The Comforter
THE COMFORTER
“And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may be with you forever,” (John 14:16)
I started writing about comfort today, not realizing at the time that it is actually Shabbat Nachamu (Sabbath of Comfort) today. Wow! How cool is that! I believe God has a Word to speak to us about comfort today.
God has promised that He would not leave us as orphans in this world; but would send us the Holy Spirit as a ‘comforter’. How desperately we need comfort in this uncomfortable world in which we inhabit outside the Garden of Eden where trouble and tribulations abound. The Hebrew word for comfort is naham נחם
Noah’s Hebrew name, Noach, נֹחַ means comfortable. Noach would somehow bring comfort to the world. “ Lamech lived one hundred and eighty-two years, and had a son. And he called his name Noach, saying, “This one will comfort us concerning our work and the toil of our hands, because of the ground which the LORD has cursed.” (Genesis 5:28-29)
Other derivatives of this root word are: To comfort, to console, give ease, alleviate discomfort, and make comfortable.
God calls us, through the prophet Isaiah, to comfort His people, Israel:
Nahamu, nahumu Ami (Comfort, comfort My people), says your God. ( Isaiah 40:1)
נַחֲמוּ נַחֲמוּ, עַמִּי--יֹאמַר, אֱלֹהֵיכֶם.
Yeshua actually carried out a great deal of his ministry in a place called KFAR NAHUM,
which means ‘Village of Comfort’. You may know its English translation: Capernaum. It was a small town chosen to be the center of Yeshua’s three-year ministry after leaving Nazareth.
It was in this village (kfar) of comfort (nahum) that Yeshua healed a man possessed by an unclean spirit. He also healed Peter’s mother-in-law of a fever (Luke 4:38-39), healed the servant of a Roman centurion (Matthew 8:5), as well as healing the paralytic man whose friends brought him to the feet of Jesus (Mark 2:1-12 and Luke 5:17-26). Healing brings comfort; it alleviates our pain and distress.
God is interested in comforting us; He is called ‘The God of all comfort. He also wants us to comfort or console others with the same comfort He has given us.
” Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Yeshua the Messiah, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.” (2 Corinthians 1:3-4)
I would like to share with you my personal experience of being comforted after the death of my son, Clayton Jacob, in hopes that it will in some way comfort your heart.
My first - born son, Clayton Jacob Stockford, was born on March 4th 1981. His grandfather predicted that he would ‘march forth’ into the world in a mighty way.
That probably would have been true; except that the enemy seeks only to steal, kill and destroy; and his plan of destruction came to pass in my son’s life in a terrible way. He died, alone in his apartment, at the age of 36 on December 2nd, 2017. His body was not found until several days later by the building caretaker.
Our relationship had been strained to say the least, since my divorce and his subsequent drug use during his teenage years set into motion events that could not be reversed no matter how many tears were shed or how many times I said I was sorry.
He dropped out of school after grade nine (even though he was incredibly brilliant and had aspirations of becoming a brain surgeon). He tested 99.9 percentile in IQ tests and was not only a highly gifted individual; but also had a knack for making people laugh.
