my soul continually remembers and is bowed down

The sun is retreating. I can feel it.

Every year since I've been self-conscious enough to analyze my own changes in mood, I've experienced a sinking in my spirits in the weeks immediately following the summer solstice, the longest day of the year in the northern hemisphere. As often as not, and every year for the past four, these mood changes have been accompanied by some form of broken relationship with a woman. I can look back over the years and remember the disappointments . . .

2001: settling for a job serving food in an assisted living facility: a job I never wanted but wound up keeping for almost three years

2002: sent mixed signals to a woman who was interested in me; she said I needed to grow up. Resigned my job at the nursing home, then changed my mind. I did that two more times, I think.

2003: rejected by another woman the night two mutual friends were married, which also happened to be on summer solstice. The next weekend I was in another wedding, and so my two closest friends in high school and my two closest friends in college were married over a 15 month span in which I experienced bitter disappointment with four different women. I spent the next six months listening to Radiohead, hurting myself on my bike, and writing about the cursed ground. I still don't think I've recovered from 2003. It was a rough year.

2004: spent July searching in vain for decent work: no one wanted me to work in their yard, nothing at the bike shop, too late for teaching jobs. At least the tour was somewhat interesting

2005: accepted a teaching position at WCCS and promptly started doubting whether I was born again at all. Thought seriously about not signing the contract and had a sinking feeling heading into the new job.

2006: Ivan Basso and Jan Ullrich implicated in Operation Puerto on the eve of the Tour de France. I was so depressed I could hardly function. In hindsight it was the tip of the doping revelation iceberg, and my reaction doesn't make much sense.

2007: After losing my teaching job, I spent the summer scratching my head over what to do next. Not much presented itself. One memory epitomizes that July: I told some friends I'd do a road race with them, but showed up late after not wanting to get out of bed, so I went and rode the BRP solo instead.

August 2007: started working at the bike shop. Interesting how the disappointments changed theme afterwards . . .

2008: Gotta be discreet, because the characters involved might be reading this. Another early summer relationship fail. Painful. Felt like 2003. Lots of Radiohead, Tom Conlon, Coldplay, and Wilco, and Ryan Adams. Thank God for Wilco and Ryan Adams.

2009: Ignored advice not to initiate a relationship via internet with a stranger. Bad idea. Realized it in early July, tried to make it work until late September. Even worse idea. This time I was the heartbreaker.

2010: More women after me at one time than I could count on one hand. I reacted to all the attention about as well as Sarah Palin in 2008. I succeeded in driving them all away with unprecedented skill. I think there was divine intervention involved too; the way events unfolded was beyond coincidence.

2011: Once again I'm the heartbreaker. I feel like crap. I'm appalled at how selfish I am.

This has been somewhat cathartic.

"Remember my affliction and my wanderings,
the wormwood and the gall!
My soul continually remembers it
and is bowed down within me." Lamentations 3:19-20

New music for expressing disappointment:

Unapproachable Light

I realized after writing the last entry that while I noted the connection between light as the basis for understanding the building blocks of the uni/multiverse and light as figurative language (albeit in varying senses) used of Christ in texts that tell of His role in creating and sustaining the universe, I didn't make clear (enough) why I think this is significant. What struck me at first is that light would be the key to understanding ultimate physical reality, and that Christ as the light of the world would be the one who gives similar fundamental understanding at a spiritual and moral level. But as I thought of it, I realized there are deeper parallels that I would hesitate to write were they not so conspicuous and fascinating in my view.

First, there's the obvious fact that the biblical creation account in Genesis starts with God saying, "Let there be light" (Genesis 1:3). Regardless whatever difficulties there are with interpreting Genesis in light of modern science, it's interesting that light should be the first word spoken by God in creation, and so foundational to the discovery of the the laws of quantum mechanics that give us insight into so much of the universe.

