Jehoshaphat was one of the kings who ruled Judah, and from all accounts (see 2 Chronicles 17-21), he was one of the better rulers the country had. There came a time during his reign that his nation faced a disaster. Three huge armies set out to make war on him. Not surprisingly, Jehoshapat was alarmed, but in a notable departure from the regular, he sought the counsel of God in the matter. His prayer ended with these words: "For we have no power to face this vast army that is attacking us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are upon you" (2 Chronicles 20:12).
God told him not to worry: "Do not be afraid or discouraged because of this vast army. For the battle is not yours, but God’s" (2 Chr 20:15). Jehoshaphat took the advice to heart, as well as other advice that he received to do nothing but praise God. So while the invading armies prepared to annihilate Jehoshaphat, the king sent his own army with instructions to "sing to the Lord and to praise him ... as they went out at the head or the army, saying: "Give thanks to the Lord for his love endures forever.""
A sure recipe for disaster you might think, but think again. As they began to sing and praise, the Lord sowed confusion and discord among the invading armies who, instead of attacking and destroying Judah, attacked and destroyed each other leaving the battlefield empty. The battle was, indeed, the Lord's.
We, too, in our lives, are sometimes faced with mighty adversities that seem overwhelming. And overwhelm us, they will, unless we turn to God in faith and prayer like this king did. It might seem silly what this king did, but the victory he achieved is an indication of how powerful prayer and faith in tandem can be.
A lady came to me a me a week ago telling me she was half a million dirhams in debt. That's about US$ 136,000. That was a staggering debt to pay off for any salaried person. She told me that she was praying, but God was not doing anything to clear her debt. I had to explain that God wasn't going to send somebody with a check for half a million — we have to suffer the consequences of our folly — but what God would do was to help her repay the debt IF she focussed on him. If she kept her eyes on him. Otherwise, she would drive her car into a brick wall, like she told me she wanted to.
I have had people facing similar situations in the past testifying as to how God took them through when they relied on him. He did this in far less time and with much greater ease than they had ever imagined. So I know that this is not just a story in the Bible to give people hope; it works! And it's not only with looming financial catastophes that God helps us, but he's there to assist us in every difficult situation we face in our lives. It takes humility, however, and a certain amount of courage to be able to go to God and say to him, just as Jehoshaphat did: "Lord, I have no power to combat the obstacles in my life. I don't know what to do. But I got my eyes upon you!"
Get your eyes fixed on him for the victory that you seek, the deliverance that you need, the freedom that you desire. It's all it really takes.
Next: With Eyes Fixed on God: 3. In the Middle of a Storm
Monday, September 27, 2010
Friday, September 24, 2010
With Eyes Fixed on God: 1. Snakes in the Desert
They traveled from Mount Hor along the route to the Red Sea, to go around Edom. But the people grew impatient on the way; they spoke against God and against Moses, and said, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the desert? There is no bread! There is no water! And we detest this miserable food!”
Then the LORD sent venomous snakes among them; they bit the people and many Israelites died. The people came to Moses and said, “We sinned when we spoke against the LORD and against you. Pray that the LORD will take the snakes away from us.” So Moses prayed for the people.
The LORD said to Moses, “Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.” So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, he lived.
I've always loved the movies and among the many movies I have watched, I have really enjoyed the Indiana Jones series. I guess it appeals to the child in me. There is one scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark that was memorable. Indy falls into a dark pit and it seems to him that the ground under his feet is moving. He strikes a match and to his horror he finds the floor crawling with hundreds of snakes. "I hate snakes," he says, his fear of them very evident in his eyes.
I suspect that most of us hate them as well, and it isn't very surprising when we think of the painful death they can cause when they bite us. This is what the Israelites suffered during their travels through the desert. Scripture says that "the Lord sent venomous snakes among them" but as we are learning, we can't take everything in the Bible literally. What the writers probably meant is that the Lord withdrew his hand of protection over the Israelites and let the snakes bite them. But why would he do this? To teach them a lesson perhaps. Let's see what happened just prior to this.
