BibleProject - The Loyal Love of God – Character of God E12

Episode Date: November 2, 2020

Despite generations of rebellion and sin, God continues to pursue his people with his promise-keeping loyalty and generosity. In this episode, Tim, Jon, and Carissa explore the fourth attribute God assigns himself in Exodus 34:6-7, loyal love.View full show notes from this episode →Timestamps Part one (0:00–16:10)Part two (16:10–25:30)Part three (25:30–41:00)Part four (41:00–50:30)Part five (50:30–59:00)Part six (59:00–end)Show Music “Defender Instrumental” by Tents“Serendipity” by Philanthrope, feat The Field Tapes“Everything Fades to Blue” by Sleepy FishShow produced by Dan Gummel. Show notes by Lindsey Ponder. Powered and distributed by Simplecast.

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it in. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

Hey, this is John a Bible project. If you've ever been in a situation where you're looking for a word, describe, and idea, but you can't find the right word. In those situations, we oftentimes just go to another language. Like the feeling that this exact moment has happened before, French has a great word, deja vu, or that pleasure that's derived from another person's misfortune,

German has a great word for that, shot and fluid. Languages are like this. Some languages have better ways of expressing very particular ideas. German has a great word for that. Shodden for it. Languages are like this. Some languages have better ways of expressing very particular ideas. Now there's a word in Hebrew that is notoriously difficult to translate into English for this reason. It's an idea that combines being generous, with being loyal, and it wraps it all up in the emotion of deep affection for another.

This is the Hebrew word, Hesid. There's no word in any language that quite does all of the things that Hesid is doing. And so it's a challenge to render Hesid into any language. It's a covenant partner. You're motivated by love and affection. You do concrete acts. And as you do so, you are fulfilling a promise that you made. That's chessed.

Now chessed is a big deal in the Bible, because it's the fourth characteristic that God gives to Himself in Exodus 34. But if there's no word in English that translates chessed well, what do we do with it? So this word has been translated a lot of different ways. The earliest English translation of Wichlif, John Wichlif and William Tindale used the English word mercy, and whatever mercy meant to them. King James, followed in our own time by the new American standard, has gone with two words, either mercy, sometimes they translate a mercy, or more often with a compound word, loving kindness.

NIV simply translates it as love. ESV goes a little further and they call it steadfast love. When you notice these kinds of differences between translations, that's usually a flag, like, hey, there's something interesting here. There's an opportunity to learn because what these translation differences show is people are struggling to find an easy one-for-one correspondence between our language and concepts and the language and concepts of the Bible. So coming up today on the show, what does it mean that God is full of Here we go. We're walking through five characteristics of God found in Exodus 34, verse 6. And we are, this has been a long series.

It's been really great. We just got out of a whole conversation on anger. Yep. A long conversation. A long conversation. Yep. A long conversation. It was great. Yeah.

We're going to move into the fourth attribute that got assigned to himself, which is translated different ways. Yeah. We'll explore that. It's given many different English translations. But I've heard you say loyal love over and over. Yes. So it's loyal love.

We're going to talk about loyal love. And I have with me, you have with you as you're listening along Tim hey Tim Hello, hello, and Chris says here and let's get started So loyal love is The English translation I've come to favor but strong arguments can be made for other come to favor, but strong arguments can be made for other translations. And we'll look at how some smart people throughout history have translated this word. The Hebrew word is chassad. You got to clear your throat. Chassad.

Okay, is it chassad or chassad? Chassad. Yeah, the emphasis is on the first syllable. Correct. Yeah, that's right. And then the, what's the first syllable correct yeah that's right and then the that what's the Hebrew word there the letter is or letter me called the letter is right right right I decided I'm gonna learn the Hebrew yeah yeah yeah or head or head or head yeah so often transliterated with the letter ch like in the last name Johan Spachin Bach. But what I find is when you spell CH for most English speakers they say CH. And so I've come to transliterate this KH. Yeah that

makes sense. Yeah I think that's good. So if you've been pronouncing this as Chessid for a long time, you can now change to Chessed. Chessed, not chessed. Chessed. This is a really interesting word. I had a lot of fun studying this word in the Hebrew Bible. It occurs 245 times. Now the Hebrew Bible is a pretty big collection of texts, but that's a lot. That's a lot. I'm not going to take your word for it. Yeah. So here's just some interesting things about this word. It appears most often in the Psalms. 127 times in the book of Psalms. And then 46 times in the big narrative stretching from Genesis to the second Kings and

Then it starts getting smaller 26 times the prophets 13 times in the wisdom books You know as we've been going through these traits it almost seems like They have occurred most often in the Psalms and gracious and compassionate. I think fate pulls the same too Yeah, it just occurs a lot in the Psalms. Yep. Yeah, that's a good observation. The spirituality of the Psalms has been deeply shaped by Exist 346. How the poets relate and talk about God is. Yeah. Yeah, and the characteristics they rely on. Yep. About God. Though I don't know about slow to anger, if that was more prevalent in the Psalms.

Yeah, interesting. If I did search that, I don't remember off the top of my head. This is a very productive word. What's interesting is that in 75% of those 245 uses of the word, 75% of them are about God. So God's chesapeake is a major, major feature of the Old Testament's portrait of God. So God's chesa is a major, major feature of the Old Testament's portrait of God. But then also there is one out of four occurrences that talk about humans doing this and showing this. And so it's a really great opportunity to see how humans are in image of God. The humans showing showing acid gives us a window into how God chose acid. So this word has been translated a lot of different ways. The earliest English translations of Wycliffe, John Wycliffe and William Tyndale use the English word mercy and whatever mercy meant to them.

That's a surprising translation to me because I don't usually connect mercy and love in a one-to-one correlation. Like maybe a loving person is also merciful but it's an interesting translation. Where they were taking their inspiration from most likely is from the Greek translation of the Septuagin which used the Greek word word, Ella-os, which is mercy or kindness. And so I think that's where they're coming from. Is that because there's not a good Greek term for chesed? Yes, actually there's no word in any language that quite does all of the things that chesed is doing. And so it's a challenge to render Chesa into any language.

