Thursday, January 17, 2013

The Bible Challenge: Day 15

The scriptures read are Genesis 37-39, Psalm 13 and Matthew 13.

Genesis 37. Can't decide if Joseph is a brat or really unaware of the effects of what he says. Even Israel is ticked off. His half-brothers must have been brooding a long time to get to the point of wanting to kill him. Not just knock some sense into him (something all brothers contemplate) but kill him. Reuben at least wants to secretly save him. Judah actually does save him by selling him into slavery! Feel bad for Reuben.

Really feel bad for Israel! His reaction to this latest deception played on him is heartbreaking. Later in the story we see that it affects his sons profoundly, too.

Genesis 38. And now for something completely different. I never understand why people think the Bible is dull. That's because they never read it themselves, just the bits they get in Sunday school. Here's a tawdry bit about Judah. Not sure why it's in the Bible except to emphasize how very depraved everyone is. And Tamar gets twins and exposes her father-in-law's hypocrisy. Still--ew! Also prostitutes wear veils? Then veils have changed what they symbolize in the Middle East. And they never remove the veils even while, uh, earning their money?

Genesis 39. Back to Joseph. He is bought by an upper class Egyptian and he's so good, his master puts him in charge of his whole household. But then the missus wants some of this handsome Hebrew. Joseph refuses and she frames him for attempted rape. So Joseph gets thrown into prison. But he rises to head trustee. Still he's gone from slave to prisoner. Not very auspicious. To be continued...

Psalm 13. A psalm of fretting and waiting. "How long, Lord...?" The psalm is attributed to David but I could see Joseph praying something similar after a while in prison.

Matthew 13. A lot of good stories told by Jesus. The sower and the seed, which basically tells us to spread the good news and not worry about the results because they depend on the hearer. And the parable of the wheat and the weeds, which says don't be so quick to try to remove the people you think are evil or you might uproot and damage good people, too. Some stories about how valuable God's kingdom is. And then the revelation that the folks in Jesus' hometown have the same problem with him that Israel's kids have with Joseph. They can't believe he'll amount to much and resent the implication that he's someone special.

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