11…THERE COMES A GREAT FLOOD
                                             (Based on Genesis 5-10. Read more there.)

"What's that pretty bow up there in the sky?" someone once asks. We know a rainbow is light being broken up into colours we can see, but long ago people watch & wonder at the beauty but don’t understand how it comes about. Well, one day, it begins to rain. And it keeps on raining. There is rain, rain, & still more rain. Until it becomes a great flood. There's water all over the earth. Many people can't find higher ground to escape to & drown. The ancient story-teller tells us it rains for 'forty days & forty nights', a term they often use to mean 'quite some time’. Weeks, months, maybe, the way we tell time. Many peoples throughout the whole world have stories about a great flood. Some think this may mean the human race has somehow stored such an ancient & wide-spread flooding in its 'corporate memory', a bit like a computer saves work in its 'memory'. None of this uncertainty stops the Great Flood from being a Great Story! But don't take it too literally, will you! 

In the days the story comes from, people believe the earth is flat like a plate, covered by a great dome preventing water up above the sky from breaking through - except when it rains! Seas & rivers cause an uneasiness that all that water underneath the earth might one day threaten them by overflowing & engulfing the solid land they live on. This old story tries to explain how this great flood comes into being by putting a ‘God-spin’ on it & blames it on people behaving badly. (Remember, we’re hearing these tales from the point of view of the ancestors of the Hebrew people.) By now, People Behaving Badly have become widespread. More so than in some of our earlier stories. Evil is no longer just a personal matter between Adam & Eve, Cain & Abel, & their like.

Rot has been setting in among the whole of society. There is violence everywhere. So much so that people can think of YHWH God being fed up with Bad Goings-On & deciding to teach human beings a lesson by wiping out everybody & everything He’s created & starting all over again. But do bear in mind that later the N.T. makes it clear that idea doesn't sit at all well with the God Jesus embodies, though in very early times it seems a perfectly reasonable explanation to camp-fire questions like, "Why do floods happen?”, “How does God deal with evil?”, & not forgetting, “What's that pretty bow doing up there in the sky?” On a more positive note, the storyteller goes on to explain how God saves one symbolic family so life can start all over again after the flood. A man called Noah lives a good life and pleases God. So God warns Noah to build a rough boat, a raft, actually (despite the inflated dimensions that go with the story). This craft comes to be known as the 'Ark'. Supposedly big enough for Noah to take his family & representatives of the animal kingdom on board so they can ride out the flood & begin life again. (Read the story carefully & we find there's another version of the story, with different arithmetic, embedded in the one we probably know better! We’ll often find stories being interwoven or combined like this - & not always harmonised - as we explore the Scriptures further.) And that's another story: Rainbow Skies

Question: Does the story of Noah raise any issues relevant to today's climate change debate?

 

10...WHERE THERE'S FIRE THERE'S SMOKE
 (Based on GEN 4 & 5. Read more there.)

We're using our imagination to re-tell biblical stories with deep & lasting meaning. Some call them myths, i.e. profoundly though not necessarily literally true, others think of them as parables. Tales of  how everything & everybody begins, & what happens in a garden. Next thing we know, Adam & Eve, who've been put out of Eden for their own good, are having a family. First, a son called 'Cain', which may mean ‘blacksmith’ & then another son they call 'Abel' (which may mean ‘cattle-herder’). Cain tills the ground & needs sharp tools! Growing food for yourself & your family is a very important task. Abel raises sheep & cattle, also important for food & family  & also needs the food Cain grows. One day Cain & Abel have a falling out over offerings they make to YHWH. On stones as an altar Cain burns some of his crops, while Abel burns an animal from his flocks. Somehow Cain thinks God is accepting Abel's offering more than his. Maybe there’s more smoke going up from Abel's animal than Cain's crop! Cain attacks Abel & hits him hard enough to kill him. Then he buries his body. You can’t hide that kind of thing from YHWH, who of course sees what happens. He asks Cain, "Where's your brother?" Cain just shrugs & pretends he doesn't know. He says to God, rather rudely, "I don't know! Am I my brother's keeper?" (That's become a famous saying about not wanting to share responsibility for what's happening to someone else.) YHWH is not impressed! Not at all! He says to Cain, "I can hear your brother Abel's blood crying out to me from the ground!" Then, just as He's already banned Adam & Eve from Eden, now God bans Cain from the land he's been farming. Because he's killed Abel & is trying to shrug it off & cover it up by not admitting to it. Cain becomes a wanderer over the land. God puts some kind of mark on him, maybe a scar on his forehead, or something like that, so people will beware of him. Or, is it to keep Cain safe from others taking further vengeance on him, a mark to indicate YHWH’s already punished him enough by expelling him from his lands? Anyway, in this sad story of two brothers we have a reminder human beings can't always get on with each other, & that many die at the hands of others, even those close to them. In other stories told by our ancient story-tellers, there will be more & more tales about people killing & being killed by each other. All is not well on earth!

