The Narrator *NEVER* Says This Kind of Thing

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NEVER is a strong word and maybe overstates the case, but RARELY gets it just right.

The narrator in Genesis very very rarely comments on a character’s situation; the narrator shows and rarely tells.

When Joseph is sold into Egyptian slavery, however, the narrator makes a point of telling us that the Lord is with him—5 times in 6 verses!

I think the narrator wants it to be as clear as possible that though Joseph’s circumstances are difficult, that does NOT mean that the Lord is not with him in those circumstances.

What if the narrator of your life said the same thing about your circumstances? What if the Lord is DEFINITELY AND COMPLETELY WITH YOU TODAY?

Keep going.

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 39:1-6

Is This How a Man Should Behave?

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As we’re following the story told in Genesis 37-50, we are watching to see how an important question will get answered:

Who will lead the family after Jacob is gone?

In Genesis 37, Joseph seems to be the leading candidate, since he is both his father’s favorite and the most gifted. As the chapter closes, however, Joseph finds himself sold into Egyptian slavery—not a promising situation.

And then Genesis 38 seems to be a non sequitur—we want to follow Joseph’s journey, and instead we’re given—without any explanation—this strange story about Judah, #4 of Jacob’s 12 sons. Here’s why:

We’re shown something important about Judah that will help us understand if he should or should not be the leader after Jacob.

Reading along the story of Judah and his daughter-in-law Tamar so far, what do you think?

Is this how a man should behave?

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 38:1-23

Joseph in the Pit

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It’s worth slowing down and really trying to see the story as it unfolds.

Imagine the terror Joseph feels when his brothers strip him of his prized robe and violently throw him into the pit.

Imagine what it was like to be kept there under the unmerciful sun while your brothers decide how to dispose of you.

Imagine the screaming helplessness he feels as the Midianite slavers take him captive.

Imagine the brothers slaughtering a goat and rinsing Joseph’s prized robe in animal blood.

And imagine Jacob receiving the news and seeing the brown spots on the torn robe.

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 37:12-36

Is Joseph the Right Choice?

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Jacob has 12 sons; which son will be the next leader of the family? Which son will take his father’s place?

 

Genesis 12-36 is about the formation of a family that will pass on God’s new way from generation to generation. God chooses Abraham, and then Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are taught what it will take to be the founders of this new way.

We now come to the third and final part of Genesis—chapters 37-50—which will be about the problem of passing on God’s new way when there are 12(!) sons that make up the next generation.

Right off, we assume it will be Joseph, the 11th son, who will lead the family when Jacob dies. Joseph is more gifted than his brothers, and Jacob has set him apart to be the future leader of his brothers. The coat Jacob gives Joseph (an obscure Hebrew term—”coat with long sleeves” or “coat of many colors”) is meant to mark him as Jacob’s heir.

As his dreams prove, Joseph is a boy of remarkable insight. But is he the right one to lead the family into the future?

We’ll have to read on to find out.

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 37:1-11

2 Steps Forward, 1 Step Back

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Once Jacob is renamed Israel, why does the narrator still frequently refer to him as Jacob?

I think it’s because, unlike with Abraham, who once he gets his new name keeps moving forward in the direction the Lord wants, with Jacob and his family, it’s always two steps forward and one step back.

For example, after the awful story of the rape of Dinah, Jacob does what he should have done before and moves the family to Bethel, commanding that they rid themselves of foreign idols. Good. But, then later we get the ugly news that Reuben, the eldest son (whose mother is Leah) sleeps with Bilhah, who is the mother of two of his other brothers and is one of his father’s wives/concubines.

This family is still not ready to be Israel, the people of God.

How they become so is the story told in part 3 of Genesis: Joseph in Egypt.

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 35-36

The Rape of Dinah

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Dinah is probably around 13 years old. (Her eldest brother, Reuben, is probably around 20, which means Simeon and Levi—the brothers who lead the attack against the Shechemites—are in their late teens.)

Where was Jacob? Where were her brothers? Why was this girl left to wander into a strange city? Why isn’t the innocent protected?

The truth is that Jacob should never have settled anywhere near the city of Shechem to begin with, but rather returned to Bethel, as he had previously promised the Lord he would do. (See Genesis 28:20-22 and 31:13).

But after the violation occurs, how do you make it right?

Doing nothing is tacitly accepting it. But doing what the sons of Israel actually do cannot be right either, as not only do they kill all the men of the city, but they carry off all the women and children as property as well.

Already, the new Way of righteousness towards which the Lord is leading the children of Israel is under threat.

