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Adding Knowledge, Increasing Understanding

21 Monday Nov 2022

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Hello!  Welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman where this week I continue my study of Isaiah 45:7 and specifically look at evil.

If you have read last week’s post, you might be wondering why write anything more on evil if I believe what I wrote is true: that we who belong to Jesus live from His life rather than live our lives determining for ourselves what is good or evil.  I do believe it but I also believe in Jesus’ warning: “Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves.  Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves” (Matthew 10:16).

It is important to me to understand exactly what the Holy Spirit meant to convey as He inspired the prophets to speak and the scribes to record.  The world system uses words as it sees fit and rarely do these meanings line up with what was intended in the scriptures.  I hear the word “evil” used to describe a person who simply disagrees with the mindset of another.  I don’t think that’s what is meant by “evil” in the Bible but I don’t know for certain.  Any dissent I may attempt will quickly fail as I have no foundational understanding to strengthen me.  And so, I continue my study.

One thing I noticed while studying “create” and bara was, bara is the only Hebrew word translated “create”.  While bara is translated with other words in other passages (to fatten, to cut down), any time you read the word “create” in the King James Version of the Bible, the corresponding Hebrew word is bara.  There will be prefixes and suffixes attached but the root is always bara.  I don’t know that I’ve gleaned any significant meaning from that but I do mention it as a matter of interest because this is rarely the case.  When I look up a word in the Strong’s concordance, I find that one English word has been used to translate several Hebrew (and Greek) words and thus variations in meaning are missing from our translations.  One such word I’ve already looked at is “darkness” and you can take a look at those previous studies if you like.

Going back to previous studies is not necessary though because “evil” in English has been used to translate several Hebrew and Greek words.  In Hebrew they are: ra, ra’a, ra’ah, roa, dibbah, beliya’al, and aven.  In Greek they are: poneros, kakos (spelled with an omicron), kakopoieo, kakia, kakologeo, kakoo, kakos (spelled with an omega), kakourgos, katalalia, katalaleo, phaulos, adikema, blasphemeo, blasphemia, and dusphemia. 

It is obvious that some of these occurrences are variations of a word rather than a different meaning: both the verb and the noun, for example.  Some of these words have only been translated “evil” in one passage so, as I continue in this study, I won’t focus on them.  These words in the Hebrew are dibbah, ra’ah, beliya’al, and aven.  Dibbah appears in Numbers 13:32 and is translated “evil report”.  The word dibbah means “slander, defaming.”  Beliya’al appears in Psalms 41:8 where it is translated “evil disease.”  The word itself means “without profit, worthlessness, destruction, wickedness.”  Aven appears in Proverbs 12:21 where it is translated “evil” as in misfortune.  The word aven means “trouble, vanity, wickedness, to come to naught”.  Ra’ah appears in Job 24:21 but, since it belongs to the same family as the word in my study passage, which is ra, I may be looking at ra’ah as well.

The Greek word adikema is translated “evil” as in “evil doing” in Acts 24:20 and that is the only time the King James Version used it so.  It might be interesting to see how its meaning contrasts with kakopoieo which means “to be a bad-doer” but I probably won’t be considering it in too much depth.  The same with dusphemia which occurs in 2 Corinthians 6:8 where it is translated “evil” as in “evil report”. 

My point of this study is not for you or me to memorize a bunch of Hebrew and Greek words so we can insert ourselves into situations and point out how much we know.  Neither is it for us to arm ourselves with an extensive vocabulary we then use to bludgeon others into silence.  My point is the importance of words.  Those who wrote both the Old and New Testaments certainly were specific in the words they chose to convey what they wanted to say.  Our English translations were less so.  Two different words are translated as “speak evil” in the New Testament: kakalogeo and katalaleo.  They don’t mean exactly the same things. Kakalogeo means “to revile, curse, speak ill of” and katalaleo means “to be a traducer, slander”.  Traduce means to “speak badly of or tell lies about someone so as to damage their reputation.” 

James speaks of the tongue as being “an unruly evil, full of deadly poison” in Chapter 3 verse 8 of his epistle.  The word for “evil” here is kakos spelled with an omicron.  Proverbs 18:21 says, “death and life are in the power of the tongue” but if I were to try and make the point that we speak out of the fullness of our hearts and attempted to use Luke 6:45 to do so, the Greek words translated evil in this passage are not kakos nor are they in any way part of the same family as kakos.  The words here in the Greek are poneros.  So, my point might be valid and I might be able to substantiate it using the English translation, but the Greek words mean different things and my point would not end up being accurate.

