Life Gets Crazy Sometimes...

 Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi

Another random pic from the month's photos...coming into town from the south a couple of weeks ago, heading down Brindley Mountain towards the Tennessee River bridge.  Haze courtesy of Canadian wildfires.  Yup, all the way in Alabama...  a great parallel thought for the craziness.

Not going into details (includes 2 weddings, at least a couple of trips out of state, two conferences), but the next three months are going to be nutso.  So posting will be erratic.

As you may already have noted, lol.

Anyway, I am going to post the weekly study when I get to it.  Might be Friday, might be Tuesday, might happen twice in a week to make up for skipping the previous week.  I dunno from here.  They will show up when they show up, lol.  I don't want to put it hiatus until November, so I'll just hit it when I can.

It's all good.  It's just...crazy.

Deep breaths.

Blogging Bible Study: Heart of the Matter - Leviticus Part 1

 Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi

I have four references total between the two books, Leviticus and Numbers, so I thought I'd just stretch one post to cover them. Then I went way into the weeds on the first reference in Leviticus.  It's worth a post by itself.  So much for covering two books in one post... 

The first reference is Lev. 19:17, one verse in a long list of 'do nots':

"Do not hate your brother in your heart.  Rebuke your neighbor frankly so you will not share in his guilt."

The NIV 84 lists those two thoughts in the same paragraph, which kind of makes me think they are supposed to be connected.  And those are two interesting directives to be connected.

First, the concept of 'hating in one's heart'...That's a tough one.  How many of us have folks that we can be civil towards, even treat kindly, but if you get down to it...our personal opinion of them is not good.  Whether we want to admit it or not...it's hatred.  Doesn't show, we would never express it, but, nonetheless, when some misfortune falls on someone that occupies that dark place...somehow it feels justified.  If you read on down, the very next verse has the 'instead'. Instead of hating in your heart...love your neighbor as yourself (yeah, that's where that comes from). 

But how is that connected w/ 'Rebuke your neighbor frankly'?  Clearly, this verse implies that the neighbor is engaged in wrongdoing.  Or maybe not engaged in rightdoing? 

I pulled up Blue Letter Bible to check the original language and...oy, this one is a puzzler.  The Hebrew word translated 'rebuke' is yakah (Strong's H 3198) : reprove, rebuke, correct, plead, reason, judge, convince, argue.  It is a primitive root, and I fear my feeble attempts to squeeze deep meanings out of this are going to go astray.  Instead, let's consider some other English translations of this phrase and see what true scholars made of it:

KJV: "Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbor, and not suffer sin upon him."

ESV: "You shall not hate your bother in your heart, but you shall reason frankly with your neighbor, lest you incur sin because of him."

NASB 77: "You shall not hate your fellow countrymen in your heart; you may surely reprove your neighbor, but do not incur sin against him."

And finally, I went looking for and found a Bible translation done from a Jewish viewpoint on Bible Study Tools Dot Com (which has annoying pop up ads, but I found what I was looking for)... the Complete Jewish Bible:

CJB: "Do not hate your brother in your heart, but rebuke your neighbor frankly, so that you won't carry sin because of him."

Notice that in several of those translations there isn't even a full break between those thoughts; they are the same (compound) sentence.  So there  is definitely a connection there.  Pulling them all together, it seems that one is not to carry hatred or resentment against someone, but to go to that person and honestly share why one is offended.

We are not to carry secret offenses or opinions but to speak honestly with one another and if there is something that needs reconciling, we are to be honest and speak about it.

Easier said than done, I fear.  We all hate confrontation.  But if an offense can fester into resentment can blow up into hatred, so much better to have the uncomfortable conversation and resolve it.  Most of the time it's all a misunderstanding anyway.

But what if the attempted discussion/ reconciliation goes awry?  The other party is determined to remain at odds?

Do not hate in your heart.  Forgive anyway...and that individual then will not cause you to be in sin if your heart is clear of offense/ resentment/ hate. 

Yeah, this one needs a selah.  

A Little Exercise in Creativity...

 posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi

We are having once-a-month ladies' leadership meetings to prepare for the 2023 Women's conference; we are going through the book It's Not Supposed to Be This Way by Lysa Terkeurst, and in chapter 5, Lysa writes about her mother taking her to painting events to do some therapeutic painting on a canvas.

Lysa protests that she is not a painter, but no matter to her mom.  They took the painting classes.

So tonight in our meeting, canvases and paint were distributed and...we painted.

