Tag Archives: Kingdom Life

Saved to the Uttermost

06 Monday Feb 2023

Posted by in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , ,

Image by Holger Grybsch from Pixabay

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

As I continue my study of Isaiah 45:7, and specifically my study of the word “evil”, I wonder about the role of Satan in the existence of evil.  There are a couple of scripture passages I’ve shared before that are worth taking another look at.  The first is in Galatians 5 verses 19-21 where the Apostle Paul writes, “Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like…”  The second is Jeremiah 17:9 which says, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it?”  My study has made it clear to me that it is mankind and not God who is the source for those things I think of when I hear the word “evil”.

And, I say again, that “evil” isn’t the best translation for the Hebrew word ra.  Bad and calamity are better choices although my personal favorite drawn from the Strong’s concordance is “injurious to happiness”.  It is also important to remember that the Hebrew word bara, often translated as “create”, does not necessarily mean “to make something from nothing.”  My study of both the word and its usage throughout the Old Testament has caused me to settle on a definition of “to cause something new to come into being and grow towards an intended purpose”.  I can see God doing exactly this throughout the Old Testament as He deals with Israel. 

It is interesting to note that when God does bring calamity upon His people, He isn’t the source of it as in He brings something entirely new into being in order to bring about said calamity.  Two examples are when He uses nations already in existence: the Northern Kingdom being taken captive by Assyria (See 2 Kings 17) and Judah being conquered by Babylon (See 2 Kings 254 & 25).  This is fascinating to me because there is no record of Assyria being aware they were a tool used by God.  No doubt they were certain their god had triumphed over the God of Israel.  The Book of Daniel does record the fact that the Kings of Babylon were aware the God of Israel was a living God but they never did come to serve only Him.  Something else interesting to note is that fact that, while God did use these nations to bring about calamity on Israel, He also kept the promise He made to destroy them.  There is nothing but ruins to bear testament to the fact the kingdoms of Assyria and Babylon ever existed.  Truly, “the kingdom is the Lord’s and He rules over the nations” (Psalm 22:28) and that the God of Israel “makes the nations great and destroys them; He enlarges nations, and guides them” (Job 12:23).

It is clear to me those things we call “evil” are sourced in the flesh.  Our God is certainly a God who knows good and evil (See Genesis 3:22), is a present God (at hand!) and will use whatever or whoever is at hand to bring about His purpose in the microcosm of our lives and the macrocosm of the world around us.  What about Satan?  Isn’t “the devil made me do it” a viable excuse for some of the things we human beings do?  I cannot see that it is.  There are too many scriptures to list here but I encourage all of you to look up how many times the words “repay according to your deeds”, “reward according to works” or some variation of the same appears in scripture.  We human beings reap what we sow.

And yet-the Book of Revelation calls that serpent of old a great dragon “who deceives the whole world” (Rev. 12:9).  Ephesians 6:12 speaks of principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness, and spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places. 1 Peter 5:8 says we have an adversary who “walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.”  The Bible makes it clear we have an enemy whose wiles ought to be respected-because he’s been deceiving a long time-but I can see nothing in scripture that tells me this enemy ought to be feared in any way. 

Consider Luke 10:19 where Jesus says, “Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.”  Consider also Romans 16:20: “And the God of peace will crush Satan under your feet shortly.”  Jesus has defeated every foe, including and I should say especially Satan, and His living in me means His victory is mine.  Be afraid of a roaring lion?  What for?  Our savior is the Good Shepherd and He is the one who is able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him (Hebrews 7:25).

There’s a brief passage in Amos 3:12 which never ceases to fascinate me when read in the light of Hebrews 7:25.  This passage is “…as a shepherd takes from the mouth of a lion two legs or a piece of an ear…”  There’s a footnote in the Archeological Study Bible which states, “a piece of the sheep was saved to prove to the owner that it had been eaten by a wild animal, not stolen by the shepherd” (Page 1450). 

