This is the second in a pair of articles on the unexpected things God has required of people. In the first article, we looked at God’s naming of unborn babies, sometimes before they were even conceived, and his renaming of some adults as well.
In this article, we
look at some of the unconventional, unexpected or possibly even peculiar things that God told people in the Bible to do.
Battles
In the time of king David, the Philistines often attacked Jerusalem and David was quick to ask God what to do. 2 Samuel 5 gives us some details of two of these confrontations. On the first occasion, when David asked what to do, God told him to go and meet the Philistines in battle and that he would be
victorious. He did and he was.[1]
On the second occasion, God directed David to take a different approach, leading his army around behind the Philistines and waiting near some balsam trees. When he heard the sound of marching in the tops of the trees, he was to attack, because God would already have begun to defeat the enemy. David obeyed and won a convincing victory.[2]
When people
refer to David as a great king they are right,[3] and this willingness to ask God for instructions and then do what God told him is one of the oustanding characteristics that made him great. I can’t help thinking that few generals would ever ask God for guidance, and most would ignore such an instruction if they ever received it. Despite God’s insistence that he controls the kingdoms of the world,[4] we, as humans, continue to believe that we know better!
Prophets and
parables
God spoke to his prophets frequently and some of the instructions he gave them were particularly strange, things they were to do as part of giving others a message from God.
For example, Ezekiel was told to get a sword and use it as a barber’s razor to cut off his beard and the hair on his head. Not too strange, you might say, but it didn’t stop there. Imagine how you would feel if
you were given the following instructions:
“Take balances for weighing and divide the hair. A third part you shall burn in the fire in the midst of the city, when the days of the siege are completed. And a third part you shall take and strike with the sword all around the city. And a third part you shall scatter to the wind, and I will unsheathe the sword after them. And you shall take from these a small number and bind them
in the skirts of your robe. And of these again you shall take some and cast them into the midst of the fire and burn them in the fire. From there a fire will come out into all the house of Israel.”
Ezekiel 5:1-4
When God talks about “the siege” above, he is referring to another instruction he had already given Ezekiel instructing him to draw a picture of
Jerusalem on a brick, then lie down in front of it and act as if he were laying siege to it![5]
These instructions do seem strange, but they were all part of God’s attempts to get people to listen to his warnings, in the hope of saving their lives. Sadly, most people didn’t listen in those days – any more than they do nowadays. God explained what Ezekiel’s little parable with his hair meant:
“A third part of you shall die of pestilence and be consumed with famine in your midst; a third part shall fall by the sword all around you; and a third part I will scatter to all the winds and will unsheathe the sword after them.”
Ezekiel 5:12
Ezekiel’s play acting was a terrible warning of coming judgement, given by God in the hope that his people
would repent. They didn’t.
Other prophets who acted out parables were:
(a) An unnamed prophet asked someone to wound him so that he would have to wear a bandage which would stop King Ahab from recognising him and also make his message more convincing.[6]
(b) Isaiah was told to:
- Write “Belonging to Maher-shalal-hashbaz” on a
tablet and get the signing witnessed.[7]
- Go naked and barefoot for three years.[8]
(c) Jeremiah acted out several parables. He was told to:
- Buy a pot and break it in front of an audience and then speak God’s message to them.[9]
- Buy
a loincloth and put it around his waist but not to wash it. Then he was travel a long way to the Euphrates River and bury it there. After many days, he was told to go and find it, only to find it ruined. [10]
- Go through the process of buying a property outside Jerusalem, including getting witnesses, paying a reasonable purchase price and signing the deed of purchase. Yet this happened at a time when the whole
nation was under siege and land was practically worthless. God was encouraging them to believe that things would go back to normal in the future and that land would be bought and sold again.[11] It happened.
