Then Araunah said to David, “Let my lord the king take and offer up what seems good to him. Here are the oxen for the burnt offering and the threshing sledges and the yokes of the oxen for the wood. All this, O king, Araunah gives to the king.” And Araunah said to the king, “May the Lord your God accept you.” But the king said to Araunah, “No, but I will buy it from you for a price. I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God that cost me nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver. And David built there an altar to the Lord and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. (2 Samuel 24.22-25)

The background of this little episode has to do with an unauthorized census and a plague sent by God as punishment for David’s lack of faith.  The idea was that, whether the census was for taxes, military conscription, or both, David’s help came from God, so why was he now assessing his own strength for the first time?  But the particular sin isn’t really what’s important right now.  Consider David’s response to judgment.  God had told him the pestilence would last three days (v13), but his sorrow led him to to the point of offering up a sacrifice anyway.  The owner of the land didn’t feel right profiting from David’s problem, and offered his own property as a gift, both to David and to God.  David’s response, “I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God that cost me nothing,” is a lesson lost on far too many people today.

Consider an illustration from current events: Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, after years of moving in this direction, finally unleashed an invasion of Ukraine, under the dubious justification of having been asked for help by the totally-legitimate and totally-not-funded-by-Russia-in-the-first-place separatist forces in the eastern corner of the country, and never mind that the invasion extended over pretty much all of Ukraine from the very first day.  He also said his invasion represented the “de-Nazification of Ukraine,” which was morbidly amusing, considering that Ukraine’s current president is Jewish, but let’s move on.  There has been discussion among political leaders around the world, as well as the usual risk-less opinion spouting by pundits across the spectrum, but at least as of this writing, no one outside Ukraine has actually seen fit to lift a finger in its defense. 

It’s not the goal here to answer the question, whether anyone should step in to help.  But it’s revealing how relatively united the western world has been in condemning Putin and shouting that something must be done—and yet what measures are actually under consideration?  No one wants to send soldiers to die on the other side of the globe, but everyone wants to spout off about how evil Putin is.  Everyone wants to threaten economic sanctions on Russia, but there’s less support for actually imposing them.  When there are finally sanctions, there are massive exceptions—rather than a complete embargo, Europe is happy to keep selling high-value goods to Russia, as well as buying gas and oil from them, which is the industry that keeps Russia’s economy afloat almost on its own.  Why?  Well, we wouldn’t want to hurt our own industries, would we?  Nor would we want the cost of energy to increase.  So the consensus seems to be that Putin is a very bad man doing very evil things, and someone should put a stop to it; but not me!  Perhaps you can see how Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, and others in the 20^th century graduated to greater and greater depths of evil, while the world looked on and shrugged.

It’s so easy to profess righteousness, then refuse to act in keeping with the profession.  But in the end, if we’re not willing to take a hit in the name of righteousness, it’s just a hollow shell.  Satan doesn’t mind us saying godly things, so long as, when the chips are down, we do his will, instead.  The invasion of Ukraine is in sharp focus right now for 40 million Ukrainians, but for the average person on the other side of the world, it’s just a lucid illustration of the struggle we face every day, which was with us long before the invasion started and will remain long after it's over.  We all face the temptation to say one thing, but do another.  Jesus took the Pharisees to task for this very thing, saying that

“they preach, but do not practice. They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people's shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger. They do all their deeds to be seen by others.” (Matthew 23.3-5)

They didn’t really care about pleasing God.  When they thought no one was looking, they made no effort.  But it wasn’t just a problem among those who rejected Jesus—Christians in the early church faced the same struggle!

If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? (James 2.15-16)

We justify inaction by saying we don't have time, can’t afford it, or have other duties to fulfill.  These are common excuses precisely because they may be legitimate!  Whether we’re sincere in any one case is a judgment call, and we dare each other to make that judgment.  Look from the other side—rather than judgment, who receives praise?  When Christians in Judea suffered financial need, Paul says of the churches in Macedonia,

their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part. For they gave according to their means, as I can testify, and beyond their means, of their own accord, begging us earnestly for the favor of taking part in the relief of the saints…” (2 Corinthians 8.2-4)

It’s supposed to hurt.  It has to hurt.  When they knew it was going to hurt, these Christians gave anyway.  Go, and do likewise.

