//The prophet Isaiah is sometimes pictured as one of the more aristocratic, at least in comparison to other prophets. He has access to the king and other higher-ups. This makes God’s instruction in today’s verse even more bizarre.

God tells Isaiah to walk around naked for three years. Why? To illustrate the shame of Egyptians and Ethiopians, who would soon be captured and taken into captivity.

Then the LORD said, “Just as my servant Isaiah has gone stripped and barefoot for three years, as a sign and portent against Egypt and Cush, so the king of Assyria will lead away stripped and barefoot the Egyptian captives and Cushite exiles, young and old, with buttocks bared–to Egypt’s shame. –Isaiah 20:3-4

I have to ask. Does this make Isaiah the first to “walk like an Egyptian”?

//These are wonderful words of equality, penned by Paul, meant to be interpreted symbolically. Right? A person can’t really be neither male nor female, can s/he? Didn’t Genesis tell the story of how mankind was created “male and female” by God?

Let’s go back and read that text a little more carefully:

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. –Gen 1:27

Oh! Maybe we’ve been reading this wrong all along? God created “man” in His own image—being both male and female?

Hellenistic Jews read this text just this way! Mankind, they say, was created androgynous—both male and female—and they speculated that a time would come when human beings would once again return to this state of androgynous perfection.

Maybe you’ve read the Gospel of Thomas, and uncovered these words:

Jesus said to them: “When you make the two into one and when you make the inside like the outside and the outside like the inside and the above like the below, — that is, to make the male and the female into a single one, so that the male will no longer be male and the female no longer female– … then you will enter [the kingdom].” –Thomas 22

Maybe Paul was writing more literally than we thought?

//Today’s verse is about the children of Israel after they escaped from Egypt and fled into the desert. I’ve mentioned this topic so many times when talking about exaggerations in the Bible that I’ve noticed a mocking tone creep into my voice. The Bible says there were 600,000 men making this journey. As if one source isn’t enough, Numbers 1:45-46 counts “603,550 able-bodied, battle-ready men above twenty years of age.” Counting women and children, that’s probably about two million Israelites.

Guys, if there were ever two million people traipsing around in the desert for forty years, we’d know about it. We’d be able to uncover some record of it. Our archaeologists are not that bad. Instead, we have nothing. No record at all of an exodus ever happening. I’m not saying the escape didn’t happen, but two million people?

I’ve heard it calculated that if there were two million people crossing the Red Sea, in a column four people wide, the length of the line would stretch from northern Egypt down to the tip of the Sinai Peninsula, around Mount Sinai, and back up again. I mean, really! (There’s that mocking tone again, sorry!)

Archaeologists estimate that the population of Palestine around the year 1000 BC (the time of David) was about fifty thousand. Even if we consider all of these inhabitants to be Israelites, what happened to the two million? Did God kill 39 out of every 40 Israelites in the desert?

So, some scholars suggest the Hebrew word elef, translated as “thousand” in both Exodus and Numbers, should perhaps instead be translated as “military unit.” Each such unit could be as small as ten people. That means 20,000  escapees from Egypt, counting women and children. Still more than I would guess is reasonable, but at least it’s now within the realm of possibility!

//Ever hear of “Micah 6:8 Christianity?” Without arguing about context, this is an inspiring verse in its simplicity and self-direction. If only our lives could be so simple. Micah 6:8 is also the inspiration for a Charlie Hall song:

Verse
You could feed the whole world with the crumbs of old bread
Spread the good news through dreams and stones
With a breath of the wind You could raise up the dead
But You ask us to go

Chorus
Help us love mercy, help us do justly,
Help us walk humbly with You God

Verse 2
Forget not the widow, the orphan, and slave
O God please remember the helpless today
Call on Your children repairing the breach
There is no place too far that Your mercy can’t reach

Outro
For the children who sleep beneath cities at dark
let love go and touch them with your Father’s heart

//In today’s verse, Jesus and his disciples pass through Samaria on the way to Jerusalem. The Samaritans, despising Jerusalem, do not welcome Jesus on his way. So, James and John ask if the Samaritans should be destroyed by fire.

James and John, you may recall, were nicknamed the “Sons of Thunder” by Jesus, a reference to the two twin sons of Zeus. These two sons sat on each side of the throne of Zeus, the children of the sky, controlling thunder and lightning. Recall also the desire of J&J’s mother, who once asked Jesus if James and John could sit one on his left and the other on his right when Jesus came into glory. A glory which apparently was emphasized by consuming fire.