And so actually the translation of this word throughout the history of English Bibles is instructive then. So the earliest English Bibles, Tintel and Wichlifco with Mercy, the King James, followed in our own time by the new American standard has gone with two words, either mercy,

sometimes it translate to mercy, or more often with a compound word, loving kindness. Loving kindness. Loving kindness. Loving kindness. No space. That is a very Bible word. It is.

Like I learned that word as a kid, because of the Bible. Because of the Bible, let me count one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen letters six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 letters. It's a good germative. Totally. That is just put two words together and call it good. So many letters.

Though it is descriptive. Yes. Okay. Of the type of love, maybe. Yes. So yeah, kindness, you can show acts of kindness, but not necessarily associated with the deep kind of pathos. Of a love. Yeah.

So acts of kindness combined and motivated by love. Actually, this is not a bad translation. It's a pretty good one. Yeah. But notice they had to merge two words. Yeah. To make it work. Now, when you say sometimes they did mercy, wouldn't King James have just one translation?

Mm-hmm. say sometimes they did mercy, wouldn't King James have just one translation? No, for stylistic purposes, they might discern in a particular context. Oh, I see, depending on the context. Depending on the context of that word. Yeah, but in Xs is 34, they're going to have one. Loving kindness. Yeah, that's right. But other times that it shows up, they sometimes seem mercy. Correct. Yeah, this is right. Yep. But other times that it shows up, they sometimes seem or seem.

Correct. Yeah. 20th century, the new Revised Standard, the English standard versions, they use the phrase, two words, steadfast love. Mm-hmm. And they decided to keep those two words separate. That's not great.

Yeah, it's not great to do it. That's right. So not all spelled is one word. So two words. But steadfast is also not that common of a word. So two words. But steadfast is also not that common. I have a word. That's true. Or is it, is that a really kind of Christian-y's word type?

I've probably never used that word in any sort of normal situation. Yeah, steadfast love. So what that translation brings out is both this act of pathos. It leaves out the kindness that you get with, or mercy, that you get with those other translations, but it introduces a new concept,

which is enduring, reliable through time, consistent, steadfast. And that's good, that's a part of what's going on here. That is a part of chessed, is it's enduring commitment. And then just last, the new international version sometimes just uses the English word love or sometimes translates it with the phrase unfailing love. Just kind of like steadfast. Yeah, yeah, that's right, like steadfast love.

So, you know, anytime this kind of a little axiom or a rule of thumb that we've learned to develop, when you... This is why it's helpful to read with multiple English translations of the Bible throughout time. When you notice these kinds of differences between translations, that's usually a flag like, hey, there's something interesting here. There's an opportunity to learn because what these translation differences show is people are struggling to find an easy one-for-one correspondence between our language and concepts

and the language and concepts of the Bible. Yeah, it's an interesting word because it is describing this quality of love that goes beyond maybe the way, or I guess I'm curious how this word has said compares with how we usually understand love in general or maybe even how we understand other kinds of love in the Bible like a gope or or how it compares to faithfulness or compassion those kinds of ideas. Yeah, yeah. So actually in our in the Bible project video library, we have two word studies on love already. One on the Hebrew word

and then one on Greek word. Ah hava and Hebrew and aqape. So this will be the third. So this will be the third word. Kind of. Second Hebrew word. Second Hebrew word. But it's loyal love.

Yep. What was the other Hebrew word? Ah hava. Ah hava. Ah hava, yep. And that's, give me the quick. Yeah, ah hava is affection. Affection.

The emotional attachment and affection. Agape is about actions to seek another person's well-being, they're motivated by a desire and affection for them. And the subtygent is Ahva usually translated as a agape? Hmm, I don't remember that. That's the top one. OK. So what sets Chesid apart?

The word Chesid, if you study all of these occurrences, we'll look at a whole bunch. It's the kind of love that someone demonstrates when they're keeping a promise and when a desire to be loyal to their promise motivates them to go above and beyond and be super generous more than what you would expect. That's chessed. Yeah, so it differs from those other words in that it's inside of this commitment or perceived as commitment, even if it's not an explicit commitment. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah, it's almost always in the context of enduring relationship either a family or a covenant connection and it's about Yeah, it's it's one among a whole history of acts to maintain a relationship through acts of generosity and kind and it's still an emotional or emotive

Word well, you know, it's it's focus more on behavior and action. It's combining generosity, commitment, and affection, all in one. It's interesting. The shorthand illustration that I came to use when this word would come up when I was in pastoral ministry and preaching is like an elderly man whose you know husband and wife they've been married 57 years his wife gets really sick and she can't care her for herself anymore And so he dedicates himself to full-time care like wheelchair feeding bathing Chess it so it's concrete if you just sat on the couch and it's like I love you But then doesn't help her that's not Cessed

But if he was just a nurse getting paid to do it. Yes, no affection It's just the obligation. No, it's of Covenant partner you're motivated by love and affection You do concrete acts and as you do so you are fulfilling a promise that you made. That's chessed. It's actually, yeah, a really beautiful word. It's so beautiful. It is a beautiful word. Because it describes that kind of love that's a commitment and a choice and a desire all in one. Yeah, that's true.

And it's active. So all of these different English translations, I really sympathize. And, you know, I'm just adding my opinion to the bunch now with the translation, loyal love. But here's the thing, is unfailing love of the NIV, I don't use the word unfailing. Yeah. Steadfast. They're using it as a set-fast. But loyal. That's a normal English word.