Second, if we take seriously the words of Scripture that speak of Christ as the agent of divine creation, specifically that "all things were created . . . for him. And . . . in him all things hold together" (Colossians 1:15-16), then the identification of Christ as light is not merely a metaphor that the apostles thought would be fitting, nor even something God found in His world and thought, "Oh, look what I've found; that would come in handy as an illustration!". Instead, God created light in the first place to reveal something of Himself, and the possibility that light and its unpredictable properties would be a window into the nature of ultimate reality correlates beautifully to the New Testament presentation of Jesus Christ in His creating and sustaining work as the "radiance of the glory of God" (Heb 1:3), the "image of the invisible God" (Col 1:15), and the divine word (Gk. logos) whose "life was the light of men" (Jn 1:5). In other words, just as God spoke into existence physical light in such a way that it would give us insight into the cosmos, so He eternally spoke Jesus the Son of God and light of the world to give us insight into the ultimate reality of the living God.

Aside: The idea that any element or property of the natural world was created by God to communicate Himself with humanity may seem naively anthropocentric to a secular or naturalistic worldview, but could it be that though naturalism doesn't claim such a man-centered view, it inevitably functions with man at the pinnacle of a natural world that operates in ways understandable to our minds? Are the efforts of scientists to discover the nature of ultimate reality and the scope of the cosmos more compatible with humanity as made in the image of God with a mind like His, designed to know Him and truth about His world, or with humanity as the latest dominant species on an insignificant planet, with our primary purpose to pass on our genes, as Dawkins says? Which version of reality would we expect to yield such intellectual behavior? Do naturalistic biology and cosmology adequately explain their own existence? And if our perceptions and mental capacities are merely adaptations that enable us to survive on this planet, should we have a great deal of confidence that our speculations about the far reaches of space and time are all that reliable?

Third, and this is where it really gets interesting, light at the quantum level behaves like God in His character as the light of the world of humanity. Perhaps the most perplexing discovery of the double slit experiment is that in seeking to observe the path of photons through the slits (scroll down to the second section, entitled "role of the observer"), the photons mysteriously no longer behave as they would when not subjected to such observation. This blows my mind. In just the same way, Christ the light does not (primarily) present Himself to us for our examination, but rather demands to examine us. That's how light works. At any level, light resists scrutiny: we do not understand and appreciate the sun by staring at it, but by basking in its glow and seeing the world it illumines. The only way we're able to study it is by indirection, with shields and filters on telescopes and cameras, all of which owe their existence to the energy it gives. C.S. Lewis said,

"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen. Not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."

How much disbelief in and confusion over God and His word and ways is owing to a wrong approach to Him as God? Instead of submitting to Him as the Creator, Redeemer, and Judge of His world, we seek to put Him in the dock, save Him from aspects of His self-revelation we deem unacceptable, and then (re-)create Him in our own image that's PC for the 21st century. We ask why He doesn't do anything about poverty, suffering, and injustice in the world, while He is actually asking us the same question all along (Thanks, Renee). We like to point out the hypocrisy and abuses in the history of the church (and in the present day), but don't like to think about our own meanness to the people around us, nor how we'd probably be right at home in a group of hypocrites, because we judge others with the very moral standards we reject. Instead, we ought to say with David, the man "after God's own heart" (1 Sam 13:14; Acts 13:22),

O Lord, you have searched me and known me!

You know when I sit down and when I rise up;

you discern my thoughts from afar.

You search out my path and my lying down

and are acquainted with all my ways.

Search me, O God, and know my heart!

Try me and know my thoughts! [3]

And see if there be any grievous way in me,

and lead me in the way everlasting! [4] (Psalm 139:1-3, 23-24)

As I said in the last post, I'm not well-read in cosmology or quantum theory, or any field of science for that matter, so last night I picked up two books: Introducing Quantum Theory: A Graphic Guide and Brian Greene's highly respected The Elegant Universe. I'm eager to read them both (though well aware of how easily my interests get re-directed), curious to learn, and at this point expectant to see more ways this marvelous world reveals him "who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see" (1 Tim 6:16).

