I have yet to hear of anyone who experiences God as a god of vengeance, but for some reason, personal experience does not seem convincing enough for those who still picture God as a stern judge. For such people, I point out the following: Jesus, multiple times in the Gospel of John, insisted that he could be recognized as the Son of God because of his nature. Today’s verse is an example. If Jesus is compassionate and forgiving, then so must be God. If Jesus is vengeful and unforgiving, then so must be God.

So what is Jesus’ nature? Perhaps this verse will help you decide:

//Many have the sort of mistaken idea that Paul taught we would be saved entirely by grace … or, as some put it, by faith … rather than by our works. That we could never earn our way into God’s favor. Indeed, it does seem that way, when you read verses like Romans 4:1-5. I discussed these verses yesterday, pointing out how Paul argued furiously that even Abraham was not righteous enough to earn God’s grace.

So are works worthless in Paul’s mind? Are we saved by faith instead of works? Here are some more verses Paul wrote to the Corinthians that might make you think twice:

How do we reconcile this difference in Paul’s mind? Are we saved by faith or by works? I do not have the answer, but I recently read something that makes a lot of sense. In Paul & Judaism Revisited, by Preston M. Sprinkle, the suggestion is made that Paul recognizes two instances that require salvation: the initial inbreaking of the Kingdom and the final judgment. In relevant terms for today, we might say we are accepted by faith, but rewarded for our works once we begin walking with God.

//Over and over, throughout Jewish writings prior to Paul’s day, Abraham (the father of the Jews) is presented as a paragon of righteousness. Read Maccabees, read Sirach, read Jubilees. All of these will tell you that Abraham was pleasing to God because of his works; in particular, probably the act of nearly sacrificing his son.

But Paul turns this line of thought on its head. In no uncertain terms, Paul, in this letter to the Romans, claims Abraham was wicked, not righteous. Indeed, Paul’s entire argument regarding justification by faith rests on the assumption that Abraham was ungodly! Paul’s argument runs like this: If Abraham failed so miserably, but still found favor with God, what makes us think we can ever earn our place with God by our works?

Yet Paul did believe works were important! He’s one tough dude to figure out. Tomorrow, I’ll list a number of verses that Paul wrote, verses that demand good works so that we can be justified before God, and discuss how Paul makes sense of these two contradictory ideas.

//Today’s verse tells how Peter (Simon) was the first person called into discipleship by Jesus. Peter is not only the first disciple called, but the first disciple mentioned in the Gospel.

He is also the last:

Thus the mention of Peter forms a literary convention called an inclusio, centered on Peter himself. Scholars call this the Petrine Inclusio.

How much meaning are we supposed to read into this inclusio? Hengel suggests, “Simon Peter is as a disciple named first and last in the Gospel to show that it is based on his tradition and therefore his authority” (Hengel, Four Gospels, p. 82) . I mention in my book about John’s Gospel that Mark’s Gospel quickly became associated with Peter. Indeed, Eusebius, writing about Papier the presbyter, would write:

“This also the presbyter said: Mark, having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately, though not in order, whatsoever he remembered of the things said or done by Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor followed him, but afterward, as I said, he followed Peter, who adapted his teaching to the needs of his hearers, but with no intention of giving a connected account of the Lord’s discourses, so that Mark committed no error while he thus wrote some things as he remembered them. For he was careful of one thing, not to omit any of the things which he had heard, and not to state any of them falsely.” These things are related by Papias concerning Mark.

//Nestled in between two curious verses about David’s wives is this even more curious verse.

Verse 42 tells how, after Nabal dies, his wife Abigail hastens to marry David. Then verse 43 tells how David also married Ahinoam. Finally, verse 44 tells how Saul had given Michal, David’s wife, to another man. So in these three consecutive verses, David gains two wives and loses one.

But who is this Ahinoam? In all of the Bible, there is only one other woman named Ahinoam. It is the wife of Saul, mother of Jonathan and his two brothers (see 1 Samuel 14:50). Is this the same Ahinoam David married?

