A couple of weeks ago I answered the question, “Are unicorns mentioned in the Bible?” Frankly, I was surprised by the number of responses I received both from members at Canyon View and from readers on the Internet. The article generated a host of other questions that we will try to answer in the future. Let’s start with the great “Gopher Wood” controversy.

 

“In Genesis 6:14, God tells Noah, ‘Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch’ (KJV). What is ‘gopher wood’?”

That’s a great question since this is the only place in the Bible where this obscure Hebrew word is used. Most scholars (and many modern English translations) call it cypress wood. The Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible says:

The cypress is a massive tall-growing evergreen with scale-like leaves and is widely distributed in the mountainous regions of the Bible lands. On Mt Lebanon and Mt Hermon it grows together with the cedar and oak. Its usual height is 50 to 60 feet but it may grow as tall as 80 feet. … Cypress wood is very hard and durable and was employed by the ancients in the manufacture of idols. It is said to have been used extensively in ship building by the Phoenicians, Cretans, and Greeks.

So where did the KJV translators come up with “gopher” wood? The answer is: they didn’t translate the Hebrew word – they transliterated it! It’s a Hebrew word written in English. The Hebrew word is “go-pher.” It just happens we have an English word “gopher” too, but that refers to a pesky rodent and not to a tree.

It is fascinating to compare the different English Bibles at this point. The King James Version, along with the ESV, NASB, ASV and RSV transliterate the Hebrew text and read “gopher wood,” while the New International Version, along with the NRSV, and NCV, interpret the word as “cypress wood.”

So which translation is correct? Since we truly don’t know what kind of wood God told Noah to use, I like the versions like the KJV that transliterate the Hebrew word and put a note in the margin, but that’s just my personal preference. I’d love to hear how you feel. Meanwhile, I’ve found some other scholars who say it was “pine” and others even say it was “teak.” The important thing is Noah knew exactly what God was talking about and followed the Lord’s instructions to the letter!

A book I recommend is Warren Weirsbe’s Real Worship (Nashville: Oliver Nelson Books, 1986). In it Weirsbe writes about the wonder of wonder.

“Wonder is the basis of worship,” Thomas Carlyle. 

“Wonder is the seed of science,” Emerson. 

“Philosophy begins with wonder,” Alfred North Whitehead.

But while wonder is a priceless ingredient in life, wonder is a rare ingredient. It seems to be missing from our age of explanations and it is certainly missing from much of our worship.

“The church today is imperiled by what it thinks it understands. Most preaching focuses on explaining something and neglects to admit the things that cannot be explained,” Warren Weirsbe.

“Worship is the exercise of the mind in the contemplation of God in which wonder and awe play an important part in stretching and enlarging our vision, or in opening up our conceptual forms to take in that which by its nature far outruns them,” T.F. Torrance.

True wonder is not a passing emotion or shallow excitement. It reaches into your heart and mind and shakes you up.

“It is an encounter with reality – with God – that brings awe to your heart. You are overwhelmed with an emotion that is a mixture of gratitude, adoration, reverence, fear – and love,” Warren Weirsbe.

Wonder is not born of ignorance. The more we know, the more overwhelmed we become, but where has our God-given sense of wonder gone? Perhaps it was lost when we discovered science with its recipe for everything. Maybe God was replaced by a formula. True science, or course, thrives on wonder. Albert Einstein wrote in his book, The World As I See It, “The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. He who knows it not, can no longer wonder, no longer feel amazement, is as good as dead, a snuffed-out candle.”

So let me call for a return to wonder. We need a new emphasis on the mystery of things. The Apostle Paul understood this when he wrote “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” (Romans 11:33, ESV). We need to recapture a childlike wonder and humility in our age!

 

What did he say?

Words fascinate me. We have a daughter living in England and I’m starting to have a hard time understanding her. Oh, her accent hasn’t changed but the vocabulary has. Our little grand-daughter, India, just had a “jab” (vaccination). Meanwhile Heather has been busy “hoovering” the carpets. It’s been a little cold, so you’ll need to wear a “jumper” (sweater).

I’m told Winston Churchill was invited to a proper-Bostonian luncheon during one of his visits to the United States. The women were thrilled and decided to serve the famous prime-minister a typical American meal of fried chicken. (That in itself was pretty remarkable for these blue-blooded ladies!) As Mr. Churchill was being served, they asked him which piece he would prefer to which he answered, “I believe I would like a breast.”

