Genesis and Matthew XIII

But God paid mind to Noah and all living-things, all the animals that were with him in the Ark, and God brought a rushing-wind across the earth, so that the waters abated.

. . . and Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the paralytic, "Take heart, son, you are forgiven your errors."

The waters of the flood decrease, and Jesus leaves the boat that had gone through a great storm, just previously. Water had been used as an example of God's power and judgment, and of His command over the elements of Nature.

God set up Nature so that an-eye-for-en-eye is the rule. What goes around does come around. The parent that does not discipline his child is only setting up the child to do greater wrongs later, and to suffer a greater punishment. Every action leads to an equal and opposite reaction, so that the laws of physics cross over into the laws of society.

But this was done only so that we could learn how to love one another with a godly love. I do not believe that God enjoys punishing His children. He is not willing to do this! But He wants us to enjoy the blessings of holiness, and to have full communion with Him, the Author of Life, and Life is everything. It is the only thing that matters, the only thing that ever was, that really mattered.

So we see God holding back, over and over again. He reminds me of a doting parent, one that wears blinders at the errors of his children. He spoils us. He lets us get away with so much. He lets Nature run its course most of the time, for that is how we learn. And God's Nature does do its work in time.

But He paid mind to Noah and all the living things on earth. Once the destructive action of the Flood was accomplished, God returned to a loving, doting focus on His children. The rushing-wind, or Breath of God, came over the oceans again. The spirit of God restored order. All was anew.

It was an early historic act of forgiveness. God forgave humanity, through the faith of our father Noah. It was the first of many New Creations.

The paralytic in Jesus' time was also an example of God letting us start anew. Gale-force winds had engendered fear and dread in the Apostles just moments before. Never is God's judgmental fury more on display than in the middle of a severe storm on the open sea. In the peace and calm that follows a storm, Jesus walks up from the shore and tells a paralyzed man, simply, "Your errors have been forgiven."

God does not need to punish us directly. Nature does. But He loves us, and is more than ready to forgive us.

Genesis and Matthew XII

 . . . the waters swelled and increased exceedingly upon the earth, so that the Ark floated upon the face of the waters.

Then he got up and yelled at the winds and the sea, and there was great calm.

Water. We are both fascinated by it, and terrified by it, at the same time. We are mostly made up of water. It is second only to oxygen, as the most critical thing we need to survive. Without oxygen, we die an almost immediate death. Without water, we die a slow and miserable death. Water is made up partly of oxygen.

But too much water kills us. It is perhaps the most destructive force in nature, able to wreak havoc and devastation instantaneously. The winds of a hurricane are accompanied by water. Indeed, they are caused by water - the ocean fuels typhoons as gasoline does an automobile. Fires advance slowly, compared to the sudden action of a water disaster. Even the rise of flood waters, once the flood line is topped, expand in an instant. You cannot outrun it.

Prior to God's creative activity in our universe, the earth is portrayed as mostly chaotic. It is mostly ocean. Imagine ocean being all there is on the face of the earth. We would have, in one place, a critically life-giving substance in extreme volume. But there is no dry ground, no plants, no land-dwelling animals. It is total, utter chaos, and humanity cannot survive in those conditions.

With the Deluge of Noah's time, God re-creates the conditions of the earth prior to the creation of humanity. It is a true starting-over point in history. But we have a sense of God's protection, as the Ark is peacefully lifted above the terror on the earth's surface.

Then, for thousands of years, God demonstrates again and again, His protection of His people.

Finally, His son appears, and walks among men. Christ's followers are learning of his greatness. They are on a boat out on the sea, when a great storm comes and tosses their boat about. With even the Son of God present, they are terrified. This is quite different than the scene in Noah's Ark!

There is no greater demonstration of God's power, than that He command even the atmosphere, and it obeys!

