Quotations from the Desert

  • June 4, 2021
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  • John Tillman

Scripture Focus: Deuteronomy 8.3
He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

Psalm 91.11-13
For he will command his angels concerning you
   to guard you in all your ways;
they will lift you up in their hands,
   so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
You will tread on the lion and the cobra;
   you will trample the great lion and the serpent.

Reflection: Quotations from the Desert
By John Tillman

Jesus and Satan both quote from our readings today during the temptation of Christ. Satan quotes Psalm 91, telling Christ that the angels would hold him up and would shield him from harm. The words are accurately quoted, and the psalm does claim that God will miraculously aid those he loves. However, the meaning of the verse is twisted.

From the temptations in the garden to the temptations of Jesus and his followers, Satan encourages us to misapply and misinterpret God’s words. In the garden, he says, “Did God really…,” minimizing God’s provision. Standing on top of the Temple, he says God, “will command his angels,” exaggerating God’s provision.

Commenting on Satan’s use of scripture, John Piper wrote, “What makes Satan happy is when he can get Christians to believe that Proverbs 15:6 justifies the accumulation of wealth in a world of hunger; that 2 Thessalonians 3:10 abolishes charity; that Romans 9:16 makes evangelism superfluous.”

It is significant that Satan stops his quotation of the Psalm before the verse about himself: “You will tread on the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent.” He is, after all, speaking to the one destined to do the trampling.

That brings us to Christ’s quotation, in which Moses is reminding the Israelites of the purpose of the manna in the desert. Manna wasn’t a backup plan. Israel’s hunger and God’s provision was a divine plan teaching his children dependence upon God and not the wealth of the land.

Christ and the Israelites weren’t hungry in the desert for no reason. Nor are we.

Christ demonstrated that he mastered the lessons of the desert that Israel failed to learn. He demonstrated that he learned the lessons of the Garden that Adam failed to learn. He locked eyes with the serpent upon whose head his heel would soon step down with infinite crushing weight.

Connecting to God’s Word and relying on it for our sustenance, for our source of life, is a consistent theme of scripture and the purpose of spiritual disciplines. In our deserts, we must eat the Word of God and drink the Living Water of Christ. We will be fed with Honey from the Rock.

What we lost in the garden, Christ has regained.
What we failed in the desert, Christ has won.
What we cannot bear, Christ has carried.
What we cannot complete, Christ has finished.

“Lord God Almighty
Came as a preacher man
Fastin’ down in the wilderness
Quotin’ Deuteronomy to the Devil
And then He set His face like a flint
Toward Jerusalem…”
— Quoting Deuteronomy to the Devil, Rich Mullins

Divine Hours Prayer: The Greeting
I am bound by the vow I made to you, O God; I will present to you thank-offerings;
For you have rescued my soul from death and my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before God in the light of the living. — Psalm 56.11-12

 – Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle
Today’s Readings
Deuteronomy 8 (Listen – 2:58)
Psalm 91 (Listen – 1:39)

This Weekend’s Readings
Deuteronomy 9 (Listen – 5:06), Psalm 92-93 (Listen – 2:09)
Deuteronomy 10 (Listen – 3:12), Psalm 94 (Listen – 2:08)

Read more about Our Opportunistic Opponent
We can resist Satan and he will flee. But just as he left Jesus in the wilderness, he is only waiting for an opportune time to return.

Our Opportunistic Opponent

Read more about There is a Fountain Filled with Blood — Lenten Hymns
When we are at our lowest of lows, Jesus extends his hand to rescue us. He has been there.

There is a Fountain Filled with Blood — Lenten Hymns

The Shema and The Lord’s Prayer

  • June 2, 2021
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  • John Tillman

Scripture Focus: Deuteronomy 6.3-9
3 Hear, Israel, and be careful to obey so that it may go well with you and that you may increase greatly in a land flowing with milk and honey, just as the Lord, the God of your ancestors, promised you. 

