Praying Through God's Word - Genesis
Praying Through God's Word - Genesis
Milt Reynolds | Last updated: October 2, 2022
Genesis 11 | September 23, 2022
"One language and the same words..."
Generations and centuries of time have passed in the first ten chapters of the Book of Genesis, and this is the first mention of language and words? This implies that God created language and words from the beginning, just as he created hands and feet, eyes and ears, and heaven and earth!
Moreover, there is yet no mention of writing...no command to record history or the words of God. Chapter 10 does describe different languaes and people groups...it seems out of place here chronologically. Or rather, Chapter 11 seems to be a look backward, before global dispersion. There is mention here of "genealogies" and records of clans and peoples.
Chapter 11 serves as a transition in perspective, from Noah to Abraham. Perhaps the history of the land of Shinar and the great city and tower of Babel happened concurrently with the days of the "Nephilim"?
This chapter conveys strong words of self-rule and power:
"Let us make a name for ourselves..."
The people regarded their nation as their strength and security, with their common language serving to preserve them as a nation, allowing them to feel that nothing they proposed or imagined is impossible for them.
This confidence in human strength and skill has been seen earlier:
- "You will be like God..." (3:5)
- "They knew they were naked..." (3:7)
- They hid themselves from God (3:10)
- Cain brought produce instead of an animal (4:3)
- Cain killed his brother (4:8)
- Lamech killed a young man (4:23)
- They took any they chose (6:2)
- They were corrupt, violent, drunken and scornful (6:11, 9:20-22)
God dispersed the self-confident, self-strong nation by confusing their language and flooding their land. The world's population was suddenly reduced to a single family led by Noah, and history brought focus upon one person: Abram, ten generations removed from Noah.
God Almighty, today I am tired, unwilling to endure conversation, much less conversion and transformation. It is easy for me to see my weakened and warped emotions and attitudes toward people around me. But it is not easy to see you as my refuge and hope of comfort and success. I feel wooden and resigned, with little expectation of change or progress.
Change my heart, God. Open my mind and emotions to trustfully walk in confidence and contentment with your power over all things. Do what is right and good, God, even if that means confusion and dispersal. Confuse my false hopes in my own intelligence and morality. Disperse the cracked and toxic influences of this world that I think I must pursue and obey. Settle my hope and health firmly in what you propose to do.
Make the language of my heart and mind fluent with your heart and mind.
Amen!
Genesis 10 | August 24, 2022
The sons of Noah re-populated the earth after the flood:
- Japheth: the Coastland People
- Ham: Babel, Assyria, Ninevah and more
- Canaan: Amorites, Canaanites and more
- Shem: the Hill Country of the East
Noah's curse upon his own grandson in Chapter 9 described the generations of Canaan as the lowest of the lowest servants to all other peoples. Noah's blessings described the LORD as the God of Shem children, with Japheth's living with Shem's, with Canaan's serving them all.
"Family" as a notion feels comfortable, warm and safe. In reality it is a fragile, complicated thing. Many parents watch their children separated, scattered, stressed and splintered with competing dsires, hardened hearts, or shameful memories. An entire family could be wiped from a communities's memory in a generation or two. The branches of a family tree can become divided and distant to the point of hatred, war, invasion, conquest, holocaust and genocide.
Have we examples of enduring family love and remembrance? What is the use of genealogies and family photos if the family's fences are narrow and isolated and arrogantly indifferent to distant cousins separated by centuries of distance and damage?
Lord God, our Father in heaven, I feel disillusioned today with the notion of family. It feels only a society's fond fantasy. It feels a deeply buried memory of life in Eden millennia ago. Teach me to understand and treasure your creation of family. Form my heart and mind to long to see you face to face as my Father. Help me to see my family tree here on earth as a reminder of my family in heaven.
Genesis 9 | August 20, 2022
Chapters 6-9 are connected by four distinct references to Noah:
- Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD (Genesis 6:8)
- The LORD said to Noah (Genesis 7:1)
- God remembered Noah (Genesis 8:1)
- God blessed Noah (Genesis 9:1)
Of these four references, the first serves as a summary of all four chapters: The LORD saw Noah with favor.
Noah was treated by God with favor.
FAVOR: /khane/ graciousness, kindness, favor, beauty -- from /khaw-NAN/ to bend or stoop in kindness to an inferior -- to favor, bestow, implore
Given his power over creation and global destruction, why did God even speak to Noah? Why did God use Noah, or any creature at all to effect his power? Why provide Noah, and those with Noah, a way of rescue from global destruction?
God's favor...God's gracious giving of undeserved kindness and benevolence...God's gracious goodness...is undeniably inscrutable. Who can explain or demand it?