Man had departed far from God's will in the time of Noah. By moving away, they re-established chaos on earth. The return of the flood waters, of the global ocean, was a natural outcome. In the time of Christ, humanity had drifted far from God, once again. Christ's friends saw first-hand the chaos of a sea-storm, and how it represents humanity without God. In their presence, the Son of God commands the winds, and order is restored.

Genesis and Matthew XI

Now the earth had gone to ruin before God, the earth was filled with wrongdoing.

Go in the narrow door; because the door is wide and the road is broad leading off to destruction, and many people are going that way.

The idea, that humanity tends to create disorder out of God's ordered universe, goes back to the very beginning of Scipture, and reappears again and again. It is, perhaps, one of the key themes of the Bible.

Do the people that are wrecking the earth, or "ruining" it, realize how wrong they are? Of course not! Nobody goes about to do wrong. We do not deliberately concoct "evil schemes" and visit them upon innocent victims! This only happens in comic books, where the evil people come out and say "I'm an evil scientist," or an "evil villain."

Hitler himself believed in the rightness of his cause. Yes, crazy as it seems, he saw himself as a savior of the earth. Even the wickedness that he did was viewed as right, fair, and just, in his own eyes. And this is perhaps the most unsettling concept of all: that evildoers never intend to do evil! They have redefined "good" and "evil" so that they are on the side of "good." And we do the same, although perhaps at a much more benign level.

It is only when we begin to realize our own sinfulness, and can re-examine ourselves according to God's standards, that we can move towards righteousness. Only by seeing that we need to change, can we begin to change. Our tendency is toward chaos. But God calls us toward Him. When we are moving in His direction, we suddenly become righteous. It's like, the process itself is as important as the destination.

So if something feels good, we consider it "good." If we can make some good happen, through foul means (like ruthless tycoons that hurt people on their way up, but become lavish benefactors after they have become wealthy) we convince ourselves that we are "good." If we can invent some religious ritual that we may follow, we deem ourselves "good."

And if the vast majority is doing something, it must be good and right - for it's majority rule, and the majority must always be right!

But this does not move us in the direction of God.

Even though generations come and go, and humanity keeps moving creation further away from God and more into chaos (are all of the choices available to people today, in terms of lifestyle, careers, hobbies, mates, residences, etc., really improving things?), still God finds one person that got it right.

Enter Noah.

Genesis and Matthew X

Now Hanokh (Enoch) walked in accord with God, . . . 


Ask first for the kingdom of God and His justice, and these other things will be delivered to you.

We wonder about Enoch, this man who was several generations from Adam (about mid-way through Adam and Noah), and how it is that he, of all those that had lived, merited special mention and was one who walked "in accord with God." Apparently, he had a special bond, and fellowship, with the Lord. Was their walk together similar to that of Adam and God, before the fall?

First let's consider the total population. Enoch was 7 generations from Adam. Let's assume that each generation had ten children. By the time of Enoch the earth's population could have reached up to ten million people! Assuming they all lived many hundreds of years, let's take away an estimated half that had died, so that the world in the days of Enoch had five million people. By then there were cities and some well-developed economies.

But of all those millions, only Enoch "walked with God."

When you walk with God, you are one in a million, at least!

Enoch was a kingdom builder. As we go through Scripture, and see the patterns developing, we learn that it is all about building a kingdom. This kingdom will be not of this world. It is one where peace and love reign. There is no illness. If we ascribe the values Jesus spoke about, to Enoch, we find him to be a man that did right, did not sin, prayed, sought closeness to the Lord, loved others, and sought justice on earth. He was pleasant to be around. He defended the weak, and was loyal to his friends.

It only takes one in a million, to receive God's approval and advance His kingdom.

Genesis and Matthew IX

Is it not thus: If you intend good, bear-it-aloft, but if you do not intend good, at the entrance is sin, a crouching-demon, toward you his lust - but you can rule over him.


Let your way of talking be "yes" and "no"; anything more than that comes from the Evil One.

