Isa's Story

I’d like to tell you a story about a friend of mine. We knew each other growing up, but we did not become good friends until just the past few years. His name was Isa.

As a teen, Isa was always made fun of. His mom and adopted dad are both Caucasian, but he appears to be of middle-eastern descent. After 9/11, when he was a freshman in college, rumors started that his mom had an affair with some terrorist leader while his adopted dad was stationed in the Gulf and that he secretly was carrying on his real father’s legacy. Knowing Isa and his parents, I doubt there is any truth to that, but I want to give you a perspective of his background.

After graduating college in 2005, Isa was awarded a fellowship at a small seminary.  At first he wanted to go into teaching, but after coming against strong opposition for his liberal viewpoints, he decided instead to be a missionary. He received his MDiv in 2008 and spent the next three years as an international relief worker in the Middle East, working especially with oppressed people groups. He didn’t care who the people were—if they were in need, he helped them. Women, children, minorities, gays, Islamists, even a few terrorists were impacted by Isa and made a better life for themselves and their community as a result of his involvement. Many of them turned their lives around and became Christians, not because of anything Isa said, but rather because of how he showed them God’s love.

After spending three years overseas, Isa returned to the US on furlough in 2012. His missionary agency wouldn’t even give him the time to speak. Apparently they did not like the type of people he helped and the fact that he did not denounce their actions. Word had it in fact that Isa had on more than one occasion denounced the actions of his supporting churches for using the Bible as a tool for ostracizing others, especially when it came to Islamists and members of the gay community.

On April 5, 2012 my friend Isa was arrested for conspiracy to commit treason against the United States. The anonymous tip to Homeland Security later was revealed to have come from one of the unhappy members within Isa’s home church.  Isa was not trained as a spy and could not handle the first 24 hours of torture. The next day Isa died of a heart attack while in custody of Homeland Security. He was barely 30 years old.

My friend Isa was a great man who truly acted as the hands of feet of God in this world. He didn’t care about your race, religion, political affiliation, or sexual orientation. All he cared about was that God use him to bless others in need so that they might in turn be transformed back into ambassadors of God in this world. Even though his church and his government opposed him, he by far is the closest thing I have ever seen to the face of God in this world.

Perhaps by now you realize this story is a work of my imagination. However, this should not be confused with a work of fiction. The twenty-fist century story you read above is very similar to what it would have looked like had Jesus lived today. To a great extent, today’s Church rejects the teachings of Christ. If we are to ever return to living a life of Biblical principles, we must forget the notion that we are better than others and instead embrace the Biblical mandate to love both our neighbors and the outsiders in our midst as ourselves (Leviticus 19:18, 34).

So I ask you this: if Jesus walked into the doors of your church today, preaching the same message he preached 2,000 years ago, would He be welcome? Would his message or his ministry? If not, what can you do about it?

Hanukkah - Biblical Roots and Historical Background (Part I)

Happy Hanukkah! This week celebrates the rededication of the second temple after Antiochus Epiphanes was halted from his abomination that caused desolation as discussed in the second half of the book of Daniel. 

During the Great War between Persia and Greece in the second century BCE, Antiochus demanded an idol to Zeus be erected in the temple where pigs would be sacrificed to profane the name and temple of God. Some Jews sided with Persia in opposing Greece, while other Jews gave into Greece and opposed Persia. Yet God was faithful to those who remained faithful to Him, not siding with either empire. Antiochus was driven out, and the sanctuary of God was restored. 

Jewish legend holds that during the rededication of the temple, there was only enough oil to burn for one day, yet miraculously it burned for 8. Thus we now celebrate the 8-day festival of Hanukkah with the symbol of the menorah. 

Stay tuned next week for the second part of this post that will take a more in-depth look at Daniel 7-12 and its relationship to this event. 

The Walk to Emmaus - A Close Reading of Luke 24:13-35

And He Walks with Us and He Talks with Us, and He Tells Us We are His Own...

I really enjoy onomatology, which is a word I just made up that happens to already exist. It refers to the study of the meaning of names. In the Bible, especially the Pentateuch, one can almost always know what role the person in a story plays by the meaning of their name. The same can often be said of cities.

In the case of the "Walk to Emmaus" in Luke 24, however, it appears to be either a coincidence or an oxymoron. The name of the city has ties to the Hebrew word for a "warm spring." While the root word literally meaning "heat of the day" can have a figurative meaning of "perpetual life," saying that the disciples walking into Emmaus were walking into the city of perpetual life makes no sense. Most dictionaries simply show that it is a city about 5-7 miles from Jerusalem, and commentaries specify that it is important only in its proximity to Jerusalem, implying both nearby yet a short distance away.

