Strange balance, these times when the thrill of waiting for the bizarre to be perfectly rationally "explained" by the Spirit of God because the explanation always comes with the call to some moral strain bearing witness to the depths He was willing to have His heart broken on our behalf.
Such is the beginning of explanations for things revealed to my friend, D., and me separately and corporately. Glimmers are flaring, suddenly offering many potentialities for study. Not long ago I sensed from You the following idea: expect more communication from Me, particularly regarding this idea of a transgressor being held to a proper boundary. Now in a rushing flood, I find other verses that contain all this imagery that D. and I have ben sifting through these last 6 months, and all that imagery shows up in a panoramic prelude to the verse she and her husband discovered prophesied over them in that stranger's prayer (so many things are proving providential in all this.)
First, the saga of all the revelation is found in entries last May--conversations with God, August 8, She Counts!, and one about the same time frame about the Courier and the Tinder. All these recently about D. and K. (her husband) and horses tie in here, too.
There are several places where the idea of taking someone's coat is mentioned. It is almost always in the context of a strong one taking the coat as a pledge for the debt a poorer one owes. There are rules about this sort of thing:
The basic rule of the coat as a pledge:
Exd 22:25
"If you lend money to any of My people who are poor among you, you shall not be like a moneylender to him; you shall not charge him interest.
Exd 22:26
"If you ever take your neighbor's garment as a pledge, you shall return it to him before the sun goes down.
Exd 22:27
"For that is his only covering, it is his garment for his skin. What will he sleep in? And it will be that when he cries to Me, I will hear, for I am gracious.
The dignity preserved of the one owing:
Deu 24:10
"When you lend your brother anything, you shall not go into his house to get his pledge.
Deu 24:11
"You shall stand outside, and the man to whom you lend shall bring the pledge out to you.
Deu 24:12
"And if the man is poor, you shall not keep his pledge overnight.
Deu 24:13
"You shall in any case return the pledge to him again when the sun goes down, that he may sleep in his own garment and bless you; and it shall be righteousness to you before the LORD your God.
The ones I saw first regarding the taking of a garment, in this place it seems to say the garment of one who vouches for a seductress, twice given. Joseph would say "As proof it is from God."
Pro 20:16
Take the garment of one who is surety for a stranger,
And hold it as a pledge when it is for a seductress.
Pro 27:13
Take the garment of him who is surety for a stranger,
And hold it in pledge when he is surety for a seductress.
Bible side notes explain that in the following passage, both father and son go in to the same woman--possibly in a cultic prostitution situation. "Here the worshipers lay down by the altars for luxurious feasts (religious ones) on garments taken in pledge, in order to keep their own clothing clean. The borrowed clothes were to have been returned before sundown so that the owners would not be deprived of their coverings." (See again the Exodus 22 commandment)
What strikes me profoundly in this one is that the point here is that these ones who are worshipers are more concerned with their own cleanliness than they are with the care of those who owe them a debt People who "went to the place of worship but defiled God's law and brought more misery to the least of His people." One thing about the coat dream I had: the coats I saw were suit coats, and they were all perfectly uniform and tidy, all identical in a row. I put them away in part because the water coming off me would make them messy. I remember the same idea of how when Stephen was being stoned, Paul kept the coats of those doing the stoning...again that idea of keeping one's own coat clean, even while doing work they blindly believe is for God but is actually despicable to Him.
It seems that when the question arises according to the prompt of the Holy Spirit: would you set aside the neat orderliness of things for the sake of repairing a breach--would you allow things to potentially get rather messy if I the Lord your God say it is my will to use that period of disarray and potential pain to make a greater healing a part of the total story, what would ye say?
But here is the passage from Amos:
Amo 2:7
They pant after (trample on) the dust of the earth which is on the head of the poor,
And pervert the way of the humble.
A man and his father go in to the same girl,
To defile My holy name.
Amo 2:8
They lie down by every altar on clothes taken in pledge,
And drink the wine of the condemned in the house of their god.
Amo 2:13
"Behold, I am weighed down by you,
As a cart full of sheaves is weighed down.
Amo 2:14
Therefore flight shall perish from the swift,
The strong shall not strengthen his power,
Nor shall the mighty deliver himself;
Amo 2:15
He shall not stand who handles the bow,
The swift of foot shall not escape,
Nor shall he who rides a horse deliver himself.
Amo 2:16
The most courageous men of might
Shall flee naked in that day,"
Says the LORD.
So I saw all these the other day. Then today, I found not only this idea of garments showing up, but just about all the imagery of these past days synthesized into these couple of chapters:
Interestingly, the staff here called Bands (in red) is the same Hebrew word I've been citing about in its usaga as "pledge" for it is the same word.
Zec 11:7
And I will feed 7462 the flock 6629 of slaughter 2028, [even] you 3651, O poor 6041 of the flock 6629. And I took 3947 unto me two 8147 staves 4731; the one 259 I called 7121 Beauty 5278, and the other 259 I called 7121 Bands 2254 ; and I fed 7462 the flock 6629.
Zec 11:14
Then I cut asunder 1438 mine other 8145 staff 4731, [even] Bands 2254 , that I might break 6565 the brotherhood 264 between Judah 3063 and Israel 3478.
I have more to consider from this chapter from Zechariah, and much from the one that follows it, and from some in Jeremiah, but do not have time right now. Bring me back to this, God.
May we continue to be evidence of this relationship with Thee in all these things:
Pro 20:5
Counsel in the heart of man is like deep water,
But a man of understanding will draw it out.
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