I think accuracy is important but it is not more important than our relationship to the Holy Spirit.  Through His indwelling us, we have the very person of Jesus Christ.  The Holy Spirit guides us into the truth that Jesus Himself is our all: our life, our wisdom, our peace, our words, our salvation.  And yet, Paul gave this admonition to Timothy: “Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15).  Peter writes in his epistle, we have been given exceedingly great and precious promises and that through these we may be partakers of the divine nature.  He then writes, “But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love” (2 Peter 1:5-7).

Peter’s list isn’t possible without the Holy Spirit and that includes knowledge.  We can study all we like but, without the Holy Spirit revealing the truth of what we study to us, our study gives us head knowledge only and there is no life to it.  And yet, study is important.  At the beginning of this post I quoted, “be wise as serpents and harmless as doves.”  Some translations have “innocent” and others have “gentle” in place of harmless.  The Greek word is akeraios (G185) and the first meaning given in the Strong’s is “unmixed”.  I like that: I want an unmixed mind.  I want to know what these words meant by the ones who wrote them.  I do not want the world system giving me definitions because then, it will begin to interpret scripture for me and that path ends in death.  And so, in the upcoming weeks, I will look at the different words translated “evil” and their meanings.  I will look at the passages in which these words occur and see if my understanding of them changes.  My ultimate desire is that, through this study, the Holy Spirit will open my eyes and I will know the Truth.  Jesus Christ is the ultimate Truth and my prayer to the Holy Spirit is “increase my understanding that I might know Jesus in a deeper and more intimate way.”

May the Holy Spirit open our eyes that we may know Him!

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

The Comparative Study Bible,  Zondervan Bible Publishers, The Zondervan Corporation, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1984

Strong, James, LL.D., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990

No Longer Wretched

14 Monday Nov 2022

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Image by Daniel Reche from Pixabay

Hello and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman where, this week, I continue my study of Isaiah 45:7 by looking at “evil”.

There is no denying that usage ends up defining a word.  There are words that mean the opposite today of what they meant decades ago.  One example is “let”.  Let was once used to mean lacking or obstruction or hindrance.  Nowadays it is used to mean to allow, to give an opportunity, to free from confinement.  Understanding literature from bygone eras can be difficult unless the reader understands the words used to carry much different connotations than they do today.

If I go to the world for a definition of evil, which is something quite easy to do in this day and age thanks to social media, I find two definitions.  “Evil” is used to describe acts that most would consider are obviously evil-war crimes, humanitarian atrocities, etc.  The second way the word is used is extremely superficial.  Person A is labeled “evil” by Person B because Person A disagrees with Person B.  Or Person A is labeled “evil” because Person A looks and/or sounds different from Person B.  This is not anything new, though it may seem to be more pervasive due to the immediacy of social media, but I have found this to be so in the histories of every era I have read.  This labelling another “evil” because he or she disagrees with what another says is good goes back to our first parents in the Garden of Eden. 

It is important to remember that the tree Adam and Eve ate from was the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  I have come across several arguments that speak of it as the “Tree of Knowledge” full stop.  The argument is then made FOR the Serpent because God didn’t want us to use our intellects and the good serpent brought us knowledge.  This argument has no legs to stand on because the Tree was not the Tree of Knowledge (full stop) but the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

I am going to take a small foray into the Book of Genesis and consider Adam.  The argument that God is a selfish God who wanted to keep us stupid does-in my opinion-utterly collapse when I consider Adam as described in the second chapter of Genesis.  God plants the garden and then puts Adam in it to tend and keep it.  The Hebrew word translated “tend” in the NKJV is one that means “take hold of, bear up, sustain”1 and the word translated “keep” is one that means “to guard, protect, take heed, preserve.”2 Then, God brings every beast of the field and bird of the air to Adam to see what he would call them.  In this single chapter, I see Agriculture, Government, The Art of Defense, Biology, and Zoology.  I can see nothing that would lead me to believe God had no expectation of Adam using his intellect.

