It’s Thanksgiving weekend in Canada. Many of us are enjoying turkey, stuffing, potatoes, squash, cranberries and pumpkin pie (or in my case, Junior Mints (don’t ask)). Yom Kippur also fell on this weekend, so for many of us it’s a weekend of feasting and fasting.
This week’s blog posting is a bit of a word famine as I’ve decided to swap out a word study for a general tidy up. One month after my husband passed away, in 2021, I stopped updating the the three Word Lists (A-H, I-Q, R-Z) on this website. I just had enough emotional energy to write the blog posting, and that was it. That means I’m three years behind updating those pages, so this week and next week I’m going to get the lists fully up-to-date (I’m more than half way there already).
In the meantime, perhaps you’d like to learn this phrase from Psalm 95:2a:
Let us come into His presence with thanksgiving!
נְקַדְּמָ֣ה פָנָ֣יו בְּתֹודָ֑ה
N-cawd’mah paw’naw b-toe’dah
Be thankful, because when you are in prayer or in worship, you are in His presence! This is a beautiful thing about our faith, God is not a far-off, distant, unreachable, uncaring, deity. YHWH is in our midst; He lives through the Spirit, within us. We are in the presence of our Creator because He wants to be in communion with us… so let us come into His presence with thanksgiving!
Finally, in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I do want to say how thankful I am for all of you, my readers. I really appreciate your encouraging messages and intriguing questions. I may not respond immediately, as I have a lot of emails in a day, but I intend to respond to everyone, when I have the chance!
Happy Thanksgiving to my fellow Canadians and Shalom to one and all!
Next week: The Hebrew Alphabet (Aleph-bet) and the new tidied-up pages
Hebrew Word Lessons 
B-todah
I thank you for all you do to enrich individual and, particularly, communal Bible study.
I especially thank you for your labor of updating the index to your valuable contributions to interfaith dialogue.
I consult your word studies twice weekly, once before meeting with a lay-lead Episcopal Bible study group every Wednesday evening and again before meeting with two Reform Torah Study Groups every Shabbat morning.
I have also relied on your scholarship for enriching my occasional written meditations on the Revised Common Lectionary, posts sent very early every morning to hundreds of subscribers as the best way to start their day.
May you have a sweet year.
Paul Wilson
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Hi Paul,
I’m glad this site is helpful to your ministry… and what a ministry you have! Thank you for the work you do, as well!
Shalom,
Sarah
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