Living water, light and joy! These images and themes are beautifully presented. It's amazing to read and ponder, and I am so very grateful to you for taking the time to put it all in one place.
That footnote (13?) on joy was like a bow on top of this gift!
Oh I love the Jubilees connection! Here’s a paragraph I cut out:
I have mentioned many OT allusions in this post, probably too many, and I can’t prove John intended this one, to Jubilees 16. But like the others, it is suggestive, and it makes sense. Tabernacles is about reformation and renewal. Ironically and providentially, for Protestants at least, Reformation Day is a fall festival, often taking on seasonal harvest themes. One of the more memorable Latin slogans from the Reformation is post tenebras lux: after darkness light. Sound familiar? That’s what Tabernacles is all about. Only the society in the time of John’s audience had lost that meaning, similar to those today who have been harmed by reformed leaders and churches who fail to practice semper reformanda. When and where this has happened, the healed blind man’s story speaks to us. Festivals of reformation mean nothing apart from Jesus; and all that they mean can be found in Jesus, even when the festival is unavailable and unsafe.
Living water, light and joy! These images and themes are beautifully presented. It's amazing to read and ponder, and I am so very grateful to you for taking the time to put it all in one place.
That footnote (13?) on joy was like a bow on top of this gift!
Oh I love the Jubilees connection! Here’s a paragraph I cut out:
I have mentioned many OT allusions in this post, probably too many, and I can’t prove John intended this one, to Jubilees 16. But like the others, it is suggestive, and it makes sense. Tabernacles is about reformation and renewal. Ironically and providentially, for Protestants at least, Reformation Day is a fall festival, often taking on seasonal harvest themes. One of the more memorable Latin slogans from the Reformation is post tenebras lux: after darkness light. Sound familiar? That’s what Tabernacles is all about. Only the society in the time of John’s audience had lost that meaning, similar to those today who have been harmed by reformed leaders and churches who fail to practice semper reformanda. When and where this has happened, the healed blind man’s story speaks to us. Festivals of reformation mean nothing apart from Jesus; and all that they mean can be found in Jesus, even when the festival is unavailable and unsafe.