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Proven Trustworthy

13 Monday Nov 2023

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Welcome Everyone to a new week and a new post on Renaissance Woman!

I am still in the midst of my study on The Whole Armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-18a) and am looking specifically at the Shield of Faith. 

What is faith?  I have to admit I was astonished at the definition for faith found in the New World Dictionary.  The entry for faith begins with “confidence, belief, to trust, to urge, be convinced, to persuade, a compact” but then comes #1: “unquestioning belief that does not require proof or evidence”.  This is followed up by #2: “unquestioning belief in God, religious tenets, etc.”

Far be it from me to disagree with the example of scholarship that is a dictionary, but I do.  These two entries are not at all what is meant by the Biblical description of faith.  Consider first the relating of the Syrophoenician/Canaanite woman coming to Jesus as related in Matthew 15:21-28 and Mark 7:24-30.

Jesus and His disciples have gone to the region of Tyre and Sidon and here they are approached by a woman who cries out to Jesus asking Him to heal her daughter who is severely demon possessed.  Jesus does not answer her but does say to His disciples “I was not sent except to the lost sheep of Israel.”  When the woman continues to cry out for His help, He does say to her, “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.”  The woman answers Him, “Yes, Lord, yet even the little dogs eat the crumbs which fall from their master’s table.”  Matthew records Jesus’ reply as “O woman, great is your faith!  Let it be to you as you desire.”

Let us next consider the story of the Centurion also related in Matthew’s gospel as well as in Luke.  Jesus enters Capernaum and a centurion comes to Him asking Him to heal his servant who was sick and near death.  Jesus answers, “I will come and heal him.”  The centurion says, “Lord, I am not worthy that You should come under my roof.  But only speak a word, and my servant will be healed.  For I also am a man under authority, having soldiers under me.  And I say to this one ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another ‘Come,’ and he comes; and to my servant ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”  Jesus marvels and says, “Assuredly I say to you, I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel!” (See Matthew 8:5-13, Luke 7:1-10).  

Matthew 9:20-22 and Mark 5:25-34 also records the story of the woman with the flow of blood for twelve years.  She manages to get close to Jesus and touches the hem of His garment because she believed that, “If only I may touch His garment, I shall be made well.” Jesus says to her; “your faith has made you well.”

The Greek word used in each of these passages is pistis (G4102).  The Strong’s defines pistis as “persuasion, i.e. credence; conviction (of religious truth or the truthfulness of God or a religious teacher) especially reliance upon Christ for salvation; constancy in such profession, by extension the system of religious (Gospel) truth itself-assurance, belief, believe, faith, fidelity.”  Pistis is related to peitho (G382) which is a primary root meaning “to convince-by argument true or false, to pacify or conciliate, to assent (to evidence or authority)…” 

As I read through the entry for “faith” in the Dictionary of New Testament Theology, I found no basis for the dictionary definition.  The very word “persuasion” infers the one being persuaded is at the very least indifferent to the persuader’s argument and, at the most, hostile to it.  I cannot imagine there would not be questions asked before persuading and convincing would take place.

Pistis is a covenant word.  The word group (pistis, pisteuo, pistos, pistoo) originally denoted conduct that honored an agreement or bond (Brown, 594).  While there are certain parts of the world where the seriousness of entering into an agreement or bond is understood, it is less so here in the Western World.  Here, we think nothing of breaking bonds if it suits us to do so whereas breaking a bond-especially a covenant bond-used to mean death.  I cannot imagine two parties entering into such a bond without having strong evidence both parties were trustworthy and reliable. 

I don’t see that any of these Gospel accounts can be considered unquestioning or without evidence.  Word of Jesus’ works had spread through the region so there were plenty of accounts to convince these three of His willingness to heal.  The evidence that He was not only willing but able was walking about on two legs.  What astounds me is the fact that two out of three of these stories involve non-Jews.  The fact that a Canaanite (Luke says Greek or Syrophoenician) and a Roman approached Jesus described a level of persuasion and convincing I don’t have words for.

Perhaps the Canaanite woman was not quite despised by the Jews.  Gentiles had their own court in the temple so they could worship the True God but they were not allowed to worship with God’s Chosen People.  She was more acceptable than a Roman.  The oppressor.  An enemy of God Himself.  And these are two people whose faith is recorded in the Gospels.  Again, I can see nothing in these accounts to suggest these two made an unquestioning or evidence-less decision to act against culture, nationality, and extreme prejudice and ask Jesus for help.