Yes. And it also kind of has the connotation of, like, a friendship or a partnership. Oh, yes. Loyalty, I think we think in terms of human partnerships when we talk about loyalty. Yep. What Loyal Love does and get across is, so we got the affection, it doesn't get across

the generosity piece. Oh, I see. That's true. It feels a little bit, it could feel a little contractual. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Like, give me Loyal Love versus there's a sense of the way you guys have been talking about it

Which is this like outflowing of generosity? Sorry, I'm a cause in your turn. No, that's alright. I yeah so loving lovingly kind loyal love Yeah, loyal loyal loving kindness We met loving kindness one word kindness. That would be the New King James. Okay, so that's the basic idea. First, let's take in some famous Bible verses, like some that might be on bumper stickers or cross stitch patterns on people's walls.

And then you'll see it. You'll actually see it displayed. And then I thought we could look at a bunch of examples of people showing chesa to each other in famous Bible stories. And then we can conclude by looking at God's example of God showing chesit. 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh

1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh 1 tbh Famous Old Testament Bible verses with the chessed.

Psalm 36 verses 5 and 6. Your chesed, O Lord, reaches to the heavens. Your faithfulness. Yeah, sing to them to the skies. I don't remember what the verb is, right? This is the song that we should be anthem. Yeah. Your righteousness, like the mighty mountains. I'm from Bible College.'m in this from Bible College. Okay. We had Chapel, Bible College. You know what's funny is because there's only a small window

of worship songs you're probably familiar with. Yeah, smaller than me. Yeah, from the mid to late 90s. Yeah. Well, I think that one stuck around for a while. That one, that's a long one. That one endured. But yeah, you can't read this verse without getting a tune in your chapter.

Exactly, yes. Yes. Are you looking it up? Third day. Third day. Shout out to third day. Forgot about that. Third day.

Yeah. Yeah. Third day. Well, there you go. They're getting in on those design patterns. Third day. Yeah, totally. Yeah.

Yeah. So your chesed, O Lord, reaches to the skies. Okay, so here, let's note, there's four poetic parallel lines here. So notice the attributes of God that are paired, your chesed reaches to the skies, your faithfulness to the heavens, your righteousness, like the mountains, your justice, like the deep abyss below. Notice we just stand the three tiered cosmos.

Yeah, the Genesis one. Yep, with the mountains in the mix. The Skies, the mountains representing the land. Oh, okay. And then the deep is the waters under the land. Yeah. And God's character is what upholds every tier of the cosmos. Isn't that interesting? That's cool. Yeah, God's character is what upholds every tier of the cosmos.

Isn't that interesting? That's cool. Yeah, God's character is saturated throughout the entire cosmos. And I wondered if the certain character traits are paired with certain parts of the cosmos. That might be over. It's gotta be in the brain, right? So God's loyal love and then the word

that you're gonna take us on a tour through next, Krista, your faithfulness, that's associated with the what's above. Well both of them are. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, God's chessed and his faithfulness are associated with this guy. Now, is that two different words in this poem here? Because heavens and skies are the same word in Hebrew, right? No matter what. Seems like it should be two different ones. Oh yeah, so the first word is shimayem, the traditional word heavens or skies. The second word is actually the word for clouds.

Okay, faithfulness in the clouds. Shachachim. So yeah, your clouds. That's so fascinating that the translated clouds sky, probably because they already translated sky heavens. Yeah, I don't. The kids, yeah, that's right. Yeah, that is interesting. But yes, V of Psalm 36 for five has clouds. Oh, it's a fullness to the clouds. Yeah. Yeah, and it seems like it does the same thing either way. It's starting up really high. Heaven skies, mountains deep, or skies, clouds,

mountains deep. Yeah, Mountain Steep. Yeah, that's right. So basically from the top to bottom of the cosmos, God's character is what upholds it all. And this is in the larger context of a whole paragraph and some about meditating on the stability of creation. Can I take a son of tangent? Sure.

There's two other attributes of God in these two verses. Yes. Righteousness and justice. Mm-hmm. Why aren't those in Psalm 36? Why do God leave those out? What? Oh, Exodus 36? Yes. Sorry, Exodus 36. Yeah, those are two great attributes

that you would think God would want Moses to think about at that moment. Yeah, righteousness and justice. So you're saying why are they absent? Why are they absent? Yeah. That's a great question. It almost seems like justice is described in those verses. Yeah, anyways, it's a tangent.

That's a good one. It's just, yeah. Just making an observation, they're missing out of, righteousness is about doing right by somebody. And justice is about fairness and equity. One could argue that God is not very fair with Israel. He gives them much, much more than what they deserve. In fact, that's what the next line, that's what the next example of chesa is, is he doesn't give Israel what they deserve. But he is being just with them. You're not being unjust if you're being generous with somebody. Next line, that's what the next example of chesa is, is he doesn't give Israel what they deserve. Right.

But he is being just with them. That you're not being unjust if you're being generous with somebody. Right. Yeah, you know what, I've never asked myself the question the way that you just did. So I need to take a long walk and think about that.

I mean, there's tons of attributes missing. Yeah. But these, they're pretty core. That's right. Yeah. And they're the verses that are repeated over and over. So I think for me, the question is whether this yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished is talking about his justice or if the purpose there is actually to emphasize his graciousness that his mercy extends to the thousand generations and this punishment only goes to the third or the fourth. So maybe justice isn't being emphasized here. Yeah, it's interesting.

Which is, yeah, it is interesting to think about what core characteristics of God really were important to the biblical authors and which ones weren't as important. Yeah, or just when they wanted to summarize the core of God's character, if you only get a list of five, even there's... What are the top five? What are the top five? Yeah, that's... I would have guessed righteousness would have made top five. Yeah, that's a good point.

It's my... Certainly, to me, Paul. That's righteousness. So, yeah, that's interesting. I need to be a Paul. That's righteousness. So yeah, that's interesting. I've never, yeah, I need to think about that. You've stumbled upon a really profound question. I need to think about it. Psalm 103 verses 11 and 12, for as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his chessed for those who fear him, as far as the east is from the West, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. So the parallelism between those lines, it's really illuminating, I think.

