Today’s
Psalm starts by praising God, and calling for us to ascribe to the Lord the glory
due his name. It ends by calling for strength and peace. I see that there is an
order to this that we can use for our own prayers praise the Lord – for he has
earned it above all else, and in the end beg for mercy and strength that we may
have his peace.
Genesis
Now, wait a minute; I’m thinking back to yesterday’s
reading from Genesis and I begin to wonder why it said that Esau and his
Hittite wife made life ‘bitter’ for Isaac and Rebekah. Is it because she was a
Hittite? I had been thinking that Esau was making life bitter for Jacob, that
might make sense – but perhaps I was near the mark anyway when I said that Esau
was living through some buyer’s remorse because of his own actions with Jacob
and it was coming out with his dealings with his family, I can certainly see
that happening.
Today’s reading takes over from where we left off
yesterday and it is where I thought we were going after that interlude with Esau
and Jacob – and coming on the heels of the word that Rebekah received in a
dream from God when the two were in the womb.
But [Isaac] said, "Your brother
came deceitfully, and he has taken away your blessing." Esau said,
"Is he not rightly named Jacob? For he has cheated me these two times. He
took away my birthright, and behold, now he has taken away my blessing."
Then he said, "Have you not reserved a blessing for me?" Isaac
answered and said to Esau, "Behold, I have made him lord over you, and all
his brothers I have given to him for servants, and with grain and wine I have
sustained him. What then can I do for you, my son?" Esau said to his
father, "Have you but one blessing, my father? Bless me, even me also, O
my father." And Esau lifted up his voice and wept. (Verses 35-38)
Reading
this we can feel sorry for Esau – especially from his perspective – but I can’t
say that Jacob ‘cheated’ him the first time – Esau thought more of his hunger
and said what does the future matter if I die of hunger now...and since he didn’t
die, now he has come to that future and it does matter. I can understand where
this might be an object lesson for those of us who pay more attention to the
desires and immediacies of the present rather than the long term needs of our
lives. Today’s reading ends with Rebekah saying, yes indeed she does loath Esau’s
wife because she is a Hittite, and sends Jacob away to be far from his angry
brother, and also to be where he might find a woman of her own family, and not
from the country where they sojourn.
I
will go directly to the passage from Luke, (I read of Solomon’s building of the
temple, I just don’t have a lot to say about it today) and the reason I jump
right to it is the question of authority. That is what the Pharisees and
scribes ask Jesus; that is also what was going on in our Genesis reading – it was
all about the question of authority. Here we have the Pharisees angry and
plotting to kill Jesus (much like Esau plots his revenge against his brother
Jacob), and they try to trick Jesus with the question about paying taxes. ‘Who
owns everything, and everything, and everything,’ I asked just a few days ago.
Well, Jesus answers the Pharisees that we are to give to the authorities what
is their due, and to give to God what is his; hmmm, that seems like a
double-meaning answer if I understand him correctly.
There
are more verses today, and the questions are getting tricky or heated or both.
Partly, I would guess they are as outlined – ways in which they might catch
him out – but on the other hand, I would suspect that their spirits wanted to
know these things. The Sadducees really did want to know about the
resurrection; their question about marriage and remarriage and death was just a
way to get into a tricky question – but one they themselves wrestled with and
weren’t able to answer satisfactorily.
I
suggest that for us, we need to continue asking the questions and seeking his
word to us through these readings and then when done, to start all over again
and read, and question and ask some more.
Until
tomorrow.
Today’s
readings: Psalm 29, Genesis 27:1-40, 2 Chronicles 3, Luke 19:47-20:44
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