Adam and Eve go on to have two more sons, Enoch, then Seth. We're told Adam & Eve later 'have other sons & daughters' too. Back then, disappointingly, no-one bothers to name most of the girls & women in our stories. Though they count in God's eyes, in that patriarchal society their place is to play second fiddle to the menfolk! (When we come to N.T. times, we'll find not much changes despite Jesus' efforts on women’s behalf!)  By the way, because most of the women are left out of the stories people still sometimes ask, "If there are only men in the story, whom did they marry?” The simple answer is, from among the women who've been left out (we might say ‘air-brushed’ out) including from other families & clans who don't ever get into the story either! Truth is, when YHWH creates humankind, He makes us all 'in His own image' [GEN 1:27] which means we’re meant to be so like God people can tell just by looking at us & the way we live that we are God's children. But the tales of Adam & Eve disobeying God in the garden, & then Cain killing Abel, remind us people (including ourselves!) & things don't always turn out to be whom or what God means them to be. It’s quite a bit later that Jesus lives out God's image & shows us how to do the same by loving each other as God does. But that's another story.... Next time: There Came a Great Flood

Question: Do we ever feel God is unfairly treating someone else better than us & feel aggrieved? Where to from there?

9...SNAKES IN THE GRASS, THE REEDS, & ONE ON A POLE!

Let's follow that snake as it slithers away from Adam & Eve & God when He gives it a piece of His mind in GN 3. It's a great example of Biblical story-telling. This ‘snake motif’ also crops up elsewhere in Scripture. Here God is commenting on the fact that human beings do react to the presence of snakes near them. Spelling danger for both. The part the snake plays in the story of The Fall is also the story tellers’ response to feelings & questions human beings associate with snakes. Like, ‘Why are we afraid of snakes?’ or, ‘Why do snakes hurt us, or even kill us?’ The more possibilities in a story the richer & more fruitful that story can become for us. There's a lot more to our snake motif than meets the eye! So let’s take a look at some more connections.

Here in vv.14 & 15 we have what is often referred to as a 'glimmer of a Gospel’. A kind of prophecy in which the snake stands for the evil that will come upon the human race through failing, falling out with God, & also the fate that will befall the Son of God & Humanity, Jesus the Christ. The woman here starts out as Eve, but the motif extends to all women & their offspring, & then to represent Mary the Blessed who gives birth to Jesus. Jesus will be ‘struck on the heel’ by evil, represented by the snake, & dies. But in so doing He ‘bruises the head’ of the ‘snake’ of death in His resurrection.  

Jump to NUM 21: 4-9 & we come across a strange story of fiery (‘poisonous’ in some versions) snakes that threaten the Israelites as they make hard going of their continuing escape from Egypt. As they travel beside the Reed Sea (part of the Gulf of Aqaba, itself connected to the Red Sea) on their way to the Promised Land, the reedy nature of the terrain poses new hardships. It is infested by snakes! The Israelites are in fact travelling through an area anciently rich in copper deposits. Models of snakes made of copper or bronze have been dug up there. Put snakes & copper together & maybe Moses is copying what the locals do, making a snake of copper / bronze to ward off attacks from the real thing! In making the metal snake & setting it up on a pole for people to look up to Moses develops this from just a superstitious practice into a test of faith in YHWH. Emphasising the connection between human ills & God’s will for our healing. (If you ask, ‘Why does God tell Moses to make a copper snake in contradiction of the 2^nd Commandment He’s recently given him?’ that’s a good question. Whether we have a good answer is another matter!) A fascinating comment in 2K18:4 tells us the Israelites keep the snake, known as ‘Nehushtan’, until the reforming King Hezekiah orders its destruction hundreds of years later! 