Who is our God?  Is He the one who has come to seek and to save what is lost but will settle for two legs and a piece of an ear?  Is that the story of the One who is risen from the dead and ascended to the right hand of the Father?  Would all authority in heaven and earth have been given unto Him if He’d presented pieces of His sheep and said, “I’m sorry, Father, I tried”?  Of course not!  David describes himself as a shepherd who, when a lion or bear took a lamb from the flock, he went after it and struck it, delivering the lamb from its mouth (1 Samuel 17:34-35).  We have an even greater Shepherd who returns with His lamb and says “rejoice with me for I have found my sheep which was lost!” (Luke 15:6)  He need not settle for pieces of his sheep because He is able to save to the uttermost.

I was going to call this post “Ain’t No Bite Marks on Me” because that is the truth.  I have been rescued and my wounds have been treated with oil.  My Rescuer is, was, and shall be speaking to me and I have learned to know and love the sound of His voice and another I will not follow.  My Shepherd has told me I am more than a sheep.  I am a Called-Out One.  I no longer walk in darkness but in His marvelous light.  I am a member of His body.  I am a member of His church, cleansed and sanctified by the washing of water by the word.  He presents me to Himself glorious, without spot or wrinkle.  Or bite marks.

This is my identity.  This is your identity.  We do not need to fear anything: not any evil human beings might do and not any stratagem of an already defeated enemy.  We live within the beating heart of the God who is Love.  There is no fear in His love because His love is perfect and casts out all fear.  We may find ourselves walking through the valley of the shadow of death but we need fear no evil for our God is not only with us but IN us.  We are in Christ therefore we are new creations.  The old things have passed away and Behold!, all things have become new.  We have been saved to the uttermost!

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

References

NIV Archaeological Study Bible, Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2005, Page 1450

Resolution

02 Monday Jan 2023

Posted by in Poetry, Writing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , ,

Welcome to Renaissance Woman and the first post of 2023!

I will be continuing my study of Isaiah 45:7 in the upcoming weeks but, for today, I am sharing a poem. This poem is inspired by one of my all time favorites: [i carry your heart with me (i carry it in] by E.E. Cummings. You can read it here. 

Resolution
My Love, we've counted down another year
As years are measured by the clock
Time has come to remember and
Spend a moment taking stock
Of where we've been and where we are
How far we've come and have yet to go
To make a brand-new resolution
Though what may come I cannot know.

My Love, we've ascended heights
Far above all I could have dreamt
But lows there have been as well
Traversing them left me spent
You, My Love, were always with me
You led, You guided, sustained, upheld
I must admit-as I look back-
There's been no good thing You've withheld.

My Love, I look to this new year
One resolution only can there be
And that is to not resolve at all
Because I do not know-I cannot see
No resolution-I choose Your rest
For I do know this one thing is true
Day by day, age to age,
You bring me deeper into You.

The wonder is we are never apart
I am carried in Your heart-I carry You in my heart.

My Missing Piece

12 Monday Dec 2022

Posted by in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , ,

Hello and welcome to Renaissance Woman where, this week, I am returning to my Isaiah 45:7 study.  I am still in the beginning stages of studying “evil” with the intent of understanding just what God meant when He said, “I create evil.”

I must say, it does appear to be a hopeless undertaking.  I looked up “evil” in the Davis Dictionary of the Bible and found this as the first sentence: “The origin of evil is a problem which has perplexed speculative minds in all ages and countries”.1  The Hastings Dictionary doesn’t appear to hold out much hope either because, at the end of the entry for “evil”, I found: “The speculative question of the origin of evil is not resolved in Holy Scripture, being one of those things of which we are not competent judges”.2

These two statements did almost obliterate an enthusiasm already dampened by the sheer vastness of the subject of evil.  If such august personages as Aquinas, Calvin, Plato, and Plotinus have turned their minds to the subject of evil and failed to find a definitive answer as to its nature and source, what hope did I have?

