David Bahn – Reflections

“Isaac loved Esau because he ate of his game, but Rebekah loved Jacob” (Genesis 25:28). The favoritism of these parents caused significant trouble for their children. The brothers fought and deceived each other, with Jacob tricking Esau out of his blessing, leading to years of estrangement. They reconciled after many years, but their relationship remained complex, suggesting lingering tension. Playing favorites causes great trouble.

Can you imagine if God played favorites as is supposed by some? I think of those who tie God’s favor to a certain political bent, or religious expression (not faith)? Actually I think that is exactly what is playing out in many Muslim countries. There is a clear sense of God’s favor attached to the true followers of Islam. The Qur’an describes Muslims as a favored community due to their adherence to Islam. This favor is conditional on righteousness.

Contrast that with God’s love and grace for all through Jesus. God loved the world (before the redemption of Jesus) and gave his Son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. Jesus commands us to make disciples of all nations – not just a favored group, culture, or nation. God’s impartiality extends to both blessings and judgment, emphasizing fairness across all humanity.

You don’t get a bye because you’re a Lutheran, Texan, pastor, or Sunday School teacher. You don’t get to the front of the line because you’re a disciple. In fact, it’s just the opposite. Jesus commands that his followers put themselves at the end of the line, and show no partiality to any group, nation, or culture. We are to do good to all people as a reflection of God’s goodness, grace, mercy, and love for all people.

I like to say, the ground is level at the foot of the cross. I’ll stand shoulder to shoulder with any penitent sinner and together we can rejoice that God does not play favorites.

People have long tried to blame those who lose their lives for a cause, as if they somehow invited their own fate. I recently came across a line from Charlie Sheen’s book: “As long as I kept wearing hamburger pants on safari, I couldn’t complain about being attacked by a lion.” It’s a tongue-in-cheek way of saying, “If I keep putting myself in harm’s way, I can’t be surprised by the consequences.”

Some may be tempted to use that logic about people like Charlie Kirk, as though he “made himself a target” for the assassin’s bullet that ended his life last week. That is a cruel and false moral equivalence, unworthy of serious thought.

Consider Stephen in Acts 7. He speaks boldly to the Jewish leaders, naming their part in Jesus’ death: “the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered.” He accuses them of receiving the law “as delivered by angels” yet failing to keep it. No wonder they were enraged! Yet James reminds us, “The anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God” (James 1:20). When truth exposes our sin, we may respond with indignation or even violence, rather than repentance.

It is never right to excuse wrongdoing, whatever the provocation. But look carefully at the events surrounding Stephen’s death and you see a larger story unfolding. Tertullian famously wrote, “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.” Stephen’s witness—and his willingness to die—became the spark that propelled the gospel outward. When Stephen’s accusers laid their garments at the feet of Saul, none of them could imagine how central Saul (soon to be Paul) would become in carrying the good news of Jesus to the nations.

And good news it is. For Jesus has overcome death, sin, and the devil. He forgives our sins and strengthens us to stand against evil and the evil one. He promises life even in the face of death. This gospel truth will stand forever and produce the righteousness of God in hearts and lives — something no human anger or effort could ever accomplish.

I took a speech class in college and recall one of my classmates telling a joke as part of an assignment to deliver an entertaining speech:

Moses was walking through the desert when he saw a bush on fire but not burning up. As he stepped closer, a voice boomed, “Take off your sandals, for the ground is holy!”
Moses bent down, untied his sandals, and approached the burning bush, but the hot sand scorched his feet. He jumped and yelped, and the voice chuckled: “Ha! Third one I got today!”

I tell it only because it illustrates that the sense of holiness is very much caricatured by the world. There is no fear of God in the world. Holy ground is too easily dismissed or ridiculed. The closest we get is the ground at a cemetary, at the 9/11 memorial (I am writing this on 9/11), or in a place of great tragedy, like Utah Valley University where Charlie Kirk was recently shot.

But Holy Ground is the place of God’s presence and sacred work. It is where God touches hearts deeply with profound and significant impact. Certainly that would be true of Moses’ encounter with God as Stephen recounts in Acts 7.

This reminds me that God is truly holy, majestic, and glorious beyond compare. Outward acts of worship, humility before him, and reverent fear is beyond proper. In fact, it is unavoidable. When we encounter God in the fullest sense, we will discover this for ourselves.

But there is more to this encounter with God – and the experience of holy ground – than fear, reverence, and humility. Consider what God is doing here. He is setting things up for his grand Old Testament deliverance event. He will send Moses to tell Pharaoh, “Let my people go!” There will be many words, experiences, and plagues along the way to this deliverance. And this encounter between Moses and God in the burning bush is the beginning of all this.

Have you encountered the depth of God’s grace and truth? Have you experienced the reality of your desperate need for forgiveness? Have you seen someone brought back from the brink of death – spiritual or physical? Have you heard God’s voice calling you to a deeper fellowship? Have you experienced the touch of God’s grace at the altar rail? Have you seen it at the baptismal font?

Those are holy ground moments. And although it is quite proper to respond to holy ground moments with shoes off and eyes shaded, it is important to realize that God’s desire is to bring us beyond mere fear, to love and trust in him.

I can remember lines from my favorite movies – although not as well as some. I can remember many many Bible verses – again, not as many as some. I can remember the dates of our anniversary and Diane’s birthday. But I can’t remember whether I’ve seen some movies or read some books. I’ve even been listening to an audio book, and eventually thought, I think I’ve listened to this one before. And don’t get me started on how many celebrities I can identify, much less remember their names (somewhere between 14-24 perhaps).

Our version of remembering is like finding a bit of data on a computer disk. Eventually we’ll find the fact and remember it. It’s stored there somewhere, if I can just find it!