One, the Israelites grew impatient along the way. We may be inclined to feel a little sympathetic towards them considering that they were on the road for a long time until we understand that it is this impatience that kept them on the road for so long. The journey from Egypt to the Promised Land was barely a few weeks, but it took them forty years to make it!!!
God puts us through situations in our lives to teach us patience, to teach us to wait upon him, and the quicker we learn these lessons, the quicker we get out of the situations. Unfortunately, like the Israelites we too get impatient, and then we too wander around, sometimes for years, until we get to where we want to be.
Two, they spoke against God and against Moses, which is never a good idea, because when you speak against someone you are, in effect, rebelling against them. What do you want God to make of rebellion?
I know of people who are constantly speaking against God, sometimes even cursing him because they aren't happy with the way he is working in their lives. I'm no Moses, but they speak against me too, sometimes for the strangest possible reasons.
Three, they whined and moaned, asking God why he brought them up out of Egypt? Obviously, they had forgotten that they had begged and pleaded with him to get them out, fed up with the years of suffering they had underwent at the hands of the Egyptians.
We, too, make prayers of God, sometimes perhaps not realizing that God does answer prayers, but in his own fashion. Unable to deal with this, we question God in a similar manner, presuming we know better than he does.
Four, they exhibited a tragic lack of faith when they spoke of dying in the desert, indicating that they had also forgotten everything that God had done to ensure they were safe. He got them out of Egypt without so much as a scar, gave them safe passage through the Red Sea when a blood thirsty army chased after them, kept their clothes, foot wear and health intact over the years, and they implied, by this question, that he was now incapable of keeping them alive.
I am sure that this, too, is familiar to us. We receive blessing after blessing — and we only have to take a cursory glance at our lives to see how true this is — but the moment we face something that is a little difficult, we believe God has abandoned us and we're headed for defeat and destruction.
Five, they complained that there was no bread or water, and in a shocking display of ingratitude, whinged about how they detested the manna God was giving them — given at no cost, without toil or labor!
Again, they didn't do anything we don't do.
I figure God must have decided if they really wanted to complain, he'd give them reason to, and when they came across a patch of desert sand infested with snakes, he withdrew his hand of protection, leaving them to ponder the consequence of a life without him to help them.
They began to get bitten and die painfully and not knowing what to do they turned to the same person they spoke against — Moses — to ask for help from the same God they spoke against — the mighty I AM. Fortunately for them, Moses was not one to hold grudges and he interceded with God, who also didn't hold grudges. He told Moses to "make a snake and put it up on a pole and get the people who were bitten to look at it for healing."
It seems here that God is breaking one of his own commandments about not fashioning any graven images (Exodus 20:4-5, 32:31), something that he appears to do again when he gives instructions on building the ark of the convenant (1 Chronicles 28:18-19), orders the carving of statues of angels (Exodus 25:18-20), and commanding that Aaron's priestly robes have pomegranates on them! (Exodus 28:31-34), but obviously there are circumstances in which God is okay with such things. (We are not going to talk about idol worship here; to understand more about this may I refer you to an article by Patrick Madrid).
So why is God doing this? To point people the way to salvation by making them aware of their sins and its consequences! What would the people who were bitten by the snake see when they saw an image of it nailed to the cross? They would see how their sins were causing them a painful death and repent of whatever they had done. This repentance would bring healing.
Do you recollect another instance when something was nailed to a cross? Of course you do. Many years later Jesus would say, "Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life" (John 3:14).
The serpent is not a representation of Jesus, but of the sin that Jesus took upon himself when he was crucified on the cross. If we want to stop sinning all we really need to do is to look at Jesus on the cross, understanding how much he suffered because of the things that we did. Most of us have looked at the cross and found forgiveness of our sins, but we tend to treat this as an event that took place two thousand years ago in another time and place, not realizing that it is a lifetime process of looking, and repenting.
