March 23 ▪ Day 82

Scripture Readings

Proverbs 13:24
Exodus 33–34
Luke 11
Psalms 82

Verse Focus (Proverbs 13:24)

Whoever spares the rod hates their children,
     but the one who loves their children is careful to discipline them.

Meditation

Today’s verse focus, Proverbs 13:24, metaphorically speaks of corporal punishment in disciplining children. Some modern theories of parenting consider any kind of spanking or physical discipline to be not only archaic, but actually damaging to young psyches. And, of course, we are too familiar with stories of abuse, of physical punishment that was less about teaching someone than it was about about having someone weaker to use as a punching bag.

Nevertheless, in the Bible, corporal punishment may sometimes be warranted. The verse actually says, in the NIV, “Whoever spares the rod hates their children, but the one who loves their children is careful to discipline them.” By referring to “the rod,” Solomon is referring to a common shepherd’s implement that was used both to protect and to guide sheep. The rod was a kind of a short club that would be used directly against a predator, but with sheep it was used gently to prod them to move in a certain direction.

Over the ages, some have interpreted this proverb quite literally to mean that a parent would use a shepherd’s rod against his or her child — metaphorically, they saw this as akin to a paddle, a belt, or a whip. However, also metaphorically, this proverb refers to other forms of discipline — whatever might be used to urge a child in the right direction, whether that is “time outs” or some other system of rewards and non-corporeal punishments.

We have all laughed at the father who tells his child before spanking, “This hurts me more than it hurts you.” When you are on the receiving end of discipline, you cannot imagine that non-physical pain could surpass what you are experiencing. But as a disciplinarian, our hearts quail at the thought of causing hurt to someone we love, even though we know it will be very temporary. I think this is why the proverb tries to shock us by saying that if you neglect disciplining your child, you actually hate them. We need to understand that lack of discipline is what truly hurts a child.

Father God, please give us wisdom from your Word. We need wisdom not only for self-discipline, but also for those situations where we may be called to discipline another person. May we be gentle like Jesus, using minimum force to rebuke and correct. We pray for your Holy Spirit to be with parents and teachers to help them to carefully discipline those in their care. We thank you for how you also shepherd us. We don’t always appreciate your discipline at the time, but we know that you orchestrate all circumstances for our good. We pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.

In Exodus 33, God commands Moses and the Israelites to leave Sinai and head towards the Promised Land. He promises to send an angel with them, but says He will not come himself or else He will “consume” the Israelites (that is, end or finish them). As a result, the Israelites take off their jewelry and ornaments as a sign of their mourning. This seems a particularly fitting expression of mourning, considering they had used personal jewelry to create the golden calf idol.

As the Israelites traveled through the wilderness on the way to the Promised Land, Moses would set up the tabernacle — also called the “tent of meeting” — outside the camp. Anyone who sought the LORD would go to the tent of meeting. Moses would also go there to meet with God. When he entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend to the entrance of the tabernacle. And so God would speak to Moses “face to face, as one speaks to a friend (v. 11).” Moses went back and forth from the tabernacle to the camp; however, his assistant Joshua son of Nun, remained full-time in the tabernacle.

Moses continues to intercede for the Israelites, asking God to go with His people. God agrees to this request. However, Moses also requests to see God’s glory. The LORD replies in verse 19, “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.” Yet he tells Moses that he cannot see God’s face; “for no one shall see me and live (v. 20).”

God’s declaration of His nature, that He will be gracious and merciful to whomever He desires, is both comforting and disturbing at the same time. With this statement, we see God’s sovereignty, and we understand that God cannot be manipulated or forced into a one-dimensional box. We would prefer a god that we could control, that we could be certain would always be gracious to us. But as C.S. Lewis described the character of Aslan in The Narnia Chronicles, He is not a tame lion, but He is good.

It is interesting that this chapter tells us that Moses spoke with God “face to face,” but then also makes it very clear that is a metaphorical rather than a literal description. I also wonder about this statement. Didn’t Abraham speak face to face with the LORD? What about Isaiah? Didn’t he see God in the throne room? However, the accounts in Genesis speak interchangeably about the “angel of the LORD” and “the LORD,” as if when He is on earth He is always communicating through an intermediary. Also, in Isaiah 6, as he describes his experience in the throne room, we know that Isaiah sees God on the throne, but it’s not clear whether he was able to see God’s face. Indeed, even the cherubim in the throne room hid their faces with two of their wings. As I think about other visions of God, I remember descriptions of blinding brilliance — perhaps too bright for a person to actually see the LORD’s face. I come to the conclusion that our earthly bodies are too frail to bear the unadulterated presence of the LORD. When we get resurrection bodies in the new heaven and earth, then we may literally see God’s face.

