Bible Quiz
007
Sticks and stones
1. How did Ezekiel demonstrate the future reunification of divided Israel?
2. What did Gehazi, Elisha’s servant, use to try to revive a dead child?
3. In addition to its use in miracles, a stick, staff, rod or reed was a sign of power and authority. Who was described as a “reed” causing weakness and wounds for the nation of Israel?
4. What happened to Aaron’s rod so as to prevent a rebellion by affirming the priestly status of the tribe of Levi and Aaron’s leadership of the tribe?
5. Cairns and heaps were important in early biblical times. Who established a boundary covenant by making the stone pile called Jegar-sahadutha/Galeed?
6. Single standing stones were also set up and sometimes named. What did Samuel call his?
7. Water came from Sinai’s rock, but what else did Moses say once flowed forth from a rock?
8. Why did Joshua build stone cairns in the midst of the Jordan and at Gilgal?
9. David picked five stones and used one to kill Goliath. What other giant, made of five mineral elements, appeared in a dream and was brought down by a mysterious stone?
10. To illustrate God’s fatherly love, Jesus said that no parent would give a stone in place of bread to a child (Matthew 7:9). But who offered Jesus a stone for food?
Prepared by Bill Ickes, a reader in Berlin, Pennsylvania, who has written other quizzes for BR (see
Summer 1986 ,Spring 1987 andApri1 1988 ), and whose ideas led to the Illuminations in theWinter 1986 andFall 1987 issues of BR.
009
Answers
1. By joining two sticks. The Lord told Ezekiel, “take a stick and write on it, ‘For Judah and the Israelites associated with him’; and take another stick and write on it, ‘For Joseph—the stick of Ephraim—and all the house of Israel associated with him’; and join them together into one stick, that they may become one in your hand” (Ezekiel 37:15–17). Then the Lord explained that this represented a future reunion of the northern and southern kingdoms: “I will make them one nation in the land, upon the mountains of Israel” (Ezekiel 37:22).
2. Elisha’s staff. When a wealthy woman of Shunem, who had provided lodging for the prophet Elisha, came to him on behalf of her dead son, Elisha told his servant Gehazi, “Take my staff in your hand, and go. And place my staff on the face of the boy” (2 Kings 4:29). Doing as Elisha had commanded, Gehazi “went on ahead and laid the staff on the face of the child, but there was no sound or sign of life” (2 Kings 4:31). Then Elisha came and revived the boy himself.
3. Pharaoh. During Nebuchadnezzar’s siege of Jerusalem, the Lord mocked Egypt’s unreliability as an ally to Israel by characterizing the Egyptian ruler as “a staff of reed to the house of Israel; when they grasped you with the hand, you broke, and tore all their shoulders; and when they leaned upon you, you broke, and made all their loins to shake” (Ezekiel 29:6–7):
4. It budded and blossomed. In order to quell the Israelites’ rebellious murmurings against Moses and Aaron, the Lord commanded Moses to collect the tribal leaders’ rods, to write the leaders’ names upon their rods and to place the rods in the tent of meeting. The next day, “the rod of Aaron for the house of Levi had sprouted and put forth buds, and produced blossoms, and it bore ripe almonds” (Numbers 17:8). After Moses had exhibited the rods to the people, God told him, “Put back the rod of Aaron before the testimony, to be kept as a sign for the rebels, that you may make an end of their murmurings against me, lest they die” (Numbers 17:10).
5. Jacob and Laban. In the hills of Gilead, Jacob and Laban resolved to end the strife between them by establishing a boundary covenant. So they gathered stones into a mound called “the heap of witness,” “Jegar-sahadutha” in Aramaic (Laban’s language), “Galeed” in Hebrew (Jacob’s language). Then Laban declared, “This heap is a witness … that I will not pass over this heap to you, and you will pass over this heap … to me, for harm” (Genesis 31:47–52).
6. Ebenezer (Stone of Help). When the Philistines gathered to attack the Israelites at Mizpah, the Lord threw them into confusion, and the Israelites routed them. To commemorate the victory, “Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Jesha-nah, and called its name Ebenezer [a word combining the Hebrew words for stone (eben) and help (ezer)]; for he said, ‘Hitherto the Lord has helped us’ ” (1 Samuel 7:12).
7. Honey and oil. Shortly before Moses’ death, the Lord commanded him to write a song that would be a witness for the Lord when the Israelites turned to other gods. Moses obeyed and taught the song to the people, reminding them that God had “made him [Jacob] suck honey out of the rock and oil out of the flinty rock” (Deuteronomy 32:13).
8. To recall the river crossing into the Promised Land. Joshua explained to his men, “When your children ask, in time to come, ‘What do those stones mean to you?’ … tell them that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial for ever” (Joshua 4:1–9). The same reason is given for the cairn at Gilgal.
9. Nebuchadnezzar’s dream statue. After Nebuchadnezzar’s wise men declined to guess what the king had dreamed, Daniel took up the challenge successfully. He said that Nebuchadnezzar had dreamed of a mighty image made of gold, silver, bronze, iron and clay, which was smashed to dust by “a stone … cut out by no human hand …” (Daniel 2:34). Daniel said the stone represented the kingdom of God, which would smash the kingdoms of the earth, represented by the statue.
10. The Devil. When Jesus had fasted for 40 days in the wilderness, the Devil offered him a stone for food and said, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread” (Luke 4:3; Matthew 4:3). But Jesus resisted the temptation with the words, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone,’ ” (Luke 4:4; Matthew 4:4).
Sticks and stones
1. How did Ezekiel demonstrate the future reunification of divided Israel?
2. What did Gehazi, Elisha’s servant, use to try to revive a dead child?
3. In addition to its use in miracles, a stick, staff, rod or reed was a sign of power and authority. Who was described as a “reed” causing weakness and wounds for the nation of Israel?
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