A frequently used sales
pitch in years gone by referred to the durability of a product: “Ford Trucks,
built Ford tough” or “Timex, takes a licking but keeps on ticking”. If you’re
old enough you might even remember Maytag’s lonely repairmen. We live in a time
now though where very little is actually meant to endure. We don’t generally
buy clothes today expecting them to really last for more than a year or two.
Either they wear out because of low quality, or they go out of style so we
don’t want to be seen in them!
We all appreciate quality
and workmanship, things that are built well and that last. Yet nothing that
mankind can make will ever truly endure; our best made creations over time will
become obsolete, erode, decay and eventually disappear.
In the TaNaKh, also
referred to as the Old Testament, the prophet Isaiah wrote about this very
issue. He said in chapter 40:6-8:
6 A voice says, “Cry!” And I said, “What shall I cry?” All
flesh is grass, and all its beauty is like the flower of the field. 7 The grass withers, the
flower fades when the breath of the L-RD blows on it; surely the
people are grass. 8 The
grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our G-d will stand
forever. (Isaiah 40:6-8)
Isaiah is making in this
Scripture two very important points for us to consider. The first is that our
current lives on this earth are just temporary, like the grass and flowers. We
are born, live life, have earthly successes and failures, but inevitably our
physical lives decline, ending in death. This is what G-d has ordained to be in
our current world broken by sin. But the second point Isaiah is making in this
text is that G-d’s Word, G-d’s Will, G-d’s Instruction, has no end. As G-d
himself is eternal, without end, so there is eternality to what He has
expressed, and this includes what is his Instruction to us through his
Scriptures. This also includes eternal life which G-d has promised by his Word
to those who hold onto his Word by faith, who believe in what G-d has said in
his Scripture about how we come into everlasting relationship with him through
faith in Messiah Yeshua’s atonement.
Consider your own
mortality, the limitation of your own life. In humility consider G-d’s love for
you and his desire for you to know him and to have a relationship with him for
eternity, all made possible through the shed blood of your Messiah Yeshua.
Rejoice in G-d’s Word which was built to last and invest your life and the time
that you have left in knowing and living out that Word!
Forward for Messiah,
Rabbi Kirk Gliebe
