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For I know the plans I have for you,declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jer 29:11 |
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| Archived Manna: | |
Dear
Friend,
If you do not already have a habit of gathering daily manna the first thing in the morning (we can look at the example given to us in Exodus 16 and find the pattern for make it a habit. Establish your life and your schedule to allow you the necessary time to do your daily collection first thing every morning to give you the strength to make it through the day. And remember that today’s manna will not be sufficient for tomorrow; tomorrow’s manna must be collected tomorrow morning. Tuesday, July 4, 2023
Today's Passage : Today's Passage :The Philistines Return the Ark Bible Verse: 1 Samuel 6 (ESV) "When the ark of the Lord had been in Philistine territory seven months, the Philistines called for the priests and the diviners and said, “What shall we do with the ark of the Lord? Tell us how we should send it back to its place.” They answered, “If you return the ark of the god of Israel, do not send it away empty, but by all means send a guilt offering to him. Then you will be healed, and you will know why his hand has not been lifted from you.” The Philistines asked, “What guilt offering should we send to him?” They replied, “Five gold tumors and five gold rats, according to the number of the Philistine rulers, because the same plague has struck both you and your rulers. Make models of the tumors and of the rats that are destroying the country, and pay honor to Israel’s god. Perhaps he will lift his hand from you and your gods and your land. Why do you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh did? When he treated them harshly, did they not send the Israelites out so they could go on their way?” five gold rats Five gold rats! ”Get a new cart ready, with two cows that have calved and have never been yoked. Hitch the cows to the cart, but take their calves away and pen them up.Take the ark of the Lord and put it on the cart, and in a chest beside it put the gold objects you are sending back to him as a guilt offering. Send it on its way, but keep watching it. If it goes up to its own territory, toward Beth Shemesh, then the Lord has brought this great disaster on us. But if it does not, then we will know that it was not his hand that struck us and that it happened to us by chance.” So they did this. They placed the ark of the Lord on the cart with a chest containing the gold items and hitched it to two cows. The cows went straight up toward Beth Shemesh, keeping on the road and lowing all the way; they did not turn to the right or to the left. The rulers of the Philistines followed them as far as the border of Beth Shemesh. The people of Beth Shemesh were harvesting their wheat in the valley, and when they looked up and saw the ark, they rejoiced at the sight. The cart came to the field of Joshua of Beth Shemesh and stopped, beside a large rock. The people chopped up the wood of the cart and sacrificed the cows as a burnt offering to the Lord. The Levites took down the ark of the Lord, together with the chest containing the gold objects, and placed them on the large rock, and the people of Beth Shemesh made offerings and sacrifices to the Lord. The five rulers of the Philistines saw all this and then returned that same day to Ekron. These are the gold tumors the Philistines sent as a guilt offering to the Lord—one each for Ashdod, Gaza, Ashkelon, Gath and Ekron. And the number of the gold rats was according to the number of Philistine towns belonging to the five rulers of the fortified towns with their country villages. The large rock, on which they set the ark of the Lord, is a witness to this day in the field of Joshua of Beth Shemesh. But God struck down some of the men of Beth Shemesh, putting seventy of them to death because they had looked into the ark of the Lord. The people mourned because of the heavy blow the Lord had dealt them, and the men of Beth Shemesh asked, “Who can stand in the presence of the Lord, this holy God? To whom will the ark go up from here?” Then they sent messengers to the people of Kiriath Jearim, saying, ”The Philistines have returned the ark of the Lord. Come down and take it up to your place.”" Message:
The Philistines, being suitably chastised (and aware of how much suffering the Hebrew God caused in Egypt), cannot simply tell the Hebrews “come get your Ark.” That would be much too simple. Instead, they invent a bit of absurd theater.
Picture a rural road in ancient Palestine. On it, two milk cows, their udders no doubt full and them mooing loudly, pull a common cart containing 1) the most holy and fearsome item in Israel, the ark of the Covenant; 2) five lumps of gold shaped, rather grossly, like tumors, and 3) five golden mice. There is no driver for this precious cargo. At some distance, high Philistine officials watch it avidly, some of them no doubt hoping it will turn around and bring their gold back to them.
But it crosses the border into Hebrew-occupied lands; then it stops by a large rock next to a wheat field, whereupon the Israelites kill the cows and burn them as part of a religious celebration. Except, of course, for 70 bumpkins who just have to look inside the Ark and are consequently struck dead — and now, the local Hebrews are stuck with the Ark (and seventy bodies), and have no idea what to do with it. So before it can cause any more trouble, they send a message to Kiriath Jearim (a holy town that had once been a center of Ba’al worship) to come and take it to their town.
This is, all in all, a great bit of melodrama, but very little known except among Biblical scholars.
Meditation : Prayer : Oh Lord as I face creation Let me see with eyes made clear By Your promise of salvation, Never to return to fear.Amen |
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