Create

I've been getting a daily devotional in my email inbox for awhile now. Most days, it's exactly what I need to hear. God is just good like that.

Here's how it works: we pick a portion of scripture - a book of the Bible, a Psalm, a couple select passages - and we walk through them step by step asking ourselves questions like:
Who wrote this?
Who was it written it to?
What was the current environment?
What is the purpose/theme of these verses?
Are there any words or ideas that repeat themselves?
And most importantly, we have learned to ask the question: How is this applicable to my life?

There are message boards and discussion groups you can get in on, but I usually just study it on my own and listen to other interpretations and such.

Lately, we've been in Genesis. In my limited Biblical knowledge, I thought the word "Create" simply meant "to make". As I learned on Monday, there are actually 4 versions of the Hebrew word "create":
1. Bara (said like "Buh-rah") - which means to form from nothing
2. Asah (said like "Ah-sah") - to make from something existing
3. Yatsur (said like "Yat-sir") - to form
4. Kun (said like "Coon") - to establish

Then, after we walked through all of the different meanings of the word "create", the devotional leader (a successful US pastor) had us flip over from "When God created..." in Genesis to Psalm 51:10, a passage of the Bible that was written by David. At this point in his life, he had seen Bathsheba on the rooftop and had her brought to him despite the fact that she was married. When she got pregnant with his child, he had her husband sent to the front lines of battle so he would die and David could take Bathsheba as his own and "cover up" what he had done. David is at the point where he is finally "breaking" under the weight of all of his wrongs, so he cries out to God with these words:
Create in me a clean heart, O God.
Renew a right spirit within me.
Do not cast me from your presence,
and don’t take your Holy Spirit from me.

As I learned, in the original language of Hebrew, this particular mention of "create" that David used was the "bara" version of the word which means "to form from nothing". I sat there with chills as I realized that David was asking that God not use any of his old self or old nature but to change him completely by using new parts. David didn't want any part of his former self. Not even recycled parts; he didn't ask God to "asah" or "create from existing", he asked him to "bara" or "create from nothing". To create brand new.

Oh, I have chills now just writing about it again and I sit here wishing that this didn't lose so much impact as I try to translate it from my experience into the written word. All I can tell you is that I'm dying to have all of the parts of myself that are old, displeasing, and ugly; the parts of me that don't honor God removed and tossed away. I want it replaced with the brand new!

Bara in me a clean heart, Oh Lord...