And I Hear You Got A New Man, He's Like A New Age Hippie and He's Rollin' in the Money

My mom often tells me that because of man’s sinful nature and our actions from that nature God is more saddened by us then anything.  Sure he loves us eternally and is occasionally proud on top of that, but more often than not I do think he is saddened by us.  In our journey through Exodus in class I came across Exodus 32 where Moses takes his time on the mountain with God and the people get anxious and impatient because of it and ask Aaron to build them a golden image for them to worship, because let’s be honest that is what we all do when we get bored, which is sad to say because I do not mean that entirely sarcastic.  They want a new God, one that works on their time scale and who is right there for them at all times, even after all God has done for them!  I have to go back to Genesis 6: 6 where God regretted making man and was saddened by that.  So I have to think that every time the Hebrews mess up and they mess up often and usually big at that, i.e. there are no little screw ups with them, God is more sad than anything.  There has to be that immense annoyance factor for God to have these people he has created, whom he has set apart, and taken care of every step of the way go the opposite direction of him and his ways.  Everything they have asked for he has given them; food, freedom, water, homes, family, kids, etc.  So in this immense sadness I have to say is it any wonder to us that God takes the actions he does when these things take place.  Should it be any surprise to us that he floods the whole Earth, that he makes the Hebrews wonder 40-80 years in the desert, put them in exile, etc.  As a half-Jew I often hear and recognize the question “why us” especially in recent history with the Holocaust and even more recent with just the everyday normal non-ending violence that occurs in Israel and I won’t say God was and/or is the cause of all of that.  But I will say that I would not be surprised if he were.  I suppose the only people who could really sympathize with God in this matter on any level at all are parents.  You have a child and you raise them the “right” way teaching them all that you know to be “good” and at times they go the complete opposite way from what they know and what you taught them.  The agony, anger, disappointment, annoyance is all there for parents.  I almost hate to imagine then that that is infinitely magnified within God as we are his creations.  It is more so than birth for him, for he brought us out of nothing and molded us and shaped us, made us who we are and for us to rebel against that in whatever way we might has got to be pure anguish, among other things, for him.  I literally do not think that we could ever even begin to get close to knowing or understanding such a practically almost depthless sadness.  More so I do not think I ever want to know such sadness.

Kalos Elpis

Kelly M. Doolittle

Big God, Little god

In Exodus 23:32-33 there is reference to other gods as there is throughout the Old Testament as I am sure you have noticed if you have been reading at all.   In Sunday school we were always taught that the Jews believed in just God alone and no others, sure they would stray from time to time and build a golden calf or two, but for the most part it was just God, right?  Well apparently not.  Polytheism was rampant in ways I do not think that we can begin to imagine.  This is weird for me.  On the one hand in Genesis you have “we made man in our image” with God speaking pluraly and these polytheism beliefs would buy very well into the theory of “divine council” as part of that plurality in God’s language.  But that is what troubles me I suppose.  There is always mention of other gods, but the Jews and God almost speak as though these gods actually exist, like they acknowledge their existence and it just so happens that God is far and above all of those in comparison.  Okay fine, but then God loosely takes on a Zeus like role or more closely to home in Exodus a Ra like role in that sure all these other gods exist but they are far below and subject ultimately to God.  I think God ultimately proves to us that these gods don’t exist with the whole scene in I Kings 18 with Elijah and the priests of Baal and God’s continual defeat in other “competitions” against other so-called “gods”, but the Jews continue to have this language of the pluralness of all the gods and then God!  I have no real answer for this other than maybe that it just took them so long to transition into just One God and really they never got out of that transition until long after the fact as we see that the Jews have continual boats with other idols and gods.  Is it more comfortable to rely on made up gods?  Do these gods actually exist or better yet what is the people’s understanding of a “god”?  It is common for man to see another man do something miraculous or amazing, even unexplainable and see that as “god-like” and from that begin to worship them or even look up to the sky and see the massive thing of fire that we call the sun and say something so immense and powerful has to be a god itself.  If this then is the case then that would absolutely simplify and explain why they speak as though these other gods exist.  It, like many things is a still mystery ultimately though.  I guess my only real point that you can take home with you is that the Jews of the Old Testament were not as monotheistic as we all thought they were.  I still love my Sunday school teachers though ha ha.