 I am also not one who subscribes to the belief that the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was a magic tree with the power to bestow said knowledge.  I have read many studies which refer to the story of the Garden of Eden as an allegory and these studies have made solid and valid points.  And then, I read in one of my science books that: “In 2016…scientists identified a mutation in a stretch of snake DNA called ZRS.  This one small change was enough to rid the animals of their limbs and confine them to a future of slithering on their bellies” (Pilcher, 117).  Whether you are one who believes Moses wrote Genesis or one who believes the Old Testament was finally written down during the Babylonian Captivity, I think it interesting that the one who wrote “On your belly you shall go” knew something thousands of years ago scientists only recently proved in DNA.  So, perhaps Genesis is a bit more than allegorical…

Allegory or fact, I find something interesting and worthwhile in both points of view and neither agree nor disagree with either.  The point of view I do agree with is that all the Trees in the garden are best looked at as sacraments.  God places decrees on the Trees thus bestowing upon them a sacred character and significance.  He has caused all manner of them to grow and be both pleasant to look at and good for food.  Of these, the Man and (later) Woman can freely eat.  It appears both could have freely eaten of the Tree of Life as well.  It is the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil alone which God decrees “you shall not eat for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die” (Genesis 2:17).  I have a two volume Exposition of Genesis where I read:

“As in the sacraments by virtue of the divine Word the visible means become vehicles of divine grace, so here by virtue of the divine word, which designates the one tree as “the tree of life,” “life” can in reality be imparted by its use when and under whatever circumstances God decrees.  In like manner, the second tree, as its name implies, becomes an agency through which under certain circumstances, divinely appointed, man may come to an experimental knowledge of good and evil.  He may through the presence of the tree be confronted with a choice, he may exercise his freedom to do God’s will in the choice, or he may refuse to make use of his freedom. Had man persisted in his freedom, the experience as such would have wrought in him a knowledge of good and evil analogous to that of God, in this sense that, without having consented to evil, an awareness of its existence and its implications would have been aroused in him.  The tree of the knowledge of good and evil would have effectively done its work…So the trees are rightly regarded as sacramental in a sense” (Leupold, 121)

What could have been?  What would our world look like now if a different choice had been made then?  I can’t help asking the question but it is a waste of time to dwell on it.  A different choice was not made and the entire human race now has a day to day experience of good and evil.  What is good and what is evil really doesn’t have a clear definition because something is described as good or evil depending on how it is perceived by the five senses.  What is determined good by one person is evil to another and so it goes moment by moment, day by day, as the world turns round and round.

What can we do?  Even we believers have a problem because we intend to do good and by good we mean do what God declares good but our good is either called evil by someone else or we find we don’t have the wherewithal to do good.  Like the Apostle Paul, we “find then a law, that evil is present with me the one who wills to do good.  For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man.  But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.  O wretched man that I am!  Who will deliver me from the body of death?” (Romans 7:21-24)

This is not a question without an answer.  Paul goes on to say “I thank God–through Jesus Christ our Lord!” We can all give thanks for the day that we live in because Jesus Christ came to earth, lived as one of us, died our death, rose from the dead, ascended to the Father, and carried us with Him!  We are raised up with Him and, because we are in Him, we are seated in heavenly places! (Ephesians 2:5-6).  We who know who we are in Jesus Christ are no longer trapped in the cycle of misery, deciding for ourselves what is good or evil, and seeing our intended good fail.  The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil no longer has any power over us for we are the Bride of Christ.  We have come to that Holy City, the New Jerusalem and there we find once more the Tree of Life (Revelation 21 & 22). 

In Jesus Christ, we are restored to what human beings were always meant to be.  This truth is being formed in us bit by bit, day by day, but the fact that we are still in process doesn’t change what IS.  We have the down payment of our inheritance in the Holy Spirit living within us.  Because His Spirit lives in us, we have the very mind of Jesus Christ.  It is this mind within us that renews and thus transforms our minds. (See Ephesians 1:14-16, 1 Corinthians 2:16, Romans 12:2, 2 Corinthians 3:18). We no longer live deciding what is good and evil but we live by His LIFE.

His promise is certain.  The day will come when all things are restored and our very bodies will be made like His.  We do not know exactly what we will be but we know we will be like Him!  How I pray for the hastening of that day!

