Note: quotes from Matthew 22:2-3 & 8-9 (NIV). Follow-up: in 22:15 Matthew implied – but didn’t explicitly say – that Pharisees in the crowd doped-out the meaning of this parable (and weren’t happy). Whereas in 21:45 he says the Pharisees definitely did get-it.

Week 28  Matthew 23

Jesus was asked a test question: which is the greatest commandment in the Law?. His reply was that there was a short hierarchy of laws:
Law #1: love God
Law #2: love your neighbour.
Jesus said that all the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments. So all of the hundreds of other laws were suspended on those two – all subordinated to the two Primary Directives.
The 10 Commandments are a pretty good example of the connection between personal actions and the Big Two:
The first few commands spelled-out what I do concretely to show that I love the Lord (for instance: I don’t manufacture an idol). That’s a visible action of love-for-the-Lord.
The second group of commandments show what it looks like to love people (I don’t kill them. Don’t have random sexual intercourse with them. Don’t steal their property).
[I wondered if all of the laws could be ranked from top to bottom – but I figured that’s likely impossible and beside-the-point.]
But what I know is the top two laws – the Greatest & the Second Greatest. All the rest are subsidiaries to the Big Two – all my specific behaviours cascade down from there. And conversely I think that all my individual actions can be broken down and examined (kind of deconstructed or back engineered) to see how – or if – what I’m doing reconnects to either loving the Lord or loving other people.

Note: quotes from Matthew 22:36 40 (NIV)

Week 28  Matthew 17

Matthew’s transfiguration story is retold by Mark & Luke.
All three writers say that Jesus’ clothes became blazingly bright. But Luke adds that the appearance of his face changed (and Matthew that his face shone like the sun).
MM&L all say that Moses & Elijah appeared and began talking with Jesus. But in Luke there are two additional details.
First: Moses & Elijah appeared in glory. So in their visible return-to-earth appearance they were enhanced (one version says in majesty and another that they were bright and glorious). Visually spectacular.
Second: in very general terms Luke says what they were talking about: (they) were speaking of his (Jesus’) departure, which he was about to accomplish in Jerusalem (other versions replace departure with the more explicit decease or death).
I don’t know what the main reason for the transfiguration was. In my past readings I’ve tended to think that it was to confirm & solidify PJ&J’s belief in Jesus. But now I’m wondering. Maybe these two premiere OT figures emerge from the realm beyond death not to shock-and-awe PJ&J but to talk to Jesus about his death. A solemn & serious conversation about the Lord’s very near future. Out of all the things he had done Jesus had never died. And at the transfiguration he had a chance to discuss the great transition with two experienced & knowledgeable men of faith.

Note: quotes from (Luke 9:29 & Matthew 17:2 (CSB) Luke 9:31 (CSB DRA & ERV)

Week 27  Matthew 17

Jesus did a lot of exceptional things in the gospels but his transfiguration is one of the really unusual & unique ones.
The Lord had gone up onto a mountain with Peter James & John and then he was transfigured before them (quite a few bible versions use that term: transfigured. Others use a more common word: changed).
The Lord’s baptism is the one similar event in the gospels. In both cases a voice came from heaven and said more-or-less the same thing:
Baptism: this is my one dear Son; in him I take great delight
Transfiguration: this is my one dear Son, in whom I take great delight. Listen to him!
But the two events are also different. When Jesus was baptized: just as he was coming up out of the water, the heavens opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him. But at the transfiguration his physical appearance was actually altered (it seems more like a dramatic enhancement than a complete makeover). Matthew describes that metamorphosis: his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light.
Another (stupefying) difference: Moses and Elijah also appeared before them (the disciples), talking with him (Jesus)’. A couple of old paintings of the transfiguration have the disciples lying on the ground with their hands in front of their faces. Which seems about what you’d expect.

Note: quotes from Matthew 17:2 3:17 17:5 3:16 17:2 3 (NET)

Week 26  Psalm 58

David’s opener is a question-and-answer:
Q: do you rulers really pronounce just decisions? Do you judge people fairly?’
A: No! You plan how to do what is unjust, you deal out violence in the earth.
He’s talking to the people who get to administer justice. Officials who make decisions and have authorization to lay-down-the-law.
There are a couple of things in-play when it comes to justice. There’s the law code itself. Then there’s the person who applies the law – the Legal Umpire. When there’s an injustice problem – let’s say I get assaulted & robbed – then that needs to be resolved. So the umpire listens to the evidence and then interprets the law and makes decisions & rulings & judgments. When the umpire is impartial then justice-is-served.
But in psalm 58 David is talking about a certain type of umpire who isn’t impartial. A partisan judge. Someone who: a) plans how to do what is unjust & then b) administers violence in the earth. So that’s a concern for me in my assault-&-robbery case: what if I end up getting a Psalm 58 umpire?
David  reassures me that in the end there is a God who judges in the earth – an Umpire of the umpires. But while I wait for the slow turning of the wheels-of-justice I have to build stamina. Recognize justice’s limitations. Concede that I might not get a fair-shake. Endure the way things actually are.

Note: quotes from Psalm 58:1-2 & 11 (NET)