Detours
“Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; Remove the evil of your deeds from My sight. Cease to do evil, Learn to do good; Seek justice, Reprove the ruthless, Defend the orphan, Plead for the widow.” Isaiah 1:16-17 NASB
Remove – What worries you? Job security? Taxes? Politics? Terrorism? Your children? Perhaps those worries need to be removed by concentrating on what God describes as justice? Perhaps if we paid attention to His directions, all these other things would be taken care of. When Yeshua told us not to be anxious, He didn’t mean that we should sit back and do nothing. He meant that we should not be anxious over things that aren’t priorities of YHVH. Take care of His agenda and He will take care of the rest.
Notice that every one of these directives in Isaiah is completely within your control. Hey, you might not have the last word about your job, your taxes, your politics or the evil acts of some terrorist, but you can do something directly about removing evil in your sphere of influence, learning what God says is good, reproving the ruthless, defending those without parents and pleading the case of the widow. And, by the way, if you don’t do anything about these near-at-hand circumstances, then maybe all that worry about jobs and taxes, politicians and terrorists is just what you deserve.
“Remove the evil of your deeds,” says YHVH. The Hebrew verb is sur. Generally it is not about spiritual matters. It’s just about turning aside, avoiding or altering direction. It’s pretty practical. You’re walking along a path toward someplace you wish to go when you get distracted and take a detour. That’s what sur is all about. But in this context, taking a detour means changing your direction back to God. You didn’t know it but all along you have been on the wrong course. In this case, the detour is the correct way. You just thought that where you intended to go was perfectly fine until God called you to stop traveling that way and take His detour toward righteousness.
Remarkably, the thought assumes you knew you were heading in an evil direction. It assumes that God sees all those evil intents. It assumes that you can change direction. As a consequence of taking God’s detour, you remove evil from His sight. You learn another way; a way that seeks justice. You remove sin from the presence of YHVH.
How this is possible? How do we get to that heightened spiritual state where we are acceptable in the presence of God? Well, He gives us the answer, and it isn’t that far away. Learn to do good. Obviously, it is a process. Keep reading. Pursue justice. Again, an action over time. Admonish and chastise those who are without mercy. Not easy, but clearly possible. Defend orphans and widows. Yes, I am sure you can do that too. Everything God requires in order to cease doing evil is directly connected with actions toward others. There is not a single mention of repentance, penitence or personal humiliation. It’s all focused away from self. And not a word about motive. Interesting.
Topical Index: remove, sur, evil, Isaiah 1:16-17
For Realz
Who “went about doing good?” (John 10.38) – And are these His words? “Follow Me!” Do, as I do. Love as I love. Serve as I serve. Minister as I minister.
Whose words are these? ~ ” Serve one another in love?” The Christian life is one of service. We cannot say we love God (the One who is unseen) and not love our neighbor (the one who is seen).
Chrisitianity is a very “practical” religion- for those who are practicing it! To borrow the words from a local commercial: “in a word- it works!” It is (leaving all doubt far behind!)- the Way to go!!
Today, our mantra (if we need one), our mission (we do have one of these!) needs to be, -should be, – will be (if we are willing!) as a “modern day?” disciple of our Sovereign Shepherd:
~ Serve one another in love! ~
Easy-peezy. Find a need and fill it! (Remember?) ~Give, and it shall be given unto you! ~ Need love? (who doesn’t?) – Give love. Need a friend? Be a friend. Need comfort? Give comfort. We “get” by giving! Blessed are the generous! Blessed are those who show hospitality! Blessed are the “givers!”
These are the ones who are “godly”- or God-like. Is not our Father (both) a Lover and a Giver? Yes. (it goes without saying!) He is! Friend, “Like Father-like son!”Today, Show (give) mercy. Show (give) compassion. Show (give) hospitality. Show (give) forgiveness. All of the above.. – I’m from Missouri- Show Me!!
~ For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in.. ~
~ Blessed (happy) are the merciful.. – for they shall obtain (receive) mercy!!
~ Give, and it shall be given unto you!! ~ We “shovel out” – God shovels in- And Who holds the “bigger” shovel? Just “do it!” Live generously!!
Doable. Indeed.