The ladies were affronted by his brazen language. The chairwoman politely explained, “Mr. Churchill, we ask for ‘white meat’ or ‘dark meat.’” The Englishman smiled and the next day sent the hostess a corsage along with the note, “I would be honored if you would pin this to your white meat.”

Language is a funny thing and Christians are often guilty of innocently using “stained glass vocabulary” – language that tends to baffle rather than communicate with our non-Christian friends. For example, if your neighbor asks about our usual music in worship, we might say, “We sing acapella.”  You will probably get a puzzled expression in response. (The Microsoft spell-checker doesn’t know that word either! “Acapella” comes from the Latin for “as in church” – to sing without instrumental accompaniment.) Perhaps a better answer would have been, “We worship un-plugged.”

A plane lost all of her instruments during final approach in a fog over Seattle. The pilot was desperate – especially as he barely missed an office building – but he was quick thinking and shouted at a man in the window, “Where am I?”

“You’re in an airplane.”

The pilot immediately turned to bearing 342, lowered his flaps and made a perfect touch down. The co-pilot was amazed and told the captain, “That guy’s answer was 100 percent accurate but totally unhelpful!”

“Yes, when I heard him, I knew it had to be Microsoft technical support so I knew exactly where we were and landed the plane.”

Not everyone was raised in the church and understands our jargon so our challenge is the same as it always has been: to make the message clear.

Bible Questions

“Are unicorns mentioned in the Bible?”

Yes. If you read the King James Bible (translated in 1611), you can read about unicorns and dragons.

The King James Bible was translated over 400 years ago and includes some wonderful creatures we don’t recognize today. For example we can read about dragons (Jeremiah 9:11 and 34 other places), Sirens (Isaiah 13:22), Satyrs (Isaiah 13:21; 34:14) and unicorns (Psalm 92:10 and eleven other places). The Douay-Rheims Bible (1582, 1609, 1610 — the English translation of the Latin translation of the Hebrew Bible used by many Catholics) even includes griffons (legendary creatures with the body, tail and hind legs of a lion with the head and wings of an eagle, Leviticus 11:13) and lamias (a horrible, mythical creature that ate children, Isaiah 34:14).

Though these mythical beasts occur in our old English Bibles, that doesn’t mean they actually appear in the Bible. The Bible was originally written in Hebrew for the Old Testament and Greek for the New Testament. What the presence of mythical beasts in the Bible means is that the Bible translators four hundred years ago didn’t know the meanings of the Hebrew words. When the old English translators of King James’ day encountered Hebrew words they didn’t have meanings for, they guessed! In the days of Shakespeare, people believed in all kinds of mythical creatures from unicorns to dragons so it didn’t seem strange that these creatures should appear in the Bible.

However, 400 years have passed and we have learned a great deal about the true meanings of these ancient words. As archaeologists and linguists continue to discover ancient manuscripts and inscriptions, previously unknown words are deciphered and defined.

So, for example, the Hebrew word re’em, often translated in the KJV Bible as “unicorn,” actually refers to the wild ox (Bos promigenius or Aurochs – an extinct predecessor of our modern cattle). Likewise, the KJV translators were fond of the word “dragon” and used it to translate many unknown animals including jackals (than: Job 30:29; Isaiah 34:13; 35:7 and elsewhere), crocodiles (tannim: Psalm 73:13; Isaiah 51:9; Ezekiel 29:3) and hyenas (ciyyim: Psalm 73:14; Jeremiah 1:39).

That’s just another reason why it is important to choose a modern English Bible like the English Standard Version (ESV) or New International Version (NIV) for your personal Bible study. However, I want to reassure my grandkids, even though unicorns and dragons aren’t real – I still think they are cool.

Of course this past month I turned 60 so I can sit back in my rocking chair and say things like, “I remember when…” Years ago Vacation Bible School was really just an extended Sunday School class with an assembly where we sang “Booster Booster be a Booster.” Then we ate snacks and made crafts with clay and Popsycle sticks.

Boring… But not any more. Last night our 2013 Vacation Bible School began at Canyon View and it rocked! It was an exciting multi-media production of fast paced learning and fun as you can see from this video compilation.

Thanks to “Lady” Lydia and her never-tiring crew. VBS continues through Friday, July 26th.

