Breaking Bread in Acts, II

I’ll be out of the country until next Tuesday, but I wanted to try to spur some more discussion on this. Let’s simplify it. Give me your view on the following passages:

(1) Acts 2:42   And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.
A. Lord’s Supper B. Common Meal C. Could be either

(2) Acts 2:46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts,
A. Lord’s Supper B. Common Meal C. Could be either

(3) Acts 20:7   On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul talked with them, intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight.
A. Lord’s Supper B. Common Meal C. Could be either

(4) Acts 20:11 And when Paul had gone up and had broken bread and eaten, he conversed with them a long while, until daybreak, and so departed.
A. Lord’s Supper B. Common Meal C. Could be either

(5) Acts 27:35 And when he had said these things, he took bread, and giving thanks to God in the presence of all he broke it and began to eat.
A. Lord’s Supper B. Common Meal C. Could be either

Breaking Bread in Acts

Keep those pitchforks sharp and those torches burning… but save them for a week.

In the meantime, help me with this study. Here are the passages in Acts that refer to “breaking bread.” How do we decide which ones are the Lord’s Supper and which ones are a common meal?

Acts 2:42   And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

Acts 2:46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts,

Acts 20:7   On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul talked with them, intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight.

Acts 20:11 And when Paul had gone up and had broken bread and eaten, he conversed with them a long while, until daybreak, and so departed.

Acts 27:35 And when he had said these things, he took bread, and giving thanks to God in the presence of all he broke it and began to eat.

1 Timothy 2:8-10 (addendum)

This post merely adds to the previous one, so if you haven’t read it, please do so. In the spirit of this blog in general and the last post in particular, it’s time for me to say that I think I was wrong about something. I think that I was misreading 1 Timothy 2:9. I accused most of the Western world of misreading that verse, but now I think it was me. If you haven’t read the comments on that post, please do so, especially the ones by Bob Bliss. He and I want to study this passage further, but my initial impression is that I was wrong.

I still feel, however, that we’ve read too much into what Paul is saying. His statement that he wants men to pray does not mean that he doesn’t want women to pray. When he says that older women should teach younger women in Titus 2, that doesn’t mean men can’t teach younger women. Paul wants the men in Ephesus to get together and pray, lifting holy hands (why don’t we bind that part of the verse?), without fighting. They apparently have a problem with that, and he wants it to change.

All right, citizens… back to your lives. I just thought I shouldn’t leave these things to the comment section.

1 Timothy 2:8-10

All right, I’ve gathered my courage and am ready to delve into a couple of passages where I hold unorthodox views. If you’d rather not have any preconceived notions challenged, please don’t continue reading. These are the kind of posts that inspire the local villagers to gather around my castle with torches and pitchforks, ready to slay the monster…

Let me begin with some disclaimers:

• No, I’m not promoting anything. Too many people want to start with the conclusions and work backwards. I’m trying to deal with the text. Only when we have fully dealt with the text can we work on the application. Too many people let what they want to find dictate what their study will reveal.



• I’m presenting hypotheses. If the orthodox conclusion is correct, I will be thrilled to return to that view. Help me get back to it, if that’s what I need to do.

So, what better passage to get into trouble with than a passage about gender roles in the church? Or, should I say, a passage that we’ve made to be about gender roles in the church. Let’s look at 1 Timothy 2:8-10:

“I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling; likewise also that women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel, with modesty and self-control, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire, but with what is proper for women who profess godliness—with good works.” (ESV)

Many people feel that Paul, in this passage is telling us who can pray in public and who can’t. My belief is that he’s talking about what and not who. Here’s why:

1. What if this passage said, “I desire that in every place men go to church instead of going to the theater on Sunday”? Would we then argue that only men can go to church? Paul is telling the men to stop quarreling and start praying. His command that men should pray doesn’t preclude women from praying as well. Look at Titus 2:2-3; we logically understand that the older women are to have the same traits as the older men. Interestingly enough, the grammatical construction between these two passages seems to be similar. The connecting word between the instructions for the two sexes, “likewise” or “in like manner,” is used both in 1 Timothy 2 and in Titus 2.



2. I think that most of our translations have allowed their views toward this passage to override their grammatical understanding. To help you see what I mean, let me quote from Young’s Literal Translation. Young seeks to reflect the grammar as closely as he can, and he translates this passage as follows: “I wish, therefore, that men pray in every place, lifting up kind hands, apart from anger and reasoning; in like manner also the women, in becoming apparel, with modesty and sobriety to adorn themselves, not in braided hair, or gold, or pearls, or garments of great price, but — which becometh women professing godly piety — through good works.” There is no verb in verse 9, only a participle. It seems that Paul is saying that the men should pray without quarreling and the women should pray in becoming apparel. A. T. Robertson admits that this is what the grammar could say, but he doesn’t think it fits with verses 11-15. I say that’s not translation, that’s interpretation. Besides, Paul talks about women praying in public in 1 Corinthians 11; why can’t he do it here as well?