Well, firstly, I do not seek to provide a definitive answer.  Even if I were to do so, the odds against anyone else agreeing I had done so are astronomical.  And yet, my enthusiasm was restored during the retreat I attended earlier this month as I sat in the airport terminal reading a book while waiting for my flight.  The book was “Authors and Their Public in Ancient Times” by George Haven Putnam.  I both laughed and somewhat sadly acknowledged the truth of what he wrote in his introduction.  Mr. Putnam spoke about his reasons for writing what he called an “essay” stating it was to “trace, as far as might be practicable, from the scattered references in the literature of the period, an outline record of the continuity of literary activity, the methods of the production and distribution of literature, and the nature of the relations between the authors and their readers”.3  He then when on to write:

“The majority of my reviewers were ready to understand the actual purpose of my book and to recognise that my part in the undertaking was limited to certain general inferences or conclusions as to literary methods or conditions.  In one or two cases, however, the critics, ignoring the specified purpose and the necessary limitations of the essay, saw fit to treat it as a treatise on classical literature and devoted their reviews almost exclusively to textual criticisms and corrections.”4

This made me chuckle but it restored my enthusiasm because, no matter what I discover or what conclusions I draw at the end of this study, someone will argue.  Knowing and accepting that is liberating.  Some arguments are useful but there are those who argue for the sake of arguing.  I cannot tell you how many times someone has argued against something I have said but has done so by picking up a phrase or even a single word, constructing their argument on that, and ultimately ignoring the material point I took some pains to make.  This is irritating and yet these critics are also useful because I have learned-and am continuing to learn-how not to fall into the trap of arguing back and forth about something that really had no bearing on the main point in the first place.  I include “am learning” because there are still times when my mind gets caught up in refuting this or that and it takes a moment to mentally step back and realize, “wait a moment: we’re not even talking about the same thing!”

And so, expecting arguments and not expecting a definitive answer on the origin and nature of evil, just why am I conducting this study?  1 Peter 3:15 instructs us to “sanctify the Lord God in your hearts and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you”.  That is what I am seeking to get out of this study.  I want to understand as much as I can so I at least have both a scripture and study based answer for any question I am asked.  The question specific to this study is; “why did God say He creates evil?”  Since I am trusting the Holy Spirit to guide me into all truth, I am looking at the scriptures that pop into my mind as I am conducting the study and the first scripture is Psalm 8:5.  For the sake of context, I’ll begin quoting in verse 3: “When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained, What is man that You are mindful of him?  For You have made him a little lower than the angels, and You have crowned him with glory and honor.”

The bit of scripture that popped into my mind was “you have made him a little lower than the angels”.  You might be wondering what that could possibly have to do with evil so allow me to tell you how and why I got here.  This translation: “a little lower than the angels”, is not accurate.  The Modern Young’s Literal has it, “and cause him to lack a little of Godhead.”  The Amplified renders it, “but little lower than God” but adds [or heavenly beings] as a disclaimer while the NIV says, “little lower than the heavenly beings” but adds the footnote “or than God”.

The Bible fascinates me and one thing that keeps me wondering is why the translators have chosen to translate certain passages the way they have.  The only answer I have is that their theology couldn’t hold up to what the original language is actually saying and they thus translated passages to say what they thought they ought to say.  This particular passage is one such case in point.  If you have a Strong’s concordance, I encourage you to open it to the “Angels” entry and look at the list of numbers.  You’ll see 4397, 4397, 4397, 4397…and then you’ll see 430.  4397 relates to malak in the Hebrew and it means “to dispatch, as a deputy or messenger”.  This is the word usually translated as “angel” or “angels”.  430 is the word Elohim which is not translated as “angel” or “angels” anywhere except Psalm 8:5.  It is, however, very often translated as “God”.  For example, in Genesis 1:1 “God” = Elohim. 