I have reproduced a still from Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ here. It is a particularly bloody picture of Jesus on the cross. Take a good look at it. Everytime we give into temptation, giving into thoughts that are sinful, it is as though we are piercing a new thorn into Christ's head. Everytime we give into temptation, doing things that are wrong, it is as though we are piercing a nail anew into his hands and feet. I don't know about you, but it makes me never wanna sin again.
What else do we find when we look at Jesus on the cross? Freedom! Romans 6:1-14 says this. It is a little long, but worth reading carefully.
What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.
Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.
With eyes fixed on God, we get victory over sin and temptation, but that's not the only thing looking at God does to us. It gives us victory over overwhelming odds! Coming up next.
Then the LORD sent venomous snakes among them; they bit the people and many Israelites died. The people came to Moses and said, “We sinned when we spoke against the LORD and against you. Pray that the LORD will take the snakes away from us.” So Moses prayed for the people.
The LORD said to Moses, “Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.” So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, he lived.
I've always loved the movies and among the many movies I have watched, I have really enjoyed the Indiana Jones series. I guess it appeals to the child in me. There is one scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark that was memorable. Indy falls into a dark pit and it seems to him that the ground under his feet is moving. He strikes a match and to his horror he finds the floor crawling with hundreds of snakes. "I hate snakes," he says, his fear of them very evident in his eyes.
I suspect that most of us hate them as well, and it isn't very surprising when we think of the painful death they can cause when they bite us. This is what the Israelites suffered during their travels through the desert. Scripture says that "the Lord sent venomous snakes among them" but as we are learning, we can't take everything in the Bible literally. What the writers probably meant is that the Lord withdrew his hand of protection over the Israelites and let the snakes bite them. But why would he do this? To teach them a lesson perhaps. Let's see what happened just prior to this.
One, the Israelites grew impatient along the way. We may be inclined to feel a little sympathetic towards them considering that they were on the road for a long time until we understand that it is this impatience that kept them on the road for so long. The journey from Egypt to the Promised Land was barely a few weeks, but it took them forty years to make it!!!
God puts us through situations in our lives to teach us patience, to teach us to wait upon him, and the quicker we learn these lessons, the quicker we get out of the situations. Unfortunately, like the Israelites we too get impatient, and then we too wander around, sometimes for years, until we get to where we want to be.
Two, they spoke against God and against Moses, which is never a good idea, because when you speak against someone you are, in effect, rebelling against them. What do you want God to make of rebellion?
I know of people who are constantly speaking against God, sometimes even cursing him because they aren't happy with the way he is working in their lives. I'm no Moses, but they speak against me too, sometimes for the strangest possible reasons.
Three, they whined and moaned, asking God why he brought them up out of Egypt? Obviously, they had forgotten that they had begged and pleaded with him to get them out, fed up with the years of suffering they had underwent at the hands of the Egyptians.
We, too, make prayers of God, sometimes perhaps not realizing that God does answer prayers, but in his own fashion. Unable to deal with this, we question God in a similar manner, presuming we know better than he does.
Four, they exhibited a tragic lack of faith when they spoke of dying in the desert, indicating that they had also forgotten everything that God had done to ensure they were safe. He got them out of Egypt without so much as a scar, gave them safe passage through the Red Sea when a blood thirsty army chased after them, kept their clothes, foot wear and health intact over the years, and they implied, by this question, that he was now incapable of keeping them alive.
I am sure that this, too, is familiar to us. We receive blessing after blessing — and we only have to take a cursory glance at our lives to see how true this is — but the moment we face something that is a little difficult, we believe God has abandoned us and we're headed for defeat and destruction.
Five, they complained that there was no bread or water, and in a shocking display of ingratitude, whinged about how they detested the manna God was giving them — given at no cost, without toil or labor!
Again, they didn't do anything we don't do.