God calls his people to remember. “Remember that you were foreigners,” God says in Exodus 22. “Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands” (Deuteronomy 8:2). “And [Jesus] took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me’” (Luke 22:19).

But the biblical concept of remembering is not simply a matter of rummaging through our brains to retrieve bits of data. It is more than pulling past events into the present as information. Biblically, to remember is to place yourself back into a specific situation, time, or event so that it shapes how you live now. When Stephen recounts the events surrounding Moses’ ministry in Acts 7, he is doing more than giving a history lesson. He is calling his listeners to stand again in that moment, to see God’s hand at work, and to let that remembrance guide their faith and obedience in the present.

So while our human memory may fail us in small and sometimes frustrating ways, God graciously calls us to a deeper kind of remembering – one that roots us in his mighty acts and renews our trust in him today. Each time we remember Jesus – his cross, his resurrection, his presence with us – we are not just recalling facts but stepping again into the story of God’s redeeming love. And that kind of remembering strengthens faith, fills us with hope, and leads us to live in joyful obedience until the day we see him face to face.

We are a time-bound lot. We measure life in hours, days, and months. Holding on to the long view is hard. As the years pass and birthdays seem to come closer together, we can grow impatient. Proof? How often do you hunt for the shortest line at the grocery store? Or switch lanes in a traffic jam—only to watch the lane you left move faster?

Joseph’s story comes to mind. He was faithful when tempted by his master’s wife, and honorable even when unjustly thrown into prison. God’s hand was on him so that whatever he did, he succeeded. Yet a charmed life in prison is still prison. Others might have grown bitter or abandoned their morals, but Joseph did not.

The saga of Joseph stretches over 14 chapters in Genesis (37–50). Stephen sums it up in just seven verses in Acts 7. Likewise, Eugene Peterson’s book A Long Obedience in the Same Direction: Discipleship in an Instant Society reminds us that following Jesus is not about shortcuts or instant results, but about steady, faithful discipleship over a lifetime.

We may be able to summarize Joseph’s story, Israel’s history, or even Jesus’ ministry. But we don’t live in summaries – we live one day at a time. And though we may grow weary, stumble, or fall to temptation, we have a Savior who strengthens us, restores us, and forgives us. Joseph points us to Jesus, who carries us forward in faith, obedience, and hope. Following him is not about quick fixes but about a long obedience in the same direction. It is the path he traveled perfectly for us. He calls us to the long path of daily repentance and faith, and he promises to be with us every step of the way.

I’ve not been to war. But this much I understand: If your commander tells you to take a certain route and go to a specific place, you better do as he says. This is not just because you’ll get in trouble if you don’t do as he says. It’s because he has laid out protection for you along the route he has suggested and provision at the place to which he tells you to go.

So as God calls Abram (later to have his name changed to Abraham), he directs him to go to a certain place and promises to bless him and make his name great. God will show him this place. And not only will Abram be blessed, he will be a blessing to others.

Abram’s obedience puts him on the pathway of blessing. The initiative is God’s. The provision is God’s. The blessing is God’s. Abram will experience the fullness of those blessings as he follows the pathway of blessing.

These blessings, however, will not often be instant. And in Abram’s case it was anything but instant. Abram will be 100 years old when the son of the promise is born. Sarah will be 90. It will be 25 years before Abraham sees even the birth of Isaac. Much later do we see Isaac’s sons Jacob and Esau born, and then years later when the 12 sons of Israel (Jacob) are born (Genesis 29; 30).

But the pathway of blessing isn’t neat and tidy. It is messy. Leah and Rachel will compete for Jacob’s attention and the opportunity to bear his children. They will even give their maidservants to him in order to have more children to claim. It becomes on big mess. They stumbled from the path many times – to one side and the other.

But God can deal with messy. He did that completely through his Son who walked the pathway without stumbling. He earned the full blessing of God and calls us to follow him on the pathway of faithful obedience – however messy it may become. For the pathway of faithful obedience is also the pathway of grace and forgiveness. That is the greatest blessing of all.

Nehemiah 13 today struck me strongly today. It is all about purity of the Sabbath, the Lord’s Temple, the Priests, and the nation itself. There is no place afforded foreigners. This particularly caught my eye and touched my heart: “no Ammonite or Moabite should ever enter the assembly of God.” That seems particularly harsh. 

This has much to do with the desecrating of the Temple, the laxity of true worship, profaning the Sabbath, and abusing the priesthood. The situation was horrible. The room in the temple reserved for tithes had been turned into a sleeping quarters for Tobiah. Tobiah was a known enemy of the community. It was a bad situation that had to be dealt with. The whole of the Jewish faith had been abandoned, abused, and desecrated. So Nehemiah took action.

When Jesus came to earth he discovered a different kind of abandonment and desecration. The Jewish leaders of his day had made the Sabbath into a mere outward performance. Rules about the Sabbath put Jesus under scrutiny for healing someone on that day. The Temple was guarded and the offerings were scrutinized so much that people had to use special temple currency to purchase certified animals for the sacrifices there. The priests were well taken care of while the people were oppressed. The whole of the Jewish faith had been abandoned. So Jesus took action.

Jesus action – specifically in relation to the temple – was to overturn the tables of the money changers in the Temple court. But his ultimate action was not to drive out the foreigners, but to offer himself as the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world. In him, every people, tribe, nation and tongue are welcome into his eternal kingdom.

As I thought about the prohibition of the Ammonites and Moabites, I also thought of Ruth. She was a Moabite woman. Yet she is listed in the genealogy of Jesus. In the end people from every tribe, nation, and tongue will have a place at the great feast of victory. We’ll never be pure enough on our own – nor will even our religion be untainted by sin. Thank God Jesus is the pure and spotless Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

That includes foreigners – like you and me.