Talk of JESUS . com

Tag: Scripture

Scripture is the word commonly used for the Written Word of the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible.

TalkofJESUS.com would like to hear from you via your comments and questions on a NEW Series of brief posts in A.D. 2022.

Short Takes on Scripture – Tell us your thoughts about this brief quote from the Bible.

ONLY Scripture

Confidence in Troubled Times – Psalm 94
(from times Before Christ)

You give them relief from troubled times
until a pit is dug to capture the wicked.
Psalm 94:3 New Living Translation

Confidence in troubled times (even Before Christ)

WE THE PEOPLE of every nation have heard it before. ‘NO CONFIDENCE’

Australian Parliament debate in troubled times of COVID
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Today's Short Take on Scripture for ASH WEDNESDAY in the year of our LORD 2022 may help your perception of confidence in these contemporary troubled times.

Our Scriptures from Psalm 94 and another context from history in 2 Chronicles 15 are linked to 5 language translations:
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- English: Authorized (King James) Version
- Псалми Ukrainian Bible
- Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition
- 诗篇 Revised Chinese Union Version (Simplified Script) Shen Edition
- Псалтирь New Russian Translation
The Heavy Hand of Authority
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Click here for Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition (incorrectly linked on link below)
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Psalm 94:

O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth;
O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself..

They break in pieces thy people, O Lord,
and afflict thine heritage.
6 They slay the widow and the stranger,
and murder the fatherless.
Yet they say, The Lord shall not see..

2 Chronicles 15:

Prophesy of Troubled Times:

And the Spirit of God came upon Azariah the son of Oded:

³Now for a long season Israel hath been without the true God, and without a teaching priest, and without law. But when they in their trouble did turn unto the Lord God of Israel, and sought him, he was found of them.

During those dark times, it was not safe to travel. Problems troubled the people of every land. Nation fought against nation, and city against city, for God was troubling them with every kind of problem.
2 Chronicles 15:5-6 New Living Translation

12 And they entered into a covenant to seek the Lord God of their fathers with all their heart and with all their soul; that whosoever would not seek the Lord God of Israel should be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman.

BBC News TODAY: Babyn Yar: Anger as Kyiv’s Holocaust memorial is attacked

Confidence in Christ Jesus

“Teacher, look! What wonderful stones and what wonderful buildings!”

Things to Come from the Good News of Mark:

And Jesus said to him, “Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left upon another, which will not be torn down.”

..

And Jesus began to say to them, “See to it that no one misleads you. Many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am He!’ and they will mislead many.
Mark 13:5b-6 NASB20 [Click for context]

“And the gospel must first be preached to all the nations.
“Watch out, stay alert; for you do not know when the appointed time is…
Mark 13:10 & 13;33 – The word of the Lord Jesus..

What’s your short take on these Scriptures and events of Ash Wednesday,

in the year of our Lord 2022?
March 2, 2022
A Brief Glance at Paradise
Where can I Find Paradise?

We all know the story of Eden as a former place of paradise on earth from where Adam and Eve were evicted by God because of sin. But where can we find paradise in the Bible now that mankind has lost it?

Today’s short take from Scripture will take us on a brief journey we find in the New Testament.

The real question of DEATH is ‘What then?’

We have just witnessed an brief scene of Stephen at the point of his death in Acts 7.

55 But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed steadily into heaven and saw the glory of God, and he saw Jesus standing in the place of honor at God’s right hand.

“Behold, I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.”
Acts 7:56b NASB – a final witness of Stephen before the Sanhedrin

Jesus also gives us several glances at life after death in the Gospel. And we could be taken up into John’s vision of heaven in Revelation.

But today’s Short Take on Paradise comes from Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians.

What is Paradise?

I know a man in Christ, who fourteen years ago— .. was caught up into Paradise and heard inexpressible words, which a man is not permitted to speak.
2 Corinthians 12:2a,4 NASB20

Could this have been at the moment when Jesus met this man on the road from Jerusalem to Damascus? Paul later writes about his own imminent death as if he prefers it!