Jeremy Nettles

“Jerusalem shall be inhabited as villages without walls, because of the multitude of people and livestock in it. And I will be to her a wall of fire all around, declares the Lord, and I will be the glory in her midst.” (Zechariah 2.4-5)

When Zechariah prophesied, the people of Judah had already endured a 70-year period of enforced exile from their homeland, due to the Babylonian conquest beginning in the late 7^th century BC.  Those exiled due to the Assyrian conquest of Israel, nearly a century and a half before, had been away far longer.  When Cyrus conquered the empire in 539 BC, he allowed them all to return home, but this promise came more than 20 years later, in “the second year of Darius” (Zec 1.1), 520 BC.  It was a risky and expensive trip, and it meant leaving behind homes, businesses, friends and family, and the relatively comfortable and stable lives they’d built for themselves over time.  Most of them didn’t go back to take up the task of rebuilding a nation from scratch, including Jerusalem and the Temple.  The Babylonians had destroyed the city’s walls, and it would be the greater part of another century before Nehemiah would come along and speed up the process of rebuilding them. This large city clearly needed to be fortified against raiding and plundering, and yet for that work to be done, people would have to move there and build.  But they didn’t want to move to Jerusalem, because it had no walls!  This Catch-22 scenario meant that the work on both the walls and the Temple dragged to a halt, and the great City of David remained a depressing collection of mostly empty ruins.

When God gave them this promise, he was deliberately invoking well-known events from Israel’s history.  God appeared in a “pillar of fire and of cloud” (Ex 14.24) that stood “between the host of Egypt and the host of Israel” (v20) while the waters of the Red Sea parted before them to provide their escape.  Later, the psalmist described God’s relationship with this city:

As the mountains surround Jerusalem,

        so the Lord surrounds his people,

        from this time forth and forevermore. (Psalm 125.2)

What about God’s glory in Israel’s midst?  There are several options for this one, but the most appropriate comparison would be the dedication of Solomon’s Temple, when

a cloud filled the house of the Lord, so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord. (1 Kings 8.10-11)

But this last one introduces a bit of a problem to our interpretation.  It’s not that we’ve been reading it wrong; God did, in fact, bless and protect the Jews and Jerusalem.  He thus enabled them to build a majestic Temple complete with implements of immense value in gold—in a city with no wall to protect its inhabitants!  Even after the walls were rebuilt by Nehemiah much later, the city continued to expand in size, just as God said it would do, to the point that it overflowed its walls repeatedly.  At various times over the next few centuries, most of its inhabitants were outside of them, and might as well have been living in “villages without walls” until another wall could eventually be built to protect a larger and larger area.  The nation did indeed re-establish itself and regain some degree of respect from its neighbors. 

But it was never like the good old days, when David was king and no other power could challenge his might.  But the greatest discrepancy comes when we consider the last in this string of promises—that God’s glory would again be seen in Jerusalem.  In the metaphorical sense, perhaps we could say that Jerusalem recaptured its former glory, but that’s really not what God promised.  The primary audience for Zechariah’s prophecy expected the cloud of the Presence to reside in the Temple again.  And that never happened.

Did God fail to keep his promise, then?  No.  It’s not that we’ve been reading it wrong, but the fulfillment, at least in Jerusalem’s growth and renewed prosperity, was a bit underwhelming, considering the way God presented it.  That’s because what God really meant was bigger and better than they could have imagined.  This promise involves us.  A few verses later, we find this:

And many nations shall join themselves to the Lord in that day, and shall be my people. And I will dwell in your midst, and you shall know that the Lord of hosts has sent me to you. (Zechariah 2.11)

Who’s the “me” of this verse?  The prophet Zechariah?  Zechariah will dwell in their midst?  Whoop-tee-doo.  Is it, instead, the angel who was introduced earlier in the chapter?  We’re closer here, and can understand why the Jews of the late 6th century BC might interpreting it this way, but one would hope they at least furrowed their brow when they said it.  In fact, it’s ultimately about Christ.  The whole thing was about Christ.  His kingdom grows constantly, starting at Jerusalem.  It has no borders to confine it.  He is himself her protector, and an ever-expanding wall about her, guarding her against predators with a fiery fury.  And not only did he walk the streets of Jerusalem and in that city die and rise again, but now, in the New Jerusalem—the church—he dwells in our midst. 

The promises meant something to the returned exiles and their near future, but in the greatest sense it was always about Christ.  The exile is the world; Jerusalem is his kingdom, tasked with building his house and glorifying him.  What are we to do about all of this?  Zechariah tells us: “Up! Escape to Zion, you who dwell with the daughter of Babylon” (Zec 2.7).