An awful story.

As usual, Leon Kass sums it up well:

“Jacob, who had settled in the wrong place and who was now grown comfortable among the Canaanites, compounds the error by allowing his one daughter to wander off towards the ways of Shechem. This mistake sets in motion the entire ugly chain of events: once Dinah ‘goes out,’ everything that follows takes on a tragic inevitability. The failure to protect the purity of innocent Dinah (whose name means ‘judgment’) brings on her unjust defilement (the rape), in a horribly parody of the proper union of man and woman. There follows grim parodies of (1) a marriage proposal (asking for the hand of a woman already seized and violated); (2) proper fatherhood and rulership (fathers serving rather than ruling the passions of their sons; a ruler leading his city into ruin for the sake of satisfying his son’s erotic wishes); and (3) the practice of just retribution by means that appear to be anything but just (the brothers’ slaughter and spoiling of the entire city), involving (4) what appears to be a parody of the sacred rite of circumcision. The entire order of justice falls apart from the neglect of the purity and dignity of woman.” [my emphasis]

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 34:1-31

"Israel"

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Jacob has never prayed before.

But the fear he has in seeing his brother Esau again for the first time in 20 years (an Esau who is approaching with 400 armed men) has overwhelmed him, and he cries out to the Lord in prayer:

“Then Jacob prayed, “O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, Lord, you who said to me, ‘Go back to your country and your relatives, and I will make you prosper,’  I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness you have shown your servant. I had only my staff when I crossed this Jordan, but now I have become two camps.  Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children.  But you have said, ‘I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.’”

[Genesis 32:9-12]

Receiving no answer to his prayer, he sends his flocks and herds and his wives and children across the river ahead of him and is left alone as night falls.

Alone, but not alone:

“So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”

But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”

The man asked him, “What is your name?”

“Jacob,” he answered.

Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.”

Jacob said, “Please tell me your name.”

But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?” Then he blessed him there.

So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.”

The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel, and he was limping because of his hip.  Therefore to this day the Israelites do not eat the tendon attached to the socket of the hip, because the socket of Jacob’s hip was touched near the tendon.”

[Genesis 32:24-32]

The mysterious man proves to be more than a man. It’s as if all of Jacob’s previous struggles with men have really been struggles with God. Jacob is a trickster and a liar, but he’s also stubborn and persevering, and here he refuses to give in. Finally, as dawn is breaking, the opponent touches him in the thigh (the groin?) and disappears, after giving Jacob the new name, “Israel,” which means something like “He wrestles with God” or perhaps “God prevails”.

From now on, Jacob will be Israel, and he will walk with a limp.

The deceiver now has a new identity. Now, limping, he’s ready to walk before the Lord in the new Way.

To be a bearer of the Covenant, Jacob will need to seek righteousness, but he will also need to be bold and persevering.

He is now the man the Lord needs.

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 32:1-33:20

Homecoming

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“The twenty years of exile are ended. Jacob is returning as a patriarch of his own clan, prosperous, independent, and more confident than ever that God is with him. His trials at Uncle Laban’s have not broken his spirit; on the contrary, adversity has made a man out of him. He has acquired enough children to become a tribe, enough possessions with which to provide for his family, sufficient dignity and courage to declare his independence, sufficient clout and standing to establish political agreements with other clans and nations, a newfound desire to return to the land of his father (and to Isaac himself), and perhaps most important, a growing awareness of his dependence on God, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and now also the God of Jacob. None of this would have happened had he stayed home. He has struggled, he has suffered, he has endured, and he has come out much the stronger and better for it.”

—Leon Kass

 

How might your present difficulties be preparing you for future possibilities?

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 31:1-55

Biblical Genetic Engineering

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That thing that Jacob does by peeling the bark of branches in strips and placing them in front of the watering troughs of the sheep? I don’t get it either. Must be some kind of ancient genetic engineering trick that’s lost to us. Who knows?

Don’t get too hung up on those details—just keep reading!

P.S. In case you haven’t figured it out yet, the Bible does not look favorably on polygamy. In fact, all the examples of polygamous relationships in Genesis are examples of what NOT to do! Can you imagine the mess that is Jacob’s household, with 12 sons (and 1 daughter) by 4 different mothers all of whom live under the same roof!!

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 29:31-30:43

Jacob's Ladder

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Jacob is a clever, ambitious man, but his twenty-year sojourn away from home will humble him and make him into the man he needs to be if he will successfully pass the Covenant on to the next generation.

