God’s Court is a Court of Equity. Psalm 98:9

Professor John Mixon standing in front of some of the cartoons that he used while teaching classes at the UH Law Center. He retired in 2013 after a 60-year career as a law professor.

I was scribbling notes as fast as I could—like eighty of my law-school peers. Suddenly, the professor tossed out one of those phrases that made my head spin:

“Now this is a case where your client wants what? Specific performance! And who can provide that? The Court of Law?”

Professor Mixon paused, the old man’s dancing blue eyes looking at us eagerly. He wanted someone to speak, but it was too early in our first semester. No one was quite sure. Finally, a tentative voice spoke up right in front of him, mumbling so only he could hear:

“No.”

“Right! The court of law only cares about cash! So if it’s not the Court of Law, then it is the … Court of—” He waited.

“Equity?”

“Exactly!” And Professor Mixon raced back to the chalkboard to add to his daily, thirty-foot mural. (The man was an artist and a legend.)

When I was a law student, one of the topics I found difficult was the notion of Courts of Equity. While my peers may have struggled with the “Con-Tort,” or Commercial Paper, or Bills of Lading, for me it was the constant talk about “Courts of Equity.” My eyes would glaze over and I would begin this internal dialogue: Okay, what is a court of equity again? That thing with injunctions and specific performance, right? And it’s not about money damages. And it’s motivated by fairness….

The Equity Courts were part of the English legal system and represented a forum for a plaintiff whose needs could not be met in a traditional law court. For example, if you had a difficult tenant renting your property, a law court might award you damages (money). But the Equity Court could award you what you really needed: an eviction. Or if you paid for a one-of-a-kind sculpture by a deceased artist, the law court might award you with a refund, but the Equity Court could require the person in possession to deliver the sculpture to you.

EQUITY, in a nutshell, is a court focused not on the wooden application of the law and the resulting payment of damages, but on achieving a broad range of fair or equitable results[1]. In Biblical terms, a Court of Equity looks not at the letter of the law, but at the spirit[2] or the intent behind the law (2 Corinthians 3:6).

“He cometh to judge the earth. With righteousness shall He judge the world, and the people with equity” Psalm 98:9.

God will judge the people with equity. Fairness.

God will not apply a rigid interpretation of the law, but when He judges people He will consider the “totality of the circumstances.” That is, God will judge not in legalism, but in equity. After all, God is holy. But God is also “not willing that any should perish” 2 Peter 3:9. God loves people and will extend to them as much grace, love, mercy, and “fairness” as He can while remaining true to His holy nature.

God’s court is a Court of Equity.

Isaiah prophesies that Jesus will judge with equity: “The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him … but with righteousness shall He judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth, and he shall smite the earth with the rod of His mouth and with the breath of His lips shall He slay the wicked” Isaiah 11:2,4.

Even while executing judgment, Isaiah says Jesus will judge the poor with righteousness and the meek with equity. Again, God is not legalistic about judgment. He wants men to be saved. He will look at their hearts. Again, I believe God will give people as much grace and “fairness” or equity as He can.

God’s Court is a Court of Equity.

“The king’s strength also loveth judgment. Thou dost establish equity” Psalm 99:4.

AΩ.

[1] The curious may wish to know: the notions of law and equity have been combined in U.S. federal law and all but a handful of U.S. states. Consequently, understanding the concept of Equity Courts has been more helpful while writing this Bible study than it has ever been in my legal practice.

[2] The difficulty for lawyers arguing about the “spirit of the law” is that the letter of the law is written in words, whereas the spirit is an indefinable concept, like the penumbras and emanations of which the Supreme Court speaks in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965). Penumbras and emanations can be impossible to pin down.

Nothing is Really That Remote. Psalm 89.

Statue of Liberty During Pink Sunrise. Copyright Matthew Chimera Photo. Prints available online.

“I can’t believe it. I mean, there she is! It’s really her!”

My wife was so excited. We were bouncing gently on the bow of a Circle Line Tour boat in New York Harbor. Everyone around us had camera phones pointing at the same thing—the Statue of Liberty.

“Yeah,” I laughed. “It’s really her.”

“She’s so beautiful. Wow. I mean, she’s really real, you know what I mean?”

I knew exactly what she meant. It was Wendy’s first trip to New York and she had been saying the same thing everywhere we went: there it is. It’s really real. I’m really here. I can’t believe it.

As a trip planner, I could not have been happier. My wife is always enthusiastic, but this was special, even for her. She was beside herself, amazed and delighted to be seeing things in person that she had been seeing on television or in movies all her life.

Travel will do that for you. I remember walking around Mount Vernon as a child and thinking George Washington walked here. George Washington probably held this banister. George Washington might have sat in this chair. George Washington might have grabbed this doorknob. I was amazed too. It is remarkable the way history comes to life when you travel.

The truth is, history is never as far away as we think.

You could board a plane today and be standing at Pearl Harbor or Ford’s Theater in a few hours. Better yet, you could go to a library (or look online) and instantly read the words of Aristotle or Homer, men who have been dead thousands of years. Nothing is ever as far away, as removed or remote as it seems. With a cellphone in hand, you can instantly read English translations of nearly every book in history that matters. Moreover, you can see pictures in seconds of every place that matters, or every work of art that matters.