Well, we have one clue. Saul is said to have two more sons after Jonathan and his brothers, but they are born not to Ahinoam, but to a concubine named Rizpah. Indeed, after David marries his Ahinoam, Saul’s Ahinoam seems to disappear from the record, replaced by Rizpah. It seems, then, that David did indeed take Saul’s wife.

Could it be? If true, then today’s verses may show how the feud between David and Saul began to escalate. As sordid as this all sounds, the story gets even stranger. Continued tomorrow.

//Today’s verse tells of John baptizing people in the river Jordan. This was done, according to Luke’s Gospel, so that they could repent and be forgiven of their sins.

This seems to imply that only a person aware of their sinful nature, and a believer in Christ, could be properly baptized. In other words, not an infant. Yet over the centuries, infant baptism became very popular.

Enter a man named John Smyth. In the year 1609, probably influenced by Anabaptist teaching, Smyth embraced the unpopular idea that only believers’ baptism was valid. He and his followers had experienced only infant baptism, and wanted to be baptized again as a believing adult. But there was a problem: No one among his followers were rightly baptized; none had been baptized as a believer. Could an unbaptized person baptize another person?

John Smyth took a chance, and “cast water on himself,” effectively baptizing himself. He, then, was able to baptize others.

A year later Smyth began to question whether or not he was legitimately baptized. By extension, that would mean his converts also were not legitimately baptized. He tried to join a group of Anabaptists, but he died before they accepted him.  But his followers, named the “Brothers of the Separation of the Second English Church in Amsterdam,” remained convinced of their legitimacy as Christians. Near London, they founded England’s first Baptist church … and the Baptist denomination was born.

Thus was born the Baptist church.

But Saul, the appointed king, didn’t seem to promote himself in this manner. Indeed, Saul’s reign appeared quite humble in many respects. Nor did David, who succeeded Saul. We don’t find Samuel’s prediction coming true until the generation after David: specifically, David’s third son Absalom, who usurped the throne from his father:

No longer can we consider this coincidence. The Bible writers were specifically referring to Samuel’s prediction in telling how the kingdom went sour after David is chased from the throne. But the worst was yet to come; more tomorrow.

When Pilate asked Jesus about truth, Jesus gave no answer. Maybe Jesus was an agnostic.

//In today’s verse, the women of Israel honor returning warriors David and King Saul with this little ditty. The hyperbole is obvious, meant to imply that David’s battle heroics far exceed even the magnificent warrior Saul.

How do we know it’s hyperbole? Well, the Philistine population at its height probably numbered about thirty thousand. If David slew tens of thousands (plural), and Saul thousands (again plural), then that’s at least 22,000 slain. Obviously, they could not have slain the majority of the Philistines; this is not meant to be a body count.

Instead, the Bible turns a phrase, meaning “aheckofalot.” You’ll find the same language in other places, not meant to be read literally there, either:

The superscription above many of the psalms, le-David, however, probably does not ascribe authorship. It doesn’t anywhere else in the Bible. More likely, it means “to David,” or “for David,” or perhaps “about David.” The book of Psalms seems to be comprised of several song collections, one or more of which are written in the tradition of David. For example, Psalm 72 concludes with the words “End of the prayers of David son of Jesse,” though this is hardly the end of the Davidic Psalms; they pick up again with Psalm 86. Also curious is the existence of two Psalms–14 and 53–which are virtually identical, so the same Psalm was surely included in more than one collection.

More problematic to the idea of Davidic authorship is the existence of psalms which describe events after the death of David. I counted seven psalms which speak of the Temple. Others describe the destruction of Babylon, which occurred four centuries after David. And, of course, there’s psalm 137 about Babylonian exile: “By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat and wept when we remembered Zion.”

However, the Chronicles repeatly claim that David instituted the praise of God through song in the sanctuary. It is very possible that David and his musicians began the process of collecting hymns of praise to God, a process which continued for several hundred years ascribed to the tradition of David. Thus did the tradition evolve of Davidic authorship, similar to the way Moses is traditionally thought to be the author of the Torah.