I want at this point to give all of my readers a better idea of who I am. The internet provides unmatched ability to give you a better sense of who I am personally without my having to travel to where you are today. So today I am providing to you a video to watch that sums up where my project on the definition of holy is and where it is going.
Here it is (simply click on the link below):
http://youtu.be/BV0p9aJs_QU
I hope viewing the video gave you a little more personal insight into who I am and that it also communicates where I am in the process of studying the meaning of holy in the Biblical text. My goal from my studies is to be qualified to also teach on the subject from the Biblical text. Remember from what I said in the video that being a knower is not the same as being a teacher or vice versa. It takes both.
If you have insights, questions, or comments; then feel free to respond to this blog entry and my video. It is my humble wish that this entry is an encouragement to all who need it. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Jon
Showing posts with label sense. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sense. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 07, 2012
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Holy: Understanding it Better Through What Definition People are Accustomed to in their Lifetime
It is very important to understand that the mind and the conscience do not work separate from the emotional aspect of who we are as human beings. In 1 Corinthians 8, Paul points out that some are afraid of eating meat sacrificed to idols because of what they are accustomed to rather than to what knowledge he possesses. What people are accustomed to can function as a block to what others know. Part of the difficulty in considering the meaning of holy as being whole is that people are today are largely acquainted only with the definition of set apart. As a result, in their conscience they may feel that they are doing something wrong, if they were to surrender the definition of set apart and instead believe that the definition of whole is correct.
I understand this emotional hesitancy. I grew up with being taught just the definition of set apart and I never heard of the possibility of whole as holy's meaning until approximately the year 2000. It is only through reading a great deal of writing that I have come to realize that my conscience could be misinformed and I can have the courage to test two possible plausible meanings for holy and not just hold onto one. The other issue here is to realize that defining holy as whole does not mean that the idea of set apart goes away. It only shifts in its priority and in its location in the biblical text. It wiil always be in the text through other words in the Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek.
I am writing this to say that we must not overlook the emotional and conscience issues in dealing with the meaning of holy. Our weak conscience can tell us that any other meaning than set apart is impossible and yet it can mislead us like those who could not eat idol meat. So my first recommendation to people before they plunge into this topic, is to take measured steps in looking at the plausibility that holy in the Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek could mean whole.
Don't plunge in and violate your conscience as a guide. Take measured steps from where you've always been before this time and have been accustomed to being. Remember the lessons of 1 Corinthians 8. Don't let another's authority and knowledge lead you to quickly to change your position.
Follow your conscience as well as the evidence. The truth is that the conscience and our emotional side cannot be ignored, even in the pursuit of finding out what we all should know. I pray your desire to know the meaning of holy is one that acknowledges not just he evidence, but also the emotional side of the process of learning to know the truth. Read through the evidence I've uncovered carefully and thoughtfully. I don't want anyone to push to hard against their conscience, but rather to find a place where conscience and evidence meet.
In Christ (the King-appointed),
Pastor Jon.
I understand this emotional hesitancy. I grew up with being taught just the definition of set apart and I never heard of the possibility of whole as holy's meaning until approximately the year 2000. It is only through reading a great deal of writing that I have come to realize that my conscience could be misinformed and I can have the courage to test two possible plausible meanings for holy and not just hold onto one. The other issue here is to realize that defining holy as whole does not mean that the idea of set apart goes away. It only shifts in its priority and in its location in the biblical text. It wiil always be in the text through other words in the Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek.
I am writing this to say that we must not overlook the emotional and conscience issues in dealing with the meaning of holy. Our weak conscience can tell us that any other meaning than set apart is impossible and yet it can mislead us like those who could not eat idol meat. So my first recommendation to people before they plunge into this topic, is to take measured steps in looking at the plausibility that holy in the Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek could mean whole.
Don't plunge in and violate your conscience as a guide. Take measured steps from where you've always been before this time and have been accustomed to being. Remember the lessons of 1 Corinthians 8. Don't let another's authority and knowledge lead you to quickly to change your position.
Follow your conscience as well as the evidence. The truth is that the conscience and our emotional side cannot be ignored, even in the pursuit of finding out what we all should know. I pray your desire to know the meaning of holy is one that acknowledges not just he evidence, but also the emotional side of the process of learning to know the truth. Read through the evidence I've uncovered carefully and thoughtfully. I don't want anyone to push to hard against their conscience, but rather to find a place where conscience and evidence meet.