Nothing is really that remote.

Furthermore, when you dabble in genealogy, you discover again that nothing is really that remote: not history, not famous places, and not famous people.*

God is certainly not remote.

“Thy seed will I establish forever, and build up thy throne to all generations … I have found David my servant. With my holy oil have I anointed him … Also, I will make him my firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth … My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips. Once have I sworn by my holiness that I will not lie unto David. His seed shall endure forever, and his throne as the sun before me. It shall be established forever as the moon, and as a faithful witness in heaven” Psalm 89:4,20,27,34-38.

God promised to establish the throne of David forever in 2 Samuel 7:12-16. But how? Although there were exceptions, David’s descendants grew more evil and more idolatrous with each succeeding generation. But God was not depending on these earthly kings. Instead, God sent His Son, and God’s Son would be the Holy King whose kingdom would never end. Think about this: Jesus was born into the “House and Line of David” Luke 2:4. In fact, there are solid arguments that not only Joseph, the adopted father of Jesus, but also Mary was from the line of David.

The point is, Jesus walked among us. In the Son of Man, God Himself walked among us, living as one of us. He had parents and grandparents, brothers and sisters. Jesus had a family tree. He was related by blood to thousands of distant cousins all across Israel and the world. After all, he descended from Noah. In fact, this One Paul described as the Second Adam literally descended from the first Adam—as did we all.

Jesus walked among us.

He drank from the rain that falls on the earth today. He breathed the air we breathe. He ate fish from the same waters, ate bread made from the same wheat. He sweated in the heat and shivered in the cold and lived a life not as different from yours as you probably think.

That is the essence of the Incarnation, after all: God, the Creator, became Man, a creation. He ate and slept and laughed and lived a human life. He was one of us. God Himself became one of us.

Nothing is as remote as it seems.

God is never remote and is with you right now as you read this.

“For He is not far from any of us, for in Him we live, and move, and have our being … for we are also His offspring” Acts 17:27-28.

AΩ.

* If you can provide a few generations of your family tree, a website called relativefinder.org can connect you to famous people living and dead—though perhaps no more closely related than seventh cousins (a pool that can include 100,000 people). Though the relationship may be distant—and though you will never be able to verify all the parent-child connections involved—there is something interesting about considering that you might be related to this handful of famous people you have never met. After all, someone must be related to them, right?

Barking Dogs. Psalm 59.

“Daddy, I can’t sleep. The dogs won’t stop barking!” my drowsy daughter said.

“I’ll take care of it.” I sighed.

I was quickly growing tired of this. I stepped into my boots, went outside, turned on the water hose, and began spraying. The neighbor dogs took off running. But we had been doing this for days. There was no doubt the dogs would come back to bark at my dogs. I did not want to come out here again every hour. I dug around in the garage and found the rotating sprinkler. It was a last-resort, but it always worked. Even if it was December. The dogs would hunker down in the dry dog house and not make another sound until morning.

When we moved to a house in the country, we put our two dogs into the fenced-in dog pen in the backyard. Cowboy and Annie could not come in the house; my allergies would not allow it. We wanted to have dogs, but they had to stay outside. And they loved it out there. They loved the birds and squirrels and rabbits and possums and horses and goats and chickens. What’s not to like? But in the early days, I was just pleased our blue heelers never tried to jump the fence. It was the only barrier between the dogs and the highway.

The trouble was, the neighbors had dogs too. There was Blue, and Lippy, and Snowball–or those were the names my kids gave them anyway. Those three dogs would run circles around our house, barking and getting into things and acting like they owned the place. Our dogs would bark at the intruders, and the intruders would bark back. Sometimes it seemed like we were listening to barking dogs all night long. To make matters worse, there were other dogs in the area who wanted to join the fun. They may have been a quarter mile away, but on a quiet night, all the dogs could hear each other and the barking jamboree would go on for hours.

What did we do? We slept with fans going–white noise, they call it. And we took to wearing earplugs. And of course, I immediately repaired and replaced all the fences between my house and the neighbors. Anything to get those animals out of my yard at night!

“Deliver me from my enemies, O my God. Defend me from them that rise up against me … Save me from bloody men. For lo, they lie in wait for my soul. … They return at evening. They make a noise like a dog, and go round about the city. … At evening, let them return. and let them make a noise like a dog, and go round about the city. Let them wander up and down for meat, and growl if they be not satisfied. But I will sing of thy power, yea, I will sing aloud of thy mercy in the morning. For thou hast been my defense and refuge in the day of my trouble. Unto thee, O my strength, will I sing. For God is my defense, and the God of my mercy” Psalm 59:1-3,6,14-17.

David compares his enemies to circling, barking dogs. “They return at night, they make a noise like a dog and go round about the city” Psalm 59:6. David expresses confidence that God will handle these enemies, these dogs. “But thou, O Lord, shalt laugh at them … Consume them in wrath … let them know that God ruleth in Jacob” Psalm 59:8,13.

David gives the problem to God. David KNOWS God will handle it. And then David says something interesting:

“At evening let them return. And let them make a noise like a dog” and go around the city barking and growling, Psalm 59:14-15.