I figure God must have decided if they really wanted to complain, he'd give them reason to, and when they came across a patch of desert sand infested with snakes, he withdrew his hand of protection, leaving them to ponder the consequence of a life without him to help them.
They began to get bitten and die painfully and not knowing what to do they turned to the same person they spoke against — Moses — to ask for help from the same God they spoke against — the mighty I AM. Fortunately for them, Moses was not one to hold grudges and he interceded with God, who also didn't hold grudges. He told Moses to "make a snake and put it up on a pole and get the people who were bitten to look at it for healing."
It seems here that God is breaking one of his own commandments about not fashioning any graven images (Exodus 20:4-5, 32:31), something that he appears to do again when he gives instructions on building the ark of the convenant (1 Chronicles 28:18-19), orders the carving of statues of angels (Exodus 25:18-20), and commanding that Aaron's priestly robes have pomegranates on them! (Exodus 28:31-34), but obviously there are circumstances in which God is okay with such things. (We are not going to talk about idol worship here; to understand more about this may I refer you to an article by Patrick Madrid).
So why is God doing this? To point people the way to salvation by making them aware of their sins and its consequences! What would the people who were bitten by the snake see when they saw an image of it nailed to the cross? They would see how their sins were causing them a painful death and repent of whatever they had done. This repentance would bring healing.
Do you recollect another instance when something was nailed to a cross? Of course you do. Many years later Jesus would say, "Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life" (John 3:14).
I have reproduced a still from Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ here. It is a particularly bloody picture of Jesus on the cross. Take a good look at it. Everytime we give into temptation, giving into thoughts that are sinful, it is as though we are piercing a new thorn into Christ's head. Everytime we give into temptation, doing things that are wrong, it is as though we are piercing a nail anew into his hands and feet. I don't know about you, but it makes me never wanna sin again.
What else do we find when we look at Jesus on the cross? Freedom! Romans 6:1-14 says this. It is a little long, but worth reading carefully.
What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.
Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.
With eyes fixed on God, we get victory over sin and temptation, but that's not the only thing looking at God does to us. It gives us victory over overwhelming odds! Coming up next.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Interpreting Scripture - 2: Moses and the Burning Bush
Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the desert and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the LORD appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. So Moses thought, “I will go over and see this strange sight—why the bush does not burn up.”
When the LORD saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!”
And Moses said, “Here I am.”
“Do not come any closer,” God said. “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” Then he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.
The LORD said, “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey—the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt.”
But Moses said to God, “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”
And God said, “I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.”
Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?”
God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ ” (Exodus 3:1-14)
The best way to begin trying to understand what is happening in this passage is by asking a series of questions: Where? Who? Why? What? When?
Where is this passage from? The Book of Exodus. It's the second book of the Bible following Genesis. The two books, together with Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, form the Pentateuch (Torah to the Jews).
Who wrote it? A great deal of it has been written by Moses, but it cannot have been written entirely by him, as often suggested, because many portions tell the story of his life in the third person. It also describes his death. The literary form also varies considerably through the text.
Why was it written? To record the events of Israel's deliverance from Egypt and development as a nation.
What was the setting? Egypt. God's people who were once favored in the land were now slaves. God is about to set them free.
When was it written? Modern biblical scholarship places its final textual form in the mid 5th century. When did the events that are described in it happen? From about 1700 BC to 1280 BC.
Once these questions are answered, we need to see how the passage fits into the overall story. The book of Genesis ends with the death of Joseph. The book of Exodus begins about four hundred years later. Things have dramatically changed. The Israelites no longer enjoy the favor that Joseph enjoyed with the Egyptians. On the contrary, they have been made slaves for fear that their rapidly increasing numbers might make them a threat to the Egyptians. Seeing that this scheme of keeping their numbers down didn't work, Pharoah decrees that the midwives kill every baby boy at birth, but when his doesn't work either, he orders that "every boy that is born must be thrown into the Nile" (Exodus 1:22).
