June Newsletter

Hello Church Family,
My schedule in May ended up working quite differently than previous months. The
majority of the month was spent focused on getting our new services through Subsplash up and running. That left little time for doing visitations and other meetings. Bill Berkheiser was busy coaching Cedarville High School’s baseball team, so we were not able to meet much. Brian Croft’s travelling schedule started picking up as well, so my weekly Zoom calls for my Practical Shepherding cohort were moved to every other week. Now that online giving is available and the church app and website close to being finished, I am planning on returning to my normal routines in June.

Why I Say "Yahweh" In the Pulpit

Because I don’t have much to report for this newsletter, I wanted to use this space to answer a question that I have received several times from church members. Some church members have noticed that I am saying something different than what’s on the projector screen on Sunday mornings. For instance, my sermon on Haggai had many repeated uses of the phrase “this is the Lord’s declaration” or “the declaration of the Lord of Armies.” But when I read these passages from the pulpit, I instead would say “this is Yahweh’s declaration” or “the declaration of Yahweh of Armies.” It’s understandable that this would be confusing for some people. So to explain my reasoning, we have to discuss why the Christian Standard Bible (the English translation I use during our services) uses Lord in this passage.

Although Lord appears as early as Genesis 2, its definition comes from Exodus 3. This is the famous “burning bush” story where the God of Israel confronts Moses and calls him to serve as his representative to the Israelites and before Pharaoh. When Moses receives this call, he asks several questions in the hope that he can explain why he is not the best candidate for this position. One of these questions is about how Moses should refer to God when he is speaking with the Israelites:
Then Moses asked God, “If I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what should I tell them?" God replied to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM., This is what you are to say to the Israelites: I AM has sent me to you.” God also said to Moses, “Say this to the Israelites: The Lord, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is my name forever; this is how I am to be remembered in every generation. (Exodus 3:13-15)
God’s first response to Moses is ehyeh asher ehyeh, which is translated as “I AM WHO I AM” by most English translations but could alternatively be translated I AM BECAUSE I AM, or I WILL BE WHO I WILL BE. God then gives a shortened form of this phrase, I AM (ehyeh). God finally gives his covenant name, Lord.

To better understand why the word “Lord” is written in this way, it is important to know how Hebrew is written. Hebrew is written from the right side of the page to the left side. As originally written, Hebrew contains no vowels; words are only comprised by consonants and the pronunciation of words was passed down by tradition. When the Second Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed in 70AD, Jews scattered throughout the Roman Empire seeking refuge. It became more difficult over the centuries to maintain proper pronunciation of words by only passing things down by speech. A group of Jewish scribes called the Masoretes met this challenge by developing written vowels that could indicate proper pronunciation. Rather than writing vowels and consonants side by side as in Greek and English, Hebrew uses a vowel point system where dots and strokes are written underneath the consonants. So, in the phrase I AM WHO I AM, the Hebrew is written as אָהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אָהְיֶה.

This brief history of Hebrew linguistics is necessary because of the challenges raised by the covenant name in the Old Testament. In Hebrew, it is written as יהוה; transliterated into English, it is YHWH. The Hebrew letter yod can be pronounced with a Y sound or a J sound, and the Hebrew letter waw can be pronounced with a W sound or a V sound, so you will sometimes see the covenant name transliterated as JHVH. In the time between the Jews returning from exile in Babylon (529 BC) to Jesus’ birth (likely around 4 or 5 BC), a tradition developed that Jews would not speak the covenant name because they thought of it as too holy to say aloud. So whenever the Old Testament was read in public, the person speaking would say Adonai, or “Lord” in English. The Masoretes carried on this tradition in their written copies of the Old Testament by taking the vowels from Adonai and putting them beneath the consonants YHWH. The reader was supposed to know that whenever they would see those vowels under the covenant name, they should say Adonai as a replacement.

However, this practice of constantly replacing YHWH with Adonai resulted in the proper pronunciation of YHWH being lost to history. Biblical scholars must try to reconstruct the pronunciation from several clues we have within and outside the Bible. First, it was common practice for parents in ancient times to name their children by combining the name of their god with another word. Jews did the same thing. Names like Zechariah, Isaiah, and Elijah all have a yah sound built into the name that serves as an abbreviated form of YHWH. Other words, like hallelujah (“praise Yahweh”), also incorporate the abbreviated form. And second, as stated above, the letter waw can be pronounced with a W sound. Together, these facts suggest that the pronunciation was likely Yahweh. Transliterations of the covenant name into other ancient languages also reflect this pronunciation, increasing the probability that Yahweh is correct.

When Bible translators are forced to choose how to write the covenant name in English, they have a few options. The 1611 King James Version chose to follow the Masoretic tradition of replacing YHWH with Adonai, so in English they chose to write “Lord” in all capital letters to signal that this was an instance of the covenant name. In passages where the biblical author has Adonai and YHWH next to each other, they translated it as Lord GOD. Because of the vast influence of the KJV on the English language, most modern English translations have continued this tradition (CSB, ESV, NIV, NASB, NKJV, NRSV, and many others). In 1901, the American Bible Society decided to release an updated English translation and went a different route. They thought that the vowel points underneath YHWH designed to indicate Adonai were the actual pronunciation of the covenant name, so they translated the name as Jehovah. Many hymns written in the early 20th century incorporate the name Jehovah because of the American Standard Version. Lastly, the translation committee for the Legacy Standard Bible (a 2021 update of the NASB) decided to translate the covenant name with its probable pronunciation. You will see Yahweh used throughout their translation.

With all this background information in place, you can hopefully see why I am comfortable saying Yahweh in the pulpit. I think it valuable for people to hear the actual covenant name Yahweh spoken in worship gatherings. It is clear from Numbers 6:22-27 and Deuteronomy 6:4-9 that the Israelites spoke the covenant name in public during their times of worship. The tradition of saying Adonai instead appeared very late in their history. I don’t believe it is “using God’s name in vain” to say it publicly in our Sunday morning services. Therefore, I plan on saying Yahweh whenever I see Lord appear in the text we are reading together. If you have any further questions about this topic, or any other biblical or theological questions that you would like me to discuss, please let me know and I am happy to address them in future newsletters!

Thank you church family for your kindness and support. Celeste and I are thankful for everyone who showed up to Pierce’s first birthday party at the end of the month. You all have been very sweet and supportive with him, and we are happy to call Union Baptist our home.

Blessings to you all,
Pastor Nathan
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