I really hate going to the mall. I find them crowded and frantic and full of rude people. On the other hand, I enjoy sitting down with a good cup of coffee and watching the people go by. People watching is great fun and there is no better place than the mall to observe them.

One person in particular intrigues me. You’ve seen him. He walks by the big glass storefronts and stares at his reflection. Perhaps a hair is out of place, or his pants aren’t hanging just right. Narcissus of the Mall quickly makes an adjustment and then grins, self-satisfied. Now comes the fun part. Watch him do exactly the same thing when he walks in front of the next storefront!

In the first century, they didn’t have the fine, silvered glass mirrors that we enjoy today. The best they had were highly polished metal mirrors and mirrors were prized possessions. While I was in Jerusalem a few years ago, I was fascinated with a display of artifacts archaeologists had discovered in a cave in the desert. There was a goatskin bag, stuffed with straw, wrapped around an ancient mirror. As I stared at the mirror, I tried to imagine the owner. Of all the things she could have taken with her as she fled the Roman soldiers, why did she choose her mirror?

We are coming up on fire season in San Diego and it’s important to have a box of essentials packed and ready to go in case you need to evacuate. In that box you might include important papers, perhaps some cash and a few priceless heirlooms but would you include a mirror? I suppose it would depend on how vain you are.

James the brother of Jesus wrote:

^1:22 But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. ²³ For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. ²⁴ For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. ²⁵ But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.

The Bible is like a mirror. It is full of stories and as we read them, we identify with the characters and situations. As we see ourselves in the story, the Bible is like a mirror. The important point is: do we use the mirror as a tool, something that allows us to put things in order, or do we, like Narcissus of the Mall, simply see the Bible as a source of endless entertainment?

I just discovered my dear brothers and sisters at the Raven Street Church of Christ videotaped a lesson I delivered there on September 10th, 2012 during their week-long revival. I’m truly flattered. Raven Street may be a small congregation in size but they have an enormous heart and enough enthusiasm to put churches twice their size to shame. I love preaching for them and I thought I would share the evening with you.

The video presentation is about 34 minutes long and available on YouTube.com (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYDALg6qpNM) or you can just click the icon below to watch:

I believe the Christian life is life lived to the fullest. This is my Father’s world and so I’ve had many adventures. Each year, since I became a Christian, I’ve tried to learn something new and adventurous. I began sailing at 14 and that was followed by soaring, spelunking, backpacking, mountain climbing, skiing (downhill and cross-country), fly-fishing, scuba diving and many more.

Sometimes the hobby will become an obsession and then there are years I would like to forget. (The year I learned to golf comes to mind.) But one hobby I dearly love is scuba diving. I was so enthusiastic about the undersea world that my dad decided to learn to dive while he was living in Florida. When he came to visit me in California, he wanted to go diving in one of the great kelp forests he had heard me talking about.

I was a bit nervous about taking him there. Yes, they are magnificent. You feel like a giant bird soaring through a magical forest. The rays of sunlight pour down through the leaves and strange creatures swim all around you. But it can quickly become a nightmare if you become tangled or panic. Dad was use to the warm waters of Florida but this is the Pacific and the water is so cold you must wrap yourself in a thick wetsuit. Some people become claustrophobic. There were a thousand things for me to worry about as dad and I waded through the surf and swam out to his first kelp bed. I kept a close eye on him as we submerged.

It was everything I had hoped for! What an incredible day but then I noticed a stream of bubbles flowing uncontrollably from dad’s regulator. Something was wrong! What was the matter? Urgently I beat my knife on my scuba tank to get his attention and signaled “surface.”

“Dad! What’s wrong? Your regulator was running out of control!”

He pulled up his mask and took the regulator out of his mouth. He was grinning from ear to ear. “It’s just like you said son. God did such a great job I just couldn’t help but sing!” The bubbles were the chorus of dad’s hymn to the Creator.

 

³            Great is the Lord and most worthy of praise;
his greatness no one can fathom.

⁴            One generation will commend your works to another;
they will tell of your mighty acts.

⁵            They will speak of the glorious splendor of your majesty,
and I will meditate on your wonderful works.

⁶            They will tell of the power of your awesome works,
and I will proclaim your great deeds.

⁷            They will celebrate your abundant goodness
and joyfully sing of your righteousness.

Psalm 145:3-7 (NIV)