Readings for the week:
Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25
Psalm 78:1-7
I Thessalonians 4:13-18
Matthew 25:1-13

Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25

For a people who spent a generation on the move, this text is the call to stay put in the land YHWH promised their forebears, and to serve the LORD their God alone.  Joshua reminds the people several times here to serve God alone.

Joshua knows that it is all too easy for us to fall back on what we’ve known and miss experiencing the new.  Joshua had witnessed these people complaining while in the wilderness.  He had heard them beg to go back to Egypt, because liberation was not what they thought it would be.  He knew they fashioned a god into something they were comfortable with–a golden calf–when God Almighty became uncomfortable.

Joshua knows this history and so when the people vow, “Yes, of course we’ll serve God and God alone,” Joshua challenges them:  “You can’t do it; you’re not able to worship the LORD. He is a holy God. He is a jealous God. He won’t put up with your fooling around and sinning.”

Have we held to our vow any better?  Don’t think on just an individual basis, think on a communal level.  Has your family, your neighborhood, your faith community, your tribe worshipped the LORD our God alone?  Have I and my family?

Or have we rather served the gods of money, stability, status quo, government, politics, career, prestige, opinion?

What a great text to call us again to answer this simple and profound question:  Who owns you?  And to answer that question, it seems we need to look at what has consumed our time, energy, resources, thoughts, and feelings this past week, month, year?

The apostle James spoke truth when he admonished the Church to let their actions speak.  For a credible communal life speaks louder than any words.

Psalm 78:1-7

Lest we ever forget our mission, the psalmist here poetically calls us to account: Trust in God; never forget the works of God, but keep his commands to the letter.

This text is like a guide to the drama of our lives.  We are to be constantly in dress rehearsal mode.  Rehearse the acts of God to our children, over and over and over again.  Why?  So that we are ready when God reveals himself.  By rehearsing the acts of our LORD, we remind ourselves–whether we are on the mountaintop, in the valley, or in exile–that our God is real, our God cares for us, our God will redeem us, our God will act.

The surprising part is the mystery of how God acts.  Unless we have been rehearsing God’s story, we might miss the “how;” because God often surprised us in how he chooses to redeem.

I Thessalonians 4:13-18

This text has spawned quite a bit of theologically irresponsible notions, such as the rapture.  The Left Behind series is testament to that.  Did you know the word “rapture” does not appear in Scripture?  In fact, the very idea that we will leave this earth at the Second Coming of Christ is not biblical at all.

Stop, take a breath.  I know that sounds heretical.  But read the entire Book of the Revelation.  Especially the ending chapters.  It’s clear that the Revelation of Jesus Christ to John is about the end our salvation story.  And we will not be leaving.  Instead, Christ will return to this world in bodily form, making a new heaven and a new earth, and we will dwell with Jesus in this newly reconciled world!  What a concept.

A biblical view of the end of story does not trivilize salvation as some “get out of earth and hell” card.  Instead, salvation history is the story of God reconciling all things … ALL THINGS … to himself.  How?  I don’t know.  But he’s promised to do it:  “God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself.”

Paul’s emphasis in this text is not on the particulars of the Advent of Christ.  Then what is it on?  Hope.  Paul is encouraging people who have legitimate questions about what comes after death that even in death we will not be out of God’s care.  What a joy to know that because of Christ even death cannot separate us from the faithful love of our Creator.

And Paul urges us to encourage each other continually in light of this great hope.

Matthew 25:1-13

Are we ready to rejoice?  Do we live in a state of expectant joy?  In these final weeks before we celebrate the beginning of the Church Year with Advent, the theme of waiting is already beginning.

There are two ways to wait on the LORD:

1. In a sleepy state, sadly unprepared, or …
2. Ready, joyful, expectant.

This wonderful story Jesus tells of the ten bridesmaids illustrates two different ways to live life: in the kingdom or unaware of the kingdom.  Imagine if we actually lived like our prayer “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” we already being answered in a multitude of ways?  What if we lived like the kingdom of Christ was already breaking into this world?