In Christ (the King-appointed),
Pastor Jon.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Holy Means Whole: According to Common Sense
Common sense is not as common as people wish. I don't mean this as a criticism of people in general. I also don't mean to sound as though it is an unreachable ideal. I rather mean that it is not as common, as most of us would like. If it were more common, I think the idea that holy means whole would also be more common.
I recently was on flights to Atlanta and Orlando. In the airports, I heard a lot of common sense and a lot of people complaining about the lack of it, when it came to airports and airlines. I witnessed its lack again the other day, when discussing rules for a track meet. Even the officials admitted the lack of common sense in rule making. What is happening?
It is intimidating, if people feel that "It is all Greek to me!" It is exhilarating, if people feel, "It is just common sense!" So how does a person find a way out of intimidation, when dealing with the Bible originally being written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek? Does it mean we all are left feeling intimidated by scholars? Or is there a way out?
I know from the Bible that there is a way out. I also learned a very valuable way out, while I was in the auto industry. One of my coaches taught me the way out by distinguishing between features and benefits. This greatly diminished the feeling of being intimidated and the danger of intimidating others.
When we were in training, very often our training focused on features like power windows, ABS brakes, rack'n’ pinion steering, etc. But when we were talking to our customers, we were supposed to focus on the benefits of those features, not on the features themselves. So we were to talk about convenience, the ability to brake and steer at the same time and quick handling on corners, etc. There were exceptions, like when a customer started asking technical questions. Sometimes, my job then switched to finding someone more technically educated, than I was. Yet our rule remained, start with benefits.
A more common sense example would be your first moving vehicle, usually propelled by another family member. It was your little red wagon. Admit it, you rode in one of these long before you owned a red Dodge Power Wagon. You became very aware of a smooth ride, when it was happening. It was definitely a benefit, when a rough ride got too rough. We may even have advanced to understanding that rough sidewalks or a damaged wheel meant a rough ride. Those features usually could be grasped by even a pretty young rider. I'm sure you were brilliant for someone your age.
Going back to our cars, most of us know that when we have a properly inflated tire, which is a feature, that it shows itself by a smoother ride, which is the benefit. As a person working in the auto industry I was living in a world beyond common sense and a world of common sense at the same time. You could say I was a middle man between the uncommon sense world of technical features and the common sense world of real benefits.
So what is the difference between a feature and a benefit? In a few words, it is the common sense difference between parts and the whole. You have the part called a round wheel and then you have the whole of the smooth ride. The experts on language say it in almost the same words; they call it the difference between feature and activity. Watch how this plays out in the common sense world of real benefits and see if the experts are right. In the end, you can then feel a lot less intimidated. Just use your common sense to advantage.
In Luke 10:25-37, life and love are connected to each other. Life is the big thing in the question asked and life is the big thing in the answer given, using common sense. On the city street or at the grassroots of the farm, life and death are everyday things. Most people’s common sense tells them that a person or an animal is dead when activity or life ceases. They get life and death. It is a little harder to get their hands around love, yet love is not absent from life.
Jesus makes it clear that without love, life will not be inherited. Both love and life are actions; the only question is what their roles are. From a common sense point of view, life is the more common sense thing, so it is likely the greater of the two. So life would be the benefit while love would be the feature.
To understand love you actually do have to get a little technical. Sorry. Love is a general word. Love relates to helping change another's tire, like furniture relates to chairs.
Yet love is very important, because it is the umbrella for the features needed for the activity of life. That makes common sense, since life is the main issue in the question and that indicates what is most central. Also without love for one's neighbor, Jesus makes pretty clear that there will be no inheritance of eternal life. So what does this mean for the meaning of holy? How can we use our common sense there? I think we can use it, like we used it for seeing the roles of life and love. The question is which role, whole or part is the role for holy?
We read in our Bibles many times that Yahweh is holy. We also see a difference between love and holy. We don’t read love, love, love; yet we do read “holy, holy, holy” is “Yahweh God Almighty.” Holy is not a feature like love, it is something greater as indicated by its repetition.
