Open My Eyes… that I Can Understand
April 20, 2013 ~ Iyar 10, 5773
Day 25 of Omer
~~~
Torah Parashahs for today are Acharei Mot (After the death) starting in Vayikra (Leviticus) 16:1, and K’doshim (Holy People) starting in 19:1.
We aren’t going to do them today… but I am sure what we do will relate.
~~~
~~~
~~
Sh’ma
~~
Open My Eyes… that I Can Understand…
….A beginning to understand the Ruach HaKodesh
*
Two weeks ago I commented that something has changed in the Spirit… that darkness has increased…
It seemed that everyone I knew and saw has hard hard things going on… it was like every demon that seemed to be affecting lives… was stirred up…
And then we have the crisis of the Boston Marathon…
That incident moved many people… (especially the people that were at the bomb sights)…. right out of their normal time space continuum into a place where there is no logic…
Like when things are difficult in my life… I ask Kevin… “just tell me it is going to be okay.”… I don’t care what it looks like… if he says “they are going to be okay”… then I am fine… or at least better…
Someone in this “different place”… can hear most anything and believe it….
For example – if all the power on the east coast went out at one time… that would be a huge crisis… and if it was for any length of time… it would be more deadly than this week’s bombs in Boston…
And if we told people – who were moved out of the comfortable/normal time space continuum… “ mouse chewed one cord… and that is why”… they would be happy with that answer.
*
Well, several things have occurred to me this week….
1. Our “normal” just got moved a bit closer to people who live in the middle east… where bombs are reality…
And
2. What if… when YHWH created the world… HE created a “normal” – a time-space continuum for man…. And as long as we follow him… we are in that…. But when we step out… b/c of not keeping Torah / His instructions… we accept anything as the answer… b/c we don’t know what truth is any longer….
This is pretty significant concept when we look at persons around us… involved in the popular religion of our culture… and when we consider and make choices on how to live.
*
This week – after the bombing… I was asked to read an article by a chaplain… I did.
It was a fairly well written article about the privileges of being white… and listed in a large paragraph, a lot of the historically “bad” white people… and then commented that probably nobody would be looking for a Caucasian person as a suspect in Boston…
I told him I agreed with much of the article…
And then I pointed to the large paragraph of names… and I said…
“The other side is that probably nobody in this list, is part of a religion who believes – whose book – says that if they kill certain people, then they will go to ‘heaven’.”
His tone changed and asked if I could find a reference for that…
I said I could but don’t have it off the top of my head… Then said… “I have 4 dvds that I could let you borrow that explain this, if you are interested.”
His response … “I wouldn’t be interested in that.”
Within less than one minute he had emailed me a link to an article I did not read, but based on the title.. the article’s point was … the Koran is misinterpreted… and where people think it says “kill” – it says “convert”.
… Now I know this person sees Allah as the same as YHWH… and we know that could not be further from the truth!! – All one has to do is read the Word of YHWH to understand this…
Oh but wait….
The point of me sharing this chaplain story is… This is a person who is out of YHWH’s time-space continuum… plan / instructions/ Torah… and so he accepts anything that “feels good” to him – as truth…
When in fact, b/c he is out of YHWH’s plan… he has no way to accurately decide what is true…b/c TRUTH is a person and TRUTH is the WORD of YHWH….
And without that we accept anything….
*
All this said… to say – Where do you live?
In what YHWH says or in the world with what feels good??
**
But let’s look at that further… and may we have eyes to SEE.
Amein.
**
Remember that we have talked about 4 ways to read/process/ understand the Word…
Open Block Logic = PRDS
1. Peshat = simple; story; just what it says
2. Remez = like someone winking… a deeper meaning below the surface
3. Drash = discussion; midrash; comparing and relating and contrasting with other scriptures
4. Sod = secret level; prophetic insight; looks for reoccurring patterns
*
Drash = dalet, resh, shin
Drash is where we get the word…Midrash .
*
Those of you who are parents… have you ever lost one of your little children, even for a moment?
(Tell story of losing Paxson in a store… out the front door is a busy road and literally out the back door is steps down to a boat dock on a very flooded rushing river!)
The word Midrash is like that…
Midrash= thoroughly seek something out – a diligent search for something: desperate for something…
... Like a parent searching desperately for a lost child.
This is what YHWH is looking for from His people ...