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

  1. Strong’s, H5564
  2. Strong’s, H8104

Think it’s impossible for Moses to have written the Pentateuch? Check out this DVD:

The Moses Controversy

References

Let Definition & Meaning – Merriam-Webster

Sacrament Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com

Leupold, H.C., D.D., Exposition of Genesis, Volume I, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1942

Pilcher, Dr. Helen, Mind Maps: Biology How to Navigate the Living World, Unipress, Ltd, 2020

Strong, James, LL.D., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990

Our Increasing Inheritance

31 Monday Oct 2022

Posted by in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

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Hello and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman!

This week I continue looking at the Hebrew word bara and, as I have conducted this study on Isaiah 45:7, I found I haven’t been able to look at bara without also looking at bereshiyt.  I’ve felt I could spend the rest of my life just looking at Bereshiyt bara, the first two words of the book of Genesis or the Torah.  The deeper I look the more I find I am in fathomless depths.  There is so much more to be seen and learned and I may never find a bottom.

Which is fine by me.  Being taught of the Holy Spirit is a never ending adventure of discovery.  As my God is infinite and I am finite, I can delight in knowing there will always be something new to discover about Him.  I will grow into Him, come to know Him more and more, and our relationship will continue to grow and evolve.  I find it interesting that the English word “create”, which is almost always used to translate bara in scripture, comes from the base kre which means “to grow”.  We Believers speak of “growing in the Lord” but I don’t think I’ve ever thought of that in terms of create/creating.  This is a truth I do not hear spoken of in Christian circles near enough: “But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you”.  That’s Romans 8:11 and I do think it’s worth some time to ponder that: the same Spirit who raised Christ from the dead lives IN us.  The Spirit we see hovering over the face of the waters in Genesis 1:1, the Spirit who is sent forth creating (Psalm 104:30) dwells inside of us. 

It doesn’t seem possible, does it?  It seems too good to be true and yet this is what scripture tells me is true so all I can do is ask that same Spirit to open my eyes to see it, believe it, and then strengthen me to live it.  The same Word who brought all things into being lives in me-and each one of you-through His Spirit.  How can we help but grow!

I do have to admit I always believed that, while there couldn’t help but be growth as long as I lived here on earth in this body, one day I’d go to heaven and then I’d know everything.  There’d be no more growth: just singing and dancing on golden streets in the presence of Jesus for all eternity.  I used to sing those very words during worship services and yet there’s a passage in Isaiah that always use to frighten me because it seems to say something different.  It’s found in Isaiah 9:7 and echoed in Luke 1:33: “Of the increase of His government and peace There will be no end.  Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom, to order it and establish it with judgment and justice, from that time forward, even forever.  The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.” 

No end?  The very idea used to terrify me.  If there was no end to the increase of His government and peace, what about me?  My early-church days had instilled in me the certainty that once I got to heaven that was it.  I would have-both literally and metaphorically-arrived.  This passage appeared to be telling me that wasn’t true.  If there was really no end to His increase, that meant I had no idea what “going to heaven” meant nor what to expect when I got there.  This passage deserves a dedicated study but, as I sought out a definition for bara, found there were some who thought it ought to be translated as “to fatten” or “to fill”, and then learned “create” contained the idea of growth, I couldn’t get this passage out of my mind.  What correlation could there be between bara-as it is translated “create”-and never ending increase?

When it comes to the dictionary definition of “create”, at first glance there doesn’t seem to be any.  The Webster’s dictionary goes on to define “create” as: “to cause to come into existence, bring into being, make, originate, to make or design (something requiring art, skill, invention, etc.), to bring about, give rise to.”  However, there is a further definition of “create” in the Webster’s dictionary that caught my attention.  It is, “to invest with a new rank, function, etc.”  This fascinates me because the Hebrew word for “increase” in Isaiah 9:7 is marbiyth (H4768) and it means “multitude, offspring”.  

I quoted Romans 8:11 before.  It is crucial that each one of us know the Holy Spirit lives within us because it is the Holy Spirit Himself who bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God (Romans 8:16).  Because the Holy Spirit lives within us, we know we are born from above (or born again).  John 3:3 says, “Jesus answered, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God’”.  What is the kingdom of God?  It is “righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Romans 14:17). 

The Pharisees asked Jesus when the kingdom of God would come and He answered them: “The kingdom of God does not come with observation; nor will they say ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’ For, indeed, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:20-21).  Some translations say “in your midst” but the Greek word used is entos (G1787) and it means “inside, within”. 