I think that in 1 Timothy 2:8 Paul tells men how they should pray and in 1 Timothy 2:9 he tells women how they should pray. No, I’m not advocating women preachers, women elders, nor any outings on slippery slopes. I’m trying to figure out the meaning of this passage in 1 Timothy 2. Help me out with your comments. Save the pitchforks and torches for later.

Labels, labels, labels

"I never call Christians or others 'anti's,' 'digressives, ' mossbacks,' 'tackies,' or 'trash.' I concede to all, and accord to all, the same sincerity and courtesy I claim for myself, as the Golden Rule demands…" T.B. Larimore

As I’ve taken another look at Restoration History the last few years, I’ve become a fan of T. B Larimore. I’d love to be known as a man who refuses to take sides and who refuses to label others. It wasn’t until recently that I realized that the church where I grew up in San Angelo, Texas, was basically started through a one-month gospel meeting by T. B. Larimore. I guess some of his views were imparted to me from very young. One of those views is a deep-set distrust of labels.

Conservative. Liberal. Change agent. Anti. Progressive. Digressive… who wears what label depends on who is speaking. It’s rare that someone applies a label to himself. I’ve been called sectarian. I’ve been called liberal. I’ve been called a legalist. I’ve even been called evil (I’m sure that e-mail was sent in Christian love!). And all for expressing basically the same ideas. It just depends on where the other person is standing. In the big scheme of things, it really doesn’t matter what others say:“But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself. I am not aware of anything against myself, but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me.” (1 Cor 4:3-4) Still, I hate to see people resort to labels. There are several reasons why:

1. When we resort to labels, we’ve stopped viewing the other person as an individual. We judge them in terms of other people, not according to what they actually think and believe.



2. When we resort to labels, we stop listening. “Everything you’ve got to say, I’ve heard before from others just like you.”



3. When we resort to labels, we tend to fall back on preset ways of reacting. “Post-modernists think this way, and here’s what I always say to them.” If I were to accept anything that a “post-modernist” says, I’d be accepting everyone else to whom I’ve given that label.

So here’s one suggestion for preserving the integrity of our Lord’s church: stop the labeling!

If you want to heal wounds in the Lord’s Church today,
Gather all of your labels and put them away.
If you have to use labels, I suggest these and few others:
Christians, fellow saints, disciples and brothers.

I Pledge Allegiance

Take a look at this, taken from an article on Pew Research entitled “42% - Christians First, Americans Second”



Some people will look at this and worry about the Muslims being too fanatical. I look and worry that the citizens of the Kingdom of God don't seem to know where their citizenship lies! Only the Nigerians seem to have a clue about this; is it any wonder that churches are multiplying in Africa while they stagnate and die here in the States?

I am a Christian. A citizen of heaven, a subject in the Kingdom of God. I was born in this country and admittedly love it, yet would be willing to see her pass away for the good of the Kingdom. The United States of America is not God's chosen nation. My passport says that I am a citizen of this country, but it doesn't tell the whole truth. I am an alien, living out my life away from my homeland. "This world is not my home, I'm just a passing through…"

Paul says that we are fellow-citizens with God's people (Ephesians 2:19). He says that we are citizens of heaven (Philippians 3:20, written to the Philippians who would have been proud of the Roman citizenship that was theirs by birth). Peter wrote that we should live our lives as "aliens and strangers" (1 Peter 2:11). In fact, it's always been that way for God's people. Even when they were living in the Promised Land, they weren't at home. God told them: "The land is mine and you are but aliens and my tenants.” (Leviticus 25:23) If the people who lived in the land that God had provided for them were supposed to view themselves as aliens in that land, how much moreso should we.

Yet we forget that and get far too comfortable in the land we live in. I lived 15 years in Argentina and came to be very at home there. Yet I was never truly Argentine. (And my accent always gave me away!) What a blessing that was for me, to live those years as an alien. It helps me remember that, even now that I'm back in Texas, I'm still an alien.

There's an important passage in Hebrews 11. While discussing the men of faith from olden times, the writer says: “These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.” (Hebrews 11:13-16) They recognized that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. And because they didn't seek an earthly homeland God is not ashamed to be called their God! Does our speech make it clear that we are seeking a celestial homeland? Can everyone tell that we aren’t thinking of a land here on earth? Do we readily acknowledge that we are strangers and exiles? Or are we too busy being proud to be Americans?

The apostle Paul, in Philippians 3, writes about his heritage and his past, his identity as a Jew, a Benjaminite and a Pharisee. He then writes: “But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.” (Philippians 3:7-11) Does this sound like a man who would walk up and down the street waving a flag? He considered everything else as manure compared to his status in Christ. I hope one day to learn to do the same.

I am a Christian. First and foremost. Above all else. I have a national identity document from Argentina that identifies me as a resident alien. I should have one from the United States saying the same thing. My citizenship is in heaven.

I pledge allegiance to my God,
All else falls far behind.
No land, no piece of earthly sod,
Can my obedience bind.
May my love for this world and the kingdoms thereof,
Not make me forget what I read in the Word.
My citizenship lies not here but above.
My true loyalty belongs to my Lord.

