Welcome to Revelation

Famously, in the Book of Exodus, the nation of Israel is born. Much less famously, this newborn nation bears the image of a baby.

"...?!"

• Early in the narrative, God plainly invites readers to think about Israel as his child:

  Exodus: "This is what the lord says: Israel is my firstborn son."

• Instantly, God reinforces this metaphor by likening Israel with human firstborn sons:

  Exodus: "I commanded you: Let my son go so he can worship me. But since you have refused, I will now kill your firstborn son!"

• After establishing and reinforcing this metaphor, God promptly...
  • Forgets about it? Noooooooooooooooooooo!
  • Takes it back? Nooooooooooooooooooooooo!
  • Abandons it? Nooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
  • Does a cute trick? Yessssssssssssssssss!

The trick

After 40 weeksdecades of pregnancy: captivity:
A father delivers his firstborn son!

• A literal human baby the nation of Israel is forced out of his yeasty home through an entrance smeared with someone else's blood. His mom host screams in agony and tries in vain to push him out faster.
• A literal human baby the nation of Israel enters into a bright, dry unfamiliar world where his father looks forward to carrying him. Dad readies a safe first bath: A newbornA nation shouldn't be submerged, so heit isn't.
• A babyIsrael is exclusively fed the exact same white, sweet, highly nutritious food for every meal. (Eating regular grown-up food won't end well.)
• A babyIsrael believes the best way to get what he wants is to cry and scream. This selfish strategy would test everyone's limits.
• A baby Israel lacks object permanence:
  • Mama Moses vanished! Waaaaaah!
  • Papa God vanished! Waaaaaah!

A spooky connection

The people of Israel had to be born again to reach their promised land.

likewise, we must be born again to reach ours:

In John's gospel, we find an odd interaction between Jesus and a highly respected rabbi named Nicodemus.

Jesus, always a weirdo, opens with this:

"Unless you are born again, you cannot see the Kingdom of God."

Unlike you, Nicodemus is totally lost:

"How can an old man go back into his mother's womb and be born again?"

Unlike you, he earns a rebuke:

"You are a respected Jewish teacher, and yet you don't understand these things?"

An unlikely pair

The Bible has two separate stories following the same impossibly specific narrative:

One narrative

[todo: animate a bright figure descending]

• An ancient heavenly being, known by some as the "morning star", descends to Earth. He takes the form of a creature, hiding his true power.
• The morning star spies an unsuspecting human among some fig trees. He's crafty: he'll take advantage of this to recruit for his cause.
• His goal is to upend all established order: to create division and sow lasting chaos. He'll even turn family members against each other.

[todo: animate a fig tree]

• He speaks with an ignorant bride, challenging her attitude toward a famous rule given by God. She's been obeying a false version of the rule, one that's harsher than God designed.
• "Eat whatever you want!" "Enjoy your freedom!" "If you listen to me, you won't die!" This rule clearly promises death to anyone who breaks it, but that doesn't seem to bother him.
• The morning star goes so far as to encourage the bride to become like God. And the weirdest part: The bride obeys him and tosses her away!

[todo: animate a bright figure falling]

• The bride will have to suffer for following the morning star's advice. Nevertheless, she's given blessings and encouraged to be fruitful through her hardship.
• The morning will have to suffer at the hands of a new foe. Before enmity developed, the foe had eaten food in the presence of the morning star.
• This foe will lift his heel against the morning star, crushing him. The morning star knows that this is coming, and yet he refuses to change.

Two stories

Yes, Both stories fulfill every detail above.

P.S.

By putting so many parallels between these stories, God is practically begging us to:

• Pray about them as a pairx
• Learn about them as a pair
• Think about them as a pair:

What is the Bible, really?
What story is God telling us?

It's as simple as it is sad:
The story of our climb from
Satan snaring us to Jesus.

• The stories mirror each other
• The stories balance each other
• The stories explain each other:

Let's try to remember that.
Later along our quest to God,
These *** gems might prove useful.

Break this covenant in case of emergency

You may have heard that the land of Israel must always belong to the descendants of Abraham. Not quite.

(This Easter egg will be painted soon.)

That ship has sailed

All through the Bible, people display their grief and sorrow by tearing their clothing.

