A Reminder of ‘Rightly Dividing’
During my study recently, I got stuck on a particular passage, had to really dig and pray to settle it.
The passage begins in Judges 19:1 and goes through the end of the book. Briefly, a Levite's concubine is unfaithful to him. He goes to her father's house to get her and bring her back. He and the father spend several late nights partying and finally late one evening he and his concubine leave. They travel to a town but have no place to stay. A man invites them in, but the men of the town want to 'know' the visitor. The man offers his daughter & the Levite's concubine but they are declined. The Levite grabs his concubine and throws her outside. She is abused all night and dies on the doorstep the next morning. The Levite is displeased, hauls her home, cuts her into pieces and sends the pieces throughout Israel. This angers Israel, and a war between Israel and the tribe of Benjamin start. Many on both sides are killed.
The troubling part for me was that I was trying to find a 'deeper' meaning or application for this passage. As is my habit, when something troubles me, I read and prayed over the passage for several days. I felt led to continue to investigate, so I began consulting commentaries. NONE of them had the 'ring of truth' to them. Most suggested that the woman was being punished for her sin, and that it was divine judgement. Some suggested that she probably 'volunteered' for this to protect her husband. Others didn't claim to understand, but chalked it up to a difference in customs.
The TRUTH is actually much plainer than that. As always, we must interpret scripture with scripture, and take passages literally. This story is a literal truth. Not an example for us to follow or a passage for us to glean pearls of wisdom from, but an accurate description of an actual incident. The greater lesson is that Israel (at least the tribe of Benjamin) had degraded to the same level that caused God to destroy Sodom & Gomorrah. Levites were specifically instructed as to the women they were to marry, and this Levite didn't follow it. Man's counsel is taken (Judges 20:7) when God's counsel should have been sought. When God's counsel is sought, it is not 'What is your will?' but which one of us gets to go first. God uses this civil war to severely punish Israel for their corruption, and (in my opinion) teaches them to have compassion later.
I'll post more on how to study later.
Diet Sodas in Schools
ABC News reports that non-diet sodas will not be sold in any public schools by 2010.
Combine this with other research that shows that people that drink diet sodas tend to gain MORE weight than people that drink non-diet sodas. As reported by WebMD:
For regular soft-drink drinkers, the risk of becoming overweight or obese was:
- 26% for up to 1/2 can each day
- 30.4% for 1/2 to one can each day
- 32.8% for 1 to 2 cans each day
- 47.2% for more than 2 cans each day.
For diet soft-drink drinkers, the risk of becoming overweight or obese was:
- 36.5% for up to 1/2 can each day
- 37.5% for 1/2 to one can each day
- 54.5% for 1 to 2 cans each day
- 57.1% for more than 2 cans each day.
A possible reason for this has been proposed, but not investigated yet. Basically, the brain receives the 'sweet' signal from the taste buds, and prepares the body to process carbs (sugar). When the carbs don't arrive, the body starts craving them, leading to a higher than normal intake of carbs. At this point, it is a lose-lose situation, because if you give in to the craving, you've negated any benefit from drinking the diet soda. If you don't give in to the craving, your body puts itself into 'famine' mode, setting itself up to store any excess calories that it has to get you through the lean times. Your body has a similar mechanism for water. If you don't drink enough water, your body will conserve as much as it can, and store it for later. It can take a month of adequate water intake to convince your body that the 'drought' is over, at which point it will go back to normal. During this time, it is possible to gain 8-10 pounds of water weight, which are quickly dropped when your body switches the 'drought' mode off.
I realize that this goes against the standard chant of the health establishment that says that the only way you gain weight is if your caloric intake exceeds your output through exercise. In my opinion, this is overly simplistic. We all have known people that didn't exercise, ate whatever they wanted, and never gained weight. We call this metabolism. Some people just naturally burn more calories at rest (or don't store them) than others. We've all also known people who diet constantly, eat healthy and exercise, but can never manage to lose weight. Such is life.
In addition, there are many adverse side effects to the artificial sweeteners. In my opinion, if you MUST use a low-calorie sweetener, your first choice should be stevia, followed by saccharine.
Here are some links to sites discussing the side effects of various artificial sweeteners. Even without my tin-foil hat it looks like a good idea to stay away from them as much as possible.
Aspartame Toxicity information center (good research documents)
Aspartame Truth – including a long list of side effects
Sweet Poison – info about lots of artificial sweeteners
The Baptism of Jesus
Most of us have a world-painted picture of the baptism of Jesus. A pastoral scene with green grassy hills and sheep, a blue sky, white fluffy clouds, and a gathering of disciples to witness the event.
Let's take a scriptural look and see how accurate that picture is:
John was widely known, and large crowds attended his preaching and baptisms. Pharisees, Sadducees, publicans, soldiers are specifically mentioned. The events were not calm and pious events, as his preaching was confrontational, and aggressive. (way too aggressive for our lukewarm times)
Jesus was the last one baptized (Luke 3:21). I assume that those baptized didn't immediately leave, but that the entire crowd would wait until John was finished.
John briefly resists baptizing Jesus, probably loudly enough for the crowd to hear – at least the 'Behold, the Lamb of God' part – but finally relents and baptizes him. As this hadn't happened before, I'm sure it would have attracted the attention of anyone who wasn't paying full attention before. (murmuring in the crowd – who is it that John doesn't want to baptize? Did he say he wasn't WORTHY to do it? What's going on now?)
Suddenly, when Jesus is coming up out of the water, the heavens are torn open (the word for opened in Mark 1:10 is the same word used when the veil of the temple was rent in Matthew 27:51, Mark 15:38, and Luke 23:45). Picture the clouds and sky splitting to reveal heaven behind it. The glory of heaven shining down through a tear in the sky would have attracted the attention of everyone immediately, even if it were soundless (which I doubt).
The visible Spirit of God leaves heaven through the tear, and lights on Jesus. I guarantee you that everyone that was looking at the tear in the sky followed its flight and saw it land on Jesus.
Immediately (and while everyone was staring at the Spirit on Jesus), the great booming voice of God declares "Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased"
Now tell me that anyone in the crowd that day would have possibly been confused about who Jesus was.