Guess what … it is!  That is the statement of Christ’s Resurrection.  The world as we have known it has ended.  Death will not win.  God’s care cannot be stifled.  We can never fall out of God’s grace.  Yes, we can reject it, we can choose not to lean into the Spirit’s presence.  But God’s grace is extended to us in all ways in all places.

Do we see it?  Do we see this reality of heaven on earth breaking through the cracks of our false realities?  Jesus preached a kingdom where the poor are cared for, the disenfranchised are the important people in the community, the naked are clothed, the hungry are fed, the blind are given sight.  Where is this happening around us?  When we see it, we should recognize is as the presence of Jesus the Nazarene!

Better yet, we should be part of it.  We should be like the five bridesmaids who were eagerly waiting for the groom.  We should have our lights on, joyful, ready to break out in song and dance when one of the least of these is comforted.

——

Brian Niece
www.brianniece.com

If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS.Related Posts:

• Prayer for the Week
• Prayer for the Week
• Prayer for the Week
• Time Away is Never Time Away
• Prayer for the Week

Read Part 3 here.  Read Part 2 here.  Read Part 1 here.

WARNING: Academic content ahead …

The Korahite Psalms (42-49; 84-85; 87-88) serve as an excellent study in the thematic web woven from the foundation laid in Psalms 1 and 2 of torah, pathway, and refuge. The process of ‘refuging’ in the torah pathway begins with faint hope and profound devotion, moves to proclaiming joy in YHWH’s presence, and ends with absolute abandonment. From heaven to hell, the full gamut of love, rage, fear, peace, anxiety, despair, and hope is here. Specifically, these psalms consist of Zion songs (46, 48, 84, 87), a wisdom psalm (49), a wedding song (45), an enthronement psalm (47), and laments (42-44, 85, 88). ¹

It must be noted that the refuge metaphor–or ‘refuging’–has many synonyms that are identical thematically in the Psalter. The primary of these are: shadow–tsel; stronghold–ma’owz; secure height–misgab; rock–tsur; hiding place–sether; shelter–cukkah; as well as a slew of verbal forms.

Psalms 46, 48, 84, 87. These Zion psalms express the elemental yearnings of wayfarers to permanently reside in Zion’s sacred space. Zion is the destination of desire because it is “the holy habitation of the Most High” (46.4). God, though residing in the heavens as creator God, is understood to be present with his people in time and space by the Korahite psalmist in the city of Zion: “God is in the midst of the city” (46.5). Yet, verse 1 of the first Korahite Zion psalm clearly states that “God is our refuge (mahseh)” (46.1). The identity of the city and God are more than linked; they become interchangeable:

Walk about Zion, go all around it, count its towers, consider well its ramparts;
go through its citadels, that you may tell the next generation that this is God. (48.12-14)

It is this “dwelling place” (84.1) that is lovely, for which the life-force–nephesh–of the psalmist faints. Movement is predominant on the “highways to Zion” (84.5). This movement is not erratic nor arbitrary, but transformative. As the singers move through the waterless valley, they make it a place of springs and the early rain covers the valley with pools (84.6). Moving within Zion/God’s life is an activity that carries believers from “strength to strength” (84.7). Indeed, the supreme statement is made of this city that contains God’s presence: it is the source of all transforming good, for “[a]ll my springs are in you” (87.7).

Psalm 49. Associated with the sapiential tradition, this psalm weaves wisdom understandings of observed life like that found in Qoheleth, with the mystery of practicing life. This practice of life is carried out in communion with God, and learned through repetition. Again, the theme of movement is noted and recognized as necessary and right for the “dwelling places to all generations” (49.11). Life in God is viewed as liberating, beyond even Sheol and the grave (49.15); thus the psalmist asks, “Why should I fear in times of trouble?” (49.5).

Psalm 45 and 47. The enthronement psalm, Psalm 47, celebrates YHWH’s rulership of all creation. Much activity is involved in the proclaimation of YWHW’s kingship. Yet, for all the praise, “God sits on his holy throne” (47.8) where “he is highly exalted” (47.9). There emerges a span, a distance, between humanity and YHWH who was so recently carried simply on the shouts of his people (47.5).