Is that a worship song? What do you know? Yes, it is, guys. Is it really? I don't know. It's far the East is from the West. What? That's how far he has removed our transgressions from us. No. Maybe I was later than you guys said.

I don't know that one. But I bet you there is a song or a hymn for most Psalms. Yeah, that's right. That we can for sure. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, we don't have to sing them all. It's okay. In Psalm 36, the first example, if God's Reset is there, associated with the stability of creation, that's a part of God fulfilling his promise and fulfilling his word. Here, God's loyal love is expressed by forgiving people, forgiving them. This is kind of like how much do you love me question? And you know, you play with your kids and you're like, how much do you love me question? And you play with your kids, and you're like, I love you this much, you can hear hands out by six inches.

And then they're like, I love you this much, and they get to a foot, and you keep going. This is the solmest thinking about God's acid, and how grand is it? Yes, how high and how far? Yeah. So it goes vertical, high as the. Yeah. So yeah, it goes vertical High as the sky above the land and it goes horizontal east from the west

Which is an impossible distance Yeah, yeah, and then what's paired is showing Hesid is expressed through forgiving people when they're wrong you Hmm. I specifically you're your covenant partners. So that brings out the generosity. Yeah, that's right. Peace or kindness. Yeah, yeah. So forgiveness is core to has it. Yep.

Because you can't be in a loving, loyal, generous relationship with someone without constantly forgiving each other. Yeah, that's a good point. Right. I guess unless you're, yeah, in a covenant relationship with Jesus. Yeah. And then he's the one who is the one for this. He's doing it for getting. Yeah. 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1%, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1%, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1%, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, Micah 6, verse 8, he has shown you, oh human, what is good and what the Lord requires of you.

This is a song. To do justice. To love, chess it, and to walk humbly with your God. Now there, because of the King James version, the songs of Micah 6.8 that have become popular, have retained the word mercy.

Mm. Do justice, love, mercy, walk humbly with your God. What's the song that I know? I don't know those ones. He has shown you, Oh man, what is good and what the Lord requires of you.

But to do justly. But to do justly. That's a love mercy. That's a love mercy. Well, you didn't know when you tuned into this podcast. You were gonna get a solo for us. Yeah. All three of us did.

Yeah, mercy, it's mercy. Yep, okay. So, NIV renders mercy here, Micah 6.8. Yes, V translates kindness. The new American standard goes with kindness as well. So how do you think these three terms are related, relating here to do justice, love, has said, and walk humbly?

Yeah, well in Micah, he's railing against the leaders of Israel for not being loyal to the covenant with Yahweh, and then that's demonstrated by not doing justice for the needy in the poor in their cities, and throwing raging drinking parties. He just lays into them for the leaders drinking way too much. So you can kind of see that reflected here. Like do justice for the poor. Keep your covenant with Yahweh and don't think of yourselves too highly. Okay, so it's three significant things, not synonymous things or... Oh, I see. Like mutually describing...

They don't build on each other in some systematic way. Oh, interesting. I like your explanation, that makes sense. Yeah, it makes sense to me. Yeah. It's love, chessed? Yes, yeah. Achawat, chessed. Love of chessed.

It makes me chessed. Make loyal love the thing you love. Yes. The thing that you have affection for. Love of chessed. Love chessed. Yeah, love chessed. Like desire chesed? Yeah. Yeah, desire. I have us kind of a desire word.

Yeah, it is. It's to desire. Desire love. Mm-hmm. Desire, loyalty love. Loyal love. And remember, loyal love is concrete acts of, it's not referring to a feeling chesed, not a feeling chesed is a visible action that shows your posture in the relationship. You know, one thing that kind of keeps this together,

I think is a large view, I don't know if that's the best way to say it, a large vantage point. So like, to love, Hesid, you kind of have to think about the future. You have to think about relationships are like a long-term thing. And it's easy to love like the immediate like gratifications in life, but to love Hesid is kind of like saying, I'm going to commit myself to things that are going to be not always hard or not always easy.

Sometimes challenging, but because I love this thing that's much broader than just here and now. And I feel like justice is kind of the same, like, lots of times. Justice often is when I feel wronged, but when you really love justice or you really are like about justice, it's a big picture view of like, I want society to be just. It feels like to love both those things you have to step outside your immediate context. Yeah, it's good. Yeah, it's good observation. Okay, so those are famous Bible verses. Let's dive into some Bible stories where people are showing, Professor, do each other,

or kind of fill out the portrait. At the end of the book of Genesis, Jacob, the patriarch, is dying. He has all of his sons around his 12 sons around him, and in Genesis 47 at the end, we read that the time drew near for him to die, and so he takes his son that he lost and regained again. His son that he thought was dead, but was really alive, Joseph, and he says, if I have found, ooh, if I have found favor in your eyes, remember that? Hing, hing, so word gracious. If I have found grace in your eyes, put your hand under my thigh and swear an oath.

That's how they did it back then, right? Yep, totally. That you will show me chesed and faithfulness. There's again, the two words are often paired. Don't bury me here in Egypt. When I lay down with my father's, carry me out of Egypt and go bury me. We're there buried, which is hundreds of miles away.

Remember, they didn't have cars. And Joseph said, I will do it. I will do it. So, a son showing a father chessed is carrying his corpse hundreds of miles to go be buried with his ancestors. That's an act of chessed. Yeah. Yeah, because it's a lot to do. It takes an incredible amount of generosity to do something like that. He does it because he loves his father. Yeah, it's also loyalty without repayment because his father's obviously debt. He's carrying his bones. Yes, yes. So it's not that he wants his father to reciprocate or...

