Thoughts from our trip to Israel #2: Size is relative

Masada: Looking across to the Dead Sea to the mountains of Moab

The Jordan River, we've got two bigger river flowing through Franklin

Looking across the Sea of Galilee, we'd call it a lake here.

Size is relative, that's a phrase you'd heard before, and one that hits home when you see with your own eyes the Sea of Galilee and the Jordan River.  In many parts of the world, especially places with much higher yearly precipitation totals, neither of these bodies of water would be all that remarkable.  A decent sized lake, albeit a deep one, and a narrow river, wouldn't feature prominently into the narrative of very many historical moments if they weren't located in a place as significant as this one.

Because important things in the Bible, and especially in the life of Jesus, took place around (as well as upon and in) these bodies of water, they have an outsized place in our collective imaginations that looms larger than what familiarity with them would have otherwise given.

Another way to look at it, however, is to wrap your mind around how important these two bodies are water are in this land precisely because freshwater is scarce.  The Sea of Galilee and the Jordan River have been vital to life in the Holy Land for thousands of years, and remain so today, even if they look unremarkable to those who, like me, grew up on a peninsula surrounded by the Great Lakes.  

The picture from the top of Masada emphasizes that the Jordan River Valley, like its namesake river, isn't all that wide (further upstream it is narrower even than this).  As we journeyed south from the Sea of Galilee toward Jericho, it was easy enough to see both side of the river valley from our bus windows.  At times the two hilly/mountainous regions that the river runs between were no more than a couple miles apart, the fertile valley (thanks to the river) between them only a farm or two wide.

For Americans, in particular, used to the vast Great Plains, the Mighty Mississippi, and trips in the car where you can drive for hour after hour without seeing much change in the landscape, this truncated scale takes getting used to.

Lastly, while it is indeed a small land when compared to other places on the planet, the events described in the Bible were taking place at a walking pace, we might be able to drive from Galilee to Jerusalem in considerably less time than it takes to cross Ohio on I80 (mores the pity: it is obligatory to make as many Ohio jokes as possible when you grew up in the Mitten), but it still took a goodly number of days to make that journey on foot.

Thor: Love and Thunder - A scathing and accurate dismissal of Paganism's anthropomorphic gods

 

* This is a spoiler free commentary *

The villain of the newest Marvel movie, Thor: Love and Thunder is Gorr the God Butcher, a mortal played by Christian Bale.  Through events that the movie makes crystal clear, Gorr has grievances with one particular god that he then is intent upon generalizing as he begins the process that earns him his nickname.

The indictment of Gorr against his particular god, and then all such similar gods, is thoroughly believable and just.  It is, in fact, the exact complaint that could have been levied in the Ancient World against any of the gods of Paganism whether they be Greek, Egyptian, Babylonian, or any other besides that of the Jews.  Why?  For a very simple and very powerful reason: All such gods with the exception of Yahweh who revealed himself to Abraham, were anthropomorphic.

An anthropomorphic god is made in the image of humanity, that's a problem.

The gods of Ancient Paganism were immortal and powerful, but beyond these qualities they were just like you and me.  They experienced greed, lust, rage, petty jealousy, pride, and a the whole range of human sinfulness.  They were just like us, but bigger (often with bigger, more spectacular, sins too).  They could be grossly evil when it suited them.

Which leads to a problem we can see from a mile away: Immortal powerful beings like us are NOT worthy of worship or devotion.  In fact, such a being would be a menace to be feared, not a Father to be loved.  Imagine the harm that any human being would do with immortality and god-like power.

The actions taken by Gorr in response are their own moral question, but his anger and disappointment are not only justified, but inevitable because his god is just like he is.

The God of Abraham made us in his image, not the other way around

In contrast, the God that you meet when reading the Bible deviates significantly and consistently from human nature.  We change, he does not.  We are tempted toward selfishness, he is not.  We would make use of evil if we thought it would benefit us (or our causes), he would not.  As the Scriptures unfold, the God who will reveal himself as Father and eventually send his Son to save the world and his Spirit to guide his people, persists in love, compassion, mercy, and justice.

God calls us to be like him, to discard our fallen human nature with its vices, and by faith embrace his nature and actually be transformed to be more like him (aiming at ultimate full Christ-likeness).

Does God answer every prayer, are his people always happy with him and his decisions?  No, and the Bible doesn't shy away from these hard truths, offering us the book of Job to contemplate and Ecclesiastes to ponder, but the nature of God: pure and holy, right and just, loving and merciful is what endures through the ages.  

The Jews had a God unlike any of their neighbors.  When the Apostle Paul and his generation of Jesus' disciples brought that God to peoples who had only known petty and cruel gods, their enthusiastic willingness to abandon their gods made in their image, and embrace the God who made us in his, makes a whole lot of sense.