The Pharaoh Syndrome

Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died.  Numbers 21:6  NASB Sent – The Hebrew verb šālaḥ has three different linguistic domains.  The first is the way we typically read a verb like “send,” i.e., compelling or transmitting someone or something from one place to another. …

God Is Good

Let the wicked abandon his way, and the unrighteous person his thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, and He will have compassion on him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.  Isaiah 55:7  NASB Abundantly pardon – “I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of His wrath,” says Lamentations 3:1.  Oh, there’s…

What Only God Can Do (1)

Were You, O Yah, to watch for wrongs, Master, who could endure?  For forgiveness is Yours, so that You may be feared. Psalm 130:3-4 Robert Alter Forgiveness – “I’m sorry.  Please forgive me.”  How often those words are offered to another person!  And rightly so.  We all make mistakes and we all need forgiveness.  But Hebrew…

Saving Grace

The next day he saw Jesus coming to him and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! John 1:29  NASB Takes Away– “Take up and carry”?  Or, maybe, “carry off.”  The Greek verb, aíro, can mean either.  “Whether the sense in Jn. 1:29 is ‘to take up and carry,’ i.e., in a…

Subtotal

For You, Lord, are good, and ready to forgive, and abundant in lovingkindness to all who call upon You. Psalm 86:5 NASB Ready to forgive – There’s a lot of action in this verse. It combines words like ṭôb (good), ḥesed (lovingkindness) and sālaḥ (forgive). We’ve looked at ṭôb and spent considerable time with ḥesed,…

God’s Foot

Then the woman gave birth to a son and named him Samson; and the child grew up and the Lord blessed him.  And the Spirit of the Lord began to stir him in Mahaneh-dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol. Judges 13:24-25 NASB To stir – Samson. We know the story, don’t we? At least we know the highlights. Don’t forget the lion…

History Revised

Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers; and the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon David from that day forward. And Samuel arose and went to Ramah. 1 Samuel 16:13 NASB Came mightily – We know David’s story. Starts out great, lots of trouble in…

A Religion of Piece(s)

On October 9, 2015, the Muslim cleric Muhammad Salah “Abu Rajab” preached to the congregation of the Al-Abrar Mosque in Rafah in Gaza. In his “sermon,” he expressly avowed that he and his brothers of the West Bank are terrorists intent on killing every Jew on the planet and continuing their killing campaign to America….

What Days Are These?

“They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the Lord, “for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” Jeremiah 31:34 NASB I…

The Four Words (2)

But with you there is forgiveness, that you may be feared.  Psalm 130:4  ESV May be feared – YHWH pardons!  Rejoice!  YHWH is salah.  I can be straightened. But this is no surprise to the serpent, and he is prepared to manipulate YHWH’s pardon for his purposes.  Never underestimate the craftiness of the yetzer ha’ra. …