Saturday, October 19

Admirable Men: Joseph and David

In most Protestant Bibles, the Hebrew Bible is comprised of thirty-nine texts and the New Testament (from the word testamentum that can also mean covenant) is comprised of twenty seven canonical texts. Through these Biblical texts, we find a large number of men and women who perform extraordinary - and some not so extraordinary - feats. We find individuals who are not carefully crafted fictitious but actual individuals with actual flaws and actual problems. For example, Noah's family was the only one preserved when the global flood covered the world, and God credited him as righteous. Yet after the flood, Noah planted a vineyard and became drunk. Abraham lied, Jacob was deceitful, David committed adultery, and so forth. However, there are a great number of admirable qualities in different Biblical figures.

King David began the Davidic monarchy, created the plans for God's temple, helped the nation, expanded the boundaries of Israel, and faithfully led God's people. Despite his downfalls, the Davidic Psalms as well as other Biblical texts demonstrate the heart of David. In short, he is quite the admirable man. Very few can compare to King David, but Joseph is perhaps one individual who can. Joseph son of Jacob and Rachel was sold into slavery at a young age. He ended up working for an Egyptian named Potiphar and later became second in command of Egypt. Both David and Joseph were rulers over a nation (to different extents), and both men faithfully served God throughout the majority of their lives. However, where David fell to his lustful temptation Joseph did not. Joseph also made the best out of whatever situation he was thrown into, and tried his hardest to help out the nation as well as forgiving his brothers for what they did to him. In short, Joseph has various admirable traits - a forgiving heart, courage in the face of despair, leadership, and faithfulness to God.

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