What does sin cause?

It causes you to not realize when situations are out of control. It causes you to not recognize the problems you are surrounded. It causes you not to take action against sins that should be punished.

King David's son Amnon had relations with his half sister Tamar (2 Samuel 13). It mentions here that David was angry when he heard what happened. That is it though. David does not do anything else. In fact it seems that later when Absalom plans to kill Amnon that David has no idea that Absalom might want to do this.

David's unwillingness (or inability) to appropriately punish Amnon for his sin ends up leading to Absalom's killing of Amnon. All of this goes back to David's original sin with Bathsheba. This sin lead to a series of problems that come into David's kingdom.

Another interesting relationship David had with a sinful man was David's relationship with Joab.

One way that sin starts

2 Samuel 11:1
1 In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king's men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem.

What happens next in 2 Samuel is David's sin with Bathsheba. I propose that one way that sin starts is contentment. Instead of going out with the army to fight the battles. David stayed home, but this is one of the reasons Israel even wanted a king. They wanted a king that would go out in battle for them. In this case David does not go out. He stays home and just relies on Joab to lead the army. Compare this to the response of Uriah when David calls him back from the battle. David lives in comfort and contentment but Uriah

2 Samuel 11:11
11 Uriah said to David, "The ark and Israel and Judah are staying in tents, and my master Joab and my lord's men are camped in the open fields. How could I go to my house to eat and drink and lie with my wife? As surely as you live, I will not do such a thing!"

(I love the juxtapositions in 1 and 2 Samuel.)

This has become more on my mind while running

For some reason running makes me compare my life to a race. Can't figure it out...

1 Corinthians 9: 24-25
24Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize.
25Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.

The thing I have thought of a lot lately with this idea is how much easier it is to run when you run with someone else. As a leader in a church itseems to me you have two roles. 1. Coach: Encouraging others on to do good works and live more faithful lives. 2. Teammate: Joining with others in serving the Lord. A part of recognizing that you are aso a teammate is realizing that you also need encouragement from the rest of the church.

Why read the Old Testament?

Many people look at the Old Testament as just a long lost of do's and don'ts. God telling the Israelites to do (or not do) something, and them not listening, then he punishes them. This happens over and over again.

What did Jesus get from reading these scriptures? Did he view them as just a list of rules?

Jesus looked at the scriptures as not just a list of rules. He looked at the lives of the people in the scriptures to better understand the attributes of God. Example of this is Matthew 12. Jesus gives two examples from the scriptures to help explain the intentions of God in regards to the sabbath. He also uses one part of the scriptures to help explain another. Example is when he quotes, I desire mercy, not sacrifice. Jesus also used the scriptures to show how they pointed to himself.

So I say we should read the Old Testament with a look at how the way people lived helps explains the attributes of God. Also we should read the Old Testament with an eye towards how it points to Jesus. We should learn from the Old Testament in similar ways to how Jesus did.

Are you hungry?

Matthew 4:4
4Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'

Matthew 5:6
6Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

The first verse comes when Satan first tempts Jesus. I found it interesting that the very Word of God would respond in this way.

What are we hungry? What do we thirst? Let us not live on just bread or just water. Let us be filled with the righteousness of God.

1 Samuel 28 Saul goes to a medium

In 1 Samuel 28, King Saul goes and visits the witch of endor. She was a woman who was known to perform seances to "raise" the spirits of the dead. Samuel was dead at the time. Samuel was the primary method in which Saul had received advice from the Lord. So Saul goes to the witch (as she is referred) and asks her to bring up Samuel. Lo and Behold she does. The primary question raised about this is whether it was really the spirit of Samuel who was raised.

I believe that Samuel really was raised. God allowed it to happen and used it to give Saul the word that the next day he would die along with his sons. I believe that these sorts of thing can actually happen, and are an area that we as Christians have to make a strong effort to avoid. Dabbling in areas such as tarot cards, mediums, horoscopes, etc. can not be a part of the Christian life.

Reflections on 1 Samuel

1 Samuel is one of the books in the Bible I have probably read the most. It begins with the calling of Samuel and ends with the death of Israel's first king, Saul. Along the way you meet this guy named David who ends up being pretty important.

So towards the beginning of the book, Samuel has been judging Israel for some time and he is getting old. His would theoretically take over for him, but it mentions that they are not doing a good job. So this means that before Samuel was Eli, but his sons did not do well (i.e. sinned very blatantly at the expense of worshipping God) then Samuel comes along and his sons do not follow in his ways either. So the Israelites ask for a king. Most of the times I read this, I think to myself, "I would have asked for something different too." In fact I might have asked for a king. The problem with the question is becoming a little more clear to me. Asking for a king was not asking to replace Samuel. Asking for a king was actually asking for someone to be over Samuel and the other priests. I wonder if God would have been upset if they had instead asked for a priestly family that did not turn from the ways of their father in the next generation.

The thing that interests me the most about this book is the swings in people's decisions. David seems sure that he will eventually be king. He knows that God will provide for him. Then all of a sudden he gets scared for his life and moves to Gath. The realness of David and his strengthening of his faith is very interesting.

Also, I can not decide what would have happened if David had gone to battle with the Philistines against Israel. The most common answer seems to be that he would have turned on the Philistines. It is never discussed so who really knows.

The thing I like about running

You can see your improvement. Today I ran the same distance as last week's second jog. Last week I ran it in 31 minutes and 25 seconds. This week i ran it in 30 minutes and 17 seconds. Next week I may have to run a slightly further distance. I had another moment of genious on the run. Early in the run I started kicking a loose chunk of ice for distraction, then a little later in the run I tried to kick another. This one was frozen solid to he ground. It nearly turned my knee around. Put another star in the should have known better column.

Did I mention I decided to read Ezekiel? Sometimes I read about the prophets and I think, "It would have been cool to be a prophet." Sometimes I read about them and say, "Thank goodness someone else had to do that." What always interests me about reading the Old Testament is to see how God is clearly the same God as in the New Testament. He is not a God that was at one time strict and full of wrath and the later on became loving and full of grace. He is a God that in the Old Testament and the New Testament hates sin and yet shows grace to his people in spite of their sin.

Cool Things In The Bible

So I am reading through the book of Numbers. This book has many memorable stories in it.
1. It has the story of when the Israelites first spy out the promised land and do not go in.
2. It has the story of Balaam and his donkey (the talking one).
3. Discussion on how the Levites are dedicated to God instead of the first born. Then God gives them back to serve the people.

One story that particularly stands out to me is when the Israelites complain against Moses and Aaron. So the Lord has a leader from each tribe of Israel bring a staff that to stay in near the tabernacle overnight. Aaron's staff overnight sprouts buds and ripe almonds. How cool is that? This is an example of how the Lord continually showed the Israelites what His will was by doing things that could only be accomplished by the hand of the Lord.

For us we are given these stories as a reminder of the love of the Lord and how he is always reaching out to His people to bring them to a closer relationship with Him.