2Sam. 6: 1 - 5, 12b - 19

[1 - 5, 12b - 15, 17 - 19, suggested]

The inclusion of the problem in verse 16 is indeed a poor choice. Either tell the whole of Michal's story, or omit it altogether.

Then David and all the troops that were with him set out from Baalim of Judah.... (2) The Tanakh footnotes that Baalim is another name for Kiriath-jearim(1). But I think we should read this metaphorically. Baalim is the Hebrew plural of Baal, which means 'lord', 'master'. It is also the name of a prominent Canaanite god. David, in setting out to retrieve the Ark of God for Israel, is symbolically leading them out of, away from the idolatrous worship of the Canaanite deities.

At least, he tried; David's heart was in the right place. The problem is that not all of Israel chose go with him.

David and all the House of Israel danced before the LORD (5). Thus David and all the Hou of Israel brought up the Ark of the LORD with shouts and with blasts of the horn. (15) The church looks askance (I am being nice) at the Israelites and their cult of sacrificial worship. But perhaps those ancients would look askance (I am still being nice) at the dour, staid and lifeless "worship" of many Christian churches. Are we still enslaved to sin? Have we no reason to shout and dance before God?

Psalm 24
If we take this literally, we have a conundrum, another apparent contradiction within Scripture. First we read: "But for your own life-blood I will require a reckoning: I will require it of every beast; of man, too, will I require a reckoning for human life, of every man for that of his fellow man!" (Gen. 9: 5) The proscription of manslaughter, You shall not murder (Exo. 20: 13) goes back further than Noah; see YHWH's words to Cain. (Gen. 4: 9-11) And it echoes on throughout Scripture:

It would seem quite clear, from what we know of David's career (beyond today's reading), that this bloody-handed creator of injustice (2Sam. 11: 15, e.g.) was an abomination to [God]. Indeed, we hear it from David's own mouth: "But the word of the LORD came to me, saying, 'You have shed much blood and fought great battles; you shall not build a House for My name for you have shed much blood on the earth in My sight.'" (1Chr. 22: 8) David must have been very high up on God's "black list".

The conundrum, the apparent contradiction, is that this same Scripture lauds David, holds him up as a paragon of virtue. "As for you, if you walk before Me as your father David walked before Me, wholeheartedly and with uprightness, doing all that I have commanded...." (1Ki. 9: 4) "But you have not been like My servant David, who kept My commandments and followed Me with all his heart, doing only what was right in My sight." (1Ki. 14: 8) David, the murderer and master of intrigue, kept [God's] commandments and [did] only what was right in [God's] sight.

Eph. 1: 3 - 14
[1 (2)- 14, suggested]

I would include v.1 for three reasons. First, because it defines the Apostle's audience. He is addressing a particular people, not the world at large, and he defines them with two phrases: the faithful, incorporate in Christ Jesus. Second, because the first definition contains a clue to Paul's argument concerning "chosen" and "predestined". And third, because the second definition explains the results of the prior argument.

Before the foundation of the world [God] chose us in Christ to be [God's] people, ...and [God] predestined us to be adopted as [God's] children through Jesus Christ. (4..5) If we think that God goes finger-walking through the white pages, picking out this lucky one and bypassing that unfortunate one, then we arrive at a concept of God as irrational, capricious and arbitrary. And we are badly mistaken.

[God] has made known to us [God's] secret purpose, ...that the universe, ...might be brought into a unity in Christ. (9..10) The key word here is "might". Read the statement again, substituting the verb "shall", and you will perceive the effect. Unity in Christ is the hope, the desire, the aim of God, but not the mandate. Rather, unity in Christ is a potential, an offer that God holds out to humankind in Christ Jesus; a free gift which the Church, to date, has rejected.

But since humanity has eaten of the fruit of the tree and thus has the knowledge of good and evil, God honors that capability and leaves the choice to us. When Paul writes: once you had heard the message of the truth, the good news of your salvation, and had believed it-- (13) he repeats the clue. It is the faithful, who of their own free will choose to believe the good news of [their] salvation, who by that choice become "chosen". In other words, God's love is for all people, and predestines salvation to anyone and everyone who responds willingly to the good news. God chooses everyone; not everyone chooses God.