- Take the cup of God’s wrath from God’s hand and then take it to kings of many nations telling them that they would all serve the king of Babylon.[12]
(d) Hosea was told to marry a prostitute to present a living example of God’s willingness to forgive his people.[13]
Instructions for prophets and others
Shortly after the kingdom of Israel was split into two parts, God sent a prophet from Judah to give a warning to Jeroboam, the new king of Israel. The conditions God placed upon his journey were that he should go to Bethel and deliver the message, but not eat or drink anything
while he was there. Not only so, but he was to return home by a different way from the way he had gone.[14] Sadly, he didn’t follow those instructions.
Elijah was a famous prophet whose life is celebrated in the oratoria “Elijah” by Felix Mendlessohn, which contains some magnificent music. He received a few unexpected instructions from God during his life, including being told to go and live beside a creek at the start of a
drought and that ravens would feed him. He obeyed and the birds gave him bread and meat every morning and evening, and he drank from the creek until it dried up.[15] After that he was told to go beyond the borders of Israel to live with a widow and her son in Zarephath. There he was looked after until the drought ended after three and a half years.[16]
Elisha took over from Elijah as God’s prophet and he became famous for doing
twice as many miracles as Elijah. One involved the healing of a Syrian general, Naaman, who was a leper. He went to the king of Israel and demanded to be healed, which convinced the king that Syria was looking for a fight. Elisha, however, told the king to send the man over to Elisha so that he could learn that there was a real God in Israel. When Naaman arrived, Elisha sent him a message telling him to go to the Jordan and dip himself in it seven times. Initially,
he refused, angrily saying that the rivers of Damascus were better than all of the waters in Israel. Fortunately for him, however, his servants convinced him to try anyway and he was cured of his leprosy.[17] Had he held on to his stubbornness, he would have remained a leper. Stubbornness might feel good at times, but it can often make us miss out on good things.
Some other well-known Bible characters were told to do very
unexpected things.
Abraham was told to sacrifice the only son of his beloved wife Sarah – which is the only time in the Bible where God told anyone to sacrifice a human being. The happy sequel was that when Abraham showed that he was willing to obey, God stopped him and provided a ram for him to sacrifice instead.[18]
Let’s look at a few other examples where godly people followed strange instructions to the letter:
- Abraham was told to cut some animals in half and lay out the pieces of each animal opposite each other to form a path between.[19]
- Israelites in Egypt were told to paint the blood of a lamb on the doorposts and lintels of their houses at the very first Passover.[20]
- Priests were told to carry the ark of God to
the side of the river Jordan and stand in the water. When they did so, the water stopped flowing and the priests went down into the dry centre of the river and stood while the people all crossed the Jordan on dry ground.[21]
- The people of Israel were told to march around the city of Jericho once per day for six days and then to march seven times around it on the seventh day. After they did so and concluded with a
great shout, the walls of Jericho fell down.[22]
- Jeremiah was told to go and watch a potter at work.[23]
- Joseph, the husband of Mary, was told in a dream to get up and escape to Egypt because Herod the king was going to try to kill Jesus as a baby. He got up during the night and left.[24]
We
could go on with many other examples or look at the strange things people saw and did in visions (eating scrolls, digging through walls, being picked up by the hair and taken to Jerusalem, etc.), but this is enough for now!
Notes
[1] 2 Samuel 5:18-21
[2] 2 Samuel 5:22-25
[3] 2 Samuel 22:36; Psalm 18:35 and see Bible Tales article “David’s Legacy” (https://www.bibletales.online/davids-legacy/)
[4] eg. Daniel 4
[5] Ezekiel 4
[6] 1
Kings 20:35-43
[7] Isaiah 8:1-2
[8] Isaiah 20:1-5
[9] Jeremiah 19
[10] Jeremiah 13:1-11
[11] Jeremiah 32:1-44
[12] Jeremiah 25:15-38
[13] Hosea 1:2-3
[14] 1 Kings 13:1-32
[15] 1 Kings 17:1-7
[16] 1 Kings 17:8-18:1
[17] 2 Kings 5:1-14
[18] Genesis 22:1-18
[19] Genesis 15:8-21
[20] Exodus 12:3-14
[21] Joshua 3:7-4:18
[22] Joshua 6:2-21
[23] Jeremiah 18:1-17
[24] Matthew 2:13-15