… Thoroughly seeking HIM out… making a diligent search for HIM…
…Desperate for Him…
Searching for Him with the passion and intensity of a parent searching for a lost child.
This search – the search for a lost child is diligent constantly… until that child is found…
Is that how we search for him… or do other things distract us?
Midrash appears 2 times in Scripture:
Divrei-Hayamim Bet (2 Chron) 13:22 cjb p 1197 “commentary”in cjb and “story” in kj = midrash
Divrei-Hayamim Bet (2 Chron) 24:27 cjb p 1207 – “commentary” = midrash
In the greek – that word is Biblion … which is where we get the word ”bible” from.
Imagine… the word “bible” comes from the Greek word Biblion and the Hebrew word Midrash…. Which means it is like saying…
Here is this book… it is something that you Midrash… you pursue YHWH in here .. like a parent pursuing a lost child… never stopping, never tiring.. always looking… always with this book as your focus… b/c YOUR desire must be YHWH! – Imagine if we were told that when someone first handed us a Bible!!
Imagine still greater, if this is how we lived now!!
If Torah is the book of life… then certainly I must be pursuing it with everything that I am!!
The world is getting darker… and if I am not standing on the Word… as they say… I will fall for anything….
Is this where you live – in the midrash… running after HIS TORAH?!!
AMEIN!
Brad Scott said he speaks to hundreds of people at a time… and usually 4-5 will ask about how to study the Word… and he will tell them… and they will follow up and email him and some will get the books and actually begin to study… but the other 95… well, they don’t. hmm
*
Hosea 10:12 cjb p 718 – “If you sow righteousness for yourselves, you will reap according to grace. Break up unused ground for yourselves, because it is time to seek YHWH till he comes and rains down righteousness upon you.”
“seek” = derash… pursue with all that is in us!
Are we??
Mikhah 6:8 cjb p 755 “Human being, you have already been told what is good, what YHWH demands of you – no more than to act justly, love grace and walk in purity with your God.”
= “ demands” = derash = diligently seeks of me…
= He is seeking us diligently expecting and desiring us to seek him diligently!
In the Greek - derash is = paideia = “instruction” in B’rit Chadashah (NT)
2 Tim 3:16 cjb p 1488 “All scripture (Torah) is God-breathed and is valuable for teaching the truth, convicting of sin, correcting faults and training in right living;
- “training” = instruction, == derash
**~~**
Let’s talk about two other words before we get to the Ruach…
(this is largely from Brad Scott’s “Words mean things”)
Shaar and Shagar – family words in Hebrew
Shaar = The Hebrew word for remnant =
Yah always has a remnant… and that always refers to those who are “true believers”
Remnant in Hebrew = Shaar = Shin, aleph, resh
= literally means== “that which remains”
- Remains in what? … in the Torah and the ways of Yah as opposed to wondering away to another god or another messiah or another set of rules.
1st occurrence of Shaar =
Gen 7:23 cjb = “was left” – remained = shaar
Yesha’Yahu (Is) 4:3 cjb p 441 “Those left in Tziyon and remaining in Yerushalayim will be called holy, and everyone in Yerushalayim written down for life.”
= describing those who remain steadfast and faithful in the ways of Yah b/c Yah’s ways are from the east and Tziyon is the epitome of the east…
…not saying just those THERE….
…but ….those who remain in his instructions/ Torah.
Yesha’Yahu (Is) 10:20-22 cjb p 452 “remnant” = shaar
Yirmeyahu (Jer) 23:3 cjb p 586 -“… I will gather what remains of my flock …”
Remains = the remnant = shaar
Vayikra (Lev) 18:6 cjb p 130 “a close relative” = shaar = one who remains…remnant = Shaar
B’Midbar (Numb) 27:11 cjb p 182 – “closest relative” = shaar – one who remains/ the remnant
Shaar (remnant) = translated into 3 greek words =
1. Okaos
Ephes 2:19 cjb p 1460– household of Yah = Okaos = shaar.
2. Catalayman = Romans 9:27 cjb p 1412 = catalayman = “remnant” shall be saved…
=There will be all those out there calling themselves Isra’el, but only a remnant won’t turn from Yah and His instructions.
3. Loipos = Rev 12:17 cjb p 1544 = Loipos = rest of her children = remnant of her seed – those who keep Torah and have Messiah.