Now read v.13 again. If there is to be a message of the truth to you, if there is to be any good news for you, then your salvation must first be an established state, not just a future possibility. In Christ our release is secured and our sins forgiven through the shedding of [Jesus'] blood. (7) Predestination denotes prior preparation; our salvation is a room in the mansion that Christ has prepared for us. All we need to do is to open the door and walk in. No ticket price, no admission fee. For the doorway is within each of us; it is the door to our hearts.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has conferred on us in Christ every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms. (3) Review verses 1 - 14, and discover what phrase is the most common, repeated seven times. For that is the message of the truth, the good news of your salvation: once you have decided to join the faithful, you are incorporate in Christ Jesus.

Finally, read the whole passage again. Note that all the "work"-- mental, physical and spiritual-- of Christ and God are stated in the past tense. It is already done, all accomplished fact. There is nothing for anyone to do but to open the door and walk in: believe and accept God's Word as the message of the truth, the good news of your salvation.

Mark 6: 14 - 29
As [Jesus] went round the villages teaching, he summoned the Twelve and sent them out two by two with authority over unclean spirits. (6-7) The apostles rejoined Jesus and reported to him all that they had done and taught. (30) The story of John's death, told as a flashback, is an entr'acte-- an intrusion, seemingly-- in the story of the Apostles' mission. Some commentators speculate that Mark has inserted it for the literary purpose of delay, to insinuate the passage of time between verses 13 and 30. Not being a student of ancient literatures, I cannot protest. But I do wonder if other examples exist-- that Mark would have known-- to support their claim. For I think Mark may have had another purpose in mind, and that, not a literary, but a didactic or hortative one.

Mark's story of John's death tells us nothing about John, but about Herod, Herodias and her (not his) daughter. This girl is obviously young; perhaps just pubescent enough to be "interesting" to the men, but not yet capable of thinking for herself of a suitable gift to ask from the king. Herodias, Mark tells us, "had it in" for John, to a violent degree. If her resentment derives solely from his chiding of Herod for their marriage, then there must have been other psycho- emotional issues at work within her, to drive her to such a state.

Herod, as Mark depicts him here, is an odd character. Hliked to listen to [John], although what he heard left him greatly disturbed. (20) It is doubtful that the king journeyed to the Jordan and mingled with the ungainly crowds, so he must have brought John up from his cell to speak. John, already a prisoner for having spoken out against Herod's adultery, had no reason to repeat that message, for the effects were evident. So John's preaching was probably similar to that at the Jordan. And from what little we have read of that, we can see how the king might well have been troubled by it. That being so, then why would he summon John more than once, as Mark's text implies?

Perhaps king Herod is not so odd after all, but a person honestly seeking. Mark begins his description with Herod's reaction to Jesus. Having considered various options, the king concluded that Jesus was the beheaded John come back to life, resurrected from the dead. And this, I think, is Mark's purpose: to get his audience, in this interim, to consider the concept of resurrection.

Herod's understanding was, to Mark, wrong; that is, not the concept of resurrection that he wants his readers to have concerning Jesus. Therefore Mark positions Herod's version-- which represents a common one-- inside the story of Jesus giving the Apostles authority over unclean spirits and their report of all that they had done and taught. Mark is saying that Herod, those he represents, and his readers, need to seek Jesus in another way; not within the traditions, myths and fables of long-established and revered religions and cultures, but within the authority-- and its exercise by common human beings-- over unclean spirits: vain imaginings and traditional folk-lore.

"Stop thinking like people think," Mark is urging. "Get your minds off all those traditional, cultural, religious, hum€an things. For this story is not like that at all! This is a spiritual story, and in order to understand it, you have to think not in physical, worldly or cosmic terms, but in spiritualnes."

Then David and all the troops that were with him set out from Baalim of Judah.... Mark is following in the footsteps of David. Are you marching with them?

1. 1 See 1Sam. 6: 21; 1Chr. 13: 6; Josh. 15: 9.

2. 2 Haiku poem by Phil Gilman. Please feel free to utilize anything from these pages; just give God the Glory, Praise and Thanks and me whatever credit may be due.

(comments to Phil at ENAPXH@aol.com )