Contemplative Bible Reading

Deuteronomy 4:5-8 (New International Version)

⁵ See, I have taught you decrees and laws as the LORD my God commanded me, so that you may follow them in the land you are entering to take possession of it. ⁶ Observe them carefully, for this will show your wisdom and understanding to the nations, who will hear about all these decrees and say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.” ⁷ What other nation is so great as to have their gods near them the way the LORD our God is near us whenever we pray to him? ⁸ And what other nation is so great as to have such righteous decrees and laws as this body of laws I am setting before you today?

God’s people were about to enter the Promised Land. God had given them (and repeated to them) the laws he wanted them to obey.

Look at one of the promises of obedience:

this will show your wisdom and understanding to the nations

The nations around God’s people will notice the laws that God’s people observe. And once the nations observe, they will say:

Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.

God’s laws – here the old covenant – are excellent laws about diet, nutrition, agriculture, business, government, justice, and all the other things that make a nation and a culture. The nations – those people who have no relationship with God – can plainly see the excellence.

I believe the same is true for God’s new covenant with us.

• love one another
• don’t lie, hate, cheat
• and so on

These are not burdens; they are excellent guides to a good life now and forever. The nations can plainly see this.

Genesis 9:1-2 (New International Version)

¹ Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. ² The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands.

The title is something that adults always told me when I was a kid.

Don’t worry about mice, rats, snakes, dogs, and so on. You are bigger than them.

And of course,

They are more afraid of you than you are of them.

All those adults were right. They were probably right from years of observation, but now I see that they were right from the words of God.

One of my grandmothers put cotton in her ears at night as she was afraid that ants would crawl into her while she slept. Alfred Hitchcock made a movie “The Birds” where birds stopped being afraid of people. Terrible things, simply terrible.

Verse 2 tells me that the creatures of the land and the see will fear me, fear mankind. This is the way God created the situation.

God thank you for your creation. You thought things through when you did this. You are marvelous, wonderful, magnificent.

Romans 1:20 (New International Version)

¹⁸The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, ¹⁹since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. ²⁰For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

And then we have…

Psalm 19:1-3 (New International Version)

¹ The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

² Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they display knowledge.

³ There is no speech or language
where their voice is not heard.

Here is a message from God to mankind:

I gave you enough information to know that I exist. Did you accept or reject me?

At some times, some things are simple and clear to me. This is one of those times. I hope my words won’t muddle God’s.

Paul tells us in Romans that God has been clearly seen by man in what was made. The writer of the Psalm tells us that the creation declares God to us day after day in all languages that men speak.

In America today, people know about God. It is on 200 channels of TV, regular and satellite radio, and on countless pages of the Internet. We have so much information coming from other people that we don’t have time to look at what God’s creation is telling us.

God, help us to slow down a bit and listen to what your creation is saying.

Genesis 11:28 (New International Version)

While his father Terah was still alive, Haran died in Ur of the Chaldeans, in the land of his birth.

This comes from one of those chapters in the Bible listing genealogies. Other verses from this chapter include:

¹⁴ When Shelah had lived 30 years, he became the father of Eber. ¹⁵ And after he became the father of Eber, Shelah lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹⁶ When Eber had lived 34 years, he became the father of Peleg. ¹⁷ And after he became the father of Peleg, Eber lived 430 years and had other sons and daughters.

¹⁸ When Peleg had lived 30 years, he became the father of Reu. ¹⁹ And after he became the father of Reu, Peleg lived 209 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁰ When Reu had lived 32 years, he became the father of Serug. ²¹ And after he became the father of Serug, Reu lived 207 years and had other sons and daughters.

²² When Serug had lived 30 years, he became the father of Nahor. ²³ And after he became the father of Nahor, Serug lived 200 years and had other sons and daughters.

²⁴ When Nahor had lived 29 years, he became the father of Terah. ²⁵ And after he became the father of Terah, Nahor lived 119 years and had other sons and daughters.

Verse 28 is different. In it, Haran died while his father Terah was still alive. The son died before the father. This is the only case in this long list of fathers and sons where the son died before the father. It just didn’t happen.

Why not?

I think the reason is that men were at peace with one another. We don’t have records of wars at this time.

This is one of the blessing of peace (not war) that I had not realized. In peace, fathers don’t see their sons die. They don’t have to grieve in that way. That is peaceful.

God, grant me the blessing of not seeing my sons die before me.

Leviticus 19:11 (New International Version)

” ‘Do not steal.
” ‘Do not lie.
” ‘Do not deceive one another.

The first two parts of the above verse are well known. In good old English these were:

Thou shalt not steal

Thou shalt not lie

The third part of the above verse is not so well known,

Thou shalt not deceive

Ooops, that seems to cover much more behavior than “don’t lie.” It prohibits all the “Well, I wasn’t lying, you see, he didn’t really understand what I was saying, and that wasn’t my fault” or “hey, he fell for that old gag, his fault.”

The word “deceive” has some interesting synonyms:

dupe, fool, gull, hoodwink, trick, defraud, outwit, entrap, ensnare, betray

Ooops again. These things are wrong. Even “outwit” is wrong. I thought that was a good characteristic – maybe not.

God is pretty smart about us and our nature. He should know, he created us. Sprinkled here and there in the old and new covenants we can find God telling us,

“I know you are clever. I created you that way. I know there are loopholes in the instructions I have given you. You are smart enough to find most of them, but spending your time to find them and go through them is wrong. I didn’t create you to spend your time and energy doing that. I created you to love one another and love me. Let’s concentrate on that.”