The path to God is the simple one. Yes, I know all about the narrow way, easier for a camel to get through the eye of a needle, etc. The difference between "simple" and "easy" could not be more distinct than in this case!

Look at what God says to Cain, ages before Moses, and the Law, and the Ten Commandments: it is, pretty much, the Gospel message of Jesus Christ! "If you do not intend good . . . "

Jesus' Sermon on the Mount was all about intentions! It's not so much the act, as what we're thinking. For, our thoughts lead to actions, if we are not careful to bring them under our control. God's first lesson in morality, (since the Garden of Eden incident), is to the sinful, prideful son of Adam and Eve. Cain is the prototype of all the great opponents of God that will follow him. But it is early in human history, and God provides some one-on-one to Cain.

Consider, Cain was jealous of Abel's offering to God, the first-born and choicest meats from his flock. God preferred Abel's offering (which required a sacrifice, i.e. the death of a living thing, thus more precious), to Cain's, which were some amazing fruit from among his garden. Where Abel had to sacrifice a lamb, Cain brought forth from his produce, and this is important. Cain's garden would continue to yield good fruit. But Abel's lamb was gone forever.

But imagine the hard work that went into producing such fine fruits and vegetables. Compare that to Abel's task, which was to watch a herd of sheep. One worked and sweated (the works paradigm), while the other waited and watched, reflected and pondered (the grace paradigm). Maybe Abel even wrote music and poetry, while tending his sheep.

The story goes on to talk about the great cities built by Cain, and his descendants, that invented many fine forms of craftsmanship. There is no question that the Western culture today would consider Cain the more valuable of the two brothers! So it is with people that put work over relationships!

I can also find it easy to imagine God being present while Cain worked. Did they engage in conversation? Was their relationship friendly? Cain's offering may not have been accepted - but at least God cared enough to talk to him about it! We do not see this type of relationship between Abel and God!

Adam and Eve were cast out. And now Cain is cast out. Is this the same as the casting down of Lucifer? Are the events one and the same?

Cain's lifestyle was one of work and sweat. He had the chance to commune with God. God offered friendship to him. But once his intentions got darkened, sin moved toward him. Sin is treated like an actual person here. And the word "toward" denotes a physical, almost sexual attraction. The person moving away from God becomes an easy target for sin. Our dark intentions create a magnetic attraction to sin.

Christ shows us the simple way. "Yes" and "no." Train our thoughts, and our words, not to be so analytical. Too many words can confuse things. Those that talk too much, or think too much, are just providing a welcome to sin, or the "Evil One."

Genesis and Matthew VIII

Here, the human has become like one of us, in knowing good and evil.


Seeing the crowds, he went up the mountain, and as he sat there his students came to him, and he opened his mouth and taught them, saying . . .

The God of the early Old Testament is in many ways different than the God of the early New Testament. He is still the same God, still consistent in every way. But as a parent changes his approach as the child grows and matures, so does God change his towards us.

The great crisis of the Garden of Eden story is that humanity went against God's will. We insisted upon our independence. We were created to be be curious, and to want to grow. We want answers, and we want to investigate. So it is that the serpent used reason to get our first parents to disobey God.

Adam and Eve ate from the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. Their eyes were opened. This is equivalent to so many things that we still do today, in every phase of our lives. A new idea, or book, opens our eyes. We can have our eyes opened by some new form of music. Charismatic leaders can open our eyes to injustices, as Martin Luther King, Jr., did.

The big gateway to eye opening experiences is the same as ever: sexuality. You can almost tell when a child has crossed that bridge (if done before marriage). Often, a break is formed between child and parent. A mystery once only known by adults, by our parents, is now known by us. We know it all, now, we think. A sense of equality or even superiority over our parents emerges. We have done the one thing they told us not to do, and not only did nothing bad happen to us, it was actually a great experience!

It is only later that we understand why it is better to wait. We would not listen to our parents, and we do not listen to God!