Jeremy Nettles

One of the most surprising turns in the story of the kings of Judah involves the king often considered to be the worse of the bunch: Manasseh.

And he did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, according to the despicable practices of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel. For he rebuilt the high places that Hezekiah his father had destroyed, and he erected altars for Baal and made an Asherah… And he built altars in the house of the Lord, of which the Lord had said, “In Jerusalem will I put my name.” And he built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the Lord. And he burned his son as an offering and used fortune-telling and omens and dealt with mediums and with necromancers. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger. (2 Kings 21.2-6)

This guy is just the worst.  Yet his father, Hezekiah, was among the rather few kings in Judah’s history to be considered righteous, comparing favorably to the beloved King David—“And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done” (2Ki 18.3).  Of course, since Hezekiah’s life gets a fair amount of text, we learn about his mistakes, too.  For example, he displayed his immense wealth to visiting diplomats from Babylon.  Babylon wasn’t the sort of nation that inspired fear, at the time, but God told him what would be the consequence of his pride: “all that is in your house…shall be carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left, says the Lord” (2Ki 20.17).

That’s a major consequence, and we clearly see the mistake that caused it.  But we’re left to speculate about what caused another consequence—why did this righteous king’s son stray so far from the pattern his father established?  We have all sorts of expressions, like “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” which we put to use when someone does something reminiscent of his father’s behavior; but they don’t seem to get as much use in regard to scenarios like Manasseh’s.  As his father, Hezekiah had some kind of influence on his son, but we can’t say whether Manasseh’s list of sins reflects a mistake in Hezekiah’s parenting technique or a stubborn rebellion on the part of the son (or, more likely, some combination of the two).

We’re ready to trot out the phrase, “chip off the old block,” when it comes to Manasseh’s son, though!

[Amon] did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, as Manasseh his father had done. He walked in all the way in which his father walked and served the idols that his father served and worshiped them. He abandoned the Lord, the God of his fathers, and did not walk in the way of the Lord. (2 Kings 21.20-22)

When we read that Amon’s own servants got together and killed him, we’re almost ready to cheer them on—almost disappointed that “the people of the land struck down all those who had conspired against King Amon” (2Ki 21.24), as if the bad guys won.  He was a jerk, and we’re glad that he only reigned two years before being assassinated, meaning he didn’t have very much time to wreak havoc.  But what kind of king will replace him?  Well, Amon’s son, Josiah,

did what was right in the eyes of the Lord and walked in all the way of David his father, and he did not turn aside to the right or to the left. (2Kings 22.2)

How did this happen?  When we consider that Josiah was only eight years old at the start of his reign, we can surmise that he got a lot of help from advisors, and this explains a lot.  But there’s more to it.  Manasseh, after reaping some of the consequences of his sins, “humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers” and repented of his evil deeds (2Ch 33.12).  He did his best to clean up the messes he’d made in his younger days.  While his son and heir, Amon, was a real piece of work as we saw, it’s worth noting that Josiah was six years old when Manasseh died—Amon having become his father at age 16.  It’s clear that Amon wasn't a godly man, repeating his father’s many sins.  But as Manasseh drew near his death, he had the opportunity to be a better influence on his young grandson, who was in line for the throne, than he had been on his own son. 

As with Manasseh himself, we can’t credit all, or even most of Josiah’s righteousness to this hypothetical godly influence from the family patriarch.  The four generations between Hezekiah and Josiah demonstrate that sons do not always turn out like their fathers—they make their own choices whether to submit to God’s will, or exalt their own.  But we also see that influence—good or bad—can make a difference, and echo through the generations.  Is that any less true today?  Your relationship with God comes down to an intensely individual responsibility, regardless of external circumstances or influence, to live out an obedient faith in Jesus.  At the same time, Jesus tells us that “whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea” (Mt 18.6).  Paul tells us to bring up our children “in the discipline and instruction of the Lord” (Ep 6.4).  The present generation will have a substantial effect on whether the next generations love the Lord and walk in his ways, or rebel and follow the road that leads to hell.  Use your influence wisely.  Start by seeking adoption into God’s household, through the intercession of his only true Son.  Then, imitate the Son and be conformed to his image, living as he lived, righteous and selfless.  Finally, work to bring others into God’s house—family, friends, and the little children, before the door is shut.