What does Paul mean by παράδεισος: Paradise?

And what’s your short take on this definition?

παράδεισος :: Strong’s G3857 – paradeisos

Outline of Biblical Usage
1. among the Persians a grand enclosure or preserve, hunting ground, park, shady and well watered, in which wild animals, were kept for the hunt; it was enclosed by walls and furnished with towers for the hunters
2. a garden, pleasure ground
3. grove, park
4. the part of Hades which was thought by the later Jews to be the abode of the souls of pious until the resurrection: but some understand this to be a heavenly paradise
5. the upper regions of the heavens. According to the early church Fathers, the paradise in which our first parents dwelt before the fall still exists, neither on the earth or in the heavens, but above and beyond the world
6. heaven
Let’s Talk of Jesus and our possibility in Paradise

Want to know my opinion from Scripture and experience?

COMMENT or ask your questions on this post.
January 27, 2022
σκληροτράχηλος – a stiff-necked people
I must confess that one of my favorite phrases of conviction today comes from one of several sermons which was not well-received by its audience: Stiff-necked!

“You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you.
Acts 7:51 ESV – from Stephen preaching to the jews

σκληροτράχηλος – stiff-necked

Strong’s G4644 – sklērotrachēlos –

Pronunciation
sklay-rot-rakh’-ay-los

(Has a rather guttural insulting tone to it, don’t you think?)

We might easily dismiss this insulting word from Stephen in the New Testament of Jesus Christ.

But not so fast; for Luke tells us in Acts that Stephen is full of the Holy Spirit.

(If you or I were to say that to someone they might think us full of something other than the Holy Spirit, wouldn’t they?)

To accuse another of being ‘stiff-necked,’ while making our ‘religion‘ an idol, may look like hypocrisy.

Stephen: Witness and Martyr

“This is that Moses who said to the children of Israel,
‘The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear.’
- σκληροτράχηλος, σκληροτράχηλόν (σκληρός and τράχηλος), properly, stiff-necked;
  - tropically, stubborn, headstrong, obstinate:
  - Acts 7:51; the Sept. for עֹרֶף קְשֵׁה, Exodus 33:3, 5; Exodus 34:9; (etc.)
Stephen’s single use of ‘stiffnecked‘ people in the New Testament points to those who CLAIM the Old Covenant of the LAW of Moses.
Roger@TalkofJESUS.COM

Looking back to Moses – Stiff-necked Hebrews

קָשֶׁה

אֶל־אֶרֶץ זָבַת חָלָב וּדְבָשׁ כִּי לֹא אֶעֱלֶה בְּקִרְבְּךָ כִּי עַם־קְשֵׁה־עֹרֶף אַתָּה פֶּן־אֲכֶלְךָ בַּדָּרֶךְ׃
Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey; but I will not go up among you, lest I consume you on the way,
for you are a stiff-necked people.”
Exodus 33:3 WLC, ESV
- Strong’s H7186 – qāšê
  - KJV Translation Count — Total: 36x from the LAW, History and the Prophets
קָשֶׁה adjective hard, severe; — absolute ק׳ Exodus 18:26 +; construct Exodus 32:9 +; feminine singular קָשָׁה Deuteronomy 26:6 +; construct קְשַׁת 1 Samuel 1:15; masculine plural קָשִׁים 2 Samuel 3:39; construct קְשֵׁי Ezekiel 2:4; Ezekiel 3:7; feminine plural קָשׁוֺת Genesis 42:7, 30; —
1. hard, difficult, of a legal question (דָּבָר) Exodus 18:26
Stephen has proposed a legal question to you. Are YOU also a stiff-neck worshiper who will NOT listen to any, even the LORD your God?
Roger@TalkofJESUS.com

Stiff-necked?

Now that I’ve shared MY Short Take on these Scriptures, WHAT’S YOUR SHORT TAKE on them?
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Hammurabi praying - source article from cover photo
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January 25, 2022