So harsh penalties were required. A noble race does not go off and disobey God! So death entered in. Death (not sin) became the thing from which we needed to be saved!

The approach changes now, in the New Testament. Humanity has been battered around for eons, with the consequences of sin. Death reined since the dawn of time, but not just Death: violence and cruelty became Death's chief attendant! Along comes Christ.

We have a scene more like a college professor teaching a group of young adults. This was God's relationship to us at the time of Christ. The world was ready now, to listen to God. And the time had come for God to teach us, mentor and coach us.

Genesis and Matthew VII

 . . . but from the Tree of the Knowing of Good and Evil - you are not to eat of it, for on the day that you eat from it, you must die, yes, die.


  . . . It is written, "Humanity shall not just live on bread, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God."

The opening chapters of the Old and New Testaments parallel one another. In the Old, the order is established. God is in charge, but God's enemy, called "the serpent", challenges Him. In the New, God's enemy, called "the examiner" seems to have wrested control of the earth from God. He challenges the Son of God, so as to complete his dominance. But the Son of God resists. God is challenging the satanic order. The New Testament is God's counter-punch.

Nourishment, the eating of food, plays an extensive role. We need food to eat. When it is time to eat, we hunger, we crave it. If it looks good, we try it. God gave us all that we need to survive (he still does, if people would pay attention). But in the Old Testament, humanity corrupted the concept of eating for survival, to eating for pleasure. We began to see our need, or drive, for pleasure, as being equal to our need to survive. We began to put ourselves first. Rejection of God and acceptance of ourselves as the ones in charge, became the paradigm. This rejection of God and pleasure-first lifestyle is manifest in sexual immorality.

God's supremacy is encapsulated in the command, "You are not to eat of it". This the line in the sand. Everything that we needed, he provided. But this one thing, this alluring thing that looks good, was prohibited from us, at least for the time being.

Millennia later, the Son of God further defines it. God feeds us, yes. But that is not all He does. His word itself keeps us alive. But the word of God was from the very beginning. The command "You are not to eat of it" is God's Word! When we rejected God by eating the forbidden fruit, we were rejecting His life-giving word itself, that which is more than food; that which later became flesh in the form of the Son of God!

The Tree of the Knowing of Good and Evil was food that killed. It represented that which is good for us, but not yet. We need food to live. This food made us mortal. But it wasn't the food itself that killed us. It was the rejection of God's word.

The hunger problem of the earth is easily solved. Feed on the word of God.

Genesis and Matthew VI

 . . . and YHWH, God, formed the human, of dust from the soil, he blew into his nostrils the breath of life and the human became a living being.

After being bathed, Jesus came straight out of the water. And all of a sudden the skies opened and he (John) saw the breath of God descending like a dove and coming toward him.

We do a great injustice in our most popular Bible translations, in going for "modern relevancy" or adhering to historical or orthdox "correctness."

Take the word normally translated "spirit." In the Hebrew, the word was ruach, in Greek, pneuma. In both cases, the literal translation should be breath.

Spirit brings to mind ghosts, misty-like humanoids floating around . . . quite frightening, really.

But the word breath has a more instant quality. It is immediate. Our breath comes in and permeates our souls; it leaves us and joins the air in our immediate surroundings. Breath is here and now, within, without. Isn't this what we want in our connection to God?

In God's two primal acts of human creation, breath is involved. First he forms a man from the dust of the earth ("Adam" meaning "man of the earth"; "adama" meaning earth or ground, itself.). Then the breath of God comes down and around Adam. It goes into Man's nostrils, and he becomes a living being.

In the second primal act of creation, the continuous development of Jesus Christ from Second Adam into Redeemer of the Race, God's breath is equally present and active. Christ's obedience to the Father, his modeling humility in being baptized by John the Baptist, the washing away of sin by bathing earthly dust and grit from off his body, was highly valued by God. (Water has similar qualities as breath. You go into the water and are completely surrounded by it. This is how we want to be held by God our Father!)