A Whale of a Story

Jonah didn’t want to go preach in Nineveh. So he tried to run from God. When God sent a storm that put in danger the ship Jonah was on, Jonah was tossed overboard and saved by a “great fish.” After the fish “deposited” Jonah on dry land, Jonah went to Nineveh and preached. Actually, he went and announced destruction. “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” The people of Nineveh repented, and God relented. He spared the city.

Jonah should have been thrilled. One of the most successful preachers of all time. But instead, he was furious. Mad at God. He said, “O LORD, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster.”(Jonah 4:2)
And he was so angry that he asked God to kill him!

I see several important things in this story:

1. We should expect God to be merciful and forgiving. God continually surprises with His grace, though those who know him well shouldn’t be surprised. It’s quite possible that in the final judgment God will once again prove Himself to be a God characterized by forgiveness and mercy.


2. Even though we expect God to be merciful, our job is to preach the message that has been given to us. Jonah thought that it was quite possible that God would not destroy Nineveh, yet that’s not what he preached. He was given a message of destruction and preached what was given to him. (I think that’s why he was especially angry, because God had “made him look bad,” had allowed Jonah to announce something that didn’t happen)


3. We need to learn to care for all people. There was an article on Time’s website which pointed out that Americans have a good idea of how many Americans have died in Iraq, but grossly underestimate how many Iraqi civilians have died. We tend to focus on “our boys” and forget that God respects no borders, no nationalities. Jonah couldn’t understand why God would love the Ninevites; let’s not be that shortsighted.

It’s a whale of a story!

Why I don't support the "prayer in school" movement

The petitions come around every now and again, people wanting to get signatures to force the government to do something to “allow prayer in school.” And people are always shocked when I say that I don’t support that. “What? You don’t believe in prayer in school?” Of course, I do. I just don’t believe that prayer was ever taken out of school. And I don’t support any of the actions that government would take to try and “put it back.”

I don’t want the school system trying to teach my kids to pray. [There was a humorous article about this in John Clayton’s Does God Exist magazine (read it here).] The vast majority of teachers and administrators out there don’t believe as I do, and I don’t want them involved in the spiritual formation of my children. I will teach my kids to pray. We pray before they go to school. I teach them to pray at different times throughout the day. They need no permission from a teacher or anyone else to say a prayer. Believe me, as long as there are tests in school, there will be prayer in school!

I’m much more interested in getting prayer in our homes. If our families are praying with their kids (not just at mealtime!), if kids see their parents turn to God in times of crisis and in times of joy, there will be no need for a “moment of silence” at school. The kids will pray.

Forget the “prayer in school” movement. Let’s work on the “prayer at home” movement.

Teachers don’t bother to make my kids pray,
Their prayers will be there, can’t take them away.
Keep your Hail Marys and“Allah be blest”s
Our kids will be praying as long as there’s tests!

Aaron’s sons — what’s the point of Leviticus 10?

“Note then the kindness and the severity of God” (Romans 11:22)

This is the fourth in a series of lessons on Aaron’s sons. In the first post, I raised the question of why we in our fellowship have tended to focus so much on Aaron’s eldest sons while basically ignoring the other two. Since Nadab and Abihu are not mentioned in the New Testament nor are they ever held up as an example in the Bible, we need to take a long hard look at our fascination with them. We also need to look at why we don’t talk about Eleazar and Ithamar, even though the Bible talks about them more than their more famous brothers. As a “people of the book,” we should be concerned about such inconsistencies. In the second post, I talked about the forgotten sons, Eleazar and Ithamar. And in my third post, I looked at what happened to Nadab and Abihu.

I think that Leviticus 10 is a living example of what God says about himself in Exodus 34: 6-7 — “The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” God is first and foremost a loving and forgiving God. Yet He is also a God who punishes sin. God forgave Eleazar and Ithamar their disobedience yet punished Nadab and Abihu for their rebellion.

Here are some conclusions that I’ve drawn from my study of Leviticus 10:

• The death of Nadab and Abihu is not a case of sincere, godly worshipers who made a mistake as to how they worshiped God. Theirs was irreverent rebellion. It was because of this that Aaron was silent after their death; he did not seek to defend them as he did Eleazar and Ithamar. Eleazar and Ithamar disobeyed God out of pure motives and their sin was forgiven. Nadab and Abihu did not recognize the holiness of God and died for their boldness.


• This story shows us once again that God looks on the heart, looking at our motives when we fail to do what He has said and looking at our motives when we do what He has asked. Prideful rebellion against God will be punished as such. Yet God reserves the right to forgive failure to keep “the letter of the law,” because He and only He looks on the heart.


• The sin of Nadab and Abihu was the failure to recognize the holiness of God. Theirs was the sin of Uzzah (2 Samuel 6:7) and the sin of Uzziah (2 Chronicles 26:16 and following). Theirs was the sin of Simon the magician (Acts 8) who sought to purchase the gifts of the Holy Spirit. God will be seen as holy by His people or they will not be His people.

