Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions Torah

Where everyone knows the Name (Genesis 12)

Where everyone knows the Name: When your legacy depends on moving out on faith (Genesis 12)

In the Torah reading לֶךְ-לְךָ Lech Lecha (Genesis 12–17), we are introduced to Abram (later renamed Abraham) when he is called to leave his hometown to for a new land.

God calls us into community, not only with Him but with His people. This is why He establishes a land, a place of rest where people can focus on fellowship with Him, whether one is in the land or not.

This Promised Land, originally occupied by Abraham, is meant to be a “home” for all of His people. It’s where God put His name, where the Word became flesh, died and rose, and where the King of Kings will return to restore the world to the maker’s specifications.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions Torah

Why ‘living water’ is better than water that destroys (Isaiah 54; Genesis 6–9; 2Peter 3)

Why 'living water' is better than water that destroys: How to get ready for Heaven's reset for you and the world (Isaiah 54; Genesis 6-9; 2Peter 3)

Do you want to be like one who was “taken” in the Flood, washed away (Isa. 54:9–11)? Or do you want to be “left behind” to experience the “living water” pictured as flowing from God’s throne into all the world on the Day of the LORD (Ezek. 47:9, 11–12; Rev. 22:1–2)? 

We are living the time of the second exile — after the resurrection of Messiah Yeshua (Christ Jesus) and after the destruction of the Temple in A.D. 70. The Torah reading נֹחַ Noach (Genesis 6:9–11:32) teaches us to see Heaven’s elephant in our room while we have the time to change.

Categories
Discussions Prophets and Writings Torah

Heaven in our likeness: Adam & Eve’s revolutionary views on God (Genesis 2–3; Isaiah 42)

Adam & Eve's revolutionary views on God: A timeless warning against creating Heaven in our likeness (Genesis 2-3; Isaiah 42)

God made mankind as the pinnacle of creation. He created us to aspire to do things beyond our reach, to learn about the world beyond our horizons and to change our environment.

Men and women are pre-programmed to seek out our purpose in relation to each other and to the world at large. This gives us the ability to either accomplish great good in the world or great evil.

And that’s where the lessons come in from Adam and Eve’s choice between the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of Life, recorded in the Torah reading רֵאשִׁ֖ית Beresheet (“in the beginning,” Gen. 1:1–6:8). We can learn from them to choose the path that leads to life, rather than the one that leads to death.

Categories
Appointments With God Discussions Tabernacles

Don’t let your joy in the spiritual world blind you to the harsh reality of this world

Don't let your joy in the spiritual world blind you to the harsh reality of this world. Split view of a Sukkot sukkah and a crime scene with police tape.

The repetitive cycles of our lives feel pointless. God created the world cyclical, but He did not create cycles of suffering and sin. These cycles seem pointless, but what God has created is never pointless.

From the Bible book of Ecclesiastes and related passages, we learn that our current world is abnormal. This is not the way God created it. It’s only our “normalcy bias” that leads us to assume that these cycles of history, of life and death are normal. Death is an aberration in time, but we have become accustomed to it because we live with it.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions Torah

Got knocked down? You can get up again (Deuteronomy 32–34)

Got knocked down? You can get up again (Deuteronomy 32-34)

The Torah does not end on a high note, but on a solemn one. The final dual reading — הַאֲזִינוּ Ha’azinu (“listen,” Deuteronomy 32) and וְזֹאת הַבְּרָכָה Vezot Haberachah (“and this is the blessing,” Deuteronomy 33–34) — is written so that when the descendants of Israel eventually hit rock bottom, they would see the way back home.

This restoration only is possible by the perfect Atonement offering — the Mashiakh (Christ). This is why we read through the entire Torah over the course of the year and put into practice those things that apply to us.

Categories
Appointments With God Atonement Discussions

Faith meets fullness of mercy in Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement)

Faith meets fullness of mercy in Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) - Leviticus 16

For everyone except Israel’s high priest, the Tabernacle/Temple service of Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) is all about faith — no one else is present there. It takes several layers of faith to believe that what the high priest is doing would heal the rift between Heaven and Earth. So it’s only that Yom Kippur finds its fullness and its enduring lessons-in-practice through faith in Messiah Yeshua (Christ Jesus).

https://hallel.info/atonement-2022/

Categories
Torah readings

Parashot הַאֲזִינוּ Ha’azinu & וְזֹאת הַבְּרָכָה Vezot Haberachah: Deuteronomy 32–34

Studies in Torah

A common misconception about God’s Law is that it’s all about perfection, that it’s unrealistic in a fallen world. Rather, the capstone passages of the Torah — this week’s readings הַאֲזִינוּ Ha’azinu (“listen,” Deuteronomy 32) and וְזֹאת הַבְּרָכָה Vezot Haberachah (“and this is the blessing,” Deuteronomy 33–34) — recounts Israel’s screwups past, present and future as well as the LORD’s mercy and plan for redemption.

It should be no surprise, then, that the final acts of God’s redemption give the “song of Moses” (Deuteronomy 32) double-billing with the “song of the Lamb” (Revelation 15:3) by Yeshua the Messiah (Jesus the Christ).