One thing that I have found in reading Luke's Gospel is the importance of his verbs of motion. His account is presented out of chronological order so that first Jesus is "descending" into areas in the first third of the Gospel, "walking around" in the second third, and "ascending" to Jerusalem in the final third. Of course prior to Jesus' ministry we read the Spirit descending, and after his regular life we read of Him ascending to Heaven. Luke's verbs of motion continue to play an important part in this passage even though most of them do not apply to Jesus.

The verb of motion at first seems largely insignificant here regarding the disciples going into Emmaus. It simply means "going" or "traveling" and has no "descending," "going around," or "ascending" connotation that we have seen in play regarding Jesus' verbs of motion within Luke. The preposition used likewise has little significance but shows they had intent to reach the city that same day. Thus the movement and physical locations gain their significance solely in their relationship to Jerusalem. Emmaus is near to Jerusalem, but the disciples here are separating themselves from Jerusalem.

When Jesus enters the scene the verb of motion gains more significance. Although they are hindered from recognizing him, a term connoting intimate knowledge, he begins traveling with them. Both the primary verb of motion (travel with) and the helping verb (draw near) have connotations of Jesus joining the disciples on a more intimate level than simply two groups of people walking the same direction. Although the intimate connotation is not as strong as other verbs, there is still an intentional connotation of fellowship.

Jesus asks what they are discussing and specifies "while (they) are walking."  He makes the first move to enter the conversation about His own passion, that is, the events surrounding His death. His words include the "walk in/abide in" connotation that is quite a bit more intimate. Whatever they are talking about is sadly consuming their life. They respond by standing still. Given Luke's particular use of verbs of motion, this verb of lack of motion should be interpreted with extreme, figurative significance. Their disposition regarding their sad state of life remained unchanged.

They ask Jesus if He is ignorant of the surrounding events. He feigns it. They refer to Him (still not knowing it is Him) as a Prophet mighty in deed and word in the sight of God and the people. They acknowledge that He spoke on behalf of God to the people and also acted upon those words. He was a hearer, speaker, and doer of the word of God. (Recall, Him being the word is a later concept in the book of John.)

They recount His passion succinctly, blaming the Chief Priests and their Roman rulers, but not blaming the Pharisees, nor the nation of Israel. These later groups we come to find out are moving more in line with Jesus' "in the world but not of the world" thought per Luke's perspective late in Luke and in Acts.

The disciples then recounted their seemingly misplaced hope in Jesus' redeeming Israel. Redemption is in the middle voice, meaning the action also applies to Jesus, connoting that they also had seemingly misplaced hope of His redeeming Himself. They justified their ongoing state of sadness and mundane activity by recounting the seemingly unreliable story by women about angels saying He had risen but admitting they saw no evidence for it. Despite the empty tomb, Jesus had not appeared, and no angels had told them what the women had seemingly so unreliably stated.

Jesus then explains the Torah and the Prophets and how the Writings require the Passion before the glorification. They get to town. He pretends He has further business that does not include them but responds to their request accordingly by staying with them, presumably for them to hear more of His uncanny interpretation regarding Israel's Redeemer.

Jesus then sits at the table with them and breaks the bread and blesses it for them. Sharing meals is an intimate act, and when He broke the bread and blessed it they instantly recognized him. More specifically, they shared intimate knowledge with Him regarding who He was. As soon as they did this, He vanished. Then they got up that very hour and turned back into Jerusalem, the City of God and the City of the King. They had been going away from the City of God in sadness, but when they recognized the burning in their hearts had come from Jesus Himself, they literally repented of their sadness and went back to the City of God to tell their story.

The disciples thus were not going to a city of perpetual life when they journeyed to Emmaus. Rather, they were going away from one. Their encounter with Jesus began with Jesus meeting them where they were and even traveling away from His throne to explain to them the Gospel. The final revelation came at the meal, the most intimate occasion, where the Passover was in a small way reenacted. The response was joy and a full act of repentance-spurred evangelism. He had risen, and their hopes for Israel's redemption were just a small part of the joyous picture yet to come.

... And the Joy We Share as We Tarry There, None Other Has E'er Known

LORD God,

Thank You for walking with us and talking with us, even when we are walking the opposite direction of where You want us to be. Give us the ears to hear Your voice amidst signals that are unfamiliar. Give us eyes to intimately perceive who You are and where You are working. Give us wisdom to turn from our disheartened ways of life to pursue the realization of Your Kingdom.