And therein lies the main lesson for us. The holiness of God. The overwhelming characteristic of God, from what I can see, is holiness. Beings in His presence cry out “Holy, holy, holy.” His holiness overwhelms. We, as priests, enter into the Holy of Holies because of what Jesus did (“Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.” Hebrews 10:19-22) . He opened the way for us to do what Nadab and Abihu tried to do. We enter confidently (Hebrews 4:16), knowing that our entry is permitted where theirs was not. Yet we must not enter flippantly. We must be aware of the holiness of God. God is not my good buddy; He is the holy God. We fear Him, not in the sense of being afraid of Him, but as we fear electricity: we’re not afraid to be around it, but we’re not going to stick a fork in the socket, either. I remember William Barclay writing about a Jewish rabbi who began every prayer by saying “Lord, forgive me.” He says that this rabbi confessed his fear of dying after calling on the Lord and before asking forgiveness. I by no means advocate that kind of fear of God, but I think we need to recognize that, when we worship God, we are entering onto holy ground. We are entering into the same area where fire consumed Nadab and Abihu, consumed them because they were flippant about the holiness of God. If their story is to be a warning to us, surely that is the warning: “Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.” (Hebrews 12:28-29) Acceptable worship has to do with the condition of our heart before God.

Our God, the Holy God, is a consuming fire. Let us draw near to Him with confidence; let us draw near to Him with reverence and awe.

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord!

Aaron's Sons, Pt. 3

“Note then the kindness and the severity of God” (Romans 11:22)

All right, as Don said last week. let’s talk about “the boys.” Nadab and Abihu. While not mentioned as often as their brothers Eleazar and Ithamar, their story is definitely more dramatic (Sort of like why they always show tragedies on the news, not the happy endings).

Leviticus 10:1 And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the LORD, which he commanded them not. 2 And there went out fire from the LORD, and devoured them, and they died before the LORD.

What’s that all about? Contrary to popular notion, it is not common in the Bible for God to strike people dead. This is the sort of incident that makes us say, “Man, whatever they did, I don’t want to do it.” So what did they do? With my best investigative skills, I’ve tried to reconstruct what happened. Here goes:

Aaron and his four sons have been named priests, going through an elaborate ritual that ended with fire coming out of the tabernacle and consuming the burnt offering and the pieces of fat that were on the altar. Seemingly, what happens to Nadab and Abihu happens in this same context (remember, that big number 10 in your Bible wasn’t in the original copy). During the festivities, Nadab and Abihu grab their new priestly censers, put fire into them and head off for the tabernacle. Apparently, they didn’t use the fire that God had provided (fire which was to be kept burning at all times and was to be used for holy purposes). The Bible calls what they used “strange fire”; think “strange” in the sense of stranger, not weird. It was fire from another place, not from the place that God had commanded.

A big part of their sin lies in the phrase “before the Lord.” They weren’t just making a strange offering; they were going to trot into the Holy of Holies to do it! Look at Leviticus 16:1-2. “The LORD spoke to Moses after the death of the two sons of Aaron, when they drew near before the LORD and died, and the LORD said to Moses, “Tell Aaron your brother not to come at any time into the Holy Place inside the veil, before the mercy seat that is on the ark, so that he may not die.” They drew near before the Lord and died. Having been given power, they wanted more. They wanted to do what only the high priest could do, enter the Holy of Holies. They wanted to do it when they wanted, not just on the Day of Atonement. They wanted to use the fire of their choosing, not just what God had ordered. And they died for their audacity. They did not respect the holiness of God. (Leviticus 10:3)

How could this happen? I think the Bible gives us a clue. Look at Leviticus 10:9-10. “Drink no wine or strong drink, you or your sons with you, when you go into the tent of meeting, lest you die. It shall be a statute forever throughout your generations. You are to distinguish between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean.” Now I have to admit, it’s possible that God’s thinking was: “Now that I’ve got their attention, I’ll give them another law to remember.” But the more likely explanation is that this statute had to do with what had just happened. I think that Nadab and Abihu had been drinking. They were sacrificing under the influence. Their inebriated state kept them from recognizing God’s holiness, and they paid the price for it.

That’s my reconstruction of the crime scene. We’ll take a break for comments.

Aaron's Sons, Pt. 2

“Note then the kindness and the severity of God” (Romans 11:22)

I’m sure you remember the story of Aaron’s two sons that disobeyed God in Leviticus 10, but in case you don’t, here’s the story:

