Follow peace with all men, and holiness,
without which no man shall see the Lord:
looking diligently lest any man fail of the
grace of God; lest any root of bitterness
springing up trouble you, and thereby
many be defiled; lest there be any
fornicator, or profane person, as Esau,
who for one morsel of meat sold his
birthright. For ye know how that afterward,
when he would have inherited the blessing,
rejected: for he found no place of repentance,
though he sought it carefully with tears.
Hebrews 12:14-17
Before I begin I want to apologize for no blog yesterday for I had a relapse and spent the day wrapped in a blanket trying to sleep. I feel better today. I will also be in the VA Hospital Palo Alto on Monday so no blog. They will remove the sutures and make a plan for the next date for surgery to continue the reconstruction. Pray to God that I will always present Jesus Christ in every situation and that the Gospel will be seen in me, not for my benefit, but for theirs, for the God who saves. Thank you for your prayers!
As I study the word of God I realize that there is much that I will never get to speak of and write about. God has revealed to us Himself and how we are to live in accordance to His will. There are those who hate to be reminded of the Greek or Hebrew and desire to live in some form of ignorance. Yet, if we do not know what the Bible writers wrote, how they wrote, we cannot know their purpose for writing. Just as in our English, our native tongue, we know of our grammar, and our idioms so that we can understand what is being written or spoken. The Greek speaking persons understood the grammatical form of the words written or spoken, so we too must understand those words. For instance our English word in verse 14 "pursue" is a verb that has not time stamp to it; it just says to do it, but does not really tell us that we should do it. The Greek word: "διώκετε" is second person, plural, present imperative, active. This Greek word means to put into rapid motion, to pursue, to follow, to follow eagerly, earnestly to acquire. That this word is imperative in the present tense, active means to stop what you are doing and do this: in this case to purse, rapidly, endeavor. What are we to pursue? Peace! This peace is to be pursue to all peoples and to be done with holiness, (sanctification is the better translation of the Greek). Now comes the harsh words of God? "Without which no man shall see the Lord" (verse 14). Wait a minute!! You mean that unless I am pursuing peace, sanctification, I will not see the Lord? Yes! If you are seeking peace, sanctification, you will then be diligently looking towards God and you will not be apt to fall from His grace. If you are doing this pursing, then bitterness, fornication, causing trouble you much trouble. Greater yet, others will see your faith in action and turn from their defiled life. Do you think that God is serious about our hearts, our intentions? Do you think that God will repent from His condemnation for sin? If so, you are wrong. Esau who had the birthright sold it for a bowl of soup. Esau wanted to have what he wanted to satisfy his hunger at any cost. This is lust, wanting what you want: NOW! How did this work out for him? Not so good! He could not be any means retrieve that which he gave away so freely.
What are you willing to give away so that you can have your way, to have what you want, to not be told that what you are doing is wrong? We so often give away God's call to save us, and often until a serious chastizement comes you will not relent and repent and turn again and pursue peace, to pursue sanctification, to be diligent in our service to our God, our Lord, our Savior. Don't wait for God's chastizing! This is imperative in the present tense, active: stop doing what you are doing and begin, now, to follow the commands of God.
But the LORD said unto Samuel,
Look not on his countenace,
or on the height of his statue;
because I have refused him:
for the LORD seeth not as man seeth;
for man looketh on the outward
appearance, but the LORD looketh
on the heart.
1Samuel 16:7
Pursue Peace, Sanctification
Richard L. Crumb
No comments:
Post a Comment