Mosaic Law Ceremonies and Offerings -- and Advent

 Please see how the intent of Advent or the coming of Christ was prefigured in the Old Testament in my earlier blog - My Word Does Not Return to Me Empty - Part 1.

Our Jealous God

"Do not worship any other god, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God."
(Exodus 34:14)

As humans, we often experience a jealousy that is tainted with an unreasonable and suffocating expression of emotion by another over our self/person. Or, we may be the one who obsesses to a level of madness that grips us like a spell that cannot be broken. We have read about so-called 'love' relationships where a partner says he or she loves the other but it is a selfish, obsessive driving emotion that seeks to control and dominate in such a way that it edges onto or crosses the border of sanity. While we would like to think that this is 'love' at its most passionate expression, it is not. The One who created love says this about what true love is: "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails." (1 Corinthians 13:4-8a)

Too often, this jealous madness that is obsessed with controlling and dominating the other person results in harm to the other and/or to those perceived to be encroaching on the jealous one's turf - a harm that potentially becomes deadly. The song of the jealous is, "if I can't have you no one will." 

I have been in such a relationship. 

My then husband more than once threatened my life at gunpoint and took our children hundreds of miles away as leverage. When a person is victimized to such an extent, you experience your own type of madness; your reasoning becomes warped. You walk in fear and shame - especially when the outbursts and threats become public and/or on your job. I was asked to leave my employment because of the risk to other employees. I felt like less than nothing at that point. While he claimed to be religious, and put on a religious face when attending services or around members of the church, his obsessive jealousy and need for control over me was exhibited behind closed doors. He had no fear of God in his heart. His kidnapping of the children, and unrelenting search to find me after I escaped his terror shattered every aspect of my life, estranged me from my family as I did not want to put them in jeopardy. Yet, ironically, they would distance themselves from me because of the shame I had brought on them, as I became known in all our circles as the one being chased from place to place by a crazed husband.  One day he found a way to contact me because he had won the lottery but, due to state law, had to share it with me as we were still legally married. I bargained with him for the children, telling him to keep the money and let me have the children. He signed them over to me for money. We fled immediately hundreds of miles in the other direction. Jealousy clothed with the label of  "Love" was spiritually, emotionally, and psychologically damaging so much so that only a merciful God could repair what was broken, distorted, and restore my scarred my relationship with Him. He had to teach me to forgive. He had to teach me perfect love.

Jealousy that leads to strong desire to control and manipulate others is a product of our sinful nature that we inherited from Adam. God created humankind in His image; our sin mars that image, damages our personhoods, minds, souls, bodies. Sin destroys relationship with God. Our inherited sin - aided and abetted by the evil one and the moral and spiritual darkness of his evil world system - impairs our ability to perfectly express anger or jealousy. We have no pure starting point within our natural selves to provide the perfect expression of such powerful emotion. Our human anger and jealousy has no righteousness attached to it because it emanates from a place of damage and brokeness. Within our human power, we cannot even love as we ought. Within our natural selves, this lack is a critical and chronic disability that is also self-deceiving - it permeates all we do. Because our natural selves suffer in that way, when we come across a scripture like the Exodus passage quoted above, or Deuteronomy 4:24, or 1 Corinthians 10:22, we are challenged in our sin-shaped hearts and minds to understand this jealousy of God - which is a perfect expression and sovereign right.

To be honest, from a spiritual standpoint, I know for a certainty that God's jealousy is beyond my comprehension. There was a time when that lack of 'sight' was a struggle because I lived by logic. Logic can sometimes get in the way of faith, as I had to learn. Awareness of God those aspects and attributes of God's character that I cannot fully comprehend is a reason to rejoice because why would I want a God I can control and manipulate? No, instead of dampening my faith, I more and more desire for it to be stronger so that even though I cannot comprehend every iota of knowledge about our Almighty God, my growing faith becomes growing trust in Him, gratitude for His perfect jealousy over what belongs to Him. That includes me.

How must we look at this part of God's character from a Biblical viewpoint - how He has revealed Himself in scripture?