Thus in today’s verse, James and John refer back to the fiery prophet Elijah and his punishment of the prophets of Baal. In a contest to see which prophets (Yahweh’s or Baal’s) were serving the true God, Elijah called fire down from heaven. This was a perfect time, they reasoned, for Jesus to let them play with fire.

But Jesus turned and rebuked James and John, saying, “You do not know what manner of spirit you are of.” Jesus rejected the spirit of Elijah, and his treatment of those who espoused a different religion, in favor of a peaceful respect for religious differences. No sons of thunder that day.

Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, to the saints which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful in Christ Jesus.

//So begins Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. Or so we have it today.

The fact is, many scholars dispute that Paul wrote this letter. I agree with them; the doctrine of this epistle differs too radically from the seven undisputedly authentic Pauline letters (1 Thessalonians, Galatians, the two letters to the Corinthians, Philemon, Philippians, and Romans). In fact, we don’t even know who this letter was written to! The best ancient manuscripts lack the words “at Ephesus” in today’s verse. The author simply addresses his letter to “the saints who are faithful in Christ Jesus.” The words “at Ephesus” were added later; we don’t know why or by whom.

Sometimes we forget how much mystery really does surround this ancient collection of writings called the Bible. We just don’t know what we think we know, about even the most basic things.

But I do not think I am in the least inferior to those “super-apostles.”

So, Paul embarks on a challenge to show himself worthy of apostleship, too. Appearing rather embarrassed about the whole episode, he stoops to bragging: “Since many are boasting in the way the world does, I too will boast.” And what did Paul boast about? Why did he think himself worthy? Here is the basis of his three-fold argument:

[1] In the second half of 2 Corinthians chapter 11, Paul lists his sufferings as an apostle: imprisonments, floggings, stoning, shipwrecks.

[2] In the first part of chapter 12, Paul says “I must go on boasting … I will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord.” So he tells of the day he was caught up to paradise, hearing there inexpressible things which he dare not (or cannot) mention.

[3] In order to keep Paul from becoming conceited about his special revelation, God gave him a thorn in his flesh. There is considerable speculation between scholars about just what Paul’s “thorn” was, but it seems to have been obvious to his readers, or he would not have mentioned it among his credentials. (This leads me to believe that the trendy idea of Paul’s “thorn” being a homosexual tendency is way off base).

Finished with his three-fold argument, Paul again insists in verse 12:11 that he is not in the least inferior to the super-apostles.

//Here’s a befuddling topic. Did Jesus’ body ever get anointed for burial? This seems to be a significant theological event, but the Gospels don’t seem to agree.

Let’s start with Mark, the first Gospel written. Mark says that after Jesus was buried, probably on Saturday night (the Sabbath officially ended at sunset on Saturday evening), spices were prepared by some women, and that the next morning they went to anoint the body. Jesus had been wrapped days before in a linen shroud, unanointed.

Matthew tells the same story as Mark, so let’s move to Luke. In this version, the women note where Jesus is laid, and go home to prepare spices before the Sabbath (they rest on the Sabbath, according to the law). Then, they go to the tomb on Sunday morning. Like Mark, they find Jesus’ body missing, so he goes unanointed.

John tells an entirely different story:

Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds. Taking Jesus’ body, the two of them wrapped it, with the spices, in strips of linen. This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs. –John 19:39-40

Thus Jesus is anointed before his burial, with seventy-five pounds of spices! John not only contradicts the Synoptic version, indicating that Jesus was indeed anointed, but makes a point of describing it as a burial fit for a king! On Sunday, Mary Magdalene knows not to bring spices to the tomb, for Jesus’ body has already been anointed.

Is there some way to synchronize these stories?

//So begins the genealogy of Jesus, according to Luke’s Gospel. Matthew’s Gospel traces an entirely different genealogy, claiming the father of Joseph to be Jacob (instead of Heli) and going in a completely different direction.

These two genealogies have been endlessly discussed, with explanations for the differences provided by both liberals and conservatives. Both genealogies, of course, converge at King David, though Matthew traces his genealogy through David’s son Solomon and Luke contradicts this to say it was instead through David’s son Nathan.

Why two different parental lines? And why aren’t conservative Christians more distressed about this obvious contradiction? Let me call your attention to the phrase “so it was thought,” in today’s verse. This, according to some, provides an explanation for why Luke went a different direction: Luke must have been tracing Jesus’ lineage through his mother, Mary, instead of his “supposed” father, Joseph. The claim, in this case, is that Luke recognized Joseph not as the son of Heli but as the son-in-law. Heli was presumably Mary’s dad.

What do you think? Does this explain the difference in genealogy? I remain skeptical. If Luke meant to trace Jesus’ genealogy through Mary, why didn’t he just say so? Still, I do admit the logic in thinking this way.