7 July 2010
Psalm 119:1-24; Deut. 1:1-18; Rom. 9:1-18; Matt. 23:27-39

Verse 2 may be the saddest verse in the Pentateuch: “By the way of Mount Seir it takes eleven days to reach Kadesh-barnea from Horeb.” Eleven days or forty years, take your pick. Moses recounts his attitude towards this horde and uses the words of the promise to Abraham, they are as numerous as the stars in heaven. He begins his valedictory address by remembering before them what they have done and how he has led them in righteousness, according to God’s plan. They are to remember who they are and whose they are and to recall that these forty years need not have been.

Jesus speaks plainly and directly to the spiritual leaders of the nation, calling them whitewashed tombs and murderers of the prophets of God. Jesus exposes them for who they are and that in their quest for righteousness they have forgotten what real righteousness means. Righteousness is an inside-out issue, the motivation for the action matters. As Paul will say to the Corinthians if love isn’t there then what we do is clanging cymbals and sounding brass. Jesus also connects these leaders with the leaders of old who led the people astray and into exile, ever believing that they were right, even in the face of prophetic words to the contrary. A greater prophet now speaks, one John says came directly from the Father’s side, and here He prophesies that they will do as their forefathers did to the prophets of old. He closes with a tender image of a hen gathering her chicks and says that the blame is all on them, they would not come to Him.

Is God fickle? Paul’s argument here is that election is God’s sovereign will at work and it seems that He chooses whom He favors without apparent cause. Part of the omniscience of God requires us to understand that He knows the future in the present, and His choice is based on knowledge we don’t have at the time. Time is a construct of creation, a function of the movement of the planet on which we live, and God lives outside of that creation. We are limited by the reality of our created-ness in ways that He is not. We can either rail against that or rest in it in peace and trust in the One who created us to be wise and loving.

Deal bountifully with your servant,
so that I may live and observe your word.
Open my eyes, so that I may behold
wondrous things out of your law.