forgiveness

  • The Great Equalizer

    One person dies full of innocence, completely tranquil and at peace . . . Another dies with a bitter heart, and he has never enjoyed good.  Together in the dust they lie, and the worm will cover them.  Job 21:23, 25-26 Robert Alter The worm – Alter’s sobering remark puts Job and Qohelet on the…

  • Forgiveness and Purity

    What is man, that he would be pure, or he who is born of a woman, that he would be righteous?  Job 15:14  NASB Pure – Baruch Levine emphasizes one of the most important characteristics of the Hebrew view of law when he writes: . . . the laws of the Torah did not permit Israelites to…

  • The Fall

    How then can mankind be righteous with God?  Or how can anyone who is born of woman be pure?  If even the moon has no brightness and the stars are not pure in His sight,  Job 25:4-5 NASB Righteous – Perhaps Moses was delusional.  Or maybe just egotistical.  He certainly seems to have been affected by some mental mistake when he…

  • The Direction of Forgiveness

    as far as the east is from the west,  so far has he removed our transgressions from us.  Psalm 103:12  NIV East/ west – You have undoubtedly heard this verse offered as proof for God’s forgiveness, but perhaps you haven’t considered some of its more esoteric implications.  So, let’s ask a few questions.  Why the order…

  • A Year of Living Dangerously

    “I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.” Isaiah 43:25  NIV Blots out – I think I need to confess.  I’ve been branded a heretic because of my views about the royal position of the woman (Guardian Angel) and my argument that Yeshua is the…

  • Down and Out

    For You—whom You struck they pursued, and they recounted the pain of Your victims.  Psalm 69:27 [Hebrew Bible]  Robert Alter Whom You struck – When did God strike you?  The verb is nākâ, used some 500 times in the Tanakh, often for physical injury or even death.  But that’s not the way it’s used here. …

  • Ignorance Is No Excuse

    The Lord spoke To Moses, saying: Speak to the Israelite people thus: When a person unwittingly incurs guilt in regard to any of the Lord’s commandments about things not to be done and does one of them–  Leviticus 4:1-2 JPS Unwittingly incurs guilt – “But I didn’t know!”  We’d like to believe that this justification…

  • A Remedy Comes Before The Sickness

    And not only this, but we also celebrate in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.  Romans 5:11  NASB Reconciliation – Reconciliation: noun: 1 the restoration of friendly relations: his reconciliation with your uncle | the colonel was seeking a reconciliation with his wife. 2 the action of making one view or belief compatible with another: he aims to bring about a reconciliation…

  • The Internet “god”

    As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our wrongdoings from us.  Psalm 103:12  NASB Removed – Humanity has come face to face with a new god, an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent god of eternal examination, a god that never forgets the worst things about you and provides the whole world…

  • Which One Would You Choose?

    Then David said to Gad, “I am in great distress. Let us now fall into the hand of the Lord, for His mercies are great; but do not let me fall into human hands.”  2 Samuel 24:14  NASB Fall into the hand of the Lord – Are you in great distress?  Oh, maybe not now, but have you…