In the Matchless Name of our LORD, Savior, and Redeemer,
Let it be so.

~ The Deeper Magician's Apprentice ~ 

Hope for the Hopeless - A Reading of the Transcendent God of Isaiah 40

Earlier today I posted with a close look at two texts that people often misuse to prove the Bible’s scientific infallibility. We looked at how people often misuse Job 38:14 and Isaiah 40:22 regarding the physical structure of the Earth, and I demonstrated how both of the texts assume and apply an Ancient understanding of the world. If you missed my point, it is not to argue that the Bible is faulty, but rather that the writers made assumptions and used them in allegories with no intention of teaching scientific truths. Rather, they were focusing on the transcendence of God using worldviews common to the day. If you have not already read it, you may want to reference that post first, though it is not necessary in order to understand this one.

In this post I am applying the principle of the previous post. I wish to look at Isaiah 40:22 in light of the meaning of the entire chapter and in context of both parts of Isaiah. You can decide if the Ancient worldview of a flat disc changes the meaning of the text at all. 

Regardless of the date of the writing, scholars agree that the events depicted in Isaiah 40-66 are Isaiah’s visions after the fall of Jerusalem to Babylon in 587 BC. Isaiah 39 concludes with King Hezekiah in power, having heard a good word from God, thinking he would have peace and security the rest of his life serving as Israel’s King. If we only had the book of Isaiah to go off of, in Isaiah 40, we wake up a century and a half later. What has happened to the peace and security Hezekiah thought he would have? We don’t know. What has gone on? Jerusalem has fallen. This we know. The temple therefore has presumably been destroyed, and the King is presumably dead. Israel's children have been raptured from their homeland and forced into exile in Babylon. Where is God in all this turmoil? Isaiah 40 therefore is the introduction to this half of the book, addressed to comfort those in exile and address this very question.

Below I have offered a direct paraphrase of all of Isaiah 40. My intent was to use some of the same concepts and emotions as the original writing rather than simply directly translating the passage. Isaiah was written during the apex of written Hebrew, and I hope to convey that apex of emotion below, as modern near-direct translations do not convey the emotion present, in my opinion. For reference purposes, I have included verse-by-verse citations in superscript, and I have included rhetorical information implied but not present in a grey font.  I have preserved the Hebrew proper name of God as YHWH, translated as “The LORD” in most English Bibles. I will not be concluding with a prayer but will rather leave you with the Word of God, inviting you to internalize the Message for yourself:

¹Comfort, oh comfort, my people! ^2fJerusalem is gone, destroyed for her sins, but in this time of desert, YHWH, our God, is coming... ^4fMountains may fall and valleys may fill with the sands of time, but YHWH is coming.... He said it Himself! ⁶I heard a voice. It said to proclaim the good news: He is coming!  

^7fCivilizations fade like dry grass, but the word of YHWH our God lasts forever. ^9fDo not fear, for the fallen Jerusalem will rise!. Behold! He’s coming now! ¹¹He brings a reward for his flock. He will feed us like a shepherd. He will gather us up in His arms as tender lambs.

¹²What? You do not know this God?! How can I describe Him?! The oceans are in His hands! The limits of the sky are but an arms reach! The Earth and its mountains are but dust on a scale! ^13fWho directs Him? Who advises Him? With whom did He consult to enlighten Himself or teach Him justice? ^15fNo one! Even all the peoples of the Earth are like a drop in the bucket to Him! All the trees of the King’s forrest and all the animals therein could never amount to an offering to Him! 

¹⁷All the peoples of the Earth are nothing compared to our God. ^18-20With what or whom can you compare God? An idol? Worthless! ^21fDo you not know? Have you not heard? Have you not been told since your birth? Do even the foundations of the earth not attest to this understanding? It is He! He! whose throne is above this petty disc of land, whose inhabitants are but insects! He parts the curtains of the Heavens and dwells in them as a tent. ^23fHe humiliates those rulers of the Earth, for they are nothing compared to Him. They are like scarce seed, planted without root, withering away and blowing as dust in the wind. ²⁵The Holy One of Israel Himself asks: “Who is like Me?" No one! 

^26fLift up your eyes and see: the Creator is coming! He is mighty! Do not feel that God has abandoned you. ²⁸Do you not know? Have you not heard? YHWH is an everlasting God! The Creator of even the very edges of the Earth! He doesn’t grow weary Himself, ^29fno, He even energizes those who are weary. He strengthens those without power. Even the most stalwart young man will fall. But He doesn’t!  