One mother decides to save her son but putting him in a basket and floating it on the Nile. When Pharoah's daughter went to bathe she discovered the baby and decided to adopt him for her own. The boy, named Moses, thus grew up as prince of Egypt. As he grew up, however, he began to identify with the Israelites, getting angry at the way they were treated.
One day, when he was about forty years old, he witnessed an Egyptian striking an Israelite. He lost his temper and struck down the Egyptian, killing him. (Here's a question to ask yourself: How do we know Moses was forty years old when this happened? There is no reference to this in the book of Exodus. Or in the Pentateuch. Or in the entire Old Testament for that matter! Answer: Stephen mentions his age in his speech to the Sanhedrin where he was on trial for his life - see Acts 7:23. But how did Stephen know this if it wasn't mentioned anywhere else in Scripture? That's a question for you to chew on. I'll provide the answer another time, but here is a clue to get you going. Is Sola Scriptura truly legit?)
After slaying the Egyptian, Moses now "thought that his own people would realize that God was using him to rescue them, but they did not" (Acts 7:25). They had different ideas. "Who made you ruler and judge over us?" they asked (Ex 2:14). (What do you learn from this? Moses was trying to exercise authority that hadn't been given to him).
Rejected by the Israelites and on the run from the Egyptians — Pharoah discovered his crime — Moses fled to Midian. There he meets Zipporah to whom he gets married. He soon becomes a daddy (good thing that; if he stayed on to rule in Egypt he would have become a mummy). He also becomes a shepherd, tending flocks for his father-in-law Jethro. And he continues doing this for forty years, until one day he sees a bush burning .... which brings us to our story here.
The Allegorical Sense
We can acquire a more profound understanding of events by recognizing their significance in Christ. In this passage, the God of the Burning Bush is generally considered to be a preconfiguration of Jesus, who would, himself, use the words I AM to describe himself many times, especially in the Gospel of John. Consider these statements:
"I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty." (John 6:35)
"I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." (John 8:12)
"I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. He will come in and go out, and find pasture." (John 10:9)
"I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." (John 10:11)
"I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies." (John 11:25)
"I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." (John 14:6)
"I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener." (John 15:1)
But perhaps most telling was his remark to the Pharisees who sneered at him when he told them that Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing him.
“You are not yet fifty years old,” the Jews said to him, “and you have seen Abraham!” “I tell you the truth,” Jesus answered, “before Abraham was born, I am!” (John 8:57-58)
The Moral Sense
The events reported in Scripture ought to lead us to act justly. As St. Paul says, they were written "for our instruction".
Here we see God commissioning Moses to bring the Israelites out of Egypt. God gives us a similar commission. In Matthew 28:18-20 we see him saying:
"All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."
(Notice what Jesus says at the end. Just as God said to Moses, "I will be with you," Jesus says the same.) Like Moses, we make excuses, but we need to fulfill this commission to make disciples of all nations. We can't do that, however, unless we become disciples ourselves. And that takes some doing!
The Anagogical Sense
We can view realities and events in terms of their eternal significance, leading us toward our true homeland, which is heaven.
From this passage (and subsequent chapters in Exodus) we see how important obedience is to fulfill God's plan in our lives. We often don't realize how important this obedience is when it comes to our eternal salvation. Jesus was particularly stern when he told the people:
"Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’"
All the "Hallelujas" we say, and all the mighty deeds we do for God, are no substitute for obedience. which is a prime requisite for entry into heaven. Faith in Christ Jesus gets the gates open, but we still need to walk through them.
Next: Interpreting Scripture - 3: Abraham and the Sacrifice of Isaac
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Interpreting Scripture
Soon after my conversion, I started reading the Bible with fresh earnestness, eager to find out more about the Lord whom I had given my life to. I remember going through the gospel of Matthew, utterly fascinated by what I was reading, but coming to a shocked stop when I reached the end of Chapter 12 where it spoke about Jesus's mother and brothers.
While Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside, wanting to speak to him. Someone told him, “Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.” (Matthew 12:46-47)
Brothers? Even though I had been an atheist for most of my life, I had been born a Catholic and the influence of my early years remained with me as did the memories of some of the things I had learned back then, including the virgin birth and Mary's perpetual virginity. What was this, then, about Jesus having brothers?
My confusion increased as I found more refences to the "brothers" of Jesus is the gospels of Mark and John (Mark 6:3, John 7:5) and also in the Book of Acts (Acts 1:14), and my first reaction was that the Church had fed everybody with a lot of fiction about Mary.
But then I thought a little more about it and I wondered how the Church could have possibly fooled millions of people for 2,000 years. Surely there would have been at least a few intelligent men through the years who would have questioned this. The Church must have its reasons to claim what they did.
I figured it might be wise to find out what theose reasons were and what I discovered quite astonished me. In the original text of the Gospel, we find the Greek word adelphos, meaning "brother," used. However, adelphos does not just mean blood brothers born of the same parents, but used to describe a variety of relationships including half-brothers, step-brothers, cousins and even uncles!
While this did not prove that Jesus didn't have brothers, it certainly threw the door wide open for more questions. Like: Why wasn't there any reference to Jesus's brothers in Luke 2:41-42 when Jesus was lost at the temple? Surely, if there was any place where they would have been mentioned it was here. But this was still not very conclusive. I dug deeper and discovered a lot of other things indicating that Jesus may not have brothers, but what sealed it for me was John's narrative of the crucifixion of Jesus.
Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, “Dear woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home. (John 19:25-27)
If Jesus had brothers, he would have left his mother with them, not with John, regardless of how favored a disciple he was. Besides, if they existed, they would have been there while Jesus was being crucified, wouldn't they?
Now that I realized the Church was not as manipulative as I had briefly imagined, I began to look to it for answers to the more difficult questions that I had, not surprised any more than not only did they have them, but in almost every single instance they were very rational, very logical, and very Scriptural!
Take this for an example. After reading the New Testament, I began reading the Old Testament and I had a lot of questions crop up in my mind as I read the book of Genesis. One of them was this: Adam and Eve had a number of children including Cain, Abel and Seth (cf. Genesis 4:1-2; 5:3-4). For these children to have reproduced, they would have had to marry each other. Is this what happened? Might there be another explanation? I thought I got the answer one evening when a preacher I was listening to suggested that after God created Adam and Eve, he may have created other people around the world. It seemed a reasonable explanation that would also account for the different races we find on the earth. There was also nothing in Genesis to contradict this viewpoint, but I decided to check what the Church taught on the subject. A little digging uncovered this from Pope Pius XII's encyclical Humani Generis:
... the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents. Now it is in no way apparent how such an opinion can be reconciled with that which the sources of revealed truth and the documents of the Teaching Authority of the Church propose with regard to original sin, which proceeds from a sin actually committed by an individual Adam and which, through generation, is passed on to all and is in everyone as his own (HG37).
And what did Scripture (the "sources of revealed truth" mentioned above) have to say? I took encouragement from Luke's words in Acts 17:11 where he said that "the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true" to verify what the Holy Father said. Here is what is in the Bible:
From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. (Acts 17:26)
Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned— (Romans 5:12)
Wow! Theories may be interesting, but they need not necessarily be the truth!
The Church also had guidelines to interpreting Scripture that I found remarkably useful and this article hopes to pass on some of what I learnt. Although it cannot possibly be as comprehensive as I might like it to be, I hope the few pointers I share will help you in your own study of Scripture. The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) offers some sterling advice in paragraphs 112-114..
The Second Vatican Council indicates three criteria for interpreting Scripture in accordance with the Spirit who inspired it.
