Pethuel

The end of the year is approaching so in my Old Testament reading I'm at the minor prophets. The language is often beautiful and poetic, even though the words to the peoples are quite frightening at times. I have to admit that with my limited historical knowledge (and short memory) I often have to grab a commentary to help me understand exactly to whom the prophets were speaking and what the context is.

So the other day I was reading Keil and Delitzsch's introduction to the book of Joel and came across this little gem:
Joel is distinguished from other men of the same name, which occurs very frequently, by the epithet "son of Pethuel" (which means 'the open-heartedness or sincerity of God").

I got to thinking about that little parenthesis and it just blew me away. Most of us, if asked to describe God, would probably not come up with the term "open-hearted" right off the bat. Pethuel's parents (Joel's grandparents) must have had an experiential knowledge of God's open-heartedness toward them, so much so that they wanted to declare it to the world through their son's name.

Recently I was talking with someone about the scars left in our lives by relationships in which the person's "love" for us is conditional, where their approval is withdrawn or withheld whenever we displease them and we spend a lot of time trying to earn that love back. I think most of us have this experience at some point in our lives because as flawed human beings, our love is also flawed. To even come up with the idea of a love that never fails seems to me to simply be outside the realm of probability, given our own experiences.

So that brings me back to Pethuel's parents. I am consumed with curiosity to know what they experienced about God's open-heartedness and sincerity. Certainly some significant event or insight must have made them want to declare it to the world through their son's name. And certainly we, who celebrate God's open-heartedness demonstrated at Bethlehem, have reason to rejoice and be open-hearted and sincere ourselves. I want to be a Pethuel, too!