Random Study June 2024

 So while engaging in morning prayer today, I read and recited The Apostles Creed. I stopped after reading this phrase:

"I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.

He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit

and born of the Virgin Mary.

He suffered under Pontius Pilate,

was crucified, died, and was buried.

He descended to the dead."  (emphasis added)

In an earlier version of The Apostle's Creed (1940s Book of Common Prayer uses the 250AD version), the last phrase is translated as, "He descended into hell". 

I wanted to see the possible origin or original thought for framing Jesus' death that way. I "consulted", as I often do, Dr. R.C. Sproul. In his book, "Hard Sayings," in the 27th chapter entitled, "Did Jesus Descend into Hell?", he offers views from various Bible scholars and theologians. He is referencing the context of 1 Peter 3:18-22. Some say He went to hell on a redemption mission to free the OT saints so that they could go to heaven. Others say He went to hell to fully complete His sacrifice by being exposed to the terrors of hell. However, when comparing scripture with scripture, there is no passage that says Jesus went to hell in any localized place. What it does say is that Jesus said at the time of His death on the cross, "It is finished!" using the language of the time to state that He has made full and final payment at the moment of His death. The other difficulty in trying to puzzle out the writing at ! Peter is that the interpretations and explanations are very diverse. Dr. Sproul says it is a struggle to unravel the difficulty of this passage, but for a certainty it does not say that Jesus went to hell, but rather to a place of imprisonment. It also does not say when Jesus went to proclaim to the spirits in prison. 

Also, when looking at the original Greek and Hebrew scriptures and the words used there to describe what happened to Jesus after death, the Hebrew word "kever" is used and the Greek word "mnemeion"  is used (where the "e" between the "n" and the "m" has a stroke above it); both words translate to "grave or tomb" - a place of burial. 

So the phrase, "He descended into hell," may have been understood through a surmised interpretation of 1 Peter 3. 

Also notable: the Hebrew word "Sheol" which sometimes gets transliterated as "grave" is an incorrect translation. That Jewish word has the connotation of "realm of the dead" or "abode of the dead" where the souls of the dead reside. However, in Jewish texts, the word "Gehinnom" refers to a place of eternal punishment or where the wrath of God is executed. Similarly, in Greek, the word "Geenna" refers to such a finality. The Greek also uses the word, "Hades", which is pulled from Greek mythology and likewise refers to "the place of punishment, hell" and may even refer to the "lowest condition or lowest place."

Therefore, when the Book of Common Prayer was updated, the "He descended into hell" was rendered "He descended to the dead." Possibly as a "middle ground" in the debate? As the "to the dead" could carry with it an implication that He went to an "abode" or simply, as scripture states, that His body was placed in the tomb, and His spirit was commended/committed to the Father. (Luke 23:46; Matthew 27:58-60)

I am a Bible student and not a Bible scholar with credentials to qualify me as a Bible expert. I always try, however, to interpret scripture with scripture and listen for the Holy Spirit when I am stumped. He will either say '\'you're not able to understand right now," or "here is what you should know at this point in your journey."

It's 6:30 a.m. on a weekday, and I know I should be packing lunch or doing some kind of morning ritual, but I wanted to share this before I forgot it again...

When we were talking at Bible study about what Moses was doing or better yet, what God was doing with Moses for 40 years, I was again reminded of an encounter I hope I don't forget... I was dropping off a rental car and one of the gentlemen was assigned to get me to the Metro station. Mind you, it was a 10 minute or less trip...I can't remember how we got around to praising God but in retrospect the conversation must have gone from 0 to 60 in Christ. The gentleman was giving testimony that before he came to Christ he lived like there was no god but himself. And then the tugging began, and he finally answered God's call. He said that he asked God, why LORD did you wait 40 years before you called me? He said that the response was, 'because you didn't know anything yet 40 years ago.'

Even in our fleeing from God, He is working everything out for good. What the gentleman brought to the Body of Christ was compassion, understanding of what it is to be outside of God's will - in other words, a platform for reaching others based on his own experience that God allowed in his life. As we continue the account of Moses (next time Exodus chapters 4 and 5) let us each consider the episodes and circumstances God allowed in our lives  before we fully gave ourselves to him and ask God how he wants us to use those 'dark' days to his glory.