1. Be especially attentive "to the content and unity of the whole Scripture". Different as the books which compose it may be, Scripture is a unity by reason of the unity of God's plan, of which Christ Jesus is the center and heart, open since his Passover (cf. Luke 24:25-27, 44-46).
2. Read the Scripture within "the living Tradition of the whole Church". According to a saying of the Fathers, Sacred Scripture is written principally in the Church's heart rather than in documents and records, for the Church carries in her Tradition the living memorial of God's Word, and it is the Holy Spirit who gives her the spiritual interpretation of the Scripture (". . . according to the spiritual meaning which the Spirit grants to the Church").
3. Be attentive to the analogy of faith. By "analogy of faith" we mean the coherence of the truths of faith among themselves and within the whole plan of Revelation (cf. Romans 12:6).
The Senses of Scripture
The CCC also suggests we take into account the two senses of Scripture: the literal and the spiritual. The spiritual sense is further divided into the allegorical, moral, and anagogical senses. Don't let the words throw you; it's all simpler than you may think and a few examples will make it all clear. But let me first quote the definitions from the CCC itself.
The literal sense is the meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture and discovered by exegesis, following the rules of sound interpretation: "All other senses of Sacred Scripture are based on the literal." (Exegesis is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text).
The spiritual sense. Thanks to the unity of God's plan, not only the text of Scripture but also the realities and events about which it speaks can be signs.
- The allegorical sense. We can acquire a more profound understanding of events by recognizing their significance in Christ; thus the crossing of the Red Sea is a sign or type of Christ's victory and also of Christian Baptism.
- The moral sense. The events reported in Scripture ought to lead us to act justly. As St. Paul says, they were written "for our instruction".
- The anagogical sense (Greek: anagoge, "leading"). We can view realities and events in terms of their eternal significance, leading us toward our true homeland: thus the Church on earth is a sign of the heavenly Jerusalem.
As I said before, this may sound intimidating, but it isn't really. A couple of illustrations will help us to understand how to interpret Scripture using these four senses.
Next: Interpreting "The Sacrifice of Isaac" and "The Burning Bush"
While Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside, wanting to speak to him. Someone told him, “Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.” (Matthew 12:46-47)
Brothers? Even though I had been an atheist for most of my life, I had been born a Catholic and the influence of my early years remained with me as did the memories of some of the things I had learned back then, including the virgin birth and Mary's perpetual virginity. What was this, then, about Jesus having brothers?
My confusion increased as I found more refences to the "brothers" of Jesus is the gospels of Mark and John (Mark 6:3, John 7:5) and also in the Book of Acts (Acts 1:14), and my first reaction was that the Church had fed everybody with a lot of fiction about Mary.
But then I thought a little more about it and I wondered how the Church could have possibly fooled millions of people for 2,000 years. Surely there would have been at least a few intelligent men through the years who would have questioned this. The Church must have its reasons to claim what they did.
I figured it might be wise to find out what theose reasons were and what I discovered quite astonished me. In the original text of the Gospel, we find the Greek word adelphos, meaning "brother," used. However, adelphos does not just mean blood brothers born of the same parents, but used to describe a variety of relationships including half-brothers, step-brothers, cousins and even uncles!
While this did not prove that Jesus didn't have brothers, it certainly threw the door wide open for more questions. Like: Why wasn't there any reference to Jesus's brothers in Luke 2:41-42 when Jesus was lost at the temple? Surely, if there was any place where they would have been mentioned it was here. But this was still not very conclusive. I dug deeper and discovered a lot of other things indicating that Jesus may not have brothers, but what sealed it for me was John's narrative of the crucifixion of Jesus.
Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, “Dear woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home. (John 19:25-27)
If Jesus had brothers, he would have left his mother with them, not with John, regardless of how favored a disciple he was. Besides, if they existed, they would have been there while Jesus was being crucified, wouldn't they?
Now that I realized the Church was not as manipulative as I had briefly imagined, I began to look to it for answers to the more difficult questions that I had, not surprised any more than not only did they have them, but in almost every single instance they were very rational, very logical, and very Scriptural!