I had been taught my whole “Christian” life that I couldn’t do these things. It was just impossible because I was born a sinner, will always be a sinner, and can do nothing but sin, ever. There was nothing I could do apart from trusting Jesus to do it for me and through me. Sounds good, looks good, tastes good (sorta, all except the useless sinner part.)
I was taught this and much much more for many years, over and over again. Campus Crusade for Christ (who really pushed that Jesus was coming back in 1980, then 1988, then 2000, but didn’t!), CMA churches, Presby churches, Methodist churches, Baptist churches all impressed me with the same general themes. Tons and tons of teachings. The logical and encouraged (and ‘biblical’) action on my part was to realize I was not even in the game, it was all Jesus. He was the one and only one that could actually do anything.
The result, practically speaking, was that I just didn’t see the need to try. Jesus would forgive me anyway, no matter what I did. That is, except the unpardonable sin, whatever that was. No one ever really explained that thoroughly. They just told me not to do “it.” Again, not knowing what that really was, I didn’t really try real hard, because, well, Jesus would always forgive me anyway. No big deal.
This is what I was taught. Yeah, yeah, I was always nudged toward doing good things (again, whatever those were), but again, always to just trust Jesus to do things through me. Whatever that meant. “God,” I prayed, “Work through me. Make me the kind of person you want me to be. Make me like your son, Jesus. Give me the faith to not sin, give me the faith to walk in a holy manner to please you. Mold me in to your likeness.” Countless variations of that prayer came from my lips time and time again. I tried my best to follow the ‘trust Jesus’ plan everyone kept telling me and pushing me toward. And yet, for years and years I seemed empty.
I was mostly always on the sidelines “trusting Jesus” to do something in me. I got to experience many wonderful things, events, happenings along the way. Looking back, those things had a close relationship to things I actually did and participated in. Things I chose to do as opposed to other things I chose not to do.
There were some high points of peace every so often, but by in large, mostly mediocre and common and frustrating experiences. Experiences that mostly left me wondering what was really going on.
It really wasn’t until seven or eight years ago when I began pretty much throwing out all doctrines I had been taught and seeking to thoroughly evaluate them whether to accept them as is, modify them or evaluate a whole new understanding of them. What a frightening journey the beginning was.
Leaving out much of what happened since then, I’ll summarize with this. Previously, I was riding on the “simply trust Jesus” roller coaster and going no where as far as I could tell. After cleaning my doctrinal house, rearranging things, and cleaning up, I have a new house to shalom in.
Now, I don’t “trust in Jesus” anymore riding that roller coaster that had been going no where and in circles up and down. Now I faith in Yeshua’s life and example of following a very definite path of right living, that is life. That is, I don’t just sit on my can asking for someone to do something in me without my actionable participation. Now I have begun to do the simple and doable directions to life that are laid out in Torah. I decide to do them and I do them. I walk on the path of life. When I, for whatever reason, come to my senses that I’ve stepped off this path of Yeshua, I stop, turn around and move back in the direction of his path. Simple. Doable. Willful actionable choices I choose to do.
Thank Skip for illuminating and pointing to the path that I can really do and accomplish. With Yeshua’s help – of course! He has demonstrated and illustrated and made an example for me to do and follow. Follow him? Yes, that is the way to righteousness. Torah living. I CAN do it. I have yet to find one command that I’m responsible to do, that I couldn’t do. It’s that simple to understand. Yet, so challenging to do as at every turn I must submit to choosing the yetzer haTov over the yetzer haRa. A daily choosing of life or death.
“There is not a single mention of repentance, penitence, or personal humiliation.”
Welllllll……perhaps not in THIS verse (Is. 1:16-17) but Scripture is certainly loaded with references to those expectations in verses throughout both the old and new Testaments.
That said…the directives of Isaiah 1:16-17 remain front and center in importance. Definitely not to be ignored!!
Hi Judi,
On the other hand, there is a difference between unintentional sin and intentional sin. There is a remedy for unintentional sin, not intentional sin in that it results in death. That is, walking outside of the way of life as outlined in Torah.
It seems to me that when we fall in to unintentional sin, as Skip illustrated in today’s TW, God will “bump” us with the understanding to not continue in that way, and the right response, our choice one way or the other, is to obey and head back in the direction God calls us.