The Bible does not require unquestioning trust or belief in the face of a lack of evidence.  1 Peter 3:15 tells us to expect questions: “…always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you…”  The passage in Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians so resonates with me I have it as the tagline for this blog: “Test all things; hold fast what is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21).

As I dig further down into the dictionary definition of faith, I find entries I can agree with: “5. complete trust, confidence, or reliance, 6. allegiance to some person or thing, loyalty”.  My faith is not at all unquestioning.  If you’ve been reading my blog for some time, you know how true that is.  Our God answers me.  Sometimes it takes time to get an answer to the exact question I asked but years of walking with Him has proved that He couldn’t answer the question at the time I asked it.  There were other answers to related questions needed before I could even understand His answer to what I asked.  He’s never not answered me.

Our God is relationship.  He is the Covenant God and does not require us to give our lives to Him in unquestioning loyalty. (Not even the Mosaic Covenant had such a requirement: see Exodus 24:3).  Cults demand unquestioning loyalty.  The Word of our God was made flesh in Jesus.  Those of us living now who have never seen Jesus in His flesh are not in a worse off position than the people of that day.  We have something far better.  We have the Spirit of the Living God living in us convincing, persuading, comforting, teaching, and answering. 

Of course, I can’t convince you.  I can only promise you Our God is safe to question but you will have to discover that for yourself.  Do it!  Ask Him a question.  Any question.  See how He answers you.  Test His answer.  The Bible is an excellent litmus test for trusting the answers received are indeed from God.  No answer will contradict His revelation of Himself.  It will contradict the interpretation of Him you’ve received so be prepared to spend some time with Him.  He loves you.  He gave Himself for you.  You can trust Him.

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

References  

Court of the Gentiles – Bible History (bible-history.com)

Brown, Colin, The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, Volume I, Regency Reference Library, Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1967, 1986

Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, Second College Edition, William Collins + World Publishing Co., Inc., Cleveland • New York, 1953, 1976

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

Just Have Faith

06 Monday Nov 2023

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Hello Everyone and welcome to a new post on Renaissance Woman!

I am continuing my study of the Whole Armor of God as described in Ephesians 6:10-18a and, this week, am moving on from the Breastplate of Righteousness to the Shield of Faith. 

The course my study is taking was not at all what I intended.  I thought I’d go through the Armor in the same order as it is written in the Letter to the Ephesians and then, as the study progressed, I thought perhaps I’d look at it in the order it would have been put on.  That is not what is happening.  No matter!  Even though no soldier would pick up a shield without first being fully clad in armor, I have found moving from the Breastplate to the Shield a logical progression.

I shared Philippians 3:8-9 in last week’s post: “Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith.”  As I studied “righteousness”, I was struck by the relationship righteousness has with faith, especially as I looked at the correlation between belief and righteousness and discovered “believe” and “faith” in the New Testament are both used to translate the same Greek word.

Before I get into the Greek, I wanted to point out something I found interesting.  When I looked up “faith” in the Strong’s concordance, I found two Old Testament references whereas there are 2 full columns of New Testament references.  Out of curiosity, I looked up “believe” and found a similar situation: 19 occurrences in the Old Testament verses an entire column of occurrences in the New.  The same is true for every conjugation of both words: there are far more New Testament references than Old Testament.  Something else fascinated me: there are two passages of scripture listed in the concordance under the word “Believers”: Acts 5:14 and 1 Timothy 4:12.  There are zero Old Testament scriptures in the list. 

Why?  Is it a result of inconsistency in the English translations or did something change?

I cannot immediately rule out the possibility of translation inconsistency.  Because I want to genuinely know and not make a stand on something that looks and sound interesting but has no foundation, I took a moment to look up the Hebrew word(s) for “believe” and “faith”.  Each occurrence I found in the Strong’s all are related to the primary root aman (H539) which means “to build up, support, foster as a nurse.”  All other words build on this concept: I find definitions of confirm, established, trusty, faithful, sure, stability, certainty, and truth as I looked up the related words. 