Its greatness is indicated by how many times we read that Yahweh is holy, but also by its connection to the name Yahweh. When I was growing up, I knew that nothing in church was more important than the name Jesus. It was common sense. I have known this and it matches with what I know from my grassroots and my street life. Names are important on the street and at the grassroots.
Experts tell it to us this way. They say that there is the integrating object or person and there are the components of that object or person. They are talking here about the whole and its parts.
Using common sense, either Jesus or Yahweh are the name for the integrating person. If you are not familiar with the name Yahweh, Jesus’ name means “Yahweh saves.” There is nothing greater in the Old Testament to integrate everything than the name Yahweh. I grew up knowing that there was nothing greater in the New Testament than that name Jesus.
So what then is the meaning of holy? I think holy is that word that indicates the components that make up the person of Yahweh and Jesus. It tells us the most important thing about the components. It tells us that the person’s components are whole. They lack no component in their personality.
On the city street or at the farm’s grassroots, you have to know that the people you are dealing with are whole. On the street, your survival depends on others being integrated people who are whole and healthy. You don’t want to hang out too long with people who are imbalanced and whose personalities are disintegrated, unless you are skilled to handle their issues. At the grassroots, your survival depends on others being integrated who are whole and healthy. You don’t go hunting with a partner who lacks an important part of his personality, like the scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz, who needs a brain. You need whole persons.
I know in the business world, there were imbalanced personalities, who thought that just working hard is all you need to succeed. These imbalanced people were dangerous to one’s health. That is to say nothing about the fact that they were spewing nonsense.
It is common sense too that Jesus was not a person who saw his primary component as a person, as being separate. Isn’t this just common sense from his story? He didn’t become an Essene or join the community in Qumran. He walked the streets and the country grassroots restoring the wholeness of the broken-hearted.
In the end, I think common sense tells us that separation doesn’t make sense as a meaning for holy. An integrated person is the central object of the Bible. And His person is made up of not just one component, but many. His Name is Yahweh. He is one, He is Father, etc., He is living and He is God. He is also these things in general. He is holy, He is righteous, He is true, He is love and He is good.
So I think this makes it easier for us not to feel so intimidated about the technical parts. If we can first grasp the common sense whole, then we can accomplish a great deal. We do not need to feel so intimidated by the scholar, yet we don’t want to be too scornful either. The parts have their place, like love to life and like round wheels to a smooth ride. Yet common sense seems more comfortable with the whole. Common sense needs to come first, so that it rules rather than nonsense and intimidation. There is a way out.
In Jesus,
Pastor Jon
I recently was on flights to Atlanta and Orlando. In the airports, I heard a lot of common sense and a lot of people complaining about the lack of it, when it came to airports and airlines. I witnessed its lack again the other day, when discussing rules for a track meet. Even the officials admitted the lack of common sense in rule making. What is happening?
It is intimidating, if people feel that "It is all Greek to me!" It is exhilarating, if people feel, "It is just common sense!" So how does a person find a way out of intimidation, when dealing with the Bible originally being written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek? Does it mean we all are left feeling intimidated by scholars? Or is there a way out?
I know from the Bible that there is a way out. I also learned a very valuable way out, while I was in the auto industry. One of my coaches taught me the way out by distinguishing between features and benefits. This greatly diminished the feeling of being intimidated and the danger of intimidating others.
When we were in training, very often our training focused on features like power windows, ABS brakes, rack'n’ pinion steering, etc. But when we were talking to our customers, we were supposed to focus on the benefits of those features, not on the features themselves. So we were to talk about convenience, the ability to brake and steer at the same time and quick handling on corners, etc. There were exceptions, like when a customer started asking technical questions. Sometimes, my job then switched to finding someone more technically educated, than I was. Yet our rule remained, start with benefits.
A more common sense example would be your first moving vehicle, usually propelled by another family member. It was your little red wagon. Admit it, you rode in one of these long before you owned a red Dodge Power Wagon. You became very aware of a smooth ride, when it was happening. It was definitely a benefit, when a rough ride got too rough. We may even have advanced to understanding that rough sidewalks or a damaged wheel meant a rough ride. Those features usually could be grasped by even a pretty young rider. I'm sure you were brilliant for someone your age.