Kalos Elpis

Kelly M. Doolittle

God-Size

“’And the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, when I stretch forth my hand upon Egypt and bring out the people of Israel from among them.’” (Exodus 7:5).  “’but for this purpose have I let you live, to show you my power, so that my name may be declared throughout all the earth.’” (Exodus 9:16)  Often when we start a new book in class Dr. Reid will ask many of us what we thought was the most important part or text in that particular book; our book this time being Exodus.  In thinking about my answer to this question I really have to say that to me the most important part of Exodus is the whole ten plagues episode.  It is not the actual plagues themselves that I find to be most important, but rather the power behind them.  Up until this point God does some pretty miraculous things, creation alone is awe-inspiring for lack of better word, but here in Exodus we have a different showing of his power in that this is destructive rather than constructive as Creations was.  We do have the episode of Sodom and Gomorrah’s destruction and the Flood, but they were, I don’t want to say less, but less graphically described.  We get this sense after the Flood that God’s destructive powers are held at bay so to speak, or maybe we just get the sense that they won’t be released again that we have moved beyond the bad times so to speak, the worst is over.  Then you have this whole stream of miracles set altogether one after the other from Exodus Ch. 7 to Ch. 11.  It of course stretches past that, but it is the plagues episode which concerns me most today.  God wants his people let go and Pharaoh refuses and so each time he refuses he sends a different plague.  There are the frogs, water into blood, darkness, bugs, death of livestock, crazy hail, boils, and of course the ever lively death of the first-born children.  All of these things took place in the matter of days.  Then in all of this God “hardens pharaoh’s heart” which could be said that God made the decision for Pharaoh, God put the thought on his mind, God whispered very loudly in Pharaoh’s ear; however you want to take it, God’s power is at work.  Power!  To me it really speaks to how much power God really does have, he can literally do whatever he wants and not have to have explanation behind the matter.  You’ll notice it does not say why God hardened Pharaoh’s heart it just says he does.  That thought is sometimes hard to grapple with that God can do whatever he wants but I really believe it to its fullest extent and beyond, at least as far as my mind can carry such an infinitesimal thought.  It is funny to me how many times I ask people do they really believe God can do anything and they will of course say yes at first, but then I ask the question again with heavy emphasis put on the word “anything” and then a slow “but . . .” will follow or they’ll say “yes, but he can’t . . .”, or “he’s not allowed to . . .” and you can well imagine what can be filled in the blanks here.  So one has to really question what they think God can and cannot do and then really question their thoughts on believing that God can do anything and how much they really believe that.  For me the Plagues and really the whole Exodus itself just affirms to me that God can and will do anything.  I used the two verses above to show maybe if for no other reason God did all of this to show you that just in case you forgot he is God or even if you had your doubts about that fact.  Some might say this then is saying that God is merely flexing his chest, his muscles so to speak and if so, oh well, it is his prerogative to do so if for no other reason than that he is God.  I do not think this is the case as a certain situation brought about these courses of actions; God did not just randomly come outside look to the Egyptians and say, “hmm I think I’ll throw some plagues their way for the fun it”, no, rather there was incitement involved.  We want to pretend that God won’t notice or chooses to ignore us when we turn the other way, but he does notice and he will use whatever is in his power to get our attention, it just so happens to be that that power is beyond infinite.  The phrase “lest you forget” used so many times throughout the bible comes to mind.  And so I am attempting to not forget anytime soon as boils do not sound appealing to me ha ha.    

Kalos Elpis

Kelly M. Doolittle

Deadly Forgetfulness

“At a lodging place on the way the LORD met him and sought to kill him.   Then Zipporah took a flint and cut off her son's foreskin, and touched Moses' feet with it, and said, "Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me!"   So he let him alone. Then it was that she said, "You are a bridegroom of blood," because of the circumcision.”  (Exodus 4:24 -26).  Here we have what Dr. Reid calls a “huh” verse something we look at and wonder to its meaning but really don’t have a plausible answer, just a lot of guess work, which to be honest are my absolute favorite verses to read and look at, maybe it is the mystery that gets to me, who knows.  But really in context to what else is going on in Exodus this is almost assuredly just randomly thrown in there to someone just passing through Exodus’ text.  You know, here we are hopping along getting ready to lead the Jews out of Egypt miraculously and boom! All of suddenly God comes swooping in to kill Moses!  I mean really where did that come from?  As I read it over and over I got the feeling that there is a stronger meaning to it than just randomness.  They are literally gearing up to leave Egypt, that is the Jews, in dramatic fashion and with God’s help to set out on their own to establish themselves as a nation.  In this there has to be a preparedness for the people, but even more so there has to be a remembrance of who they are so they can boldly set out on their own and at the same time know who they belong to, that being God and no one else.  Apparently, Moses’ child is not circumcised and this above all else is what physically sets the Jews apart and reminds them of the covenant that they made with God.  I don’t really think God set out to kill Moses just for the fun of it, to prove he could, or just on a random whim.  I believe it was to send this message of making sure that all of the people, especially including Moses and his family who would be leading the Jews, knew who they are and know who they belonged to; circumcision being a reminder of both of those things.  So God swoops in to kill Moses one night and Zipporah’s only response is to immediately circumcise her and Moses’ child and once she does, making a dramatic scene of it as she does, God leaves them be and the story just keeps a rolling along as it did prior to this little episode.  Very very interesting set of verses.  Logically one would have to look at Zipporah’s response to maybe see where this is all going, but of course, it is just guess work.  Although God is so not above using very dramatic means to get and keep our attention.  It just seems to me that Moses and all of his household should be as prepared as much as possible in not only leaving Egypt as Jews, but making sure that he and his people and family know who they are, a people set apart; a people circumcised in their being set apart.  The more and more I read and reread these set of three verses I get this very powerful feeling about it; about remembering who I am and what I am supposed to be doing.

