WORD STUDY APPROACHABLE קרוב Isaiah 55:6: Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon Him while He is near. I was speaking with a friend who was expressing a desire to pray after the church service. I had to think on that one for a while. I grew up in a Baptist church where every Sunday morning we put in our hour for a service and we were quite displeased with our preacher if he should preach even five minutes beyond 12:00 PM. Not that anyone was in any particular hurry because after the service everyone gathered outside in front of the church in small groups to just talked. I loved to stand around with the grown ups and listen to them talk about the events of the past week, their vacations, the latest ball game or their jobs. They were catching up with friends they had not seen all week. Yet, in all those many Sundays when I was growing up in that
little Baptist church I do not recall one conversation over the sermon that was preached or one conversation on one s struggle with their Christian walk or even a discussion on some Scripture passage. I was simply told this was Christian fellowship. It was like we endured our hour, put in our time and now it was time to relax and talk about more interesting things, like how big that Muskie Al Bergen almost caught but got away. I remember that conversation because I was that boat and he did not almost catch it, it just swam by our boat and was not even close in size of Al Bergen s stretched out hands. He even tried to get me to confirm his fish tale. I also remember it because the sermon that Sunday was on how deceitful our hearts can be. Don t get me wrong, I loved that little church and the people in that church were my second family. Yet, I wondered why no one gave much thought to God on this the Lord s day beyond that one hour in church. When my friend suggested she would like to spend time praying after the church service I was struck with the thought: She really wants to pray. Come to think about it, I never really met anyone who wanted to pray, who look forward to praying and would get excited about praying. We just prayed because, well just because it was the Christian thing to do. It really wasn t until I spent my first week in silence three years ago that for the first time in my life I wanted to pray, I looked forward to a time of prayer like I would look forward to meeting with a good friend. As I meditated on this today Isaiah 55:6 kept coming to my mind. Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near. I was always told this was for the sinner, God s Spirit will not always strive with man and if you keep rejecting Him, He will no longer be near and you will not find Him. Perhaps that is true. But that is not the context.
The word for seek is daresh which really has the idea of visiting frequently more than trying to find something. The word is spelled Daleth, Resh and Shin. The built in commentary suggest that the Daleth represents a gateway, a channel or portal. The Resh represents repentance and Shin represents a passionate love. The reason we make frequent visits to God is that through repentance we find a doorway to His passionate love and our hearts are then joined with His. The words while He may be found is really something special in the Hebrew. While He may be found is all one word: behimase u. We can really play around with this word and not always come up with the standard translation. This is a Niphal infinitive. It has the idea of obtaining or finding knowledge. The infinitive form would suggest an overwhelming or abundance of knowledge can be found. Many pastors spend hours studying and praying over their little half hour sermon. It is filled with knowledge, questions and insights. Yet, how many Christians just walk out the door after a sermon excited to tell someone about the new pitcher for the Chicago Bears. They may never get another chance to get that little depth of knowledge about the God they love. They won t discuss it, pray over it and allow the Spirit of God to expand it, because they want be the first to tell their friends that Trump s polling numbers are rising. We are to call upon him while he is near. I mean isn t He always near? Surely He can wait until Bunkie fills you in on the latest episode of Games of Thrones. He will still be near after that. The word translated for upon is simply an inseparable pronoun expressed as prefix Beth which means in or on. Sure we could say call on him, but grammatically, to say that we would really use the separable pronoun, al. I say we translate it, Call in Him. The word call is qara which has
two meanings. One is to call or shout. Another is to fall into. I like the idea of falling into him. I think that speaks more of God s heart. Fall into him while He is near. Remember that seeking is a gateway to enter God s heart. Repentance will open that gateway or portal to His heart and when it is open we will feel a rush of his love and presence, but don t stop there, fall into his heart while He is near. The word near is qarav. This word is very closely related to qara which is another reason I chose to translate the word qara as fall into rather than call, because it is making an obvious play on the word qarav which means to approach, be approachable and/or vulnerable. I would render this as fall into His heart when He is approachable. Let me explain it like this. A husband shares a candlelit dinner with his wife, they speak lovingly to each other and they express the inner secrets of their hearts to each other. They even touch each other. Then when they have expressed their love for each other, holding each other close, the husband looks at his watch and says: Oh my, it s 12:00 I am missing the big game, he then runs over and turns on the TV and totally ignores the wife who just finished expressing her love for him and sharing the secrets of her heart with him. Maybe I am wrong, throw rocks at me if I am, but somehow I just feel that is what we do when 12:00 hits on Sunday morning. After expressing our love to God and His to us, sharing in an intimacy, we look at our watches and race off to talk about the latest world events. That husband may enjoy the football game but he missed a great opportunity with his wife who was behimase u and to qara call upon her while she made herself garav, approachable and
vulnerable. Next time after your Sunday service as everyone races out of the sanctuary, why not spend a few moments meditating and praying to a God who has just made himself garav, vulnerable or approachable to you. http://whpub.me/hebrew_ws