If we don’t believe what these scriptures are saying is true, if-as some denominations say-the action of the Holy Spirit stopped with the death of the last apostle; what is a Christian life?  Being a moral person?  Adhering to a list of do’s and don’t’s?  There certainly is no life.  Without the Spirit of God within us, there is no heart of flesh given us in place of the heart of stone, His law is not written in our hearts, and there is no enablement to walk in His statutes and do them (Ezekiel 36:26-27). If the kingdom of God is not righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit and we do not know we have that kingdom inside of us now through the witness of the Spirit within us, if everything is indeed reserved until after we die and go to heaven; why do we pray the Lord’s Prayer?  Why say “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth…” if we have zero expectation of His kingdom actually coming and His will actually being done on earth?  I cannot believe when we pray that we pray for a future kingdom because the rest of the prayer is for now.  We ask for our daily bread and we pray to forgive others as we too are forgiven.  If that portion of the prayer is not reserved for some far off future, I cannot think praying for His kingdom to come and His will to be done would be.

While I do believe we have the kingdom within us, I also believe what the Apostle Paul says in his letter to the Ephesians: “In Him (Jesus Christ) you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession to the praise of His glory.”  While I believe what the Bible says is true, that the kingdom of God IS righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, I also believe what we experience is merely a down payment on our inheritance, as this passage is rendered in the Common English Bible.  There is coming a time of greater things, what this passage calls the redemption of the purchased possession.  But, we do have the down payment and what a down payment it is!

Every time the Holy Spirit opens the eyes of someone’s heart to see who they are in Christ, who Christ is in them, and the peace of Christ rules in their hearts, they begin to see the kingdom.  I also think it’s fascinating that the admonition is to “let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts” (Colossians 3:15) because it is peace that is juxtaposed to evil in Isaiah 45:7:  “I make peace and create calamity (or evil)”. His government and peace increases.

We are the dwelling place of God.  His peace which is part of the fruit of His Spirit rules in our hearts even in the midst of calamitous or evil circumstances.  Moment by moment, day by day, “from glory to glory”, His life is formed in us.  His Spirit is sent forth and we are created.  I am no longer frightened but rather I delight that “Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end.”

Hallelujah!  Hallelujah!

Amen.

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

Green, Jay P., The Interlinear Bible: Hebrew, Greek, English, Volume 4, Authors for Christ Inc., Lafayette, Indiana, 1976, 1984

Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, Second College Edition, Williams Collins + World Publishing Co., Inc., Cleveland • New York, 1970, 1976

Strong, James, LL.D., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990

Let’s Put A Pin in That

23 Tuesday Aug 2022

Posted by in Walking in the Way

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Hello and welcome to another post on Renaissance Woman.

I do intend to move on to looking at the Hebrew letter Mem but, before I do that, I have come across another side path I have found it necessary to take.  I hope to be back to my main study track next week but we’ll have to see how it goes.

In last week’s post, I wrote; “The call to all mankind now is ‘Come!’” and included the scripture references Matthew 11:27-29, John 7:37-38, and Revelation 22:17.  To these three I ought to perhaps have added John 12:32 which says, “And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself” which is a spectacular scripture I would love to hear more teaching on as I have only come across one.  There are other passages of scripture I could include but I think these four make clear that the call to return to the heart of God does go out to all mankind.  Perhaps though, as you read last week’s post, a passage popped into your head and you wondered, if it is true the call to Come! is to all mankind, then what does this passage mean?  It certainly popped into my head but I did not have the space to address it in last week’s post.  I am doing so this week and thus my brief foray down this side path.

The passage that popped into my mind was Matthew 22:14: “For many are called but few are chosen”. It is Jesus’ closing statement to the parable of the Marriage of the King’s Son.  You can read the parable in Matthew Chapter 22 verses 1-14 but, briefly, it is this: A king has arranged a marriage for his son and he sends his servants out to call those who were invited to the wedding.  The invited ones were not willing to come so his servants went to them a second time telling them all was ready.  Again, those invited refused to come.  Some busied themselves with tasks and others abused and killed the servants.  The king is angry and, after dealing quite harshly with those invited, tells his servants to go out and gather all they could find and bring them to the wedding.  The servants do so and verse 10 says “both bad and good” were brought to the wedding hall.  The king comes out to see the guests and finds one man who did not have on a wedding garment.  The king asks how the man managed to get in without a wedding garment and the man has nothing to say.  The king tells his servants to “bind him hand and foot, take him away, and throw him into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (verse 13).  Then, Jesus ends the parable by saying “For many are called, but few are chosen.”