Jeremy Nettles

So Peter opened his mouth and said: “Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.” (Acts 10.34-35)

With these words, Peter began the first gospel sermon delivered to an audience of Gentiles.  His choice of words shows that this isn’t a popular opinion or an accepted fact.  Rather, he voices it as a concession—as a surprising conclusion he can no longer avoid.  That’s hard for us to grasp, because we take it for granted;  we would be disturbed by the suggestion that God acts prejudicially on the basis of race.  But Peter is surprised to have arrived at this conviction.  Why?  Because, to paraphrase Paul in Romans 2.17-20, he called himself a Jew, relied on the law and knew God’s will; he could consider himself a guide to the blind and an instructor of the foolish, because of his heritage as a Jew, and therefore his important place in God’s plans. And he wasn’t far off.  In contrast to the Jews, the Gentiles were formerly

separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. (Ephesians 2.12)

Later in the same letter, Paul calls God’s plan from the start a “mystery,” now revealed: “that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel” (Ep 3.6).  The Jews didn’t expect this, despite hints in the Old Testament, such as this one:

In that day the root of Jesse, who shall stand as a signal for the peoples—of him shall the nations inquire, and his resting place shall be glorious. (Isaiah 11.10)

The Messiah would not only be the chosen one for the Jews, but for the nations—the Gentiles!  Yet the Jewish audience, happy to agree the Messiah would rule over the Gentiles, didn’t realize that he would rule over the Jews themselves in the very same way!  They imagined he would give them glory and put them above the nations—they were, after all, God’s chosen people.

Jesus himself gave plenty of hints about this mystery, for example saying in John 10.16,

“And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.”

There’s plenty more where that came from, but although the apostles heard him speak these words, they still didn’t get it.  Jesus told them to be his “witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth” (Ac 1.8).  In fairness to the apostles, the Jewish diaspora included much of Europe, North Africa, Babylon, and farther east, as well.  It’s understandable that they would have assumed he meant the gospel was to spread to those Israelites who had been scattered to the four winds.  But “to the end of the earth?”  There were not at that time a whole lot of Jews in Britain, nor in Japan, nor in North America.  “To the end of the earth” is what Jesus said, though. 

Even the message the apostles preached implied that God was opening the door to the Gentiles.  Peter reminded the crowds at the temple of the promise God gave to Abraham:

“‘in your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed.’ God, having raised up his servant, sent him to you first, to bless you by turning every one of you from your wickedness.” (Acts 3.25-26)

It seems impossible to miss, and yet a lot of time passed between this proclamation and Peter’s somewhat begrudging admission before Cornelius, “Truly I understand that God shows no partiality.”  How could it be that the very men tasked with making “disciples of all nations” (Mt 28.19) had to be prodded forward into sharing the gospel with the first Gentiles?  Why was Peter criticized by Christians immediately upon returning to Jerusalem?  “You went to uncircumcised men and ate with them,” they said (Ac 11.3), and it wasn’t a statement of fact, but an accusation!  Despite the clear and mounting evidence to be found in God’s hints and eventually direct statements throughout the ages, they continued to see what they wanted to see.

God is patient, and led them along at his own pace, until they finally realized the obvious: that “God shows no partiality.”  It’s not the only time God has put up with man’s failures on a fairly basic issue, and gently coaxed him in the right direction over a period of time spanning generations.  There was polygamy, divorce, slavery, and more.  We tend to accept what society tells us is right and wrong, never mind that the standards are different now from those of ten years ago—or perhaps even ten minutes ago!  Anyone who’s not up on the current orthodoxy (subject to change without notice) is a prime target for shame and ostracizing.  When the overwhelming majority around you say this is right and that is wrong, will you go along with them, or sincerely seek God’s word on the matter?  When you examine his word, will you see what you want to see, or what he actually said?  Would his patience have endured, if Peter had still refused to go and preach the gospel to Cornelius’ household after Jesus told him the distinction between Jews and Gentiles was passing away, just like the Jews’ dietary code with its distinction between clean and unclean foods, saying, “What God has made clean, do not call common” (Ac 10.15)?  Best not to find out!  Instead, follow Peter’s example and adhere to God’s word not only when your enemies disagree, but when your friends disagree, too.  Society’s orthodoxy means nothing in the long run.  Conforming to society makes your life a little easier, but you have to give up your soul in exchange.  Worry instead about conforming to the image of God’s Son.

Jeremy Nettles

Praise the Lord!

