2508AFC022125 – Do not harm God’s anointed Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often.
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1 Samuel 26:23 c – I would not raise my hand against the Lord’s anointed.
1 Corinthians 15:48-49 – 48 As was the man of dust, so are those who are of the dust; and as is the man of heaven, so are those who are of heaven. 49 Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we will also bear the image of the man of heaven.
Psalm 103:1-2 –
1 Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and all that is within me,
bless his holy name.
2 Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and do not forget all his benefits
Luke 6:38 – 38 give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap; for the measure you give will be the measure you get back.”
(GNT) [1]38 Give to others, and God will give to you. Indeed, you will receive a full measure, a generous helping, poured into your hands—all that you can hold. The measure you use for others is the one that God will use for you.”
La grâce du Seigneur Jésus-Christ, l’amour de Dieu et la communion du Saint-Esprit soient avec vous tous. Well, “pardon my French” for this opener. I’ve had salutations in Spanish, Hawaiʻian, and English, one with a touch of Latin, and – since I spent about 8 years in school (5th – 12th Grades) studying french, I decided, “Why not?” That translates as The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you. As I prepared for this topic, my inmost-self felt a comfortable and desirable communion with you. It’s quite likely that if you are reading this, you have been sacramentally anointed. That anointing makes us members of the same family.
It is a HUGE family – an estimate of more than 2.5 billion living all around the Earth in 2024. And that’s just the LIVING family members! Over the past 2000 years or so it is estimated that over 2.4 TRILLION persons have lived their lives as Christians. If I did not believe that is possible, I would call it incredible – but it is not incredible! It is very credible! And every Christian is anointed with the Holy Spirit. It is one of those very important things that is obvious because it is so prominent, but the very nature of its ubiquity is cloaked in its Mystery. What does it mean to be “anointed?”
This is a practice that goes w-a-a-a-a-y back. Priests, Prophets, and Kings were anointed to signify that they were consecrated to service of God and community and to strengthen them in their roles as leaders. In the history of Israel, the anointed were “ha-Meshiach” – the Anointed – and Meshiach is the root-word for Messiah. We see this, for example, in Leviticus 4:3 – 3 If it is the anointed priest who sins, thus bringing guilt on the people, he shall offer for the sin that he has committed a bull of the herd without blemish as a sin offering to the Lord. The word anointed is הַמָּשִׁ֛יחַ – ham-mā-šî-aḥ – and the anointing is for a Priest who has been consecrated to God. In today’s Key Verse from 1 Samuel, David, already consecrated by Samuel to be King, will not harm Saul who is chasing David with the intention of killing him. David refers to Saul as “the Lord’s anointed” (↔ Music Link) because Samuel had anointed him to be Israel’s first King at God’s command. David, too, was the Lord’s anointed, so Saul should not have been seeking ways to kill David. It would be a great sin to harm The Lord’s Anointed. It was indeed a great sin for Saul, one for which he soon had an opportunity for repentance. He did repent – then – and David’s life was spared because he had spared Saul’s life. For the second time! It’s a great tale of bravery and daring and you can read it in 1 Samuel 24 and 1 Samuel 26.
Well, there you have it. David said not to harm the Lord’s Anointed, and he followed that teaching to the letter when it came to Saul. BUT, when it came to following that teaching not to harm the Lord’s anointed, David failed to apply it to himself. Belovéd, isn’t that what we also do? We are the Lord’s anointed if we are Baptized. We are the Lord’s anointed if we are set aside for him, that is, if we are consecrated to him. We are under the same teaching as David, and Saul, and Samuel, and Elijah, and Ezekiel, The Apostle Peter, The Apostle Paul, and … Jesus! He is, I am, you are, we are the Lord’s anointed, (↔ Music Link) and we are taught – we might as well say required NOT to harm the Lord’s anointed. That means, to my thinking, that we should not do harm to any of God’s anointed – including ourselves. Do we, can we, should we, must we refrain from harming any of God’s anointed? Wouldn’t that include Jesus as well? Isn’t it apparent that we must not harm ourselves because we are the Lord’s anointed? If we have a crucifix nearby, we can take a quick peek at that and ask ourselves what our own degree of culpability we have to shoulder because of that image of Truth. Can each of us say with genuine conviction (think about what that word means), “I did that. he would have done that for me if I was the only earthling on the planet!”
We are each born of dust and return to dust, except that dust is not all that we are. We are also spirit, and if that Spirit has been dedicated to the Lord, if that Spirit belongs to the Lord, then the image of dust will be left behind and the image of Spirit will go forward because Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we will also bear the image of the man of heaven. Now there is a GREAT reason to say Bless the Lord, O my soul, and do not forget all his benefits! And how do we bless the Lord?
We bless the Lord when we [1] acknowledge his Gifts, [2] thank him for his Gifts, and [3] make good use of his Gifts! When we choose to Bless the Lord, we choose to make him happy, and when he’s happy, we’re happy, too. God made everything beautiful and blessed it … but we broke it, and it stays broke. Still, we can rejoice in thanking him for the beauty of the Earth. (↔ Music Link) Why? Because we are of the Earth, and the Earth is Beautiful and Good, Why? Because God SAID SO, and continues to do so every moment of every day, because God is Good. (↔ Music Link).