The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon drew my attention to two passages were aman appears as “foster-father” (Numbers 11:12, Isaiah 49:23) and two where it appears as foster-mother/ nurse (Ruth 4:15, 2 Samuel 4:4).  This, along with the fact that the Strong’s does list occurrences of the characterization “faithful” being applied to people and, since the Hebrew word translated “believe” is the same translated “faith” just as in the Greek; perhaps I read too much into there being only two New Testament occurrences of “believers”.

And yet, there is no denying believe and faith appear far many more times in the New Testament than the Old which, considering the size of the two books, is interesting.  My Bible teachers have offered an excellent visual when they are making similar points in their Sunday sermons.  Let’s give it a try.  Pick up your Bible and stick your fingers in at Matthew’s Gospel.  Take a long look at how much of the book is on one side of your fingers compared to how much on the other.  Even without taking into account the appendices and maps included at the back of our Bibles, the difference is extensive.  Therefore, a valid answer to the question “did something change” is “yes”. 

Some of you might be rolling your eyes at me because of course something changed.  Jesus was born, lived, died, rose again, and ascended to the right hand of the Father and then the Holy Spirit was poured out on all flesh.  This is basic Christianity 101.  I agree!  It is!  And yet, how many of us understand what this means?  We say we are New Creations in Christ but I don’t see all of us living as if anything changed.  I still see so many speaking of the necessity of our believing in order to receive what all Jesus Christ did for us and insisting we must have faith in order to please God.

That last thought it a Biblical one.  Hebrews 11:6 says, “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”  This passage in particular seems to back up the insistence that our faith requires some hard work and diligent seeking on our part.  And yet, there are other passages that say the opposite.  For example:

Hebrews 12:2: “looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith…” I must point out the word “our” does not appear in the Greek but was added by the translators.  The Young’s Literal Translation has this verse as: “looking to the author and perfecter of faith-Jesus…”

Also consider the Gifts of the Spirit listed in 1 Corinthians 12.  Verse 9 says, “to another faith by the same Spirit…” 

Then there is the necessity of considering the difference between the Greek words en and tou.  En is a preposition meaning “a fixed position, in, at”.  Tou is a proper noun meaning “of this person, his”.  I consider it an absolute travesty that there are instances in my Bible where tou has been translated as “in.”  Pertaining to faith, an extremely important one is Galatians 2:20.  The King James Version renders the description of faith as, “…the life I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God…” whereas my New King James has it, “…the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God…” 

With one tiny substitution, the entire meaning changes.  Instead of living our lives by the faith OF the Son of God, we must live by faith IN the Son of God.  The responsibility to have faith becomes ours.  Any reference I hear to faith being a gift of the Spirit is only made with the caveat that the all the gifts aren’t given to everyone.  Some are given the gift of faith and others…I don’t know what hope others have.  This belief then makes our God a respecter of persons where some are mighty in faith and others are hung out to dry.  That is, unless we who are ungifted can somehow stir up enough faith to get through the days.

If this is so, what good is our Shield of Faith?  We are to take it up in order to quench the fiery darts of the wicked one but if our shields are comprised of whatever faith we’ve been able to summon up in the strength of our flesh, I don’t hold out much hope for any of us.

If however, the Shield of Faith is the faith of Jesus Christ, what a shield!  What fiery dart could possibly penetrate the shield of the Risen and Ascended One to whom ALL authority on heaven and earth has been given?  What protection is bestowed on us!  What rest and relief there is to know it was never our responsibility to have any sort of faith but that our faith is that of Jesus Christ!

I pray the Holy Spirit opens all of our eyes to this truth and that we see how this changes the meaning of Hebrews 11:6.  If you are hung up on the word “please” does it help to know the Greek word is euaresteo (G2100) and means “to gratify entirely”?  It is a word of delight not appeasement.  What joy there is in the heart of our god when we recognize we were never meant to create our own faith but to be partakers of His!  But this passage as well as 1 Corinthians 12 are ones I plan to look at in upcoming weeks.  I will stay on the subject of “faith” until my entire being is saturated with the certain knowledge that I live every day protected by the Shield of Jesus’ faith!