The word translated “lower” is the Hebrew chacer (H2637) and it does mean “to lack.”  I looked it up in the Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon and over and over again the word is used to mean “lack”.  It is only by stretching both the intent of the words and the imagination that one can came up with “lower than the angels” as a correct interpretation of Psalm 8:5.  The Hebrew says, “made to lack from God” though I quote it to myself as “lack from Elohim”: I prefer the Hebrew word.

It is because “lack from Elohim” is how I have long thought of Psalm 8:5 that it popped into my mind as I was looking up “evil” in the Dictionary of New Testament Theology.  I read through a brief comparison of the different theories on evil and then read, “Whichever cause is regarded as the basis of evil, even when it is seen as hamartia (Sin), it must not be regarded as personal guilt, for it is not the result of a free and responsible personal decision but of a lack.  It may be the lack of knowing the divine providence (Socrates), or of the working of a cosmic power.”5

I read that, Psalm 8:5 popped into my mind, and I took a moment to consider the evil in the world as the result of a lack.  A lack of what?  With Psalm 8:5 in mind, I must first consider it as a lack from all that God is.  This lack is the will of God for he made man to lack and, more than that, called man good.

I turned my mind to consider man placed in the garden with the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  Man at this moment had the very breath of God in them and were not yet subject to death but had to look elsewhere for the source of their life.  They could eat freely from the Tree of Life but Life was something both exterior to them as well as interior.  That Life was provided by God in the form of the tree (exterior) but it was as they ate of its fruit that they would know Life (interior).  Man did lack from Elohim because Man did not have their own source of life to draw on.  In choosing the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, man really did believe a terrible lie.  Already without a source of life in themselves, they decided to make themselves their source anyway and decided it was right to know good and evil for themselves.  Of course the result was death.

I take a look at my own life and breathe a massive sigh of relief.  I do not have any life in myself!  I have no resources to meet my own needs much less the needs of others around me.  I can pretend with all my might and I might even fool a few people along the way but I am NOT enough.  The relief comes in knowing I was not designed to be.  I was made to lack from Elohim.  I was made to know Him alone as the source of my life.  And, what a blessed gift to be alive now.  I am not holding onto a promise of one to come who would one day crush the head of the serpent and restore to me what was lost.  The One has come!  Everything that was to be done, He did! 

Jesus Christ IS now, this very moment, my life.  He is my missing piece, the One who perfectly fits me because I was designed to live in union with Him (See Ephesians 1).  I no longer attempt to fit myself to anything else because I am complete in Him (Colossians 2:10).  What a blessed rest!

I have been meditating on Deuteronomy 30:19-20.  Moses declares he has set before the people of Israel life and death.  He begs them to choose life so that they may “love the Lord your God that you may obey His voice, and that you may cling to Him, for He is your life and the length of your days”.  I pray to utterly know this truth for myself and I pray it also for each of you.  May we know Jesus for in Him is life and that life is the light of men.

Amen

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

  1. Davis, John D., Davis Dictionary of the Bible, Royal Publishers, Inc., Nashville, Tennessee, 1973, Page 234
  2. Hastings, James, Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible, Fifth Printing, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, Massachusetts, 2001, Page 247
  3. Putnam, George Haven, Authors and their Public in Ancient Times, Third Edition, Cooper Square Publishers Inc., New York, New York, 1967, Page iv
  4. Ibid., Page v
  5. Brown, Colin, The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, Volume I, Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1967,1971, Page 562

Other References

The Comparative Study Bible, The Zondervan Corporation, 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

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

No Matter What May Come

07 Monday Nov 2022

Posted by in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , ,

Good morning!  Welcome to another week and another post on Renaissance Woman.  This post will be my last on bara, the Old Testament Hebrew word most often translated by the English word “create”.  For the sake of this study anyway as there is still a great deal to learn.  As I looked up scriptures containing the word bara, I found many that stirred up questions and opened up avenues for more study.  I am staying focused on Isaiah 45:7 though and thus plan to move on to taking a look at the meaning of “evil” in upcoming weeks.