Great. That's exactly right. Yeah, without expectation. When you show somebody, Chesid that's living, you might hope they show you Chesid back, but Chesid is about the one doing it. It's purely generated out of the character of the one doing it. You're right, because here there's no return on investment. Maybe that's a reason why your other story was really great about the old man Tinkariv's shirt wife. Yes. There's just nothing you can back. Correct. And the next story is a famous biblical story that makes

the same point in another way. The story of Ruth. Oh, man. We have to make some more videos on Ruth. Yeah. I just... It's amazing. Even in this video, so that you've just written the script

for Loyal Love and the artists are in the process of making the video. It's already such a powerful scene that's seen with Ruth's Hesse. Yes, yeah, that's right. So the story in Inuchel is a relight family in a time of famine, leaves the land of Israel to go live among the land of their enemies, Moabites, the Moab, across the Jordan, modern day Jordan. All of the men die, but the sons and the family had each married women. And so now you have an Israelite mom and her two Moabite daughters-in-law, Ruth and Wurpa.

Are the two daughters? Are the two daughters. And so this is interesting. Naomi is going to move back home. And she says to each of her mobile daughters, she says, go. Return each of you to your mother's house. May Yahweh do chesid with you as you've choned chesid to me. You've been good daughters in law. You've been loyal. And so may the Lord do loyalty to you, you can go. And so Orba goes back,

home, but Ruth refuses. This is the famous scene. And so you got to read Ruth's words. Ruth said, don't urge me to leave you or turn back from following you. Where you go, I go. Where you live, I live. Your people will be my people and your God My God where you die I will die and there I will be buried May Yahweh do to me and even worse if anything but death separates you and me. Oh, yeah come on Yeah, that's like Shakespeare right there Yeah, it's amazing especially because in that ancient context Naomi has nothing to give her.

And it really makes those words just when you read them where you die, I will die. It's almost like, well yeah, you're probably going to die. Like two women traveling from Moab to Jerusalem on your own, you have nothing. Yeah. Yeah, these are really amazing words. They don't, yeah, totally. So when later on in the story, they go back and settle and Bethlehem, and when people hear about this promise that Ruth made, people like Boaz, an important person in the story, he calls this an act of

chesset that Ruth did toward Naomi. So this fills out the portrait a little more. It has similar to the previous example in that there's no expectation of return. It's a family bond or a covenant family bond, but she increases it. I mean, she's almost swearing enough Yeah, and you know, this is all it sounds like a like a house. Yeah, which is talking Well, that's you you've used or covenant a number of times around this word. It does feel like yeah He's bound up in that yep oath-taking and commitment taking and commitment, relationally. Yeah, totally.

And so this is what Ruth does, and this is her active acid. So there's many other examples. So after David kills Goliath, but he's not yet the king of Israel. Saul, King Saul is still around. But Saul comes to hate David and tries to murder him. But problem, Saul's son, Jonathan, becomes David's best friend. They become best friends. And they make a covenant together. So I have that here in 1 Samuel 20, Jonathan says to David, may Yahweh be with you, just like he was with my father. And if I am still alive,

will you please show me chesed so that I may not die? Because my dad wants to kill you, and he knows we're best friends, he might want to kill me. Show me chesed. Jonathan continues, don't cut off your chesed from my house. Not even when Yahweh cuts off all the enemies of David from the face of the land. And so Jonathan made a covenant with the house of David. So this is the ruling king, son, says, my dad's gonna like somehow be torn down from being king and Yahweh's gonna raise you up. And so it's actually a pretty smart move. I mean they're best friends, but it's also a pretty savvy political move. Yeah, yeah, right. And so they make this promise to each other and you read on in the story, John is in dies and battle. Sad, David cries, sings a lament. But then it's not

till years and years later when David becomes king, there's the story in 2 Samuel 9 where he asks someone in his court one day, is there anyone left among the descendants of Saul that I can show Chesed to because I Jonathan and I made that covenant? And he learns, well yes actually, there is one descendant, a grandson of Saul, your enemy, whose alive, his name is Maffibosheth. Good name. And that one for future children. Yeah, totally. Good boy name, Maffibosheth.

And so what he does is he adopts, he adopts this grandson of his enemy, the son of his dead friend. He adopts him into his home, into his family, and he basically says, you can eat at my table for the rest of your life. And his legs are injured. He can't walk. He's crippled. So he adopts this young boy into his family and character him for the rest of his life. That's awesome.

That is really amazing. That it's his enemies, grandson, and it's the rival king or the previous kings. Oh, grandson. Yes, that's right. Somehow, now this previous king is still going to have a person that could potentially be David's rival in the future. Yes. Really amazing. Yeah, that's good.

Thank you for bringing that out in a hereditary monarchy culture. Yeah. This represents somebody who's, yeah, a rival. And so, yeah. So there you go. There's many more stories, but you get the picture, even from just these handful of examples. Loyalty, commitment, generosity, and love,

all kind of an- And there's a theme of sacrifice too. It's like a joyous sacrifice of like, I want to make this sacrifice. Yeah, it's motivated by generous love. When you're doing something out of familial loyalty, there's a duty, there's an obligation. Like Joseph, to his father, to bury him.

Sure. And so, you know, the fact that something is done out of loyalty doesn't necessarily mean that you're doing it out of goodwill. Right. But Hesad in these contexts is used to describe that abundance of goodwill and affection in addition to the behavior. And it occurs often between friends and family or other kinds of committed relationships or making promises like with Ray Hab in the spies. There's a handful where it's people who recently met,

but usually it's what's surprising is because they're asking, like Joseph asked this of the cup bearer that he meets in prison, Pharaoh's wine server. Uh-huh. And he says, hey, you know, I interpreted your dream for you. And when you go back to Pharaoh's court, show me chessed by remembering me

and getting me out of prison. So he calls it an act of chessed, even though he just met the guy. He's asking him to treat him like family. Treat me like you would somebody you are in a covenant partnership with or family member. So we just look at a few, you get the idea. Remember that number, this word occurs almost 250 times, only one out of four does it describe

people doing this? Three out of four times. 75% of 250. Oh, it's a lot. It would be 70. Over 150. Yeah. The remainder would be 70. Yeah, it would be 70 over 150.