I will honestly say that my best artistic medium is not visual arts, lol.  And we only had about 40 minutes to paint, after the devo.

That ain't much time...specially if you want to layer paint.  Can't wait for it to completely dry between layers.

Most of the ladies painted flowers or trees or butterflies or sea/landscapes.

I am not most ladies, lol.

I can point out about 20 different things in that which could have been done better.  But I felt like I expressed the thought I had and that, my friends, is what it's about.  Not perfection. As a non-painter, I am kinda surprised it turned out at all.

Eight years ago I wrote a song taken from Ezekiel 37...which periodically gets stuck in my head.  It's kinda been there for a bit now.  Probably why that painting came to be.

Oh- Oh- Oh

Can these dry bones live? Can these dry bones live?

It's such a dismal sight; bones all bleached and white

But the question comes to light...can they live?

Lord you know, Lord you know, Lord you know....

We prophesy to the dry bones, we prophesy to the dry bones, 

We prophesy, we prophesy - 'Live!  In Jesus' Name!

Live! In Jesus' Name!  Live! In Jesus' Name!'

Oh - Oh- Oh

Can these dead dreams breathe?  Can these dead dreams breathe?

The spark has long gone cold, they're all stale and old

We have not been told - can they breathe?

Lord you know, Lord you know, Lord you know...

We prophesy to the dead dreams, We prophesy to the dead dreams, 

We prophesy, we prophecy - 'Breathe! In Jesus' Name!

Breathe!  In Jesus' Name!  Breathe! In Jesus' Name!"

Oh - Oh- Oh

Can this mute hope sing?  Can this mute hope sing?

Its voice has long been gone, shutters closed and drawn,

Forgotten every song -- can it sing?

Lord you know, Lord you know, Lord, you know....

We prophesy to the mute hope, We prophesy to the mute hope

We prophesy, We prophesy - 'Sing!  In Jesus' Name!

Sing! In Jesus' Name!  Sing! In Jesus' Name!

Oh- Oh- Oh

We will live, we will breathe, we will hope in you, 

With your life, your breath, your song!

We will live we will breathe we will hope in you, 

With your life,  your breath, your song!

Oh- Oh-Oh

 

Blogging Bible Study: The Heart of the Matter - Exodus part 2

 Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi

Covering the rest of the 'heart' references in Exodus today.  It has been a bit interesting to discover that the word 'heart' is not consistent across translations.  My Exhaustive Concordance is based on the 1984 edition of the New International Version, and it lists the very first mention of  'heart' in Exodus in the NIV 84 as Ex. 4:14:

Then the LORD's anger burned against Moses and he said, "What about your brother, Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well.  He is already on his way to meet you and his heart will be glad when he sees you."

But when I looked this up in Blue Letter Bible, I found that the 2011 update to the NIV, which is what is used on that site, phrases that last sentence as "He is already on his way to meet you, and he will be glad to see you." 

Doesn't even mention 'heart'. 

But according to the interlinear translation the sentence actually is "And moreover behold he is coming out to meet you; when he sees you, he will be glad in his heart". 

The Hebrew word used for heart, Leb (Strong's H3820, 'inner man, mind, will, heart, understanding') is actually in the structure of the sentence.

I suppose this is the simplification of the language; the translators likely considered the phrase 'in his heart' to be redundant.  Of course, if someone is glad, they are glad in heart...right?  

Well, maybe.  Part of the reason I'm not a huge fan of the 2011 edition.

Let's say it is redundant...that just serves to emphasize it.  By removing the redundancy, the impact of the emotion is reduced.  Aaron isn't just glad to see his brother, he is glad all the way to his core.  Given the likely circumstances under which Aaron and Moses last saw each other, I kinda think this represents a shift in Aaron's perspective.  I mean, it's been 40 years...and suddenly he decides to go find Moses?  How did he even know where to look?  He HAD to have had a prompting from God to do so.

The help Moses needed was already on its way.  With gladness of heart.

The next mention of 'heart' in Exodus, aside from all the heart-hardening references, is in 25:2 -  again, this is Leb:

"Tell the Israelites to bring me an offering. You are to receive the offering for me from each man whose heart prompts him to give."

This was the instruction to collect the materials needed to construct the tabernacle and its furnishings.  Notice...this was not done by a taxation but by a free offering.  That thought is repeated in the last reference to heart in Exodus, 35:21, in which the people actually bring the offerings:

and everyone who was willing and whose heart moved him came forward and brought an offering to the LORD for the work on the Tent of Meeting, for all its service, and for the sacred garments.

