Roald Dahl

Is to this day one of my favorite authors. This quote comes from The Twits if memory serves me correctly. :) I agree with this statement to the utmost, as well as its juxtaposition. I have seen scores of beautiful people who have ugly souls, and it's almost as if the souls corrode the natural beauty.

Moses

So for my Old Testament class, I have a week to read the book of Exodus and write an extensive paper on it. C'est la vie. I've read  through the book before, but everytime I reread Scripture, I believe there's something new I a) haven't seen, b) couldn't be applied in a previous season or c) just never understood.

I noticed something that I haven't seen before. I always thought of Moses kinda as this mighty guy plowing through the desert for many years, and had this gnarly beard, super weathered and tan by the heat, and kinda this Einstein hair do going on.

But I just went through Exodus 6 and saw Moses as a younger man, okay 83 but still young-ish ;), and he's kinda a hot mess. God showed up to this kid in a burning bush and totally commanded Him to free the Hebrews, and Moses saw all these signs that the Lord was powerful and mighty; God gave Moses leprosy, and took it away. The burning bush did not phsyically burn itself, on and on. And Moses is commissioned to go on behalf of the Lord, but in 6:12, 30 Moses says the same thing "Behold, I am of uncircumcised lips. How will Pharaoh listen to me?"

Okay, there's a few things to unpack here. First, Moses was uncircumcised. In Genesis, the Lord made a covenant with Abraham saying to circumcise the males on the eighth day, so as to show they belonged to the Lord. Now, we know Moses was brought up by the Pharaoh and he wasn't sent off until about three months old (Ex. 2:2) and he wasn't circumcised. He was already in hiding, so it may be his parents were not practicing Jews, or they were partially practicing, or they just didn't want to draw attention to themselves. Anyways, God used someone uncircumcised, which was a big deal back in the day. Also, Moses has the confidence of a jr. high girl when he's flipping 83 years old. Lastly, he is arguing with the Lord of Lords about going.

So onwards and upwards to application:
-Moses was a hot mess, who had some serious self-doubts and worries.
-Moses didn't necessarily have the traditional "qualifications" that other Hebrew people had.
-Moses had a sketchy criminal record (Ex 2:11-12)
-Moses found answers to his self doubt in the Lord (Ex 7:1-8)

Now, looking at the track record. Moses had it just about as together as I do, which is not much. But the Lord threw away the conventionality of what people may think of a servant of the Lord as, and used someone who was willing, hesitant, but willing. God could have done it Himself and just used Pegasus to arilift the children of Israel to the promised land, or He could have used angels who wouldn't have wrestled with God, but God used hot mess, stuttering, unconfident Moses.

There's a Christian cliche of "God does not call the equipped, He equips the called." But the more and more I dig into the Bible, I realize that these heroes of the faith were just as jacked-up, pock-marked, and messed up as I am. They had their self-doubts, their worries, whatever junk was in their trunk, but they were willing.

I know God has a plan for me, and I'm trying to prepare my heart so if He calls me beyond my comfort zone, I am ready to respond.

And then Moses threw the tablets to the ground. No really, he did (Ex. 32:19) ;) 

Watch below if you don't get the joke. :) 

Psyche & Eros

Psyche&Eros is one of my favorite myths, it literally translates to heart and soul. 

I am in a Biblical Interpretation & Spiritual Formation class. It's a fancy way to say the point of the class is  to discover the best way to study the Bible and commentaries, and how to work with the sanctification process. 

This week, we had a class with dual topics. Many people may think they are not intertwined, but especially after this week I beg to differ. The topics were of the heart and of the mind. 

The mind focused on how we believe what we believe, and how our actions show if we truly believe what we say we do. The heart focused on how the Bible says our hearts are in their natural state. 

Some things the Bible says about the heart: 

-It guides our lives (Proverbs 4:23) 

-It is deceitfully wicked (Jeremiah 17:19) 

-We are to trust the Lord with all of it (Proverbs 3:5-6) 

One of the most interesting things I read was by J.P. Moreland I believe, and it said loosely, "The heart controls the life, but our minds control our hearts." 

I think sometimes we get fluttered into the Disney whims of "Follow your heart." Don't get me wrong, I love my Disney, but the Bible is saying our hearts are wicked. 

What the learned men I was gleaning wisdom from were saying is Trust your heart, BUT take your mind with you.

When logos and pathos are intertwined, they become intrepid. There is a balance to everything, and logos and pathos are no different. 

Sometimes we need a new perspective; I'm mostly black and white, but I love talking to people who are more gray. I'm more logos weighted, but some people I love dearly are more pathos weighted. And we compliment each other, them giving me passion, and heart; and I giving them more reason.