Regarding bara: I am finally ready to settle on a definition.  I have previously shared how there are some who say bara ought to be translated “to fatten” or “to fill” and have also shared how I find those definitions unsatisfactory for two reasons: 1) because there are other perfectly good Hebrew words used to express those concepts and 2) neither definition encompasses what the word intends to convey in the passages where it is used in scripture.

I don’t believe there is any language where a word means one thing in one place and something entirely different in another place.  I have also previously shared where I plugged the different definitions for bara I’d come across into every passage where the word occurred to see if the definition worked.  An excellent example is in Jeremiah 31:22 where I find: “…For the Lord has created a new thing in the earth–A woman shall encompass a man.”  The definitions “to fatten” or “to fill” simply do not work in this passage.  Neither does defining bara as “to do a new thing”.  I was curious so I looked up the Hebrew words in this passage and it isn’t bara repeated twice.  There is a different Hebrew word translated as “a new thing”: chadash (H2319) and it means “new, fresh.” 

After all these weeks of study and compiling information from different sources, here is what I think is the closest and fullest definition of bara: to cause something new to come into being and grow to accomplish an intended purpose.  It is long and complicated but it is a definition I find fits every occurrence of bara in the Old Testament.  I find it even works in 1 Samuel 2:29 where bara is translated “to make yourselves fat” and in Joshua 17: 15 & 18 where bara is translated “to cut down”.  In both instances those involved had a purpose and caused something new to come into being in order to bring that purpose about.  In the 1Samuel passage that something new was a malformation of something God had ordained and the purpose was the satisfaction of selfish appetites.  It was born out of greed.  In Joshua, the purpose was to make a home and the new thing necessitated the removal of existing trees.  In both of these cases, the purpose did originate in the minds of mankind but the bringing about the new thing was accomplished using processes and material already in existence.  The same is true in the Jeremiah 31:22 passage where God is causing a new thing to come into being in order to satisfy His purpose but, while this new thing is originating in the mind of God and is something only God can do, man and woman already exist.

My point is, I don’t need to think “something out of nothing” every time I read the word “create” in scripture.  This is a point I think is important when I apply my definition of bara to Isaiah 45:7: “I create evil.”  What is God saying here?  Is bara intending to convey the idea that God is the source of evil i.e. He caused it to come into being or does bara mean evil is the thing already in existence God will use to cause something new to come into being and grow according to His purpose?  The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew Lexicon lists Isaiah 45:7 under the definition “to shape or fashion new conditions and circumstances” so some scholars, at least, do not think the passage is saying God is the cause of evil.   

 The context of Isaiah 45:7 establishes both the Lordship and uniqueness of God.  God says to the future ruler Cyrus that, no matter how great he thinks he is, God alone is God.  God goes before him and has held his right hand (verses 1-3).  The rest of the chapter continues to establish the absolute truth that God alone is God and I find this an important truth to have established when it comes to evil.  There is a prevalent idea among believers, never outright declared but there nonetheless, that God is the God of good and Satan is the god of evil.  God might have had His original intent but Satan got in there with his lie and ruined everything.  God did what He could in Jesus but Satan is still ruining God’s plans.

I simply cannot go into how much the Bible refutes that so will simply use what is said in this chapter: “I am the Lord and there is no other…Truly You are God, who hide Yourself, O God of Israel, the Savior!  They shall be ashamed and also disgraced, all of them; they shall go into confusion together, who are makers of idols…For thus says the Lord, Who created the heavens, Who is God…Look to Me and be saved, all you ends of the earth!  For I am God and there is no other.” Satan is not a god neither does he wield power equal to God.  Evil exists but, drawing on my study of bara, God comes down into it, makes His home in the midst of it, and destroys it forever by causing something new to come into being and grow and accomplish His purpose.  