The psalm for a royal wedding, Psalm 45, contains strong messianic tones that may contribute to its final inclusion in the Psalter. ²  The telling–and perhaps problematic–section of the psalm is weighty indeed:

Your throne, O God, endures forever and ever.
Your royal scepter is a scepter of equity;
you love righteousness and hate wickedness.
Therefore God, your God, has anointed you
with the oil of gladness beyond your companions . . . (45.6-7)

It does not make much sense grammatically to take the God of “O God”–elohim–as referring to anyone else here other than the earthly king. Of course, God is the source of the king’s power and authority. ³ The psalmist’s desire for God’s presence is so strong, that God’s presence is equated, not simply with the divinely appointed city, but now with the divinely appointed earthly ruler! God and man are united in presence. This is radical indeed. Longing for God’s presence so intensely–that the king and God would be as one–must arise from a very real knowledge of separation from the deity.

Psalms 42-44, 85, 88. The separation is in fact unbearable: “When shall I come and behold the face of God?” (42.2). Could the God who is a ‘stronghold’–ma’owz–cast off the faithful (43.2)? This is at least the perception. There is still action that is occurring in the life of God who is characterized as “my rock”–tsur–, but this action is not the delight nor ‘refuging’ of Psalms 1 and 2. Something is painfully amiss and the laments of the Korahites begin to crystallize what is skewed. The psalmist still walks about in the way, but does so mournfully, not happily.

Why this shift? The presence of the LORD is not discerned. Yet, the Korahite understanding is that YHWH’s presence is forever linked to the temple. The boast of the psalmist has been in God’s name (44.8). Glory, however, does not at present “dwell in our land” (85.9). For righteousness and faithfulness and covenant love to commingle, the responsibility of activity dramatically shifts from those who are pilgrimaging in God, to God himself: “righteousness will go before him, and will make a derek for his steps” (85.13). YHWH must be on the move!

What if YHWH does not come? Psalm 88–the embarrassing accusation against God–addresses this concern. The psalmist does not evacuate himself from the conversation. ⁴  Rather, he cries out at the silence and apparent pervading absence of God’s presence all the more. Ironically, though the presence of God seems far away, the psalmist declares, “O LORD, God of my salvation, when, at night, I cry out in your presence . . .” (88.1). The psalmist acknowledges, even when all would speak otherwise, he is still in YHWH’s presence.

——

Brian Niece
www.brianniece.com
If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS.

Related Posts:

• The ShadowPath of YHWH’s Open Story — Part 1
• The ShadowPath of YHWH’s Open Story — Part 2
• Some Excellent Quotes from Jim Wallis
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Readings for the week:

Deuteronomy 34:1-12
Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17
1 Thessalonians 2:1-8
Matthew 22:34-46

Painted Prayer Book

Deuteronomy 34:1-12

With a background in theatre and a call to preach, I see much in Scripture through the lens of a storyteller.  It is after all God’s story.  This conclusion to the Torah is a very conflicted ending.  It’s a bit like watching a movie that gives you no catharsis, but requires the audience to work out the catharsis after the credits roll.

Moses finally gets his people to this land of promise: it’s just on the other side of the river!  After 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, suffering endless complaints, doing his best to obey God (though sometimes failing in that), being misunderstood by the people he’s trying to lead, going to bat for those people with God when God gets angry … after all this Moses only gets to see the promised land and then die.  It seems so unfair.  But as we turn the page and see the struggles Joshua has in leading the people once in the promised land, I wonder if it isn’t a blessing that Moses doesn’t have to endure anymore.  I can’t imagine how disappointed Moses would be to discover that these self-seeking group of “YHWH’s people” still whine and complain and fear and don’t believe even when they arrive in the promised land.  Or, maybe I can imagine it …

There’s also something here of how Moses equipped the next leader.  While Moses was still the leader, he spent a ton of time with Joshua.  Joshua was prepared for leadership.  Perhaps the people complained, “Moses spends all his time with Joshua, and Aaron, and that crowd … Why doesn’t he visit our tent too?”  What they did not understand is that Moses was pouring his time and energy into good soil that was willing to be equipped for the future good of the people.