“Moses spoke to Aaron and to Eleazar and Ithamar, his surviving sons: “Take the grain offering that is left of the LORD’s food offerings, and eat it unleavened beside the altar, for it is most holy. You shall eat it in a holy place, because it is your due and your sons’ due, from the LORD’s food offerings, for so I am commanded. But the breast that is waved and the thigh that is contributed you shall eat in a clean place, you and your sons and your daughters with you, for they are given as your due and your sons’ due from the sacrifices of the peace offerings of the people of Israel. The thigh that is contributed and the breast that is waved they shall bring with the food offerings of the fat pieces to wave for a wave offering before the LORD, and it shall be yours and your sons’ with you as a due forever, as the LORD has commanded.”
  Now Moses diligently inquired about the goat of the sin offering, and behold, it was burned up! And he was angry with Eleazar and Ithamar, the surviving sons of Aaron, saying, “Why have you not eaten the sin offering in the place of the sanctuary, since it is a thing most holy and has been given to you that you may bear the iniquity of the congregation, to make atonement for them before the LORD? Behold, its blood was not brought into the inner part of the sanctuary. You certainly ought to have eaten it in the sanctuary, as I commanded.” And Aaron said to Moses, “Behold, today they have offered their sin offering and their burnt offering before the LORD, and yet such things as these have happened to me! If I had eaten the sin offering today, would the LORD have approved?” And when Moses heard that, he approved.”
(Lev 10:12-20)

I’m sorry… were you thinking of the other two sons? That’s understandable, since, for some reason, we often hear the story of Nadab and Abihu and rarely hear the story of Eleazar and Ithamar. Yet their story is every bit as much a part of the Bible’s teachings as is the story of Nadab and Abihu. In some ways more, since they are mentioned in the Bible more often than their two infamous brothers.

These two, along with their father, Aaron, disobeyed a direct command from God. One that Moses took special pains to make sure that they were aware of. They did so because of grief, even though God had warned them against mourning their brothers’ deaths. Moses had to be in a bit of a panic; if God also killed these men, the priesthood would be wiped out in one fell swoop. But they weren’t killed. They explained the motive behind their disobedience and seemingly received forgiveness for it.

How can we explain this? Is God a capricious God, punishing some sins and forgiving others? Did He just “have it in” for Nadab and Abihu? I think the obvious explanation is: God looks on the heart. Or, as Dr. Glenn Pemberton put it when discussing this story: “The good news is God looks at the heart. The bad news is God looks at the heart.”

(How much easier it would be if we could just “go through the motions.” Unfortunately for us, God wants us to worship Him from the heart.)

Do you remember how God describes himself in Exodus 34? “The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.”” (Ex 34:6-7) Leviticus 10 is a beautiful illustration of this. Our God is a forgiving God, slow to anger, steadfast in love. But He will punish the guilty.

Next week I want to look at Nadab and Abihu one more time. Although we might like to make that story say certain things, the story shows a great contrast between how God deals with the truly rebellious and how He deals with those whose motives are not those of rebellion against Him.

Aaron's Sons

Here’s an interesting exercise. Choose your favorite Internet search engine. Put in the words “Nadab” and “Abihu” or put “Nadab and Abihu” as a phrase. Run the search. In the ones I’ve done over the past few years, the majority of the sites that have come up have been sites with articles by members of the church of Christ. I just did one on dogpile.com and had to go down to the 15th position before I found an article by someone from another religious fellowship (there were a few sites with just the biblical text).

Here go some reflections:

(1) Aaron had four sons: Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar. Two of these are mentioned much more often in the Bible than are their brothers. They are, of course, Eleazar and Ithamar.

(2) In fact, following the passage in Leviticus 10 that records the deaths of Nadab and Abihu, the two who died are never mentioned by name in a passage that does not include their brothers.

(3) The New Testament does not contain the names of Nadab and Abihu.

(4) Nowhere in the Bible are Nadab and Abihu held up as an example to be avoided. There are warnings to not be like Cain, not like Esau, not like Balaam, not like many other people… and not one specific reference to Nadab and Abihu. (Leviticus 16 is the closest I can find)

So why do we as a fellowship refer to these men so often? You can search the Internet on many other biblical stories, and we won’t dominate the rankings as we do with Aaron’s two oldest sons. (Try searching on “Eleazar and Ithamar,” for example) Why the fascination with this story?

Personally, I’ve resolved to follow the biblical example. I try my hardest not to mention Nadab and Abihu without mentioning Eleazar and Ithamar. Next week I want to look at the story of all four of them from Leviticus 10; I think that if we talk about two of them without talking about the others, we get an unbalanced view of God.

Still, I’d like to hear some opinions. Why our fascination with these two men?

Sophomore English, Central High School. Above grade level, I might add. I sat near the back on the right, with “the guys.” Not the nerds (they were at the front). The guys. Football players, basketball players, swimmers… We weren’t the coolest at school, but we were on the fringe.

And we liked Encyclopedia Brown. Every week our teacher gave us some sort of Weekly Reader, and it always had a case from the files of Encyclopedia Brown. We would read them carefully, trying to see who could pick up the hidden clues that would lead us to the right answer. It was never obvious; you had to piece together different sets of facts to solve the case. Sometimes we got it, sometimes we didn’t, but it was always fun. My feeling was that the author wrote in a way to make them difficult, but not impossible, to understand.

Did the author of Encyclopedia Brown write the New Testament? Is it intended to be some sort of mystery that must be pieced together, uniting half a verse here with the Greek definition of a word from here in order to come up with what isn’t obvious? My belief is that it isn’t and that it can’t be. Partly for some of the reasons I’ve discussed in my last several posts. If people didn’t have their own personal copy of the Bible, if they depended on hearing the Word rather than reading it, then the message could not be based on nuances, inferences and word studies.

