Sunday Sermonette: Strange Interlude

There ' s plenty of competition for weirdest passage in the Bible, but we may have the winner here. Exodus 4 is plenty weird overall, but it contains an interpolation which is weird, bizarre, and very very strange. The chapter is also very problematic theologically, but I think most interpreters pretty much ignore the problems. I won ' t. Moses answered, “What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, ‘TheLord did not appear to you ’?”2 Then theLord said to him, “What is that in your hand?”“A staff,” he replied.3 TheLord said, “Throw it on the ground.”Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from it.4 Then theLord said to him, “Reach out your hand and take it by the tail.” So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and it turned back into a staff in his hand.5 “This,” said theLord, “is so that they may believe that theLord, the God of their fathers —the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has appeared to you.”6 Then theLord said, “Put your hand inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand into his cloak, and when he took it out, the skin was leprous[a]—it had become as white as snow.7 “Now put it back into your cloak,” he said. So Moses put his hand back into his cloak, and when he took it out, it was restored, like the rest of his flesh.8 Then theLord said, “If they do not believe you or pay attention to the first sign, they may believe t...
Source: Stayin' Alive - Category: American Health Source Type: blogs