Biblical Tradition of Storytelling - Festivals (Feb 22nd)

In the Bible there are traditions in storytelling.

Animators, illustrators - they're storytellers. Stories are diverting yourself away from reality - when's it ok and when's it not? There was a reason God gave us the ability to tell stories and to want to hear stories.

1 Cor 10 is Paul recounting a story of something that actually happened - when the children of Israel crossed the Red Sea.

Buddaism is an idealogy. Buddha thought of a bunch of ideas and people nowadays LIVE from these ideas, whereas we live by what scripture says.

1 Cor 10 goes on to explain that ideally we should be learning from other peoples' mistakes so that we don't have to make them . The wilderness journey in Exodus had a whole bunch of mistakes. (1 Cor 10:6 'now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did')

Now. The stories in Scripture are true --except the parables. Jesus used stories based on real things, grounded in reality for people to learn. He used things they could relate to, just as in one of the letters in the Bible the writer says something about "remember your ancestor Abraham" so that the people can relate to it more and understand better. Found it - it doesn't say "remember your ancestor Abraham", it's the note i have. its for galatians 3:28,29 'There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise.' Paul is talking to the Jews here so he's trying to convince them by bringing up their forefather Abraham.

Deut 4, 6, Exodus 10. In Exodus 10 it talks about the day for a year. When the children of Israel had just left Egypt and crossed the Red Sea, they started grumbling because they'd left all that behind and were now wandering in the middle of nowhere, so they sent spies into the land for 40 days - and were punished that they would spend 40 years wandering. (Numbers 14:34). Also anyone over 20 would die - they would wander and wander but never get the land. If you were wandering for 40 years, you aren't going to spend the whole time moping- you'd teach your children how to better than you had.
In Hebrews 11 it tells us how Abraham was to come out of Ur of the Chaldees (which was the most civilised place of that time). Hebrews 11:10 'he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God'. Abraham left all he had and wandered, not knowing where he was going. Deut 4:9 - remember things they've experienced in their life. They were to take these experiences and make them live in the hearts of their children (also in Deut 6:7).

We talked about how much fun it was when you were a little kid, to sleep in a tent in the back garden overnight instead of staying in the house. They did something similar in Leviticus 23, they enacted the wilderness journey, they dwelt in booths for 7 days - how much fun for the children! Lev 23:42,43 'You shall dwell in booths for seven days. All natice Israelites shall dwell in booths, 43 that your generations may know that I made the people of Israel dwell in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.'


homework - look at Hosea 4:6 and write how it relates to what we looked at

The Name of God - El

This is the third and last in our Name of God lessons (which were very good and helpful =D )

El:

• basically means 'God'
• was used of the idols of other nations as well ('gods'), not just our God
• but it can also have meanings of 'strength,' 'mighty' and 'Almighty'
• translated as 'God', 'goodly', 'idol', 'mighty one' and others

Elohim

• it comes from 'El'
• a kind of simplified version of the meaning would be 'mighty ones' but it is so often used with a singular verb that it doesn't give the impression that it is many gods, or god as many (eg the Trinity..)

To solve this problem, we looked at another word, 'chaiyah' (spelling?), that has a plural that is often really meaning singular. i guess 'sheep' is an english word that is kind of the same - it can be singular or plural.

We concluded that this probably meant that 'Elohim', rather than being 'mighty ones', means 'might' - again if we looked at 'chaiyah' we could get that kind of association between what the singular means and what the plural means => 'Chaiyah' means 'living one', often 'beast.' The plural ('chaiyim') can sometimes be translated 'lives', but more often 'life.' That helps us to understand how 'elohim' is used in the Bible. Confusing, I know!

So, from this, we reckoned that translating elohim as 'Almighty' is probably a very good way.

El is a word that, in Bible, is often used with other words to give lots of different sides to God's character and being. Dad thought about a kind of football prism shape with something inside - if you look in the different 'windows' you get lots of different views of God's character.

Some examples of these different views of El were:

• The One God (El Echad)
• The Faithful God (El Hanne'eman)
• The God of Truth (El Emet)
• The Righteous God (El Tsaddik)
• The All-Sufficient God (El Shaddai)
• The Most High God (El Elyon)
• The Everlasting God (El Olam)
• The God who Sees Me (El Roi)
• The God of Jeshurun (El Yeshurun)
• The Mighty God (El Gibbor)
• The God of Knowledge (El De'ot)
• The Great God (El Haggadol)
• The God of Glory (El Hakkavod)
• The Holy God (El Hakkadosh)
• The God of the Heavens (El Hashamayim)
• The God of My Life (El Chaiyai)
• The Gracious God (El-Channun)
• The God of Israel (El Yisrael)
• The God of Patience and Consolation (El Erekh Apayim avi ha-tanchumim)
• The God of Compassion (El Rachum)
• All Merciful God (El malei Rachamim)
• The God of my Salvation (El Yeshuati)
• The God of our Salvation (El Yeshuatenu)
• The Jealous God (El-Kanno)
• God with us (Immanuel)
• The Awesome God (El Hannora)
• and apparently this isn't all - the list goes on =)

We each chose one of these to take a look at (these are from a site called 'Hebrew for Christians'), one that we wanted to find out a bit more about.

