A Word Makes a Difference
Sometimes one word can make a profound difference, as I found through reading the book: “Understanding
the difficult words of Jesus—New Insights from a Hebraic perspective.”
The authors, David Bivin and Roy Blizzard, Jr., believe
that the first three gospels: Matthew, Mark and Luke; also known as the Synoptic gospels; were not originally
written in Greek as was believed for centuries, but in Hebrew, which was then
translated into Greek and then from Greek into English.
A triad of languages involved in translation, create issues obvious to anyone who has tried using Google Translate, which seems to focus on words alone as opposed to the idiom it is translating. For example, I translated “raining cats and dogs” into Dutch, and got the result: "hondenweer," which literally means “dog weather” or “dogs
again.”
Bivin and Blizzard’s theory that the first three gospels were originally written in Hebrew is based on relatively recent evidence revealed by the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, between 1947 and 1956, as well as by studying the writings of the early church fathers and the inscriptions on coins from the time of Jesus.
This was
interesting, but understanding how one particular word should have been translated
acted like a key to understanding other scriptures. It
was all to do with a Hebrew verb that was poorly translated into Greek, and in the process confusing the tense.
I learned that in Hebrew, the verb “karav” means “to
be at, to come up to and be with--to be where something or someone else is,”
but this was translated into the Greek word “engiken” which means “about to
appear” or “is almost here,” and is sometimes interpreted into English as “come
near.”
The original word “karav” was sometimes used to indicate intimate
relations between people as it clearly does in this account in Genesis 20:1-6: Abraham,
was worried that his safety would be at risk because of the desirability of his
beautiful wife so he told her to say that she was
his sister. Here is the text:
20 Now Abraham journeyed from there toward the land of the [a]Negev, and [b]settled between Kadesh and Shur; then he
sojourned in Gerar.2 Abraham said of
Sarah his wife, “She is my sister.” So Abimelech king of Gerar sent and took Sarah.
3 But
God came to Abimelech in a dream of the night, and said to him, “Behold, you are a dead man because of the woman
whom you have taken, for she is [c]married.” 4 Now Abimelech had not come near
her; and he said, “Lord, will You slay a nation, even though [d]blameless? 5 Did he not himself say to me, ‘She is my sister’? And she herself said, ‘He is my brother.’ In the integrity of my heart and the
innocence of my [e]hands I have done this.” 6 Then God said to him in the dream, “Yes, I know that in the integrity of
your heart you have done this, and I also [f]kept you from sinning against Me;
therefore I did not let you touch her.
Why is this all so important and how and why does it make such a
difference? Luke 10:1-11 New
American Standard Bible (NASB) describes Jesus sending out 70 disciples ahead to the
cities he planned to visit. Notice the instances where the words
“come near” are used:
The
Seventy Sent Out
10 Now
after this the Lord appointed [a]seventy others,
and sent them in pairs ahead of Him to every city and place where He
Himself was going to come. 2 And He was saying to
them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore
beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest. 3 Go; behold,
I send you out as lambs in the midst of wolves. 4 Carry
no money belt, no [b]bag, no
shoes; and greet no one on the way. 5 Whatever
house you enter, first say, ‘Peace be to this house.’ 6 If
a [c]man of
peace is there, your peace will rest on him; but if not, it will return to
you. 7 Stay in [d]that
house, eating and drinking [e]what
they give you; for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not keep moving from house
to house. 8 Whatever city you enter and they
receive you, eat what is set before you; 9 and
heal those in it who are sick, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come
near to you.’10 But whatever city you enter and they
do not receive you, go out into its streets and say, 11 ‘Even
the dust of your city which clings to our feet we wipe off in protest against
you; yet [f]be sure of this, that the
kingdom of God has come near.’
Verses 9 & 11 use the phrase, “The Kingdom of God
has come near to you,” but translated
back to the Hebrew “Karav” it should say, “It’s here! It has arrived!” That makes a profound difference.
Luke 17:20-21
New American Standard Bible (NASB)
20 Now having been questioned by the Pharisees as
to when the kingdom of God was coming, He answered them and said, “The
kingdom of God is not coming with [a]signs to be
observed; 21 nor will they say, ‘Look, here it
is!’ or, ‘There it is!’ For behold, the kingdom of God is [b]in your midst.”
How was the kingdom of God present in this case? In
the people sprinkled like salt and light amongst the crowd--Jesus and his
followers.