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  

A Comprehensive Guide to Greek Pronouns (greekpod101.com)     

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

Brown, F., S. Driver, and C. Briggs, The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon, Eighteenth Printing, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, Massachusetts, 2018

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

Walker, Allen G., The New Koine Greek Textbook, Volume II/III, 2014-2018

Young, Robert, Modern Young’s Literal Translation: New Testament with Psalms & Proverbs, Greater Truth Publishers, Lafayette, Indiana, 2005

The Beauty of Righteousness

30 Monday Oct 2023

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Hello Readers and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman where, this week, I continue in my study of The Whole Armor of God.

I have not come close to exhausting the subject of righteousness but I have completed enough study that I am ready to move on to another piece of the armor.  Therefore, this will be my last post on the Breastplate of Righteousness. 

As I have studied the word “righteousness” in the English and the Greek and read through various scriptures wherein righteousness appears, I am convinced righteousness is not only a word of action but one of position and state of being.  A bit of review is necessary but taking another look at definitions will show what I mean.  The first definition of righteous in the New World Dictionary is: “Acting in a just, upright manner; doing what is right; virtuous [a righteous man]”. The second and third definitions are: “Morally right; fair and just [a righteous act] 3. Morally justifiable [full of righteous anger].”

Righteousness is derived from the Middle English “rightwise” which means, “on the right side, moving clockwise, rightly (correctly or justly), rightfully, by a rightward path”.  When I looked at the word “right” on its own, I found a meaning that isn’t widely used: right means “straight, not crooked.”  The Greek word translated as “righteousness” in Paul’s description of the Breastplate is dikaiosune (G1343) and means “equity of character or act: justification, righteousness”.  Looking up “equity” in the dictionary, I find it means “fairness, impartiality, justice.” We see here both action and position. There is a set standard, a correct path, and any actions are in accord with that standard.  

I have also found that, within the meaning of righteousness, there is contained the idea that our acts are determined to be righteous by Another.  The fourth definition in the dictionary defines righteous as “[Slang] good, excellent, satisfying, pleasant, authentic, etc.: a generalized term of approval”.  However, if we stop here, we are left with a serious question: who or what have we allowed to determine the standard?  I have spoken to some people who tell me they decide that standard for themselves.  They have their own moral code to which they adhere.  Others I’ve spoken with take solace in the certainty their actions are righteous because they correspond to the standard set by a set of particular religious or cultural tenets.  Still others are certain their actions are righteous because they adhere to the Law of God whether the Law ministered by Moses and preserved for us in the Old Testament or a new Law of believing in Jesus and proving it by actions.

Those of us who know we are in Christ and He is in us do not adhere to any of these standards.  Our standard is Jesus Christ Himself.  Now, this is not a standard we have no hope of ever adhering to imposed on us by a God who knew we were incapable of doing so.  Our lives are not lived with the sick certainty that we must ever fall short of God’s perfect standard because Jesus was sinless and we are not.  No!  Our certainty is 2 Corinthians 5:21: “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” 

In last week’s post, I mentioned Jonathan Mitchell using rightwise instead of righteousness in his New Testament.  I like the definitions of rightwise he includes.  Mr. Mitchell renders Ephesians 6:14 as, “and then, entering within (putting on; clothing yourself with) the breastplate armor (cuirass; corselet) of fair and equitable dealing of the eschatological deliverance (or: which is the rightwised relationships of the Way pointed out; the Righteousness; the Justice; also = covenant inclusion and participation)”.  Rightwise is also found in Mr. Mitchells’ rendering of James 2.  Verse 21 says, “made fair and equitable; put in right relationship; rightwised; made a just one; also: = placed in covenant” and  verse 24 says, “from time to time being placed in right relationship with the Way pointed out; progressively made fair and equitable; normally justified; = put in covenant”.

I have also been looking at Genesis 15:6.  The Hebrew word translated as “righteousness” in this passage is tsedaqah (H6666) and is comprised of the Hebrew letters Tzadi (צ), Dalet (ד), Qoph (ק), and Hey (ה).  Robert M. Haralick gives the following meanings to the Hebrew letters:

Tzadi = Righteousness and Humility,

Dalet = Physicality

Qoph = Growth and Holiness

Hey = Power of Being

I see all three components to the definition of righteousness here.  There is position, there is action, and there is being.  There is also a complete picture of who we are in Christ.  Our position is in Him, there is the action of His life being formed in us and our being conformed to His image, and there is our current state of being-as new creations in Christ-being manifested in us and through our actions.