Look at the Old Testament Law. God goes to great lengths to explain exactly what He wants. More than 600 commands, explicitly stated. Some would argue that God replaced this inferior law with a superior one, one which is not always directly stated but is sometimes taught through “necessary inference” and “approved examples.” In other words, God went from being a God who spoke clearly to one who spoke in the genre of Encyclopedia Brown. “You missed the fact that John 13 says the Last Supper wasn’t on the Passover, therefore we shouldn’t use unleavened bread. And Paul says we all eat of one loaf, so we can’t use those individual matzah crackers anyway. And that grape juice had better be non-alcoholic because the Greek word actually means…” Folks, I just don’t buy it.

I believe that God speaks clearly. If something is truly necessary, it will be specified in the New Testament. I don’t have to piece verses together. I don’t have to fill in the gaps nor connect the dots. If the New Testaments plainly teaches something, I will teach it. If God has bound something, I will teach it as bound.

I still enjoy Encyclopedia Brown stories (I was pleasantly surprised just now to find out they’re still being published). But that’s now how I’m going to read God’s Word.

“So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.” (Is 55:11 KJV)

This verse is sometimes used to say that giving people a Bible is enough, for it is God’s Word and God’s Word will not return void. Personally, I don’t think that’s what this verse is saying. I think that “my word” here refers to God uttering a decree; when God says something it will happen.

Still I have long held to the belief that anyone can and should be able to understand the Bible on their own and, through that understanding, learn the truth and become a Christian. While still believing in the power of God’s Word, I have some doubts about that exact process. Here’s why:

(1) As I’ve been discussing recently, God’s Word was not originally delivered in book form, not originally distributed to the masses in book form as it is today. Therefore, that cannot have been God’s original plan. It could be a way for people to come to the truth, but it’s certainly not intended to be the most important way. In fact, this whole idea didn’t spring up until the last few centuries, when printed Bibles were readily available.

(2) The Bible never makes the claim that everyone can just read it and understand it. As troubling as that sounds, it’s true. Faith in biblical times was not built around people sitting at home reading God’s Word. They had to come together to do it. And they didn’t have trouble with the idea that someone would need to explain it. Look at Nehemiah 8, when Ezra stood and read the Book of the Law to the people following their return from exile. Notice that the Levites were explaining the meaning as Ezra read: “Also Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, the Levites, helped the people to understand the Law, while the people remained in their places. They read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly, and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading.
  And Nehemiah, who was the governor, and Ezra the priest and scribe, and the Levites who taught the people said to all the people, “This day is holy to the LORD your God; do not mourn or weep.” For all the people wept as they heard the words of the Law.” (Nehemiah 8:7-9 ESV)
Look also at the eunuch’s words in Acts 8: “So Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, “Do you understand what you are reading?” And he said, “How can I, unless someone guides me?” And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.” (Acts 8:30-31 ESV) Philip didn’t reprimand him saying: “Of course you can understand. Anyone can.” He taught him.

(3) I cannot think of even one example in the Bible where evangelism is done by giving someone a Bible. Again, look at Philip and the eunuch. The eunuch had the Bible in his hand, yet Philip was sent to teach him. I believe in the Bible and the power of the Bible. I just don’t see where God says, “Hand out these books and people will become Christians.”

God works through people and through relationships. He always sent a prophet. He didn’t just hand Moses a book. Jesus wrote no book. People need God’s Word, but “Bible-only” evangelism isn’t God’s way.

Out With the Concordance

We’ve been looking at the idea that the Bible was written to be heard and that it wasn’t written originally in the book form that we have now.

As always, such comments deserve a resounding “So what?”. I see several implications, one of which is the need to trash our concordances. Well, OK, that may be a bit strong. But I’ve found that the misuse of the concordance can be a great hindrance to effective Bible study. We piece together verses and phrases from here and there, creating entirely new “biblical passages.”

Let me give you an example. When studying the subject of elders in the church, many take 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 and create a list of “requirements for elders.” The problem is, the resulting list isn’t what is in Timothy nor what is in Titus. It is a new hybrid, one which the Holy Spirit didn’t create. It’s probable that Timothy didn’t have a copy of Titus and Titus didn’t have a copy of 1 Timothy. So, if the only way to have the full list of requirements is to combine the two passages, neither of them had the list. Or at best, one of them had an incomplete list. The truth of the matter is, if God had meant those passages to be used together, He would have given them to us that way! We need to learn to respect the integrity of the biblical books, and read each of them as the early readers would have read them.

Now in this example the lists are very similar. The one in Timothy contains “should not be a recent convert,” because the church in Ephesus had been established decades before. The one in Titus doesn’t have that requirement because Titus was working in more of a mission setting. The list in Titus contains a warning about love of money because that was a common problem in Crete, according to historians. The lists are different because the needs are different. If there had been one list for all congregations, Timothy and Titus would have received the same list, and we would have it as well. As is, when we cut and paste the two together, we create something which God did not! When it comes to Bible study, that’s a dangerous practice.