4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. 7 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. 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

Matthew 6.9-13
9 “This, then, is how you should pray: 
“ ‘Our Father in heaven, 
hallowed be your name, 
10 your kingdom come, 
your will be done, 
on earth as it is in heaven. 
11 Give us today our daily bread. 
12 And forgive us our debts, 
as we also have forgiven our debtors. 
13 And lead us not into temptation, 
but deliver us from the evil one.’

Reflection: The Shema and The Lord’s Prayer
By John Tillman

Many people today pray daily using The Lord’s Prayer which Jesus taught his disciples in the New Testament. Jesus and his disciples however, already grew up saying a daily prayer. It was a prayer taken from Moses’ speech to the people about to enter the land and was, in Jesus’ day, said twice daily. Jesus answered using this prayer when he was asked what the greatest commandment in the law was. (Mark 12:28-34; Matthew 22.36-40)

This prayer is called, “the Shema.” The Shema takes its name from the first word of the prayer. The Hebrew word shema is sometimes translated to listen or hear. In this prayer, and elsewhere in scripture, hearing and obeying are intrinsically linked in the Hebrew language. Shema implies not just hearing words but carrying them out. 

In The Lord’s Prayer, action is also implied. Praying “your will be done on Earth as it is in heaven,” is not intended to be a passive wish with no participation on our part. In both the Shema and The Lord’s Prayer, we are expected to engage in concrete actions once we stop praying.

We will pray today, combining these two prayers from scripture. Before you rise from prayer, ask God to guide your feet and hands to enact his word.

Hear, Listen, Obey
We ask you to hear us, God, but we need to hear you.
You alone are God, our only Father in Heaven
Your name is holy as we are to be holy.
Father, Son, and Spirit are one, as we are to be one.

You alone are the provider of our bread.
You alone are the forgiver of our debts.

In return, Lord, we love you with all our heart, showing your love to others in forgiveness
In return, Lord, we love you with all our soul, opening our inner being to your indwelling
In return, Lord, we love you with all our strength. The strength of our body and mind, we give to you for your service and will.

Tie your Word to us that…
In your strength, may we resist temptation.
In your love, may we rescue the falling.
In your Spirit, may we speak the gospel with our words, carry the gospel with our feet, and enact the gospel with our hands.

Video: (Shema — The Bible Project)

Divine Hours Prayer: A Reading
Jesus taught us, saying: “Whoever holds to my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves me; and whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I shall love him and reveal myself to him.” —- John 14.21– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle

Today’s Readings
Deuteronomy 6 (Listen – 3:13)
Psalm 89 (Listen – 5:29)

Read more about Lewis on Prayer Without Words
For many years after my conversion I never used any ready-made forms except the Lord’s Prayer… — C.S. Lewis

Lewis on Prayer Without Words :: Readers’ Choice

Read more about Public, Prayerful, Persistent Protest
Daniel prayed in defiance of an unjust law. He was guilty before the law of the land, but blameless before God.

Public, Prayerful, Persistent Protest

Who is the Sabbath There For?

  • June 1, 2021
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  • John Tillman

Scripture Focus: Deuteronomy 5.15
15 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day. 

Reflection: Who is the Sabbath There For?
By John Tillman

A “preacher joke” many preachers have alluded to is that when there is a “therefore” in scripture, one must look back to previous verses to see what the “therefore” is there for. Therefore…why is it that God commands the Israelites to observe the Sabbath? 

Because you were slaves. (v. 15)
Because your workers need rest. (v. 14)
Because work should have limits. (v. 13)
Because holiness is connected to rest. (v. 12)

Repeating the sabbath rules, Moses adds the remembrance of slavery. This emphasizes that not only must Israel not work, they must not compel others (even animals) to work for them. Moses seemed to realize that sabbath rules could be twisted to enable abuse. 

British manors were often divided into areas for masters and servants. Pulling a cord in the “upstairs” rang a bell in the “downstairs” summoning a servant. Today, however, even low-wage workers carry a device in their pocket through which the “master” can “ring a bell” to summon them at any time.