Righteousness is our state of being.  And, it is not in any way a self-righteousness but is the very life of Christ made our very lives by the work inwrought by His Spirit dwelling in us.  Philippians 3:8-9 says, “Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith.”

Our righteousness is His righteousness and it is our breastplate.  The breastplate protected the vital organs with the most crucial organ being the heart.  In Hebrew, heart is lebab (H3824) from the root leb (H3820) spelled Lamed (ל) Bet (ב).  Returning to Mr. Haralick’s book, the Lamed means “Learning, Teaching, Purpose,” and the Bet means “Container.”

Speaking not of the muscle that pumps our blood but of the HEART which sums up who we are, our hearts are the center of our being just as the Holy of Holies was in the center of the temple.  We are now the temple of the Holy Spirit who lives in us and was given to us by God (See 1 Corinthians 6:19-20).  From the center of our being, He teaches and guides and instructs us and also convinces us of the reality that we are filled with the fullness of God.

We are the dwelling place of God.  I don’t want to make a rule out of it but we can look at our hearts as being the Holy of Holies where we commune with God.  Such a sacred place is worthy of vigilant guarding and protection and it is protected by the Breastplate of the Righteousness of Jesus Christ.

Hallelujah!  Amen.

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

References  

Rightwise Definition & Meaning | YourDictionary

Holy of Holies | Temple Mount, Ark of Covenant, Tabernacle | Britannica

Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, Second College Edition, William Collins + World Publishing Co., Inc., Cleveland • New York, 1953, 1976

Haralick, Robert M., The Inner Meaning of the Hebrew Letters, Jason Aronson Inc., Northvale, New Jersey, 1995

Mitchell, Jonathan Paul, MA, The New Testament, 2019 Edition, Harper Brown Publishing, 2009, 2013, 2015, 2019, Page 479, 568

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

The Sound of His Voice

23 Monday Oct 2023

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

I have been studying the Whole Armor of God as described by Paul in his letter to the Ephesians specifically, for the last few posts at least, the Breastplate of Righteousness.  The scripture passage that immediately springs to mind when I think of “righteousness” is “And he (Abram) believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness” (Genesis 15:6).  Perhaps the reason this passage is the one that springs to mind is because it is quoted by James in his letter and by Paul in his letter to the Romans (See James 2:23 and Romans 4:3).    

In my previous posts, I have looked at the meaning of righteousness, the relationship between belief and righteousness, and whether or not our belief in the Lord Jesus Christ is something we stir up or a work of God within us.  I looked at the Greek word pisteuo (G4100), which is translated as both “belief” and “faith” in the New Testament; and found it means “to persuade” or “be persuaded”.  The definition I found on Bible Hub stated the word could mean human persuasion or God persuasion depending on the context. 

I would suggest it is always God persuasion.  We are in glorious partnership with the Father, in the finished work of Jesus Christ the Son, and through the indwelling Holy Spirit.  The Spirit gives us the words to say to someone and it is the Spirit who both prepares the heart to receive the words and tends those words until they sprout, grow, and bear fruit.

The Apostle Paul has written a beautiful passage on righteousness in his letter to the Romans: it is found in Chapter 14.  Verse 14 and 15 of this passage says, “How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed?  And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard?  And how shall they hear without a preacher?  And how shall they preach unless they are sent?  As it is written: ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, Who bring glad tidings of good things!’”  This is a passage I plan to return to when I begin studying “having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace” (Ephesians 6:15).  For now, I am focused on the necessity of “hearing” in order to believe.

Abram, or Abraham as he became, did not one day decide to believe in a different God than the ones he’d grown up with.  A great deal of Abram’s early life can be surmised from Genesis 11: 26-32.  He was born in Ur of the Chaldeans which was a vibrant city of that day with a vital worship of gods decidedly NOT the Elohim we meet in Genesis 1.  I have no doubt there is a fabulous story as to why exactly Terah (Abram’s father) takes his son Abram, his grandson Lot, and his daughter-in-law Sarai out of Ur of the Chaldeans and into the Land of Canaan to dwell in Haran.  Haran is the name of Lot’s father, Abram’s brother, and, if they are listed oldest to youngest in Gen. 11:27, is Terah’s youngest son so perhaps there is a connection to be made there.

