The Mentor who models

Understanding the difference between Greek thinking and Hebrew thinking.

 

Greeks tended to categorize things intellectually. One example is the human personality. Man is a whole, not divided into parts, body soul, and spirit, although all three exist. These are not separate entities, but integrated parts of a whole. Heb 4:12 says that the Word can divide soul from spirit etc.

 

I've found that the Word can deliver us when our emotions get so tangled up with our spirits that we cannot really worship, because we are so hurt by other people.

 

Until the Word sets us free to forgive, we are bound in our spirits by the hurts in our emotions. A friend of mine has not come to worship for the last 2 weeks because he says he is so depressed he cannot leave his house. He says it's so bad he doesn't mind if he dies anytime. I told him only the devil talks about death. I quoted Jesus, "I am come that they might have life and more abundantly." He is in such bondage.

 

Years ago I walked around with quite a list of people who had hurt me and kept calling their names before God and saying, "Lord, I forgive...... Eventually, I was set free to work with a brother who had really hurt me very deeply.

 

One last thing on Grk/Heb thinking. When the Bible says "Faith comes by hearing," it does not mean 'listening', but obeying. When our children disobey an order, we say 'You are hard-of-hearing' we really mean, you did not obey. When the Word to Israel was, "Hear, O Isreal, the Lord our God is One Lord" it meant they should obey the command to have no other gods since the heathen had many gods. It was more than listening.

 

Also, when the Word tells us to believe God, it meant obeying. That's Hebrew thinking. Greeks kept belief and faith in their heads; hebrews carried it into action. Abraham believed God. He moved to the mountain with Isaac to sacrifice him. He obeyed God.

By CRM