Stoned! Laws and Invitations

Good morning,

Well, there they are, in the original .... At this point, I sort of derailed this morning.  I went on a search to determine if The 10 were written in Hebrew or in Aramaic.  The answers I found were surprising.  I'm sure it's not a burning question, but I'll just remark on it briefly.  The 10 were not written in Hebrew (until the Old Testament was compiled), nor Aramaic (my second guess).  They were most likely written in either Egyptian or in a pre-Hebrew pictorial language called Ktav Ivri. Ok, enough about that!  If you want to research it further or to enlighten me, go ahead, lol!  I reserve the right to be wrong about this!

At any rate, Ann's Advent devotional for Dec. 10th centers around The Law, of which the 10 Commandments was the "cornerstone", if you will pardon the pun.  Jesus referred to Himself as the Chief Cornerstone ("the stone the builders rejected") in Matthew 21:42.  Paul referred to Him by this title in Acts 4:11, and both were quoting Psalm 118:22. 

There is an inescapable part of human nature that longs for God, because we are made in His image. There is also our "sin nature", which causes us to want to rebel against Him and seek our own ways. With rules, some find comfort in them, while others are repulsed by them.  I'm in the former category, and some of my loved ones are most definitely in the latter.  That's not a judgmental statement, just a statement of fact that we are all unique.  Some of us tend toward the former and others toward the latter.  One predisposition is not better than the other.  The pitfall for rule-followers is that we begin to trust in the rules, which leads to legalism and pride over our ability to adhere to a set of commands.  The pitfall for the renegades is that they, too, are puffed up with self-love, loving the ability to choose their own way.

We were and are a messed up, stony-hearted people!  As Elyse M. Fitzpatrick put it:

"I am more sinful and flawed than I ever dared believe, more loved and welcomed than I ever dared hope."

Amen and amen!

It's funny, really.  God gave us 10 laws.  "Just 10 things...just attend to these 10 things!"  We couldn't even do that!  SMH...

What folks miss about the 10 and about the Law as a whole is that God gave them to us out of love for us.  Basically, the Mosaic Law is a set of governing principles which, if we follow them, will allow us to experience life here on earth with a minimum of disease, peril and harm to others.  But, more importantly, all of the last nine flow from the first commandment:  "You shall not worship anything or anyone other than Me.  You shall have no other gods before me."  The first commandment was about relationship, our relationship with the God who loves us, chases us, carries us, changes us.  If that relationship was/is right, all other 9 commandments and particulars of Mosaic law were/are not so burdensome.  

When we make ourselves god and pursue our own paths, we are violating the first commandment. Then, every bit of the rest "goes to pot".  This is the story of mankind, over and over and over.  The story of God's love and the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that the God who IS love pursues us over and over and over.  Precisely because we were unable to meet His perfect standard of holiness, precisely because we find ourselves dashed and broken against those stone tablets, our loving God kept His own law for us, in the Person of His Son, the Chief Stone.

Jesus is the Stone who breaks the stone tablets into pieces and while fulfilling every iota of that Law, gives us a new one, the Law of Love, a covenant TO love.  It was all about love anyway.  We just didn't see it.

"Oh, that their hearts would be inclined to fear me and keep all my commands always, so that it might go well with them and their children forever!"

Deut. 5:29

The anguished cry of Perfect Love, longing for His fallen creation.  He calls us still.  His heart ever longs for ours.

Surprisingly, our Lord's first invitation is to rest in Him, to find ourselves completed in Him.  Some of the most beautiful words in the Bible are these:

“Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. 29“Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS.

Matthew 11:28-29

Hallelujah!  Because He has fulfilled God's "impossible" requirements, our souls can rest in what He has done for us.

Another time He said this:

"Abide in me, and I in you."

John 15:4

This is an invitation to walk through this life in the realm of God.  It is what the psalmist meant when he wrote:

He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High 

            Will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.

Psalm 91:1

Jesus longs to be our heart's permanent home, our forever residence so He can show us that every longing of the human heart finds its fulfillment in Him.

Jesus's third invitation to us is "follow Him", to be His willing servant in the carrying of the gospel to the whole world.

"Follow me, and I will send you out to fish for people!"  

Mark 1:17

What an amazing life purpose, a mind-blowing opportunity - - to share Jesus's life-giving message of grace with this beaten-down, broken-hearted world!  There is no better life, than eternal life in Him.

Lord Jesus, you call me to be Your very own, and despite my frequent wandering, your love call persists.  You never give up on me, on us.  Your love is everlasting.  Praise be to the One who paid my debt and raised my life up from the dead: Jesus!  In Whose name I pray, amen.  