Even today as I read the first book, in a section describing experiments by Max Planck and friends dealing with electromagnetic waves, I looked up to see this:

I'll buy a waffle for anyone who can figure out what made that happen.

That's pretty good timing, and reminded me of what God has said of rainbows in His word, most familiarly to Noah after the flood:

I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth. (Genesis 9:13-16)

Fascinating, that God, whose creation began with light, should then make the sign of His covenant with that creation the range of light (or electromagnetic radiation) that is visible to human eyes. In this He was condescending to us, since He can surely see it all, a thought which gives fresh meaning to Psalm 139:12:

even the darkness is not dark to you;

the night is bright as the day,

for darkness is as light with you.

Beams of truth are bursting forth to my eyes, but it's well past time when my eyes should be shut. How about a U2 song on this theme to leave you with? Yeah!

Summer Solstice, the Light of the World, and some raw thoughts on ultimate reality

I read this in Proverbs 3 this morning.

19 The Lord by wisdom founded the earth;
by understanding he established the heavens;
20 by his knowledge the deeps broke open,
and the clouds drop down the dew.

In my increasing persuasion to read Scripture in terms of Christ, I thought of Colossians 2, which says,

in (Christ) are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. (v. 3)

What is the wisdom in God's anointed one Jesus that was instrumental in creation? Scripture speaks in many places of Christ as the agent of God's creative work (Col 1:16; John 1:1-5; Hebrews 1:2-3 are the main ones I think of), but how? It seems that if creation exists through a person, Jesus Christ the Son of God, then it should be more obvious, right? I asked to be shown better how this is true, and I didn't have to wait all that long for what I think is the beginning of an answer.

I had left up on the computer at work a talk on "God, Math, and the Multiverse":

I'd tried to listen to it the night before, but got distracted and had to leave. When I got to work, Jay said it looked interesting, so we put it on. I'm woefully ignorant and in my ignorance skeptical of many ideas I overhear from the field of cosmology, among them that of a multiverse. It seems to me like a copout taken by scientists who don't want to allow the possibility of a God who has fine-tuned the universe for life. And if our existence is bound within the constants and laws of our particular "verse" within the multiverse, how can we presume to know anything at all about existence beyond those confines? Continuing on the verse/literary theme, it would be like a character in The Chronicles of Narnia figuring out by events in his own story that C.S. Lewis had also written a space trilogy. It just seems to presume an awful lot that is pure speculation and, to my mind, not even reasonable.

I've been told that an understanding of quantum theory might help me make sense of it, but the problem is understanding quantum theory, and frankly, there are only 24 hours in a day and too many roads left to be ridden in York County. Apparently the dual slit experiment described in the lecture above (something I'd forgotten about since high school physics) is key to quantum theory in that it demonstrates how light operates as both a wave and a particle. With a little help from Jay, I got the basic idea that such properties of light, as Hawking proposes, indicate that the basic nature of existence is "multi-" rather than "uni-", to oversimplify. I still don't get how the properties of light particles diffusing(?) in a box dictate the fundamental structure of all that exists, or again how any observation or knowledge or pattern within this part/verse/version/manifestation of the multiverse can tell us anything about its entirety, but I'll go with it. I suggested that light might be some kind of "bridge" that gives us a window beyond this "verse" into the multiverse, and Jay said that's getting at the idea.

As I pondered it more, it struck me as interesting that physical light would be such a bridge. The lecturer in the clip above spoke of the glories of quantum theory as displayed in light waves and particles, the wonder of the enlightenment that gives us clean restrooms, among other good things, but also of the inadequacy of both of them ultimately to rectify the human predicament. Quantum theory makes predictions more accurate than any theory ever theorized by human minds, and because of the enlightenment, we can fight off disease and ailment that in past centuries decimated entire continents, but we still can't live in peace or overcome death. Perhaps the enlightenment that gave us the intellectual tools to guide us to light as the paradigm for understanding ultimate physical reality are pointing beyond that physical reality. On this note I find it striking that in the biblical texts that speak of Christ as the agent of creation, He is also spoken of as the light:

". . . through (Christ) also (God) created the world, who is the radiance of the glory of God . . ." (Hebrews 1:2-3)

The Greek word for radiance, ἀπαύγασμα, only occurs here in the New Testament, but is used of crepuscular rays in other Greek literature.