Verse 1 of Chapter 12 begins with, “Now the Lord had said to Abram: ‘Get out of your country, from your family, and from your father’s house, to a land that I will show you.’” So perhaps the original removal from Ur to Canaan was at the command of the Lord.  Nahor and his family are left behind in Ur so and verse 7 of Chapter 15 would support this version of events: as I said, there is a fascinating story to be uncovered here. 

My point is “The Lord had said…” Whatever that looked like (an appearance in form? A bright light? A voice?), Abram had heard the voice of the Lord and recognized the speaker as God.  This hearing so changed him he departs Haran.  He’s a seventy-five year old man at this time so this hearing resulted in a belief so strong, he uproots his life and we see this repeated throughout Abram’s story.

Genesis 12:7-9: “Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said…there he built an altar to the Lord who had appeared to him…and he moved from there…Abram journeyed, going on still toward the South”

Genesis 13: 14-18: “And the Lord said to Abram…arise, walk in the land…Then Abram moved his tent and went and dwelt…and built an altar there to the Lord”

Genesis 15:1-6: “After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision saying…and behold the word of the Lord came to him saying…then He brought him outside and said…he believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.”

 Abram’s belief was not the result of a personal decision.  He didn’t decide on his own to uproot his entire life and drag his family into a strange land.  The Lord revealed Himself to Abram and did so by speaking to him.  Abram heard and he believed. 

The Septuagint has episteusen in this passage which is the Aorist Active Indicative 3rd Person Singular Verb form of pisteuo.  It means “and the man believed the word.”  The word had to come to him first or else there would have been nothing for him to believe. 

I suppose Abram could have chosen not to believe.  I can’t imagine life in Ur of the Chaldeans was too bad.  It was familiar anyhow and was certainly a safer choice than packing up his family and wandering through Canaan.  There is nothing in Abram’s story to indicate The Lord ever pressured Abram or forced him to make a choice.  He spoke and it was up to Abram how he responded.  I can’t imagine Abram making any other choices because he heard the Voice of The Lord and the story makes clear there was no doubt the One he heard was real and was God.  He was persuaded, he trusted, he believed, and that belief was accounted to him as righteousness.

The story also makes clear Abram’s belief wasn’t always perfect.  The situation with Hagar and Ishmael occurs after God makes covenant with Abram and changes his name to Abraham.  Abraham also repeats with Abimelech, King of Gerar, the mistake he made with Egypt’s Pharaoh.  His belief was accounted to him for righteousness but not all of his subsequent actions could be called “righteous”.  Still, both James and Paul refer to Abraham as an example of righteousness.  I will quote James 2:23 again but this time from Jonathan Mitchell’s New Testament: “And thus the Scripture was made full, the one saying, “Now Abraham believed (or: put trust and confidence) in God (or: became persuaded by God; adhered to God), and he was counted into the way pointed out by Him (or: he was considered rightwised by Him he was reckoned fair, equitable and just in Him; alternately: so it was counted into right relation [= covenant inclusion] for him),” [Ex. 15:6] and later, he was called “God’s friend.” [Isa. 41:8].”

There is a great deal to be learned from the story of Abraham.  One is rest.  Abraham’s mistakes did not prevent him from being held up as an example of righteousness by Paul and James.  This should bring us to a place of rest because neither do our mistakes alter the truth: we have become the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus (2 Corinthians 5:21).  Another is trust. 

We are in a state of being so far and beyond Abraham’s I don’t have words to express it.  The God who spoke to Abraham is the same God living IN US by His Spirit.  I can’t say that too many times.  We are now the dwelling place of God.  Our bodies, the one I am in as I write this and the one you are in as you read it, are the temple of the Holy Spirit.  These are not just words to be quoted out of a book on certain days of the week.  This is our reality right this zeptosecond. 

There isn’t any part of this Christian life that relies on us.  Our God reveals Himself: He has done so in Christ Jesus and it His goodness that leads us to metanoia.  He speaks and His voice is unique: we know His voice.  His Spirit is our Teacher and Guide: He leads us into all Truth.  Our righteousness is not of ourselves but is His: the very lives we live are no longer ours but are the life of Christ lived through us.  His righteousness is our breastplate which I plan to examine in more detail next week.