**
I ask you again…
Where do you live??
In YHWH’s time space continuum / Torah or the ways of this world?
Do you see.. where you live has great effect on what is ahead for you??!!
**
Luke 15:11- 32 cjb p 1314
For most of my life, I believed that I certainly was not the prodigal who left and didn’t listen and squandered all the Father had given…
But….
The prodigal son - is the shaar ===
= the remnant that came back…
- Think about this for a moment with what we have learned about the 2 kingdoms… and where most of us fit in that…
- We who were not keeping Torah – are the prodigals!
… But… since he came back he shares the inheritance as his brother does!
Funny how we read the Bible as – others are the bad guy … but not me…. Turns out… wow… I am the prodigal!
Praise Yah I can come back/ return to where I came from!!
You are the prodigal!!
Praise Yah you can return to where you came from!!
**
Now lets look briefly at shaagr
Shaagr = has ayin instead of aleph =shin, ayin, resh.
It means “gates”, but literally this word means = “to complete a transaction.”
Well why is this important to us??
B’resheet 19:1 cjb p 17 “The two angels came to S’dom that evening, when Lot was sitting at the gate (shaagr) of S’dom, Lot saw them, got up to greet them and prostrated himself on the ground.”
The elders went to/ sat at the gates to make transactions and settle debts.
Interesting that this says that Lot was probably an elder of S’dom.
What we need to know about cities with walls in those days…
There was one large gate – for anyone…
And there was a small gate- or - narrow gate – where elders sat – and you settled your business /your accounts/ your debts there…
-Messiah said enter narrow gate… to settle your accounts….
Settle your accounts with Messiah…and don’t use the wide gate.
At the wide gate, there is no settling of accounts with Messiah…
And a lot of people are going in that gate!
But the remnant will go in the narrow gate!
See why Shaar and Shaagr are related??
**
Where do you live? Have you settled your accounts at the narrow gate with Messiah?...
**
{Other scripture about gates…Gen 22:17 “gate of his enemies” “cities” in cjb; Ex 20:10 “strangers in thy gates”; IS 60:18 “gates, praise”; Amos 5:15 “gates”;Prov 31:23 – elders at the gates; Psalm 24:7,9 “gates”; Deut 16:18}
We’ve already been through the narrow gate and had our debts settled with Y’shua… J
Matt 7:13 cjb p 1231 “Go in through the n arrow gate; for the gate that leads to destruction is wide and the road broad, and many travel it; 14 but it is a narrow gate and a hard road that leads to life, and only a few find it. (“life” = zoe; “a few find it”=tamim = those spiritually mature.)
Rev 21:12 cjb p 1554 “It had a great, high wall with 12 gates; at the gates were 12 angels; and inscribed on the gates were the names of the 1w tribes of Isra’el.”
walls = IS 30 describes those walls as salvation = praise…
12 gates into this place… they are the 12 tribes.
-- The word “names” is supplied/added… in.. .
So it really says --- the GATES ARE the 12 Tribes!
- So the “gate” is the remnant – the ones that have the Torah and the testimony of Y’shua…
Scott says… of Shaar – the remnant and Shaagr …
… there is a clear relationship between spelling, and meaning of these two words and how they are used with each other throughout scripture….
Shaar = remnant and Shaagr = gates… go together!
John 10 :1-3 cjb p 1343
The shepherd goes through the gate…the gate keeper opens the gate for him….
….The remnant has a right to go through the gate b/c they have remained in the ways of Yah.
**
Let’s talk about another Word…
Leb = Heart
Leb = lamid and a bet = literally means ”to collectively bring to one certain place”… “to bring things that are scattered and broken back into one-ness.”
All words about holy = mean about “oneness”.
Leb also translated in English in the Tanakh as “mind”… but Yah says HEART.
Everything comes from the heart.
Yah has never had his people respond to anything other than the heart… he always starts with the heart.
Lamed = shepherds staff…
=That which leads and guides you… the heart
Sh’ma….
Hear O Isra’el…
“Love YHWH your God with all your heart…with all your soul and with all your might….”
Yah doesn’t put heart first here by coincidence… He always begins with the heart…
b/c if I love him with all my heart I will love him with all my soul and all my might…
…Which is why Y’shua says this is the greatest commandment….
This is important…
What comes out of me is from my heart!!!
