Sunday, June 26, 2016

DBRP_179 1KI.8 PSA.119.97-112 JHN.6.25-71


Turning to 1KINGS 8:

Yesterday we heard lots and lots of details about the building of the temple. A man from Tyre, Huram, must have been an efficient and artistic technician in working with bronze casting. He corresponds to the two craftsmen who designed and constructed the first tabernacle.

PSALM 119:97-112

Again we are focussing on what God’s Word means to us. A favorite verse from yesterday’s portion is verse 89:
“Your word, O Lord, will last forever; it is eternal in heaven.”

Turning for the second time to JOHN 6:

There is an important play on words between Jesus and the crowd in Capernaum which does not come out clearly in either the NLT or the GNT. It involves the word ‘work’. Observe verses 27-29:

27 Do not work for food that spoils; instead, work for the food that lasts for eternal life. This is the food which the Son of Man will give you, because God, the Father, has put his mark of approval on him.”
28 So they asked him, “What [work] can we do in order to do [the work//what] God wants us to do?”
29 Jesus answered, “[The work//What] God wants you to do is to believe in [me,] the one [whom] he sent.”

The irony captured in this play on words is that normally the act of believing is not considered a ‘work’. In fact, in later NT writings there is a strong contrast between working for salvation vs. believing for salvation. (As we have said before, this is not really a contradiction.) I bring this up to remind us that ‘believing’ is an act of the will. It is something one can choose to do, and therefore it can be called a ‘work’.

Translation notes:
33 PET I am that bread from heaven, because I came down from heaven to give true life to the people in this world.”
46 [PET There is no one who has ever seen the Father except Me, who came from Him. I am the only one who has seen Him.//This does not mean that anyone has seen the Father; [I who have come from God am//he who is from God is] the only one who has seen the Father.]
53 Jesus said to them, “I[— the Son of Man] am telling you the truth: if you do not eat [my/the] flesh [0//of the Son of Man] and drink [my/his] blood, you will not have life in yourselves.
56 Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood live in [union with] me, and I live in [union with] them.
[Another word that might be used is ‘joined to’. We are talking of the kind of union that a branch has with a tree, like in John 15.]
65 And he added, “This is the very reason I told you that [[no one among you//no people] can come to me unless the Father makes it possible for [you//them] to do so.”


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