The remainder would be 70. Yeah, it would be describing God's message. So what's cool is you can go through narratives and do the same thing. Profile God's message with actual narratives about God doing it. And I found this really enriching. We can kind of go through some stories. So shall we? Yeah. There's the story in Genesis 24 where Abraham is old and about to die. Actually, he tells his head servant to make a promise by putting your hand under my thigh. He says to him, it's a thing. So essentially what Abraham says is, hey, my son Isaac, he's not married.

And God made a promise about blessing the nations through my descendants. So let's find a partner, find a wife. So he sends one of his head servants back to the family, the Abraham life bind. And so the servant doesn't have a name. He's just called the servant in this chapter. In the history of Jewish interpretation, they named this figure

Eliasar, because that's the servant that Abraham names in Genesis 15, Eliasar. So the servant goes hundreds of miles back to where Abraham came from. And he prays. He goes to a well. And Abraham came from and he prays. He goes to a well and he went to a well. At the time when the young women came out to draw water. Good place to meet a wife. And it was like the singles club. Yeah, totally. Apparently. So we're told that he prays and he says, Oh Lord, God of my master Abraham, grant me success today and show chesed to Abraham. Here I am standing by the spring. There's young women coming out to draw water. May it be, he basically sets up this elaborate sign,

you know, that I'm gonna say this to one of these women. And if she answers me this, I'll know that she's the one. And so, he calls this God's chesapeake to Abraham. So that what appears to be a chance meeting turns out to be an act of God's providence, and he calls this chesapeake. So, it's chesapeake because why? This story doesn't tell you. It's the context of God made a promise to Abraham. And this wife, this young woman he's going to meet will be the fulfillment of that promise.

And that's what makes it chessed. Abraham's grandson is a treacherous liar. His name is Snatur, he'll Snatur, Jacob. And God repeats that promise that he'll snatcher, Jacob. And God repeats that promise that he made Abraham to Jacob. And Jacob actually makes the same journey that the servant did in Genesis 24, but not because difficult promise, but it's because he cheated his family. Escape plan.

Yeah, escape plan. And so he comes back into the land 20 years after being exiled because of his stupid decisions. And what he says to God is he crosses the Jordan River, as he says, I'm unworthy of all the chessed and all the faithfulness. Again, notice. You know what, he didn't do. I didn't count the number of times. Oh, it appeared. Loyal love and faithfulness appeared again. Yeah, it does a lot though, even in that previous story with Abraham, faithfulness is used into those verses too. That's right.

Very close in to them. Yeah, that's right. So this example is interesting because, you know, in the story of David and Jonathan, Jonathan was kind to David and helped him. And so David chose Chesed to his son. Here's an example of God showing Chesid to somebody who clearly doesn't deserve it. This guy doesn't deserve. A second chance. Loyal love. He didn't show loyalty to his family. His father or his brother. But God has shown Chesid to him.

What is it that motivates genuine Chesid? Well, my thought here is, it's only chesed when you desire it, when there's some pathos behind it. But if someone doesn't deserve it, you're probably not energized by pathos. So that's interesting, yeah. But you're just still called chesed. The right thing to do. So it's not purely obligation or duty, but it's...

What keeps it from being pure obligation or duty at this point for God? Yeah, yeah, yeah, it is described as has it if somebody doesn't deserve it, but you show it anyway it's called chessed here you could say that Jacob presents a unique problem for God because you know Abraham was stupid, but he ultimately passed the test. He showed himself faithful with Abraham and the Isaac story. And he had some promising qualities even in the beginning following God and going to the New Land.

Yeah, that's right. So Jacob has shown himself to be pretty unworthy of this whole promise deal. And so it creates this unique dynamic or a conflict of interest, you could say. Should God be fair with Jacob and give him what he deserves? But then that would mean violating his promise to this family. And God doesn't violate his promises as you discover about this God. And so God gives generously to a guy who doesn't

deserve it. And that is a part of the profile, Hesad. That big is a question though. Why didn't he say, I'm unworthy of your generosity and faithfulness? Right? I'd imagine there's a good word for that where Hesad seems to have emotion involved of love, of pathos. Yes, but it refers primarily to the concrete expression. So what he says is, I cross the Jordan River with only a staff in my hand, and now I've become two huge camps of people

and animals and kids and stuff. He calls that chessed. Okay. So he's not just referring to, primarily referring to you have warm fuzzies for me. What he's saying is I had nothing and now I have a lot. And the only thing I can attribute it to is that you made this promise to my grandfather and my father and you're giving it to me. But what makes chessed here more than just generosity then?

Commitment to the promise. Commitment to the promise. Correct. Commitment to the promise in generosity. Where does love fit in then? Well that is love. I guess what I'm saying is you can decide to be generous to someone because of an oath, but despise the person. Yeah, that's right.

Totally. Yeah, that's right. And I don't think you would use the word a asset there. Right? Maybe within a commitment. I don't know. If you make a commitment to somebody and momentarily despise them for something, you could still choose to like exercise love. Or I'm going to choose to like love this person. Yeah. Regardless, we probably all had moments where there's somebody that in a moment you find it difficult to find any affection for them,

but you still do right by them. And then maybe your actions kind of paved the way for that affection to follow, sometimes a lot later. But yeah, I don't know. That's interesting. Again, what we're trying to do is take our experiences and you know, map them on to what we think God's experience working with Jacob might. But your question, John, is kind of about whether, as said, always involves this desire or emotional love. Yeah, I kind of, this Venn diagram was created in my mind when you start to wear those. Yes, loves.