God's breath comes down and fills the place. The surrounding crowd sees the breath of God, His presence, come down gently and peacefully, lovingly (as it did to Adam originally). The visible breath of God is the Father's expression of pleasure in what had transpired.

Everything Christ did, His obedience to God, invited breath of God into his ministry. The breath of God creates, enlivens, animates, blesses, heals, and comforts.

Genesis and Matthew V

 . . . all green plants for eating, it was so.

. . . and his food (John the Baptist's) was locusts and wild honey.

John the Baptizer was a true natural man. He was like an original person created by God, someone within a generation of Adam and Eve. He lived off the land, God truly provided for him and he lacked for nothing. His DNA was very close to that of Adam and Eve's, for he was Jesus' second cousin, and Jesus had (I believe) an identical DNA match to Adam.

John ate food from the land. He did not require offerings. He slept in whatever bed he could find in the field. He wore clothing that came from the hide of wild animals. He killed only to survive, and did not kill warm-blooded animals for food. He had no income, but was rich. He had no job, but was fully occupied. He had no health care plan, for God took care of him.

According to Genesis, we were not originally intended to be omnivores. The early humans were vegetarians. God commands us to eat green plants, but nothing is said about eating meat until later.

John had a great life. He lived as God intended all of us to live. He had no cares, no worries (of himself!). He just followed God and lived well.

Genesis and Matthew IV

God blessed them . . .

"Get up, take the child and his mother and flee to Egypt . . . "

In Genesis, God creates humankind, and blesses them. From the moment that God blessed Adam and Eve, it meant something unique and permanent for the human race. He had created them in His own image. They were made to dominate the earth. With good follow-through, it was an excellent arrangement.

How does God go about blessing people? That is, what does this mean, to be "blessed" by God? It means something like receiving His favor. It means we need not worry. If God has blessed us, all is, (or will be) well.

God blessed our original ancestral parents.

God gave them dominion over all the earth, including all living things (except other humans, and this is an important point!)

So, what happens when these people, whom God has blessed, conduct their rulership over the earth in selfish, ungodly, or even wicked ways? What happens when we interpret it to mean we can rule over other humans? (If we rule over someone else, it means that the other person does not have full dominion over earth - someone else is prohibiting their duty to be a steward over earth).

Well, to follow-through on His blessing of us, God needs to teach us, to train us, and like any good educator, to let the learning roll out as we are ready for new lessons. And this is what God's plan, its sequence and timing, is all about! He is not slow - we are!

He also must be active and involved in human history - just enough to keep us alive, and just enough to keep us moving forward, as a people. So - He does little things like protecting the baby Jesus from King Herod.

It is always just enough. He has not withheld His command to us, to have dominion over the earth. He is just keeping us from destroying ourselves! To make it all work - He has to get involved every now and then!

Genesis and Matthew III

God said . . . it was so . . . God saw that it was good.

. . . and they shall call his name Emmanuel (which is translated "God-with-us").

Imagine all the time it took for God to create everything. Yes, we say six days, but how long were the days, before the sun and moon were created (the fourth day)? By the way, on the third day of creation, plant life was created. Plants are life that comes up from out of the ground. They are living things that come out of seeds, which are as good as dead unless activated by outside forces. Christ rose from the dead on the third day.

Was there "time" before God began to create our universe? If there were other beings, angels perhaps, did they fellowship, did they while away the hours, if there were such a thing as "hours"? Did the waiting seem interminable? Did they have to wait, at all?

Once He began creation, it meant He had finally taken a step of completion of the next phase of His Greater Plan. For whatever reason, He wanted creatures not unlike Himself, with intelligence, character, and integrity, with whom to share the Universe. But He began to create. It was the beginning of "God-with-us". (From this point, I will use the actual translation, and not "Emmanuel").