³¹Wait for Him.... He will restore our strength.... We will soar with Him again like eaglets... We will run with Him again like untiring deer... We will walk with Him again and never get tired of it... Wait for Him.... He is coming!

~ The Deeper Magician's Apprentice 

Subtle Science or Transcendence of God using Ancient Concepts: You Decide - Isaiah 40 and Job 38

Good morning to my fellow disciples. I apologize for not taking the time to write a new post yet this month. It has been a very hectic Summer with my added responsibilities as a teaching assistant to the normal shortened and more intensive Summer term, but I will make it up to you today with a two-part post.

I’d like today to take a brief look at how we approach the Bible, taking a close look at a few passages as illustration. Modern Science and Philosophy have brought a lot to the table in the past few hundred years. Faced with apologetic evidence from a few who seek to destroy our faith in God’s revelation to us in the Bible, Christians have often either abandoned their faith in the veracity of the Bible or have turned the Bible into a tool to combat Science. The Bible is indeed True. It is a faithful representation of the nature of God and God’s relationship to man. But those who have turned the Bible into a tool to combat Science miss the point of the Biblical message entirely. If we want to truly understand the message of the Bible we need to move beyond using it as an apologetic tool, often in the form of a weapon against flesh and blood (in contrast to Ephesians 6), and instead view it as an attestation of the reality of God and an attestation of how God has remained True to His Word over the course of the history of mankind.

With this hermeneutic in mind--that is, the way I am approaching the text--I want to take a close look at two passages often incorrectly used as a proof against Science and show how they demonstrate the reality of the truthfulness of God’s word. First let’s look at Job 38:12-15. In some Christian’s minds, Job is viewed as the oldest book of the Bible. This is not my view, but I am not here to debate dating. Let’s just assume for a moment that it is the oldest book in the Bible so we can hear the full argument. Christian apologists against Science will often quote Job 38:14 as a proof that the oldest book in the Bible refers to the Earth as round. The King James version is most often used to support this view, as it has God speak the following phrase to Job and his associates: “It (the Earth) is turned as clay to the seal.” They read this as throwing a sphere of clay on the potter’s wheel and letting it spin on its axis, similar to how the Earth is a globe that spins on its own axis.

We know today that the Earth is round and that it spins on its own axis, and there is nothing wrong with knowing that God, who sets all things in motion, created this sphere and set it spinning. But that is a true claim that is deducted from what we know outside the Bible and applying it to the passage. The passage in itself doesn’t say anything about this. What we have here in Job is a scene near the end of the book where God has come down to rebuke Job’s associates for continuing to say Job did something wrong. God is likening himself and his ways to a Master Potter shaping not only human clay vessels but also all of creation. If Job’s associates can’t understand how God is shaping all of creation, then how could they understand why he chose to shape Job the way he did? This is an allegory, not a scientific statement of the shape of the Earth.

In fact, if we were to read Job 38:14 as a Scientific statement that God “turns” the Earth as a globe, we would have to read the entire paragraph of 38:12-15 in the same light. 38:12 suggests God commands light--no problem there, we read that in Genesis 1 that God spoke light into existence via a command: “Let there be light!” But when we get to 38:13 we run into problems. The dawn (i.e. morning Sun) is said to “take hold of the ends of the Earth.” The word for “ends” literally means “wings” and is often appropriately translated “edges.” A clay statue under heat can be envisioned here, with God grabbing the edges of a clay eagle’s wings and “shaking out” the unwanted excess pieces of clay, likened to wicked people whose power will be broken (v 15).

If we don’t interpret it as literal “wings” but rather stick with the allegorical “edges,” we still run into problems, as we now are using 38:14 as allegory to support a metaphor of spinning clay as an exact replica of the spinning Earth. This spinning earth shouldn’t have any edges. What could this be referring to? To answer this question we should look to the second passage often incorrectly used to suggest the same thing, Isaiah 40:17-24. 

In Isaiah 40:22, we read in most English translations that God “sits above the circle of the Earth.” Those who wish to read the Bible as a scientific weapon against Modern Science use this passage frequently to say that long before any man conceived the idea of the Earth as a globe that God subtly put this notion into the Bible. While I am not debating God’s scientific knowledge of the Earth, the concept of a globe here is abusively forced upon the text by Modern readers. There is a word for a sphere in the Hebrew Bible, but it is not used here. The word that is used here refers specificly to a flat circle or a compass and can best be rendered “disc.” 

