22 Lay hands suddenly on no man, neither be partaker of other men’s sins: keep thyself pure.
The first part is easy enough. It's the second part that we need to watch out for. It's a lot easier to be swayed into doing something bad by a friend or a group of people. An example I can think of is using foul language, especially in the military. Soldiers swear a lot, and it's one of the few jobs where you can swear at work and it's usually fine. It's really easy for a person to start swearing even though it's not good.
23 Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach’s sake and thine often infirmities.
This doesn't apply to us right now. Maybe if there was a huge world calamity and there was no drinkable water the rules would change. That's what it was back in the day, the water wasn't safe to drink.
Hebrews 12
14 Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord:
Well, now there's a reason to not lay hands on any man!
15 Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled;
16 Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright.
17 For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.
18 For ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest,
19 And the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which voice they that heard entreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more:
20 For they could not endure that which was commanded, And if so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart
This sounds quite severe, but then, the greatest commandment is to love one another. It's not as easy as it sounds.
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2 comments:
wine used to be a general word for any juice made from grapes. it just became more common to use the fermented form of the juice for obvious reasons.
I'm not sure if they commonly drank the fermented form in biblical times. The bible does mention drunkeness from time to time. I know that the nazirites forbade drinking alcohol (Nazirites would be like Hasidic jews today in that they follow a more strict form of worship). I imagine the wine in this case could be like us drinking orange juice which is full of vitamin c and very good for the body. I'm not sure of the safety of the water. I've drank water direct from wells when I was in Nicaragua. I didn't get sick. But we typically always had an abundance of fruit juice of various kinds provided to us.
Selling our birthright is serious... I don't think it is so easy to do... have you ever seriously thought about what selling your soul to the devil means? It takes a serious act or a general dwindling in unbelief (such as just continuing on a bad path that continues to get involved in worse and worse things, like a person who starts doing drugs and then ends up stealing and progressing into worse and worse crimes).
Just my thoughts as I read these.
it would be very hard to actually sell your soul. The birthright is similar very hard to sell in that you have to chose to do it and then you do not have to get it back even if you are restored to full fellowship in the gospel you may never have the same blessings and opportunities that you would have had if you had not sold your birthright. The birthright being the right to rule and reign and the right to stewardship and all that comes with being a leader in the kingdom of God. you can become a righteous person again however God does not have to allow you to lead his children ever again.
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