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The Genesis Syndrome

Monday, August 16th, 2010 | Author:

Commit your way to YHWH, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass. Psalm 37:5 (Hebrew text)


Commit/Trust – David demonstrates that the fulfillment of God’s purposes in our lives depends on two related actions.  The first is voluntarily granting God ownership.  The second is acting with complete confidence of God.  David wasn’t the first to notice this combination.  In fact, it is built into the very fabric of successful human relationship.  If we look closely, we will find that our best relationships with each other are merely copies of the divine-human pattern.  The whole story begins in Genesis.

God established the perfect pattern of human relationships when He presented Adam with his needed companion, Havvah.  You will recall that God built Havvah according to a preconceived blueprint for a specific purpose.  That purpose was to act as Adam’s guide; to insure that Adam had the necessary advice and counsel to keep God’s commandment and fulfill God’s assigned task in the world.  In order to act in this enormously important role, God designed Havvah with the intelligence, spiritual acumen and relationship management skills necessary to set the boundaries for the couple.  Adam was created to remember. Havvah was built to guide.

Since Havvah was built from the substance of Adam, she became the perfect match for Adam, “bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh.”  Adam is the beneficiary of God’s design covenant with the woman.  But since she is now a separate being, the first step in the process of reunion (“and the two shall become one”) is voluntary.  Men do not have a voluntary relationship with themselves, but if they are going to have any kind of successful relationship with their spouses, it will have to be voluntary.  More importantly, it will have to be the voluntary relinquishing of self-ownership.  Marriage means giving up my rights to myself and giving those rights into the hands of my spouse.  This applies to every aspect of the marriage, including my own body (cf. Paul’s remark).  The first step in the first human relationship is galal, to roll, to roll that cylinder of ownership on my actions and my attitudes.  They don’t belong to me anymore.

The second step is just as important.  Proverbs 31:11 underscores the trust component in marriage.  It tells me that a man should trust (batach) his wife with the same actions that he trusts God.  Notice that Proverbs 31:11 concludes with the same category of thought as Psalm 37:5.  When we commit and trust in God, He completes His work.  When a man trusts his wife, it is prosperous to him.  Things get done that benefit him.  God’s actions are reflected in her actions.  Ownership and trust are defined by the vertical relationship to God, but they are demonstrated in the horizontal relationship between spouses.  Just how crucial this proper alignment is can be seen in Genesis 3, a story about a tiny twist on the correct alignment.

David may have reflected on the Genesis syndrome when he wrote these words.  He might have seen this ancient design pattern stretching across all flourishing relationships.  He could have considered the tragic consequences of not combining ownership and trust.  We don’t know what David was thinking, but we do know what God thinks about the matter.  Roll and rely.  Does that describe your divine and human relationships?

Topical Index:  Psalm 37:5, Adam, Havvah, commit, trust, galal, batach

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Melanchthon’s Mistake

Sunday, August 15th, 2010 | Author:

Commit your way to YHWH, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass. Psalm 37:5 (Hebrew text)

Bring It To Pass – Philipp Melanchthon was born Philipp Schwarzerd, but changed his name to the Greek Melanchthon in 1531.  He was an exceptional scholar in astronomy, law and particularly Aristotle.  He earned his baccalaureate degree at age 15 and his master’s degree at age 17.  He was considered an expert in Greek grammar.  Melanchthon became a close friend of Luther and for 42 years he worked alongside Luther in Wittenberg.  Melanchthon contributed to Luther’s translation of the Greek New Testament into German.  We owe Melanchthon the debt of converting the concept of external evidence found in Hebrews 11:1 into an internal inner confidence.  That mistake altered the face of faith for the next 500 years.

Why is this history important for our examination of Psalm 37:5?  Because Psalm 37:5 is an answer to the question, “How do I get my heart’s desire?” (see the previous verse).  If this verse is simply a spiritual magic formula that obligates God to fulfill my desires, then God becomes the “cosmic butler” of my faith.  My religion will be focused inwardly, on my heart and my wishes and my expectations.  This, of course, is nearly blasphemy.  God is not my servant.  He is my Master.  Therefore, His desires must become the focus of my heart.  If it weren’t for mistranslations like those of Melanchthon, we would never have imagined that God would fulfill our desires.  We would realize that it is God’s desires that replace my past self-centered preoccupation.  What God will bring to pass is what He intends – and I am privileged to participate because He chooses to use me to accomplish His will.  The focus of my faith is not inward; it is outward.  It is about restoring righteousness in God’s creation and bringing back the harmony that once ruled the world.  Faith is not about how I feel.  It is about what God is doing.  To have faith is to put myself at God’s disposal and let Him use me as He sees fit.

The translated phrase, “bring it to pass,” is the Hebrew verbal construction ya’ase.  This is from the root verb ‘asah, “to do or make, to accomplish or complete.”  It is about performing an activity with a distinct purpose in mind.  Notice that in this verse it is God’s distinct purpose that is in view.  God will make, He will accomplish, He will complete the desires He puts in my heart.  How can I be utterly confident that this will occur?  Because the desires are His, not mine.  As long as I am aligned with what He intends to accomplish, I can be absolutely confident that I will be used by Him.