When we study a passage, we must seek to study it as the early listeners would have, not as modern readers who have 66 books rolled into one.

The Good Book

Another confession. I don’t open the Bible as often as I used to. That is, I don’t take it off the shelf and open it. I read it on my computer. I have a Bible program installed which I have configured to open 5 versions at once, three in English, two in Spanish. I also have three sets of study notes open under it. It’s a convenient way to study, plus I can easily copy and paste passages that I need to use (I do a 20-minute radio program five days a week and often need to copy fairly long sections of scripture).

This wouldn’t be so bad, except that I do encounter times of guilt. Guilt that my bound Bibles aren’t getting “well-worn” like they used to. Guilt about the dust build-up on the pages (I know… dust can be removed with a cloth). And it can be really embarrassing when I do what I’ve done several times lately — gone somewhere to preach and realized that I didn’t bring a Bible!

The Good Book. I’ve grown up surrounded by the idea that a black bound book is the proper presentation for the Word of God. Funny thing is, how long has anything like that been around? A few centuries at best. Paul would not have thought of the Bible as a book. So much of it would have been in separate scrolls. That could even be what Paul was talking about when he asked Timothy to bring him his scrolls and parchments (if so, we now have scriptural precedent for forgetting your Bible).

Besides interesting trivia, I think it might say something about the way God’s Word is to be taken in, the way it is to be heard, the way it was communicated. If you don’t have 66 books bound into one, if much of your “Bible study” must be done from memory, if you can’t flip back and forth and compare one passage with another, you study differently. You read differently.

A question to my co-chefs in this kitchen of half-baked thoughts: What implications does this fact have for Bible study? Our Bible study. If we were to study as Christians would have in the first few centuries, what would we do?

Hear the Word of the Lord

I have a bad habit. Well, I have several, but one of them happens a lot during Bible class or sermons. I find myself listening impatiently to the reading of a text, waiting to hear what the preacher or teacher has to say about it. “Yeah, yeah… I’ve read that text. What are you going to do with it?” Nasty habit, that one.

At the same time, I’ve developed a growing awareness that I’m not receiving God’s Word in the way it was intended. I read it. Even when someone is reading from the text, I have to open the book and read it, or I feel like I’m not really participating. But God’s Word was meant to be heard. The Bible continually talks about hearing the Word of God. “That’s a metaphor,” you say. (If you didn’t say it, say it now, just for the effect) I don’t think it’s just a metaphor. For the greater part of history, God’s people heard the Word read to them or quoted to them. Many of them couldn’t read. Of those that could, few owned a personal copy of the Scriptures. If they did, it was probably just a portion, like the Ethiopian eunuch owning a scroll of Isaiah. They had to hear God’s Word. And the books that make up the Bible were written to be read aloud. They were intended to be heard as much as read, or even more so.

“Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness that God requires. Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.” (James 1:19-21) I’ve often heard “quick to hear, slow to speak” quoted, but rarely has it been pointed out to me that the context is that of hearing the Word of God (if you don’t believe me, go to James 1 and continue reading). I’ve found the opposite is often true in our assemblies; we preachers are anxious to get the hearing done so we can start speaking!

“Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching.” (1 Timothy 4:13) Somehow, when men added to the Bible by creating a list of “five acts of worship,” preaching replaced the public reading of Scripture. They are two separate activities, and if either of them has a stronger scriptural base behind it, it is the reading of Scripture.

“So what?” you say. (I hope you’re remembering your lines) Well, I think we need to get back to an emphasis on hearing God’s Word. Especially in our assemblies. We need to de-emphasize the human element and emphasize the Word of God. Here are some suggestions:

(1) Emphasize “stand alone” Bible reading. Not part of a sermon or a class. Not followed by commentary. Just a reading of God’s Word.

(2) Teach our people how to read out loud. It’s not hard, but it takes some thought and practice. Learn to read with feeling and sense, without inserting drama that overshadows the words themselves.

(3) Teach our people how to listen. More than teach, I guess it’s exhort them to do so. To make the effort to listen when God’s Word is read.

(4) Make use of modern technologies. It’s now easier than ever to listen to God’s Word, with it available on cassette, CD, mp3, etc.

Take time to hear the Word of the Lord.

I sometimes wish I'd taken the blue pill

If you haven’t seen the movie The Matrix, you won’t recognize the reference. At one point in the movie, Keanu Reeves is offered a choice: take a red pill and come to see the reality of life in the Matrix or take a blue pill and go back to peaceful ignorance. Reeves takes the red pill, of course, or there wouldn’t have been much of a movie. One of the other characters later says to him: “I know what you're thinking, 'cause right now I'm thinking the same thing. Actually, I've been thinking it ever since I got here: Why oh why didn't I take the BLUE pill?”

As I look at my life, I sometimes wish that I could have taken the blue pill. There was a time when I knew everything, especially when it came to religion. The main thing that I knew was who to get the answers from. If there was something that I was unsure about, I could find someone at church to tell me what to believe. We had an exclusive lock on the truth, an exclusive lock on salvation. People that didn’t agree with us were either ignorant or rebellious. Anyone who honestly studied the Bible would come to exactly the same conclusions we had arrived at.

