HEBREW WORD STUDY – BROKEN BONES – SHEVAR ‘ATSEM שׁבר. עצמ
Lamentations 3:4 “My flesh and my skin hath he made old, he hath broken my bones.”
“Why not? They are the only ones who can take it.” C.S. Lewis when asked why the righteous suffer.
Tradition ascribes the Book of Lamentations to Jeremiah who wrote this book just as Judah fell to the Babylonians. Chapter 3 of Lamentations is more of a personal reflection than a lament over Judah. Where he should have been rejoicing over the fact that his prophecies have proven true, it was still, after all, his home and homeland that had fallen. There was no joy in this vindication.
One thing I can say for sure, God will never be sued for false advertisement. He clearly points out in his word that the righteous will suffer and it is through those fires that we are purified as gold.
Contrary to popular belief and Hollywood, the Council of Nicaea in 325 did not canonize Scripture nor establish the church structure as indicated in the Da Vinci Code. Nor did it venerate Mary. It did establish a date for Easter and a couple other minor things. But the major accomplishment of the Council of Nicaea was to just confirm (not establish) the deity of Jesus. It did establish the Nicean Creed which is still our statement of faith and belief in the fact that Jesus Christ is God incarnate, born of a virgin who died for our sins on a cross and rose from the dead.
I do not believe there was anything evil that took place in the Council of Nicaea; there were no hidden agendas or political maneuverings. I call as my witnesses 306 of the 318 delegates who attended the Council of Nicaea. Constantine issued an invitation to 1,800 bishops throughout Europe and only 318 showed up. These were not beautifully robed, pompous, a king like leaders that we would picture. Actually, we are dealing with a period just twelve years after the Edict of Milan (313). The Edict of Milan ended the horrendous persecution of Christians under the Roman Emperors. These 318 bishops who attended the Council of Nicaea were survivors of this persecution.
Of these 318 delegates, 306 were missing one or more of their physical limbs, (arms, hands, legs, feet, or eyes). All bore physical evidence of the torture they endured for refusing to deny their faith in Jesus Christ. They boldly traveled to Nicaea to declare to the new emperor and to confirm their common belief that Jesus Christ was the Son of God, born of a virgin who died on the cross for our sins and rose from the dead. That was the first order of business and it was that which was established as the foundation of the church. These delegates clung to this belief at great sacrifice and personally witnessed friends and family who died clinging to this belief.
If I cannot endure suffering, then these bishops who attended the First Council of Nicaea had something that I do not have.
Jeremiah states in Lamentations 3:4 that He makes my flesh grow old and he breaks my bones. That He is referring to God. The word old is a verb bilah which is in Piel perfect form. Hence it would more appropriately be rendered as waste away in terror. Even seeing pictures of United States Presidents before they entered off and when they left office. It is like that age 20-30 years in just the 4-8 years they held office. The stress of the job aged them. That is bilah in a Piel form. Jeremiah aged before his time due to the stress he was under in the office of a prophet.
We also learn that God broke his bones. The word for break is shavar but if you look in your Hebrew Bible you will see a dot inside the beth of that word. That and the seghol under the Shin, puts the word into a Piel perfect form. God did not just break his bones, but painfully broke his bones. Under torture breaking, bones can be made a lot more painful than breaking a bone during an athletic event.
Did God inflict a painful breaking of Jeremiah’s bones; did He painfully break the bones of the 318 delegates to the Council of Nicaea? In a sense, yes. By choosing to believe and love God, these men suffered great affliction. Had they not chosen God, they could have enjoyed a peaceful life.
Elizabeth Clephane wrote the following poem and dedicated it to St. Christopher. It could have been dedicated as well to the 318 members of the Council of Nicaea and Jeremiah. I pray that I too can claim these words as well.
I take O’ cross thy shadow
For my abiding place,
I ask no other sunshine,
Than the sunshine of your face,
Content to let the world go by
To know no gain nor loss
My sinful self, my only shame.
The glory all the cross.
Most definitely it is Biblical and personally it is true that God allows us to go through difficulties of a “bone breaking” nature. These things do refine us but that is not, in my opinion, the motivation behind them (although it is a good one if that is what God sees fit). Humans see suffering or the avoidance of suffering as a top priority. God sees the universe past, present and future. His ways are not our ways, His priorities are spelled out in the Bible. Does He care about human suffering? yes but it is not his top priority and there are things that He will accomplish in spite of OR through our sufferings. Hard to accept for a human but there it is.
I should add that suffering is the greatest theological issue Christians, theologians, thoughtful people have grappled with and still do. To address it superficially and paint God as a monster is to commit a great wrong against God particularly because it is the 1st lie of the Serpent.. “did God really..”.. by which he meant, is God really good, does He really want what’s good for you? It’s the fear that lies very close to the human heart and it’s based on a lie, that’s why the Devil is the father of lies. To reinforce it is horribly, horribly wrong.
You did not, but I did:
“We also learn that God broke his bones. The word for break is shavar but if you look in your Hebrew Bible you will see a dot inside the beth of that word. That and the seghol under the Shin, puts the word into a Piel perfect form. God did not just break his bones, but painfully broke his bones. Under torture breaking, bones can be made a lot more painful than breaking a bone during an athletic event.
Did God inflict a painful breaking of Jeremiah’s bones; did He painfully break the bones of the 318 delegates to the Council of Nicaea? In a sense, yes. “
It’s difficult to understand what your conclusion is. You say that God causes suffering, directly, personally so to speak and seem to imply that it is how the faithful are refined; then you seem to say that it’s faith in God that causes the faithful to suffer in a wicked world so that would seem to imply it is the Devil and/or the world that causes suffering. Is it one or the other? Is it both? If it’s the 1st case, why would God make a world where He has to terrorize His children in order to get them to improve? What would you say of such an earthly father? Why would Jesus have healed people instead of letting them suffer if suffering leads to perfection?
“God terrorizes His children in order to get them to improve”?? I did not get that from reading the devotional at all. What I got from it is …Yes, we go through a refining process if our hearts are willing, and yes fulfilling God’s calling is stressful at times, and especially that of a prophet, and yes we may be persecuted for our Faith (as those in Fox’s Book of Martyrs, who would not deny Jesus, testify to) and no, saying the sinners prayer does not guarantee a life free of tribulations but NO, God does not terrorize us to get us to improve or for any other reason. Since I am the Author’s best friend and study/ministry partner, I think I have pretty good insight about where he’s trying to express :).
Hebrews 5:8 Even though Jesus was the Son of God, he learned obedience by what he suffered. And because his obedience was perfect, he was able to give eternal salvation to all who obey him.