A recurring theme during much of Jacob’s journey will be about the limits of sight. After his amazing dream with the ladder that goes to heaven, he wakes up and says, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it!” [Genesis 28:16]. Jacob, the clever man, learns that there are things he doesn’t understand and “see” properly.

That lesson about the limits of sight is made more clear in the 20 years he lives with Laban and in all his troubles with women. For example, Jacob literally sleeps with the wrong woman on his wedding night!

Part of Jacob’s humbling and his formation is for him to admit that there are limits to what he can see.

The same lesson applies to us:

What if you aren’t seeing the events of your life correctly, either?

The way to see clearly is to see through Christ. Use his life, death, and resurrection as the lens through which you look at your life, and you’ll be seeing correctly.

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 28:10-29:30

Why Doesn't Isaac Take Back the Stolen Blessing?

Jacob—the “deceiver”—steals the blessing Isaac intends for Esau, the firstborn, by pretending to be Esau in the presence of their blind father. When Esau finds out about the deception, his response is one of the most heart-rending in scripture:

30 After Isaac finished blessing him, and Jacob had scarcely left his father’s presence, his brother Esau came in from hunting. 31 He too prepared some tasty food and brought it to his father. Then he said to him, “My father, please sit up and eat some of my game, so that you may give me your blessing.”

32 His father Isaac asked him, “Who are you?”

“I am your son,” he answered, “your firstborn, Esau.”

33 Isaac trembled violently and said, “Who was it, then, that hunted game and brought it to me? I ate it just before you came and I blessed him—and indeed he will be blessed!”

34 When Esau heard his father’s words, he burst out with a loud and bitter cry and said to his father, “Bless me—me too, my father!”

35 But he said, “Your brother came deceitfully and took your blessing.”

36 Esau said, “Isn’t he rightly named Jacob? This is the second time he has taken advantage of me: He took my birthright, and now he’s taken my blessing!” Then he asked, “Haven’t you reserved any blessing for me?”

37 Isaac answered Esau, “I have made him lord over you and have made all his relatives his servants, and I have sustained him with grain and new wine. So what can I possibly do for you, my son?”

38 Esau said to his father, “Do you have only one blessing, my father? Bless me too, my father!” Then Esau wept aloud.

[Genesis 27:30-38]

Here’s what I’ve wondered: Why can’t Isaac just bless Esau and renounce the blessing he pronounced over Jacob?

I think the answer lies in that strange detail about Isaac’s response when he realizes he has been deceived:

“Isaac trembled violently”.

Why does Isaac tremble?

When she was pregnant with the twins, Rebekah received a word from the Lord that it would be the younger son who would have preeminence over the elder. Isaac has favored the elder son, Esau, even though Esau is clearly not fit to receive and pass on the Covenant. Here, however, Isaac is confronted with the fact that, in spite of his sinful passivity with regard to his elder son, the Lord’s purposes are still realized in the blessing of the younger son, Jacob. I think Isaac trembles because he is struck in that moment of realization that God has been at work in spite of Isaac’s sin.

The reason Isaac cannot just retract the blessing he gave Jacob and give it again to Esau is because Isaac realizes that God intended for Jacob to receive the blessing. Isaac now “sees” (despite his blindness) that he blessed the correct son, even though he was tricked into doing so.

The point: God’s purposes will be achieved. All things opposing God will be defeated.

How can you work with the purposes of God today?

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 26:24-28:9

Isaac and The Twins

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Remember, the central question of Genesis 12-36 is about family: what will it take to raise the next generation so that the Covenant can be successfully passed down?

Alarmingly, it is unclear at first whether Isaac will be an adequate link in the chain. Compared to Abraham’s activity and far-sightedness, Isaac seems weak and is literally blind in his old age. And he certainly doesn't seem capable of making wise decisions with regard to his sons. Esau, as the story about the stew and the birthright shows, does not have what it takes to be the next carrier of the Covenant. [I’m preaching on that passage this Sunday.] Fortunately for Isaac, he has married well! Rebekah is more than capable of ensuring that the right son is chosen as the next link in the chain. That son is Jacob, though he has a lot of learning and suffering to do before he’s ready to be a Patriarch.

Though Isaac is not the great man his father was, nevertheless he is still his father’s son and therefore highly favored by the Lord. What the stories of Isaac and Abimelech tell us is that even for those who are not as naturally great as Abraham, the Lord’s favor is powerful for those who are part of Abraham’s family!

I take comfort in this fact. What about you?

