Devotion - Thursday, September 24

There is a heresy of the Christian Church known by the name of Arianism.  It started with a man named Arius who insisted that Christ was the Son of God, but that Christ was distinct from the God of the Old Testament.

We too often hear vestiges of Arianism in modern day talk.  Folks will make reference to "the God of the Old Testament" as one who was vengeful and cruel; while speaking of "the God of Jesus" as gracious and merciful.  

I am not writing of this in order to threaten you with excommunication for committing the hearsay of Arianism, rather to encourage you to trust the wisdom of the ancient Church in insisting that Jesus is the embodiment of the promises lifted up in the history and religious writings of Israel.  

While our Sunday readings are taken from Mark, the daily cycle of readings has us reading from Matthew.  This morning I read Matthew 2:13-23.  There are numerous references to Old Testament passages in these eleven verses.  There will be many more in the following chapters.  Maybe Matthew had already heard questions about the relationship between the God to whom Jesus witnesses and the God of which the prophets spoke. He certainly illustrates for us the ways in which those ancient writings speak of the current outpouring of God's desire to be among us and to receive us.

There is no break between the Testaments.  There are differing understandings of what must happen before Messiah can be said to have arrived.  Regardless, it is the same God who is glorified.