Sermons, Articles, and Other Things

  In the previous chapter of Judges there are two lists. One list concerns successes that the children of Israel had known under the guidance of Joshua and the second list concerns failures that they had experienced. Perhaps we might have been happy with that description of things because life is usually composed of progresses and declines. Maybe the children of Israel were content too, especially if we recall that initially they did not possess any of the land. Whether they were or not, there was one person who was not content, but we might be surprised at who it is.   Who is he? The one concerned about the situation is called the angel of the Lord. The word angel can have the idea of messenger and on this occasion the angel had a message for the people. Yet as we look at his message, we can see that he did not pass on a message that spoke about what God had done. Instead, he passed on a message about what he had done in the past, what he had said and done, and those act...

So far, Jacob has seen angels when he had the vision of the ladder at Bethel. He also had the dream when the divine angel had told to return from Laban to Canaan in fulfilment of the divine promises made to him by God at Bethel. Now having reached the borders of Canaan he meets with angels. It must be of some significance that when Jacob left the promised land, he had a vision of many angels, and when he returned to the promised land, he saw many angels as well. On this occasion, many angels met him because he describes them as the Lord’s army or camp. I suppose the questions to ask are (1) why did they meet him? and (2) why did they meet him as an army? Meaning of Mahanaim One detail that contributes to understanding this encounter is the word Mahanaim, which means ‘two camps’. One’s understanding of the incident is affected by how the word is understood. There are four options: one is that the two camps are (1) the people and animals with Jacob and (2) the host of angels; the secon...

We could say that the Book of Ruth is all about decisions that individuals make and the consequences and outcomes of those decisions. It began with a decision by Elimelech to move to Moab and this was followed by another decision by Naomi to stay there after his death. Then other decisions were made by their sons to marry two Moabite girls. A few years later came another opportunity for decision making when the sons died. What would the women decide to do? They decided to go to Israel. And they knew that that decision would lead to further decisions and more outcomes. That should not surprise us because life is made up of decisions. Sometimes, however, several major decisions occur together. The immediate cause for this opportunity was the end of the period of famine in Judah. This change of circumstances seems to have stimulated some self-assessment in Naomi. As far as we know, provision was still plentiful in Moab, so it was not the mere availability of food that caused Naomi to ref...

We could describe the words of this passage as a spiritual testimony because Jacob is revealing to his wives what he had been told in a dream. The background to them being his wives is rather murky, and we know that they have been competing with one another throughout the marital arrangement. Surely, this message shows that God is a God of grace since he has plans that involve them although they are undeserving of it.   The Angel of God and the God of Bethel The title ‘The God of Bethel’ is a well-known one, perhaps because of the paraphrase connected to it called ‘O God of Bethel’. As far as the Bible is concerned, the title only occurs in this passage in Genesis 31, and one of the interesting details connected to it is that it is said by a being described as ‘the angel of God’. Is it significant that he is not described as ‘ an angel of God’? It is how the heavenly visitor described himself when giving messages to Hagar after she and her son Ishmael were exiled from the home...