"Tight lines" is a blessing fishermen offer each other, a wish for lines taut with the weight of good fish. May God grant that the lines written here be taut with His blessings.
Tuesday, 16 March 2010 | |||
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Is the War Over? | |||
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One of the not-so-stellar moments of the George W. Bush presidency came less than two months after the invasion of Iraq in 2003. On May 1 of that year, President Bush stood on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln under a banner reading "Mission Accomplished," and told the crew that we had reached the "end of major combat operations" in Iraq. By just October of 2003 the media and critics were pointing out that more American lives had been lost in Iraq after that speech than before. The seemingly premature victory remarks continued to haunt Bush and seem to ring especially hollow now that seven years later the war supposedly won back then has been handed off to another president. You might want to excuse President Bush's ill-timed announcement just a little, because he has a biblical precedent in our text for this week, Joshua 11-12. Chapter 11 records Joshua's decisive victory over another coalition of Canaanite kings, and the destruction of the populace and plunder of their cities. Verse 16 says that Joshua "took this entire land." So does verse 23, adding, "Then the land had rest from war." Chapter 12 celebrates Joshua's completion of the conquest with a list of all the kings he conquered. And so arises a major interpretative question about Joshua. How do we reconcile these grandiose claims of complete conquest (found near the end of the book as well) with the clear indication in the coming chapters (13-19) that the conquest remained incomplete? There are territories left for individual tribes to subdue and plain statements that a number of Canaanites (besides Ruth and the Gibeonites) remained living among the Israelites. There are various schemes of interpretation to handle the complete/incomplete conflicting claims of Joshua. One is to suggest Joshua 11 and passages like it express a hyperbole acceptable in ancient writing and rhetoric. Another is to maintain that God's part of the victory was complete. He gave His people the whole land. But Israel failed to carry through on their possession of the entire country. Neither of these options is entirely satisfactory. Nor do other answers we will consider in a few weeks feel wholly satisfying. For this week I would simply like to remind us that there is a general human tendency to be triumphal before the war is over. It tempted Joshua, it tempted Bush, and it tempts us all. We need to be careful about living and expressing an overly triumphal Christianity. My wife and I recently attended an apologetics conference. We love that sort of thing--carefully reasoned, thoughtful defense of our faith. However, we were both struck with the note which seemed to permeate the talks at this particular conference. It was a sense that all the questions were being answered, that there could be no reasonable objection to the cases being presented for Christian truth, that all the skeptics should take flight before the arguments offered here. We could only describe the spirit of that conference as naively triumphalist, a little too quick to declare victory. That's why the season of Lent is such a pivotal time of the Christian year. In it we remember that as much as we live in the victory of Easter, the spiritual war is not over. We remember that our Lord told us that we would each need to take up and carry a cross in order to follow Him. We remember that there may be many losses and much heartache yet on our way to the final victory. The war is not over. On the other hand, as long as we remember that the war's not over, that much suffering still lies ahead for ourselves and for God's people everywhere, then it doesn't hurt to celebrate the fact that our Lord's victory is sure and complete. The Resurrection of Easter guarantees our own resurrection as if it had already happened. So I'm willing to cut Joshua and Bush a little slack, if the same grace might be extended to me as I get ready soon to shout "Christ is risen!" on Easter morning and sing, "Thine is the glory, risen conquering Son!" | |||
Tuesday, 09 March 2010 | |||
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Daylight Saving Time | |||
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It's a happy coincidence and not by design that this coming
Sunday, March 14, on which I months ago planned to preach from Joshua 10,
turns out to be "Spring Forward Day." Saturday night before bed
we all turn our clocks ahead an hour, thereby losing an hour of sleep,
but gaining over the spring, summer and much of the fall an hour longer
of daylight in the evenings. The story from Joshua at the beginning of chapter 10 is of course the Lord holding the sun still while Israel finished its victory over an Amorite coalition of several kings. There the extension of daylight appears to have been not just a single hour, but perhaps about twelve hours, the length of a "day" as ancient people typically used the word (to mean the length of daylight hours). Perhaps the first question that arises for modern readers of Joshua 10 regards the scientific feasibility of the miracle. We can obviously quibble about the language which has the sun standing still, when modern astronomy has taught us that it is the earth which turns only making the sun appear to move through the sky. And there are deeper questions about whether events contrary to the course of nature are possible. But the Bible and traditional Christianity are rooted in belief in a God who is able to and has chosen to break into the natural order and bring about events of which natural agents are not capable. Part of the wonder of Joshua and the sun is the awesome extent of God's capability in relation to natural powers. It's no surprise that the God who can stop the sun can also raise the dead. It's also good to point out some of the silly things believers have said over the past 100 years or so about the miracle of Joshua 10. Circulating around the Internet you can find reports that a 24 hour gap in astronomical history has been found by astronomers, NASA computers and the like. The gap is supposedly explained by Joshua's long day. Those stories are all nonsense and probably all stem back to a book by C. A. Totten, who briefly taught military science at Yale in the 19th century. His book starts with the absurd assumption that one can calculate the date and day of the week of