In the late 90s, I remember an acquaintance having to bail on plans because she got paged to go to work. She wasn’t on call to perform life-saving surgery or another similarly urgent task. She was on call to stock sweaters and shirts on shelves and attend to customers in fitting rooms at a mall retailer. Being “on call” for a part-time job making near minimum wage seemed like an overbearing, outrageous expectation even then. Today, it seems like a quaint practice from a gentler time.  

The invasion of work into private places and times is near complete. As much as smart phones have blessed our lives (such as enabling us to receive email devotionals) they have also allowed work to become, for many, a demanding and omnipresent god.

Let us center our weeks on the sabbath rather than on work, but without allowing sabbath to become a self-obsessed, self-care day which compels others to provide for our rest. Gods of modern economics demand we work harder in their presence, our God begs us to rest in his.

God’s model of the sabbath says, “I rest so that all can and will rest.” Jesus says the sabbath is for humans, not for God. Our rest, observed rightly, is an act of faith in God’s holiness and an act of kindness to all around us. May our rest bless others, not just ourselves.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Call to Prayer
Come, let us sing to the Lord; let us shout for joy to the rock of our salvation.
Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving and raise a loud shout to him with psalms. — Psalm 95.1-2– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle

Today’s Readings
Deuteronomy 5 (Listen – 4:25)
Psalm 88 (Listen – 1:58)

Read more about Keeping the Sabbath by Action
To Jesus, keeping the Sabbath holy meant staying in step with God’s Spirit and leaving nothing undone that the Spirit commanded.

Keeping the Sabbath by Action

Read more about Better Things to be Doing
“When will..the Sabbath be ended that we may market wheat?” — Amos 8.5 There is nothing more profitable…than worshiping God.

Better Things to be Doing

Honey and Grace

  • May 28, 2021
  • /
  • John Tillman

Scripture Focus: 
Psalm 81.16
But he would feed you with the finest of the wheat,
   and with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.

Reflection: Honey and Grace
By John Tillman

The honey from the rock in Psalm 81 is an image of God’s provision. Asaph is making reference to similar imagery in the Song of Moses recorded in Deuteronomy. This is the song Moses sings to the people right before his death as he passes leadership to Joshua. In the Psalm, Moses uses the image of honey from the rock to describe God’s provision for Jacob and metaphorically for Israel in their desert journey which has come to an end. 

In Charles Spurgeon’s commentary on Psalm 81, he notes that, “God extracts honey out of the rock—the sweetest springs and pleasures from the hardness of afflictions; from mount Calvary and the cross, the blessings that give greatest delight; whereas the world makes from the fountains of pleasure stones and rocks of torment.”

Puritan pastor, Thomas Wilcox, also takes the image of Christ the Rock and combines it with the imagery in Psalm 81:

“If ever you saw Christ, you saw him as a Rock, higher than self-righteousness, Satan, and sin, and this Rock follows you; and there will be continual dropping of honey and grace out of that Rock to satisfy you. Examine if ever you have beheld Christ as the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Be sure you have come to Christ, that you stand upon the Rock of Ages, and have answered His call to your soul, and have closed with Him for justification.”

The rock implies our suffering and our sojourn, but it also implies a sure foundation of Christ on which we may stand. Honey from the rock is an image of extravagance brought out of scarcity. Honey is a treat, an extra. It provides energy and health, but it, chiefly, is pleasurable and even indulgent.

The grace and mercy that we receive through the gospel of Christ is honey from the rock. It goes beyond satisfying some need or law or rule. Christ pours out, upon those who follow him, extravagant grace that goes beyond a dry court ruling of “not guilty.” It is the passionate, running embrace of a father receiving back a son from the dead.