(ok so I was just about to sign off and my hands hit the keyboard in such a way that these references to Jesus' I AM statements jumped onto the screen. So, I located the references from Isaiah and added them too! - these are in reference to God's revelation to Moses - one of the most incredible episodes in the Bible - as to who He says He is; a look at the Hebrew for those words point not to the personal name Yahweh but to another name!)
John 6: 35, 48 I am the bread of life
John 8: 12, 9:5 I am the light of the world
John 8: 58 Before Abraham was, I am
John 10:9 I am the door
John 10:11 I am the good shepherd
John 11:25 I am the resurrection and the life
John 14:6 I am the way, the truth, and the life
John 15:1 I am the true vine

The I AM statements in Isaiah
41:4, 10, and 13
42:8 I AM Yahweh (the LORD)
43:3, 10, 12 – I AM Yahweh your Elohim, Qedosh Ysrael (Holy One of Israel), the one who saves you
44:6 I AM the First and the Last
45:5, 6 18, 22
48:17 -  I AM … teach you what is best
49:26 I Am … that saves you
60:16 – I AM – Go’El your kinsman redeemer

"For the LORD (EloHim, Yahweh) your God is a Jealous God..."

Can you ever remember a time when your mother warned you about taking a certain course of action? "Don't go over there to play, there are bad weeds there!" But, so-and-so was playing over there last week and nothing happened to him, you said to yourself. So off you go to play in the weeds. Only a few hours later you are itching and scratching your legs because there was poison ivy mixed in with the weeds. "If only you had obeyed me," your mom later says, "you wouldn't have to suffer like this." And she puts gobs of stuff on your legs to help reduce the itching. Or, "don't go across the street to so-and-so's house - there's something funny going on over there/I haven't met the parents yet." But so-and-so goes to your school and you played with him or her at recess. He/she is o.k. Your mom just doesn't know him/her like you do. So off you go across the street and play with so-and-so. You have had fun. Your mom wasn't right this time! You keep on going over there and playing with so-and-so in the yard and all is great. One day it starts to rain just as you all were getting your game on and so-and-so says come on - dash into my house so that we don't get wet. You hesitate for a second because you hear your mother's words in your head, but then again, you're getting soaked and it is easier to go into his/her house than go way across the street to your house. When you get inside, it is kind of dark, and smells of funny smoke. Some guy is chillin' in a chair looking at TV and when he hears you all running into the house, yells some very pithy foul language at the two of you for making noise. Your friend does say bad words from time to time, but you have never heard anyone say what the guy said, nor the threats he made to you if you made any more noise. He looks like the kind of person who would do what he says. You tell your friend that you've got to go home and, um, do your homework (you just make up anything at that moment), and run out of the house and when the door slams you can hear the guy cussing. 

Scary stuff.

Well, the above may not have exactly been your experience. But I can almost guarantee that you, someone of your acquaintance, or even someone in your group of siblings or extended family have had something kind of close to that. I can think back to some of my childhood and adolescent years when I wanted to be independent of my mother's judgment and rules. I thought that some of them were kind of out there, or that she couldn't understand how things were 'nowadays'. So when I finally began to take the Bible seriously, I couldn't believe how much I could see real life in it and episodes that mirrored some of the things that happened to me! The stories and principles were like right now, instead of old timey stories for bedtime. I saw those little scenes of a wise and experienced person giving sound advice so that people could have victory and success in their lives, and saw it being played out over and over and over again in the lives of the people who lived in the nation of Israel. And over, and over again even when the God who made all the universe, who could see into every nano-molecule, gives warning after warning about the consequences of certain behaviors and activity, the children of Israel dis it, and wind up getting in big trouble. Each and every time - it might vary in the amount of time each time the problems start due to disobedience, but they always come. And each time, the disobedience impacts not just the ones doing the disobeying, but also their children and grandchildren. [Exodus 20:3-7; Deuteronomy 4:1-40; 6:1-19]  

So how did these 'Bible people', these Israelites, get started? We all know the story about the Exodus from Egypt, with Pharoah and the 10 plagues and all of that, but how many of you know the backstory - the story behind the story? Why was a nation of Jews living in, of all places, Egypt? Why did God have such an interest in them? Was He God only of the Jews? Why would God tell the Israelites to move out of Egypt - the only place they've known for all of their lives, and go mostly on foot into a land a few hundred miles away that they have never lived in, and then to war against the folks who were living there so as to make it their home? (some people today will call what happened a kind of genocide and call God a murderer) So, is God guilty of wrongdoing? Why would this God, this Yahweh, have the Israelites traipse through the desert and wilderness for years instead of going directly to the land of Canaan? Who were the Canaanites and where did they come from? Why did God want them destroyed?

