Matthew 1:1: Will u b my friend?, part 2

To review, (using my own paraphrase) God says to Abram, "Dude! Let's cut a covenant." Abram says, "Sweet!" Abram gathers the animal volunteers and prepares them, then shoos away some birds of prey who weren't chosen to be apart of the covenant all (apparently participating in a covenant was a pretty popular thing). Once things have quieted down, v 12 says Abram does what any man would do in that situation: he takes a nap (seriously though, the text says a deep sleep fell upon him – see KJV, NASB, and ESV translations).

Anyway, as the sun was setting, the deep sleep falls upon Abram, and God states His part of the covenant in vv 12-16 and answers Abram's question. He says that Abram's descendants will receive the land, but not for about 400 years and that after being mistreated as slaves. Even then, Abram will live a long life and will die and still not receive the land himself.
God spoke from the time from when the sun started setting to when the sun had set (v 17a).

Then once the sun had set, something weird happened. Scripture says in v 17 that "a smoking firepot" and "a blazing torch" passed between the carcasses (NIV). Then Scripture continues saying that God made a covenant with Abram and gives more details on the land that Abram's descendants will receive.

Let's take a twenty-second time out. I know we're jumping ahead a little bit, but since this is a study of Matthew and not Genesis, we'll going to cheat a little. Where else in Scripture do we see smoke and fire? God speaks to Moses from the fire of a burning bush that is not consumed (Ex 3:2). All throughout the wilderness wanderings, God leads the Children of Israel with a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night (Ex 13:21; 40:38; Num 9:15-16). When God "landed," if you will, on Mt. Sinai, Ex 19:18 says it was "covered with smoke, because the LORD descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace..." (NIV).

Before we go back to the text, let's review. The culture of Abram's day says that if two parties are going to cut a covenant, once the conditions of the covenant are agreed upon, they make a sidewalk out of 5 parts sand (already on the ground) to 1 part blood (provided by the previously mentioned volunteers), then each party walks on their newly made sidewalk symbolically stating that if they break their portion of the agreement, they are accept the same fate as the carcasses before them.

Back to the text. Abram is not conscious, so he doesn't sign on the bloodied line, so to speak. However, is it possible that God did go between the carcasses as Abram's culture demanded (the same culture that God had created) to fulfill His responsibility within the covenant? Then, is it possible that He went between the carcasses in Abram's place as if to say, "Abram if you cannot keep your part in this covenant, then may what has happened to these animals also happen to ... Me"? Is it possible that way back in Genesis chapters 12, 15, and 17 we have shadows of the Good News?

But with all of that, I still haven't answered my own question. What is a covenant? A covenant is like a promise or a vow or a treaty or a contract in that the two parties agree to do something or not to do something, etc., however, the thing that separates a covenant from all of the rest of these is one thing: relationship. A covenant is first and foremost a relationship.

Please feel free to comment on this as this is a total guess on my part, but it seems to me that it was people that needed reassurance in their relationships that cut covenants. Examples:

• God cut a covenant with Noah and his family because Noah and his family had just watched God destroy the world with a flood. They needed reassuring that God wouldn't destroy the world again (Gn 6 & 9);
• With the exception of his nephew, Abram left his extended family (read: his entire social network and support system) and didn't know where he was going. God cut a covenant with Abram to assure him He would care for him and his descendants (Gn 12);
• Jacob and Laban, son-in-law and father-in-law, cut a covenant with each other because they both kept trying to take advantage of the other person financially. Even though they were already family, they still needed a covenant to reassure their relationship (Gn 44);
• David and Jonathan cut a covenant as David was the anointed king-to-be of the Kingdom of Israel; Jonathan was the current King Saul's son. King Saul was trying to kill David (1 Sam 20).

So, a covenant. That's what it is. And that's why it's important, especially when reading the NT.

Give credit where credit is due: a lot, if not all, of the above ideas I have gleaned from hearing RVL speak that one time at that one place. It was real good – you shoulda been there. Later, I found on his FollowtheRabbi.com website a page on covenants, which has tons more info than I'm able to include here. Consider buying a pdf copy for yourself. He doesn't know I'm doing this and his ministries are very worthwhile.

