Breathing His Name

 

There was a moment when Moses had the nerve to ask God what his name is. God was gracious enough to answer, and the name he gave is recorded in the original Hebrew as YHWH.

 Over time translators arbitrarily added an “a” and an “e” in there to get YaHWeH, first of all because the original pronunciation was lost, and secondly because in English we have a preference for vowels.

 But scholars and Rabis have noted that the letters YHWH represent breathing sounds, or aspirated consonants. When pronounced without intervening vowels, it actually sounds like breathing.

 YH (inhale)… WH (exhale…)

So, a baby’s first cry, his first breath, speaks the name of God.  A deep sigh calls His name – or a groan or gasp that is too heavy for mere words.

Even an atheist would speak His name, unaware that their very breathe is giving constant acknowledgment to God. Likewise, a person leaves this life with their last breath when God’s name is no longer filing their lungs.

So, when I can’t utter anything else, is my cry calling out His name?

Being alive means I speak His name constantly. 

Is it heard the loudest when I’m the quietest?

In sadness, we breathe heavy sighs.

In joy, our lungs feel almost like they will burst.

In fear we hold our breath and have to be told to

breathe slowly to help us calm down.

When we’re about to do something hard, we take a deep breath to find our courage. 

When I think about it, breathing is giving him praise. Even in the hardest moments. 

This is so beautiful and fills me with emotion every time I grasp the thought - God chose to reveal himself through this Name that we can’t help but speak every moment we are alive.

Brave New World vs 1984

 

Two defining books - masterpieces and bestsellers at the time and ever since: Aldous Huxley’s "Brave New World" and George Orwell’s "1984". Are you familiar with these books? They used to be part of the high-school curriculum. Two different lenses portraying the future for them, which is our present, today:

- Orwell feared that books would be banned; Huxley feared that there would be no reason to ban books because no one would want to read them anyway.

- Orwell feared those who want to ban the access to information; Huxley feared those who give us access to so much information that we became passive, bored and tired because of it.

- Orwell feared that the truth would be hidden from us, and Huxley of the fact that the truth would be drowned in an ocean of irrelevance.

- Orwell feared that people would be controlled through the threat of increasing pain (physical and mental); Huxley that people will be controlled by the temptation of a increasing and addictive emotional pleasure (see also Neil Postman's essay "Amusing Ourselves to Death")

Concluding. Orwell feared that what we hate the most would lead us to doom, but Huxley was rightly afraid that what would cripple us as society and individuals is what we love the most.

I realized that we’ve got people around who are looking up seeing the reality through the lenses of either George Orwell or Aldous Huxley. Are you one of them?

Mark 4:9 - “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.”

Different Kinds of Lies = 3

 

1. First kind: “I Swear to tell the truth” – Lies of Commission

If someone tells you something that is not a fact then we call this a lie of commission. This type of lie is telling someone something that is simply not true. You’re twisting the truth to create a (usually more favorable) version of something that happened.

Suppose I knew it was raining outside and you asked me about the weather. “Oh no problem, it’s perfectly sunny outside!” You would now be making a decision to dress for sunny weather based on the wrong information you were given.

2. Second kind: “The whole truth” – Lies of Omission

Another type of lie is one where you leave out an important part of information, hence the name lie of omission. In this lies, someone omits an important detail from a statement. These are nasty lies because they’re harder to spot and take less effort from the person who is lying.

Suppose you are buying a used car. You ask the car salesman about the state of the car you’re currently considering. “Oh, don’t worry about that! This car has had all of its scheduled maintenance done!” He fails to tell you, however, about the bottomless pit became in replacing parts and still not reliable. So yes, the car has had all of the scheduled maintenance done, but to sell the car to you, the salesman leaves out some crucial elements… 

3. Third kind: “And nothing but the truth” – Lies of Character

Sometimes people will tell you something completely unrelated to the truth to cover up a lie. This is what we call a character lie or a lie of influence. These lies are meant to make you believe the liar or to make the liar seem like such a great person that they are unlikely to be suspected of lying.

For example - you work at the local store and a colleague has been taking money from the cash registers. It’s your job to find out who it is. You interview Mary and ask her if she took the money. Her response is, “I’ve worked here for 15 years!” This is a typical character lie. By telling you how long she’s worked at this store, Mary is trying to make it seem highly unlikely that she took the money.

Different kinds of TRUTHS: just one kind - truth period.

But But

 

The word “but” is a coordinating conjunction used to connect ideas that contrast. We differentiate between genuine faith and dissimulated doubt, between winning and losing ground in everyday battles, by how we routinely use this tricky "but."

We tend to think and say:

- "The Lord is my Shepherd, but... I can't pay my bills."

- "The Lord is my Shepherd, but... I am not feeling well."

- "The Lord is my Shepherd, but... I am worried about this/that issue."

Instead, we should think and say:

- “Currently I cannot pay my bills, but the Lord is my Shepherd."

- “Right now I don’t feel well, but the Lord is my Shepherd."

- “I am really worried about this/that issue, but the Lord is my Shepherd."

“You prepare a table before me…

My cup runs over.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me

All the days of my life.”

 

Is He still your Shepherd?