You need to have love. Generosity. You need to have generosity. And you gotta have loyalty. And then when you got those three things, you've got Cessed. You take one of those out. It's no longer Cessed. So you can love someone and be generous, but just in a moment of passion,

like a moment of passion, but you have no commitment. And that's not a hazard. You could be committed to someone and love them. And love them. But never show generosity. But never show generosity, would you call that a hazard? I don't think so. But here, what I think we're saying is,

there is situations where you're not feeling any pathos and you love, but you are being loyal and you are being generous and it's still as aggressive. Yeah, so I guess I should just say, this is God. He says this of God. And so I think as a Christian, what it means to believe about God's motivations here is that God loves Jacob, that he also loves him. Yeah. Because I believe God loves me and I'm not sure I'm not much better. Jacob, you know. I see what you mean.

So, even if he's not pleased with his decisions in the past few decades, you're all loves him. No, in fact, everything Jacob did to his family, God providentially brings back on Jacob's head. He deceives his father and brother, and so his uncle deceives him. So, Jacob sits for 20 years in the mess of his choices. Jacob's head. He deceives his father and brother, and so his uncle deceives him. So Jacob sits for 20 years in the mess of his choices. Yeah.

And God allows that. Right. But God doesn't leave him in that. And when he comes back to his family and land with two camps of animals and people, he says, you've shown me chesa, even though I'm unworthy. Let's see. Yeah, that's the story.

Cool. 1 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 In the Exodus story, when God trumps on Pharaoh, destroying him in the waters, the song that Miriam and Moses sang, they call it an act of God's chesset to lead the people that you've redeemed out of Egypt. It's all called an act of chesset. It kind of makes sense intuitively in that it's fulfilling God's promise to Abraham. But here, the way that the chesapeake was demonstrated was on bringing a severe justice on a tyrant. Yeah. But it seems like the focus isn't on the justice as much as it's on the fact that God was loyal and did something incredibly big and generous to for them.

And that seems to make it. Yeah, although it took a couple centuries, the Exodus story begins by just fast-forwarding for generations and suffering and they cry out to God and wondering if God's ever going to do anything. Yeah. I also remember seeing the ideas of compassion really strongly here in this narrative that the people are crying out and God is compelled by their cries to rescue them. So maybe there's also some overlap with Hesad and compassion and deliverance. His compassion was really connected to deliverance

and forgiveness too. Oh, I see, yeah, correct. Yep, that's right. They bundle together. God showing compassion and forgiving and rescuing is about focusing on the emotion God feels when he sees people suffering. He wants to help them.

Here, it's about the loyalty to his promise. And so. But there's still elements in Chesa here of forgiveness and deliverance. Well deliverance here. Yeah, you're saying in the Exodus story. Yeah, that it involves rescue. And the bringing down of oppressive rulers. That's a film I've got. Actually, this sets an important design pattern that the prophets will bring up a lot. When God brings down the mighty from their thrones, it's bad news for Babylon or Assyria or the leaders of Judah, but it's good news for the poor and the oppressed, and they experience it as an act of God's chesad when Citadel is fall.

So does God's chesad have to do with or does it exist more often between God and the marginalized throughout Scripture or the oppressed? Oh, yes, for sure. But that's true of the whole Hebrew Bible. The whole Hebrew Bible was written by a minority oppressed group. So God promises His faithfulness, His compassion, His hystead said they're all extended toward the oppressed and the marginalized. That's a great way of articulating that. Let's look at one more.

So we've seen Abraham, Jacob, the Exodus. These are all about God fulfilling his ongoing covenant promises in the wilderness stories. The story of the spies, Moses and Joshua, they send the spies into Canaan, 10 come back and say the giants are gonna kill us. So the people are like no way or we let's go back to Egypt. Actually they threaten to kill Moses and appoint a new leader to take them back to Egypt. That's how bad it gets. And so Moses steps up, God's angry, and what he says in numbers 14, how long will this people show contempt for me? How long will they not trust in me?

Despite everything I've done, I'm going to strike them with plagues. The thing I did to Egypt, I'm just going to do it to them. And Moses, I'm going to make you into a nation even greater than they are. them. And Moses, I'm going to make you into a nation even greater than they are. And if you've been reading the Torah, you're like, I've been here before. Sounds familiar. Yeah. This is the Golden Calf part two. We've actually talked about the story, I think, in this year's. Right. So any and some Moses speaks up, he uses the same tactics as he did with the Golden Calf. And you know, the Egyptians will hear about it. It won't reflect well on your reputation. Here's what's interesting. So in numbers 14 for 17, Moses says, please, let the power of Yahweh be great. Listen, you declared, quote, Yahweh is slow to anger, great and chessed, forgiving, iniquity and transgression, but he, well, by no means to

clarinate innocent in the guilty, visiting the iniquities of the fathers on the children and the children. So please pardon the iniquity of this people according to your great chessed, just as you have already, you forgive them once, so keep doing it. So the logic of this is so interesting. Forgive them because of your chesed. Yeah, that's the logic. Yeah, it's almost, he says, forgive them because of your chesed. I know you said you won't clear the guilty. Oh, yes. So would you forgive this people according to your chesed? Oh, that's good. Good job. Great. He's highlighting the fact that you have these two traits.

You won't declare innocent the guilty, but you also never give up on your promises. Yeah. That's what you're saying. He's playing the tension. He's noting the tension. I mean, yeah, because it's interesting. He just brings up this line. You will visit the anonymity.

Yeah, right. And he's maybe support the argument a little better. That's a really good point. Yeah. He notes that there's a tension between Exodus 34 and 6. Yeah, right. He says, I know this. But if you go back on your promise, you won't be showing chesed.

And that's not the kind of God that you are. You show chesed. Now, as the story goes on, you know, God will let this generation die in the wilderness and bring their children into the promised land. And God hasn't violated his chesed by doing that because he states faithful to the family, but to just walk away from the family of Abraham as such, that would be to violate his chesed.

So all we've looked at are stories in the Torah about gods. It's truly instruction, Torah. It's God's character. So notice it's multi-generational. God's promise over the course of a whole history of a family. It's not based on the worthiness of any given generation. In fact, sometimes it seems excessive. It puts God in awkward situations where he has to be more generous than people would deserve.