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 25:19-26:33

Why Did Abraham Remarry and Father More Sons?

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A good principle: everything is in the Bible for a reason. The problem is that it’s not always clear what the reason is!

After Sarah dies, Abraham remarries and fathers a bunch more sons. Why? And, why does the Bible tell us?

I thought this was a good a guess as any:

“Whether he intends it or not, Abraham’s marriage to Keturah and the sons he produces with her alters the constellation of nations in the region. In addition to the Mesopotamians from whom he came, the Egyptians from whom he escaped, and the Canaanites among whom he lives, Abraham now fathers a host of nations that are closer kin to the children of the covenant….The descendants of these sons become the nomadic peoples of the Arabian Peninsula and the region east of the Jordan. Many of them crop up in later stories, both for good and for ill. Perhaps most important are the Midianites, who figure prominently in the life of Israel. It will be Midianites who rescue Joseph from the pit where his murderous brothers had placed him and sell him into Egypt (37:28); it will be a priest of Midian, Reuel, who takes in the fugitives Moses, escaped from Egypt, and gives him his daughter as a wife (Exodus 2:16ff); it will be the same Midianite, now called Jethro, who tells Moses to establish a law for his emancipated nation of slaves (Exodus 18:1 ff.)… [I]t looks as if Abraham, in his last act, has made the world a little more hospitable for the future of the covenant, blurring somewhat the distinctions between kin and stranger, friend and foe.”

—Leon Kass

Abraham has secured a great wife for his son in Rebekah, and then his final acts are about making the world a bit less hostile to his descendants. Truly he is a great patriarch.

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 24:1-25:18

The Terror and the Awe and the Horror of the Greatest Story in the Bible

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[“The Sacrifice of Isaac”. Caravaggio. 1603. Uffizi.]

[“The Sacrifice of Isaac”. Caravaggio. 1603. Uffizi.]

The binding of Isaac is the greatest and most terrible story in the Bible. The terror and the awe and the horror of Abraham’s slow journey up the mountain are unlike anything else in scripture, or out of it.

It resists easy interpretation and neat categorization; it is a mystery in the deepest sense of the word. The only way to make sense of it is to connect it with Jesus on the Cross. Remember what he cries out? “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

“He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?”
— Paul the Apostle [Romans 8:32]

I’ve included the entire story below.

Find a quiet place today. And slowly read it.

“The Sacrifice of Isaac”. Rembrandt. 1635. Hermitage Museum.

“The Sacrifice of Isaac”. Rembrandt. 1635. Hermitage Museum.

22 Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”

“Here I am,” he replied.

2 Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”

3 Early the next morning Abraham got up and loaded his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about. 4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. 5 He said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”

6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, 7 Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, “Father?”

“Yes, my son?” Abraham replied.

“The fire and wood are here,” Isaac said, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”

8 Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together.

9 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”

“Here I am,” he replied.

12 “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.”

13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. 14 So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide. And to this day it is said, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”

15 The angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time 16 and said, “I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, 18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”

19 Then Abraham returned to his servants, and they set off together for Beersheba. And Abraham stayed in Beersheba.

 

P.S. One quick note on Genesis 23: the cave that Abraham purchases through his shrewd bargaining as a burial place for Sarah will be the Children of Israel’s sole legal foothold to the Promised Land during their long centuries of slavery in Egypt. Abraham is a great man, not only because of his faith but also because of his far-sighted shrewdness as the patriarch of a people.

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 22:1-23:20

How to Make Peace With Your Neighbors

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The Lord promised Abraham that through him all the peoples of the earth with be blessed. When Abraham lives into the Covenant, that’s exactly what happens.

Abraham has a dispute over water and property rights (specifically over a well, which can make the difference between life and death in the arid Middle East) with Abimelech, who has shows up to talk to Abraham with his military commander. You’d think the episode might end in bloodshed, but instead Abraham responds with generosity and grace and he and Abimelech make peace with one another.

The people of God are meant to be peacemakers wherever they go. How can you be a peacemaker today?

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 21:1-34

What A Wife Is Not

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Remember, the key to understanding Genesis 12-36 is to see it as the education of the patriarchs about the way to make family work.

Here we go again.

The Abraham story began with Abraham passing off his wife as his sister when they sojourned in Egypt. A lot has happened since then, and Abraham and Sarah have grown old and very wealthy. But still, Abraham hasn’t learned his lesson: a “wife” is not the same thing as a “sister” or a “mistress” or a “concubine”; a wife is a partner in the raising and the shaping of the next generation.

