Week #41 | The Old Testament: "To Be Continued..."

LOOK | WHAT DOES IT SAY?

Read Ezra 9-10; Nehemiah 1-13

THINK | WHAT DOES IT MEAN?

A Cliffhanger in Every Way. The Old Testament has a sense of incompleteness about it. If you end the way the Christian Bible does, with the Prophets, then you are left with predictions of a coming Messiah followed by a period of silence which will last for another 400 years. If you end chronologically, you end with a less-than-ideal description of the people of Israel in the Book of Nehemiah, and a frustrated leader's wish that God would at least remember him for the trouble that he's had to put up with. Then, once again, hundreds of years of silence. A greater rescue is needed, and the return from exile has not brought about the restoration that the prophets have predicted--the fulfillment of those promises must be further in the future. If you end the way that the Jewish Bible -the Tanakh- does, you would actually go back to 1-2 Chronicles after reading Ezra and Nehemiah, and end with the capture and burning of Jerusalem, and a small note on Cyrus' decree allowing Israel to return to the land. Either way you end, reading the Old Testament on its own has the frustrating incompleteness of a book series or TV show that was really good, only to be stopped suddenly and never added on to. Getting to the end, you have a sense of thinking, "What? That can't be the end. I want to know how this ends!" And that's where, after a 400 year silence between Malachi and Matthew, the New Testament picks things up.

Behind the Scenes of the Old Testament. The story of Nehemiah is actually fascinating for many of the details that it doesn't share. The Samaritan Temple was being built at the same time that Nehemiah was building his wall, and Sanballat was attempting to set up a rival center of worship to God which had references to Jerusalem and to David's throne -and thus to all of the Old Testament aside from the first five books of the Bible- cut out, as that would have taken away from his own center of power which was at Samaria. Nehemiah's struggle was to preserve the revelation given to Judah through David and the Histories and the Prophets against a collection of false versions of Yahweh-worship led by Sanballat's coalition. Eventually, Sanballat's innovations turned into the Samaritan religion, which still lasts up to today as a tiny remnant (though in Nehemiah's day, it would have been by far the bigger group). In addition, Nehemiah's Wall is still visible through archaeology, which shows that it was constructed hastily and in sections, with some sections being put together more roughly, and others having a little more care put into them. The Elephantine Letters in Egypt also act as a sort of follow-up to the Book of Nehemiah 20 years later, and they reveal that by that time Jerusalem had been sending teachers out to the exiles to instruct them in Jewish law, meanwhile at home Jehohanan had become the High Priest and Sanballat was still governor of Samaria alongside his two sons (Nehemiah, by then, is no longer present in Jerusalem). Nehemiah's Reforms became vitally important for preserving the witness of the Histories and the Prophets, which testify to the hope of the Messiah, though he likely did not understand how important his role would be during his lifetime.

The Next 400 Years. Over the next 400 years, Israel would pass from the Persians to the Greeks during the time of Alexander the Great. After Alexander died, his kingdom was split four ways to his generals, and Israel kept changing hands from the Ptolemies centered in Egypt, to the Seleucids centered in Syria. One of the Seleucid kings, Antiochus Epiphanes IV, was particularly despicable, and violently persecuted the Jews in an attempt to wipe out their religion and turn them into Greeks. This didn't work, and as the apocryphal -but still valuable- book of 1 Maccabees recounts, the Jewish people were miraculously able to drive out the Seleucid Syrian Greeks, and win back not only Jerusalem and the Temple, but also their own independent kingdom of Israel. To celebrate this event they brought in a new Feast of Dedication, known today as Hannukah (the Hebrew word for "dedication"), which Jesus himself celebrated in John 10:22-23. This kingdom of Israel enjoyed its own independence for over 100 years, eventually gaining more territory than the kingdom had even under David and Solomon, until the Romans under Julius Caesar subjugated it again in 63 BC. The Jewish people, at the time when the New Testament opens, are therefore resentful of the Romans and still harboring visions of rebelling against them as they did against the Syrian Greeks, to get their kingdom back. They are hoping that the promised Messiah will be the one to drive out the Romans and bring the kingdom back to Israel. That audience is going to be highly interested, then, when Jesus arrives doing signs and miracles, and speaking about the Kingdom of God. But his kingdom is not an earthly kingdom. And his purpose will be more than just the restoration of one nation...

DO | HOW DO WE RESPOND?

How can we respond in our worship, attitude, and actions? I won't lay out exact responses in this space because the possibilities are often endless. But it is worth it to think about application in the categories of worship, attitude, and actions. Does this reading direct me to God in worship and thanksgiving and praise, or does it direct me towards a change that I need to make here and now? If it's about a change that I need to make, is this something inward in my attitude, or outward in my actions? This helps to rescue application from just being a series of how-to tips, or one-size-fits-all instructions that go beyond what the Bible actually states. Sometimes, the most helpful application we can make is to get a different perspective on what's the most important thing, or about how we should respond inwardly to the things going on around us.

PRAY | HOW DOES THIS BRING US TO GOD?

Whether in response to anything pointed out here, or to something else in your Bible reading time, take a few moments before you close up your Bible to pray in response to God. If you need a format for prayer, both the ACTS (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication), CALL (Confess, Ask, Love, Listen), and PRAY (Praise, Repent, Ask, Yield) methods are helpful ways to stay consistent.

-Sean