In other words, David is certain God will handle his enemies. But David knows they will remain out there, circling the city and barking at night. There is an application here for us:

Often God will protect us from enemies while still allowing them to bark at us, harassing us and driving us into His arms.

God may be protecting you from your enemies though they remain in your life, an ongoing source of noise and discomfort. God will “prepare a table before me in the PRESENCE of my enemies,” Psalm 23:5. God will take care of us even as our enemies remain in the picture. Such struggles keep us coming back to God, leaning on Him. Going to Him about the noise just as my daughter came to me when she could not sleep.

Give your problems to God. Talk to Him about your fears, anxieties, worries, and dread. Trust God to handle your problems and to protect you. But be prepared for enemies who may remain in your life. Barking like dogs.

AΩ.

Do You Have a Target on Your Back? Psalm 54.

Image: an alley in the Old City of Jerusalem off Lion’s Gate street. Notice how time has worn down the ancient stone steps.

Little David was the youngest of Jesse’s eight sons, a nobody from a nobody-family. Then one day the prophet Samuel came to the home. Samuel instructed Jesse to round up his sons, one of whom would be anointed king. To everyone’s surprise, God chose the youngest, the no-account runt from the no-account family.

When David was anointed, “the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward” 1 Samuel 16:13. Suddenly David began to experience favor and blessings. I’m convinced he noticed. When God gets involved in your life, you notice! David was no longer a nobody. He must have seen that he was blessed by God. (Even King Saul eventually came to see that God’s favor was resting on David, 1 Samuel 24:20.)

Soon David began moonlighting as a musician, learning the ways of court and crown as he played music to soothe the anxious king. Then the young shepherd killed both a lion and a bear while defending his father’s sheep. Not long after that, he killed Goliath and was swept into Saul’s army, where he proved to be the greatest military strategist Israel would ever see. In a short time, young David had married Saul’s daughter Michal, and had become best friends with Saul’s son Jonathan. And Saul knew God was going to take the crown from his family and place it on the head of David (1 Samuel 20:31).

Saul could not allow that; he was filled with jealousy and murderous hatred for a young man must have once loved.

And this is where David’s real education in the things of God began: while living on the run as a fugitive.

For years, King Saul pursued David. Some say David was on the run for four years. Others say he lived as a fugitive for as many as fifteen years. The point is, the psalmist and future king of Israel received a thorough schooling in the struggles of being hated, unjustly accused, and in constant danger of betrayal and murder. David knew how it felt to wake up every morning with a target on his back. And David knew where to go with his fear, his dread, his anxiety. He took it all to God.

The book of First Samuel records the story of the Ziphites. They knew David was hiding in their region and they went straight to King Saul and sold him out. Notice how specifically they guided Saul to the exact location:

“Is not David hiding among us in the strongholds at Horesh, on the hill of Hachilah, south of Jeshimon? Now, O king, come down whenever your soul desires, and we will be responsible for delivering him into your hand” 1 Samuel 23:19-20.

David had ears everywhere. He was smart and savvy and had cultivated allies inside the palace. Everything was reported to him. And besides the ongoing feelings of rejection and hurt (after all that I have done for Saul, this is how he repays me?), David must have felt fear and dread too. And who are these Ziphites that think nothing of betraying the future king of Israel? But David took all of these difficult emotions to God.

“Save me, O God, by thy name, and judge me by thy strength. Hear my prayer, O God, give ear to the words of my mouth. For strangers have risen up against me, and oppressors seek after my soul. They have not set God before them. Behold, God is mine helper. The Lord is with them that uphold my soul. He shall reward evil unto mine enemies, cut them off in thy truth. I will freely sacrifice to thee. I will praise thy name, O Lord, for it is good. For He hath delivered me out of all my trouble. And mine eye hath seen His desire upon mine enemies” Psalm 54:1-7.

There is a simplicity to this. You have bad feelings: take them to God in prayer. Give Him your emotions, your fear, your hurt, your anxiety and dread. Take all of it to the Lover of Your Soul.

And do the same with good feelings. When you are happy, grateful, thankful, and at peace–give that to God also. Talk to God about the good times. Give Him your gratitude, whether it is mild or overwhelming. Give Him credit for the joys. “Every good and perfect gift comes from above” James 1:17.

Talk to God about your life. Give Him your fears and your joys, your failures and your successes. Commune–and communicate— with God every day. Spend time with Him. Give Him thanks. Give Him praise. Give Him your hurts and fears. (Doesn’t that sound like David’s advice? Are these not the lessons of the psalms, half of which were written by King David?)

So much of the Bible points to this simple truth:

“Just as you have trusted Christ to save you, trust Him too with each day’s problems. Live in vital union with Him” Colossians 2:6.

AΩ.

Image from: https://jesswandering.com/10-beautiful-places-to-visit-in-israel/

Eliphaz Reports a Vision. Job 4:12-21.

What if you could travel back in time thousands of years. It is 2000 B.C.–that’s 2,000 years before Christ. Five men of God are sitting around a fire talking. Let’s imagine they conveniently happen to be speaking English (a language that will not be invented for 3,000 years!). The men in robes invite you to pull up a chair, or perhaps a tree stump or a stone, and sit with them while they discuss the deeper things of God. As you take your seat, you watch the sparks fly upward from the fire. It is a dark night and the sky is filled with more stars than your eyes have ever seen.