Despite the impossibility of seeing God’s face, God does promise that His Presence will be with Moses and the Israelites. Verse 14 is another one of those gems: a verse that I highlight time and again. “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”

In Exodus 34, the covenant between God and Israel is re-established. Moses cuts two new stone tablets and goes to meet God on Mount Sinai. God proclaims His name and nature; Moses prays for God to go with them and to forgive their iniquity. And so God describes the covenant that will be between them. This chapter is a condensed form of what the covenant relationship entails: God promises to perform wonders and to drive out the Canaanites before them. He warns them not to make any treaties or agreements with the inhabitants of the land, because that will be a snare to them. The Israelites are not to make cast idols. They are to keep God’s holy festivals. All the firstborn belong to God, human and animals. All firstborn sons are to be redeemed. No one is to appear before God empty-handed. They are to keep the Sabbath holy. They are not to offer leaven when they offer sacrifices. They are to bring their firstfruits to God, and they are not to boil a kid in its mother’s milk. So Moses stays with God on the mountain another 40 days and nights as he obtains a new copy of covenant, the Ten Commandments, and the laws and regulations.

When Moses comes down from the mountain, his face shines from being in the presence of the LORD. It is such a remarkable difference that the people are frightened of him. But when Moses speaks to them, they gather near. Moses communicates the words of the covenant to them. He develops a practice of wearing a veil whenever he is not speaking on behalf of the LORD. When he speaks with the LORD in the tent of meeting, and when he goes out to tell the people what God has commanded, his face is unveiled. But once he has told the people what God has decreed, Moses would cover his face again. Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 3 that Moses would do this so that the Israelites would not see God’s glory fading from his face. (Paul concludes the Corinthian chapter by talking about how we, with unveiled faces, are being transformed into God’s image with “ever-increasing glory.”)

Exodus 34 is notable for revealing a new name of God to us: Jealous. Verse 14 tells us, “You shall worship no other god, because the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.” It makes sense that this revelation comes immediately after this first bout with national idolatry. Yet is also a difficult name for us to understand, because in human relationships jealousy is such a destructive emotion. Perhaps that is why we need to understand this name of God. Were it not for Moses’ intercession, God would have destroyed the Israelites.

I also find many of the representative laws included in this chapter puzzling. I understand about the firstborn and the Sabbath. Also the prohibition against idolatry. Even the mentions of God’s feasts. But the prohibition against leaven in sacrifices, the reminder not to appear before the LORD empty handed, and the repetition of the injunction not to boil a kid in its mother’s milk — these are baffling. They seem trivial to me. And yet I can only conclude that there must be more to these laws than I understand.

I do appreciate what we learn that is new about keeping the Sabbath, and keeping God’s holy festivals. Verse 21 tells us, “Even in plowing time and in harvest time you shall rest.” I didn’t grow up in a farming community, but my mother grew up in a small town surrounded by farmland. From this I get a glimmer of how urgent it becomes at harvest time to bring in the crops. The farmers are often racing against time to gather the harvest before the storms begin to come. My uncle is a mechanic, but he would virtually disappear during harvest time because he was needed to keep the farm equipment running. He would put in such long hours — days without sleep sometimes. So this example, which the Israelites may not have understood when they were in the wilderness, is one of the best examples of a high-pressure job where time is at a premium with an uncertain deadline. Yes, even in this situation, God wants his people to maintain Sabbath rest. And it does become a test. Do you honor God? Do you believe He controls the weather and will help you bring the harvest home if you obey Him? Do you even believe that His honor is more important than financial loss, should the harvest not be able to be fully gathered? It’s good that this verse tells us in advance that even the demands of plowing and harvesting are not sufficient cause to suspend Sabbath rest. From this we extrapolate that there are no special circumstances that would overturn this law.

Also, verse 24 tells us that those who must leave their homes to gather before the LORD three times a year do not need to worry about the consequences of this obedience. God promises that “no one shall covet their land” when they go to worship the LORD during these festivals. Whether or not the Israelites will obey, and whether they believe God will keep this promise is another question — but I love how God anticipates what kinds of worries and objections might arise for His people as they live under God’s laws.

In Luke chapter 11, Jesus teaches the disciples to pray. After giving a model prayer, Jesus immediately launches into a teaching parable about the need to persevere in prayer. As Jesus tells this story, a man asks for help from a friend at a very inconvenient hour. It is midnight, and the friend does not want to be disturbed then. But the man’s persistence will win him the help he wants. It’s interesting that Jesus frames the parable in this manner — as an interaction among friends. It makes me wonder if the persistence would have still paid off had they been strangers or even enemies.