Looking ahead, into the N.T. this time, we find the story of Moses & the fiery serpent burns deep in Jesus’ soul. We sometimes pass over JN 3: 14-15 in our haste to get to the much loved v.16. But to do this is to miss the vital connection Jesus Himself makes between the story of Moses & the snakes (NUM 21) & His own ‘being lifted up’ on the cross & the healing it will bring to those who ‘look up to Him’. Jesus Himself, the new Moses, also becomes a new 'snake' lifted up on the cross, for the healing (salvation) of those who look up to Him & believe! But that’s another story…. Next time: Where there’s Fire there’s Smoke

8…IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL…PART 2
(Based on GEN 3...For more, read there.)

In the cool of that evening, when YHWH comes walking in the garden looking for His friends Adam & Eve they're feeling so guilty about what they've done that instead of rushing out as usual to take God's hand & walk with Him, they actually hide from Him. Behind a tree. Maybe behind That Tree! YHWH calls out to them, "Adam, where are you? Eve, where are you?" Adam & Eve know deep down the game's up! They are found out! Shamefacedly they come out from behind their cover. Then they begin to make excuses. Their first excuse is they've suddenly realised they were naked & are ashamed to meet God looking like that. But YHWH pounces on what they say. "Mmm..." God says. "Who's been telling you you're naked?" Oh, I know! You've been eating fruit from That Tree I warned you not to touch, haven't you? From the Tree of the Knowledge of Good & Evil? That's why you're seeing yourselves so differently, isn't it? Seeing Me differently, too, no doubt! What on earth made you do it?" Now as well as leading them to tell whoppers, one of the other things the fruit from That Tree has done is make Adam & Eve cunning! Not very nice to each other any more. So Adam tries to pass the buck to Eve. He says to God, "She made me do it!" Now Adam would never have said that kind of thing about Eve before, but now things are different. When God turns to Eve, she blushes & doesn't know what to say, but just then she happens to catch sight of a snake slithering through the grass. If Adam can pass the buck, so can she. Quick as a flash she says to God, "That snake tricked me into doing it." Well! YHWH is flabbergasted! He knows things will be bad once they eat that fruit, but this bad? Just in case, God says some pretty harsh words to the snake that make it slither away as fast as it can, but God is so hurt by what Adam & Eve have done, so hurt He can't trust them now, He tells Adam & Eve they can't live in Eden any more. Life won't be so good & enjoyable, all fun & games any more. Because they've chosen to do what they want instead of what God wants, God knows they won't enjoy living there any more anyhow. So He sends them off to find somewhere else to live, though He knows they won't find things so easy. You know, God is really more upset than Adam & Eve are! Then, to try to stop others from making the same mistake & picking & eating forbidden fruit that makes people too big for their boots, God sets angels to guard the tree & protect others from coming to harm from it. It's been a sad day for Adam & Eve, & for God too. One of the consequences of their disobedience, so the story goes, is that human beings can't live for ever. Not in their earthly bodies, anyway. That, according to our oldest story-tellers is the answer to someone asking questions round the fire like, "Why do we always have to work so hard?" or "How is it people die?" Things will never be the same again! But that's another story... Next time: Snakes in the Grass…..

7...IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL..PART 1
[An imaginative reading based on GEN 3. For more, read there.]