Is it possible to know the will of God?  Of course it is.  He has revealed it clearly.  He has specified it in detail.  There can be no doubt about how He intends us to live and what He wished to accomplish through us.  The only question is how do we commit and trust.  The rest is guaranteed.

Topical Index:  bring it to pass, ‘asah, Melanchthon, Psalm 37:5, Hebrews 11:1

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Whole Life

Saturday, August 14th, 2010 | Author:

Commit your way to YHWH, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass. Psalm 37:5 (Hebrew text)

Trust – First I must accept the seal of ownership.  God rolls over my path.  Now it belongs to Him.  Then I must act according to the directions of the new owner.  Batach is the verb of confidence.  It expresses the feeling of security in someone or something.  To trust God is to confidently rely on Him.  This, of course, is seen in the actions of the faithful.  They do not put their confidence in the house (family), weapons, other men, temples, idols or even themselves.  The only exception to this caution is Proverbs 31:11.  Husbands are to trust their wives in the same way that they trust God.  But most of the occurrences of batach involve the admonition to “Trust in YHWH,” although surprisingly there are very few instances where Scripture indicates someone actually does trust in the Most High.  Perhaps that’s why the life of Yeshua is so exceptional.

What does it mean to place my confidence in YHWH?  No better example, other than the Messiah, can be found than Abraham.  Abraham responds to the call of God without hesitation even though he is not given any destination.  He acts on the word of the Lord.  He is obedient in spite of the lack of explanation or justification.  In fact, the instances in Abraham’s life which reveal him to be a man of faults and failures just like the rest of us are all instances where he doubted the reliability of God’s promise and determined to take action without divine counsel.  Nevertheless, Abraham demonstrates a life of confident reliance on God’s promise, even at the point where it appears that the promise will be snatched away from him.

We are all sons and daughters of Abraham, and we will all face the same call to put our confidence in His word in spite of circumstances to the contrary.  No man escapes the test of faith passed down to us by our father Abraham.  It is embedded in the spiritual DNA.

We are often taught that Yeshua fulfilled His mission knowing full well that God would rescue Him from the grave.  But I’m not so sure that we can understand Yeshua’s example of perfect trust if the end is inevitably predetermined.  Trust presupposes that there is the possibility of doubt.  I do not trust that 4 + 4 = 8.  Of that I am absolutely certain.  But I do trust that the justice of the Lord will prevail because there exists observable evidence to the contrary.  Trust only makes sense where it is possible for me to imagine a lack of confidence.  For this reason, trust is a willful decision, an active verb of voluntary submission.  Things might be otherwise, and yet I act as if they will not be.  When I put my whole life in His hands, I do not erase the possibility of doubt.  I simply refuse to accept it as real.

Topical Index: trust, batach, confidence, doubt, Psalm 37:5, Proverbs 31:11

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Rolling Right Along

Friday, August 13th, 2010 | Author:

Commit your way to YHWH, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass. Psalm 37:5 (Hebrew text)

Commit – The Hebrew language is wonderfully tactile.  It’s a language formed from the land, full of nice, clean dirt under the fingernails, streams of water, sun on your back and wind in your hair.  So, we don’t expect to find esoteric conceptualizations and cognitive abstractions here.  When we encounter a word like “commit,” we expect to get some very earthy pictures.  Galal fits the bill.

Galal is tied to some very concrete experiences.  In Genesis 29:8, Joshua 10:18 and Proverbs 26:27, it describes rolling away stones.  It is used metaphorically in Genesis 43:18 (throw against) and literally in Isaiah 9:5 (robes rolled in blood).  The principal imagery of galal is “to roll.”  So, how can this word be about commitment?  For the answer, we must look at another context – the Song of Solomon.

Put me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm.  For love is as strong as death, jealousy is as severe as Sheol; its flashes are flashes of fire, the very flame of the LORD. Song of Solomon 8:6

Song of Songs places sexual intensity, passion, desire and fulfillment under the authority of the “seal.”  At the conclusion of this great love poem, the woman instructs the man to “put me like a seal” over his heart and on his arm.  The word translated “seal” is hotham.  It describes a cylindrical piece of stone with an external carved inscription.  When this cylinder is rolled over a soft material, it leaves a raised impression that establishes legal ownership over the object.  Like a signet ring, the seal permanently establishes an unbreakable legal and moral bond.   In the ancient near-Eastern cultures, ownership was established by rolling the cylinder over the possession.  To commit is to be “rolled over,” to submit to ownership, an unbreakable covenant bond.

When the psalmist instructs us to commit our way to YHWH, he is telling us to allow God’s seal of ownership to make its permanent impression on our lives.  He is telling us that God must take complete control of our very existence.  From this point on, God owns us.

Did you notice that the psalmist separates “commit” from “trust”?  We tend to think of these two abstract concepts as though they are merely synonyms.  But once we see that “commit” is a mark of ownership, a deliberate, concrete act of allowing God to “roll over” me, then we see that “trust” is independent of this concrete act.  I can be owned by another and still not trust him.  The psalmist must have been familiar with slaves who were owned by a master but who never trusted the master.  Not so with God.  We must be rolled over and govern our behavior according to His reliability.  There is more here, but that will have to wait.

There are signs of ownership rolled on to God’s people.  Do you see His mark on you?

Topical Index:  galal, commit, roll, Psalm 37:5

Category: Today's Word  | Tags: , , ,  | 5 Comments