Once more, this was not a tax, but a freewill offering that was brought by men and women for the construction, furnishing, and use of the Tabernacle.  The people were moved in their hearts to give of their possessions and their skills to make the place of corporate worship and communion with God.  I wonder how they all felt when the process was finished and they saw the whole thing assembled....

There is one other reference to 'heart' in Exodus:

"Whenever Aaron enters the Holy Place, he will bear the names of the sons of Israel over his heart on the breastplate of decision as a continuing memorial before the Lord.  Also put the Urim and Thummin in the breastpiece, so they may be over Aaron's heart whenever he enters the presence of the LORD.  Thus Aaron will always bear the means of making decisions for the Israelites over his heart before the LORD."  - Ex. 28:29-30

I thought this might be a different Hebrew word, since it so clearly references the actual physical, blood-pumping heart, but it is still H 3820...Leb

So if there was any doubt, these verses clearly link the seat of emotion and decision with the location of the physical heart, as the same word is used for all of those applications.

Kind of a nerdy aside...Leb is NOT the most elemental form of the word.  I'm kind of waiting to see when we get to a verse that uses the actual primitive root word from which Leb  is derived.

Blogging Bible Study: The Heart of the Matter - Exodus Part 1, The Hardened Heart

 Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi

One of the principles of biblical interpretation is to consider the first usage of a phrase, word or concept, so I'm going to look carefully at the 'hardened heart', which we encounter for the first time in Exodus.  It's not exactly the first use of the word 'heart' that we encounter in Exodus (depending on the translation, lol), but it is far and away the most frequent so that is where we are starting; we'll cover the other uses of the word 'heart' next week.

Buckle up, we have a lot of verses to check out today; they all appear in Exodus 4 - 14.

The word for heart in all of these verses is leb (Strong's H 3820), and most commonly means 'inner man, mind, will, heart, understanding' (Blue Letter Bible) 

However, there are several different Hebrew words translated as some form of the verb 'harden'/ adjective 'hard'.  I'm not going to go that far into the weeds here; anyone who's really interested can dig into it. They all pretty much have the same implication...to be or to make dull, unresponsive,  severe, difficult, stiff, stubborn, hard, obstinate.

There are four different types of references to Pharaoh's heart- heartedness.  The first we encounter is a prophetic declaration that God will harden Pharaoh's heart at some point in the future, in order to maximize the impact of what he was going to do to free the captives (all references today from the NIV 84):

The LORD said to Moses, "When you return to Egypt, see that you perform all the wonders I have given you the power to do.  But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go." - Ex. 4:21

"You are to say everything I command you, and your brother Aaron is to tell Pharaoh to let the Israelites go out of his country.  But I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and though I multiply my miraculous signs and wonders in Egypt, he will not listen to you.  Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and with mighty acts of judgment I will bring out my divisions, my people the Israelites.  And the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring the Israelites out of it."  - Ex. 7:2-5

"Pharoah will think , 'The Israelites are wandering around the land in confusion, hemmed in by the desert.' And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and he will pursue them.  But I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD."  So the Israelites [camped according to God's instructions]. --  Ex. 14:3-4

"Raise your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground. I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them.  And I will gain glory through Pharaoh, his chariots and his horsemen." -- Ex. 14:16-17 (not just Pharoah here but the whole pursuing army).

This has always been a problematic concept...that God would deliberately manipulate a person's mind/ will/ emotions so that they were not able to respond to the truth.  It seemed a violation of the concept of free will.  

But at this point this is prophecy.  God is describing what will happen in the future, not what he was doing at that moment.  The second application of the hard heart is actually a description of the state of Pharaoh's heart. IE, the way he was pretty much before anything happened.  And this is set up in Ex. 5:2, when Moses and Aaron first appear before Pharaoh with the request to go a three days' journey into the desert to hold a festival and worship God.

Pharaoh said, "Who is the LORD, that I should obey him and let Israel go?  I do not know the LORD and I will not let Israel go....Why are you taking the people away from their labor? Get back to your work!"  

Pharaoh starts the narrative with that attitude...an unyielding, unresponsive, rather self-centered heart. God had not done anything yet.  This was why the Israelites had been crying out for relief.  And of course, Pharaoh promptly made their lives more miserable because of their audacity to ask for a break from their labor in order to worship God (see what is recorded in the rest of chapter 5).  

Pharaoh's heart was inclined to be hard.  "Who is the LORD, that I should obey him?' he demanded.  Well, he was fixin' to find out...