As the five men resume their conversation, one of them reports that God recently showed him a vision. The man’s name is Eliphaz and as he describes the vision, a quiet hush sends goose bumps down your arms.  

“A word was secretly brought to me, my ears caught a whisper of it. Amid disquieting dreams in the night, when deep sleep falls on people, fear and trembling seized me and made all my bones shake. 

A spirit glided past my face, and the hair on my body stood on end. It stopped, but I could not tell what it was. A form stood before my eyes, and I heard a hushed voice:

‘Can a mortal be more righteous than God? Can even a strong man be more pure than his Maker? If God places no trust in his servants, if He charges His angels with error, how much more those who live in houses of clay, whose foundations are in the dust, who are crushed more readily than a moth! Between dawn and dusk they are broken to pieces; unnoticed, they perish forever. Are not the cords of their tent pulled up, so that they die without wisdom?’” Job 4:12-21.

What do you think of Eliphaz? When you return to your life in the 21st century, what will you say about your experience? Was Eliphaz correct? Were the things he reported doctrinally sound? I described him as a man of God; clearly he was a believer. But was he correct? No. My study Bible says this in a note: “Although Eliphaz claimed his vision was divinely inspired, it is doubtful that it came from God because later God criticized Eliphaz for misrepresenting Him (Job 42:7).”

As you may recall, God rebukes Job’s friends, saying to Eliphaz, “My wrath is kindled against thee, and against thy two friends, for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath” Job 42:7.

So what do we do with these speeches? Job records the words of Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar, lengthy and poetic passages with plenty of nice lines about God and justice and repaying bad deeds with bad consequences. But God is not specific in His rebuke.

God does not explain which lines from Job’s friends are right and which are wrong. He simply says they “have not spoken … the thing that is right” leaving us no options but to dismiss everything they say.

Like I said, there are some good lines. In 1 Corinthians 3:19, the Apostle Paul quotes the words of Eliphaz from Job 5:13, but that is the only passage from the book of Job that is quoted in the New Testament. Other good lines, such as a line I like to cite from Job 5:7 (“Man is born for adversity as the sparks fly upward”) might be quoted the way you would quote Shakespeare. That is, some of the words of Job’s friends may be poetic or artfully stated, but you cannot quote them as sound doctrine from the Word of God. Remember–God rebuked Job’s friends, leaving us with poetic but ultimately unreliable essays about sowing and reaping and the justice of God.

Dear God, give us wisdom about rightly interpreting Your word. Show us what use (if any) to make of the words of Job’s friends. And show us how to interpret sketchy visions that come to us–like the vision of Eliphaz. Sometimes such dreamy experiences between wakefulness and sleep seem so real, yet ultimately prove false. Remind us to test everything against the scripture. And teach us to interpret the words of godly people around us, including preachers and teachers, against the truth of your word. May we never be deceived by those who misrepresent You.

AΩ.

*Quoting the Chronological Life Application Study Bible: King James Version, Tyndale House, Carol Stream, 2007, p.99.

Buy a Cemetery Plot. Then Go Celebrate! Proverbs 31:25.

As I twisted free of my mother’s hand and ran under the trees, I saw the gate approaching and read the words. Could it really be true? A sign above a little square of grass deep in a Pine forest made me feel like part of some royal family. Who am I, the king of England? The sign above the gate in St. Helena Parish read, WALES CEMETERY. It was a wooden sign probably purchased at a county fair from a man with a router, spray paint, and a belt sander. But to me, it was as impressive as a jumbotron in Times Square. We were famous!

Jacob also had a family cemetery. When Sarah died, his grandfather Abraham bought the Cave of Machpelah in Hebron and buried her inside. Eventually, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and their wives, Sarah, Rebekah, and Leah would all be buried there. When Jacob and his family (of seventy people!) moved to Egypt, he insisted his body be buried not in Egypt, but in his grandfather’s tomb back in Canaan, the Land of Promise. 

“Bury me not, I pray thee, in Egypt. But I will lie with my fathers , and thou shalt carry me out of Egypt, and bury me in their burying place. And Joseph said, ‘I will do as thou hast said.’ And he said, ‘Swear to me.’ And he swore to him” Genesis 47:29-31.

A generation later, Joseph gave similar instructions. “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry my bones from hence” Genesis 50:25.

Eventually I discovered that family cemeteries were quite common. They are legal in all fifty states, and by some estimates, there are tens of thousands of private cemeteries across the country. I remember my father making several trips to the family cemetery to photograph tombstones and write notes that would help him piece together his family tree. No matter how the place may have impressed me as a child, the family cemetery was primarily a place to reflect on the past. Perhaps that explains why neither my father nor his father were buried there. Having lived most of their lives outside of St. Helena Parish, being buried there held no great appeal. 

Such was not the case with Jacob and Joseph. Like Gus’s dying wish in LONESOME DOVE, Jacob and Joseph insisted on having their embalmed bodies transported from Egypt back to the land of Canaan–the Promised Land. But unlike Gus McCrae, who was looking back on happier times in a spot he called “Clara’s Orchard,” Jacob and Joseph were not looking back. The father and son were looking forward. They gave instructions concerning their bones because they had faith, because they were convinced that God would one day bring the family back from Egypt. 

