A Little Journal Entry

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This morning during Sunday school, I experienced one of the coolest things that has happened to me in a while. We, as a college Sunday school class, are going through a list of questions that one of our fellow students at OBU has given us from a Muslim standpoint, because she is Muslim. She has about 7 Word document pages over things she has searched out in the Bible and struggles with to comprehend in our faith. It’s awesome to hear from an outsider’s perspective, and to be challenged with questions that I, having grown up in church, have never thought about questioning. It’s been such a great study throughout the summer.

Here are a couple of examples of her questions:

1. John 1:20-21- “… ‘I am not the Christ.’ They asked him, ‘Then who are you? Are you Elijah?’ He said, ‘I am not.’ ‘Are you the Prophet?’ He answered, ‘No.’”

Who is “the Prophet” they were referring to if it was not the Christ or Elijah? Who else were they expecting? (Note: Some Muslims say it was Muhammad)

2. John 5:41- “I do not accept praise from men…”

Since when does God not accept praise from men? This seems like another refutation of divinity by Jesus.

3. Matthew 12:39-40- “He answered, ‘A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a miraculous sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”

“Good Friday”, the death= 1 night + Saturday= 2 nights… “Easter Sunday”, tomb is empty. 1+1=3? I’m confused. Many believe this was later added to support the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection. This would explain why Mark simply says:

Mark 8:12- “…Why does this generation ask for a miraculous sign? I tell you the truth, no sign will be given to it.”

Some questions take us back a little and stump us, and others we can easily look at the context or the culture of Jesus’ time and clarify things (like the question of Easter-the Jews counted days differently and counted part of a day as a whole day and because it was a holiday weekend they had different ways of counting when the day started, that’s why it clearly fulfills prophecy for Jesus to be in the tomb three days) (Sorry for the side note.)

Today’s question was:

Mark 15:34- “… ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’”

Why would Jesus say this? Did he honestly believe God had forsaken him? Can a perfect being lose faith in God? Can God lose faith in himself? Why did Jesus, who seemed to know what he was in for previously, start questioning now? It’s possible that he simply said this out of despair but would God exclaim things he didn’t mean out of despair? Would a perfect man exclaim things that he didn’t mean out of despair?

This is one of my favorite things that I’ve learned while at Ouachita! Mark 15.34 is what Jesus cries out when he is hanging on the cross, just before He cries, “into thy hands I commit my spirit.” This seems like a cry out to God in lost faith or something like that, but if we look closely that’s not the case at all. There’s a little footnote in most Bibles that tells us how this is so. Mine says “^aPs. 22:1” which means it’s also referenced in that part of the Bible. Back in the day, Jesus’ day, they didn’t have cute little pocket Bibles to carry around or even huge ones that they kept in their houses. The Jews rarely saw scripture and when they did it was in the temples, until the apostles began writing parts of the New Testament. Therefore, good little Jewish boys began memorizing parts of the Torah when they were very young. Most boys had the first five books down, at the least. Many would go on to memorize more, and if the didn’t, they would still hear tons of scripture often in the Synagogues. So when someone wanted to reference scripture, they wouldn’t say, “please get out your Bibles and turn to 1 Samuel 16, which is after Ruth,” they would begin citing large chunks of scripture so that the people would recognize it and know what was being talked about. So when Jesus says, “My god, my God, why have your forsaken me?” He is really referencing Psalm 22. Most learned people who would have been at Jesus’ crucifixion would have recognized the citation at some point. It may have taken them until later to recognize it, but they would have known a little about what Jesus was talking about. We, being not of the Jewish culture or heritage-praise Jesus!-loose some of what went on during that time and in turn, end up missing a lot of what was meant when Jesus was talking to Jews.

So this is my very long answer to Brooke’s question, and in Sunday school, we tossed around a few ideas of what could be the answer to the question before I brought up this reference. One other guy that was there was actually about to bring the same thing up, so I’m not just making this up, I promise! It was so insanely fun to see my peers come to understand this truth and to realize some of the “secrets” that the Bible holds for us if we just dig into it! It really wasn’t me telling them anything new, it was God revealing Himself more and more to us. It was pure awesomeness! We ran out of time this morning, but I wish we could have discussed the matter in detail. Maybe next week. J I hope I didn't confuse you or make you bored, but I was almost bouncing out of my seat from excitement. Seeing others come to understand truths has really become a passion! From children at VBS, to youth, to my peers, it has been an exciting ride so far!