creation and goes from there to further nonsense like a not-quite 24 hour gap caused by the sun standing still for Joshua. You can find a good accounting of all the silliness here: http://www.reasons.org/controversial-topics/joshuas-long-day/joshuas-long-day-and-nasa-computers-story-true Much better then a bogus apologetic based on pseudo-science is the straightforwardly allegorical interpretation of Origen who sees the battles of Joshua as symbols of spiritual warfare with evil and then interprets the long day as a sign of God's extension of the opportunity for salvation (see II Peter 3:9). We share the light of Christ with all who might believe in the long day given to us by His resurrection. We live in a long, long daylight saving time as God brings into His kingdom and saves "the full measure" of all who will believe. Like the trusty Israelite warriors kept at their battle until the long day was ended and all was complete, may you and I keep at the posts where God has placed us until the present day is ended and the Sun of Righteousness rises again on a new and eternal Day. | |||
Tuesday, 02 March 2010 | |||
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Saved by a Trick | |||
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"Would you help me with my rent?" It's a request we get more and more these days in our church office. A few years ago we responded to such a request from "Jane." We try to be wise and careful because we have limited funds and we want our gifts to be used for the purpose intended. So we agreed to provide a check for a small portion of what was needed and asked for a landlord's name to whom to write it. Jane then came to pick it up. I was in the office when Jane arrived with a young man who apparently was her boyfriend. As I handed her the check I glanced at her friend and noticed he was wearing a picture ID from work. The name on his badge was the name she had given as her landlord for the check. We had been deceived, tricked. I'm not sure why, but I gave them the check anyway. Perhaps there is some justification for my leniency in Joshua 9. Confronted by reports of Israel's victories over Jericho and Ai, a coalition of Canaanite kings forms in verses 1 and 2 of Joshua 9 and prepares for a pre-emptive strike against the Israelite advance. However, one community takes a different tack and prepares a ruse (verse 4) to protect themselves against Israel. The Gibeonites were inhabitants of a collection of towns centered on the city of Gibeon, located in the mountains seven miles southwest of Ai and about nine miles northwest of Jerusalem. Evidently deeming military resistance to be futile, they concoct a scheme to convince Israel to enter into a peace treaty with them. It's amusing to read how credulous Israelite leaders are deceived by the flimsy pretense that a Gibeonite party has come from a far away country. Props like moldy bread and worn-out shoes and clothes are taken as solid evidence for the tale that they are seeking peace from a distance and pose no threat to Israel in the land they are conquering. Only after a treaty has been negotiated is the deception uncovered. We may be somewhat surprised that Israel honors a treaty entered under false pretenses. Our present legal system would void any contract created under such circumstances. Why, we wonder, wouldn't the Israelite leaders feel free to wage war on and punish Gibeon for the trick? Part of our question about Israel's keeping the treaty arises because we have lost the sense of sanctity with which ancient people regarded oaths. But even on their own terms, Israel might have good cause to fear God's wrath for violating the herem ban on allowing their enemies to live and remain among them. Yet the text shows in verse 20 that they actually are more fearful of God's wrath if they violate their oath with the Gibeonites. And there is no sign in this chapter or what comes after that God is unhappy with them for their leniency with Gibeon. Indeed, perhaps the greatest miracle God will do for them follows almost immediately in chapter 10. There is lots to mull over in this story, but it suggests that God's violent intent against the inhabitants of Canaan is not absolute. We first saw the sparing of Rahab in chapter 2 as she acknowledged the true God. And now we see the Gibeonites saved as they at least acknowledge the overwhelming might and power of God for the Israelite army. In the midst of all the slaughter, there is a thread of mercy running, mercy even for a deceitful enemy. The lectionary Gospel text for this Sunday, Luke 13:1-9, connects nicely with our Joshua text as Jesus rebukes a question about the tragic deaths of some Galileans killed by Pilate. The disciples imagine it's because of some terrible sin on the Galileans part. Yet Jesus points to universal sinfulness and the need for repentance, then tells a parable the point of which is God's patience in waiting for sinners. We are all guilty and even deceitful about our sinfulness. We are not by birth or by right part of God's people. In a sense, we are all Gibeonites, coming to God hoping for some trick to save our skins from His wrath. And He is merciful, taking us into His holy community and suffering us to live in His presence, just as the Gibeonites were accepted into the midst of Israel and even became servants first of the Tabernacle, then of the Temple. So we may be called to regard those who deceive us with more merciful eyes. How might those who are still living in the slavery and fear of sin be brought in and incorporated into the people of God? Unlike ancient Israel, we as Christians have no calling at all to be agents of God's wrath. So even more than they we have cause to allow ourselves to suffer wrong or trickery in order to be what we truly are, agents of grace. This is what Jesus is getting at as He asks us to turn the other cheek. Though it's in the context of internal disagreements among church members, Paul says the same in I Corinthians 6:7, asking us to live in peace even if it means being wronged or cheated. We might ask ourselves, who are the Gibeonites for us, to whom we should show some leniency for their deceit or other misconduct, so that we might ultimately show them Jesus and His love? | |||
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I am the pastor of Valley Covenant Church in Eugene, Oregon. I love to flyfish and hike along the beautiful rivers in our area. I welcome your comments as I share sermon work in progress and occasional other thoughts.
Thank you for visiting this blog. I invite you also to visit my web page.
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