“By faith Joseph, when his end was near, spoke about the Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt and gave instructions concerning the burial of his bones” Hebrews 11:22.

Jacob also displayed faith. “Behold, I die. But God shall be with you, and bring you again unto the land of your fathers” Genesis 48:21.

Can you face death with faith? I won’t claim it is easy. But we know that people are happy and less anxious–healthier–when they have hope, when they can face the future with courage and faith. Jacob and Joseph recognized a key fact: this story is larger than my individual life. It will go on after me. Both men told their families to keep looking forward, to bury their bodies in the Promised Land, where God would one day bring His people home. 

“She can laugh at the days to come” Proverbs 31:25.

The ‘Proverbs 31 Woman’ looks forward to the future with not only hope but laughter. Do you?

Dear God, remind us we are part of a much larger story. We have a role to play. Give us the faith to see beyond our own lives, to know that there are years, generations, perhaps centuries yet to come. May we have an eternal perspective, and use the years of our lives to bear fruit for Your kingdom, to store up treasure in heaven, and to encourage those who follow us to live lives of deep faith in a God who loves them so much. 

AΩ.

Joseph Wept. Genesis 42:24.

One of the greatest stories in the Bible is the record of the life of Joseph. Until Benjamin was born, he was the youngest of eleven boys, and he was his father’s favorite son. People criticize Joseph for being proud, suggesting he indulged in the fact that he was his father’s favorite. But I am not convinced.

Yes, Joseph repeated his dreams and offended his family. But it is not clear that he reported on what he had dreamed in an arrogant way. In fact, the book of Genesis does not report any significant failures in the life of Joseph. He acts with integrity, and he does so consistently.

He serves his father well. He serves Potiphar. He rejects the repeated attempts by Potiphar’s wife to seduce the lonely young man. In prison, Joseph remains faithful, serving the prison guard with integrity. He then serves Pharaoh with integrity. He forgives his brothers. He provides not only for his family but for the entire nation and the surrounding nations. Joseph honors God by using his gifts of leadership and administration to save countless lives. Joseph is one of few men in the Bible about whom there is no hint of failure. No scandal. 

And there is something else: 

When Joseph was speaking to his brothers through an interpreter and overheard his brothers regretting what they had done to him, “he turned himself about from them and wept” Genesis 42:24.

Then when Joseph met his brother Benjamin for the first time (his only full-brother, born to his parents after Joseph was sold into slavery), he was overcome.

“And Joseph made haste … and he sought where to weep and he entered into his chamber and wept there” Genesis 43:30.

Finally, Joseph revealed his identity to his eleven brothers. “And he wept aloud. And the Egyptians and the house of Pharaoh heard” Genesis 45:2.

Joseph talked to his brothers. But then he spoke to each one individually.

“He kissed all his brethren, and wept upon them … and he fell upon his brother Benjamin’s neck and wept and Benjamin wept upon his neck” Genesis 45:14-15.

Soon Joseph was reunited with his aging father, Jacob. “And he fell on his neck and wept on his neck a good while” Genesis 46:29.

Seventeen years later, Jacob died in Egypt’s land of Goshen. “And Joseph fell upon his father’s face and wept upon him and kissed him” Genesis 50:1.

Then Joseph’s brothers came to him and begged him to have mercy, to forgive them, and not to visit upon them some terrible revenge for what they had done to him. Joseph reassured them that he still believed God was behind it all, and “Joseph wept when they spoke to him” Genesis 50:17.

What is going on with all the weeping? First, Joseph lived in a culture markedly different from our own. Around the world, men weep in many cultures, but probably weep the least in the United States. Some say it is a northern European trait–that cultures created in cold climates are less affectionate and less demonstrative about emotions. When you are bundled up under four layers of clothing, hats, and face coverings, you tend to hold in your affections and emotions. Perhaps there is some truth to that, I don’t know. 

But I remember a comical line spoken on DOWNTON ABBEY: “We do not hug. We are English.”

Another Brit says, “No hugs, dear. I’m British. We only show affection to dogs and horses.”

Tears are part of affection, of course. Joseph embraces his brothers and father and weeps on their necks. This man of great integrity is also a man confident enough to feel and reveal his emotions. And that is all the more remarkable considering the family that raised him. Forget his conniving brothers. Joseph’s father Jacob was the deceiver who stole his brother’s birthright and blessing. And Joseph’s grandfather Laban had never played fair with Jacob, changing his wages ten times.

This is a family of men who change the rules in the middle of the game. But somehow Joseph grows up among them with absolute integrity. 

And Joseph wept. Seven times, actually. He did not weep when thrown into slavery. Nor when he was falsely accused and locked up in prison. Nor when he was forgotten and left there. Joseph wept not for himself, but over relationships, and five of the seven times he wept he was shedding tears of joy. Joseph is not crying, per se, not lamenting his difficult life. Joseph sheds tears of joy because he is overcome with happiness. And he does so in part because of his incredible integrity.

There is an honesty in tears of joy. It shows a man who is able to truly, deeply face his own gratitude, just as he has deeply faced his hurts. 