By now we know human beings like stories. And keep telling them. Just as God does. That's no wonder, is it, seeing we're made in YHWH's image? (Reminder: YHWH is short for Yahweh, & means 'I AM WHO I AM', or, 'I AM BEING ITSELF'. [EX 3:14] It's God's 'name', just as Adam means 'from the earth', & Eve means 'living'.  Names & their meaning are important. Right from the beginning. We may sacrifice meaning for fashion today, but in the days we’re story-telling about, names mean something. But let's go on a bit further. People go on to tell more of what happens after YHWH tells Creation into being. Their earliest stories, still being told down the years in sheltering caves, round desert campfires, & then in more permanent houses, go on to tell what happens to these first representative & symbolic ancestors of ours. Up to now Adam & Eve haven't given much thought to wearing clothes. Of course we're imaginatively harking back to a time so soon after the first recognizably human beings have emerged on earth that they don't actually have any clothes! In the beginning they probably begin wear them for protection from weather, not for reasons of modesty - yet. So our ancient storytellers tell of God planting a Garden between the great rivers of the Middle East in the area of today’s Iran & Iraq & calling it 'Eden', which means 'a really nice place to enjoy'. God gives Eden to Adam & Eve to live in.

Imagine if we can God walking in these beautiful gardens with them in the cool of the evenings after a very hot day till one day something really bad happens to stop all that. You see, YHWH has set just one condition on Adam & Eve enjoying that garden with Him. He has planted a particular tree in it called the Tree of the Knowledge of Good & Evil. This tree represents things too much for Adam & Eve to understand yet. To bear yet. It represents, too, the difference between God & humans, or, if you like, the line drawn between God’s divinity & our humanity. This tree stands for things that could endanger Adam & Eve’s life with God & each other. Our lives, too! Still! YHWH says to them, "You can eat any other fruit in the garden except this one". God is so serious about this He says to them, "If you eat from this tree, it will lead to your death!" Death, they wonder. What’s this ‘death’? They soon find out! God knows blurring the line between humanity & divinity is very dangerous, & this tree represents that peril! But Adam & Eve still have some learning to do – the hard way!

One day, Adam & Eve are bored. So, as the story tells, when they don't think God is looking, & despite God warning them against it, they pick & eat fruit from this Tree of the Knowledge of Good & Evil. In the blink of an eye everything changes! They look at each other differently. They see each other for what they really are: people who break trust with God & one another. People who disobey God. They look at each other & don't like what they see any more. In fact, they can't bear the sight of each other anymore, so they pick some leaves, maybe from this very same tree, & stitch them together to make lap laps for themselves. To cover up their nakedness, &, symbolically, what they have done. But is that enough? Will it work? To be continued…

6…ANSWERS BEGIN TO TAKE SHAPE

(Continuing our imaginative reading of GEN 1& 2…Read more there.)

 "In the beginning..there is Someone called God. Somewhere beyond that vastness out there. Beyond our understanding, too. God decides to create a world. Actually, God decides to create a whole universe of worlds out of all that darkness up there. (Now we know enough to understand that darkness up there a lot better than people did long ago. We know that 'up there, out there' is what we call Space. A really good name for such Vastness with its gases swirling all around, its 'black holes' & so on & so forth. Space is really anything but empty!) So, God sets to work. And because God is God, God only has to say, "Let there be.." & whatever God wants to happen happens. Light happens. Then day, night, sky, our earth itself with its oceans & seas & rivers. God tells them, calls them all into being. It takes a long, long while the way we tell time. Billions & billions of years. Though quick as a wink in God's time. (PS 90:4 puts it: A thousand years in your sight are like yesterday….’) Plants & trees of every kind begin to appear all over the earth. Everything we can think of. And a whole lot more. Scientists tell us that, go back far enough, they all originate in the great waters. Still YHWH keeps telling things to happen, & they do. Sun & moon, galaxies, more & more planets & stars. One of those planets is this earth we live on. The people who first tell & hear this story say God makes everything there is out of that Chaos God finds 'up there'. Out even beyond that darkness we see when we look up at the night sky. And so God does in a way. One of the first things God does is bring some order out of all that chaos. He does this by making things happen according to certain rules. Makes everything work according to Laws He sets in place by telling them into the unfolding Great Story, just as He tells everything into being. And people from of old pass this on in their imaginative stories. In God's good time He calls into being life of every kind. In the waters, the skies, on the earth. Some things we still have trouble imagining!