I read through the parable and found the act of choosing was all on the side of both those invited and those gathered by the servants.  The parable is not describing auditioning for the kingdom of heaven as in the call goes out and so we come with our very best ideas of what we think the caller wants and then he decides if we get the part or not based on how close we came to the ideal.  In describing Jesus’ statement in verse 14, the Abingdon Bible Commentary says, “This is a detached saying.  By it Jesus could only have meant that while many hear the word calling to repentance it is only a few who respond to the call.”1  I have a quibble with the word “repentance” but I’ll address that in a bit.  I do see that whether or not one was chosen was based on how they responded.

There is so much to be learned from this parable but I don’t want to stray too far from the main path of my Isaiah 45:7 study.  I will thus put a pin in this parable and will perform an in depth study at a later time.  In this post, I want to look at the responses of the various parties and especially at the one man who was found without a wedding garment.  Those who were of the invited ones chose not to come.  Those gathered from the highways by the servants came but would have had no time to procure a wedding garment.  Both the Abingdon Commentary and the commentary on this parable in The Passion Translation point this out.  The Passion Translation says, “Those invited to come from the streets had no opportunity to buy wedding clothes.  This wedding robe is a picture of the garment of righteousness that grace provides for us.  The man without the wedding garment had one provided but he didn’t want to change into new clothes.  A change is necessary, for our King provides garments of white linen for us to wear, our wedding garments” and then references Isaiah 52:1, Revelation 19:8 (TPT).2

Ellicot’s Bible Commentary describes how this providing of a wedding garment was a custom of the day: “The framework of the parable probably presupposes the Oriental custom of providing garments for the guests who were invited to a royal feast.  Wardrobes filled with many thousand garments form part of the wealth of every Eastern prince (6:19; Jas. 5:2), and it was part of his glory (II Kings 10:22), to bring them out for use on state occasions.  On this assumption, the act of the man who was found “not having a wedding garment” was one of willful insult.  The “wedding garment” is nothing less than the “holiness” without which no man shall see the Lord (Heb. 12:14), and that holiness, as in the framework of the parable and in the realities of the spiritual life, Christ is ever ready to impart to him who truly believes”.3

I don’t know about you but, whenever I come across scripture references used to back up a statement, I look them up.  As I looked at the scriptures referenced in Ellicot’s Bible Commentary, I did not see that providing a wedding garment was indeed an ancient custom.  That cannot be inferred from those specific scriptures.  I checked through my history books and could not find a reference to that custom.  My history books do have examples of garments being given as gifts and there are examples of this in scripture as well.  (See Genesis 45:22, 2 Kings 5:22, Esther 8:15).  The internet did not help me as I searched for examples of kings providing wedding garments.  I was unable to find one but I did find that this was indeed a custom is a belief almost universally held.  That’s good enough for me at this moment.  I will continue to look into it-and if anyone does know of a reference, please let me know-but, for now, I put a pin in that as well.

That the wedding garment was provided is, I think, inferred by the parable.  That the man was expected to be in a wedding garment is clear and, when questioned, the man had no defense.  If there had been any way to appease the king, no doubt the man would have done so.  I accept the servants offered a garment to the man and he refused.  Vincent’s Word Studies speaks on the man not having a garment saying, “It is hardly possible to convey the subtle sense of the negative particle to the English reader.  A different word for not is used in the preceding verse, expressing an outward, objective fact which attracted the king’s notice.  The man had not a wedding garment.  When the king addresses the guest, he is thinking not so much of the outward token of disrespect, as of the guest’s mental attitude toward the proprieties of the occasion….It implies, as Dr. Morison observes, that the man was conscious of the omission when he entered and was intentionally guilty of the neglect.”4

Both the Abingdon Commentary and The Passion Translation point out the universality of the king’s call.  The Passion Translation says, “Many are called.  This can be understood to be a Semitic figure of speech that universalizes the invitation.  See also Matt. 20:28” (TPT)5 while the Abingdon Commentary says, “The deep universal note of the gospel sounds forth clearly in this parable.”6  I am fascinated by the fact that Matthew’s gospel says “both good and bad” were brought to the feast.  There was no distinction between the guests.  The right to stay and enjoy the king’s celebration was based entirely on whether or not they chose to wear the appropriate garment.  Just what is this garment?