And for what is Joseph grateful? What causes him to weep tears of joy? Family. Even after all that has happened, Joseph is thrilled to be reunited with his father and brothers. Joseph weeps for family.

In the words of a Jewish rabbi commenting on this story: “Tears communicate, to others and to ourselves, and we can feel more present and stronger when we attend to and accept their message … tears are powerful affective punctuation.”

Think about those words. “Tears are powerful affective punctuation.”

You know what else? 

“Jesus wept” John 11:35.

Let Him be your role model. Not the English. And not the dominant American culture that would remake men as robots or Vulcans. 

When Macduff, the hero of Shakespeare’s Macbeth discovers the king has murdered his entire family, Macduff is stricken with grief and receives the classic advice: be a man. 

Malcolm: “Dispute it like a man.”

Macduff: “I shall do so. But I must also feel it like a man!”

Macduff understands: there is nothing unmanly about weeping for your family. Joseph understood as well, weeping on seven occasions over difficult, but ultimately reconciled relationships. And Jesus wept over the death of Lazarus–probably moved more by the suffering of Lazarus’s two sisters than the death of a friend He knew He would heal and revive momentarily. 

“Tears are powerful affective punctuation.”

AΩ.

*A useful review of these seven weeping scenes and the way they work as a literary device is available here: thegospelcoalition.org/article/joseph-wept/ 

**The aforementioned rabbi’s essay is available here: reformjudaism.org/blog/joseph-cries-lot-and-should-matter-us 

Islands, Elevators, Cows, and Crops: Migration Economics. Genesis 36:6-8.

The island of Manhattan must have seemed huge to the Dutch who first arrived in 1626, securing the rights to farmland by paying the Lenape people $24 in beads and trinkets for the area that would come to be known as “Manhatto.” Forty years later the British took over and the island would grow so populated the only place left to go was up. Fortunately, the Otis Elevator company was there, ready to begin shuttling New Yorkers into the sky day and night, higher and higher every year. Suddenly the air above the island could support not merely a five-storey walkup, but ten storeys, then twenty-five storeys, then fifty storeys and beyond.

E.B. White referred to Manhattan’s tall buildings as “sky acreage, hitherto untilled.” Just as the Otis company allowed New Yorkers to begin tilling the sky, the growing population stopped tilling the soil, too tightly packed on the land to continue farming it. The last working farm disappeared from the island in the 1930s. Manhattan grows no crops and raises no cattle. All the food must be shipped in daily. But the wealth being generated on the island–the value created by the work of millions–is enough to pay for the daily delivery of untold tons of food. 

Our modern economy and urban geography create vertical pressure. The agrarian societies of Bible times created horizontal pressure. It happened to Abram and Lot. Abram and his nephew were both so wealthy there was not enough land to feed their animals. They had to split up. Abram let Lot choose, and the young man chose the best land, a choice that kicked off a chain of unpleasant events, see Genesis chapters 13, 18, and 19.

Less familiar is the story of the separation of Jacob and Esau. The reconciled twin sons of Isaac grew rich in their old age and faced the same problem: there was not enough grass and water to support their animals. They would have to spread out.

“And Esau took his wives, and his sons, and his daughters, and all the persons of his house, and his cattle, and all his beasts, and all his substance, which he had got in the land of Canaan, and went into the country from the face of his brother Jacob. For their riches were more than that they might dwell together, and the land where they were strangers could not bear them because of their cattle. Thus dwelt Esau in Mount Seir” Genesis 36:6-8.

Stories like this make me sad. Why can’t families be together? Jacob and Esau finally had a good relationship, but their own prosperity forced them to split up.

I remember teaching high school and realizing that I had five cousins who also taught in high schools at the time, and at least half a dozen cousins that were high school students. Yet we were all in different schools–spread out across hundreds of miles. Why didn’t God send us all to the same place, where we could see family every day? Doesn’t that seem like the way things should work? 

It may seem that way. But God did not send you here to live a comfortable life in your insulated family bubble. You are here to reach other people, to make a difference. Sometimes God calls us to change jobs, other times to change cities or even nations. My father moved 300 miles for work. My wife’s father, a thousand. Most Americans have ancestors on other continents.

Moving, whether to Lubbock or Lithuania, is simply part of life sometimes, part of the adventure to which God calls us, and for which He will reward us: 

“And He said unto them, ‘Verily I say unto you, there is no man that hath left house, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children, for the kingdom of God’s sake, who shall not receive manifold more in this present time and in the world to come, life everlasting” Luke 18:29-30.

AΩ.

  • The E.B. White quote is from his 1948 essay now published in book form, HERE IS NEW YORK.

Economy of the City. Genesis 34:20-21.

Everybody’s got to eat. And find shelter. And pay bills. The fact is, you need money. Even if you don’t want money, you need it.

How does one amass wealth? By selling something for which people will pay. This is true whether you live in a culture based on barter and trade, or whether you live in a modern, cash-based society. People create value. Human labor creates value. Ideas, creativity, and effort create value.

And if people create value, then more people should create more value. And bigger cities, bigger nations should create greater value–a stronger economy–than smaller communities. This is not a new concept. People have understood this for as long as they have understood simple addition: more people equals more money.

