A harmful spirit from the Lord? How can that be true? Agency is the issue. The Lord, it seems, removed His Spirit from Saul
after his failure to do as commanded vis a vis the Amalekites. Remember that Samuel prophesied to Saul, “Then
the Spirit of the Lord will rush upon you, and you will prophesy with them and
be turned into another man.” That man
will no longer exist without the Spirit of the Lord, he will be “another man.” Did the Lord send the harmful spirit or did
the removal of His Spirit make it possible for this other one to enter
Saul? Jesse must have wondered why his “son
with the sheep” was suddenly so popular but also perhaps wondered why the king
would want this son, the one who was anointed as the next king, would be
summoned by the man who held the title now.
When David played the lyre the harmful spirit departed from Saul. Was that due to the Spirit of the Lord in
David? Apparently David wasn’t in Saul’s
retinue always, he isn’t here at the beginning of the story of Goliath. Why did the armies of Israel, whose own story
involved the defeat, by the Lord, of Pharaoh’s army, a far greater force than
the Philistines tremble in fear and dismay before this Goliath? For the same
reason the spies sent by Moses counseled Israel against entering the land, they
were relying on their own strength rather than His.
I can understand the disciples’ reaction to Jesus presence
among them. They were “startled and
frightened and thought they saw a spirit.”
They all believed in resurrection but they had never seen it, it was a
theoretical belief. What I can’t
understand is why we too often live in fear rather than faith since we know it
has happened and that means it will happen.
We know what we need to know about life, that, if we believe in Him we
will have eternal life. Why then do we
act so often to preserve our lives here, acting like they are the end of all
things, rather than risking boldly for the one who has been resurrected and who
is our life? We live too often like the
disciples prior to this encounter, hiding in the upper room and too rarely like
the disciples after this encounter, who “returned to Jerusalem (from Bethany
whence they had gone with Jesus) with great joy, and were continually in the
temple blessing God.” If you want to be a David, you have to remember what God
has done, is doing, and will do. Let
your faith be in him not yourself.
Peter gets a piece of the puzzle at a time. He is perplexed about his vison or dream
concerning unclean animals when he hears some men asking for him downstairs
when the Spirit says that he is to go with them without hesitation for the
Spirit sent them. When he arrives at
Cornelius’ house the pieces fall into place, the vision is connected with this
visit at a Gentile home, “You yourselves know how unlawful it is for a Jew to
associate with or to visit anyone of another nation, but God has shown me that
I should not call any person common or unclean.” Now Cornelius may have been a Gentile but he
was a God-fearer and when Peter stood before him, in fulfillment of his own
vision, he worshipped the man, an extraordinary thing for a Roman centurion to
do. All he knows is that he saw an angel
who told him about this Simon, also called Peter, and now this man is in his
home. He doesn’t know why he was to summon
him but he gathered everyone he knew and now his expectation is that Peter has
some message to share that is of vital importance. Having the faith to act in accord with their
respective visions has put these men in place for something special.
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