The ten commandments are framed as negative statements. Does that mean that they are negative in purpose, and restrictive of freedom? Not at all:
“A negative command is far more liberating than a positive one, for a positive command restricts life to that one course of action, whereas a negative command leaves life open to every course of action except one.” (Motyer, page 215)
Looking at Exodus 19-24 for Sunday morning, I'm struck by the structure of the law there. It is anchored with back-references to the deliverance from Egypt in chapter 19 and 20:1-2, and the climax is a meal shared by 74 of the Israelites in the presence of God in chapter 24. They enter heaven, and they eat and drink without dying.
Church Society have just launched a new series of publications entitled The Reformed Evangelical Anglican Library. Lee Gatiss, the editor of the volumes in the series, recently dropped me an e-mail to point them out, and they look promising. In particular, I often feel that the wisdom we most often seek out is that from our own generation, but those of former years and centuries so often have much to teach us.
See Exodus 18.
I've long puzzled over Jethro's role in Exodus, and I think I'm making some progress at last.
Jethro features in Exodus 2 (as Reuel, where he welcomes Moses the refugee), in Exodus 4 (where he sends Moses back to Pharaoh in peace, although Moses hasn't been strictly honest about the nature of his mission), and in most detail in Exodus 18.
Finally, we have an announcement. It was announced this morning that the new Bishop of Rochester is to be Rt Revd James Langstaff, currently Bishop of Lynn in the Diocese of Norwich.
In the next week or two, The Well, the magazine that the church produces and distributes free of charge to all 5000 residents of our two parishes, will land on people's doormats.
As usual, page 4 has a letter from me:
Dear friends,
We’ve just come through the most unpredictable General Election for many years; people are talking not only of there being a new government but of a whole new way of doing politics. Time will tell what difference these changes will make, and whether they are great or small.
People sometimes worry that the 4 Gospels don't tell the resurrection story in exactly the same way. This is to worry needlessly. If the 4 Gospels told the resurrection story in contradictory ways, that would be a different matter. As it is, we simply have a difference in perspective. Look at the story from different angles, you include different details and stress different things. It couldn't be otherwise. The four Gospels are not an assortment of favourite deeds of Jesus, thrown together haphazardly.
Then enjoy the wisdom of William Cowper, as found in two verses of his hymn What various hinderances we meet:
Have we no words? But think again;
words flow apace when we complain
and fill our fellow-creature’s ear
with the sad tale of all our care.Were half the breath thus vainly spent
to heaven in supplication sent,
our cheerful song would oftener be,
‘Hear what the Lord has done for me!’
There is a danger in any area of Christian thought that we talk past one another, objecting to caricatures of what another Christian thinks, rather than to what they actually think. It is a tragedy whenever it happens, because it means that careful understanding (which is the grounds for charity) is replaced with a climate of suspicion. So we need to express what we think with great care, and that is as much about affirming what we do believe to be true as it is about denying what is not true.
A very striking observation from Alec Motyer on James 3:13-14:
