Verse of the Day 7/9

Verse of the Day 7/9?????? ?????? ??????

Joshua 5:9?? Then the??Lord??said to Joshua, ???Today I have rolled away the shame of your slavery in Egypt.??? So that place has been called Gilgal to this day.???? New Living Translation (NLT)

I read today's verse in today's "Today in the Word" devotional which brought to mind the importance of looking into the meaning of names in the Bible which can bring added significance the the verses or passage.?? It was pointed out that the place named Gilgal sounded like the word for "roll" in Hebrew.??

The Jewish people had been slaves in the land of Egypt for going on 400 years.?? They were tired and had been waiting for deliverance from their oppressors.?? Such oppression can lead to many things including depression and hopelessness, burdens that were carried with them and scarred them.?? Chris Rappazini in"Today in the Word" writes, "They could not eliminate what had happened in their past. With God???shelp, however, they could remove the emotional and spiritual burdens they had carried on their flight from Egypt. Verses 10???12 describe another important tradition, the Passover. The next day, they tasted food from their long-awaited Promised Land.

We too can be slaves in this day and age, more commonly to sin in the form of addictions and beliefs that take us captive and cause us to lose hope.?? No matter how long it has gone on there is hope for deliverance from God in the form of Jesus who offers "love, joy, peace, hope"?? (see Galatians 5:22 and the fruit of the Spirit) and many more things when we place our faith and trust in Him.

These thoughts brought me back to a simple chorus that we used to sing in Sunday School in my childhood.?? The words still ring true for His people today, no matter what it is that may?? enslaved them.?? We can't eliminate what has happened in our past, but we too can remove the emotional and spiritual burdens.

Rolled away, rolled away, rolled away,  Every burden of my heart rolled away.  Rolled away, rolled away, rolled away,  Every burden of my heart rolled away.    Every sin had to go,  Neath the crimson flow, HALLELUJAH!  Rolled away, rolled away, rolled away,  Every burden of my heart rolled away.

--   In Christ,  Mike    Folllow the Verse of the Day blog at http://mikesvotd.blogspot.com  Ephesians 1:7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins,  in accordance with the riches of God's grace.  NIV    

Joshua 5:2-9??English Standard Version (ESV)

^2??At that time the??Lord??said to Joshua, ???Make??flint knives and circumcise the sons of Israel a second time.?????^3??So Joshua made flint knives and circumcised the sons of Israel at Gibeath-haaraloth.^[a]??^4??And this is the reason why Joshua circumcised them:??all the males of the people who came out of Egypt, all the men of war, had died in the wilderness on the way after they had come out of Egypt.??^5??Though all the people who came out had been circumcised, yet all the people who were born on the way in the wilderness after they had come out of Egypt had not been circumcised.??^6??For the people of Israel walked??forty years in the wilderness, until all the nation, the men of war who came out of Egypt, perished, because they did not obey the voice of the??Lord; the??Lord??swore to them that he would not let them see the land that the??Lord??had sworn to their fathers to give to us,??a land flowing with milk and honey.??^7??So it was??their children, whom he raised up in their place, that Joshua circumcised. For they were uncircumcised, because they had not been circumcised on the way.

^8??When the circumcising of the whole nation was finished, they remained in their places in the camp until they were healed.??^9??And the??Lord??said to Joshua, ???Today I have rolled away the??reproach of Egypt from you.??? And so the name of that place is called??Gilgal^[b]??to this day.