Category Archives: Christianity

Can a Person Actually Melt?

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What You’ve Missed…
* Lots of psalms praising God.
* Lots of psalms asking God for help.
* Lots of psalms thanking God.
* In short. Lots of psalms.

Day 139
Daily Reading: More Psalms

As I’ve continued to read through the psalms of King David it seems each one falls into at least one of three categories. There are psalms of praise and thanksgiving. Psalms of David asking for help. And lastly, there are psalms of…what I’ll call…crazy bloodlust.

Turns out our friend King David is a serious Guns N’ Roses fan because the dude has a major appetite for destruction. (I really, really wish our Internet technology allowed me to insert some sweet 80’s guitar riffs right here. I mean, TED, Skype and icanhascheezburger.com are amazingly fantastic uses of technology and everything…I just wish it included more 80’s electric guitar is all.) Not only does David often ask God to help him, to rescue him from his enemies, but he usually takes it one step further. David often asks God to pretty much obliterate his enemies in the process. Exhibits A through D:

“Let their eyes go blind so they cannot see, and make their bodies shake continuously. Pour out your fury on them; consume them with your burning anger.” (Psalm 69:23-24)

“Let burning coals fall down on their heads. Let them be thrown into the fire or into watery pits from which they can’t escape. Don’t let liars prosper here in our land. Cause great disasters to fall on the violent.” (Psalm 140:9-11)

“Rise up, O God and scatter your enemies. Let those who hate God run for their lives. Blow them away like smoke. Melt them like wax in a fire. Let the wicked perish in the presence of God.” (Psalm 68:1-2)

“May they be like snails that dissolve into slime, like a stillborn child who will never see the sun. God will sweep them away, both young and old, faster than a pot heats on burning thorns.” (Psalm 58:8-9)

Melt them like wax in a fire? David, I thought you were a man of compassion. Let burning coals fall down on their heads? David, that sounds like medieval torture bro. Let them be thrown into the fire? David, ease up with all the fire and burning people alive talk buddy. Make their bodies shake continuously? Seriously David? You’re asking that they have a constant barrage of seizures? May they be like a stillborn child? Geez man! I’m not even fully sure what that means, but it’s repulsive.

What is the deal with this guy? To quote one of the great philosophers of our time, a brilliant and insightful woman known as Fergie, “Where is the love?” Seriously David…where is it? You seem to want God to shower you with love, yet shower others with…well with torture, pain and death.

Those were my first thoughts. But as I continued to read, I discovered more and more of this man’s humanity. He’s just a guy. A regular, imperfect guy. (Why is it that Christians tend to think of people in the Bible as “characters” who are one-dimensional, and only capable of displaying a single emotion or character trait? Aren’t they just as wildly dynamic as we are?)

And a regular, imperfect guy can be a little emotional at times, a little over-zealous. Even a little outrageous. (Me trying to live life in my 20’s is a solid example. I was Steve Martin in The Jerk, just less charming, way, way more jerkish and equally as aloof.) I think that’s what’s going on here. Regular guy David has been harassed, attacked and hunted by his enemies and he’s had enough. He’s ready for it to end.  And…he gets a little extreme in the process.

I’m not trying to give the guy an out to be a crazy pyscho or anything. I mean, I think we can all agree that the movie Seven does a great job of showing that weirdo torturers don’t mingle too well with the rest of society. But I am trying to see David as a regular dude, struggling through his emotions and thoughts like I do

So what am I saying?  I’m saying David’s desire to see his enemies suffer and die caught me a little off guard. Really off guard actually. Especially because I was beginning to think of him as a weak and humble man. But that’s the point! He’s not JUST that. He’s also a ferocious warrior who has real enemies and knows they are a serious threat to his kingdom and who need to be removed from the equation. He’s a multifaceted man, capable of grace and love, who’s also capable of seriously laying the smack down.

He’s like Andre the Giant. In the ring the dude would mess you up. In The Princess Bride he warmed your heart with charming peanut comments. In real life, he was just a man.

Real Life > Cartoons

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What You’ve Missed…
* King Saul dies.  So do his kids.
* David becomes the king of Israel.
* David goes from good-hearted underdog to wild man on campus when he becomes a total hornball, gathering together a solid concubine, then sleeps with a married woman, and then later has her husband killed.  Geez David…lay off the Red Bull man.
* David’s son Absalom starts a rebellion, chases his dad out of the city and takes over the throne.

Day 119
Daily Reading: 2 Samuel 17-19, Psalms 3 & 63

Today is going to be short and sweet.  Partly because what I want to write about is incredibly simple (ridiculous, but simple) and partly because I’m currently in Honduras with limited time and internet access.  (What am I doing in Honduras?  Two things really.  One, co-leading a missions group serving here for a month.  Two, enjoying local energy drinks I believe the FDA has banned from The States.)

So, back to David.  He’s run away from the capital with his supporters, armed guard, and of course his concubine, wondering how to recover the throne which has been stolen from him by his son.  The only problem is he doesn’t want his son to die…which makes it hard to lead an attack against the guy with the sole purpose of killing him.

