Sure Hope Gazette

[Gal 4:19-31 NLT] 1 9 Oh, my dear children! I feel as if I'm going through labor pains for you again, and they will continue until Christ is fully developed in your lives. 20 I wish I were with you right now so I could change my tone. But at this distance I don't know how else to help you. 21 Tell me, you who want to live under the law, do you know what the law actually says? 22 The Scriptures say that Abraham had two sons, one from his slave wife and one from his freeborn wife. 23 The son of the slave wife was born in a human attempt to bring about the fulfillment of God's promise. But the son of the freeborn wife was born as God's own fulfillment of his promise. 24 These two women serve as an illustration of God's two covenants. The first woman, Hagar, represents Mount Sinai where people received the law that enslaved them. 25 And now Jerusalem is just like Mount Sinai in Arabia, because she and her children live in slavery to the law. 26 But the other woman, S...

The people cried out against their fellow Israelites because they were worried about the famine or dearth in the King James.  Dearth is Hebrew for  1. famine, hunger  A. famine (in land, nation) i) of Jevhovah's word (fig) B) hunger (of individuals) They mentioned that they had even mortgaged their homes and land in order to buy food. Even the children were being forced, I assume by their parents, into slavery. I think when they say that because their fields and vineyards belong to others, that is why they have had to force their children into bondage - as a form of payment. It is sad to think that in order to eat, children can be used as payment in some degree.  When Nehemiah heard what these people were crying about he talked with the nobles and the rulers and convicted them on their usury. They were using the famine as a  means to gain wealth/slaves from their own people who didn't have the means to repay what they owed. Yet if the people who borr...