Making It My Own
Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting. Amen and Amen. Psalm 41:13
Amen – Did you know that “Amen” is a Hebrew word that has moved into our language untranslated? Every time you say, “Amen,” you are speaking Hebrew. You are saying something in the language of the Scriptures that has an enormous meaning. But the chances are that you don’t know what you are really saying. It’s time to find out.
Amen is a form of the Hebrew root ‘mn, which is also the root for ‘emet (true, that is, reliable, trustworthy, permanent and secure), and he‘emin (lasting, to prove faithful, to be constant), and ‘emeth (stability, reliability, faithfulness and truth). You can see right away that the context of all these thoughts center around the permanence and stability of the character of God. All of them are about personal actions that come from trustworthy character. Now you know what Jesus meant when He said, “I am the truth,” not “I know the truth” or “I have the truth.” Truth is not facts. It is personal engagement.
Amen is related to all of these thoughts. It is literally the personal endorsement of God’s actions. It is like saying, “What God says, I accept and submit myself to.” It is making God’s will my will, like a shorthand way of saying, “Thy kingdom come on earth (in me) as it is in heaven.”
Amen is a part of prayer, not because it is some magical formula or because it is a nice closing, but because it proclaims that I commit myself to God’s will declared in the prayer. You cannot say, Amen, and simply walk away. Amen is your spiritual signature on the holy contract. It is your word that what you have prayed is what God wants – and what you must do to see it happen. Amen is saying, “This is the absolutely reliably truth for me! I stake my life on it!”
Amazingly, amen is not used very often in Old Testament Scripture; only 24 times. Twelve of those occur in Deuteronomy. That makes perfect sense when you know that the book of the Law requires consent and submission. Amen to that! What is a bit more startling is the way that Jesus uses amen. You see, amen is normally found after a declaration of God’s will, but Jesus says amen before He gives His teaching (see John 1:51. 5:19 and 6:26 for examples). Now what does that tell you? Who can possibly give an endorsement to God’s will before God’s will is revealed? Only God, of course, because only God knows what His will is before it is spoken to men. So, Jesus is not being just a good orthodox Jew. He is declaring His divinity whenever He begins a statement with amen amen. What a shame that our English translations often change these words to “truly, truly” or “verily, verily” or “I tell you truly.” Such translations lose the real impact of Jesus’ use of amen by converting it from the Hebrew endorsement of God’s uncontested will to some kind of emphasis on what it true.
So, now you know. Now you can use amen correctly. Say amen and sign on the dotted line.