After Aaron's snake/staff devoured the snakes of the magicians:  Yet Pharaoh's heart became hard and he would not listen to them, just as the LORD had said.  Then the LORD said to Moses, 'Pharaoh's heart is unyielding, he refuses to let the people go." -- Ex. 7:13-14.

When the first plague hit:  But the Egyptian magicians did the same things by their secret arts, and Pharaoh's heart became hard; he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said.  Instead, he turned and went into his palace, and did not take even this to heart. -- Ex. 7:22-23

After the third plague: The magicians said to Pharaoh, "This is the finger of God."  But Pharaoh's heart was hard and he would not listen, just as the LORD had said. -- Ex. 8:19

After the fifth plague: Pharaoh sent men to investigate and found that not even one of the animals of the Israelites had died.  Yet his heart was unyielding and he would not let the people go. -- Ex. 9:7

But, not only was Pharaoh's heart inclined to be hard, we also find that he himself hardened his heart even above what it normally was.  Of his own choice and agency.

After the 2nd plague: But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said. -- Ex. 8:15

After the fourth plague: But this time also Pharaoh hardened his heart and would not let the people go. -- Ex. 8:32

After the seventh plague: When Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail and thunder had stopped, he sinned again:  He and his officials hardened their hearts.  So Pharaoh's heart was hard, and he would not let the Israelites go, just as the LORD had said through Moses. - Ex. 9 34-35

Whoa.  Application is begging for attention; we'll get there in a minute.

The last set of references show the actual fulfillment of the prophecy...when God hardens Pharaoh's heart.

That is not mentioned as happening until after the sixth plague:

But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart and he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said to Moses. -- Ex. 9:12

After the 7th plague was ended - But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let the Israelites go.- Ex. 10:20

After the 9th Plague, and Moses had rejected Pharaoh's offer of a compromise...that the people could go but they had to leave all their livestock behind:  But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he was not willing to let them go. -- Ex. 10:27

In the last two verses of chapter 11, we see a summary of the outcome of all the plagues to that point, with the conclusion:

Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharoah, but the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart and he would not let them go out of his country. -- Ex. 11:10

And, in the final pursuit of the Israelites, the one that pushed them across the Red Sea and out of range of any further retaliation:

The LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, so that he pursued the Israelites, who were marching out boldly. -- Ex. 14:8

So...what can we tentatively learn (subject to further investigation in later chapters, of course) about a hard/ unyielding heart here?

1) God knows a hard heart.  He knows how someone with a hard heart with think and react.

2) God allows someone who has a hard heart... to keep it.

3) God can use a hard heart, but it is a tool.  Not a personal relationship.  And the purpose is generally not what the person with the hard heart would, um, appreciate.  Once the heart has been hardened...God can and does harden it further for his purpose.  Pharaoh had a hard heart to start with, and he hardened it yet more before we read that God further hardened his heart.  Pharaoh had already made that choice, which leads to 

4) Hardening one's heart is clearly identified as a sin (Ex. 9:34).  Just today I saw a post on social media with a little description of the difference between doubt and unbelief.  Unbelief was described as a refusal to believe even when given evidence.  That's a choice, and the 'refusing to believe' part is...hardening one's heart.  That is clearly evident here; Pharaoh refused to listen to Moses and Aaron, even when it meant his own people were suffering.

Can a  truly hard heart be softened?  That's something I am going to be watching for as we continue this journey.  There are stories of folks who were skeptical unbelievers who came to Christ, but I think these folks all had a place in their hearts that was never calcified, that pursued truth even when all their actions seemed to indicate it was rejected (Think of the Apostle Paul for instance).  I think, so long as that tender place remains, there is hope it can grow.  But for someone who has utterly and completely rejected God and his truth...there really isn't a place for hope to take root.  The path in the parable of the soils, if you will.

But you and I can't really see if a heart is HARD or just MOSTLY HARD.  Because...if it's just MOSTLY HARD...then God sees and knows and will never override that bit that truly seeks him.  

Celebration

Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi 

When the inlaws celebrate their 75th wedding anniversary,  we all go home to celebrate.

No big party or even a choir special at church this time.  Just all the kids and as many of the extended family as could make it.

Reading the congratulatory cards

But we did a few other things whilst we were in the area.

Walked around the botanical gardens...

Hung out at St. Joseph, Michigan, and the beach on the shore of Lake Michigan

Hiked around Shades State Park 

And even caught some pretty sunsets.

The trip went by REALLY FAST.  

Don't they always?