However, it seems that intentional sin leaves us dead, period. This requires a “repentance, penitence, and personal humiliation” to STOP the intentional rebellion to Torah, turn back and head back toward God, that is his Torah’s life instructions.
I may not have explained the difference in these two adequately, however, I believe it points to the import of your comment somewhat.
The force of what I got out of Skip’s word today is that doing righteousness is NOT out of our grasp. It is very doable in that God explained it and then demonstrated it’s possible in the lives of all the righteous people from both the Tanakh and the Apostolic Writings; i.e. Yeshua, Noah, Moses, Abraham, Yeshua, Paul, Peter, John, etc., AND including US! Free will offers the possibility of choice, choosing life or death at each and every moment of choice in our lives.
It seems I was so confused most of my life in that I had the instructions taken away from me, that is, I was taught the “Old Testament Law” was dead and done away with! No wonder I didn’t know what to do! I had the instruction manual ripped out of my book by me being taught it was null and void.
Is the Law done away with. Certainly NOT! Never was and never will be. I and everyone will always have the law (the instructions of life) to follow and direct us to life as illustrated and demonstrated by Yeshua.
No argument there. Just interesting that Isaiah doesn’t mention what we commonly consider FIRST on our list.
So true. In my church experience, calls to repentance and penitence have always been valued over actually seeing a change of behavior. I have attended so many services where people flocked to the altar in tears on Sunday morning or Wednesday night, and then walked out of church feeling so much better that no change in behavior was actually required. In fact, change of behavior was often viewed with suspicion if “repentance and penitence” were not front and center. When we start by doing right, a change of heart will follow. Maybe the only motive needed is our intent (i.e., the active doing, not the mental assent) to be on God’s path.
I just thought of a good example of the “old” and “new” life I have now that I understand things with a new paradigm.
I’m laying tile in our master bathroom as part of our house remodeling. (Back breaking work, by the way!) The reason I’m doing it is because we mistakenly hired a constructor that hired a tile person that was actually an amateur trying to play the role of an experienced professional.
I had to rip up our entire house of tile that he laid because of the TERRIBLE job he did. (More back breaking work!) MY work laying tile as compared to HIS work laying tile can be illustrated in the foundation of mortar he laid as opposed to what I laid to hold and secure the tile to the concrete floor.
I laid a solid foundation of mortar that filled all spaces under the tile and spread to touch and hold the entire surface under the tile and on the floor. When MY mortar dries, you can tap on the tile and it sounds and feels solid. Nothing hollow sounding or feeling whatsoever. Hitting or tapping the tile feels and sounds life hitting or tapping solid concrete.
On the other hand, HIS tile was poorly supported. His foundation had gaps, spaces, holes and unevenness in it. In fact, that is what led me to discovering the terrible job he was doing. Besides having lipage every where (the edges of tiles weren’t even with each other creating a terrible lip and unevenness in the floor.) As I inspected the entire floor of the house, I came across several tiles in a row that sounding hollow when I tapped them. It sounded like tapping on an empty drum with a sort of echo. Normally, when done properly, you can actually take a hammer and beat hard on tile, and you would find it tough to make a dent or scratch if you hit the hammer flat on the head. These hollow sounding tiles, as I demonstrated, were EASILY broken with the slightest force. I positioned a hammer straight up resting on the end that you normally hold and let the hammer fall forward so the head of the hammer fell on the middle of the tile. With the light force of a hammer falling (a 12 oz. hammer) under it’s own weight, the tile broke, splintering outward like a spider web! If I had moved furniture on to that tile the weight alone would have broken the tile.
These two methods of laying tile visually and tangibly illustrate my new paradigm of understanding Scripture and all they contain. One had a shaky, hollow foundation, easily broken. The new one has a solid, firm and sustainable foundation. Solid and strong. A sure foundation.
Ok, back to work. Back to TileLand, a.k.a. “BackBreakCity”
Thanks Michael C,
Yes, Skip has definitely had a huge impact of teaching us the importance of the Law…and in clarifying the difference between intentional and unintentional sin.
Kudos to you for redoing all the tile work. The foundation is key. (But take care of your back. :-))
Thank Judi.
Doing the best I can. One tile at a time.