Hebrew Name Origins: $5/Name

Came across this in my research for a Hebrew word study paper I am writing:

The name of God is Yahweh. This name is abbreviated to Yah about fifty times in the Old Testament. Many proper names are prefixed with Yah. One of them happens to be my middle name! Jehonathan which is abbreviated to Jonathan comes from 'Yah' attached to 'nathan' which in Hebrew means "he gave." Therefore, Jonathan means, "Yahweh has given." This is way better than being named just 'nathan.'

I've decided to start a business: Hebrew Name Origins. $5/name. I can print them on mugs, t-shirts, frame them, bumper stickers, etc. (Cost of novelty items extra)

Special Needs Ministry

I just returned from an evening spent with the mentally disabled. Grace Community Church has a ministry solely devoted to this group of people, primarily composed of those with Downs' Syndrome, autism, and cerebral palsy. The Tuesday night ministry is called Grace Club and welcomes on average 100 people each week in addition to the caregivers who bring them. They gather first in the gym for a time of exercise and games. As I walked in to the gym I was immediately and warmly greeted by a young man who could not speak, but in no way did that stop him from being the most outgoing of the group. The evening continued and so did the greetings. Hugs and handshakes. Questions about whether or not I was a police officer. If you ever feel lonely, go to this group and you will feel like a celebrity.

From the gym, they move into a large basement classroom for a time of worship and short teaching time. Plastic chairs facing the front screen with song lyrics projected by a (old fashioned) magnifying projector. The group enthusiastically engaged in the singing, often with free style hand motions and seemingly genuine praise to God, our Creator. It brought me great joy to see many of this group praising God to the capacity He has given them. Some of them in this life seem to be completely locked within themselves unable to communicate. It made me wonder at God's ways. Not in a million years would I think to design someone who is fully grown yet mentally still a child. Yet God is still sovereignly their Creator and receives their praise. He knows every detail of their lives and reigns supreme over it. It leads me to think of the Apostle Paul's response to beholding the ways of God that transcend human wisdom:

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor? Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid? For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.
Romans 11:33-36

Demanding Greek

I want to be a Greek expert. Not a Greek scholar. Not a Greek know-it-all. But I do want to know Greek well. I want to know it well so that I can know God well and know what He has said well and be able to help others know God and know what He said well so we can together live well.

This semester has been a Greek semester. I was frustrated at first with the amount of work the class demanded, but now I see more clearly the goal. For some reason I get to have the privilege of learning Greek - the language of the New Testament. As my understanding and knowledge of the language increases, I hope that with greater precision I will comprehend those things that are important to God as recorded in His Word. Not everyone gets to learn Greek, nor does everybody need to learn it. But I hope that for some who love God and love His Word, I will be able to help them understand with greater clarity and conviction what the Almighty has said.

I was reminded of this in Greek class today as my professor exhorted us not to waste our Greek education. It got me excited again to be a student of Greek. To not take my studies lightly. I hope the Lord will give me opportunity to grow in my understanding of Him and to help others do the same through the careful use of the Greek language.

Puzzle Pieces

I just came across an analogy in Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology that puts to words something I have been thinking about for the last few years. Upon a first reading, the Bible can appear so mysterious and opaque to understanding. Kings and kingdoms and sacrifices and law and churches and revelations and songs and proverbs and judgment and anger and joy and brutality and grace and...how does this all fit together? How am I supposed to understand it all?
Well, Grudem compares studying the Bible and theology to putting together a jigsaw puzzle: "The more pieces one has in place correctly to begin with, the easier it is to fit new pieces in, and the less apt one is to make mistakes." This so clearly illustrates some of my frustrations and conclusions in studying the Bible in the past. At times it has been as though I have studied a single piece of a puzzle, knowing all its colors and shapes, but I have no idea where it goes. I have to put it to the side and keep working on the rest of the puzzle keeping in mind I have one piece on the side with certain colors and shapes. Eventually the puzzle fills in enough that I know where that piece should go. But at the start I had no idea. It took time and further work to figure it out.
So too it goes with Bible study. As I learn more of the Old Testament, ideas in the New become clearer. As I study one passage the light goes on in another. There is no way I could understand certain passages the first time I read them. But as I work through the Bible again and again, I pick up new things each time and begin to see how it all fits together. I view this as God's amazing wisdom in putting together a book that fits together so well and so precisely.
I look forward to working on this puzzle the rest of my life.