God, help me to concentrate where you wish me to concentrate.

Deuteronomy 28 (New International Version)

⁵⁸ If you do not carefully follow all the words of this law, which are written in this book, and do not revere this glorious and awesome name—the LORD your God-…

⁶⁴ Then the LORD will scatter you among all nations…⁶⁵ There the LORD will give you an anxious mind, eyes weary with longing, and a despairing heart. ⁶⁶ You will live in constant suspense, filled with dread both night and day, never sure of your life.

At this point in the Old Testament, God’s people are about to enter the Promised Land. Moses passes a message from God. Part of the message is a promise of blessings contingent on the people obeying God’s commands.

Given above is part of the threat of curses if the people do not obey God’s commands. Look at these curses:

• an anxious mind
• eyes weary with longing
• a despairing heart
• live in constant suspense
• filled with dread
• never sure of your life

These are terrible. I spend much of my day thinking. The concept of troubled thoughts day and night is dreadful for me.

Contrast this with the promise of peace of mind in the New Testament.

Philippians 4:7 (New International Version)

⁷And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

And in one of several passages where Jesus says, “Peace be with you.”

Luke 24:36 (New International Version)

³⁶While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.”

God promises us peace of mind, peace in our hearts, peace where it really counts. Let us claim that promise each day.

Deuteronomy 28:67 (New International Version)

In the morning you will say, “If only it were evening!” and in the evening, “If only it were morning!”-because of the terror that will fill your hearts and the sights that your eyes will see.

This passage speaks about the calamities that will come to God’s people if they fail to follow his commands. It is unfortunate that they often disobeyed and experienced these calamities. Things were so bad that they wished the painful days would fly by.

Have you ever wished it were the weekend already? Have you ever wished that 5 o’clock would come so you could go home? I have. I have wished that future parts of my life would vanish.

Perhaps these are just “figures of speech.” We don’t really want parts of our lives to vanish, but we do say these things, and someone hears us say them. I hate to consider what our neighbors and colleagues think of us when they hear us wishing away our lives. I think Christians are supposed to be full of joy. If I am full of joy, I don’t want time to disappear and the joy with it.

Each moment is a blessing from God. Why would we ever wish away a blessing? Seems pretty foolish, but we often do so.

God, help me to notice every blessing you give me. Help me to cherish the experience of every blessing. Help me to not wish away my life.

Galatians 4:12-14 12 I plead with you, brothers, become like me, for I became like you. You have done me no wrong. 13 As you know, it was because of an illness that I first preached the gospel to you. 14 Even though my illness was a trial to you, you did not treat me with contempt or scorn. Instead, you welcomed me as if I were an angel of God, as if I were Christ Jesus himself.

It sounds to me in these verses that Paul arrived in Galatia in a state of physical ailment. He sounds like a cripple. Ooh, that word doesn’t bring any good feelings to me. “Cripple.” Even the way the consonants clash against one another sounds bad.

Regardless, the Galatians accepted Paul. They listened to what he had to say.

Could I do that? Could I accept a cripple into to my life as a teacher? I considered this question after reading this verse. I don’t have much confidence in myself in this area. Physical skills – the ability to walk and chew gum at the same time – seem to carry with them mental skills. At least they seem to go together with me.

That doesn’t sound too good now that I have written it and read it a few times. What am I doing? I recall how Israel’s first king was Saul. He was big and strong and all that good stuff.

A few years later, the prophet Samuel went to find the next king. He passed through all the tall and handsome sons of Jesse and kept looking. Samuel settled on the little, scrawny runt named David. He was the one God chose.

I guess we haven’t grown much in maturity when it comes to physical appeal. Several thousand years later I still look for someone to have some physical ability before I accept them as a teacher.

I am glad that I found this example of the Galatians and how they accepted an ailing Paul as their teacher. I will try to see less-able people differently.

Psalms 86:11 b (Holman Christian Standard Bible)

give me an undivided mind to fear your name.

I read this while sitting in a Bible class on a Sunday morning. At the time I had two different notebooks in my lap, an open Bible, and several note cards in my hands. It was a typical Sunday morning.

The phrase “undivided mind” (the NIV uses the words “undivided heart”) caught my eye. If I only could think of one thing at a time. If I could only concentrate on one thing. If all the other things cluttering my mind would go away for a while.

This is akin to the session I am leading at a conference in a few weeks. It is about distractions and how they can clutter our lives.

I have a few techniques that I can use to remove the divisions in my mind. I know how to jot notes so that extra thoughts go away and my attention focuses on one thing. I know how to do better.

Still, I struggle with a divided mind.

In one sense it is a great blessing. God has filled my life with things that are of interest to me. God has blessed me with so much to do, so much to consider, so much to share, so many opportunities to serve.

At times, however, I wish I could do one thing at a time.

Today I am flying from Washington to Phoenix. These trips are a chance to be alone (in a crowded airport and crowded airplane) and think. I have a chance to think about one thing and concentrate.

Thanks God. Please give me an undivided mind.

Malachi 4:6 (New International Version)

He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers; or else I will come and strike the land with a curse.”

As a father, this verse stings me. God will turn my heart to my children.

Have I turned my heart to my children? I think so, but I am not an objective judge of this. I look to the evidence that I can see and hear.

. My sons still talk to me.

. Two of my sons still live in my house with my wife and me.

. My sons seem to like to have me around.