May 2 ▪ Day 122

Scripture Readings

Proverbs 16:24
Leviticus 19–20
Acts 19
Psalms 122

Verse Focus (Proverbs 16:24)

Gracious words are a honeycomb,
     sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.

Meditation

Drum roll… ta dah! Congratulations, all! It’s been one third of a year!!! Thanks and praises to God for His faithfulness in bringing us through so far. Hallelujah! 🙂

Our verse focus today, Proverbs 16:24, says, in the ESV, “Gracious words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body.” I do like this proverb. However, I would like this proverb better if it simply said gracious words are sweet to the soul and healing to the bones. But when gracious words are compared to honey, that’s when I start having difficulties. Not because honey isn’t sweet, but because of our culture’s problems with refined sugar. Too many of us are addicted to sugar and have far too much sweetness in our diet. The worst part of modern diets is that the sweetness is disguised and hidden so that you consume far more than you realize.

If you eat too much honey, it will make you sick. Proverbs 25:16 says, “If you find honey, eat just enough — too much of it, and you will vomit.” But today’s proverb is not talking about overeating honey, or overconsuming sugar. It’s talking about honey in moderation — which truly is “sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.”

But let’s focus on the words. Gracious words, pleasant words, kind words, delightful words, beautiful words, encouraging words. These bring just the right amount of sweetness to your soul and they heal your body, too. Isn’t it absolutely amazing that words can bring physical health? Words are spirit. Possibly mind and soul. But we’d never call words physical, and we wouldn’t normally expect words to have physical effects. Yet the Bible teaches us that they do.

Just think — you have the power to heal people by what you say! Not just heal people emotionally, but heal people physically too. What power there is in language! All the more reason to use it wisely.

Father God, help us to heal people through our words. May our speech be gracious. May what we say and how we say it bring light and health to all who hear. Through the power of Jesus Christ and in his name, Amen.

Leviticus 19 begins with the message to the people, “You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy (v. 2).” The chapter then gives a number of miscellaneous different laws. Some of these come from the Ten Commandments, some are repeats of earlier laws, and some are new. However, it seems like a mishmash of commands. The order of laws does not appear to follow a logical sequence, and the topics jump around from honoring your parents to not having clothing made of two kinds of material to not harvesting from newly-planted fruit trees until the fifth year to being kind to strangers.

I struggle with this chapter because I want a more orderly progression of laws — or at least better groupings of laws. It reminds me of how I used to hate reading Proverbs because it was just proverb after proverb without narrative — many times there was no connection between a proverb and those before or after. It strikes me that this is deliberate. Perhaps the apparent disorder is to keep me from thinking or feeling that I understand everything — it keeps me on my toes. Or perhaps it is to teach me to love each individual law just as I’ve learned to love each individual proverb.

This chapter teaches us that we are to love our neighbors as ourselves, and to love strangers as we would love ourselves (v. 18, v. 34). And yet, oddly, these laws do not come in the context of love and harmony and how the Israelites are all one community. Rather, the first comes up in the context of vengeance and grudges, and the second has to do with those who are outsiders. The law tells us first what not to do before telling us that we are love these others as ourselves.

Some of the laws appear somewhat nonsensical to modern readers. I can only assume that these laws made the Israelites different from their neighbors. Not sowing your field with two different kinds of seed? Huh, what? Not trimming the edges of your beard? No tattoos? Okay.

Yet there is a sense of justice that comes through these laws, and there is a concern for the poor and the alien. And even as the chapter began by reminding us that God is holy, I love how the chapter ends: by reminding us that we should obey these laws because He is the LORD.

Leviticus 20 speaks about punishments for breaking certain laws. Some deserve the death penalty — such as those who practice child sacrifice by offering their children to Molech (v. 2). While we readily agree that human sacrifice is evil, and child sacrifice even worse, it seems strange to us that cursing your parents is also deemed worthy of the death penalty (v. 9). Adultery and other kinds of sexual immorality also deserve death, although some of the types of forbidden sexual relationships are punished not by death but by being cut off from the people. I was struck by how the Scripture described the sexual practices deserving punishment. Perversion (v. 12), abomination (v. 13), depravity (v. 14), disgrace (v. 17), and impurity (v. 31).

As the chapter concludes, we are reminded that the Israelites must separate the clean from the unclean. “You shall be holy to me,” says verse 26, “for I the LORD am holy and have separated you from the peoples, that you should be mine.”

Acts 19 tells of Paul’s time in Ephesus on his third missionary journey. He taught for three months in the synagogues, and later in the hall of Tyrannus — “reasoning daily (v. 9)” for over two years. Verse 10 even tells us that “all the residents of Asia heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks.” Such a claim seems like hyperbole rather than truth, yet this is what we are to believe. I suppose it’s not as incredible as it seems — for over two years, Paul and others throughout Asia were speaking of Jesus Christ being risen from the dead. It was controversial. It was news. And everyone heard about it.

God did “extraordinary miracles (v. 11)” through Paul, just has He had done through Peter when the church was being established in Jerusalem. Handkerchiefs that just touched Paul’s skin were used to heal the sick. It was not just miracles of healing, though. There was the frightening incident of the seven sons of the Jewish high priest Sceva, beaten up by a demoniac because they were borrowing the authority of Jesus and Paul. In actual fact, they were treating the power like magic — as if just invoking the name of Jesus would give them the power to heal this man. And while the name of Jesus is powerful, the power comes not because we say his name, but because of the relationship we have with him. When the demon said, “Who are you?” the sons could have said, “We are faithful servants of Jesus Christ.” But they didn’t say that because they didn’t have a true relationship with the Son of God.

Verse 19 tells us about those who formerly practiced magical arts in Ephesus and Asia burning their books — valued at 50,000 pieces of silver. Clearly an incredible fortune. I was curious as to what this would come to today. I found a nice Wikipedia article that calculated the cost of the 30 pieces of silver that Judas got for betraying Jesus. There are a number of different possible coins that could have been meant by the Scripture, and they vary a bit as to how pure they are in silver content, but — using 2021 prices, the range of value for 30 pieces of silver is $91 to $442. Using these same values, 50,000 pieces of silver comes to from $151,667 on the low end to $736,667 on the high end (if the coins had higher silver content). So, easily, the books would have been worth half a million dollars.

I suppose with the numbers of people who were turning to God and with this kind of financial impact just among those who used to practice magic arts, it’s not too surprising that Demetrius the silversmith got anxious about losing income because of these Christians. After Demetrius stirred up the idol makers and craftsmen who made shrines for Artemis, they all became enraged and a near riot ensued. Verse 32 tells us, “Now some cried out one thing, some another, for the assembly was in confusion, and most of them did not know why they had come together.” It’s amazing how God worked through the simple town clerk to settle everyone down — appealing to their pride, he told them they were in danger of being charged with rioting. He dismissed them. And everyone left in peace.

Psalm 122 is a pilgrimage song that was written by David. Like many of the songs of ascent, it is short and sweet. The topic of this psalm is going to worship at the temple of the LORD while praying for the safety and prosperity of Jerusalem. Jerusalem is portrayed as a place of justice (v. 5), in addition to it being the location of the LORD’s temple. The psalmist desires peace for Jerusalem for the sake of the people; for the sake of the temple, he also prays for the welfare of the city. “For the sake of the house of the LORD our God, I will seek your good (v. 9).”

Father God, thank you for these songs of ascent. We do pray for the peace of our communities, and that any safety and prosperity we enjoy may be a means of allowing your Word to spread. Help us to be a people who are sanctified and set apart for your service. May we be characterized by your love and your light. And may our speech bring healing. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.