At first glance, it seems like it may be similar to the way we temper metals.  After creating a new alloy (of steel, or whatever) the new metal is heated to escalating temperatures, each time held at the new temperature until certain characteristics change correctly.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tempering)

So, if this is what Jesus’ temptation was all about, it would have been simply a preparation for a difficult ministry — which is certainly a reflection of his showdown with evil in the second half of Mark 1, and chapters following.

I do wonder if there’s more to this than simply preparation, or if preparation is more than I see.  I’m sure it is, so if you have anything to contribute to the thoughts, please feel free to comment!

Keith Green was a truly dedicated disciple of Christ, and wrote a lot of beautiful music before he died in 1982 in a plane crash. These aren’t the full song lyrics, just pieces to give you an idea.

When I Hear the Praises Start

For when I hear the praises start, I want to rain upon you,
Blessings that will fill your heart, I see no stain upon you,
Because you are My child and know me, to Me you’re only holy,
Nothing that you’ve done remains, only what you do for Me.

My precious bride, the day is nearing,
When I’ll take you in My arms and hold you,
I know there are so many things that you’ve been hearing,
But you just hold on to what I have told you.

Asleep in the Light

Oh Bless me Lord, bless me Lord, you know it’s all I ever hear,
No one aches, no one hurts, no one even sheds one tear,
But He cries, He weeps, He bleeds, and He cares for your needs,
And you just lay back and keep soaking it in, oh, can’t you see it’s such sin?

The world is sleeping in the dark,
That the church can’t fight, cause it’s asleep in the light,
How can you be so dead, when you’ve been so well fed,
Jesus rose from the grave, and you, you can’t even get out of bed,
Oh, Jesus rose from the dead, come on, get out of your bed.

Ok, so you'd think that after seeing God miraculously deliver them, and then following around a PILLAR OF FIRE, you'd take God seriously, and you'd take His servant seriously.  But God and Moses speak, and they seem to sort of follow, but consistently, there are those who don't pay attention or follow directions or simply obey.  How hard is it to hear them say, "don't gather manna on Saturdays - get double on Friday" and then to do that?  But inevitably, you see some of the people wandering out of their house on Saturday morning, looking for the manna.  I guess they didn't think it was actually from God.  Or they didn't understand that God told them not to do that.  doesn't really make sense.

Then, they complain complain complain about the water.  Now I understand that if you go without water for a long time, you will not make it.  I get that.  But certainly, there are better ways of approaching this aforementioned and proven God than grumbling.

And now, of course, we seem to be not much better ourselves, each at times.  We know what God has told us is important, and we know what he has for us to do; yet we still for absolutely no logical reason choose to do something else or not do what he asks or something.  I think it's just this truly stupid arrogance that we all have to let die with Christ. 

Not too much later, the nation of Israel is wandering in the desert, still following God, to a body of water which is sonn discovered to be undrinkable.  Complaints erupt from the people, and Moses seeks God on the issue.  God works a miracle through a tree branch that He instructs Moses to throw into the water, making it sweet.  God then rebukes the Israelites for their fickle lack of trust, and in essence, says that their response showed that they were no more loyal to him than the Egyptians.  The path of the Egyptians, when followed, would lead no doubt to the same end that the Egyptians met (and all who take the path away from God will meet): finding themselves somehow on the opposite side of the battle line from a God who is King and will be King whether they disagree or not.

Scene change!  The Israelites are brought to a place described as pure rest.  Palm trees and water springs.  Interesting.

You're a rich person.  In Egypt, that pretty much meant you weren't a slave.  You wake up.  It's been a week or so since those Hebrew slaves left, and a week or so since Egypt has stopped being pelted by terrible curses.  You walk out your front door and see all the fields and livestock that had been destroyed.  Someone is going to have to clean all this up and replant crops.  Someone is going to have to do some work around here.  Where'd all those slaves go?  What happened to them and their god?  I wonder if that really was a god or not, now.  Probably just some run of really bad and bizarre luck, right?  Well that run of bad luck seems to have stopped now.  I don't even know how to plant those crops, and those slaves were much better at keeping the livestock together than I would ever be.  We were stupid to let those people go.  If we've got any wits left, we'd better go catch those rebellious slaves before they get too far away, or before we'd have to do this crap work ourselves.

The Israelites, on the other hand, seem to have forgotten that God is with them.  That sounds so terrible to say, like they're such bad people.  Personally, maybe God hasn't completely smitten my enemies with wrath and vengeance, and also probably I haven't been forced into soul-sucking human slave traffic either.  Still, somehow, I forget God is with me.  Every day.  I guess it's more common than I thought, and still probably as bad a tendency as I thought — just I've got fingers pointing back to me too.

Key points from this chapter:

v10:  they saw the Egyptians, and feared greatly
v14:  the Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent
v25:  the Egyptians said, Let us flee from before Israel, for the LORD fights for them against the Egyptians.

"I think Jesus' primary metaphor for the mystery of transformation is the sign of Jonah (Matt. 16:4, 12:39, Luke 11:29). This sign has taken on a great significance for me. In Luke's Gospel passage in which Jesus tells us, 'It is an evil and adulterous generation that wants a sign' (Luke 11:49), he then says the only sign he will give us is the sign of Jonah. As a good Jew, Jesus knew the graphic story of Jonah the prophet, who was running from God and was used by God almost in spite of himself. Jonah was swallowed by the whale and taken where he would rather not go. This was Jesus' metaphor for death and rebirth. Think of all the other signs, apparitions, and miracles that religion looks for and seeks and even tries to create. But Jesus says it is an evil and adulterous generation that looks for these things. That's a pretty hard saying. He says instead we must go inside the belly of the whale for a while. Then and only then will we be spit upon a new shore and understand our call. That's the only pattern Jesus promises us. . . .