But this long enduring commitment to generosity and love and commitment is core, character trait of God. And it goes right on through the stories of David. You can see now why it appears 127 times in the book of Psalms. Because I think to be a part of this family in this story, in some later generation with all, you know, the Hebrew Bible isn't as pernity punches in terms of showing the flaws of our ancestors. Representing humanity and what humans are like.

Yeah, so to show so many flawed ancestors, and yet God continues to be committed to us, God's message is, you can see why it's such a prominent trait. I'm going to do a little bit of the same thing. I'm going to do a little bit of the same thing. I'm going to do a little bit of the same thing. I'm going to do a little bit of the same thing. 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc

1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc 1 tbc We began with some famous Old Testament Bible verses with Chesapeake. Let's conclude with some famous New Testament Bible verses with this word.

Now the New Testament is written in Greek. So Chesa doesn't show up. Hessa didn't show up, but the Septuagint translation made a couple hundred years before Jesus of the Hebrew Bible into Greek. Use the Greek word Elos, which is a standard word for mercy. And this is a good example of where they were using the Greek language, but they still clearly have the Hebrew concept. Here's a great example. The song that Mary sings when she finds out she's going to give birth to the Messiah, the Magnificat, is it's Latin name? So look at how she uses the word mercy. I'm going to use the English word

mercy and you're just going to see it doesn't make a lot of sense. Okay. Mercy being the English word of when you, what? Hmm. Mercy. It's usually when you extend or over extend yourself to show kindness or pity to someone in need. Yeah. Am I right there? I'm not happy with the dictionary.

Yeah. You extend mercy instead of maybe. Show me mercy. Yeah, instead of punishment or what somebody deserves. I mean, that's a common more modern understanding. I don't know if that's a biblical understanding. Mercyless. Mercyless means pitiless and cruel.

Yeah. Dictionary.com says compassion or forgiveness to someone that it's within your power and punish. Yeah. You have the power to bring the pain and you don't. That's mercy. So not bringing the negative. Yeah, so just, yeah, you'll just see this doesn't quite fit. So there's what Mary says.

My soul glorifies the Lord. My spirit rejoices in God, my Savior, down to verse 50. His mercy extends to those who fear him from generation to generation. You could say, I guess he could punish us from generation to generation, but he doesn't. So he's a source of generation. He is scattered, those who are proud. He's brought down rulers from their thrones. He's lifted up the humble. He fills the hungry with good things, but sends the rich away empty. He's helped to serve in Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants

forever, just like he promised. I guess you still could retain that standard meaning of merciful. Yeah. Or it's one aspect of Hesad, but not the full. Yeah, that's right. Aspect. Yeah. Because in both the two ways she uses the word here, she's emphasizing from generation to generation to fulfill the promise you made to our Hesad.

Right, you can kind of see how Hesad works really well. Yes, in the place here. It's exactly the mean of Hesad. Over the whole history of our family, you keep doing surprising things to fulfill your promises to us. So does that mean when we see mercy in the New Testament, we should run through that question of whether this is the idea of Hesad? So here's an example. I actually tried to do just that.

This would be a good way to conclude our conversation. A famous paragraph in Paul's letter to the Ephesians. In chapter 2 he begins by saying, you all were dead in your transgressions and sins, and you used to live under the principalities and powers. It's on. Verse 4. But because of his great love, his agape, God, who is rich in mercy. So there's that Greek word, Elos, that in again the Septuagint translates, has it. He made us alive with the Messiah, even though we were dead in our transgressions. It is by grace that you have been saved. So he names three attributes of God. Love, love, mercy, and grace. Mercy and grace. So because of his love, God felt affection for

dead, dying people. It's by grace that you've been saved and he goes on to say not of works. So it's a gift. It's not something you earned. It's a gift given to you. And then in the middle of love and grace is mercy. And I think what's interesting is mercy works really well because mercy, it can be a form of Hessen very easily. Yeah, to forgive someone. Yeah, because it's forgiving. It's not bringing the consequence onto someone that they might deserve.

Yeah. And why would you do that? Well, a very good reason would be your Hessen. But is the reason why Mercy was used in the Septuagint or Elias or whatever the word is here? Because it just isn't a good Greek word? Yeah, that's a good question. And that's my hunch because that's been true in the English tradition as well. And so what they did was use a word and then over time somebody emerged in the Greek Bible like you know they just realized that word really means yeah that's right because to forgive someone is one way

you could show acid yeah but by burying your father right is another way to show acid or taking care of your mother-in-law and it's another way now the context here in Ephesians 2 is about how there's consequences to our disobedience. We're dead. So mercy works really well. Yeah, that's right. But then you could also see how, but Mercy is just one aspect of, of chesed. Yeah. Because it doesn't.

Okay, and then, and it's rich, it's a rich mercy, and has it as so much richer than just mercy. Yeah, that's right, yeah, totally. So, yeah, yeah, there you go. So loyal love is the best I can do right now. I think it's pretty good. It's good, I like it too. This is, this is core. The through the generations. Yeah,

this is a unique part of the biblical portrait of God that across generations, he remains faithful to his promises and keeps fulfilling them in surprising and generous ways, that's core to the biblical portrait of God. And the word is also often paired with faithfulness. Right. And so let's look at that. Faithfulness. Thanks for listening to this episode of Vibhapraject Podcast. We're almost done with this series. We've got one more episode with one more characteristic of God to discuss, and that is God's faithfulness. So Amit means trust, trust worthy faith belief, so it encompasses all of those ideas. In this verse it was translated as faithfulness, but it's kind of rooted around this idea of trust or trust worthyness. This is an important, really important word

for the Christian faith. If we think about what it means to trust and God that's usually how we define what it means to be a Christian. If you'd like to submit a question for our upcoming question and response episode, our deadline is coming up. It's 10 a.m. Pacific on November 9th.

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