I will open my mouth in parables
(Matthew 13:34-35)
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My friends, listen to what I am going to teach you; pay careful attention to what I will say.
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I am going to give you some sayings that wise people have said. They will be sayings about things that happened long ago, things that were difficult to understand.
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These are things that we have heard and known previously, things that our parents and grandparents told us.
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We will tell these things to our children, but we will also tell our grandchildren about Yahweh’s power and the glorious things that he has done.
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He gave laws and commandments to the Israelite people, those who are the descendants of Jacob, and he told our ancestors to teach them to their children.
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He commanded this so that their children would also know them and so that they would teach them to their own children.
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In that way, they also would trust in God and would not forget the things that he has done; instead, they would obey his commandments.
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They would not be like their ancestors, who were very stubborn and kept rebelling against God; they did not continue firmly trusting in God, and they did not worship him alone.
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The soldiers of the tribe of Ephraim had bows and arrows, but they ran away from their enemies on the day that they fought with their enemies.
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They did not do what they had agreed with God that they would do; they refused to obey his laws.
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They forgot what he had done; they forgot about the miracles that they had seen him perform.
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While our ancestors were watching, God performed miracles in the area around the city of Zoan in Egypt.
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Then he caused the Sea of Reeds to divide, causing the water on each side to pile up like a wall, with the result that our ancestors walked through it on dry ground.
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He led them by a bright cloud during the day and by a fiery light during the night.
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He split rocks open in the wilderness and gave to our ancestors plenty of water from deep inside the earth.
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He caused a stream of water to flow from the rock; the water flowed like a river.
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But our ancestors continued to sin against God; in the wilderness they rebelled against the one who is greater than any other god.
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By demanding that God give them the food that they desired, they tried to find out if he would always do what they requested him to do.
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They insulted God by saying, “Can God supply food for us here in this desert?
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It is true that he struck the rock, with the result that water gushed out, but can he also provide bread and meat for us, his people?”
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So when Yahweh heard that, he became very angry, and he sent a fire to burn up some of his Israelite people.
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He did that because they did not trust in him, and they did not believe that he would rescue them.
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But God spoke to the sky above them and commanded it to open like a door,
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and then food fell down like rain, food that they named “manna.” God gave them grain from heaven.
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So the people ate the food that angels eat, and God gave to them all the manna that they wanted.
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Later, he caused the wind to blow from the east, and by his power he also sent wind from the south,
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and the wind brought birds which were as numerous as the grains of sand on the seashore.
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God caused those birds to fall in the middle of their camp. There were birds all around their tents.
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So the people cooked the birds and ate the meat; their stomachs were full because God had given them what they wanted.
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But they had not yet eaten all that they wanted.
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At that point, God was still very angry with them, and he caused their strongest men to die; he got rid of many of the finest young Israelite men.
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In spite of all this, the people continued to sin; in spite of all the miracles that God had performed, they still did not trust that he would take care of them.
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So he made them terrified all their lives; he made them die young.
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Whenever God caused some of the Israelites to die, the others would repent; they would be sorry and seriously ask God to save them.
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They would remember that God was like a huge rock on which they would be safe, and that he, who was greater than any other god, was the one who protected them.
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But they tried to deceive God by what they said; their words were all lies.
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They were not loyal to him; they ignored the covenant that he had made with them.
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But God acted mercifully toward his people. He forgave them for having sinned and did not get rid of them. Many times he refrained from becoming angry with them and restrained himself from furiously punishing them.
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He remembered that they were only humans who die, humans who disappear as quickly as a wind that blows by and then is gone.
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Many times our ancestors rebelled against God in the wilderness and made him very sad.
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Many times they did evil things to find out if they could do those things without God punishing them. They frequently caused the holy God of Israel to become angry.
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They forgot about his great power, and they forgot about the time when he rescued them from their enemies.
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They forgot about when he performed many miracles in the area near the city of Zoan in Egypt.
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He caused the Nile River to become red like blood so that the people of Egypt had no water to drink.
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He sent among the people of Egypt swarms of flies that bit them, and he sent frogs that ate up everything.
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He sent locusts to eat their crops and the other things that grew in their fields.
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He sent hail that destroyed the grapevines, and he sent more hail that ruined the figs on the sycamore trees.
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He sent hail that killed their cattle and lightning that killed their sheep and cows.
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Because God was fiercely angry with the people of Egypt, he caused them to be very distressed. The disasters that struck them were like a group of angels that destroyed everything.
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He did not lessen his anger with them, and he did not spare their lives; he sent a plague that killed many of them.
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In that plague he caused all the firstborn sons of the people of Egypt to die.
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Then he led his people out of Egypt as a shepherd leads his sheep, and he guided them while they walked through the wilderness.
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He led them safely, and they were not afraid, but their enemies were drowned in the sea.
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Later he brought them to Canaan, his sacred land, to Mount Zion, and by his power he enabled them to conquer the people who were living there.
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He expelled the people groups while his people were advancing; he assigned part of the land for each tribe to possess, and he gave the houses of those people to the Israelites.
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However, the Israelites rebelled against God, who is greater than any other God, and they did many evil things to see if they could do those things without God punishing them; they did not obey his commandments.
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Instead, as their ancestors did, they rebelled against God and were not loyal to him; they were as unreliable as a bow that breaks when you try to shoot with it.
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Because they worshiped carved images of their gods on the tops of hills, they caused God to become angry.
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He saw what they were doing and became very angry, so he rejected the Israelite people.
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He no longer appeared to them at Shiloh in the sacred tent where he had lived among them.
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He allowed their enemies to capture the sacred chest, which was the symbol of his power and his glory.
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Because he was angry with his people, he allowed their enemies to kill them.
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Young men were killed in battles, with the result that the young women had no one to marry.
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Many priests were killed by their enemies’ swords, and the people did not allow the priests’ widows to mourn.
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Later, it was as though the Lord awoke from sleeping; he was like a strong man who became angry because he drank a lot of wine.
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He pushed his enemies back and caused them to be very ashamed for a long time because they had been defeated.
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But he did not set up his tent where the people of the tribe of Ephraim lived; he did not choose their area to do that.
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Instead he chose the area where the tribe of Judah lived; he chose Mount Zion, which he loves.
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He decided to have his temple built there, high up, like his home in heaven; he caused it to be firm, like the earth, and intended that his temple would last forever.
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He chose David, who served him faithfully, and took him from the pastures
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where he was taking care of his father’s sheep, and appointed him to be the leader of the Israelites, the people who would always belong to God.
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David took care of the Israelite people sincerely and wholeheartedly, and he guided them skillfully.
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