• God's perfect jealousy is based in His holiness. He is Adonai ha'Elohim Hakkadosh - the Lord the Holy One. As sinful humans, we are unable to fully grasp the Holiness of God. It is like asking a person blind from birth to describe the sunrise or sunset, or the colors of the rainbow. -Joshua 24:19; 1 Samuel 2:2
• God's perfect jealousy is based in His justice - no jurist in the flesh can render up decisions in their repertoire of law and principle that can compare to the depths of God's justice. He is Yahweh Tsidkenu - LORD our Righteousness and Elohei Misphat (God of Just/Righteous Law). His law is perfect, His judgments are always right. -Deuteronomy 10:17-19; Isaiah 5:16
• God's perfect jealousy is based in His being El Olam - the Everlasting God. the Ever-Present God Who Dwells in the Eternal Present. He owns time. As owner and Creator of time, God has the sole right to use it as He sees fit. -Psalm 90; Colossians 1:15-17
• God's perfect jealousy is based in His being a Creator God, Elohim, The Hashem - the Great I AM WHO I AM. God owns all that He created, He has invested in us beyond our comprehension. He is our El Shaddai - our All-Sufficient Sustainer God. He has always been the Potter to our being the clay - what say do we have in what He does? -Exodus 3:14; Romans 9:20-22; Psalm 104
• God's perfect jealousy is based in His Almighty Power and Wisdom. There is no God of Power like our God. His Wisdom exceeds all the brightest 'geniuses' ever born all together. In His perfect expression of jealousy for His people, God will execute His wrath against those who desire to harm them.  -Daniel 2:20; Jeremiah 10:6; Revelation 1:7-8; Jeremiah 51:15
• God's perfect jealousy is based in His perfect love - a covenant love (Hesed) that is also sacrificial (Ahavah, Agape).  -Psalm 103:17; John 3:16-17; 1 John 4:9-10  This is not a love that we can grasp because that was destroyed by Adam's sin in us: we cannot grasp it nor express it in our human capacity. We must let the Holy Spirit create within us the love reflective of God.
• Finally (at least on this list instant), God's perfect jealousy is based in His Sovereignty. He owns all things. He controls the heavens and the earth, yet He has given His created beings the freedom to choose between His Sovereignty or theirs. (And we so deceive ourselves into thinking our choice of self-lordship is going to have a different result than it had for a perfect man and woman.) He is the author of all things, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. We cannot live for a moment if God removed all oxygen from us, and yet we presume to know better than He. As Sovereign, God has the right to act, choose, give or take away, create or destroy. This perfect rightness can often ring unfair in a nonbeliever's ear, for he or she has never known a righteous, perfect Creator and Owner; his or her experience and knowledge, or lack thereof, cannot bring him or her to comprehend that kind of Sovereignty that emanates from the love described above. He has the right to set destinies, to save whom He chooses, and allow the hearts of others to harden against Him. This question of Sovereignty has been raised against God for eons, and this challenge is eloquently described in Isaiah 40-44 and elsewhere in God's testimony as recorded in Isaiah. The book opens with a declaration of Sovereignty in chapter 1 of Isaiah where the LORD God describes the wickedness and rebellion of the people against His Lordship, in verses 23-24 He says: "Your princes are rebels and companions of thieves. Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not defend the orphan, and the widow’s cause does not come before them. Therefore says the Sovereign, the Lord of hosts, the Mighty One of Israel: Ah, I will pour out my wrath on my enemies, and avenge myself on my foes!" God our Sovereign reserves the exclusive, absolute right to be worshiped - on this point there is no gray area. -Psalm 8:1, 9; Daniel 4:2-3; 1 Timothy 6:15; Psalm 24:1-2; Isaiah 66:1; Deuteronomy 5:9; Deuteronomy 10:20; Romans 1:18-25  

The foregoing is but a glimpse into the perfect holiness and righteousness of the Only True God, a perfection that is expressed through a jealousy that we cannot understand, but which acts in agape love - a sacrificial love - for those who love God and are called according to His purpose. He desires the best for His people, and places a guardrail and hedge of jealousy around them. He has vowed to never leave nor forsake them, to not let them be snatched from His hand by the enemy. God's people are His possession because He created them to become His people through the poured-out sacrificial blood of Jesus. (Ephesians 1:6-7; Ephesians 2:12-14)

Our God of love, of Might, our Wise and All Knowing God wants our complete devotion - He deserves it! He is jealous for it! When our God Incarnate - the Son of God - walked on this earth, He constantly spoke to and taught such allegiance to God. "You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind." That we can serve only One master; that our God supplies all our needs when we put Him first in our lives. His beloved Sermon on the Mount overflows with admonition of relationship with God and how He would have us live. (Matthew 5-7) The parable of the prodigal recorded in Luke 15:11-32 illustrates God's love for us - that He does not force us into relationship with Him, that He is forgiving beyond our capacity to understand, that He desires our heart worship - our whole lives to be lived in Him and with Him; that to do so brings an inner joy unimaginable. His final earthly hours were filled with prayer and pleadings for all who would believe and obey, whose hearts were to be tied to His and to the Father, who would be one with Him and with the Father. (John 14 to 17) In Matthew 10, we hear Christ's strong implication of God's sovereign right of worship and devotion - His jealousy over His human creation - without using the word jealous. He spoke to the desire of the Father for our worship to be exclusive - not divided among other interests or gods. Christ's very presence as God in human form was to begin the gathering of those whom the Father, in His sovereign will, would set aside for salvation: His coming would set a sword, a plumb line, a line in the sand to separate those who would receive Christ and thus receive the Father and those who would choose to be their own lord or to worship the devil (as noted in scripture above - there are only 2 masters: God and the devil). He would anoint and appoint those that the Father would choose to serve Him and to carry out the work He began. In His last week on earth He foretold that there would come a time when He would, in God's righteous jealousy, His perfect love demonstrated, return for those whom He had chosen, who love Him with all their whole heart, mind, and soul, whose lives are committed to Him and are awaiting His return. That He would make known to all in an astounding set of events and acts His fierce love for those who love Him. (Matthew 24-25) O what a God! Isn't He wonderful! -Isaiah 25:19; Psalm 9:1.

Hallelujah! Praise our Jealous God who loves us with a fierce love of protection, of blessing, of provision of all things good and enduring. Who loves us forever and will never abandon those He loves. Who walks with us and lives in us. May we all cling to Him in this life and rejoice in His glorious and righteous jealousy in the life to come. Amen.