This concept of the world as a disc (with edges) was common in the ancient world. The picture painted by the writers of the Bible is a disc of land surrounded by water. The heavens were above the Earth and below the Earth was an abyss, a bottomless pit. Some in the Ancient world felt that below the Earth a god was forced to hold the world in place, but the Bible rejects this notion, saying that God created even this foundation. Not surprisingly, this foundation is specifically mentioned in the preceding verse, Isaiah 40:21.

Read in context of 40:21, the passage clearly refers to this model of the Earth. However, read in context with all of 40:17-24, we understand that the Bible is not affirming anything about the Ancient view of the structure of the Earth, nor is it subtly referring to knowledge to come. What the passage is focusing on is the utter transcendence of God who created everything and who can be a comforter to Israel in her time of exile. 

As promised, this will be a two-part entry. The next entry will be a personal paraphrase of all of Isaiah 40. You may read it at your convenience and form your own personal opinion as to whether God is trying to tell us something Scientifically about the structure of the Earth or whether Isaiah is focusing on the transcendence of God quite unlike anything the Ancient (and Modern) world could ever dream of. Let me conclude with this prayer:

LORD God, Father, Creator of All things, 

Forgive us for coming to your word with our personal agendas. Forgive us for focusing on trivia instead of You. Forgive us for using Your Word as a weapon against flesh and blood.  

Give us ears to hear Your Living Word. Give us eyes to perceive Your transcendence. Give us hearts to love others in the same way You have always loved us.

We pray this in Your Name alone, Let it be!

Pentecost - The Origins and Application of the Hebrew and Christian Holiday

Today is Pentecost Sunday for the Western Church. I hope it is an inspiring day for you!

Pentecost marks 50 days after Passover, where the Spirit of God descended upon Sinai to tell this soon-to-be-formed People of God the purpose for which they had been set free from slavery. They were set free so that they could hear God's voice, keep his commands, be his treasured possession, for the purpose of reclaiming the whole Earth as God's own (Exodus 19:4-6). For Israel, this meant keeping the Covenant: loving God, walking in his ways, and celebrating the entirety of the gift of the Torah (Deut 30:16). By doing this, Israel chose to live an abundant life in the land promised to Abraham for the purpose of blessing all the peoples of the Earth (Genesis 12:3).

Christians are most familiar with Pentecost being a New Testament event, which is true, but it is less than half of the story. Acts 2 records the commissioning of the Christian Church in terms very similar to the Exodus account of the first Pentecost. 50 days after the Passover/First Easter weekend, the Spirit of God again descended upon the soon-to-be-expanded People of God as a violent storm of fire, filling the entire place for all present to see. The grace of the Torah was expanded to not only be instructions given from the mouth of God to the People of God but became the essence of the people--the very words the apostles spoke were the very words of the Spirit of God. (Acts 2:2-3). 

The fulfillment of the Passover was restated, echoing the covenant preamble of God stating that Israel had seen what He had done to fulfill the Passover already (2:14-36). The invitation was given to those present to cleanse themselves with the authority given to them by Christ's Passover (2:37-40). Rather than turning away in dread-fear as Israel had done at Sinai, the people accepted this newly stated covenant, remaining in awe and wonder (a different kind of fear) at God's marvelous works performed by those who He had sent out (2:41-43).

Today marks the day of the formation of the People of God. What it means to be the people of God has not changed. Our identity as the People of God requires us to realize that it is nothing that we have done that has earned us the right to be called People of God. Rather it is God's Nature of being compassionate, gracious, patient, loving, faithful, and merciful that prompts God to offer an abundant way of life to us (Ex 34:6). This new way of life is a free gift, but it is a gift that costs us everything, as it requires us to choose to pursue the best interest of God above all else, and to make the needs of our fellow men an equal priority to our own. 

Pentecost is not about God initiating a paved road for people to go to Heaven. Pentecost is about the People of God accepting that God has paved a road for God to incarnate Himself today through the Church as the Body of Christ. The Spirit of God descended upon Sinai in Exodus 19 and was rejected out of fear. The Spirit of God descended upon Jerusalem in Acts 2 and was embraced in wonder. 

I set before you today life or death, prosperity or adversity. Love YHWH your God, walk in His ways, and keep His Torah so that you might live and live abundantly, and that YHWH your God may bless you in any land you enter. Choose life, in order that you might live, loving YHWH your God, obeying His voice, and clinging tightly to Him; for this is the very source and sustenance of your life.