A Verse from a Red Hymnal

I married a girl who received a red Trinity Hymnal as an Eighth Grade Graduation present. And I couldn't be happier.
My fondness for the hymnal grows as my fondness for hymns grows. (Don't worry, my fondness for my wife whose hymnal I am fond of grows too!)
There is a verse from a hymn in that red hymnal that has captured my imagination. The verse is not one that can be sung and then buried into the pages of a closed hymnal with no lingering impact. No, it reverberates in my mind each time. After the song ends and the hymnal is tucked away on the shelf again, the image remains emblazened on my mind for it so captures the significance of what happened to me when I was rescued from my sin by Jesus Christ. It draws all the power it can from words put to music and creates a picture of the epic moment that was my salvation. These words make me rejoice! They make me rejoice for what has happened to me and they make me long that conversion would come to others.
Salvation is not described here as a salvation that saves from seemingly petty and inconsequential sins. Rather it speaks of the salvation from unescapable darkness to indescribable light. It describes a prisoner bound, chained, and trapped in a dark and rotting dungeon who has not seen a glimpse of light for ages. The cramped stone walls wrap around cold, stagnant air, sealing in the fear and guilt and shunning the light. The shackles of sin press the prisoner against the wall. Even the hope of being freed from these bonds has been ripped from the prisoner. But salvation comes suddenly and it comes powerfully and it comes invincibly. The once dark dungeon overflows with light. The shackles are loosed and slide off. The victorious one who freed the prisoner leaves the dungeon leading the freed man onward.

This verse come from Hymn #455 of that red hymnal. It was written by Charles Wesley in 1738. It is called, "And Can It Be."
Long my imprisoned spirit lay fast bound in sin and nature's night; Thine eye diffused a quick'ning ray; I woke, the dungeon flamed with light; My chains fell of, my heart was free; I rose, went forth, and followed thee.

Facts and Meaning

I just heard part of a very silly sermon rooted in a very silly idea being propogated by a very silly post-modern mindset. The preacher claimed that "ancient storytellers" (as he calls the human authors of the Bible) were not concerned with facts so much as meaning, and that, "People who get overly obsessed with the details of the early Genesis stories and whether it happened exactly the way the story teller says are missing the point." His point was clear: don't worry too much about the facts, just get to what the meaning is.

This is silly.

This is silly for many reasons, but most obviously because the Old Testament (where he was preaching from) is full of facts! It lists geneologies and rivers and cities and numbers and years and countries and animals and all sorts of very clear facts. Given the amount of time devoted to listing facts, I don't think the "ancient storytellers" would dismiss facts as secondary.

Of course history needs to be understood in terms of what it means. But it only means something when you have facts by which to derive meaning from! It's never only meaning and no facts. The meaning is grounded in the facts. I could say Jesus was crucified and resurrected and have that mean nothing to you. But I need those facts in order for there to be meaning. If Jesus never died, then sins were never atoned for. If Jesus was never resurrected, then death was never conquered! The meaning comes from the facts.

So when this silly preacher claims we get too obsessed in the facts, he is the one who is missing the meaning.

Fall 09 Classes

May-October = 5 months since my last post. I think that has something to do with summer school knocking down 8/10 pins of my life. I don't really know what happened to summer. More or less for me it went from spring straight to fall (with the exception of ice-cap melting heat).

Now I am half way into my first semester of my second year of seminary. A whole new load of classes and challenges. Perhaps in short overview form, I will offer a summary of the classes I am taking:

Greek Exegesis
My most time consuming class. The highest complement I can pay this class is that I am now more capable of opening the Greek New Testament and understanding what it means. Greek has not gripped my attention as Hebrew has, even though it is a wonderful language. This class has focused so far on understanding the significance of the different uses of nouns and verbs in the language. I look forward to the point when the puzzle pieces that have been separated into the edges, corners, and middle pieces are fit together to give the big picture.

Hebrew Exegesis
Besides focusing on a completely different language, this class is completely different than Greek Exegesis. That may be due to the fact that I have a stronger foundation in Hebrew than Greek which makes this class come across as more helpful and significant. One of the first classes our professor systematically taught through a few verses of Ruth. I was stunned at how much he was able to explain about the text from the grammar of the text. Most exciting was the feeling that I am being trained to be able to pull out depths from the Bible like he had just done. That is the focus of this class: to help the student exhaust the resources of grammar for understanding the books of the Old Testament.

