Instructions on the shvi’it (“seventh”), the year of shmitah (“release”) or sabbatical year, are part of a larger teaching in Deuteronomy 14–16 on the Fourth Commandment, to guard the seventh day of the week as a holy memorial. But these instructions on care for the poor and releasing debts during the shmitah show us how the various Shabbat memorials remind us of all God has released us from through Yeshua haMashiakh (Jesus the Christ).
These instructions of “clean” and “unclean” animals connect to a bigger lesson in Deuteronomy 13–14 on the Third Commandment, about blaspheming the Name of the LORD, or making the Name common. “Cleaning” what’s distant from God is the real lesson beyond clean/unclean in Leviticus 11, Deuteronomy 14 and Acts 10.
Daniel Agee leads an exploration into a couple of centuries of the first judges, or leaders, of Israel — Yehoshua (Joshua), Othniel, Ehud and Shamgar — after Moshe (Moses) and at the start of the conquest of Canaan. From the very beginning, Israel allowed itself to be corrupted.
Richard Agee explores the Biblical tests in Deuteronomy 13 for knowing when someone is speaking for God, i.e., is a prophet.
Richard Agee explains that every woman is the representation of the Bride of Messiah Yeshua. In the Garden of Eden the Adversary attacked Eve with intellect to kill the “image of God,” her ability to give birth to the One (Messiah) who would fulfill God’s plan to bring life.
The Psalms of Ascent (שִׁירים הַמַּעֲלוֹת Shirim haMa’alot, Psalms 120-135) are called such because they relate to the ancient practice of publicly singing these songs when going to God’s house in Yerushalayim (Jerusalem). These poems are connected to סוכת Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles, which runs for seven days from the 15th day of the seventh month on the biblical calendar.
People often ask, “How can I know what God wants me to do?” and “What would Jesus do?” Richard Agee explores those questions in a study of John 6-7, in which Messiah Yeshua (Jesus) explains what it means to “do the will of My Father” (John 6:40). Yeshua is the Living Word (John 1:1; John 1:14), the Living Law (Matt. 5:17-20), the Living Torah.