Psalm 106:1-18; Wisdom 16:15-17:1; Rom. 14:13-23; Luke 8:40-56
Solomon re-imagines the events of the Exodus, particularly the plagues which destroyed the agriculture of Egypt but not of the Israelites. What he does is intriguing. He speaks of fire and water as the means by which God executed judgment on Egypt where lightning and hail were the physical causes. It is a wonderful way of re-casting the image so that what seems a paradox describes accurately the reality of the situation. He then shows that creation itself was a weapon against the Egyptians for God’s judgment while at the same time it worked benignly on behalf of the Israelites. Again we see God’s sovereignty over all things in these judgments. Solomon also tells us something about the manna that we don’t know where he gets his information; that it tasted to each one as whatever was pleasing to the person.
Again we see ritual defilement with the woman with the issue of blood touching Jesus’ garment. She is required to keep away from others lest they be contaminated ritually by contact with this unclean woman. She risks being in the crowd and then touching Jesus and her willingness to affirm that she was the one who touched him could have led to judgment against her but if she is now clean by virtue of healing then is Jesus defiled? Nothing defiled was made clean by contact with that which was clean but here she was no longer defiled so how were they to interpret the situation? Jairus doesn’t care where Jesus has been or who has touched him, all he cares about is that his daughter is dying and that Jesus might be able to do something, all those other questions are secondary. There is nothing like an emergency to help the mind determine primary and secondary issues. Jesus charged them to tell no one what had happened. Do you think they were obedient to that charge?
Paul’s argument is that there is no longer any distinction among food items. There is neither clean nor unclean any longer and yet he appeals to the strong brother to refrain from exercising his rights with regards to these things so that his freedom does not cause the weaker brother to stumble. Our consciences may convict us of certain prohibitions such as alcohol but God has not made general prohibition of alcohol. We must distinguish between the two but we should also exercise our freedom in love for our neighbor. Perhaps our neighbor’s conscience will not allow her to drink alcohol as it would be a slippery slope for her. We should not demand that she share our conviction on this issue and partake and we should refrain from exercising our freedom when we are with her. Paul’s governing principle is love and charity. If, however, our conscience (by this I mean the Holy Spirit) convicts us concerning any food or drink then we should be obedient to that conviction but not generalize to a prohibition for all.
He gave us eyes to see them,
And lips that we might tell
How great is God Almighty,
Who has made all things well.
All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful:
The Lord God made them all.
No comments:
Post a Comment