Music and Worship Ministries
I now know how to lead a hymn by flapping my hands in the air! I hope I will never have to, but just in case, I now have an emergency toolkit for leading a hymn at church. The best part of has been a quick overview of the history of modern music, originating in the monastic chants and continuing in development to the modern day. I have become more convinced of the fact that the New Testament is silent on specifics of worship styles in church, but I have also become more convinced of the importance of worship music in church for the sake of unity, not in spite of unity.

New Testament Studies
Probably my favorite class of the semester. We have spent half of the semester studying the Gospels and Acts. I wish we could spend five years in these books. The professor addresses the author, date, purpose, themes, literary structure, and major interpretative issues of each book. After this class, I don't think I will ever read the gospels the same again.

New Testament History
Focuses on the 400 years between the end of the Old Testament and the beginning of the New Testament. It gives the backgrounds of the culture and religions that abound during the era of the New Testament. The professor focuses on drawing spiritual lessons from the history, thereby avoiding the pitfall of rote memorization history classes.

Wisdom in Ecclesiastes

This post comes from a synopsis paper on the book of Ecclesiastes I had to write for my Old Testament survey class. The question I am answering is seen below.

What did the book of Ecclesiastes teach concerning how to live wisely in this world of futility?

A quick glance at the book of Ecclesiastes will yield the perspective that “all is vanity” (1:2); therefore even living wisely has no value. However, once beyond the immediate shock of a book of the Bible suggesting that “all is vanity,” one will see that, although there is a sense of futility to this world, there is still a rock solid reason for living wisely. The wisdom in the book of Ecclesiastes is in showing that living by human wisdom will expose the futility of the world, while living according to God’s ways produces the full life.

Solomon gives a clue to the reason things of this life and world appear so futile when he writes, “…[God] has put eternity into man’s heart…” (3:11). With a man’s heart holding eternity, it is no wonder this world, which is composed of temporal things, appears so futile. If a man seeks joy only in the things of this world he is not living wisely because he is foregoing the fact that he is meant for eternity. Nothing in the world will bring full satisfaction. Solomon says that he sought to indulge himself with pleasure (2:1), working hard (2:18), and human wisdom (2:12), and found that they all were worthless and ultimately futile (2:17). None brought full satisfaction. Living wisely, therefore, does not involve seeking the things of this world only.

The seeming futility of the world does not open the doors to living however one wants. Solomon realizes an important principle when he wrote, “…God will judge the righteous and the wicked…” (3:17). There is an appointed time for judgment of man. If there is judgment then there are consequences for actions. Ecclesiastes teaches that life must be lived with a view to judgment. Much else may be uncertain about life, but judgment is not. It is coming and should impact the way one lives.

In the vein of judgment, Solomon discusses approaching God (5:1-7). Solomon declares, “fear God” (5:7). Wise living in this world recognizes that the God of heaven and earth is to be approached with reverence. There is no futility to fearing God. In fact, Solomon states that “it will not be well with the wicked, neither will he prolong his days like a shadow, because he does not fear God” (8:13). In contrast, “it will be well with those who fear God…” (8:12).

It should be noted, although Solomon expounds the futility of pursuing the pleasures of this life, there is pleasure in this life. There is joy in a wife (9:9), eating and drinking, and toil (3:13). These are God’s gift to man (3:13). Therefore, the conclusion one ought not to reach is that people should flee from joy. There is joy in this life, and it is God’s gifts, however, there are caveats to that joy. It must be sought within the boundaries of what is allowed by God (12:13), otherwise it will not go well in the judgment.

Solomon’s conclusion for living life wisely in this world of futility is that one must “Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man” (12:13). All will face death, both the righteous and the wicked, the wise man and the fool, but there will be judgment, and it will go well for some and not well for others. Therefore, the ultimate wisdom for this life is to fear God, for He is the One who is the judge, and keep His commandments.