Kalos Elpis

Kelly M. Doolittle

The Problem of Stew

There is in Genesis 25 the interesting story of Jacob and Esau, Esau being born first and Jacob closely following that. However, towards the end of that chapter in v. 27 through v. 34 is what I want to discuss, where Esau comes inside from a long day of hunting while Jacob has been inside all day making stew or soup if you prefer. Esau is apparently starving and asks Jacob to give him some of the stew, Jacob will do so but only if Esau promises him Esau’s birthright. Esau thinks that’s nothing in comparison to his hunger and easily gives up his birthright to Jacob just like that. Now Esau being the first born gives him all the rights to the family’s fortune as it were and so one could see why Jacob might want that, at least in the sense of having the prestige probably rather than the actual physical inheritance, because let’s face it Isaac and Rebekah (Jacob’s and Esau’s parents) were most likely not wealthy people. Even unto this day, admittedly less so now than then, the Jewish people still hold the first born as of great importance at least that is what I know from my family. More than anything we are not rich so it is the prestige of the title of being the first born male that matters to us; essentially as that you are the man of the house so to speak and get all of the rights and privileges that go along with that. This is what Esau was . . . the first born. And wow, what a monumental disastrous choice that was to throw it away so easily. You’ll notice that when God is speaking to Moses later on in Exodus that he says his name is “I am” and he goes on to say that he is the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. You will clearly notice that God does not say that he is the “God of Jacob and Esau” and I think that is because God recognized how freely and easily Esau gave something so important away for next to nothing. We would all like to think of ourselves as Jacob in this matter, but I have to say that we as a society are far more like Esau more often than not. Looking around it is sad to see how much we will give up for so very little, simply because like Esau we have to have things right now and because of that incessant need of “right now” we believe that whatever we want is more important than what we already have regardless of what it might be. We note a little after this incident that Jacob and Rebekah together deceitfully trick Esau’s blessing away from him, but here there is no trickery involved. Jacob merely asks if Esau will give up his birthright and Esau concedes to do so, having also the easy choice of saying no at the same time. That fact makes this story sadder and as stated it is something we do every day ourselves. Of course, one could land on the side of the Starvation argument. And many who do not know starvation can easily say they would not give up something of such great importance, but when you are starving hungry you are willing to give up a lot of things including what is most important to you. I do not believe Esau was starving, I just think he was really hungry, because starving negates not eating anything for a very very very long time almost to the point of death and I do not believe that was the case for Esau, especially since he was a supposed skilled hunter. Regardless he did choose the stew and gave what was possibly most important to Jacob. So then I wonder if we will possibly learn one day for ourselves that the stew is just not worth it, despite that we might be hungry for something further and have the means to get it. Can you be happy with the greatness you do have or do you still want more, is your hunger still not satisfied? Just remember it’s only stew . . . .

Kalos Eplis

Kelly M. Doolittle

"If Tommorrow Wasn't Such A Long Time, Then A Long Time Would Mean Nothing At All To Me"

