A Word for 2014 | Seth – Continuing, yet Beginning Again

“And Adam knew his wife again; and she bare a son, and called his name Seth: For God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew.” Genesis 4:25

When the Bible recounts the lineage of Adam neither Cain nor Abel is mentioned but Seth, (Genesis 5:3). Why, because God only counts the new, just like our new creation. “Remember ye not the former things, neither consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing,” Isaiah 43:18-19

Seth, whose name means “substitute” or “a continuance” taken from the Hebrew root “sheeth” word meaning “to appoint,”  was born to Adam and Eve after they had disobeyed God in the garden and after Cain killed Abel.

God appointed another to take the place of what was supposed to be realized through Abel. 

Just like Eve, you can start over as if from the beginning but in actuality continuing on with God with another chance. You can’t go back but you can go forward. God can wipe away your past and change your future.

The Bible speaks of Jacob who labored fourteen years for Rachael before God released him to move forward. He was born a trickster, a supplanter, as one who circumvented the right way for his way. He was supposed to come out the womb after his twin brother Esau but he pulled the heel of Esau and went before him. This is how Jacob lived his life.

When Jacob fled his parent’s home after obtaining his brother’s birthright in the same way he got everything else he was still a trickster. When he got to his uncle Laban’s house where he met  the love of his life Rachael, his uncle began to trick him; making marry both daughters – first Leah then Rachel and labor for fourteen years for what he had promised in the beginning would only be seven years.

It was during this time that Jacob learned to depend on God and to stop his own supplanting ways. When the time finally came for him to leave Laban’s house there came a point in his journey where he met with the angel of God and wrestled all night long.

The same persistence that he once used to supplant others was now working for him in his fight for the Lord to bless him. The Lord blessed him with a name change because his character had changed, Israel – he who has power with God and man and prevails. The Lord also gave him a limp so he would always remember that God power supersedes our best efforts. (read Genesis 32)

Once he had prevailed in the right way with Laban not using cunning and crafting but depending on God, and then prevailed with God he was ready to begin again, to continue the path to his promise land, to start afresh with a new name and new outlook, a new hope and a new future and the blessings of God with the confidence of one who knew how to prevail.

Beloved, have you been through a season or seasons of God working things out of you? Know that He was also working things out for you. If at first we don’t succeed, God will place us in life training to prepare us for a new beginning.

God has us appointed a substitute, another chance not only because it has been two season – 14 years from the year 2000 but for many of us those 14 years were a time of testing by trials. But it put us in a place where we were able to learn how to prevail without trying to circumvent the process of God. Now, Beloved, we have been made ready to be released into the appointed season, as if it were a new beginning, however it really just the continuance of His grace.

Double for your trouble – Release,  Recovery, Restoration.

 Ready. Set. Begin!