“May the LORD reward your work, and your wages be full from the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to seek refuge.” Ruth 2:12 nasb – (Boaz to Ruth)
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Readers,
Before I venture into the subject, ‘The Shelter of His Wings,‘ for those interested, here is a list of my top journal entries that are presently receiving the largest number of readers:
- “Speaking in Other Languages” – http://buddymartin.net/blog/2009/12/speaking-in-other-languages/
- “Walking Down Memory Lane” – http://buddymartin.net/blog/2010/08/walking-down-memory-lane-gods-faithfulness/
- “Mercy Triumphs Over Judgment” – http://buddymartin.net/blog/2009/11/mercy-triumphs-over-judgment/
- “Passing Through the Valley of Baca” – http://buddymartin.net/blog/2010/01/passing-through-the-valley-of-baca/
And now…
Under The Shelter of His Wings
There was a lady who suffered greatly from a female disorder. Hearing about Jesus, she said to herself, “If I only touch His garment1, I will get well.” (Mt9:21) We don’t often catch what she was really saying. The part of His garment she wanted to touch was the fringe (tassel) of His cloak. (1The Luke account has krispedon for garment, which literally means ‘fringe’ or ‘tassel.’)
The ancient Jews had a tradition concerning the fringe of the cloak that had to do with God’s Messiah, and of His healing presence. The background for this came from God’s commandment to Moses, saying,
“Speak to the sons of Israel, and tell them that they shall make for themselves tassels on the corners of their garments throughout their generations, and that they shall put on the tassel of each corner a cord of blue.”(Num15:38)
The cord of blue was said to represent the throne of glory, or the heavenly life. Over time these tassels took on the term ‘wings.’ Keep this in mind and you’ll have a bit more insight into those Scriptures that speak of God’s wings and why the lady wanted to touch the garment (tassels) of Jesus.
Listen:
“He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty … He will cover you with His pinions, and under His wings you may seek refuge.” (Ps91:1,4)
And,
“But for you who fear My name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings; and you will go forth and skip about like calves from the stall.” (Mal4:2)
Then we hear Jesus say,
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling.” (Mt23:37)
The language that Jesus uses here speaks to who He really is. The Lord God in the person of His Messiah, walked the land of Israel. The leadership refused Him. Isaiah speaks of Jesus as God Himself:
“Get yourself up on a high mountain, O Zion, bearer of good news [the gospel], lift up your voice mightily, O Jerusalem, [message of the apostles]; lift it up, do not fear. Say to the cities of Judah, ‘Here is your God.'” (Isa40:9)
Take time to read this larger prophecy. I’ll break it down by portions for emphasis:
“Who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?
“For He grew up before Him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of parched ground; He has no stately form or majesty that we should look upon Him, nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him.
“He was despised and forsaken of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and like one from whom men hide their face He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.
“Surely our griefs He Himself bore, and our sorrows He carried; yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; thechastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed.
“All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; but the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him.
“He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth; like a lamb that is led to slaughter, and like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, so He did not open His mouth.
“By oppression and judgment He was taken away; and as for His generation, who considered that He was cut off out of the land of the living for the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due?” (Isa 53:1-8 NASB)
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But there were those who believed that Jesus was the Messiah.
This is why the peoples crowded around Jesus, hoping just to touch the fringes of His garment. Notice how deeply felt this belief was concerning the garment of Messiah.
“Wherever He entered villages, or cities, or countryside, they were laying the sick in the market places, and imploring Him that they might just touch the fringe of His cloak; and as many as touched it were cured.” (Mar6:56)
Keep in mind that to the people the blue fringe represented the throne of glory and the heavenly life. The heavenly life was walking among them. They were taught that the Messiah would bring with Him the very life of God.
But a question remains —
Does this idea of the wings of God have any relationship to the sacred Scriptures
themselves? Can the heavenly life be found in the Bible? …
Paul said that the Scriptures carry in them the very breath of God. The Bible comes to us from the throne of glory. Therefore it can be said that when we believe the message of God’s Messiah that flows through the Scriptures, that in our believing we actually come under the shelter of His wings.
However, it is important to understand that it isn’t simply the Bible in itself that causes miracles and gives us the answers that we need. It is the heavenly voice that speaks to us from the Scriptures. Make this distinction and you have the true essence of why we love the book of heaven so deeply, and why we can say that the Bible is imbued with the life of Jesus.
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Once again let’s hear the prophet…
Is it any wonder why the book of Isaiah is spoken of as the fifth gospel. When Jesus opens the scroll of Isaiah, He begins to read,
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord.” (Cf. Luke 4:16-22)
What happens next? The people are astonished at what they are hearing. They were wondering at the gracious words that were flowing from His lips. What made the difference in this case? It was Jesus speaking from the Scriptures. The people were hearing a living voice speaking from the book of heaven. It is the voice of heaven that makes the Bible the book of heaven.
Once again listen to the prophet:
“On that day the [spiritually] deaf will hear words of a book [gospel], and out of their gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind will see. The afflicted also will increase their gladness in the LORD, And the needy of mankind will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.” (Isa 29:18-19 NASB)
Jesus said to the Jewish leaders,
“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me.” (Jn5:39)
And again,
“Therefore, when He comes into the world, He says, ‘Sacrifice and offerings You have not desired and sacrifices for sin You have taken no pleasure’ … Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come (in the scroll [or volume] of the book it is written of Me) to do Your will, O God.’” (Heb10:5-7)
The term for ’scroll’ is a reference to the total volume of the book and to the spindle around which the scroll wraps itself. The picture being presented is Jesus as the spindle around which the entire Bible wraps itself.
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The blue thread of heaven…
Now back to the lady with the issue of blood. She had been taught that the blue thread in the fringe (tassel) represented the throne of glory and the heavenly life. She saw Jesus as that heavenly life that comes from the throne of God. It was her faith in Jesus as the heavenly life that brought her healing.
It takes awhile for the child of God to understand the principle of how God speaks to us. This is why it is so important for the believer to be in the congregation of God’s holy people. As the man of God speaks from the Scriptures, we began to hear the Lord speaking to our own hearts. It isn’t the man of God who is speaking to us. It is the Lord speaking from the book of heaven. This is what Jesus is speaking of when He said,
“For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst.” (Mt18:20 – He is present in His Word.)
Is the Bible a living book to you or do you just use it to argue doctrine? Everything rests upon how you view the Scriptures.
These are the hard questions — But there is an issue involved. Do you really know the Lord, or do you simply know some form of religion? What think ye? Is the Bible the book of heaven?
Think about it.
Here is your song by Carmen. (Tell Me the Story of Jesus, I Surrender All, What A Friend We Have in Jesus.)
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I love you with the love of Jesus,.
Buddy
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