Seek for Jesus in your pain, in your desert, in your struggle, for it is only from him that you can receive, not just sustenance, but honey from the rock.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons
Everyone will stand in awe and declare God’s deeds; they will recognize his works. — Psalm 64.9

– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle

Today’s Readings
Deuteronomy 1 (Listen – 6:27)
Psalm 81-82 (Listen – 2:36)

This Weekend’s Readings
Deuteronomy 2 (Listen – 5:06), Psalm 83-84 (Listen – 3:20)
Deuteronomy 3 (Listen – 4:33), Psalm 85 (Listen – 1:25)

Read more about Too Good Not to Be True
“The preacher is apt to preach the gospel with the high magic taken out, the deep mystery reduced to a manageable size.” — Frederick Buechner

Too Good Not to Be True

Read more about The Ram and the Cornerstone
May we not reject the stone of suffering, of sacrifice, of self-control, or of truth.

The Ram and the Cornerstone

The Ever-Patient Agriculturalist

  • May 27, 2021
  • /
  • John Tillman

Scripture Focus: Psalm 80.8-11, 14-18
8 You transplanted a vine from Egypt; 
you drove out the nations and planted it. 
9 You cleared the ground for it, 
and it took root and filled the land. 
10 The mountains were covered with its shade, 
the mighty cedars with its branches. 
11 Its branches reached as far as the Sea, 
its shoots as far as the River.

14 Return to us, God Almighty! 
Look down from heaven and see! 
Watch over this vine, 
15 the root your right hand has planted, 
the son you have raised up for yourself. 
16 Your vine is cut down, it is burned with fire; 
at your rebuke your people perish. 
17 Let your hand rest on the man at your right hand, 
the son of man you have raised up for yourself. 
18 Then we will not turn away from you; 
revive us, and we will call on your name. 

Reflection: The Ever-Patient Agriculturalist
By John Tillman

The psalmist compares Israel to a transplanted vine that is intended to bring the wine of God’s blessing to the world. Throughout the Bible, God is often pictured as an ever-patient agriculturalist.

God begins by planting a garden in which to place humanity. When tares are sown among his wheat, he delays judgment for the sake of his crop. He is a shepherd who seeks the lost sheep and gives his life for them. As the sower, he scatters seed even to soil others abandon. He is the oxen-driver who prepares a well-fitted and “easy” yoke for us. He is the orchard owner, giving his fruitless trees another year and every opportunity to flourish. He is a vinedresser, tenderly transplanting his vines from bad soil to good. He grafts in wild vines to join his true vine from which the blessings of wine will flow.

Israel was to become the representatives of God upon the Earth. They were to be set apart from the nations, yet welcoming to all nations. Their holiness was not intended to condemn other nations but to call them out of the darkness. God uprooted and transplanted Israel out of Egypt. He saved them from the darkness of idolatry and from under the thumb of empire. But a little bit of Egypt stuck to their roots. Eventually, they would become as evil as the empire they were extracted from.

Like his vineyard and like the fruit tree, God wants to give us every opportunity to flourish. God desires that we be placed, planted, protected, preserved, and made productive by him. We, however, can put a halt to his husbandry.  Our soil can resist his seed. Our roots can refuse his tending. Our branches can frustrate him with our fruitlessness. We can uproot in our hearts what he plants, replanting our own idolatrous crop of greed, lust, and anger.

Eventually, God, will till under fruitless vineyards. Eventually fruitless trees will be cursed and cut down. Eventually, our tares will be separated from our wheat and burned. We will experience both God’s justice and his grace.

We can participate in this process of sanctification now, becoming a partner to our own cleansing, tilling under our own sinful crops, and enabling a rebirth of fruitfulness.

The purpose in deconstruction is reconstruction.
The purpose in uprooting is to replant.
May we rejoice in being pruned and replanted.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Request for Presence
In your great mercy, O God, answer me with your unfailing help. — Psalm 69.15

– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle

Today’s Readings
Numbers 36 (Listen – 2:15)
Psalm 80 (Listen – 1:58)

Read more about The Cultivating Life
We have written before, “cultivation is supernatural,” but the simple actions of cultivating faith are not ethereal or fanciful. They are the practical, steady doings of the farmer.

The Cultivating Life

Read more about Cultivation Is Supernatural
Cultivation is not natural. It is supernatural. We give plants a safer, healthier place to grow than exists naturally, and they give us better food in greater quantities.

https://theparkforum.org/843-acres/cultivating-is-supernatural/