One of the best examples of this is found in the story of Joseph related in Chapters 37-50 of Genesis.  Just in case someone is reading this who is unfamiliar with the story it is, briefly: Joseph is the only son of Jacob’s most-loved wife.  He is also younger than his brothers, by a great many years in some cases, which makes the special attention paid to him by Jacob something difficult for the brothers to handle.  Worse is the favoritism and elevation of Joseph over the other brothers, including the first-born son, which was something NOT DONE in that culture.  This special treatment does appear to make Joseph act a bit like a brat.  The story records him bringing a bad report of the brothers born to the maidservants to their father and then comes the sharing of his dreams.  You can just imagine how this teenage kid telling his father and brothers one day they’d all bow down to him went over.  I am not surprised that, when his brothers see him coming across the fields to check up on them in his fancy coat, they decide to kill him.

Two of his brothers intervene.  Reuben convinces the others not to kill him but rather to drop him into a pit (or cistern).  Reuben appears to have vague plans to rescue Joseph but apparently he thinks of some pressing task because he isn’t around when a caravan of slave traders comes along and Judah convinces the other brothers that, rather than killing Joseph, a better idea was to sell him to the slave traders.  Joseph is taken down to Egypt and sold as a slave.  I won’t relate all the ups and downs of his circumstances there but worth nothing is how Chapter 39 of Genesis stresses that “the Lord was with Joseph” and noticeably so (verses 2-3, 21, 23).

Joseph is eventually made ruler over Egypt second only to the Pharaoh and the day comes when his dreams are realized: his brothers come to Egypt and-not recognizing him-bow down to him.  When Joseph finally reveals his identity to his brothers he says an interesting thing: “But now, do not therefore be grieved or angry with yourselves because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life” (Genesis 45:5).  After the death of their father, still fearing Joseph might take vengeance on them, the brothers come once more before him and Joseph has this to say: “Do not be afraid, for am I in the place of God?  But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive” (Genesis 50: 19-20).

This is a fascinating story.  Joseph sees God with him and at work in his circumstances so that he says, “God sent me before you”.  But, Joseph does not ignore the fact that the intent of his brothers was evil.  God no doubt could have got Joseph to Egypt a myriad of ways.  Perhaps Joseph’s suffering-and the Bible makes it clear he did suffer (See Psalm 105)-would not have happened.  It did happen and he did suffer because his brothers thought evil thoughts and acted on them.  And yet, while those evil thoughts and actions brought about circumstances I’m sure Joseph would have avoided if the choice had been his; those very same circumstances were the ones God worked in to elevate Joseph to a position where not only the lives of his people were saved but the lives of the people of Egypt as well. 

There is a passage of scripture which states, “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purposes” (Romans 8:28).  This passage states what I’ve seen so far in my study of “I create evil” (Isaiah 45:7).  No matter who may come against me with plans of evil, God is with me.  If a circumstance arises which brings evil instead of good, God is with me.  Not just with me-He lives inside of me by His Spirit.  That same Spirit that energized the creating Word is in me still energizing but also transforming and renewing.  In Jesus Christ I live and move and have my being and He not only creates evil but makes peace.

Until next time, let us each one hold fast to the truth that we are the very temples of the Holy Spirit and, as we hold fast, may the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:7).

Hallelujah! 

Amen.

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

Note: for a comprehensive look at the story of Joseph, I recommend Joseph: A Story of Love, Hate, Slavery, Power, and Forgiveness by Dr. John C. Lennox.

References

Brown, F., S. Driver, and C. Briggs, The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon, Eighteenth Printing, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody Massachusetts, 2018, Page 135

Green, Jay P. Sr., The Interlinear Bible: Hebrew, Greek, English, Volume 3, Authors For Christ Inc., Lafayette, IN, 1985

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

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , ,

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