August 7th, 2012 – Psalm 7-8

Click here to read Psalm 7-8  on BibleGateway.com

The question has been posed several times to us here at EverydayDevotions: what does it take to be a devotional writer? You’ll notice that the questioner leaves off such unimportant adjectives as “successful”, “insightful”, or “accurate.” We’d be tempted to read more into that, but sometimes if you know what’s at the bottom of the cone, you don’t need to eat all the ice cream.

In any case, the most essential ingredient for any devotional writer is deep felt conviction; or to use a more common term, arrogance. That’s right, my friends, behind every devotional you see in the Bible Book Store or read online (or “like” on facebook, hint hint) you will find a man or woman with the assumption that they have found something in scripture that has eluded the general population of goobers that go to NASCAR events and keep Kmart in business. Not only that, it has eluded the church as a whole for the last 2000 years.

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT 

Well, let it not be said that we at EverydayDevotions don’t follow the trend. Today we’re going to be looking at a passage of scripture that has been pored over by PhDs for years, and yet we will claim to find something new. Why, you ask? The answer is simple:…if I think of what it is, I’ll let you know.

Psalm 7:14, according to the NIV, says “Whoever is pregnant with evil conceives trouble and gives birth to disillusionment.” If you’re a KJV fan, you get “Behold, he travaileth with iniquity, and hath conceived mischief, and brought forth falsehood.” The NLT says “The wicked conceive evil; they are pregnant with trouble and give birth to lies.” There’s a host of other translations, of course, but you get the idea. Why so many versions of one verse? Well, fun fact of the day, one of the hardest things to translate into another language is wordplay, such as puns, metaphors, alliteration, ect. The Psalms, consisting primarily of poetry, are ripe with these types of translation landmines.

So let’s look at one of these words, specifically the one that is translated “travaileth/conceive/pregnant.” The original word here is “chabal”, which is sometimes translated as bind, such as tightening a cord or twisting to bind something. So, if we go with that meaning, then the verse could be translated: “sinners are tied up in sin; what they conceive as mischief eventually is born as deception and lies.”

“THE PATH YOU HAVE SET UPON CAN ONLY END IN DEATH” 

It’s interesting that people who are not living by God’s plan can see some actions as simple mischief, but in the end they wind up twisted up and bound by their own lies. The Bible is clear in other passages that sin is pleasurable for a season, but it ends in death. It seems to me that this verse is reiterating that same concept in poetic form.  There’s no such thing as “innocent” sin.

How does this apply to us? The time to decide how far you’re going to go with your date is not when the windows are all fogged up; by then, you’re already tangled pretty tight in those cords. The time to decide how much you’re gonna drink is not when you’re on the 3rd round at the pub. The time to decide if you’re gonna do that shady business deal is not when you’re in the closed boardroom; it’s when you first see the prospectus. God warns us time and again that walking too close to the edge is not “exciting,” it’s foolhardy and dangerous, and once the cords are tight, it’s very hard to struggle free. Decide now how you intend to live; before the knots are tied.

As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.

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One Response
  1. Joshua says:

    Thanks for the King James, much appreciated. I thought devotionals existed to remind us of things we forgot, encourage us in the things we know, and introduce us to things we may not yet have learned? Guess I was being naive. The reason that there are things that have alluded the church for the last 2k or so years has to do with the fourth dimension of scripture which is related to our fourth dimension of time. There are things that simply can’t be understood until the time is right. And there are things the church has not wanted to teach because it goes against there agenda. And then they get a hot head like Martin Luther who exposes a fallacy and liberates a lot of people. And the cycle continues.

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