                                      Praise the Lord, O my soul!

I will praise the Lord as long as I live;

                                      I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.

Put not your trust in princes,

                                      in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation.

When his breath departs, he returns to the earth;

                                      on that very day his plans perish.

Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob,

                                      whose hope is in the Lord his God,

who made heaven and earth,

                                      the sea, and all that is in them,

                       who keeps faith forever;

                                      who executes justice for the oppressed,

                                      who gives food to the hungry. (Psalm 146.1-7a)

While David is the listed author of most of the Psalms, others are attributed to Asaph, or a handful of other individuals, or to no one at all, as in the case of Psalm 146 above.  The convention is to refer to the author of a given psalm as the psalmist.  You may have heard this botched by the current president of the United States back in 2020.  The day before Thanksgiving he gave a speech in which he quoted from Psalm 28.7:

The Lord is my strength and my shield;

                                      in him my heart trusts, and I am helped;

        my heart exults,

                                      and with my song I give thanks to him.

The text is appropriate to the occasion; but then he misread the teleprompter, and since he hadn’t the faintest idea what he was reading in the first place, he was ill-equipped to correct himself when he attributed these words to “the palmist,” rather than the psalmist, as his speechwriter had intended.

This echoed the time when his predecessor spoke at a Christian university during the 2016 campaign, and in his remarks quoted a verse from 2 Corinthians.  But he called the letter, “Two Corinthians” instead of “Second Corinthians.”  A few people tried to defend him on the grounds that Two Corinthians is an accepted way to say the name of the letter in the British dialect; but everyone else rolled their eyes at this fawning attempt to make excuses for a man who’s utterly unfamiliar with the letter, if not the Bible as a whole.  And yet there he was, pandering to the audience, while his own choice of words showed he didn’t even speak their language.

In both of these cases, these politicians wanted to give the impression that they were deeply invested in the word of God, in order to encourage support from the religious crowd out of a feeling of solidarity.  But this sort of thing turns to comedy when the speechwriters try to throw in some chum in the form of a Scripture quotation without considering for a moment that it might as well be written in Klingon, for all that it means to the person tasked with actually delivering the speech!  Some wonderful gaffes are bound to occur as a result, and it ends up undermining what they were hoping to accomplish in the first place.  The outer façade of a spiritual mindset is stripped away, and the incident is instead used to spread bitterness and further polarization.

Most of us understand the timeless message from Psalm 146—there is no salvation in men, so quit putting your deepest hopes in them!  “Put not your trust in princes,” it told us.  Instead, look to the God who made heaven and earth.  Powerful men say they care about the oppressed and hungry; and perhaps they do.  But can they do anything about the problem?  God certainly cares, and has the strength to fix it!  The Psalm continues:

        The Lord sets the prisoners free;

                                      the Lord opens the eyes of the blind.

                       The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down;

                                      the Lord loves the righteous.

The Lord watches over the sojourners;

                                      he upholds the widow and the       fatherless,

                                      but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin.

The Lord will reign forever,

                                      your God, O Zion, to all generations.

                       Praise the Lord! (Psalm 146.7b-10)

When you put your trust in mere men to care for all of these, you set yourself up to be disappointed.  Rulers are appointed by God—Jesus told Pilate in John 19.11 that God had given him the authority to kill or free Jesus.  That doesn’t mean he signs off on all rulers’ actions, but it does mean that God has appointed structures of authority to govern us.  Paul tells us the same in Romans 13, and calls retributive justice service to God.  But there is a vicious tendency in every civilization to deify its rulers.  This happened among the Egyptians 5,000 years ago, among the Romans 2,000 years ago, among the Japanese 100 years ago, and in some ways we’re on that path in the west today, again.  Every ruler and every candidate trying to win your vote—no matter how much you agree with them and no matter how much they promise—will die.  Their plans will come to very little or nothing, in the long term. 

Most of us understand that message, “put not your trust in princes.”  Why is it so hard to implement?  Partly, we just disobey, but it’s also our nature—we trust our eyes to guide us around the world without falling off a cliff or being caught unawares and eaten by a bear.  We can’t see God, but we can see other men, and so it’s easier for us to trust them, even when we suspect they might not have our best interests at heart, and know they don’t have the power to do much about it in the long run, anyway.  Our designer and creator knows that.  That’s why he gave us a man—his son Jesus—to be the trustworthy prince we can’t be.  Give him your allegiance.

Jeremy Nettles