I was reading something in the biblical text this evening and I had a bit of something like a revelation.
Sometimes the one thing the King wants to emphasize, is the one thing we as translators and the writers of the original canon treated as an afterthought. We treat things as an afterthought because of the way they are phrased. And simply because of the smallness of the word, maybe the original writers did, too, if we take the words in the text at face value.
Allow me to explain.
It was Genesis 1, and always with the Fourth Day, there is something with the Fourth Day the King likes to highlight for me, and it is a kiss from him. It is a small phrase, only three words, and I have never heard the phrase emphasized, thus it seems to me most people do not treat it with emphasis when the read it, because it takes up such a small percentage of the text.
Maybe the original writer of the Creation Narrative, whether you call him Moses, or JEDP (ahem), or anyone else, just wrote this one phrase and gave it no further thought, but I would like to think it meant something, especially since these entities feature prominently elsewhere in the Tanakh, and in the Revelation and the First chapter of James.
So, here is the text for the Fourth Day of Creation:
And G-d said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. And G-d made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. And G-d set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And G-d saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.
Genesis 1:14–19 ESV
Did you see it?
And the Stars
I wonder, gang. I wonder if we know of this in this way. For He is the G-d of the Seven Stars, Who Walks Among Them, and knows the starways, and walks among the starlight.
And it is the stars as the Sons of G-d that shout for joy in the book of Job, and the Father of Heavenly Lights that gives every good and perfect gift from above as He walks among the stars, which are themselves heavenly lights.
With rain, with sun
With much, with less
With joy, with pain
With life, with deathThe only things that satisfy come from You
They come from YouEverything that’s beautiful
Everything that’s wonderful
Every perfect gift comes from YouYour grace, Your heart
Your voice, Your touch
Your word, Your peace
Your hope, Your loveA thousand words could not explain
A thousand worlds could not contain
Every perfect gift comes from YouIt comes from the Father of Lights
“Everything” by Chris Tomlin
It comes from the Giver of Life
It comes from the Heavens above
It’s coming straight from Your heart
To the people You love
When I was 18, the very first time I got to see the starways and the pitchblack of the heavens, I was in ROTC in college, and we were in Camp Blanding in Northeast Florida. My batallion was on a night march, and that was the very first time I was able to identify more than 12 constellations just based on patterns I had seen in books as a kid. And it was radiant, though not radiant like the sun. Sparkly.
And on the Fourth Day, as with other things pertaining to the Redemptive Gift of Exhorter, G-d usually highlights things in patterns of threes.
The nature of G-d
The Three major Exhorters of Scripture: Moses, Solomon, Paul.
The Sun, the Moon, the Stars
For me this highlights something that I wish to give to you as a gift in the arena of how I do hermeneutics, and precisely why the tagline of TPH is “Into all truth by the Spirit of G-d”.
It’s not the whole of scripture, written with a 1-to-1 mindset, with each word having and sharing equal weight with all the others. Sometimes, the Holy Spirit is going to highlight or lowlight certain words of phrases, depending on what is going on with you, and where He wants to point you in a given matter.
Sometimes, a phrase waits 10-30 years to emerge and glow off the page.
And this phrase “and the stars” just hits me in all the right places, moreso now I have seen stars and auroras and other entities with proper telescopes.
I put to you, as me reader, that, when you are reading, that you allow Holy Spirit the lattitude to highlight or emphasize something differently than you have allowed Him previously. If you allow Him to guide you along the river, you have no idea where He will pull the canoe up so He can take you exploring. Reading the text, as with other parts of our life, should be an adventure that is completely life-giving.
He may emphasize a piece of the text you never thought He would.
For example, when was the last time you heard there were three “veyahavtas” (the Hebrew Phrase translated as “You shall love”) in the text of the Torah.
And for you who are Torah haters, how many know the heart of the bible is the law, and the heart of the law is Deuteronomy, and for those who want to get intimate with how blessings and curses operate, you have to be intimate with how Deuteronomy operates?
I know we are not under the law and G-d abolished the law completely without exception, but maybe there is something of value in reading the law.
Just some thoughts. And yes, some of what I wrote above is a bit tongue-in-cheek.
But seriously, maybe it would behoove us to see, instead of a bipolar book, where the G-d on the Right Hand Side of the Book apologizes for the acts of the G-d on the Left Hand Side of the Book, perhaps we are dealing with the outworking of a very complex WHOLE COVENANT.
Perhaps there is life and fathering that will break the bastard curse off of us, if we will begin to obsessively hunt for the Father in the Tanakh, and in the Torah.
It’s not a list of rules and regs, gang, appended by Talmuds and Mishnahs and Gemaras. It is a arkload of principles and relationships available to anyone with the cojones to hunt for Dad’s mind AND heart within its pages.
For example, the first time “Father” is specifically implied in the pages of the Biblical Text is Exodus 4:22.
“Thus says the L-RD, ‘Israel is my firstborn son’.”
From Exodus 4:22 ESV
I wonder if one problem with too many of us that want to run from the Torah and the Tanakh and Whole Covenant into Better Covenant/Worser Covenant is that our relationships with our own earthly dads were so messed-up that we cannot bear the thought of beginning a relationship with G-d the Father in His fullness without a social worker present. And truly, if we were abused by our fathers, we might need someone who will take that role in the spirit for a season.
But, really, the gems are in the Torah for us to find if we are willing. The fat of the land, all of the fat of the land, is present for those of us who look to be transformed from disobedient to obedient, with hearts that are FILLED with the earnest of the Kingdom.
His heart is for us to know all of Him, and not just the parts with which we are comfortable.
The starsong….proclaiming the justice of G-d….
“And the stars”
May the King give light in strange and unexpected places for His kids to walk.
Just some thoughts.