Recently, I've found myself enamored with the not so casual concept of God's holiness. I'll let that notion sink in for a moment...................Ready? Ok. I have found myself reading books and coming across countless scriptures that elevate the "otherness" of God. I don't know how God works in your life, but for some reason He likes to take a concept/attribute/characteristic of Himself and decides to poor it over me for a season. Don't get me wrong, I love it and appreciate the fact that God is doing things so that I will learn more about Him, but its been somewhat of a sensory overload. Its not just the fact that He's holy (like no other/separate), but its the full extent of that implication.
God is so holy, that the OT writers would use LORD (all caps) as the name of God (Jahweh) and use Lord (adonai; Sovereign One) as a title for God. For example, George Bush is the name of our current president, but President is George Bushes title.
The terms in the Bible for God were used the same way. Have you ever noticed that in Psalms chapter 8 and verse 1 it reads: "O LORD our Lord,"? The actual translation would be "OH GOD OUR SOVEREIGN ONE." The very name of God is holy in and of itself. It is so holy that they Jews wouldn't even say His name. This has been called the Tetragrammaton (the unspeakable four letters). This all applies to the name of God, much less the actual person of God. God Himself is the epitome of Holiness. He can be likened to no one or no thing in all of creation and yet He's knowable. He shares communicable attributes with humanity rendering them made in His image. So, here's the question: Where does God fall on our reverence scale? Does His holy being dictate the journey of your life? Its just some food for thought...
3 comments:
OBCYOUTHGROUPER IS HERE IN THE BLOGISPHERE!
Come on Alan! Write more on ur blog! You haven't posted anything since before Christmas! I liked reading ur blog!
Alan, I know you probably did not mean to say that the OT writers used LORD. Surely you meant that the English Translations usually use LORD instead of Yahweh. In the Hebrew the OT writers always used YHWH.
Your pal,
Terry
Actually, the OT does us the term Lord. That is what Psalm 8:1 is saying. In the Hebrew, the first LORD (all caps) is YHWH and the second Lord is adoni, which means lord (ruler, governer).
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