Minimizing Sin is Minimizing Hope

Sin can very uncomfortable to talk about. So uncomfortable in fact, that there has been a trend to practically deny the existence of the word! To change the way we speak is to change the way we think. The terminology for sin has been transformed by some to become "mistakes," or "sickness." Using terminology like this can be dangerous. Take sickness. If we begin to discuss sin as sickness, the implication follows that the sinner merely has contracted some illness, through no fault of their own. This trend seeks to avoid the uncomfortable reality that humans are indeed culpable for their actions - refusing to identify one's condition as sinful and instead calling it illness deflects the guilt and places it anywhere but on the one who is guilty. It is very natural to want to minimize sin. We don't like being notified of our shortfalls one bit, and it is uncomfortable to tell others of theirs.
I don't have in mind here that we ought to run around self-righteously calling others sinners. The point here is that the denial of sin is the denial of hope.
Why is denying sin denying hope? Because Jesus Christ died for sinners! He died for those who recognize they are sinful and need Him for the forgiveness of their sins. When sin is minimized, so is the cross. Everybody on the planet has the same problem of sin. The Bible is very clear about that and does not shy away from addressing it. Some have problems with illnesses, certainly, but all have problems with sin. And it is sin, not sickness that separates us from God. Therefore, our ultimate need is for our sin problem to be taken care of. That is what Jesus came to handle. When sin is not addressed as sin we are denying hope. But when sin is addressed as sin, we have the most glorious hope to offer and be offered.

An Issue to Ponder

Friends and Family,

Today, I come to you with a topic very dear to my heart. And I hope as you finish reading this post, it will be very dear to yours.

For decades, we Americans have pursued noble issues. Freedom and democracy. Equality and justice. The support of animal populations endangered or ignored. However, there is a great injustice facing us today. A glaring issue that has been hanging over our heads for years. There is an entire population in our country, perhaps forgotten, or even worse, neglected by the majority of Americans for the past 20 years.

Smurfs, who once invited us into the deepest moments of their lives, allowing us a glimpse of what it is like to be small and blue, have now completely disappeared, only leaving behind worn out relics of a purer time. We were all, each and every one of us, invited to see their weekly struggles with vicious cats and evil sorcerers. But now, after two decades of their seclusion, we the American people have lost our true vision of who these sentimental modules of annoying songs really are.

Lest history scorn us, let us devote ourselves to an accurate remembrance of what these noble creatures are, and what they are not:

What they are not:

Purple.

What they are:

Blue.

What they are not:

Stuffed animals to squeeze and hug.

What they are:

Living, feeling creatures, or maybe robots.

Unless we regain this vision of Smurfdom, only time will show us what we truly lost. Perhaps it was our neglect that drove the Smurfs to their seclusion. Perhaps it was the poor choice of habitat, residing only miles from their mortal enemy, who wore them to the brink of extinction each week. Perhaps it was our rejection of their unusual social structure, which was not egalitarian in nature, but largely dominated by effeminate generic males, led by a white beard mystic, Papa Smurf. While it is indeed unusual to have a society with only one female (who is simply known as Smurfette), somehow this bee-like subsistence has sustained them for epochs dating back to the last ice-age. The primary conclusion one must reach when pondering the uniqueness of the female smurf in smurf culture is that female smurfs are, simply put, violently territorial.

People, how could we let these blue ones escape us? We don’t even know if they’re mammals! I’ve never seen one with fur! They might even lay eggs. We just don’t know at this point.

A few facts we do know regarding Smurfs:

Nobody has ever killed a smurf.

They are fanatical about pumpkin carving.

They never give in to torture.

They are the only self-conscious creature naturally born with a hat.

They are fiercely antagonistic towards Snorks.

They do not employ the use of typical weapons, but generally resort to guerrilla warfare.

They use an archaic written language consisting of hieroglyphs

Hebrew Vocab

I have not looked at my Hebrew vocab cards since my last Hebrew exam a month ago, but I am reviewing them tonight.
I have a Hebrew exam tomorrow.
The last Hebrew exam took place right after I got back from a trip to NY, so I was studying vocab while on my parents couch watching America's Funniest Home Videos with them. As I look over these cards that have sat constrained within their rubber bands for the last month, it's not just their meanings that are coming into my mind, but also memories of that night. I have not thought of that night since I got back to California (not meant as a slight to the quality of the time there, just an indication of the rigors of seminary life), but as soon as those Hebrew letters on the little white cards came into view, it felt like that night was last night.
Maybe that's a good way to make memories stick - carry around a stack of Hebrew vocab cards every where you go not looking at them until the times you really want to remember...like the night before an exam.

