Today I realized that sometimes, I have time to read, but not to journal, and so… there may be some days I skip. Today is just brief:
Genesis 6-8; what really struck me was these two little vignettes where we get a picture of God’s heart, and the contrast between them:
When the LORD saw that man’s wickedness was widespread on the earth and that every scheme his mind thought of was nothing but evil all the time, the LORD regretted that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. Then the LORD said, “I will wipe off from the face of the earth mankind, whom I created, together with the animals, creatures that crawl, and birds of the sky–for I regret that I made them.”
(Genesis 6:5-7)When the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma, He said to Himself, “I will never again curse the ground because of man, even though man’s inclination is evil from his youth. And I will never again strike down every living thing as I have done. As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, and day and night will not cease.”
(Genesis 8:21-22)
I also read a lot about the word often translated “repent” here and feel better about it—if the idea of God “repenting” for something makes you uncomfortable… go read a Hebrew dictionary. I don’t see the NT nuance of that word there at all.
Mark 3
So much CHAOS going on around Christ. So many desperate people thronging. So much evil-doers watching and trying to catch Him out. Even His family thinks he’s crazy.
Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit: man, this is increasingly unclear to me as I get older and older! We dismiss it as a weighty thing, rare, hard to do, but v. 30 seems to indicate that just their speech met the qualification. Or, at the least, their genuine heart motives from which such speech flowed out. Cautionary passage, for sure.