Chapter 9 seems an exit scene for Noah. The chapter ends abruptly and badly: Noah is drunken and naked...his middle son scornful and degrading, his grandson cursed. After the flood Noah lived another 350 years, dying at age 950. What were Noah's thoughts toward God during those last, brief 350 years? Was God the Great Gracious One for Noah, or the Distant, Disdainful One?
I am nearly 65 years now, at the time of this post. I've become disillusioned with the world in which we've all made. There are of course, moments of goodness that I experience daily...hundreds of important, necessary and pleasing circumstances...all undeserved...yet all fleeting.
As I look back over my younger self and its optimistic intentions, expectations and purpose...all of the hopes in which I've placed firmly in this world's resources and opportunities...they've all been riddled with weakness, depravity, selfishness, arrogance and shallowness. I'm convinced that the very best experiences and circumstances that this old, tired, drunken, naked world can offer are only pale scribblings and cartoonish sketches compared with the life after death that the Bible descirbes...the life that will be found in the new earth and the new heaven...the overwhelmingly real prescence of Goodness that is God.
Bless me, Good God, for you are my only hope of life beyond this world's floods, fires, violence and diseases. Bless me with Eden. Bless me with life with you!
Genesis 8 | August 7, 2022
God remembered Noah and all that were in the ark. Despite the wickedness and evil intentions of humankind...despite the sorrow and grief felt in God's heart...despite the corrupt violence of all the earth...despite the flood of water that covered the highest mountains, blotting out every living thing that was on the face of the ground...despite all of the genetic and spiritual guilt and inclination to selfish arrogance and perversion that must have riddled the heart and mind of Noah...
Despite all, God remembered Noah and all that were in the ark.
God remembered?
Had the perfectly powerful mind of God misplaced his contacts list? Had eternity worn a bit of sharpness off the memory faculties of the Creator and Judge of all?
REMEMBER: zaw-KAR, to mark so as to be recognized - to remember, to mention - to recall, to call to mind and affect the present feeling, thought or action.
Many English Bibles use "remembered" to translate this Hebrew word, despite the modern implication of having forgotten or misplaced something.
The Message translates it differently:
“Then God turned his attention to Noah and all the wild animals and farm animals with him on the ship. God caused the wind to blow and the floodwaters began to go down.” (Genesis 8:1, The Message)
"Turned his attention to" seems a helpful translation because it does not imply that God had been forgetful or distracted. It also reinforces the Hebrew meaning of "marked" and "called to mind".
This passage seems to be written, not from God's perspective, nor from Noah's perspective, but from a third perspective seen from an unknown earthly observer...someone able to discern what God is feeling and doing.
The previous two chapters describe the intentional, active, specific attention and action by God towards the corrupt, condemned inhabitants of earth.
But here, in Chapter 8, the narrative shifts focus to the attention and action by God towards Noah and all that were in the ark. There is nothing in these chapters that should be understood as God forgetting or being distracted. Rather, it is focused now on the attention of God upon those in the ark.
"Remember" comes from Latin, "re memorari", meaning to be mindful of. The word properly means to bring to the forefront of one's thoughts something that is securely kept in one's memory. The notion that "remember" implies something forgotten is not justified.
God had not forgotten about Noah and those in the ark. God had not been distracted by haivng to deal with a corrupt, condemned world. In the midst of a great flood of judgement and recompense, God compassionately considered and provided for the good of Noah and those in the ark in a way that mangified God's glorious goodness, justice and power over all things, all circumstances, for all time.
LORD God, consider me now and forever, and deal with me as you see fit, for my good and your glory.
LORD God, remember me!
Genesis 7 | August 5, 2022
God's opinion of Noah:
"I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation."
Did God compare Noah with those around him? Of all the world's population, was Noah most righteous?
Previously God had considered all humankind was greatly wicked, continually evil...a sorry bunch of sinners. Yet, out of this mess of miserable meany-heads, Noah found favor in the eyes of God? Why?
Was it because Noah obeyed the command to build an ark? Was Noah alone of all other people capable of this level of obedience?
Or was it simply a choice of God? A choice to cover Noah with a blanket of Righteousness? Did God graciously grant to Noah a "Made by God, Guaranteed Pure and Righteous" label? What was the cost of such a free gift of grace?
Whatever the reason for Noah's obtaining righteousness, it also covered all his household: wife, sons, and son's wives, plus two of every sort of animal, clean and unclean!
All other life on land drowned. All life that depended upon breath to live, died.
Only Noah, and those with Noah, lived.
LORD God, Judge of all life, cover me with righteousness in your sight...regard me as one who clings to the obedience of Another who truly is righteous in your eyes!