For ages upon ages He created the Universe. Our geologists believe it took millions and millions of years. Maybe it did. Yet it was God-with-us, doing the creating. There had to be an end-game to what He started. God-with-us was here from that beginning, yet God-with-us, the man, did not appear for ages yet to come.

Did some in God's eternal realm grow impatient with His plan? Did they get tired of the waiting? Was impatience the beginning of sin, which some believe first manifested itself in rebellious angels?

Did they say, "You said you would be "God-with-us" but all it turned out to be is eons of creation. The only living things here are these plants. We cannot fellowship with them!

God-with-us began at the moment God created the Heavens and the Earth. When he formed organization and order, out of chaos - before there was even light, before planets, before plants, before animals, before humans, God-with-us was already here. Only much later did God-with-us appear as a man.

We show great arrogance in growing impatient, by suggesting that God got something wrong. His plan is proceeding, whether we understand, or like it, or not.

Genesis and Matthew II

God said:  Let there be light! And there was light.

So the generations from Abraham to David made fourteen generations, and from David to the Babylonian migration fourteen generations, and from the Babylonian migration to Christ fourteen generations.

We see juxtaposed, two descriptions of God at work. He can both speak a thing, and it's done. Even light itself is created, simply because He states it into being.

But the promise made to Abraham, of His seed inheriting the land, took fourteen generations times three. His plan of salvation is as good as done, but it was at least 840 years in the making!

When we get impatient for God to work something out, or to fulfill on His promise, we are missing a very elemental aspect of how God works. You see right there on the page, and can read in under one minute, how God brought light into the world, but it took almost one thousand years from the time of Abraham, before it reached anything close to fulfillment. We then make the assumption that the creation of light, eons before the time of Abraham, happened instantly. Maybe it did. But what if it didn't? What if the creation of light took thousands of years?

I have a friend who has concluded that Jesus Christ is not coming back. He has based it on some book he read, that makes the case that Christ should have returned during the first century, C.E. The fact that he did not, indicates a fundamental inconsistency in Scripture. Jesus, or the writers of the New Testament, lied! The whole biblical case is now to be held in great suspicion. He has lost the light.

It took thousands of years to even get to the birth of Christ! His return is right on time!

Genesis and Matthew

At the beginning of God's creating of the Heavens and the earth, when the earth was wild and waste, darkness over the face of the Ocean, rushing-spirit of God hovering over the face of the waters - 


The book of the birth of Jesus the Anointed, son of David, son of Abraham: Abraham had Isaac, Isaac had Jacob, Jacob had Juda and his brothers, Juda had Phares and Sara by Thamar, Phares had Esram, Esram had Aram, Aram had Aminadab, Aminadab had Naason, Naason had Salmon, Salmon had Boaz by Rachab, Boaz had Jobed by Ruth, Jobed had Jesse, and Jesse had David the king.

It is commonly believed that God formed everything, from nothing. But in fact the original Hebrew talks about God creating order out of chaos. Note the phrase "when the earth was wild and waste." There was darkness and emptiness, but there wasn't nothing. Also, our translations usually say "In the Beginning . . . " which sticks us with our chronological trap - as though there ever was a "beginning," which carries the possibility that there was a time when there was no God.

But here, we know that the book of Genesis is about God moving about, hovering over the face of the waters, His spirit (ruach) moving about, active at least as a passive observer. But then, God decides to act. He begins to bring order out of chaos.

Likewise, the world at the birth of Christ, was in chaos. Yes, Rome had enforced order on most of its domain. God's people were little better than slaves to the Romans. But spiritually speaking, all was on the verge of collapse. Imagine a Roman Empire without the saving grace of the newly-formed Christian Church!

The genealogy of Christ, from Abraham to King David, conveys quite poetically, the "rushing-spirit" of God at work in the world. Doing a little here, a little there - ensuring that His plan moves forward, without forcing it too much.

God creates, by making order. He acts. He moves about. He is always there. He is always loving, always moving. And this is needed - for we, as creatures of this same universe, always tend toward the chaotic.