Take this for an example. After reading the New Testament, I began reading the Old Testament and I had a lot of questions crop up in my mind as I read the book of Genesis. One of them was this: Adam and Eve had a number of children including Cain, Abel and Seth (cf. Genesis 4:1-2; 5:3-4). For these children to have reproduced, they would have had to marry each other. Is this what happened? Might there be another explanation? I thought I got the answer one evening when a preacher I was listening to suggested that after God created Adam and Eve, he may have created other people around the world. It seemed a reasonable explanation that would also account for the different races we find on the earth. There was also nothing in Genesis to contradict this viewpoint, but I decided to check what the Church taught on the subject. A little digging uncovered this from Pope Pius XII's encyclical Humani Generis:
... the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents. Now it is in no way apparent how such an opinion can be reconciled with that which the sources of revealed truth and the documents of the Teaching Authority of the Church propose with regard to original sin, which proceeds from a sin actually committed by an individual Adam and which, through generation, is passed on to all and is in everyone as his own (HG37).
And what did Scripture (the "sources of revealed truth" mentioned above) have to say? I took encouragement from Luke's words in Acts 17:11 where he said that "the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true" to verify what the Holy Father said. Here is what is in the Bible:
From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. (Acts 17:26)
Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned— (Romans 5:12)
Wow! Theories may be interesting, but they need not necessarily be the truth!
The Church also had guidelines to interpreting Scripture that I found remarkably useful and this article hopes to pass on some of what I learnt. Although it cannot possibly be as comprehensive as I might like it to be, I hope the few pointers I share will help you in your own study of Scripture. The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) offers some sterling advice in paragraphs 112-114..
The Second Vatican Council indicates three criteria for interpreting Scripture in accordance with the Spirit who inspired it.
1. Be especially attentive "to the content and unity of the whole Scripture". Different as the books which compose it may be, Scripture is a unity by reason of the unity of God's plan, of which Christ Jesus is the center and heart, open since his Passover (cf. Luke 24:25-27, 44-46).
2. Read the Scripture within "the living Tradition of the whole Church". According to a saying of the Fathers, Sacred Scripture is written principally in the Church's heart rather than in documents and records, for the Church carries in her Tradition the living memorial of God's Word, and it is the Holy Spirit who gives her the spiritual interpretation of the Scripture (". . . according to the spiritual meaning which the Spirit grants to the Church").
3. Be attentive to the analogy of faith. By "analogy of faith" we mean the coherence of the truths of faith among themselves and within the whole plan of Revelation (cf. Romans 12:6).
The Senses of Scripture
The CCC also suggests we take into account the two senses of Scripture: the literal and the spiritual. The spiritual sense is further divided into the allegorical, moral, and anagogical senses. Don't let the words throw you; it's all simpler than you may think and a few examples will make it all clear. But let me first quote the definitions from the CCC itself.
The literal sense is the meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture and discovered by exegesis, following the rules of sound interpretation: "All other senses of Sacred Scripture are based on the literal." (Exegesis is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text).
The spiritual sense. Thanks to the unity of God's plan, not only the text of Scripture but also the realities and events about which it speaks can be signs.
- The allegorical sense. We can acquire a more profound understanding of events by recognizing their significance in Christ; thus the crossing of the Red Sea is a sign or type of Christ's victory and also of Christian Baptism.
- The moral sense. The events reported in Scripture ought to lead us to act justly. As St. Paul says, they were written "for our instruction".
- The anagogical sense (Greek: anagoge, "leading"). We can view realities and events in terms of their eternal significance, leading us toward our true homeland: thus the Church on earth is a sign of the heavenly Jerusalem.
As I said before, this may sound intimidating, but it isn't really. A couple of illustrations will help us to understand how to interpret Scripture using these four senses.
Next: Interpreting "The Sacrifice of Isaac" and "The Burning Bush"
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