Somewhere along the way, I swallowed the red pill. I learned that there was a difference between studying the Bible and studying what someone said about the Bible. I learned that many of the views that I saw so clearly in the Bible could only be seen there if you started out with those views. I also learned that the Bible is living and active and refuses to be dominated by man; the Word of God must master us; we will never master it.

I sometimes look longingly at life under the effects of the blue pill. A friend encountered a preacher, a 35-year-old scholar, who had written a book on biblical interpretation. My friend asked the man if there was any chance that he was wrong about anything in that book. The confident author replied: “No.” He had come to an understanding on everything, and his mission in life was to help other people come to that understanding. Part of me envies that. Part of me thinks that evangelism would be easier under those circumstances. It’s cut and dried, black and white. You’re in my circle or you’re out. You agree with me or you’re wrong. Unfortunately, I no longer see the world that way.

The whole premise of the Kitchen of Half-Baked Thoughts is that I don’t have all the answers. The more I study, the more questions I get, so I share them with my intelligent friends, hoping for insights. I don’t really want to go back to a blue pill life, but I sometimes long for its simplicity. Yet I know that I’m better off digging and searching, looking for God’s truth, listening for God’s voice, being willing to put aside previous beliefs in favor of eternal truths. It’s definitely the harder life, but there’s no going back.

Being Thankful

Seems like a good time to be thankful, doesn’t it? Aside from the upcoming national holiday, my lovely bride celebrates her birthday today. I’ve got a job I love, a healthy family, and three dogs that think I hung the moon (they sometimes think I didn’t hang it correctly, but they still think I did it).

Yet, I’m admittedly not good at being thankful. I’m better at feeling entitled. Rather than feeling thankful for what I have, I’m more inclined to notice what I don’t have.

But I’ve learned that I need to be thankful. Not ought to be, nor should be… I need it. Here’s a few reasons why:

(1) Being thankful helps me fight off that sense of entitlement. When I stop and thank God for what I have, I remember that I didn’t earn any of this. Nor deserve it. If I worked to earn anything, I did that work with the strength that God gave me. And in a situation in which my work could earn me something.

(2) Being thankful helps me have more compassion for those who don’t have what I have. I can get a warped theology that says that others don’t have as much as I because God intended it that way, or because they haven’t earned it (even though I didn’t either!). But when I realize that what I have comes from God, I also realize that it was given to me for a purpose: to share with others.

(3) Being thankful helps me to not worry about the future. When I thank God for what I have, I am much more likely to trust in Him to provide what I need in the future.

It’s hard, but “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” If that verse sounds cheesy or out of place, remember that Paul was talking about contentment when he uttered those words. He was talking about knowing how to live in abundance and knowing how to live in want. He was talking about… thankfulness. So if you want to finally apply Philippians 4:13 in its meaning in context, use it this week. Be thankful, and let Christ help you be thankful.

Within Understanding Distance

I’m going to leave the discussion on principal themes of the Bible, not because I feel that I’ve exhausted the subject but mainly because the subject has exhausted me! Well, actually, I think that at some point such a discussion can be counterproductive. If you lay out too many rules, passages that don’t fit under any of them suddenly become “unimportant.” As was pointed out by several along the way, we are to look to the weightier matters without neglecting the others.

I also think that we can become too scientific in our Bible study, too logic bound, too mathematical. We want to apply formulas and matrices to the text in order to systematize our beliefs. While we can find guidelines to help us, I think that, in the end, Bible study is a spiritual activity. That may be a bit “touchy-feely” for some, but I honestly think that a scientific approach to Scripture can sometimes get in our way.

I’m not often inclined to quote Alexander Campbell or other leaders from the past, but Mr. Campbell said something very interesting about Bible study (yeah, I know… he said a lot of interesting things). In his Christian System, Brother Campbell wrote:

RULE 7. For the salutary and sanctifying intelligence of the Oracles of God, the following rule is indispensable: We must come within the understanding distance.
There is a distance which is properly called the speaking distance, or the hearing distance; beyond which the voice reaches not, and the ears hear not. To hear another, we must come within that circle which the voice audibly fills.
Now we may with propriety say, that as it respects God, there is an understanding distance. All beyond that distance can not understand God; all within it can easily understand him in all matters of piety and morality. God himself is the center of that circle, and humility is its circumference.
Within understanding distance. Campbell goes on to describe the need for spirituality in Bible study. He says “the philological principles and rules of interpretation enable many men to be skilful in biblical criticism, and in the interpretation of words and sentences, who neither perceive nor admire the things represented by those words.” Put another way… rules alone won’t get you there. It takes humility, it takes prayer, it takes spiritual discernment.

Scientific Bible study can only take you so far. Without a pious spirit, all the rules in the world are inadequate. You’ve got to be close to God to be able to really hear His voice. We’ve got to draw near to Him if we want to understand His Word.