Going back to our cars, most of us know that when we have a properly inflated tire, which is a feature, that it shows itself by a smoother ride, which is the benefit. As a person working in the auto industry I was living in a world beyond common sense and a world of common sense at the same time. You could say I was a middle man between the uncommon sense world of technical features and the common sense world of real benefits.
So what is the difference between a feature and a benefit? In a few words, it is the common sense difference between parts and the whole. You have the part called a round wheel and then you have the whole of the smooth ride. The experts on language say it in almost the same words; they call it the difference between feature and activity. Watch how this plays out in the common sense world of real benefits and see if the experts are right. In the end, you can then feel a lot less intimidated. Just use your common sense to advantage.
In Luke 10:25-37, life and love are connected to each other. Life is the big thing in the question asked and life is the big thing in the answer given, using common sense. On the city street or at the grassroots of the farm, life and death are everyday things. Most people’s common sense tells them that a person or an animal is dead when activity or life ceases. They get life and death. It is a little harder to get their hands around love, yet love is not absent from life.
Jesus makes it clear that without love, life will not be inherited. Both love and life are actions; the only question is what their roles are. From a common sense point of view, life is the more common sense thing, so it is likely the greater of the two. So life would be the benefit while love would be the feature.
To understand love you actually do have to get a little technical. Sorry. Love is a general word. Love relates to helping change another's tire, like furniture relates to chairs.
Yet love is very important, because it is the umbrella for the features needed for the activity of life. That makes common sense, since life is the main issue in the question and that indicates what is most central. Also without love for one's neighbor, Jesus makes pretty clear that there will be no inheritance of eternal life. So what does this mean for the meaning of holy? How can we use our common sense there? I think we can use it, like we used it for seeing the roles of life and love. The question is which role, whole or part is the role for holy?
We read in our Bibles many times that Yahweh is holy. We also see a difference between love and holy. We don’t read love, love, love; yet we do read “holy, holy, holy” is “Yahweh God Almighty.” Holy is not a feature like love, it is something greater as indicated by its repetition.
Its greatness is indicated by how many times we read that Yahweh is holy, but also by its connection to the name Yahweh. When I was growing up, I knew that nothing in church was more important than the name Jesus. It was common sense. I have known this and it matches with what I know from my grassroots and my street life. Names are important on the street and at the grassroots.
Experts tell it to us this way. They say that there is the integrating object or person and there are the components of that object or person. They are talking here about the whole and its parts.
Using common sense, either Jesus or Yahweh are the name for the integrating person. If you are not familiar with the name Yahweh, Jesus’ name means “Yahweh saves.” There is nothing greater in the Old Testament to integrate everything than the name Yahweh. I grew up knowing that there was nothing greater in the New Testament than that name Jesus.
So what then is the meaning of holy? I think holy is that word that indicates the components that make up the person of Yahweh and Jesus. It tells us the most important thing about the components. It tells us that the person’s components are whole. They lack no component in their personality.
On the city street or at the farm’s grassroots, you have to know that the people you are dealing with are whole. On the street, your survival depends on others being integrated people who are whole and healthy. You don’t want to hang out too long with people who are imbalanced and whose personalities are disintegrated, unless you are skilled to handle their issues. At the grassroots, your survival depends on others being integrated who are whole and healthy. You don’t go hunting with a partner who lacks an important part of his personality, like the scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz, who needs a brain. You need whole persons.
I know in the business world, there were imbalanced personalities, who thought that just working hard is all you need to succeed. These imbalanced people were dangerous to one’s health. That is to say nothing about the fact that they were spewing nonsense.
It is common sense too that Jesus was not a person who saw his primary component as a person, as being separate. Isn’t this just common sense from his story? He didn’t become an Essene or join the community in Qumran. He walked the streets and the country grassroots restoring the wholeness of the broken-hearted.
In the end, I think common sense tells us that separation doesn’t make sense as a meaning for holy. An integrated person is the central object of the Bible. And His person is made up of not just one component, but many. His Name is Yahweh. He is one, He is Father, etc., He is living and He is God. He is also these things in general. He is holy, He is righteous, He is true, He is love and He is good.
So I think this makes it easier for us not to feel so intimidated about the technical parts. If we can first grasp the common sense whole, then we can accomplish a great deal. We do not need to feel so intimidated by the scholar, yet we don’t want to be too scornful either. The parts have their place, like love to life and like round wheels to a smooth ride. Yet common sense seems more comfortable with the whole. Common sense needs to come first, so that it rules rather than nonsense and intimidation. There is a way out.