• In 2 Samuel 1, future King David tears his clothing after losing a brother and a dad. The two were his in-laws: the brother loved him; the "dad" was a scorpion who stung himself.
• In Job 1, a gentle man named Job tears his clothing after losing his kids. The man's name rhymes with robe, and his story gets better.
• In Genesis 37, a rebel named Jacob tears his clothing after losing a son. The man's other name is Israel; he's the country's namesake.

God the Father didn't have a robe he could tear, but he did have a veil in his infamous Second Temple. (Jesus vowed its demolition.)

Jews murder their God:

Then Jesus uttered another loud cry, and breathed his last. And the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.

[todo]

"The Bible has no coincidences"

The setup

In the city of Sodom, Lot finds his house surrounded by a mob of sexual predators:

Genesis 19: "All the men of Sodom, young and old, came from all over the city and surrounded the house. They shouted to Lot, 'Where are the men who came to spend the night with you? Bring them out to us so we can have sex with them!'"

The mob intends to rape his two male guests.

How does Lot respond?

Genesis 19: "Look, I have two daughters who have never slept with a man. Let me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them!"

To our horror, Lot offers his daughters as a sacrifice to the mob.

If he gets his way, his daughters might even be raped to death, given the heartbreaking parallel story we find in Judges 19.

In that story, another mob demands to rape another male guest. The guest sacrifices his wife to the mob; she is raped so violently that she dies from her injuries.

Fast-forward >>

(A lot happens. We'll skip most of it.)

• The mob is blinded and sent away scattered.
• God destroys Lot's city and kills Lot's wife.
• Lot and his daughters retreat to a lonely cave.

Heavenly turnabout

In evil Sodom, Lot tried to let selfish men take turns raping his daughters.

God loves justice, symmetry, and parents who don't sacrifice their children.

In their cave, Lot's evil daughters take turns raping their own selfish dad.

"Objection!"

"Wrong! The human who recorded this story didn't share our modern understanding of sexual consent!"

God is so much bigger than you want him to be.

• God speaks through both our words and our deeds in ways that are wildly beyond our intentions.
• Never try to constrain God by the limitations of his little human helpers!

A naked angel, running from grabby men

"A certain young man was following Jesus, wearing nothing but a linen cloth. They caught hold of him, but he left the linen cloth and ran off naked."

(This Easter egg will be painted soon.)

God never commands child sacrifice

God swears again and again that he's never commanded child sacrifice. Most Christians don't believe him!

(Warning: Severely incomplete)

(Stairs are missing; the roof is gone; the walls have waffles and are otherwise overpainted.)

Two stories, too much in common

The Bible has two separate stories following the same impossibly specific narrative:

One narrative

• The hero receives an unintuitive command from God. The hero is supposed to do a bad deed? Something only the surrounding godless nations would do?
• The hero decides to obey the command, enlisting help from his confused underlings. They comply, but they don't truly consent to what's happening.
• Because of his obedience to the command, the hero endures three days of suffering.

  [todo: animate the passing of time]

• On the third day, we reach Mount Moriah. Likewise, the hero's suffering is approaching its own peak.
• Gazing upward, we see a figure brandishing a bladed weapon: He's about to strike a killing blow! [todo]
• For the hero, the stakes are unbearably high: He's about to lose his beloved son, his heir. [todo]

  [todo: animate the passing of hope]

• God roars into action! To the figure, God commands: "Stop! That's enough!" The figure stops at once.
• The hero dashes off to get an animal to sacrifice to God. The hero is offered his offering for free? Will he accept?
• The hero offers the animal on an altar he built with his own hands. [todo]

The same plot twist, too

That unintuitive command wasn't really from God.

[todo] In 2 Samuel 24:1, God commands King David to take the census. Later, 1 Chronicles 21:1 blames Satan, revealing God had been taking responsibility.

Not me, not me, not me!

Jeremiah 7: "There they burn their sons and daughters in the fire. I have never commanded such a horrible deed; it never even crossed my mind to command such a thing!"

Jeremiah 19: "There they burn their sons as sacrifices to Baal. I have never commanded such a horrible deed; it never even crossed my mind to command such a thing!"

Jeremiah 32: "There they sacrifice their sons and daughters to Molech. I have never commanded such a horrible deed; it never even crossed my mind to command such a thing!"

These denials are important: In the entire Bible, they're the only examples of God ever claiming something didn't cross his mind.

(Let's pause to play something important)

To be continued. <3