“And Hamor and Shechem his son came unto the city gate of their city, and communed with the men of their city, saying, ‘These men are peaceable with us. Therefore, let them dwell in the land, and trade therein. For the land, behold it is large enough for them. Let us take their daughters to us for wives, and let us give them our daughters … Shall not their cattle and their substance and every beast of theirs be ours?'” Genesis 34:20-21.

When Jacob and his twelve sons arrived in Shechem, the locals saw the arrival of the prosperous family as a chance to increase their own wealth. They told the city fathers to welcome the newcomers knowing that soon they would be able to share in Jacob’s property.

Unfortunately, the men of Shechem made an error in judgment. Humans bring value. But humans also destroy value. We are capable not only of towering achievements but also of appalling destruction. In 1931, Americans built the Empire State Building during the Great Depression (and completed the project ahead-of-schedule and under-budget). A few years later, Americans used only two bombs to destroy the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing an estimated 200,000 people. Towering achievements and appalling destruction.

Perhaps it is ironic that the men of Shechem did not consider the Problem of Evil. Or rather, they did consider it, but concluded that Jacob’s people “are peaceable with us.” That was a bit naive, considering that Shechem had raped Jacob’s daughter, Dinah. The sons of Jacob were already plotting their vengeance and soon killed all the men in the city, stole their animals, crops, and wealth, and captured their wives and children, Genesis 34:25.

Markets and economies are not as complicated as those who favor government control would have you believe. A healthy market allows free people to freely trade for goods and services. Currency (cash money) and investment products (stocks) increase the efficiency of markets, allowing greater wealth for everyone. But we must never lose sight of human evil. We must be shrewd.

Caveat Emptor is the rule–the Buyer Must Always Beware.

“’It’s no good, it’s no good!’ says the buyer— then goes off and boasts about the purchase” Proverbs 20:14.

Is that not the way it works? The buyer argues a product is terrible, the seller argues it is amazing, the two agree on a price, and each one tells himself he got the better deal.

The truth to remember is that skepticism is warranted. Humans create value. But humans also destroy things. More people means more value. But sometimes more people means more risk of total annihilation.

Caveat Emptor. Buyer Beware.

AΩ.

*I do not disagree with the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Not only did the bombings save the lives of countless American and Allied soldiers, but the Allies did all they could to warn the people of Japan, dropping flyers all over the cities. Sadly, the Japanese had proven ruthless in their attempt to seize control of the entire world, and they were savage in their treatment of Allied prisoners (not to mention Japan’s own soldiers and citizens). After five years of fighting, Japan had done nothing to indicate it would stop the destruction. Only the overwhelming force of the atomic bomb finally brought them to the table for peace talks. Finally, I do not consider myself a qualified apologist for the use of the atomic bomb, nor am I claiming a Biblical basis for its use.

Jacob and the Troublemakers. Genesis 33:10.

Are you a troublemaker? Do you ever feel like you are being singled out for constant punishment? Like me, did a teacher ever place your desk way off in the corner of the room where none of the other children could talk to you? 

Curiously, some teachers are drawn to the troublemakers. Some of them discover that they really enjoy the kids who drive their colleagues crazy. My wife is like that: we enjoy telling each other stories about the difficult young men we have taught who nevertheless burrowed their way into our hearts forever. I looked one of them up online just this morning (and discovered he is working as an oil and gas landman!).

Jacob was one of God’s troublemakers. When the twin sons of Isaac were born, Esau came out first but Jacob’s fist was wrapped around his heel. They called the second born “heel grabber” and the name stuck, indicating the way he always seemed to be struggling to get what was coming to him.

Jacob later conned Esau out of his birthright, then deceived his blind father into speaking over Jacob a blessing meant for Esau. But Jacob was a victim too–he who lives by the sword shall die by the sword, right? Jacob was manipulated many times by his father-in-law, Laban, and years later ten of his sons conspired to sell son number eleven to human traffickers, and for thirteen years Jacob grieved for a son he thought was dead.

Jacob’s entire life was one of constant struggles with people.

Sometimes the man won, sometimes he lost. But Jacob never stopped fighting. (The man had no chill.)

Yet, God delighted in the contentious heel grabber.

Like a father who is amused by that difficult child that can’t stay out of trouble, I imagine God turning on the Jacob Show every day and just watching the fireworks. What would the man of strife do next?

Think about this. The Bible reports many dreams. God came to prophets and showed them so many things. Other times, he walked up in human form, as He did with Abraham, and talked to him about Sodom and Gomorrah. Daniel walked around with God inside the fiery furnace. John saw visions of the future while he was alone on the island of Patmos. God talked to Noah and Moses and Paul. God even spoke to Jacob’s mother, telling her “Two nations are in thy womb … and the elder shall serve the younger” Genesis 25:23.

Most of God’s interactions with people can be described as conversations. Or maybe conversations with dreams or visions attached. 

But with Jacob it was different. God delighted in the troublemaker; He had something special in mind for Jacob. A divine interaction like no other. God came to the man late one night: 

“Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, ‘Let me go, for it is daybreak.’

But Jacob replied, ‘I will not let you go unless you bless me.’

The man asked him, ‘What is your name?’

‘Jacob,’ he answered.