Until then, may we all give thanks to the Spirit of the Living God that He is opening our eyes to see all Jesus is and opening our ears to hear His voice saying only what The Father is saying.  When His word is confirmed to us, when we know we are included in His covenant and that we have been placed in right relationship with the Way pointed out, may we respond in the strength of our belief. 

Our response can only be; Hallelujah!  Amen!   

The title of this post was taken from one of my favorite hymns: In the Garden (I Come to the Garden Alone) – HymnSite.com – United Methodist Hymnal #314

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

References  

Γένεσις (Genesis) 15 (LXX) – μετὰ δὲ τὰ ῥήματα ταῦτα (blueletterbible.org)

Meet the zeptosecond, the shortest unit of time ever measured | Space

Gray, John, Near Eastern Mythology: Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, The Hamlyn Publishing Group Limited, London, New York, Sydney, Toronto, 1969

Lanier, Gregory R. and William Ross, Septuaginta: A Reader’s Edition, Volume One, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, Massachusetts, 2018

Mitchell, Jonathan Paul, MA, The New Testament, 2019 Edition, Harper Brown Publishing, 2009, 2013, 2015, 2019, Page 568

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

Help My Unbelief

16 Monday Oct 2023

Posted by in Studies, Whole Armor of God

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

You might be thinking the photo at the top of this post looks a bit sad.  Perhaps it does.  The tiny sprouts are the result of a project I was certain had failed but it had not!  I shouted for joy when I saw them.  There was an internet tip which said to lay tomato slices filled with seeds on the top of potting soil and then cover the whole lot with plastic, creating a terrarium.  I did so and then watched as nothing happened except the tomato slices molded, shriveled, and dried into rings.  I finally approached the pot with trowel in hand, intending to scrape the tomatoes and a good layer of dirt into my compost bin.  When I looked under the plastic, there were sprouts!  The project had not failed after all.  Despite how things looked, the process was working and some of those seeds had sprouted.

There are many lessons I think can be drawn from this especially in regards to my current study.  Then again, some of you might be wondering what tomato sprouts could possibly have to do with the Breastplate of Righteousness.  When I saw those slender green sprouts long after I had given up hope of their growth, I couldn’t help but to see them as another confirmation that what I’ve been seeing in my current study is the truth.  I’ve been looking at Genesis 15:6 “And he believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness” which is quoted in James 2:23.  I’ve also been looking at John 6:29 where Jesus says, “This is the word of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent” and at Revelation 19:8 where we find this description of the wife of the Lamb: “And to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.”

I don’t think I deviate from accepted doctrine when I say the Christian life can be summed up in these four passages of scripture if we also take into account all of James 2.  Belief equates to righteousness and we do the work of God by believing/having faith in Jesus.  We prove our belief/faith is real by performing good works and then one day our works will transform into a fine linen garment.  But what if our belief is backwards?  What if Jesus was saying God does the work of belief in Him who He sent?  What if every part of our Christian life, especially the good works that have been prepared for us to do, are intended to flow out of the life of Christ within us, made our reality by the Indwelling Holy Spirit, and not a lifestyle of exhaustion and spiritual burnout?

If Jesus was saying belief in Him is a work God performs, it makes clear a passage of scripture I have never understood.

The passage is found in Mark 9.  There is a great multitude around the disciples and the scribes are there also, disputing with the disciples.  As Jesus approaches he asks the scribes what they are discussing with His disciples.  It is one of the crowd who answers that he has brought his son to Jesus.  The son has a mute spirit who, from childhood, not only seized the boy, threw him to the ground, and caused him to foam at the mouth and gnash his teeth; but had tried to destroy him by throwing the boy into the fire and into water.  The disciples could not cast the spirit out and the man hoped Jesus could do something.  Jesus answers, “If you can believe all things are possible to him who believes”.  The man answers, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!” (Verses 14-24).

I have quoted from the New King James Version but Jesus’ reply is related a bit differently in other versions.  For example, the Berean Standard Bible casts a different light on this passage.  The man says, “But if You can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”  Jesus’ reply is, “If You can?” echoed Jesus.  “All things are possible to him who believes!”  Then the man cries, “I do believe; help my unbelief!”  The Amplified is similar in its wording: “Jesus said to him ‘[you say to Me,] “If You can?” All things are possible for the one who believes and trusts [in Me]!’  While the NKJV does translate the Greek here as “If you can believe…” there is a note included which states “NU-Text reads, ‘If You can! All things…” so there is good reason to accept Jesus is repeating the man’s words, not stating that all things are possible if you can believe.