And so, here Abraham tries the same trick with Abimelech, and just as before, the Lord intervenes.

What happens next is important. As we’ll see in tomorrow’s reading, Sarah finally becomes pregnant with the child of the covenant—Isaac—but only after Abraham finally learns his lesson.

“Only when Abraham acknowledges that a wife is something absolutely other than a sister does Sarah become pregnant; and only then is she a wife in the full sense”.

—Leon Kass

For the covenant to be passed down, both husbands and wives, fathers and mothers will be necessary. As we’ll continue to see, this lesson is not one the children of Abraham learn easily!

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 20:1-18

Why Is Incest Wrong?

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Why is incest wrong? We know that inbreeding increases the chances of harmful genetic mutations, and most people cite the harmful genetic consequences of inbreeding as the reason why incest is wrong. That answer isn’t acceptable, however, and here’s why:

It implies that incest is acceptable if pregnancy will not result from the incestuous activity.

So, in that line of thinking, incest would be fine if the consenting participants use birth control, for example.

The taboo against incest, however, does not derive from fear of inbreeding. The taboo against incest derives from an understanding of the purpose of sex itself.

I have a theory—stronger than a theory, really; more like an abiding conviction—that ongoing sexual sin retards emotional maturity. Why?

God’s blessing to humanity in Genesis 1 is to be fruitful and multiply. That blessing requires that humanity move forward and mature; parents have children who then take the parents’ place and raise their own children, and so it goes. To be a husband and a father or a wife and a mother forces a person to grow up and mature. But, sexual sin is the refusal to accept those responsibilities, which is why I believe sexual sin retards emotional maturity.

Imagine a 48 year-old playboy—maybe he’s been married previously and maybe he even has kids from a previous relationship, but he doesn’t live as a husband or a father: he lives as a 48 year-old playboy, a serial monogamist. He’s with this woman for a while, and then with that woman for a while, etc. What he doesn’t do is take on the responsibilities that come with marriage and fatherhood, responsibilities that tie one down and restrict freedom; or, to put it another way, the responsibilities that make one grow up.

How does this relate to incest?

Adulthood is about leaving one’s father and mother and making one’s own way in the world. The entire human project depends on this pattern: parents raise children who then move forward on their own and become parents themselves. Incest, however, is a turning inward. Rather than moving out into the world, incest is a refusal to leave home, so to speak. It is a sexual narcissism, a seeking of the same.

The stories of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and the incest of Lot’s daughters are nobody’s favorite Bible stories. But, I think it it important that we understand why the Bible is giving us these stories; Genesis 12-36 is about the education of the patriarchs (any by extension, us) as to what it will take to make family work, so that the covenant can be passed down to the next generation.

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 19:1-38

[Every weekday I write a brief commentary on that day’s reading in the Munger Bible Reading Plan. Join us and read along!]

This Is What the Abraham Story is About

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Because it is immediately followed by the dramatic dialogue between the Lord and Abraham about the destruction of Sodom, it’s easy to overlook the Lord’s introductory comments as the episode begins:

“Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do? Abraham will surely become a great and powerful nation, and all nations on earth will be blessed through him. For I have chosen him, so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing what is right and just, so that the Lord will bring about for Abraham what he has promised him.” [Genesis 18:17-19]

Did you catch that?

“For I have chosen him, so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing what is right and just.”

The whole story is about family. It’s about the founding of a family and what it will take to pass on the covenant generation to generation.

Or, to put it another way: family is how we fight.

How can you build for the next generation today?

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 18:16-33

[Every weekday I write a brief commentary on that day’s reading in the Munger Bible Reading Plan. Join us and read along!]

What If You Rub Shoulders With An Angel Today?

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When strangers visit Abraham, he runs (not walks) to welcome them into his house. His hospitality is extraordinary and instructive:

One of the characteristics of the people of God will be their lavish hospitality to outsiders.

How can you show hospitality and kindness toward a stranger today?

And as the writer of Hebrews puts it (reflecting on this story of Abraham), you never know with whom you might come in contact:

“Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.” [Hebrews 13:2]

P.S. Did you catch how the Lord appears to Abraham? “The Lord appeared to Abraham near the great trees of Mamre while he was sitting at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day. Abraham looked up and saw three men standing nearby.” (Genesis 18:1-2). It’s ONE LORD, but THREE PERSONS. Interesting….

 

Today’s Scripture

Genesis 18:1-15

[Every weekday I write a brief commentary on that day’s reading in the Munger Bible Reading Plan. Join us and read along!]