Then the man said, ‘Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with man and have overcome.’

Jacob said, ‘Please tell me your name.’

But he replied, ‘Why do you ask my name?’ Then he blessed him there.

So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, ‘It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.’ The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel, and he was limping because of his hip” Genesis 32:24-31. 

Wait, what? God came to Jacob so the two men could … RASSLE? Seriously? Can you imagine that? Look at the pope in his tall hat (the mitre) and the fancy robes, the cathedral filled with the smoke of incense, and all the fat, old cardinals in red robes, and think about this: the God they dressed up to serve so piously came to Jacob in the middle of the night because He wanted to wrestle! Wrap your head around that! 

And the same is true for all our churches. In one way or another, all of us value a level of decorum and sobriety. We wear nice clothes, we drink coffee, and we behave. As we should. The Bible clearly says that God is a god of order and our worship should be ordered and reverent. 

But it is refreshing to remember that God wrestled with Jacob.

Boys love to wrestle. I wish every young man could spend hours wrestling with a gentle, but much stronger father. It is so valuable–and a great way to communicate love and affection between father and son. But wrestling is more than that. It is a competition. It is grappling. It is fighting, though a rather safe kind of fighting, where a boy learns rules and to respect an opponent. 

But why did God do this? Why did He take on flesh, gird up His loins, and wrestle all night long with Jacob? For one thing, God loved Jacob. He did. It seems so obvious to me. God looked at the life of this striving, angry, scheming, sometimes devious man, and God just loved him. And God knew how to reach Jacob. Jacob did not want a dream or a vision or a postcard from Heaven. Jacob was a man of action!

God knew that a good night of wrestling would reach Jacob on a deeper level than anything else. 

So that’s what He did: God showed up and wrestled with the man for hours! And God limited himself. He limited himself to a level of power similar to Jacob’s. Thus, neither one could quite seem to win. It was almost as though God made himself Jacob’s twin. The two were evenly matched and they wrestled for hour after hour. 

Jacob must have been thinking of his twin brother the entire time. After all, he had not seen Esau in twenty years, and he knew he would be seeing him the next day. Not only that, but the person Jacob had wrestled with the most in life was surely his twin brother Esau.  The two of them must have wrestled for hours growing up. That’s what brothers do. But Esau had promised to kill Jacob. There was so much bad blood. Esau was on his way with an army of four hundred men. The brothers would meet again tomorrow. 

And now Jacob is spending the entire night wrestling with someone he can’t quite defeat, but who can’t quite best him either. Over time, an awareness comes to Jacob. This is no ordinary man. No ordinary enemy. None of Jacob’s favorite moves seem to work on this guy. But every time the man has a chance to take a kill shot, he doesn’t do it. So the two wrestle on. 

What does this crazy, almost sacrilegious story have to do with me and you? First, if you consider yourself a troublemaker, a deceiver, a heel grabber, or a failure of any kind, God loves you. God can look on your life and delight in you when no one else can.

When God looks at you, He sees someone He deeply loves.

Second, WRESTLE WITH GOD!

WRESTLE WITH GOD IN PRAYER!

Go for it. When you have a need, a desire, a dream, or just something small that you want, WRESTLE! Don’t look at prayer as just a mild conversation, like handing God your shopping list, then walking away.

God wants to be involved in your life. He wants to engage with you, to wrestle with you, to hear from you–a lot–and to talk back so you can hear from Him.

When you are praying for something, pray like Jacob who said, “I will not let you go until you bless me!”

Grab onto God and demand that He bless you. Don’t worry about praying wrong. If you pray wrong, or your tone needs to be adjusted, God can show you. But for now, be like Jacob. Grab onto Him and ask Him to bless you. 

Finally, this is a proxy wrestling match. Jacob was wrestling with God. But he had to be thinking about his brother. Jacob was extremely anxious, but after wrestling for hours, I think Jacob was able to face Esau with peace. If Jacob was not confident, he was at least spent. His energy was drained while he “pulled an all-nighter” for the ages. What was left to fear? 

The next day Jacob would be reunited with the greatest wrestling opponent of his life.

Everything Jacob knew about wrestling he and Esau had discovered together. That is the way of brothers. God understands that, and He wrestled all night to show Jacob that things were going to be okay. In the end, God blessed Jacob, gave him a new name, and made his hip lame to remind him: he had wrestled with God. 

And things worked out. Esau forgave Jacob, even refusing his gifts. And Jacob spoke to Esau in words that harken back to a night spent tumbling in the dirt: 

“Accept the gifts I offer, for I have seen thy face and it is as if I had seen the face of God, and He was pleased with me” Genesis 33:10.

I imagine it this way:

God wrestled with Jacob with the ferocity and well-matched strength of a twin brother, and Jacob was reminded of Esau. A few hours later, Esau showed Jacob astounding forgiveness, and Jacob was reminded of God. 

For the rest of his life, Jacob would know he had survived an all-night wrestling match with God. (Who else can say that?) What else could life throw at him? Whatever might happen, Jacob would face the future knowing he could handle it. He would survive. He would survive the loss of Rachel and of Joseph, knowing full well that he had “struggled with God and with man and prevailed” Genesis 32:28. 

AΩ.