All things were made through him (the "word" who was with God and who was God, that is, Jesus, the Son, the 2nd person of the Trinity), and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. (John 1:3-5)

And also as the "image" (Gk. eikon) of the invisible who creates both visible and invisible things.

He (Jesus Christ) is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. (Colossians 1:15-16)

If these things are true, and Jesus, who claimed to be the light of the world spiritually, also created the world and everything in it, including light with all its wonderful properties, shouldn't we expect to find in physical light clues to ultimate reality? If theology were a science, is this a theory that allows us to make accurate predictions? It seems to be lining up today, on the best lit of all days this year.

Back in the Saddle, Rolling through the hood, and the Heidelberg Catechism

I've been back on the bike this week. Not as much as I wanted, but am trying with a little success to get up early in the morning to ride. Probably won't happen tomorrow. John Croom and I took a ride through the 'hood today. Last weekend I met Ryan Thomas, a Rock Hill police officer, at Paul's wedding, and he told me some places not to ride. I responded by asking if I had to ride there, when the best time would be. Yeah, I'm determined. He said Sunday morning or afternoon. I intended to get down there in the morning solo, but it didn't happen, so John and I rolled through late this afternoon. We didn't get much excitement other than a few odd looks. The whole time I had the lines

"man I do this for the blocks in tha Hood

the rock's in tha hood
Jesus Chist, Cornestone
gettin' props in tha hood
folks think we crazed and delirious
cilqued up 40 deep
all saved, all serious"
from Lecrae's "Souled Out" going through my head. Folks probably thought we were a little crazed and delirious, even if we were only cliqued up 2 deep. Here's more:

In hindsight I wish I'd taken some more time to rest and reflect today. It was a pretty intense weekend with a very serious accident on yesterday's morning ride. We're all praying and hoping Noreen will have a full and speedy recovery: http://rockhillbicycleclub.com/forum/comments.php?DiscussionID=3265&page=1#Item_23 Things like this make me stop and think more about what I'm doing and the risks involved, but only some. I'm aware every time I hit the road that something dreadful could happen to me. It really helps the prayer life, honestly. The first question and answer of the Heidelberg Catechism have been increasingly the cry of my heart as I head out into hostile streets each day.

1. Q. What is your only comfort in life and death?
A. That I, with body and soul, both in life and death, am not my own, but belong unto my faithful Savior Jesus Christ; who with his precious blood has fully satisfied for all my sins, and delivered me from all the power of the devil; and so preserves me that without the will of my heavenly Father not a hair can fall from my head; yea, that all things must be subservient to my salvation, wherefore by his Holy Spirit he also assures me of eternal life, and makes me heartily willing and ready, henceforth, to live unto him.

Without the will of my heavenly father not a hair can fall from my head. Those cars can't touch me unless God lets them, and that to serve my salvation and everlasting joy. I believe this because God has said it, and because it really does correspond to my experience. I've seen His deliverances on the road and in the circumstances of my life. I can't explain how I've been spared and guided any better way.

I've found some new routes and thus ridden some new roads in getting to and from the new house. After we came back to more familiar roads, we met up with Jenny and Alik and headed out by the mall. Here's the latest ride in a view of Rock Hill:

And how the whole county is looking:

I've got to get on the ball. I need to get my 24 Hours of Booty fundraising site up too. Late to sleep now though. Good night.

Adventures in Sleep Deprivation and the God who Serves

So it's 4:01 am. F. Scott Fitzgerald said "In the dark night of the soul, it is always four o'clock in the morning." The only reason I know that is that it's the opening line of Ollie Hopnoodle's Haven of Bliss, the summer vacation sequel to the well-known Christmas Story of "you'll shoot your eye out" fame.