We who
know him, represent the Kingdom of God. We carry the kingdom where we go—light in the
darkness of the world.
Everything about us should represent God’s rule and
reign--his character: goodness, mercy, patience, gentleness, love, kindness,
long-suffering, faithfulness, humility. Realizing this makes a difference. I am
not just representing me but someone and something more important. I have to
pause and consider this when I wake up on the wrong side of the bed in a
grouchy mood.
Familiar verses have a deeper meaning.
Micah 6:8New American Standard Bible (NASB)
8 He has told you, O man, what is good;
And what does the Lord require
of you
In other
words, God requires us to make manifest the values of the kingdom
of God and of the heart of God. And
this is why Jesus could say to us:
Matthew 5:48New American Standard Bible (NASB)
48 Therefore [a]you are to be
perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
It isn’t actually we who have to struggle to be
perfect, but it happens as a result of our awareness that his kingdom
has taken up residence in us.
2 Corinthians 4:7New American Standard Bible (NASB)
7 But we have this
treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the
power will be of God and not from ourselves;
John 17:11New American Standard Bible (NASB)
11 I am no longer in the world; and yet they
themselves are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep
them in Your name, the name which You have given Me, that they
may be one even as We are.
When “the
name” is referenced in the Bible, it talks of character. At a conference author
Mark Buchanan said that he understood the commandment “you shall not take the
name of the Lord your God in vain” (Exodus 20:7) to mean that the sin is to act
in the name of God in a way that
doesn’t represent his character; in other words to misrepresent God to the
world.
When Jesus
prayed, “Holy Father, keep them in Your name, the name which you have given Me,
that they may be one even as we are,” it is to do with his “keeping us” in his
character—upholding his kingdom as we represent him to the world.
Galatians 5:22-23 speaks of the “fruit” of the
Spirit.
New American Standard Bible (NASB)
22 But the
fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control;
against such things there is no law.
Fruit is the product of intimacy. Think of that word “karav” again,
interpreted as to “come near,” but actually a synonym for an intimate
encounter.
In John 3, Jesus has an encounter with a curious
member of the ruling council of Pharisees.
John 3:1-6New American Standard Bible (NASB)
The
New Birth
3 Now
there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the
Jews; 2 this man came to Jesus by night and said to
Him, “Rabbi, we know that You have come from God as a teacher;
for no one can do these [a]signs
that You do unless God is with him.” 3 Jesus
answered and said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is
born [b]again
he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
4 Nicodemus *said to Him, “How can a man
be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb
and be born, can he?” 5 Jesus
answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water
and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the
flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
Before there can be a spiritual birth, there must
be an intimate encounter with someone, the Holy Spirit.
A couple of Sunday mornings ago, I was meditating
on what I had just seen about the kingdom of God before church. An hour went by
like short minutes as scripture after familiar scripture came alive in a new
way.
That morning our pastor led us in the Lord’s
prayer.
I listened to the words “Your kingdom come,” but instead
of seeing them as a prayer for his kingdom to come in the future, I prayed them
as in the present tense, “Your kingdom come--now—in me.”
The prayer ends, “For yours is the kingdom and the
power and the glory.”
Not our power or glory—it is all his!
During our sharing time that morning I had asked
for prayer for a man who had not been heard from for 5 days in Thunder Bay, the
brother of a friend on a northern reserve. The night before she had been distraught with
worry and I said in a message to her on FB that we had no place to run but to
Jesus. On my mind were the many First Nations people in Thunder Bay that have
been found in the river. When I got home from church, I checked FB and saw that
she had posted a one line prayer:
“Our Father who art in heaven.”
Another person added
“Hallowed be thy name”
Then someone else wrote
“Thy kingdom come”
Twice in one day, it felt like God confirmed what
he was teaching me about the Kingdom of God.
My prayer that I wrote in my journal that morning before
church was:
“Today I am
praying that God will make me usable and keep me in a state of usability.”
I could as easily have simply written, “Thy kingdom
come.”
Hidden Treasure
44 “The kingdom of heaven is like a
treasure hidden in the field, which a man found and hid again; and
from joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.
A Costly Pearl
45 “Again, the kingdom of heaven is
like a merchant seeking fine pearls,46 and upon finding one pearl of great value, he went
and sold all that he had and bought it.
An intimate encounter with the Holy Spirit—it can
happen here and now. We just have to answer “yes”--and open the doors of our
hearts.
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