Let’s look at “belief”:

The Greek word translated as “belief” in this passage is pisteuo (G4100) which is the verb form of pistis, the word translated as “faith” in Galatians 2:20 and James 2.  Pisteuo is also the word appearing in John 6:9 and John 16:5-10: “But now I go to him that sent me; and none of you asketh me, Whither goest thou?  But because I have said these things unto you, sorrow had filled your heart.  Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.  And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.  Of sin, because they believe not on me; Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more; Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged” (KJV).

Pisteuo means “persuade, be persuaded” and the full definition of the word mentions two different types of persuading: “4100 pisteuo (from 4102 pistis, “faith” derived from 3982 peitho, “persuade, be persuaded”) believe (affirm, have confidence); used of persuading oneself (=human believing) and with the sacred significance of being persuaded by the Lord (=faith-believing).  Only the context indicates whether 4100/pisteuo (believe) is self-serving (without sacred meaning), or the believing that leads to/proceeds from god’s inbirthing of faith”.

The word “unbelief” in the passage from Mark is apistia and I find this definition: “570; form of 4103 pistos “faithful” properly, without (divine) persuasion”.  I think the context of this passage supports a conclusion that both definitions of persuasion are meant.  The man was convinced that, if anything could be done for his son, Jesus was the one who could do it.  “If you can…”  He needed something more than he could find in himself to come into a place of rest and trust that not only could Jesus, but that Jesus would.

What about John 6:29?  What definition does the context support?  The entire chapter is full of signs and wonders only God could do.  Jesus feeds a great multitude with 5 barley loaves and 2 small fish and then walks on the water.  When the people follow Jesus to the other side of the sea, He says, “Most assuredly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw the signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled.  Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him.”  The people ask Him, “What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?” Then comes Jesus’ reply: “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent” (John 6:1-40).

If we continue on in Chapter 6, Jesus appears to be stressing his point: Moses did not give the bread of heaven, it is the Father who gives the true bread, Jesus Himself is the true bread, etc.  I find the context to be clear that the definition of pisteuo intended is that of divine persuasion: “This is the work of God, to persuade you…”

This brings me such joy and peace when it comes to sharing the Gospel of Jesus with others.  There have been many who have asked me questions about Jesus and then have rejected outright what I have said.  The few who do not reject it outright don’t appear to make any sort of response.  What do I expect when I answer a question?  There is another passage in Mark that perfectly describes my expectations and brings me back to the picture of the surprise tomato sprouts.  It’s found in Chapter 4 verses 26-29: And He said, “The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground, and should sleep by night and rise by day, and the seed should sprout and grow, he himself does not know how.  For the earth yields crops by itself; first the blade, then the head, after that the full grain in the head.  But when the grain ripens, immediately he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.”

My work is not to try and get more faith or try really hard to believe in Jesus.  I can read and study and listen to various Bible Teachers to persuade myself about Jesus but learning about Jesus is the best I will get.  It takes the Holy Spirit, the very Spirit of the Living God, dwelling and working inside of me to reveal to me the nature of God.  I can only know Jesus and know the Father through the Holy Spirit.  In Acts 1:8, Jesus says, “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me…”  The disciples were to wait for the Holy Spirit for, without Him, they would have poured out their lives to no avail.

The Holy Spirit makes our Christian life.  He brings us into union with the risen and ascended Jesus Christ without whom we can do nothing.  The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Wisdom and Revelation and it is His working in us which enables us to be ready to give an answer to anyone who asks the reason for our hope (See 1 Peter 3:15-16).  When we speak as the Spirit gives us utterance, we can trust that the words we speak are a seed planted in the heart-ground of those around us.  No matter how impossible it looks, the Spirit will nurture and water that seed until it sprouts and grows though we know not how.

It is truly the work of God that we all believe in Him whom He has sent!

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

References

https://biblehub.com/kjvs/james/2.htm

https://biblehub.com/kjvs/galatians/2.htm

https://biblehub.com/kjvs/john/16.htm

https://biblehub.com/kjvs/mark/9.htm

https://biblehub.com/greek/4100.htm

https://biblehub.com/greek/570.htm