In Jesus,
Pastor Jon
Friday, January 30, 2009
Holy Means Whole:Yahweh is Holy
Psalm 99 has been called the holiness chapter and Leviticus has been called the holiness book. In Psalm 99:9, we read: “Exalt Yahweh our God, And worship at His holy hill: For Yahweh our God is holy.” In Leviticus 20:26, we read in part: “I Yahweh am holy.” If I asked you what is more important, God’s personal name of Yahweh or God’s character of being holy, how would you answer?
Recently, I was taken to task for not keeping the main thing the main thing in a sermon I preached. This criticism was done graciously and I was able to accept it graciously, I am happy to report. Similarly, in seminary we were supposed to write a topic paper for our master’s degree that identified the main unifying theme of Scripture. At that time, I chose the word holy, but I was left dissatisfied with my definition of holy and my placing holy as a character trait next to God Himself. I wanted the main thing to be the main thing then, even as that was my intention when I preached more recently.
In the last 2 months, I learned a great deal about priorities when it comes to categories of parts and wholes. I want to chart this out, using bold letters to indicate what is the main thing or what is more important and more urgent. And I've grouped tightly together and have italicized those parts and wholes that are less important than the first kind of parts and wholes. That same grouping is also those parts and wholes that are to be seen as equal to each other. The chart then looks like this:
Component(s) – Integrated Person (ex. funny, chubby, member of 3 Stooges - Curly)
Portion(s) – Mass (ex. slice - pie)
Member(s) – Collection (ex. players - team)
Feature(s) – Activity (ex. round wheel - smooth ride)
Material(s) – Object (ex. china - vase)
Having seen this chart, I think all will agree that God’s name of Yahweh or God’s name of Yahshua (Jesus) is more important than the components that make up God. Yet Yahweh is by his name an integrated person. And it is no small thing to say that “Yahweh our God is holy.”
Names mean more than just one thing. A name for God says more than that God is god and not man. It says something about even ourselves in a comprehensive way. So I now acknowledge that not only did my sermon not keep the main things the main things, but I did not do it either, when I was in seminary and wrote about holy. In my weak defense, neither did many systematic theologies or sermons that I studied.
Now I realize I must write about holy as a description of the wholeness of Yahweh God’s components as a person, but I must write even more about His name and the name of His son who died on the cross for my sins. The personal things must remain the main things even as they were for me as a young Christian. So I will eventually have to create another blog titled: http://yahwehisholy.blogspot.com/.
An integrated name is more significant than the whole of components. Being whole in components is more significant than each of the components, but a name is what best expresses that integration. If you must choose between a person who is integrated and having the whole of the parts, choose the integrated person who is identified by their personal name.
We use names all the time, so we sometimes take them for granted. But people who study names say that they are positively descriptive. They make sense in terms of the person or nonsense in terms of the person. A name is positively joined to some features and negatively separated from some other features.
For example, to say that Yahweh is God does not tell you everything about Yahweh, but certainly one of the central components of who Yahweh is. Yet the trait of being God and not man does not match the integration of all who Yahweh is as a person. For one He is not just God, He is the One God. God tells us what Yahweh is, but does not fully tell us who God is.
We can be steered off course by placing God’s character of holiness ahead of His personal name. The main thing must remain the main thing.
Yahweh as a name is mentioned nearly 7000 times in the Old Testament (Covenant Writings) alone. Then we need to add to that the number of times that Jesus appears in the New Testament (Covenant Writings), because Jesus’ name in Hebrew is Yahshua (or shortened, Yeshua), which means “Yahweh saves.” Then we need to add to that the number of times that LORD appears in an English translation of the Greek New Testament as a substitute for Yahweh, and we will find His name is very important. I will need to add up the full numbers some day. But frequency often says a lot about importance.
So let’s all keep the main thing the main thing even as we learn about holiness and wholeness. And let’s then also keep holiness ahead of things like justice, truth, love and goodness. Yet like Jesus, Yahshua, once said, “Do the former without neglecting the latter.” So God's name of Yahweh comes before all else, including the trait of holiness, yet it is not His name without His holiness.
In Yahshua (Jesus),
Pastor Jon
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