Matthew 1:1: Will u b my friend?

Do you remember these? I doubt they had the legalese on them... at least I hope they didn't have the fine print on them (unless your dad was a lawyer and had all of your incoming and outgoing written material examined, but that would be a great topic all by itself for a blog, even a book, possibly a book series, a TV series, or even a movie, but I digress)...

The questions varied from "Will you be my friend?" to "I like you. Do you like me?" and "Will you be my girl/boyfriend?" While sometimes there was a third option available (such as "i don't know" or "maybe"), the feature in this genre of literature was the multiple-choice answers already provided for you.

In the "Skip the First Chapter?" post, I mention that Jesus is the fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant. I thought it might be a good idea to discuss exactly what a covenant is. Take a few moments to think about it. What is a covenant (cue the theme music from Jeopardy – I know, it'll be stuck in your head for the next several hours. Sorry.)? What is the difference between a covenant and a promise or a vow or giving someone your word or being in contract with someone?

A covenant is first mentioned in Scripture between God and Noah and his family, but the Noahic Covenant is mentioned once (Gn 6:18), then is detailed in Gn 9:1-17, but then is rarely mentioned throughout the rest of Scripture. The next use of the word covenant is with the Abrahamic Covenant (Gn chs 12, 15, and 17). It is this covenant that the rest of Scripture refers to. The ark of the covenant is the ark of the Abrahamic Covenant. Before they were called the OT and the NT, they were the Old Covenant and the New Covenant (it is not "old" as in "out of date," but rather "old" as in "first"); and before there was a New Covenant, the Old Covenant was simply The Covenant. All of Scripture points back to this – it's important we get this. So we ask ourselves again. What is a covenant?

In the Fall of 2007, my wife and I travelled to San Antonio to hear Ray Vander Laan (further, RVL) speak. One of the thing he spoke about was the Abrahamic Covenant. He addressed how fascinating it was that:

– in Gn 15:8, Abram asked God, "'...[H]ow can I know that I will gain possession of [the Promised Land]'" (NIV);
– in v 9, God answers Abram by saying, "'Bring Me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon'" (NIV);
– and in v 10, Abram doesn't need instructions from God on what to do next, he got to work because he knew what to do.

It's the same as if we were trying to entertain the neighborhood kids for an afternoon when one of the dads says, "I think there's a baseball bat, a catcher's mitt, a few fielder's mitts, and some baseballs in the back of my garage." No one would need tell them what to do. It's built in to every American kid how to play baseball. When God mentioned those animals, Abram knew what God wanted. He didn't need to say anything more. God was going to cut a covenant.

Did you see that? We make promises and we take vows, but covenants we cut. The reason a covenant is cut is because that is what happens to the livestock involved with the ceremony. In this instance, the cow, goat, and sheep were cut down the middle of their bodies and placed on either side of where their blood pooled into a temporary crimson creek. The dove and pigeon weren't cut in half, but they were cut enough so that their blood contributed to the bloodpath. This bloody pathway was where the two parties who were cutting the covenant were to walk. As each party walked through the blood, they would state their responsibilities to the other party. By doing this, they were symbolically saying, if I don't fulfill my responsibilities to you, may I become like this heifer, this goat, this ram, this dove, and this pigeon.

Read through vv 12-21 of Gn 15. Note the feeling with which Abram declares his devotion to God, how he says he will always be faithful to Him, as a ... what? It's not there? Maybe it's just the translation we're using. Go to BibleGateway.com (or a hard copy of the Word, if you prefer) and look it up in the New American Standard Bible, or The Message, or better yet – the King James Version. That will have it! It doesn't? How odd.

[We'll take a writer's/readers' break here. More to come later...]

Matthew 1: Skip the First Chapter?

About two years ago, my wife and I were inspired to memorize the book of Matthew.