Another note on this text … The people mourned Moses’ death for 30 days and then the time of mourning was over.  They moved on.  They didn’t force Joshua to walk around in Moses’ shadow.  Any pastors in the organizational church out there feel like your predecessor is still around because you here said predecesor’s name all the time?  Thought so.  The Church can take a cue from our sacred history here as to how we are to grieve the loss of former leadership and move on to embrace the new.

Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17

In our current culture of US America, it seems we whole-heartedly embrace the notion of individual entitlement from birth (life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and so forth).  The Psalmist here reminds us that such a narrative has no place in the Christian story.

We aren’t owed happiness and stress-free life.  We are God’s.  And as God’s people we will flourish and wither; we will suffer and experience joy.  It’s a both/and reality, not an either/or.

I wonder how many local parishes are missing the divine life of Christ because they refuse to endure withering and suffering?  Will we walk through life with our eyes wide open to our call to Christ’s passion?  Will we embrace the God of night so that we can realize the God of day?  Will we suffer as little-Christ’s or despair that our suffering isn’t “fair?”

We can see how Moses endured, walking close to God through disappointment, sacrifice, discouragement, suffering, misunderstanding, disobedience, and eventually his death.

1 Thessalonians 2:1-8

Paul’s letters to the church at Thessalinica are powder kegs for leaders.  Paul pushes back against allegations falsely made of him.  He endures the suffering inflicted by others’ pride, selfishness, or ignorance; but he still lets them know that they are not acting like Christ’s church.

It’s unfortunate that accusations of deceit and the absence of equitable respect for labor are not limited to the early church.  Yet, even when we contemporary leaders find ourselves in these shoes, we have Paul’s example (follow me as I follow Christ).  He continued to preach the truth of the Gospel, even if the people refused to hear it or except it.  Paul then determined which churches and leaders were good soil (that is to say, who would embrace the paradoxical and uncomfortable truth of the Gospel) and put his energy into them.  Do you see a trend here?

Finally, our efforts to share the gospel in word and deed must be motivated by love of God and love of others.  The false requirements of institutions (numbers, money, prestige, toeing the line, etc.) must be dismissed in light of the truth of the Gospel.  And, unfortunately, this will require suffering for those who endeavor to do so.

Matthew 22:34-46

If we Christ-followers could encourage each other to live like this text demands, we might see the world turned upside down!  But oh, how hard it is (once again) to acknowledge that all of God’s story hinges on loving our Lord with our everything and loving our neighbors, too.

Why not pose this open-ended statement to those in your faith community:

If I love you as myself, I would …

Ask someone to make that statement and end the sentence.  Do it yourself.

Let’s get real … being the Church hinges on one simple request: Love God and love others.  That’s it! So in this present world financial crisis, what would loving God and loving others look like?

• Maybe we downsize our homes and vehicles so that we can support others’ needs.
• Maybe we live well under our means with the goal of blessing our neighbors as much as possible.
• Maybe a few of us get together and decide to stop tithing to a building program, or an organization, or an institution, but we decide to live off half our income and give the other half away to the poor, the disenfranchised, the ignored.

Hey, I’m convicted by these statements, so don’t think I’m suggesting what I’m already doing.  But I am seeking to let my whole life (and that means my family finances) speak to the reality of Christ and the truth of the Gospel.

At the least, when we focus so much energy on others, they might just know God by our outpouring of love … and we might become a little less stuck on our lives, our stuff, our agendas, our desires … on us!

——

Brian Niece
www.brianniece.com

If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS.

Related Posts:

• Persecution
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This is the third part of a continuing post. Read Part 2 here.  Read Part 1 here.

WARNING: Academic content ahead …

This one way of torah is called “the way of the righteous” (Psalm 1.6).  The way–derek–is the “means by which one lives and moves and has one’s being.”[1] By negation in verse 1, it can be assumed that the righteous are to walk, stand, and sit somewhere.  But if the way does not lie with the wicked, or sinners, or scoffers, then where?  The location must be an all-consuming place of completion.  This is suggestive by the attempts of the psalmist at completion: “walk,” “stand,” “sit;” “day,” “night.”[2] The derek metaphor, and its synonym ‘orach–‘path’–, are pervasive throughout the Psalter.  Psalm 1 is brilliantly making a match between torah and derek. 