Palm Sunday in the Larger Perspective - An Invitation to Act on the Truth of the Message

Today is Palm Sunday, the day Jesus traditionally entered into Jerusalem riding on a donkey in preparation for the Passover Feast the week before the Resurrection. Most of us know the traditional Christian version of the story, which I am in no way discounting, so I will not repeat it here. Instead, I want to look at Matthew’s portrayal of the overall story and show the bookends to his account of the overall story up until this point.

I want to draw attention to a subtle contrast regarding the types of people that were present when Jesus rode into town. In Greek there is a conjunction de that expresses contrast, often translated as “but” in English. The contrast is subtle, and sometimes it is simply translated as “and” or is left untranslated as an unnecessary conjunction that simply passes along the narrative of stories. But given the nature and placement in Matthew 21:6-9, I feel it is a subtle contrast that is intentional and want to put it into perspective in Matthew’s gospel.

In Matthew 13, Jesus’ ministry via parables begins with a story about four types of soil, differentiated simply by how yielded they have been to a plow. The good soil represents the ideal follower of Jesus: seed is planted into them, they hear the words of God, understand them, and go out bearing fruit, blessing others up to 100 times what God had blessed them with. This being fruitful with seeds goes back to Genesis and man’s original vocation as custodians of the Earth and how it plays out in Genesis 12 and the call of Abraham to bless all peoples of the Earth.

In Matthew 21:6-9 we again see four types of subtly contrasted people, an intentional bookend to this point in Jesus’ ministry. We see the disciples compared to the road, who simply do what they are told yet don’t understand the significance of it. Later, when the sower (Jesus) leaves, the disciples disperse in fear. We see “most of the crowd” compared to the rocky soil, rejoicing in joy without letting it sink in. Those cutting palm branches ironically are compared to thorny soil, letting their worldly interpretation of the Message get in the way of what God wants to do. But the good soil that is fruitful is compared to the fourth group, those who follow Jesus and go out before him. They recognize Jesus as the true Messiah and proclaim this by quoting not passages about him being a political leader but rather as heralding the name of YHWH alone, declaring Hosanna (salvation) of the highest degree, not only to Jesus but also to the world!

Now while I could stop there with an exclamation mark explaining the significance of the placement in Matthew’s gospel that most people would agree is an good interpretation, my current Inductive Bible Studies course in the Torah has trained me that a good message can only become very good if it is practical and invades people’s comfort zones. Jesus’ identity as Messiah not only for Israel (Jesus immediate followers) and the world (those going out in front of Jesus) is a Biblical truth that is relatively undisputed amongst Christians. But what people don’t like to admit is that Jesus Message was not primarily about himself but was primarily about serving God through serving others. 

I am not denying the nature of Jesus but simply saying that simply believing his identity is not the call of the Gospel. As James says, “faith without works is dead.” In other words, belief in the nature of Jesus without applying the Message of the Gospel is vanity, worthless, and unfruitful. Going back again to Genesis, it is the equivalent of Noah’s contemporaries, following God’s command to multiply without obeying his command to be fruitful. The Bible tells us that at this point in time, the world was corrupt enough to be destroyed and wiped out. Yes, I am comparing belief in the divinity of Jesus without applying the Message of the Gospel to utter corruption worthy of death!

So how do we apply this? We look back to the parable of the sower in Matthew 13. We take the seeds that we are given from our harvest and turn it into up to 100 fold by investing our personal resources into the needs of the community around us. We move beyond proclaiming salvation and into enacting salvation. We follow Jesus, and we go out from Jesus into the world and serve God by being a servant in the world.

While the above is a general message that goes out to all Christians, I want to make this practical for myself and my family and commit to my followers that as for me and my house, we will serve YHWH. I want this commitment to be practical, not merely ideological. This year for Easter, we will not go to Church. We will go do Church. The services will be recorded, and we can always watch them and listen to them later. There will be plenty of pastors, elders, and deacons in the Church building and the online services who can handle any “seekers.” But the Church, the ekklesia, is not called out of the world, it is called into the world. So this Easter we are going to take our own dead faith and work it, physically, with the small seed that God has given us in our tax return. And by doing so, ironically on Joshua’s third birthday (as the Hebrew Joshua has the same meaning as the Greek Jesus), we are going to resurrect our dead faith. 

I invite any and all Christians who do not have an official responsibility on Easter Sunday, wherever you are in the world, to join us. If you decide to proclaim the good news while serving others, please do so with the still small voice of God, not with dogmatic condemnation or simple ideological beliefs.