A short selection of recent tweets pulled from the twitter stream - food for thought, prayer, thankfulness or personal action!
@biblegateway – A Bible falling apart belongs to someone who isn’t.
@CNN – Rukhsar Khatoon has India’s last documented case of polio. The country is beating the disease. http://cnn.it/1jqC9S8 pic.twitter.com/RCs6HVXyhR
@CTmagazine – Jesus makes a radical connection between our love for the stranger and himself. http://bit.ly/1eZ6Nik
@ubsbible - #Pray for those who attended the launch of the Beembé New Testament, in #Congo, and can now read the Word of God in their mother tongue. @salvationarmy – “Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see.”—Mark Twain.
@liberatenet – The God who speaks against sinners through the law speaks for sinners through the gospel.
@timkellernyc - Don’t let success go to your head. Don’t let failure go to your heart.
@biblegateway - I don’t know what tomorrow holds, but I know who holds tomorrow. (Speaking of twitter – don’t forget to follow us @tacticalbelief and @livingbelief !)
The controversial film “Noah” is finally in theaters and drawing large audiences, as was expected. If you haven’t seen the news, most reviews seem to be positive, and Christianity Today awarded the movie four and a half stars (out of five) and tweeted “Get to the biggest screen you can and watch #Noah.” Their review is here. Many details of the movie are clearly not part of the biblical account, but overall the film seems to be getting a fairly good reception from Christian viewers. Our take on the movie is here.
There is an old story, I am not aware of its origin, that each day as we go into the world we pass through one of three doors. The first door is the dark way, the door of evil intentions, which leads to harm for ourselves and others. The second door leads to neither good nor bad intentions, and the third door leads to the good intentions of serving and helping others. The interesting thing about the story is that it continues by telling us that most people go out into the world each day by way of the door of no intentions – intending neither bad nor good - but when we do so, we invariably return by way of the dark door.
There is certainly some truth to this simple little story. How many times have we gone out into the day not intending anything in particular only to sooner or later run into traffic, coworkers, messages or whatever that rouse us to frustration, anger, fear, doubt, or other negative feelings or actions. According to the story, it is only as we go out into the day through the light door – the door of intending to do good – that we will return by way of the middle door, or, if our intentions are maintained, through the door of good intentions.
The story has a point, but its weakness is clear. We all know that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” (as first stated by Bernard of Clairvaux), and that of themselves even the best of intentions usually are not enough. Simply put, the door of our own good intentions really only leads to a partial solution to the problem of how our lives will really play out.
But the old story can remind us, of course, of the words of Jesus which carry a much more profound lesson. The Book of John records His words: “I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture” (John 10:9). This was part of the parable Jesus told of the sheepfold with the sheep and the door they entered in and out of. But the words fit our old story well, too.
It is only as we go out into the world through the power of Christ – the true door – that our good intentions will be more fully realized and maintained. That takes conscious thought and determination, but if we remind ourselves daily of the door through which we need to walk, we will be much less likely to go out through the door of wrong intentions or that of no intentions at all.
In 2 Samuel 24:1 we are told that: “Again the anger of the Lord was aroused against Israel, and He moved David against them to say, ‘Go, number Israel and Judah.’” Because this chapter goes on to say that God punished David when he did take a census of Israel’s fighting men, the biblical account is difficult to understand at this point. Another odd aspect about the story is that it appears to differ in an important detail in the parallel account in 1 Chronicles which tells us: “Now Satan stood up against Israel, and moved David to number Israel” (1 Chronicles 21:1).
So who moved David to count the Israelite men – and if it was God, why was David punished for this? There are several aspects involved in clarifying this situation. First, as at least one commentary points out, it is possible that the first sentence of 2 Samuel 24:1 –“And again the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel” – is actually the title for the section of text that follows, so that the following “He” in “He moved David” in this verse might be understood as Satan, as in 1 Chronicles 21.
Notice that when David was challenged regarding taking the census by his military commander, Joab, David did not claim that God had instructed him to do this, but nevertheless “the king’s word prevailed” (2 Samuel 24:3-4). Further, we see that as soon as the census was taken, David regretted what he had done: “David was conscience-stricken after he had counted the fighting men, and he said to the Lord, “I have sinned greatly in what I have done. Now, Lord, I beg you, take away the guilt of your servant. I have done a very foolish thing’” (vs. 10). If God had instructed David to take the census, David’s words at this point would not make any sense.
So one solution to the apparent problem is to see Satan as being behind rousing David to conduct the census in both accounts. But at a deeper level we can also understand that in some ways God can be said to influence individuals by creating the circumstances in which He knows the individual is likely to act. In this way Exodus tells us that Pharaoh’s heart was hardened toward Israel (Exodus 8:19) when God created circumstances in which this might happen. In this sense 2 Samuel 24:1 may mean that God allowed Satan to tempt David because, as the verse stresses, His anger “was aroused against Israel” for its sinfulness at that time. Note that it was primarily Israel that was punished, not David; but it is as if God decided to punish Israel at a time and in a way that would teach David an important lesson regarding his own failings.
It seems that David’s sin in numbering Israel was due to his underlying motive for carrying out the census. God actually instructed Moses to number the Israelite fighting men for a specific reason on two occasions (Numbers 1:1-3; 26:2-4). But, as the Wycliffe Bible Commentary points out, there were only two logical reasons for taking a census in David’s time: to tax the population or (more likely because it was the fighting men who were counted) to prepare to conscript an army. Because God had blessed David with both physical abundance and safety, the taking of a census may have demonstrated a failure on David’s part through pride in his military strength or, conversely, lack of trust in not looking to God for economic or military help that might be needed.
In Christianity as in so many other areas, the importance of “walking the walk” rather than just “talking the talk” is self-evident. But sometimes we need to remember the value of the talk, too. The Book of Malachi contains a classic reminder of this:
“Then those who feared the Lord talked with each other, and the Lord listened and heard. A book of remembrance was written in his presence concerning those who feared the Lord and honored his name” (Malachi 3:16).
Here, both walking and talking are shown as important. First we see it was those who “feared the Lord” who were getting God’s attention. Although it is possible to fear God and not obey Him, that is obviously not the situation here. Proper fear of God, as the Bible clearly shows, does not involve cringing fear of punishment, but positive loving obedience – as was obviously the case where the names of these people were being written in a “scroll of remembrance” (and see Malachi 3:17-18). But beyond the obedience that was clearly involved here, we see that what had caught God’s attention was the fact that these people talked with each other. The context of this verse indicates that this was not just talk regarding some topic of physical interest, but talk regarding aspects of the walk with God in which these people were engaged.
In its broadest sense, the talking with fellow believers mentioned in Malachi means not only talk which relates to biblical issues and principles in the abstract, but also talk which is based on the love of our neighbor – taking an active interest in the members of our spiritual family, finding out about them, getting to know their needs and encouraging them. That’s the kind of talk which shows both love of God and of our neighbor. If these things are regularly a significant part of our conversation with those with whom we fellowship, then we can be confident that we are “talking the talk.”
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