Torah is the one way, the one path, for the righteous who would live life in delight.  The preponderance of laments in the Psalter would seem to squelch this delight of living life in the path of torah.  Yet, the delight is not so much a happy outlook, but rather an assurance that life is contained within the life of YHWH.  The dichotomy of either/or melts away.  God makes room in his life for much struggle, pain, grief, anger, and fatigue while the righteous journey on the pathway.  Co-mingling with torah as the pathway there can be this paradox, because of the concept of ‘refuge.’

‘Refuge’ does not appear in Psalm 1, many might declaim.  Indeed.  However, here we find the link from the pathway of torah in the first Psalm to ‘seek refuge’–chaseh–in Psalm 2.  The link is nestled in the last two verses:

Serve Yahweh with awe; reverence and worship him, or he will grow angry, and you will die in the way; for his consuming fire quickly kindles.  Happy are all who seek refuge in him.  (Psalm 2.11-12 orig. trans.)

Chaseh is the verbal form of mahseh.  That the verbal and not the nominal form appears in Psalm 2 connecting the idea of pathway is significant.  This is the major point of departure for the present work from current study on metaphor in the Psalter.[3] The idea of chaseh is to be active within refuge: “Happy are all who are refuging in YHWH.”  Such a verb-ifying of the noun ‘refuge’ seems to render the most accurate understanding of the Psalter’s intent in assigning Psalms 1 and 2 as prelude to the Psalms.  Thus, God is not a static, impassable being that is the goal of seekers longing for refuge.  Torah does not serve as simply a direction toward God-as-refuge implying “destination and permanent residence.”[4]

In sum, there is a way.  That way is the one way.  It is a pathway called torah.  The righteous are those who delight in the story of God that YHWH has initiated and invited all to be active participants in.  Much activity takes place within this story.  The story is a journey wherein worshippers are seeking refuge–‘refuging’–in the openness of YHWH’s life.

[2] James L. Crenshaw, The Psalms: An Introduction (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 2001), 58.

[3] Particularly see Brown, Seeing the Psalms,18-53.

[4] Ibid., 32.

SO TELL ME SOMETHING:

Do you see the verbage playing out this way?

——

Brian Niece
www.brianniece.com
If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS.Related Posts:

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• The ShadowPath of YHWH’s Open Story — Part 1
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The “one way” is introduced in Psalm 1 indirectly as a negative statement concerning the “path that sinners tread” (v.1).  In other words, the one way is the ‘not’ toward the “[h]appy are those” in verse 1.  Happiness through “delight . . . in the torah of the LORD” (v.1).  Notice that delight does not come from, out of, beside, nor any other host of prepositional possibilities in relation to torah; rather delight is found ‘in’ torah.  To this concept of placement ‘in’ torah we shall return.

Many English translations of Psalm 1 generate sterile understandings and limited scope for the meaning of torah.  Later-day Christianity succinctly refers to torah as the law, or the Old Covenant.  Yet, after reading Psalm 1 (and subsequently Psalm 19 and Psalm 119) certainly law cannot be the exhaustive meaning of torah.  Indeed Hans-Joachim Kraus states that “[u]nder no circumstances should we translate torah as ‘law,’ or introduce a corresponding understanding in legalistic terms.”[1] Kraus proposes ‘instruction’ as a fuller understanding of torah suggesting this gives the “impression of something living, dynamic.”[2] But semantics becomes a brain-numbing exercise at this level when ‘law’ and ‘instruction’ can be considered so vastly divergent in connotation.  Indeed, instruction hardly gives any indication of a living or dynamic understanding as relayed in the text of Psalm 1.  Here torah is likened to a living and active stream giving human life wholeness.  What understanding of torah would feed such a lively metaphor?

Torah is arguably the most important part of the Tanakh, because it is the written record of YHWH’s self-revelation as the God of all creation to a peculiar Hebrew people.[3] Indeed, torah is a narrative–a story–of God’s covenantal relationship with a particular people in space and time.  It is this sweeping, almost cosmic, defining of torah that gives the Psalter liberty to implement such playful imagery concerning YHWH’s story.  And indeed, torah is clearly situated as emanating from YHWH and generated by his initiative, not simply a story about YHWH.  This is how delight can come from being ‘in torah.’  When a community finds itself involved in YHWH’s story, there is delight, there is happiness because life is occurring as it was intended from the mind of God.