These are hard questions - especially for those of us who do not know the true God, His character, and especially his sovereignty. We seldom get a full picture of the LORD God -  EloHim, Yahweh - in every Sunday corporate worship experience, but we get enough sometimes to be curious about who He really is and why He made the statement above? Like your parents - and moms are usually the more vociferous when it comes to household rules - He has a right to direct our lives and provide boundaries and guardrails to help protect us and to enable us to thrive. He wants all of our worship, that is, our obedience (which is the foundation for worshiping God). He is still a Jealous God, i.e., He rightly deserves every creature's worship, obedience, service - He does not want to share with idols or other so-called gods. And yet, like the youths pictured above, we do it - ignore God anyway when it looks like we can't get our 'play on'. And then we have to suffer the consequences.

As the story behind the story unfolds and we get answers to the above questions, we'll get to see why this is so and what was going on those thousands of years ago that still impact our daily lives and serves as warnings still for us today.

Tease for next time... 

The Israelites had now experienced a great time of growth and prosperity and had gained considerable victories in the land to which God had brought them. They were living large. Their 'modern times' were in full swing! Modern housing - they no longer had to live in tents. A marketplace close to their settlements, social activity and times of celebration. The 'latest' in fashionable clothing, meaningful work - this was living! There were still Canaanites living nearby who for some reason did not get removed from the land - some were kind of nice and kept their properties up and sometimes you would come across a marketplace that the Canaanites owned or visited. They looked different from the Israelites in some respects, and dressed and lived differently. They definitely worshiped differently ... 

Well,

I was trying to watch The History Channel's epic "The Bible", bracing myself for the new testament dramas. Intellectually, I know that there are no pictures of Jesus that he sat for to have made, no likeness carved into stone or fashioned into clay. Yet, it still bothers me how the media and the movie makers depict Mary, Joseph, and Jesus. I think it is because the depictions are not logical, and may actually be deceptive.

Probably one of the reasons I like the movie, "The Nativity", is that there was sincere effort to cast the parts of Mary and Joseph with sensitivity to the Bible's story. They were Jews who could identify as their ancestor King David. Thus, they were of the tribe of Judah. Joseph was a full-grown man, with an income and means to make a living. Mary was still a teen - of marriageable age - any where from 15 or 16 to 18-ish, in keeping with Jewish culture of the first century.

To fulfill Scripture, the one who would become the Messiah, must be born of a virgin (Isaiah 7:14), must be born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2-5a), must be of the ancestral line of Jesse, the father of the great King David (Isaiah 11:1-2; Luke 2:1-7) - thus, be a Jew by heritage, would have as an ancestor the Great Abraham (Genesis 22:18; Matthew 1:1-2). His appearance would not resemble a character walking around with a halo over his head, with blond hair and blue eyes. He instead would have darker coarse hair, dark eyes, a dark beard, and his exposed skin may have reflected the ruddiness of one who was out of doors much of the day. Thus, he would not look different from his fellow Jews, would have been identifiable as a Jew (Isaiah 53:1-2); his features were ordinary. He was just a face in the crowd of other Jewish men who eeked out a living under harsh Roman rule. (compare Luke 2:21-52; 3:1) In order to accomplish the great purpose of salvation for which purpose he came, Jesus had to be Jewish. He was not European, Eurasian, Euro-Judean, nor did he claim Roman citizenship.

True, what Jesus actually looked like is a mystery to us. How tall he was, what was the distance between his hairline and eyebrows, how he wore his hair, how thick his lips were, what his ears looked like, how his voice sounded, or how his laugh sounded are not known to us. And, true, his looks, per se, do not weigh in God's purpose for the Messiah or Christ, yet his heritage did. He was born a Jew of the tribe of Judah into a royal line, into the Jewish culture of the first century in Judea, of a Jewish mother. All of these characteristics are vital to understanding God's plan of salvation. (John 4:22) As followers of Christ, it can be helpful to know just a little something personal about the Lord we serve. When we look closely at his life, then measure it against Scripture, we may find more clarity as we read the Gospel accounts - find a clearer understanding of certain things he said. We may also get a better perspective on the epistles written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit by Paul and others in their discussion about Christ, about the law, about Jew vs. Gentile, etc.

I have a feeling that if this blog were actually read that there would be several persons who would disagree with the foregoing - in fact, some would say that of all the 'mullarky' I've penned in this blog, this is the most controversial! Which, well, would be understandable since from the time of the great painters and sculptors of Europe, portraiture of Jesus reflected a European heritage. That's what we grew up with; from my perspective, we lost so much truth as a result. I end with this thought: As an African-American woman, to be painted to resemble a European -- blond hair, blue eyes, pointed nose and thin lips - would be a distortion not just of my looks, but would give a false impression of my heritage and parentage, my culture. My story would look different, I would most certainly stand out in family portraits, as I would look distinctly different from the mother and father who bore me, and from the siblings also born to the same mother and father. The impact I would have and others would have because of me would give cause to pause - am I genuine? Well,