I concur with all of the writers I’ve read who say it is the garment of Jesus’ righteousness.  I do not concur with those who speak of this garment as something external to us.  I hear teachers saying things along the lines of, “God doesn’t see your sin because He sees you through his Son” like we believers are wearing Jesus suits and that makes us acceptable to God.  God doesn’t see our sin because the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin (1 John 1:7).  The parable is not explicit but I think washing is implied.  If those the servants brought in from the highways had no time to procure a wedding garment, neither would they have had time to bathe.  I cannot imagine a wedding garment would have been put over smelly stinking skin and then the guests sent in to the feast where their aroma would fight it out with the aromas of the food the king had had prepared.  I think this parable points to the fact that we are cleansed by the blood of Christ and we are presented to Him glorious, without spot or wrinkle or blemish by the washing of water by the word (Ephesians 5:26-27).  Not only are we cleansed but clothed in fine linen which is the righteous acts of the saints: not self-righteousness which is as filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6) but the righteousness we now are in Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 5:21). 

The call is to each one of us and it is not to repentance.  The fact that the Greek word metanoia has been translated “repentance” in our Bible is, I think, a travesty.  Repentance at its core means to do penance over and over and over and anyone caught in that loop does not know the truth: that Jesus Christ has put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself and did so one time for sins forever.  (Hebrews 10: 26, 10:12, 7:27).  Instead of repentance, metanoia! Change your mind! That Jesus Christ did live and die and rise again thus putting away sins is not dependent on our belief.  It was done long before any of us lived though He acted as and for all mankind and we living today were included.  The life it is possible to live is ours because Jesus our Saviour is self-giving love and whether or not we believe it doesn’t change what is.  However, it is impossible to live in the freedom that is ours in Christ Jesus without believing it.  Let’s remove the pin and no longer keep this life in Christ something to think about at a later time.  Heed His call!  Respond! Ask the Holy Spirit to open your eyes and change your mind!  Come and live a life where there is no guilt or condemnation.  Walk according to His Spirit rather than the flesh because the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made us free from the law of sin and death! (See Romans 8:1-2) 

That is something to celebrate!

  1. Eiselen, Frederick Carl, Edwin Lewis, and David G. Downey, editors., The Abingdon Bible Commentary, The Abingdon Press, Inc., Nashville • New York, 1929, Page 988
  2. Passion and Fire Ministries, The Passion Translation, 2020 Edition, Broadstreet Publishing Group, LLC, 2020, Page 65
  3. Ellicot, Charles John, Ellicot’s Bible Commentary, Zondervan Publishing, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1971, Pages 733-734
  4. Vincent, Marvin R., D.D., Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament, Volume I, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, Massachusetts, Pages 120-121
  5. Passion and Fire Ministries, The Passion Translation, 2020 Edition, Broadstreet Publishing Group, LLC, 2020, Page 65
  6. Eiselen, Frederick Carl, Edwin Lewis, and David G. Downey, editors., The Abingdon Bible Commentary, The Abingdon Press, Inc., Nashville • New York, 1929, Page 988

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

More Reading on the Wedding Garment:

The Wedding Garment (gracegems.org)

He Got Kicked Out Of The Wedding! – Michael A. Verdicchio (confidenceandjoy.com)

My previous post on our thoughts being our garments:

https://renaissancewoman.blog/2022/06/20/hey-what-are-you-wearing/

My Feet Are on the Rock

08 Monday Aug 2022

Posted by in Isaiah 45:7, Personal Essays, Studies, Writing

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Happy Monday and welcome to another post on Renaissance Woman.

Does anyone remember the poem The Blind Men and the Elephant by John Godfrey Saxe?  It’s a poem about six blind men who seek out an elephant so that, by observation, they might understand the creature.  Each of the six men encounter a different part of the elephant and liken it to something familiar: a wall, a snake, a fan, etc.  The last stanza of the poem states, “So, oft in theologic wars/The disputants, I ween/Rail on in utter ignorance/Of what each other mean/And prate about an Elephant/Not one of them has seen!”

Last week I posted on the Hebrew letters that comprise Shin ש and how I’ve come across two schools of thought on that.  One is that the letter is comprised of Vavs and Yods and the other is that the letter is a Yod, a Vav, and a Zayin.  Which is correct?  I don’t care one way or the other because, as I followed both paths, I found myself in the same place: 3 Vavs and 4 Yods give me the number 7 which is Spiritual Perfection and the number of the Zayin is 7 which is Spiritual Perfection.  I found value in looking at both but the study did get me thinking.   