Now, we must wonder: what does a people do who find themselves in torah?  Verse 2 continues: “on torah they meditate day and night.”  The verb hagah here translated as “meditate” is elsewhere translated differently: “As a lion or a young lion growls over its prey . . .” (Isaiah 31.4).  There is something visceral and vocal to this meditation.  The Hebraic understanding of hagah is rooted in communal worship.  The holy din of worshippers singing and chanting psalms in the ancient temple feeds the connotations of hagah.[4] Meditation then is not some isolated mental exercise, nor a closet spiritual experience.  To be swept into torah–YHWH’s story–means to fully and actively rehearse that story in community fashion at all times, because the “streams of water” (Psalm 1.3) are continually flowing.  Thus, there is no time for the “happy” to consider following the “path that sinners tread.”  Instead, hagah must be constant and ongoing.  This conceptual reality of torah implies movement over against stasis.  Life in torah is a journey, not a destination.  There must be much room in YHWH’s story to move about for so many happy ones to take delight and be always on the move.  Life is decisive because of YHWH’s story.  The gifting of this story to humanity generates the Psalter’s confidence that “torah is the only thinkable response”[5] and the one way in which to journey and live life.  If torah is “all-embracing in its scope,”[6] there is no dichotomy of equal and opposite opportunity in Psalm 1.

[2] Ibid.

[3] The first five books of the Hebrew Bible are similar in structure to the five-fold division of the Psalter, thus Psalm 1 is claiming that the Psalter is a reflection of Torah.

[4] See James Limburg, Psalms (Lousiville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2000), 2ff.

[5] Walter Brueggemann, The Message of the Psalms: A Theological Commentary (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1984), 39.

[6] William P. Brown, Seeing the Psalms (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2002), 57.Related Posts:

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• On Reading the Hebrew Scripture — Part 2
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• 24-hour Prayer Vigil … Hours 2 & 3

Almost everyday of the year I read a psalm.  Sometimes I read the same one over and over.  I’ve been particularly interested in a certain set of the Hebrew Psalter.  Bear with me  …

Why Psalm 1 (and 2)?

Though there is wide consensus in recent research on the Hebrew Psalter that Psalm 1 was placed as an introduction to the collection, little study investigates linguistic cues that link Psalm 1–and possibly Psalm 2–thematically with the remainder of the Psalter in order to define with any specificity why Psalm 1 is selected as the shaping psalm.[1]

Of a general nature, it is widely suggested that Psalm 1 has two main emphases intended to direct the understanding of subsequent psalms: the centrality of torah and the primacy of the righteous over against the wicked.  In the traditional understanding, torah has come to be associated with various commands stemming from the Deuteronomic history, the Levitical codes, and so forth.  The plight of the righteous versus that of the wicked has been determined in stark either/or worldview terms that propose a dichotomy of ‘two ways.’

However, there is more richness to the depth of torah, and more complex tones to the plight of humanity, than such general observations set forward.  Linguistic concepts of torah, ‘the way,’ and ‘refuge,’ give rise to a hermeneutical lens for the Psalter that is equally shaped by Psalms 1 and 2 as a launching pad for the scriptural hymnbook.

Likewise, in microcosm, this interpretive shape can be examined specifically in the Korahite Psalms (42-49; 84-85; 87-88).  What unfolds may not necessarily be two ways, but one way that allows for much movement in the God who makes room in his life for angry prayer, glorious doxology, and plenty more in between.

Part 2 to follow …

Jerome F.D. Creach, “Like a Tree Planted by the Temple Stream: The Portrait of the Righteous in Psalm 1:3,” in The Catholic Biblical Quarterly (Jan 1999), 35.

SO TELL ME SOMETHING:
How do you think Psalm 1 and Psalm 2 are linked?

——

Brian Niece
www.brianniece.com
If you enjoyed this post, get free updates by email or RSS.Related Posts:

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