Regardless, God is our friend — someone we can turn to for help, someone who has the resources to solve our problems, and someone who, generally speaking, feels kindly towards us and desires to give us good things. I doubt we’d ever find God tucked up in bed with the door locked, but surely there can be reasons we cannot even begin to understand that might make it inconvenient for God to answer our prayers when we first ask. Yet Jesus encourages us to remember that persistence will prevail where affection alone might not. And so he commands us, in that strange Greek imperative tense that implies continuous action, to ask and keep on asking, to seek and keep on seeking, and to knock and keep on knocking.

Jesus uses the love of a parent for a child to illustrate how we will give good gifts to our children. To think that we might respond to a request by giving the child something else instead — something not only inappropriate but actually dangerous — illustrates how ludicrous it us for us to imagine that God might do that to us. Jesus concludes by saying in verse 13, “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” Clearly, the gifting of the Holy Spirit is the ultimate of good gifts the Father may bestow upon us. And yet, is this gift one we actively pray for? Do we seek God and ask Him to give us more of the Spirit? Persistently?

I imagine, for example, praying for God to help me to be more productive with my time (a common prayer for me). But instead of helping me to finish tasks more quickly, God gives me a greater anointing of the Spirit — and soon I come to realize that some of the things I was worrying about accomplishing not only weren’t worth stressing about, but they were also things I can just eliminate entirely. That’s one of the things about the Holy Spirit. You get wisdom and perspective. And even though I get overwhelmed by immediate, seemingly pressing needs that I pray for, my greatest need is to see and understand things from God’s perspective.

We are familiar with the parable about lighting a lamp and not putting it under a bushel. All the synoptic gospels tell that story, and even Luke mentioned it earlier in chapter 8. Here, in chapter 11, Jesus starts off by saying something that sounds very much like that parable. He tells us that we light lamps so that they might illuminate things — we don’t hide the light in a cellar or under a bushel basket. But then Jesus continues in a different direction. He says in verses 34 and 35, “Your eye is the lamp of your body. If your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light; but if it is not healthy, your body is full of darkness. Therefore consider whether the light in you is not darkness.” Yikes!

As I read this chapter today, I realize that this is a parable that I’ve not given a lot of thought to previously. I’m convicted, not only by the need to be careful with what my eyes dwell on, but with how my eyes will reflect what I have inside me. If I’m focusing on disappointment or bitterness, or watching television shows with bad language and casual violence, my “lamp” will darken. I know I’ve barely scratched the surface of this parable, but I feel the Holy Spirit telling me that I need to spend more time on this passage. There’s an itch to go deeper. I suspect I will mull over this for some months yet.

Psalm 82 is an interesting psalm. It is a plea for justice: to do what is right for the vulnerable in society and to rescue the oppressed and needy. But the use of the term “gods” in this psalm is somewhat confusing. Verse 1 tells us that God sits in divine council in the midst of other “gods.” And verse 6 has God speaking to these “gods,” telling them that despite their elevated status, they will die like mortals. What are we to make of this?

Some see these gods as the gods of other religions — or as other divine beings that God rules over. Since the Bible occasionally refers to angels as “sons of God,” some interpret the “gods” in this psalm to be angels. As a third option, according to Rabbinic tradition, those who received the Law at Mount Sinai were also called “gods.” But by far the most common interpretation is from another long-standing tradition that human judges are sometimes called “gods” because they derive divine authority for their work (this last interpretation is mostly based on Exodus 21:6 and 22:8 — likely your translation simply said God, or the judges, and you didn’t even realize that the words were literally that they were to be brought before the gods).

Indeed, while this psalm is enigmatic in some respects, it is also clear that God is supreme over whoever these “gods” are. We also see the continuing concern for justice and righteousness. And the psalm ends with a prayer for God to rise up and dispense justice to the nations.

Father God, thank you that you reign supreme over the earth and the heavens. Whether these gods are divine beings or simply powerful men, you watch their every move and you see when they fail to judge rightly. Thank you that you are sovereign and that one day you will set things back in order.

Father, I do pray for your Holy Spirit. I know I need fresh filling and re-filling daily. I want more. I want to do what is right, to have wisdom, to have the clarity that your Spirit gives. Thank you that your Holy Spirit is not only our companion, but also our Teacher.

Thank you, too, that as much as we can learn from the Old Testament law, we are also not bound anymore to a law that we are unable to keep. Help us to learn what is good, and add value to our worship. Help me to develop good patterns of work and rest, and to observe your Sabbath in a manner that brings honor to Jesus. I pray in Christ’s name, Amen.