Kirsty chose the The God of Jeshurun because I don't think any of us understood it. The site tells us that Jeshurun means the 'righteous people'. The references for it were Deut 32:15 and 33:5,26. The first one we found quite understand, but its about how even the upright can be swerved by prosperance (is that a word?) - 'Jeshurun grew fat and kicked'. Being too wordly through dependence on riches can lead you to do what the righteous did then - 'he forsook God who made him, adn scornfully esteemed the Rock of his salvation.' Our lesson is never to presume that because we believe in God we're ok, and fine where we are, thankyou very much. The second reference took us to the phrase God of Jeshurun, in v26 - 'There is no one like the God of Jeshurun, who rides the heavens to help you, and in His excellency on the clouds'. That's amazing - God is both loftyand all powerful AND cares for the righteous, those who have faith, US, although He doesn't have to - he is literally way above our station! It tell us that he is helping the righteous, His arms are wrapped protectively round them -v27 'And underneath are the everlasting arms'. Look at Is44:2

Jamie wanted to look at The Everlasting God. We looked at Isa26:4, which gives us a double description of God - LORD (Yahweh) and everlasting. We can learn from our previous lessons that this telling us that God's glory is everlasting - and will always be =). Next was Ps90:1-3. v1 starts us off with our 'Elohim', once more using his 'might' to protect us. v2 has everlasting god - his protection for us is everlasting =) Our next verse was Gen 21:33 - where Abraham plants a tree and 'there called on the nme of the LORD, the Everlasting God' - again it couples Yahweh (and our picture of God being manifest in a multitude of people) with God's everlastingness - gives us a picture of the Kingdom. Ps 93:2 gives us much the same picture.

I wanted to consider The God of My Life in Ps 42:8. And again Yahweh is used with El - almost as if to classify which El they're talking about - the God of Israel, whose glory will be manifest in a multitude of people. God is of our life, and we can make it that way by using our time to singing praises to Him. In v9 we once more have the Rock idea - that God is a our solid foundation =).

We also considered The One God. This is Mal2:10. It talks about 'we all have one Father' and how 'one God created us' and goes on to rebuke Israel for 'dealing treacherously with one another by profaning the convenant of the fathers.' This emphasizes how God is single, loyal and faithful to His chosen nation, (of which we can become a part). And how ONE God created us (like El Shaddai - the mighty creator).

There's a huge amount of lessons we got from looking at El - if I have missed any please comment or if I've just got it wrong =) Please comment anyways =)

The Name of God - Yahweh

This week we looked at one of the names of God in Hebrew, which is Yahweh. It means “He Who Shall Be” (i am who i am).
In the readings, Jews read the word “Lord” as “Adonai” out of respect for the name of God and the commandment not to take the word of God in vain.
We read the word as "LORD" in all caps.

We started by looking at Exodus 3, where God has just commanded Moses to go to Egypt and to bring his people Israel out of captivity. Moses then asks God what his name is.

13. But, said Moses to God, "when I go to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' if they ask me, 'What is his name?' what am I to tell them?" 14. God replied, "I am who I am." Then he added, "This is what you shall tell the Israelites: I AM sent me to you." 15. God spoke further to Moses, "Thus shall you say to the Israelites: The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. "This is my name forever; this is my title for all generations

Here God uses the 1st person (I) form, but it gives us the basis for understanding that his character and purpose is bound up in His name. The Hebrew for ‘I am who I am’ is ‘Ehyer asher Ehyeh’ - Yahweh is the 3rd person (he) form and its use in Exodus 34 helps us understand its meaning.

We looked at Exodus 33, in which we discussed God's glory. Moses pleads for God to forgive the people, and asks to see his glory. He wanted to see who God really was, but he asks for too much.

17 And the Lord said to Moses, “This very thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name.”
18 Moses said, “Please show me your glory.”
19 And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The Lord.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.
20 But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.”
21 And the Lord said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock.
22 and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by.
23 Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”

Look at Ch 34 where God proclaims his Glory and uses the expression “the LORD, the LORD God – which in the Hebrew is “Yahweh, Yahweh Elohim”. This can be translated along the lines of ‘He will be who He will be in a multitude of mighty ones’ and gives us the understanding that God’s name, character and glory will be fully shown when there is a multitude who live by His name displaying His character in their lives.

God's glory will be seen in full when the kingdom comes.