TELLING THE STORY: SHARING THE GOOD NEWS OF JESUS




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GEMS FROM JEREMIAH (38) A Tale of Two Sisters

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“I will not punish your daughters when they play the whore,     nor your daughters-in-law when they commit adultery; for the men themselves go aside with whores,     and sacrifice with temple prostitutes; thus a people without understanding comes to ruin. Though you play the whore, O Israel,     do not let Judah become guilty.” (Hosea 4.14-15)   “The Lord said to me in the days of King Josiah: Have you seen what she did, that faithless one, Israel, how she went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and played the whore there? And I thought, “After she has done all this she will return to me”; but she did not return, and her false sister Judah saw it. She saw that for all the adulteries of that faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away with a decree of divorce; yet her false sister Judah did not fear, but she too went and played the whore. Because she took her whoredom so lightly, she polluted the land, committing adultery with stone and tree. Yet for all this he
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A 40-DAY JOURNEY WITH THE KING: Lenten reflections from Mark’s Gospel (5)

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“A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him, “If you choose, you can make me clean .”   Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, “I do choose. Be made clean !” Immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean .   (Mk. 1.40-42)      Along with exorcisms, Jesus performs many healings of various physical ailments in the early chapters of Mark’s Gospel.   Jesus’ first healing is that of Simon’s mother-in-law (1.29-31).   With the restoration of the leper, we begin to understand the meaning of Jesus’ healings (and exorcisms).   The thrice-repeated word “clean” in the above passage reveals what is truly going on when the King restores the members of the people of God to wholeness.   Leprosy rendered its victim “unclean”, i.e., it proscribed that person from participation in the life of the community, of both civil society and the worship/liturgical life of the people (cf. Lev. 13).   In the Hebrew Scriptures, as well as
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Mark's Gospel as sequel: Understanding the Backstory, part IV: David (2)

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       To fully understand Mark’s “sequel” to the Scriptures of Israel, we need to look at 7 previous “episodes”, 7 OT characters who shed light on what Mark is saying about John the Baptist and Jesus in chapter 1.   The third character from the “original story” is David .   In 2 Samuel 7.8-16, we have the story of the founding of the Davidic covenant – God’s promise that there would always be a descendant of David on the throne of Jerusalem, forever .   It repeats the key features of God’s covenant with Abraham, which “gave birth to” the people of God (cf. Gn. 12.1-3).   God promises David three things: a great name, that Israel will be “planted” securely (cf. Jer. 1.10) in the Promised Land, and an everlasting line of descendants upon his throne (2 Sam. 7.8-13).   The wider context – and play on words – is that David had recently expressed his desire to the prophet Nathan to construct a “house” (i.e., Temple) for Yahweh (2 Sm. 7.1-3).   God replies that, in fact, he will construct a
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