Author: Jeff

Categories
Apostolic Writings Appointments With God Chanukah Discussions Prophets and Writings Torah

It’s all about Yeshua: Multilayered message of God’s Living Temple of hope for humanity

Yeshua/Jesus cleanses the Temple of money changers and merchants. (Photo by LUMO project via Freebibleimages.org.)

It used to be common to ask, “What would Jesus do?” Well, why did Yeshua visit God’s House on an extrabiblical Jewish festival — Chanukah — to make one of the most startling statements about God’s love for humanity? Why did the “disciple whom Iesous loved” record it? Rather than focus on layers upon layers of manmade tradition about a winter celebration of the birth of Yeshua, let’s dig through a number of layered messages that actually are in the Bible about God’s dedicating of a Living Temple — the Messiah — among humanity that could never again by left desolate or destroyed.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions Prophets and Writings

Luke 20:17-18: Don’t mock the Rock: The standards of God’s Chief Cornerstone

Jeff

Before delving into Yeshua’s battles with the leadership of the Temple recorded in Luke 20-21, let’s explore the quote from the Hebrew Scriptures in Luke 20:17-18, that God’s true Temple would have at its foundation a Chief Cornerstone that the leadership would reject. A cryptic “hearing but not hearing” message from God in Isaiah 28 about this Stone holds a key to these arguments between Yeshua and the leadership.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions Prophets and Writings

Luke 20:1-19: Yeshua tells parables of vineyard and figs against leadership of Israel

Jeff

“What did you know, and when did you know it?” That could have been what Yeshua asked the experts in God’s words upon their challenging of His authority to teach as and what He did. Instead, Yeshua reached into their “toolbox” — Torah, Prophets and Writings — and revealed that not only were some of their “tools” rusty from neglect but also neglected maintenance left them in danger of a catastrophic failure of the machinations they created about God’s Anointed One.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions

Luke 19:45-48: Yeshua relays prophecies that God’s ‘house of prayer’ would become a ‘den of robbers’

Jeff

Yeshua’s excited anger at the leaders of the Temple came with quotations from prophets Yeshayahu (Isaiah) — “My house will be house of prayer for all nations” (Isa. 56:7) — and Yirmeyahu (Jeremiah) – “den of robbers” (Jer. 7:11). The full context of those prophecies directly relates to why the leaders should have understood why Yeshua was quoting from those passages and why those prophecies applied to them.

Categories
Appointments With God Discussions Tabernacles The Eighth Day

Shmini Atseret (convocation of the Eighth Day) pictures new beginnings

Studies in Torah

The common name for the day following seven days of Sukkot (Festival of Tabernacles) is Shmini Atseret in Hebrew, or “Assembly of the Eighth (Day).” The day also is called Simchat Torah, Hebrew for “joy of the Torah,” based on the centuries old practice in synagogues of restarting the cycle of Torah readings at that time.

Shmini Atseret is a bookend to the miqra qodesh on the first day of Sukkot. Its place following Sukkot suggests that God wants to memorialize what is planned for when the time period of “wandering” in these mortal bodies and rebellious minds finally comes to an end, and humankind enters total lasting “rest.”

Categories
Apostolic Writings Appointments With God Discussions Firstfruits Passover Pentecost/Shavuot Prophets and Writings Tabernacles The Eighth Day Torah Trumpets Unleavened Bread

God’s appointments with humankind gain meaning over time – not obsolescence

A number of theologians have wondered publicly if the festivals of the LORD are relevant for today or are just historical or intellectual curiosities. Many dismiss Sukkot as either a harvest festival only applicable in the Land of Israel or only relevant with a standing temple. Let’s explore what the Bible says about the past, present and future layers of meaning in these annual appointments and how they teach us about the Messiah and ourselves.

We will look at the different layers of the festivals: past, present and future.

In a sense, they are like a wedding anniversary, on which the couple remembers all the experiences layered on top of one another since the cutting of that first wedding cake.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions

Luke 19:29-40, part 2: Donkeys in Scripture point to Messiah’s entry to Yerushalayim

Yeshua's triumphant entry into Jerusalem. Photo via Creative Commons license from www.lumoproject.com

There is so much emphasis in Luke 19:29-40 about Yeshua’s riding into Yerushalayim (Jerusalem) on a donkey that had never carried a burden and about the proclamation, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD.” That donkey’s first burden was a profound burden, and we see throughout Scripture a number of donkeys carrying important burdens that prophetically point toward that triumphal entry.