So he sends out his personal army with the specific order not to harm Absalom.  They go out, start fighting up a storm and…

“During the battle, Absalom happened to come upon some of David’s men.  He tried to escape on his mule, but as he rode beneath the thick branches of a great tree, his hair got caught in the tree.  His mule kept going and left him dangling in the air.”  (2 Samuel 18:9)

“Then Joab took three daggers and plunged them into Absalom’s heart as he dangled, still alive, in the great tree.  Ten of Joab’s young armor bearers then surrounded Absalom and killed him.”  (2 Samuel 18:14-15)

What?  The dude was dangling from a tree by his hair?  This sounds a lot more like a really jacked up and violent Bugs Bunny cartoon than real life.  For starters, whose hair is long enough for this to even happen?  And if your hair is that long, wouldn’t it be tied up when you’re going into battle?
And while a horse could offer up some serious speed, is there a mule on the planet who could run fast enough to cause a man’s hair to become untied?  I mean…we’re talking about a donkey here.  Not Seabiscuit.  (Note: I have no idea if Seabiscuti was considered fast or not…I never saw the movie, but feel pretty safe in making the assumption he was fast enough to have a movie made about him.)

Seriously though, this really happened.  And while the Disney version may have the tree dangler charmingly talk his way out of the situation, later to become the dashing hero who has won our hearts through song and dance, The Bible delivers death by human pinata.

Way to come through Bible.  You never disappoint.

Ghost, Ghosts, and Ghostbusters

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What You’ve Missed…
* The story of Samson, a man who was more bad ass than Rambo, more follicly gifted than Fabio and exactly as (un)intelligent as you might imagine both of those men to be.
* The people of Israel don’t have nap time, so they’re all whiny, begging the prophet/judge Samuel for a king. When he tries to dissuade them, they just whine louder. This proves naps are integral for a healthy adult life. (It’s science.)
* So God gives them what they want and grants them a king named Saul who turns into a paranoid nutcase. Saul then spends years hunting down a kid named David who God has said will be the next king of Israel.
* David is pretty much an Old Testament Bear Grylls who spends his time surviving just fine in the wilderness. Not only does he survive, the dude ends up leading a rag-tag army of over 600 men in the process, eventually becoming the king of the tribe of Judah. Oh yeah, this was all by the age of 23. (I wonder if this was what my dad always meant when he told me to “take some initiative”…)

Day 108
Daily Reading: 1 Samuel 28-29

So at this point in the story Saul’s enemies are coming to attack Israel and he’s pretty much a crazy old coot who has worried himself into oblivion by now. He seeks God for advice, but God remains silent, so he looks for a medium who’s able to talk to the spirits’ of the dead. And he finds one. And then, thousands of years later, someone reads about it and writes a movie called Ghost. And then, thousands of people discover pottery wheel sex is way sexier in movies than in real life.

Alright, so Saul’s at this medium’s house and they haven’t gathered for a quick round of Ouija board, asking if anyone in his class has a crush on him. He’s here to get his Sixth Sense on and talk to dead people. He asks the medium to bring back the spirit of the prophet Samuel (who died somewhere during the recap) and, she does.

Now, we’re not talking about someone who sees some mystical smoke in a mystical crystal ball. Nor are we talking about a gust of wind that comes through, blowing out all the candles in the room to indicate the “spirits are with them”. The woman brings back Samuel from the dead. Straight up. (No pun intended.)

“I see a god coming up out of the earth” she said. “What does he look like?” Saul asked. “He is an old man wrapped in a robe,” she replied. Saul realized it was Samuel… “Why have you disturbed me by calling me back?” Samuel asked Saul?  (1 Samuel 28:13-5)

Saul goes on to say he needs help figuring out what to do about his enemies, and Samuel throws out a solid speech, which I bet was made way more dramatic because he’s probably floating in the air or something, and Saul can probably see through him and well, he’s a dead guy who’s a little annoyed that they’ve brought him back from whatever it was dead prophets do, which is probably better than hanging out with some paranoid, weirdo, old dude in the back of a psychic’s hut.

Anyway, long story short, Samuel tells Saul he’s going to lose the battle, and Saul starts moping around.  And that’s it. That’s the whole story.

But can we just stop for a minute to talk about the fact that even The Bible admits that communing with the dead is very real, and that people possess the ability to call forth specific spirits of people who died? This isn’t Ghost Hunters here, or even Ghostbusters, which is a little sad because you can never have enough Bill Murray. This isn’t Madame Sage in her suburban psychic shack who reads tarot cards and talks about the planets being in alignment with Jupiter rising in the house of Saturn and cows jumping over the moon or whatever.

This is the real deal here. A real psychic medium, bringing back a real person, who really died. And the spirit doesn’t just hover there looking all dead and mopey and maybe sliding a book across the table or something, but he speaks up and shoots straight. So, if you’re a Christian, and you think all that spiritual mumbo-jumbo is a bunch of hogwash (does anyone actually use that word in real life?) then I’d encourage you to think again. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying the jokers who run psychic hotlines know anything about anything, other than how to snag $9.95 in thirty minutes from you (and $2.95 for each additional minute) but according to The Bible, bridging the gap between the spiritual and physical worlds is very real.

Though I do have to say, while the Ghostbusters version may not be as serious, it does have a way better theme song. I mean, who doesn’t know who they’re gonna call at this point?