Apologies for the last blog, there were way too many spelling and capitalization errors. My “a” button on my computer gets stuck often as does the shift key and well I’m not the greatest speller, but I promise it is fixed for this time around. My subject today is something that is far more uplifting than the last time I wrote to you, but I am sure it will come across as a sermon and if so, oh well. There is in Genesis Ch. 24 a story that I think we often skip over or don’t put too much thought into. Abraham asks one of his servants to find Isaac (Abraham’s son) a wife from Abraham’s hometown and to definitely not get a wife from the Canaanites whatever he does. I’ll get to the rest of the story as we move along. Now for many of us there are so many times in our lives that we really don’t think God is doing anything for us specifically, that is to say for the individual. Things are happening to groups and other people around us, but what about “me”, we will often ask. We pray and pray and we don’t seem to get an answer and we will take that as God is not listening or is too busy elsewhere; he is anywhere but presiding over us at the time in other words. So I must say that on the topic of theology I personally do not believe that all of our footsteps are mapped out for us and I am a firm adherent to actual free will, but with that being said I wholeheartedly believe that God still points us in the right direction and it is up to us whether we take that direction or not. Abraham wakes up one morning and sends his servant off to find his son a wife, which if you think about it is a daunting task for anyone, that is to say, finding a lifelong significant other in one day’s time or at least at a moment’s notice is almost outrageous if I am really honest in my thinking. When something like that is launched into our lives a bit of panic will most likely set in. But of course the servant finds Rebekah (miraculously speaking if we really think about it) and of course she is the perfect woman for Isaac and lo and behold they later get married. In all of this it is undoubtedly safe to say that I do not think that the servant woke up that morning thinking “hmm I’m going to find my master’s son a wife today” and Rebekah upon waking up was most likely not thinking “hmm I’m going to get a husband today”. It is during these times when we don’t expect anything to happen or don’t think God is doing anything that he will often do something. Is it always earth-shattering revelations, no, but there is this sense that we need to have that even when we think God is doing nothing he is doing something. As previously stated it is hard for all of us single people to accept this at face value in terms of finding a significant other, we literally do not wake up in the morning and say “You know I bet Abraham has sent his servant to find me a spouse today”, but also as previously stated Rebekah nor the servant were probably expecting what happened to them at all. Free will is everything to us and maybe that is why we so often think God is “doing nothing”, but the fact of the matter for us is that even though we have the free will God is pointing out the right direction all the time and so it then becomes a matter of will we use that free will to follow God’s way or go it on our own in the other directions that are also laid out before us at every turn. I do see this instance in Genesis 24 as a miracle and so can you and I be patient enough and actually realize that whether we think it or not, God is doing something!




Kalos Elpis



Kelly M. Doolittle

Oh Brother Where Art Thou

Typing to the wolrd wide web is not new to me, but blogging is.  It is part of a semi-requirement of a grad school class lovingly called Scriptures I, catchy title I know.  In this blog I will  discuss deep thoughts on things we read and discussed in class.  So, here goes.  In reading Genesis ch. 4 we come across a well known passage in the telling of Cain and Abel.  For those who don't know the story, here's a quick recap.  It comes time to give God an offering and Cain who toils in the field all day brings God something from the field, while Abel is a shephered and brings God one of his animals as an offering.  God picks Abel's offering over Cain's and in Cain's distress over the matter he kills his own brother, Abel.  It is a very quick and precise story, but there are so many things here to discuss as I quickly discovered in class today, but I won't go into all of that.  Rather I want to stick with one subject and that is the matter of brother killing brother.  This we find is something that is far more reaching to us usually than a random murder or act of violence.  For a brother to raise arm against brother is something so intense and diliberate that it echoes with us far after we have expereinced it, read about it, or heard about it.  We have to but look into history's pages on warfare to find that some of the bloodiest, most violent, and often longest wars are ones atributed to so-called brothers.  We turn chiefly to our own American history to see the Civil War and albeit these were not literal blood borthers, the implication is there; countrymen against countrymen, for even though the Confedrate States of America had declared themselves independent they were still americans, notice how america is still at the end of their offcial title.  Yet we lost more people in that war combined than almost all the other wars we have fought in since, this of course is being erased as history moves on, but the loss there was tremendous and it was americans against americans.  Or how about we turn to something more closer to home for me as I am half jewish; the palestinian-israli conflict.  It is sad to say even the title of this ongoing fight, there have been so many different battles and wars amongst generally the same people that it is now just generally reffered to as a "conflict".  Religously speaking I do not think there could be closer brothers, one being Jewish and the other being Islamic (speaking broadly of course) and Jews trace back to Isaac while Islam trace back to Ishmael who are both sons of abraham and whom we both claim as the father to our religion.  Yet there is not a longer more violent ongoing, ceasingly never-ending conflict than ours.  Even something that Dr. Reid said today struck me when he mentioned that oprressed communities so often kill each other far more than they do so-called outsiders and that really never occured to me significantly until he said that and I realized that that had been my experience with such places and communities as well.  So then why do brothers raise hands against one another and often so violently?  I think maybe more often than not it is because we are so close, maybe too close.  We know each other's deslikes and likes, our short comings, our buttons and in the little things that we do to one another may go on being ignored at the time, but we store them up in us always becuase it was our family and one day that just spills out into this violence, at least it does for some.  Maybe more than anything in this cain/abel context it expresses to us just how real sin is in our lifes.  Maybe when sin first entered into human's lives we really didn't have this undersdtanding of how detremental it is and can be and we acted accordingly with no regard until one day when we weren't really paying attention it snuck up on us and influenced us to even kill our own family as God so warns in Genesis 4:7 that "Sin couches at the door: its urge is toward you".  So maybe we kill our family becuase we are even too busy and neglectful to notice the sin waiting right around the corner until it is too late.  Something, as always, to pounder.  Sorry for the bleak message, but thought I would share, becuase it struck a chord with me.  With that being said, LOVE YOUR BROTHER!

Kalos, elpis

Kelly M. Doolittle