I cannot count how many times over the past weeks and months I’ve heard believers of various denominations stress the importance of “sound doctrine.”  I have found “that’s not sound doctrine” is used as the final hammer strike on the last nail in the coffin of another person’s argument but there are times when the speaker will explain just what they believe sound doctrine to be.  I listen and sometimes agree and other times disagree.  This made me wonder, just who decides what “sound doctrine” is?  I see one denomination convinced what they teach is the soundest doctrine of all unlike this denomination whose teachings are based on false interpretations of scripture and definitely not like this other denomination whose teachings are a delusion of Satan.  I must infer then, that by “sound doctrine” what they actually mean is, “what our denomination teaches.”

What is doctrine?  The definition of the word is, “something taught, teachings, something taught as the principles or creed of a religion, political party, etc.; tenet or tenets; belief; dogma, a rule, theory, or principle of law.”  There is nothing in this definition that suggests a personal knowing and relationship is necessary.  Such is also what I find in those insisting everyone have sound doctrine: there is only a rare mention of knowing God for yourself.  I am not concerned with sound doctrine.  I am concerned with knowing the Father because knowing Him and knowing Jesus Christ is the very definition of eternal life.  “And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent” (John 17:3). 

I recently read a book called Evidence Not Seen by Darlene Deibler Rose.  When the author married her first husband, Rev. C. Russell Deibler, she and her husband both knew they were called to the Mission Field and, specifically, the Philippines.  Mrs. Deibler was several years younger than her husband and had just graduated from school.  She relates in her book that, before the Church would allow her to accompany her husband to the Philippines, they tested her in doctrine and theology.  She passed the tests and was allowed to go.  While in the Philippines, World War II broke out and Japan took over the islands.  Mrs. Deibler and her husband were interred in separate camps where her husband died.  Mrs. Deibler spent four years in various camps and I was struck by how it was not doctrine or theology that sustained her: it was the vitality of her relationship with Jesus Christ.  Mrs. Deibler-Rose writes, “Experientially, I was learning to understand the comfort of the Holy Spirit.  Sometime during the dark hours I slept.  The sword of sorrow had pierced deep within me, but He had bathed the sword in oil.”  

This book gave a graphic picture of the difference between having doctrine-which is by definition a lifeless thing-and having a vital relationship with the Living God.  To me, those quibbling over whether or not someone’s doctrine is sound are like the blind men quibbling over the elephant.  Not one of them was wrong per se but neither were any of them correct.  Not one of them had fully seen. 

There is a passage in Colossians I’ve been meditating on for some time: “Let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility and worship of angels, intruding into those things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom all the body, nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments, grows with the increase that is from God” (Colossians 2:18-19).  Our reward is Christ Jesus.  He is our very Life.  In Him, we are made one with the Father.  Everything the Father has belongs to Jesus.  Everything Jesus has is ours because His Spirit lives within us and declares it to us.  (See John 16:13-15)

I know this not only because the Bible tells me so but because I KNOW HIM!  He is real!  He is alive!  He is alive in me right now!  This is not something reserved for the future.  It is not something I earn if I follow Jesus’ example and live a moral life.  He freely gives Himself to me, teaches me who He is, and brings me into relationship with Himself.  There is no substitute for knowing Him and this knowing is my litmus test.  I don’t compare what I hear from others with any doctrine: the Spirit within me guides me into all truth.  Jesus Himself is that absolute living truth and, as He has joined me to Himself, I am one spirit with Him.

Let none of us allow ourselves to be cheated of our reward by anyone who has not seen.  Let us hold fast to the Head who is Christ Jesus.  Let us test everything and hold fast to what is true.  “Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection…” and, finally, let us “no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head-Christ…” (Hebrews 6:1, Ephesians 4:15)

Amen.

All Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

The poems of John Godfrey Saxe/The Blind Men and the Elephant – Wikisource, the free online library

Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, Second College Edition, Williams Collins + World Publishing Co., Inc., Cleveland • New York, 1970, 1974

Rose, Darlene Deibler, Evidence Not Seen: A Woman’s Miraculous Faith in the Jungles of World War II, A Ruth Graham Dienert Book, Harper San Francisco, Harper Collins Publishers, New York, New York, 1988