Pardon that rabbit trail. I've been awake since before 6 am, and since Wednesday morning, when I woke up around 10, I figure I've slept a total of 13 or so hours. 13 hours of sleep in 90 hours. That's a little low. Odd thing is I'm not all that tired. Saturday afternoon was another story. Ask Thomas Savage.

The reason I've been sleeping so little is that I've been moving. Something I don't particularly like to do, and am not really good at, but of necessity have become rather proficient. Interesting how this move is almost exactly one year to the day since my last move, and even more interesting how different this one feels. Then I was depressed and angry, moving into a tiny dump of an apartment reluctantly, and at a very inconvenient time of year, compounded by the fact the bike shop was in the middle of losing half our staff and I was headed out of town on vacation 3 days after my moving date. This one has some similarities, particularly that I've been invited on three different "vacations", if you will, in the past week. The huge difference this year is that I'm moving from probably the worst place I've ever lived into the best place (from what I can tell so far) I've ever lived:

• A brick house in an established neighborhood with a big yard full of hardwood trees (and poison ivy in the plant beds; who told them I love that stuff?)
• equal if not lower rent, once Thomas moves in
• TILE in the bathroom (America, why have you forgotten how to build houses?)
• a fireplace that doesn't run on gas
• built-in bookshelves in the living area (bring on the freebies, Mom, I've got more shelf space!)
• within walking distance of both church and work (if you see me driving to church in weather less severe than hail, you have my permission to slash my tires)

Perhaps all of this is the reason I'm not tired. I feel at rest, and energized. The old place gave me a palpable sense of restlessness, that I could never settle in. I never felt at home there, and thus never even finished unpacking from last June. I had boxes that sat on my floor for a year only to get loaded up for another move this week. The past year had a sense of ceaseless activity but never getting anything done, I think due in part to the location, more out of the way of where I need to be most days, so that travel took up just enough more of my time to keep me from ever adapting to my admittedly odd routine (I get around by bike 9 months out of the year and my work day starts at 10 am and ends after 10 pm with my nightshift watchman duties at WCCS). That the apartment was cheap and run down and had been smoked in (to the point that I could sometimes taste it when I was away and using something [water bottles are where I particularly noticed it] saturated in Yorkshire funk) didn't help matters either. It was almost oppressive. My spirit feels so much lighter and more hopeful to be done with that place. That is, as long as they don't shaft me on the security deposit refund, which I've heard they're good at.

As I thought about how eager I was to stay up this Sabbath eve until I completed the joyful but toilsome work of moving out of that piece of cursed earth, I remembered some things I was granted to see in Scripture a few weeks back that spoke to my on-going struggle with overwork, perfectionism, distraction, and late nights. Here's what I wrote about it to a friend . . .

God brought me to Psalm 132 this morning, in relation to our struggles with vain work related to Psalm 127 on the vanity of work that is not the Lord working...

132:1 Remember, O Lord, in David's favor,
all the hardships he endured,
2 how he swore to the Lord
and vowed to the Mighty One of Jacob,
3 “I WILL NOT ENTER MY HOUSE
OR GET INTO MY BED,
4 I will not give sleep to my eyes
or slumber to my eyelids,
5 UNTIL I FIND A PLACE FOR THE LORD,
a dwelling place for the Mighty One of Jacob.”

Praise God He succeeded in his toilsome work (sic, I was so excited to see this I forgot David actually didn't succeed in this plan he had, but even better, GOD took David's desire and did it for David, see 2 Samuel 7, which makes this even more pertinent to my situation: I feel "planted, dwelling in my own place and disturbed no more" 2 Samuel 7:10), as did his greater son, in whom we are being built into a dwelling place for God in the Spirit (Ephesians 2:19-22).