So don’t harm the Lord’s anointed within or outside of your own life, and you will make God happy. Happy God – happy you. And you must surely know that, as God’s anointed, whatever we Gift to God, he returns to us 30-, 60-, and 100-fold. Whatever measure you use to give back he uses that measure to bless you. And here’s how that works whenever you Gift to God from the Gifts you have received:
| The Measure of Giving and of Return Your measure | Your return | God’s next step |
| A thimble | A thimbleful brimming over | A teacup |
| A teacup | Overflowing into the saucer | A coffee mug |
| A coffee mug | “Bottomless” refills | A stewing pot |
| A stewing pot | Add a sauce pan | A horse & cattle trough |
| A horse & cattle trough | Includes a windmill pump | A tanker truck |
| A tanker truck | A double tanker truck | A boxcar |
| A boxcar | Double-stacked three packs | A cargo ship |
| A cargo ship | AFRAMAX (↔ Click Link) | An Ultra-super-tanker ship |
| You get the idea! If you give what you get, you get what you give, only you get more of it for giving next. | ||
Alrighty now, let’s look at our person of the week. This time I chose two men who were kings in Israel and Judah – Hezekiah and Jehoshaphat.
Hezekiah – Righteous King of Judah probably around 715-687 BC. He was the son of the very wicked king Ahaz. His mother was Abijah (recall that the Queen Mother is always named in the succession of kings because she served as the regent). Hezekiah was 25 years old when he ascended to the throne, and for 29 years he reformed the religious practices in Judah, reversing the foolishly idolatrous policies of Ahaz. He made many religious reforms, reorganized the Priesthood which had been corrupted by his predecessors, abolished and destroyed the idols and “sacred poles” used to worship false gods, repaired the temple and the Temple implements, and revived the observance of Passover.
Toward the end of his reign he chose to cease paying tribute to Assyria’s King, Sennacherib. Sennacherib laid siege to Jerusalem around 701 BC, but the Lord came to Hezekiah’s aid and slew 185,000 of Sennacherib’s army. Sennacherib later claimed he had left Hezekiah “trapped like a bird in a cage.” Sennacherib was later assassinated by his sons. In these writings, we have often referred to Hezekiah 9:9 – God helps those who help themselves. Since there is no book of the Bible named Hezekiah, this popular saying is most definitely not in the Bible. The following passage describes how Hezekiah’s reign was remembered.
2 Kings 18:5-8 – 5 He trusted in the Lord the God of Israel; so that there was no one like him among all the kings of Judah after him, or among those who were before him. 6 For he held fast to the Lord; he did not depart from following him but kept the commandments that the Lord commanded Moses. 7 The Lord was with him; wherever he went, he prospered. He rebelled against the king of Assyria and would not serve him. 8 He attacked the Philistines as far as Gaza and its territory, from watchtower to fortified city.
Jehoshaphat – Do you remember this guy on the leff? One of his famous sayings was “Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!” Yosemite Sam used a lot of musza-rabble, frackadackus, syllabackus-skunkadunk language. The consonance in Jumpin’ Jehosaphat fits his style of commentary. Are things going well? OK! “Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!” See something unusual? “Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!” Find Bugs Bunny standing behind you? “Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!” For those of us “of a certain age” who watched Looney Toons Cartoon every Saturday morning, “Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!” (↔ Enjoyable Learning Link) was part of our lingo. But was there really a guy name Jehoshaphat and why was he jumpin’?
The name Jehoshaphat means “YHWH will judge.” He was the fourth King of Israel , succeeding his father, Asa. Azubah was the queen mother of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah. She was the daughter of Shilhi and the wife of King Asa. He also made many reforms and is considered one of the “Good Kings” (a rare occurrence). He made peace with the King of Israel (Ahaz). He relied on the words of the Prophet, Elishah, when allied with Jehoram, King of Israel, and an unnamed governor of Edom appointed by Jehoshaphat. He went to war against the King of Moab (Mesha). Elisha prophesied that, for the sake of Judah, God would deliver these three kings. In the end, Mesha lost the battle because, believing he could appease his gods, he took his firstborn son who was to succeed him, and offered him as a burnt offering on the wall. And great wrath came upon Israel, so they withdrew from him and returned to their own land. The alliterative phrase Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat obviously has nothing to do with history. It’s just a handy phrase used by a rootin’ tootin’ six-gun-shootin’ big little sonuvagun voiced by the inimitable Mel Blanc (and others in later years).
Remember,
LIGHT ≡ GOD ≡ TRUTH ≡ WAY ≡ LIFE ≡ ETERNAL ≡ LOVE
so,
May the God of Peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Do no harm to God’s anointed.
(including you and me and Jesus and them)
Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!
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Unless otherwise indicated, all scripture passages are from the New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE) New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com
Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License