Genesis 6 | August 3, 2022
The previous chapter ended with a brief reference to Noah, son of Lamech. "Noah" sounds like the Hebrew for "rest", which connects with Lamech's words about his son Noah:
"This one shall bring relief from our work and pain.."
By the time Noah was born, how many years had passed?
If we regard Adam's day of creation as the beginning of Year One, Noah's sons would have been born in about Year 1556! The boys would have been able to listen to the story of Creation directly from the mouths of Methuselah and Lamech. By that time the earth was corrupt in God's sight, filled with violence. God commanded Noah to build an ark, warning of a world-wide flood that would destroy all life on land. The ark would save Noah's family and two of every living sort of land animal.
God, I see my daily struggle against every selfish, wicked, evil intention of my heart reflected in the daily news of my city, country and world.
Save us, God! Save us from destroying ourselves and this world you created for us! Forgive our sin and make us good again!
Genesis 5 | July 28, 2022
This chapter feels so different from the previous ones. It's as if we were standing atop a ridge after a challenging hike, now able to look out over the valley below, able at last to see with perspective and purpose.
"When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God..."
This makes me think of the intimacy and pleasure I feel when when I make something. The clay pot I throw on the wheel, the coffee mug cozie I crochet, the essay I write and post online...all are expressions, small and limited in scope and effect...of who and what I am.
"Man" (in Hebrew "Adam") was created to be an expression, small and limited in scope and effect, of who and what God is.
The very next sentence is so satisfying and necessary, especially in the midst of today's devisive, destructive social and political competition, confusion and cancellation of human personhood.
Male and Female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man ("Adam") when they were created.
"Blessed" literally means to kneel, expressing adoration and graciousness. The two were given the same name: "Adam". God adored and graced them both equally, as male and female.
Oh, how far we have strayed from the intimate, delightful satisfaction of being together, male and female, enjoying God's adoration and graciousness.
Sin has robbed us of so very much.
Genesis 4 | July 27, 2022
The serpent has been cursed, the woman's pain multiplied, and the land cursed because of Adam's disobedience. Now, Cain has been rebuked and is angry, and on the edge of surrending to sin.
The personification of sin is similar to the state of Cain's mother after being deceived by the serpent. Eve's heart crouched at the door, hungry to control Adam. Now that same hunger for control crouches at the door of Cain's heart. And he opens it wide. Cain murders his brother, God curses the land as bloody ground, cursed as it had been because of Adam and Eve's hungry sin.
The generations of Adam and Eve's family spread throughout the cursed land. The people built cities and industries and art and weapons. Children were born, people were wounded and killed, and the name of God became a religion.
The gate to the Garden of Eden was shut, and the tree of life was guarded, and the people knew good and evil, with no way back to Eden.
O LORD our God, how are our ruined, sinful, thirsty, unsatisfied hearts are ruined!
Genesis 3 | July 19, 2022
To be like God, knowing good and evil, was the single most self-destructive, self-deceiving, and self-focused act of humankind in history.
Trusting the devil, ignoring God's Word, preferring gifts of God rather than God's presence, condemned to a brief life of eating watching and thinking without God. That is hell on earth.
We are yet hungry, unsatisfied and foolish in all we do. We attempt to hide our God-lessness, pretending to be fed, satisfied and wise. We cover ourselves with stocks and bonds and cars and computers and self-sufficiency and food and music and advertising and adventure and goal-setting and competing and winning and losing and writing and ripping and running and sleeping and chanting and rule-making and rule-breaking and drugging and dragging...but we remain deceived and cursed, eating dust, painfully pursing that which others pretend to have...sweating and submitting to thorns and thistles until we dry up and die in the dust from which we came.
O God! Forgive us! Make us anew and firmly restore to us your Presence and Promise of Eden!
Genesis 2 | July 17, 2022
Your work, Holy God, is done? You've rested from your work? How do I join in your rest? Where is Eden now? where are the trees pleasant to the sight and good for food?
It still is not good for us to be alone, and yet we feel alone. We feel a deep, urgent, and undeniable need for beauty, satisfaction, wonder, and hope...yet we feel less and less of that every year..we feel increasingly weary and wary of what the wold around us provides. Where is Eden? When is Eden?
Genesis 1 | July 16, 2022
Oh, God! How far from your image of goodness am I feeling today! I feel unfruitful, heedless, weak and ineffective. Being or doing anything close to something good or creative feels so far from me. I am not at all a good reflection of you in your creation and good rule. The image of you in me is eroded, blurred, confused and ugly.
Bless me today, God! Grant me to be fruitful and productive, doing good for all who are near me, building up and protecting others. Grant my life to be good in your sight.
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