While we were talking about whether this was something we wanted to do, we talked specifically about Mt 1 – did we want to start there, or did we want to start by memorizing Mt 2? If you haven't done so already, click the link for Mt 1. As you can see, the first 17 of the 24 verses are a genealogical list. You can probably guess why we had this discussion. One one hand, ch 1 is as much the Word of God as is any other chapter of the Bible; on the other hand, ch 1 is ... boring, to be frank. I don't feel very close to God after reading Mt 1:1-17.

We did decide to start with ch 1: we figured that God is smarter than us and knew what He was doing when He decided to have Matthew include Jesus' genealogy. Unfortunately, we didn't make beyond the first chapter, but some good did come out of it: we did memorize some of the first chapter, and we became very familiar with the book as a whole.

There is a lot of detail that I can go into about these first 17 verses, but I think the main thing I want to focus on is v 1. It says, "A record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ the Son of David, the Son of Abraham:" (NIV). It may be because we've read it so many times, but this was a lightening bolt of a sentence for Matthew to start the book off with.

The phrase "Son of David" was a Messianic title. We see later in the same book that Matthew quotes other people as using "Son of David" as a synonym for Messiah (Mt 12:23 and Mt 21:9). The people did this because they knew their OT (passages such as Is 9:7, among others, teach that the coming Messiah will be the Son of David.) By calling Him the Son of David, Matthew was saying that Jesus is the One for Whom the Jews had been waiting for thousands of years.

The other phrase Matthew applies to Jesus is "Son of Abraham." There are some significant things to point out with Abraham. Gn 1-11 chronicle the beginnings of God's dealings with our world, with man, and with everything we know. The continuous narrative of God's story that ends with Rev 22 began in Gn 12. So it all began with God and Abraham (back when he was Abram). God made a covenant with Abram (recorded in Gn 15).

The beginning of the continuous story of God's dealings with man start with God approaching Abram. Here is what he says in Gn 12:1-3.

The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you.

"I will make you into a great nation
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.

"I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all the peoples on earth
will be blessed through you." (NIV, emphasis mine)

The Heb word translated to "peoples" here is משפחה (mish·pa·kha), which literally means "families" but can also be used as "extended families," meaning "tribes" or "clans" (BLB). In other words, there's no one left out: from the Abzinz of Russia to the Zuni of the southwest United States, and everyone else in between. Today, we might use the phrase "ethnic group;" you can use whatever word you want, because truth doesn't change.

Matthew is very clear in his intentions with the book (and he elaborates on them throughout the book): Jesus is the Jewish Messiah Who has come to bless all of the families or extended families or clans or tribes or ethnic groups or nations. He is the the Savior of the World!

Jesus Died in Zapata?

Quick note: I started this blog in 2007. I lost track of it a while back, but thought I'd give it a try again with a little more structure towards the topics (read below). Feel free to leave feedback, even if you don't agree. Also, ask questions, etc., etc. Enjoy.



When I was a boy growing up in Edinburg, Texas, Dad worked for a local construction company that was hired for a job in Zapata, a town two counties over and 100 miles away. Every so often, Mom would pack everyone up into the Oldsmobile and we would drive over to visit Dad for the weekend. As we drove, the land would become more and more hilly. At one point towards the end of the drive, there were a series of very tall hills, and on top of the tallest was a large crucifix. I used to wonder if that was the cross where Jesus was crucified. As an adult, I think about the child-like honesty of an inquiry like that and I smile. It sounds like a question that my four-year-old son would ask me today.

Let’s be honest. We continue to do the same thing as adults. We have grown up thinking that Christianity is a Western religion. Christianity is so engrained into our culture that it doesn’t occur to us that it wasn't born here. I(This can cause issues when we share the Gospel with others who aren't Westerners, but that's another issue for another time). Before Jesus was “translated,” if you will, into the Western culture, He was Eastern. More specifically, He was Middle Eastern. The Book that tells us about Jesus and His Father comes through a Jewish worldview. If we read it only through Western-shaded lenses, we understand the major teachings just fine. Yet at the same time, there is so much we miss.

My intent for this blog is to look at Scripture from a Jewish perspective so as to point out some of the things that we as Westerners might otherwise miss. I think I'm going to take a look at the book of Matthew.