Last but not least, God creates us. Human beings. The story-tellers call the first ones they can think of 'Adam' & 'Eve'. Adam means 'made from earth, dust, clay'. His very name tells us he's a representative figure. He stands for the earliest human being our ancestors can imagine back to. Adam's wife they name 'Eve', meaning 'life', for the same reason. Eve represents the earliest woman ancestor they can imagine. Some people have even gone so far as to imagine God creates us because He is lonely, & needs someone a bit like Himself to talk to, relate to, play with. That's a nice idea, but it is only an imagining. Mind you, the fact that Christians have come to believe God is Three Persons in One, has three ‘personae’ as it were, represents God having a life of God's own within Godself. Whoever tells this early part of the story says God created us in His Own Image. We are so like God people should be able to see through us to God. See God in us! That's a big responsibility to live up to! Sometimes we don't live up to being created in God's own image, as we'll find out when we hear what happens next! So, perhaps this is a good place to stop, like those early story tellers say God stops here too. As they take a break from all they must do it makes sense to them that God needs a break too. From all that telling things & us into being. A break for God & us to enjoy each other! Our story-tellers tell us God creates everything in Six Days. Six of God's days, maybe, but we know now it took more years than we can either count or dream of. But then, what’s a day or a billion years, to God? Next time we'll hear about a garden, & what happens there. But that's another story.....

5...IN THE BEGINNING
[Based on an imaginative reading of GEN 1 & 2. Read more there.]

Long ago, in the very beginning, before writing, or books, newspapers, telephones of any kind, TV, computers, the Internet, Face-book, U-tube, I-pads & Kindles, etc. there is God. Only God. Then, one day (though days don't actually exist yet!) God, who has a really great imagination, decides to tell a story. Imagine a Universe into being. Tell a whole Universe into happening. Lock, stock, & barrel. Imagine it all into being. Imagine everybody into being. Beginning with Light. Separating it from the darkness & chaos that is all that exists before. (Though time as we know it doesn't exist yet either!) Some believe God creates from that light the angels we come across in a lot of the stories. (Though creating angels from light is only hinted at in this Book of Beginnings.) But angels are Messengers of light. Messengers to do God's bidding. To go between God & the Creation as God makes it. Especially between God & humans. Angels can still be like the beams of light they're made from, while others appear in human form, & humans too, do God’s bidding as angels. We’ll come across them all. Often.

Once God tells humans into the story & onto the scene they find they need someone to talk to. Scientists tell us human life originated in today's Africa, but the biblical writers set it in the 'Middle East' they know. Where they tell their stories into being. First people talk with God. From their spirit. They learn, too, to make signs & sounds other humans can understand. Learn to form words, join them together in stories. Just little ones, at first. About things they need, something that's happened, something they're doing. Gradually they become better at speaking to each other, listening, & understanding too. Sometimes, unawares, they even talk with angels! But sometimes they forget, & leave God out of their conversations. Then God is lonely.

Life is much slower than now, though busy enough in those days. (There are days by now.) When the days' work of catching food, finding or building shelter, keeping out of the way of animals or people bigger & stronger than themselves is done, people take time to tell stories. About themselves & what’s happened today. Listen to other people's stories about their day too. And they tell their stories to God, & about God. About the rest of the Creation they see round them, too. Even if they don't always understand what they see, whom they meet, what they experience. Stories begin to take shape as they are passed around from person to person, family to family, clan to clan, even country to country - though there are no 'countries' as we know them yet.

Which brings us to a good starting place for the stories our earliest spiritual ancestors tell. Those Hebrew rellies of ours, who, thankfully, have left us their God stories. Imagine if you can: One night round a camp-fire in a cave in a cliff face, or is it out in the desert sands in front of a makeshift tent, someone asks what may be the world's First Really Big Question. Perhaps it's a child before they are sent off to bed. Maybe it's a grown-up, but it's often a child who asks the really important questions if only we'll take them seriously! This First Really Big Question may have been, "Where do we all come from?" There is a deep silence that lasts for a long, long time. Maybe the question isn't even answered that night. Perhaps it has to wait for another night, or another camp-fire in another place, who knows? But at last someone gives an answer that goes something like….But that’s another story….