Sources:

Voskamp, Ann. The Greatest Gift: Unwrapping the Full Love Story of Christmas. December 10. Print.

http://www.antiquityart.com/the-ten-commandments-in-an-ancient-hebrew-script

http://billygraham.org/decision-magazine/may-2012/the-three-invitations-of-christ/

Ladder

Good morning,

He was on the run, having committed a heinous deception.  He had been driven from his home and pursued by an angry man, as a result.  He was young and fearful, having traveled 40 miles on foot that day, through a desert wilderness.  It was nighttime.  He was cold and exhausted.  

His father was Isaac, the one nearly sacrificed by Abraham, the one to whom God promised that his descendants would be as "the stars of the sky" (Genesis 26:4).  He knew, however, that it was not assured a living relationship with God came with one's parentage or birth order.  He had proven that, through the committing of his dastardly scheme, in which he had received his father's blessing.  No doubt he was questioning the efficacy of that blessing, as well as everything he had ever known. He found himself at the "end of himself".  His name was Jacob.

Jacob left Beersheba and went toward Haran. 11 And he came to a certain place and stayed there that night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place to sleep. 12 And he dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder[a] set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold,the angels of God were ascending and descending on it! 13 And behold, the Lord stood above it[b] and said, “I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac.The land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring. 14 Your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed.

Genesis 28:10-14

Perhaps you have met someone like Jacob who, by the very means of his talents and wily ways, is able to achieve anything his heart desires. Perhaps you are like him.  Jacob had, all his life, trusted in his own abilities. Admittedly, they had taken him far... until this point, where they had taken him to Bethel, a desolate stopping point on his 500-mile trek to his uncle Laban's house, the place his mother had sent him to find refuge.  (Jacob did not suck his scheming ways out of a baby bottle, you understand...)

As he slept the sleep of the dog-tired, bone-tired, dead-tired, with a stone for his pillow, God revealed Himself to him.  Isn't it that, sometimes, we are so busy trying to carry out our own plans during our waking hours it is only during our sleep that God can get our attention?  I'm laughingly thinking about how there've been times I was praying and suddenly find myself worrying about my to-do list...right?  Come on, now, can I get an amen?!

But, look!  It was when Jacob was "at the end of himself" that God came to Him.  God peeled back the veil which separates Heaven from Earth and shifted Jacob's paradigm, big-time.  This was the first time God had appeared to Jacob.  To remove all question, from the top of the ladder God introduced Himself, after which He reaffirmed to Jacob the promises He had made to his forefathers, Abraham and Isaac.

There was never any invitation extended for Jacob to climb that ladder.  If you are familiar with the old spiritual, "We are climbing Jacob's Ladder", you can retire that one.  It is unscriptural. Attempting to "climb a ladder to God" is man's way of salvation.  It is the way of every other religion on earth, apart from Christianity. False religions are sets of steps, like rungs on a ladder, which supposedly will restore one to God by climbing them. You see, the ladder in Jacob's dream is a foreshadowing of Jesus. (He alluded to Jacob's dream, establishing Himself in it, in John 1:51.)  He is the only way to God. Yet, in proclaiming Himself to be the only way, He does not ask us to climb up to Him.

God came down to us, at Christmas.  We rejoice at His coming, because we are all so horribly unable to reach up to God ourselves.  All of our attempts eventually come crashing down.

Jacob probably rejoiced at God's affirmation that he would get the land on which he was sleeping. But, God's promise was for a much, much greater blessing - - the blessing of His Son, whose human lineage would come from Jacob's descendants.  One of the names of Christ is the Lion of the Tribe of Judah - - the same Judah who was one of Jacob's 12 sons.

and in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed.

And, we are.  Hallelujah, we are!

Look up, you weary, you debtors, you abandoned, you broken, you beleaguered, you lost.  See the Christ who descends to you, who condescends to you.  See Him in this Advent season, and claim Him as your own, your glorious salvation.  His coming - - - this is amazing grace.

Oh Lord Jesus Christ, regardless of what family we are from, regardless of our past, we find true and eternal blessing only in You.  None of any family are excluded from Your blessings, unless they exclude themselves by rejecting Your salvation.  Open our hearts to receive You today, whether by taking that initial step to ask You to be our Savior or to ask You to give us who already know You more of You.  May we not profane Your coming down to us by regarding it as trivial or meaningless. Reveal Yourself to us, not only on this day of Advent, but more and more every day, as we stop to listen for Your voice, as we open our hearts to you.  It is in Your name I pray, Lord Jesus, amen.

Sources:

http://www.biblestudytools.com/commentaries/matthew-henry-complete/genesis/28.html

 Voskamp, Ann. The Greatest Gift: Unwrapping the Full Love Story of Christmas. Print.