"We seldom go freely into the belly of the beast. Unless we face a major disaster like the death of a friend or spouse or loss of a marriage or job, we usually will not go there. As a culture, we have to be taught the language of descent. That is the great language of religion. It teaches us to enter willingly, trustingly into the dark periods of life. These dark perods are good teachers. Religious energy is in the dark questions, seldom in the answers. Answers are the way out, but that is not what we are here for. But when we look at the questions, we look for the opening to transformation. Fixing something doesn't usually transform us. We try to change events in order to avoid changing ourselves. We must learn to stay with the pain of life, without answers, without conclusions, and some days without meaning. That is the path, the perilous dark path of true prayer."

Thanks to onehouse for the link

The first thing that stands out to me is the repeated reference to God's strength.  The whole Exodus process was clearly evidence to the new nation of Israel that their God was strong.  Stronger than Pharaoh or any of the gods their surrounding Egyptians worshiped.

The second thing that I saw within the story was the way they were told to respond to their redemption.  In the Exodus-plagues-Egypt account, Israel was never necessarily "innocent" or "good".  They were simply the descendants of Jacob (Israel) who lived with his sons in Egypt over 400 years ago, and were forced into slavery.  They knew that they had an ancestor, and about his God, but it seems that is about it.  God accomplished several things through the plagues.  First, he clearly delineated this new people group.  Israel.  They were to follow Him.  Second, he proves to Egypt and to Israel that He is, in fact, the only God worth worshiping, and that He makes the rules.  Israel needed to see it just as bad as Egypt, if not more.  They just happen to have obeyed when God told them to take part in the Passover feast.  Their firstborn were spared, due to God's provision, and their acceptance of that provision.

So if God the Strong spared their firstborn, those firstborn are indebted to Him.  Seems reasonable, right?  Truth be told, the entire nation of Israel belonged to Him since He had rescued them from death and slavery.  But He asked as a testament to His Rescue that they mark their firstborn as unique and special, remembering the salvation of God at this time.  Never forget His Rescue…

We were in terrible slavery, to the point of having our babies killed at birth just because we became feared.

The God who declared us a people brought utter ruin upon our captors in order to save us, not only freeing us, but also declaring Himself as King to the rest of the world.

We are now a people.

In celebration of our identity as His people, we will celebrate the Passover, which reminds us of where we came from, and thus, again, who we now are.

The Lord's final judgement declared that He did not take lightly the slaughter of our children at the hands of our captors.

Those are my thoughts.  Any others?

I've been reading a book lately.  It's called The Strong-willed Child, by James Dobson.  Why I'm reading it notwithstanding, there is this great little section talking about why parenting strong-willed children must be approached with a much stronger will yourself than is perhaps required for other, more compliant children.  He says that strong-willed children need proof that you are worth following, and that you are strong enough to lead them and be trusted with their own trust.  To this end, they will challenge the parents authority, sometimes even 'going for broke' in a fight to see how far you will go before they win.  He describes a fight he had with a strong-willed housepet dog that required him to eventually pin the dog down on the floor and hold him there until the dog quit fighting him.  Once the dog had realized that the authority was real, and strong enough to be the leader, he never 'questioned' the authority again. 

The thought of going for broke in a fight against a child may seem a silly way to talk about the death of every firstborn in a large nation, I know that.  But thinking of God, Egypt, and Israel, let's look at it this way:  God is undisputed King of heaven and earth.  This is at least the claim of the Bible and His own words.  His stated mission is to bring creation back into His Rule/Authority, and continue to restore creation with a people who love and follow Him.  Now… Egypt (and the Egyptians) are still His creation, still in rebellion.  His chosen people, Israel (though for this argument's sake, it doesn't matter if they're chosen) are seeking to worship and follow Him, but are held back by their slavery to Egypt.  Egypt then, in blatant disregard for the human dignity and respect for God's creation, begins to slaughter Israelite baby boys, in a simple effort to reduce the number of Israelites.  This is Egypt is full-out rebellion against God, and they are willing to use every weapon at their disposal to continue in their own way, now to the extreme harm of others.  Starting slowly, God begins revealing that He is the King, and noone else that Egypt trusts in is, to more and more deep and painful degrees.  But it seems Egypt is willing to bet it all to get God to give in.  And, like any parent who gives up the right to be the strength in their house, God would lose Egypt back to their idolatry and evil, having not done everything in His power to save them.  And, worse, He would have not saved Israel, who from a standpoint of social justice, were innocent victims of Egypt's evil.

In talking with a friend of mine about this, he suggested that some have asked why not just kill Pharaoh's son, and spare the others.  He also gave the answer that while Pharaoh was considered a 'god', issues revolving around simply him would imply 'god'-issues.  For example, Pharaoh's son died because the gods were angry with Pharaoh, in some god-level dispute.  In this situation, however, Pharaoh is proved as impotent as even the lowest in Egypt, removing the possibility that he may be a diety himself.

There's also the aspect of the whole Exodus that gives hints of specifically Egyptian redemption.  We may return to this in a later post for further detail, but since the book of Exodus was written to highlight specifically the intervention of God on behalf of Israel to free them from their captors, the captors themselves don't get much airtime, especially as it pertains to their being freed as well.  But there are hints that perhaps God was working in all the hearts that were inclined to hear Him, not just among Israel.