(One Year Bible Blog post & readings)

Today’s Torah gives us the Shema:

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts.
Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and
when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

which Jesus tweaked, by attaching love for neighbor. Scot McKnight wrote an excellent book exploring the Jesus’ adaptation of the Shema, The Jesus Creed. I reviewed it here.

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(One Year Bible Blog post & readings)

Throwing this:

Ask now about the former days, long before your time, from the day God
created man on the earth; ask from one end of the heavens to the other.
Has anything so great as this ever happened, or has anything like it
ever been heard of? Has any other people heard the voice of God speaking out of fire, as you have, and lived? Has any god ever tried to take for himself one nation out of another
nation, by testings, by miraculous signs and wonders, by war, by a
mighty hand and an outstretched arm, or by great and awesome deeds,
like all the things the LORD your God did for you in Egypt before your
very eyes?

You were shown these things so that you might know that the LORD is God; besides him there is no other. From heaven he made you hear his voice to discipline you. On earth he
showed you his great fire, and you heard his words from out of the
fire. Because he loved
your forefathers and chose their descendants after them, he brought you
out of Egypt by his Presence and his great strength, to drive out before you nations greater and stronger than you and to
bring you into their land to give it to you for your inheritance, as it
is today.

Acknowledge and take to heart this day that the LORD is God in heaven above and on the earth below. There is no other. Keep his decrees and commands, which I am giving you today, so that it
may go well with you and your children after you and that you may live
long in the land the LORD your God gives you for all time.

into the mixer along with my thoughts from Thursday.

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(One Year Bible Blog post & readings)

This is coming at me from the Torah reading: While God certainly had a special relationship with and plan for Israel, Israel wasn’t the only people with whom God had a relationship or plan. In a couple places of chapter 2, we read about God having reserved particular plots of land for other nations.

I wonder how this might carry forward into the church. Does God only work thru the church? Or despite having a special relationship with and plan for the church, does God also have a relationship with and plan for other people? Is the bible the whole story, or just the story of Israel and the church?

In the Gospel reading, we are into Luke’s take on the Sermon on the Mount. After proclaiming a great reversal in the Blessings and Woes, Jesus goes on to say:

"But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If
someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. If
someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.

"If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ do that. And
if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is
that to you? Even ‘sinners’ lend to ‘sinners,’ expecting to be repaid
in full. But love your
enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get
anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of
the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

"Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give,
and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken
together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the
measure you use, it will be measured to you."

Jesus is speaking now to those whom he has just lifted up. He is calling the Blessed to transcend restribution and revenge. He is calling them to love and grace. "I have not raised you up, so that you may oppress those who formerly oppressed you. No, I have raised you up that you might show love. And grace. And mercy."

++ May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face shine upon us, that your ways may be known on earth, your salvation among all nations. ++

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(One Year Bible Blog post & readings)

Deuteronomy starts out with Moses giving a re-cap of the desert wanderings. Is it just me, or is he playing a bit of the blame game when he says, "Because of you the LORD became angry with me also?"

Also, I love the expectation of gift and generosity expressed in Proverbs today:

One man gives freely, yet gains even more;
       another withholds unduly, but comes to poverty.

 A generous man will prosper;
       he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed.

       People curse the man who hoards grain,
       but blessing crowns him who is willing to sell.

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(One Year Bible Blog post & readings)

The first day of Spring and the 3" of snow that accompanied it have me thinking about nature. We’ve got perennials hiding under their white blanket, and seed trays lining our mantle. Hopefully we’ll get some warmer weather soon, so I can assemble our veggie garden. What’s this got to do with our OYB readings? This:

You care for the land and water it;
       you enrich it abundantly.
       The streams of God are filled with water
       to provide the people with grain,
       for so you have ordained it.

  You drench its furrows
       and level its ridges;
       you soften it with showers
       and bless its crops.

  You crown the year with your bounty,
       and your carts overflow with abundance.

  The grasslands of the desert overflow;
       the hills are clothed with gladness.

      The meadows are covered with flocks
       and the valleys are mantled with grain;
       they shout for joy and sing.

Finally, a brief blog note. I’m not real satisfied with how I’ve been using categories lately. So these posts are now under One Year Bible. I’ll try to track back to the previous posts when I get time.

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