Continuing on in Psalm 132:

6 Behold, we heard of it in Ephrathah;
we found it in the fields of Jaar.
7 “Let us go to his dwelling place;
let us worship at his footstool!”

Ephrathah is Bethlehem. Do you hear echoes of Luke 2:4,8,15 like I do?
4 And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David . . .
8 And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night . . .
15 When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” 16 And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger . . .

Another concrete example of the wondrous scandal of the incarnation, as stated so succinctly by John 1:10-12 He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name

God comes into the world and there is no room for him even to have a decent birthplace . . . he is shut out in the cold so we might be brought in . . . sounds a lot like what God did for David: serve him, make him a house, give the people a secure place to dwell, etc.

Ps 132: 8 Arise, O Lord, and go to your resting place,
you and the ark of your might.
9 Let your priests be clothed with righteousness,
and let your saints shout for joy.
10 For the sake of your servant David,
do not turn away the face of your anointed one.

INDEED WE ARE CLOTHED with RIGHTEOUSNESS and HAVE REASON TO REJOICE! WE ARE WHERE GOD HAS CHOSEN to REST!!

Sorry I got carried away . . . Hope you're having a blessed day as you live as the dwelling place of God and build His kingdom on earth.

That was my message to Paul, but as I think about it in terms of how God actually dealt with David in grace, to promise to build him a house, I'm even more amazed . . . how often we beat our heads against the wall seeking to serve and work for God, when all along He is the one who

did awesome things that we did not look for,
you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence.
From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear,
no eye has seen a God besides you,
who acts for those who wait for him.
You meet him who joyfully works righteousness (Isaiah 64:3-5)

Like RIGHT NOW as I write this. Wow. Or John and Vicki Talbot deciding they wanted to buy a house to rent to me when they heard my living situation wasn't the best. Or Jesus coming "not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many." This is the true and living God, and the good news about him that makes religion in all its forms so despicable and unappealing. Religion only works for God; the gospel of Jesus is that God works for us. To Him alone be glory.

There's so much more I want to write on this theme of the dwelling place of God and the incarnation, when God dwelt among us as a man with no dwelling place, a homeless man, as Rich Mullins sang, even related to Psalm 84, from which this blog takes its title. Here are a few texts to consider: Psalm 84:3, 5 and Luke 9:51, 57-58.

Some thoughts on a Most Troubling Text

Pondering some connections between these texts this morning. Can't write more, gotta work.

Psalm 137:8 O daughter of Babylon, doomed to be destroyed,
blessed shall he be who repays you
with what you have done to us!
9 Blessed shall he be who takes your little ones
and dashes them against the rock!

Isaiah 47:1 Come down and sit in the dust,
O virgin daughter of Babylon;
sit on the ground without a throne,
O daughter of the Chaldeans!

. . .

12 Stand fast in your enchantments
and your many sorceries,
with which you have labored from your youth;
perhaps you may be able to succeed;
perhaps you may inspire terror.
13 You are wearied with your many counsels;
let them stand forth and save you,
those who divide the heavens,
who gaze at the stars,
who at the new moons make known
what shall come upon you.

Matthew 2:1 Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men [1] from the east came to Jerusalem, 2 saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose [2] and have come to worship him.” 3 When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him; 4 and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. 5 They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for so it is written by the prophet:

6 “‘And you, O Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
for from you shall come a ruler
who will shepherd my people Israel.’”

7 Then Herod summoned the wise men secretly and ascertained from them what time the star had appeared.8 And he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, “Go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him, bring me word, that I too may come and worship him.” 9 After listening to the king, they went on their way. And behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was.10 When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. 11 And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. 12 And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way.

The Flight to Egypt

13 Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” 14 And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt 15 and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

Herod Kills the Children

16 Then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, became furious, and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the wise men. 17 Then was fulfilled what was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah:

18 “A voice was heard in Ramah,
weeping and loud lamentation,
Rachel weeping for her children;
she refused to be comforted, because they are no more.”