Why did Christ die?

This comes from a portion of an assignment I have for my pastoral counseling class.

Why did Christ die?

Jesus Christ died to make purification of sins (Heb 3:1). He died so that He might taste death for everyone, destroy the devil, secure eternal redemption, and put away sin (Heb 3:9, 14; 9:12, 26). Jesus suffered for sins on the cross in order to “bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:18). He died to destroy the works of the devil and to show us love (1Jn 3:8, 16). The lamb was slain to be praised forever (Rev 5:11-14). Jesus hung on the cross to fulfill Scripture (John 19:28, 36-37). Jesus died to be put forth as a propitiation for sin (Rom 3:25; 1Jn 4:10). Christ died to reconcile God’s enemies to God and justify sinners (Rom 5:9-10). Jesus died to bear our griefs, carry our sorrows, be wounded for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities. His chastisement brought our peace. His stripes healed us. Our iniquity was laid on him. He died because it was the will of Yahweh to crush Him and put Him to grief. He died to make an offering for sin (Is 53). He died for the joy set before Him (Heb 12:2).

I'm sure this is just the beginning of a very long list...

Not Enough Jobs to Go Around

There are not many people named Job out there. I've never met one. I have met several people named Noah, plenty of Daniels, and even a Moses, but no Job. But he was declared a to be a man who was "blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil" (Job 1:1). He is even mentioned by God in the book of Ezekiel along with Noah and Daniel. As God promises that Jerusalem will be destroyed, He says that even if Noah, Daniel, and Job were in the city they would escape by their righteousness but the city would still be destroyed (Ezekiel 14:14, 16, 18, 20). So Job seems to be considered among the most righteous men of the OT by God Himself.
Of course I know why there are not many people named Job out there, since the name is synonymous with suffering. It's just interesting that God seems to think of Job as synonymous with righteousness. It would seem the two often go hand in hand.

The Worst it Ever Gets

Today in my prayer class we talked briefly about Luke 9:23-25:

"If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. (v. 23)"

Jesus does not hold back on the requirements of coming after him: we must deny ourselves and take up our crosses and follow him. None of these are easy. The cross is an instrument of execution. There is nothing easy about this statement. Living it out will lead to hardships in this life (even loss of life) that could be avoided if we just ignored Christ's words. But if we ignore His words then we ignore what comes next:

"For whoever would save his life will lose it but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. (v. 24)"

If lived out Biblically, the Christian life will be hard and perilous, but this life is the worst it gets for the Christian. For if we lose our life for Christ's sake we will gain so much more. For the non-Christian, this life is the best they will ever experience. It will never get any better. There is nothing to be envied of the billionaire atheist.

"For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? (v. 25)"

No Wrong Steps

I have no idea how many wrong judgments I made today. Hundreds? Probably more. Definitely not less.
I've read that we speak an average of 16,000 words per day (I'm guessing I probably use a few less). Certainly a few hundred of those I used today were ill chosen or timed. And most of them, if not all of them, could have been strung together better to be more accurate, encouraging, and honoring to God.
Each moment of the day I face decisions on how to use my time. Most of the time, I am not thinking of it that way, but almost every minute of my day I have a choice of how to use that minute. I wonder how much time I waste each day. Wasted seconds add up to wasted minutes add up to wasted hours add up to wasted days...I wonder how many days I have wasted in my life (wasted years?).
This analysis of how much of my life I waste is probably not mostly accumulated in the things I do, but in the things I don't. I guess I am looking at life as a constant barrage of moment by moment choices each one with thousands of options which way to go, and rarely if ever do I choose the most perfect, excellent, wise and right route.
On the other hand, God does. As far as we can discuss the choices of God without getting into heady discussions that are way over my tiny head, it seems that when the Bible speaks of the righteousness of God, this is in part what it refers to. He takes no wrong steps. He always does what is right. Out of the billions of ways things could be, He chooses the best way. Out of the infinite amount of things He could have said, He said the best thing. Out of the boundless times He could act, He acts at precisely the right moment, to the nanosecond and beyond. He makes all the right judgments and never a wrong one.
I hope to continue thinking on this one, but just wanted to record some preliminary thoughts.

"God is a righteous judge and a God who feels indignation every day."

-Psalm 7:11