What doing on outside is always an expression of what is going on in the inside…
Matt 12:35 cjb p 1238 “The good person brings forth good things from this store of good, and the evil person brings forth evil things from his store of evil.”
It always begins from the heart = why Sh’ma is so precious.
Again.. I ask you… where do you live??... In YHWH’s time space continuum or in the world’s?
If you are not sure… just look at your actions…b/c your actions indicate what is in your heart….
That will tell you.
** **
So we have talked about …
The idea that people “live” in a certain mindset… they live in a “place” that is reasonably comfortable to them… or at least where they choose…
It is either in YHWH’s instructions/ Torah – or the world’s.
And if they live in YHWH’s Torah – they can see.
If they don’t – they are blind and will accept any idea that comes along.
*
We looked at derash – and learned that it is to search/ run passionately hard after… as though looking for a lost child.. . absolutely and completely desperate and of single focus…
Do you live in midrash/derash??
*
We learned that shaar is = remnant = those who keep torah and have Y’shua… and that they are small group… and they go in the narrow gate…
And we learned that a brother/sister word to shaar is shaagr… which is gates….
We must consider if we are part of the remnant – and if we have settled our accounts with Y’shua and are going in the narrow gate or NOT… b/c the world is going in a broad / wide gate…. With no accounts settled…. And they do not meet the definition of remnant.
*
And we talked briefly about what is the condition of your heart?...
That what we do – demonstrates what is in our hearts….
And how that measures where we “live”… in Yah’s Torah or the world’s where we accept anything as truth.
*** ~~**~~**~~**~~**~~
All that to get ready to consider The Ruach HaKodesh…
Because we are going on a mission… and before we go… we need to know who we are and where we “live”…
In YHWH’s plan or in the world with the world -- hasatan’s directions…
Because it is one or the other… it can’t be both…
And before we talk much about the Ruach HaKodesh – the Holy Spirit – we need to understand some things about YHWH….
*
In the Messianic – the Holy spirit – the Ruach HaKodesh is not talked much about…
Well, it is time…
Yochanan 4:23- 24 cjb p 1334 “But the time is coming – indeed, it’s here now – w hen the true worshippers will worship the Father spiritually and truly, for these are the kind of people the Father wants worshipping him. 24 God is spirit; and worshippers must worship him spiritually and truly.”
So….
Christianity tends to spiritualize YHWH… I can say… “the Spirit said”… and nobody can prove anybody wrong.
Ie… What it means to be filled and walking with the Spirit… is based on a model of the western Christian church – rather than on the Word!
And that model of the church’s says… that the spirit is ambiguous and doesn’t have any rules.
We can understand that there are rules in the Tanakh … but then we were taught by Christianity – that we didn’t need to keep the rules anymore!
Instead of understanding that we should do what Y’shua said and did… we learned in Christianity that we don’t have to, and we can just be “led by the spirit!”… and we somehow get taught the idea that “there are no rules with the Holy Spirit!”
Besides that… we are taught that the people of the Tanakh – well at least most of them.. didn’t even have the Ruach HaKodesh!
One of the things we need to understand is that …
In Greek thinking = things are either “this” or “that” .. they are “one” or “the other”… and THAT IS ALL.
Greek thinking is “either/or”…
Either speaking in tongues is of hasatan or … you have to speak in tongues to be saved… no other options… “this or that”!
Brad Scott says… it’s like these 2 options…
1. You can look at a picture of the American presidents (b/c that is fun!) or
2. You can go to Cancun for spring break…. b/c there are no rules there.
Yochanan 3:1-15 story of Nakdimon…
Vs 6 “What is born from the flesh is flesh, and what is born from the Spirit is spirit.”
So we can conclude that the Torah is flesh… a Jewish thing… and BAD…
And that Spirit is how “the church” operates…”
BUT this is NOT what Y’shua was saying!
He was really contrasting being born of the world by a physical seed… as opposed to the seed of heavenly Father, by His Word…
In the parable of the sower… the seed is the Word of YHWH.
Y’shua goes on to say to Nikdimon…”If you people don’t believe me when I tell you about the things of the world, how will you believe me when I tell you about the things of heaven?”
*
Kadosh = kof, dalet, shin == “holy” = only in Hebrew do we see the picture of what it means to be kadosh = “to separate out”… to be set apart…
… this is action … and the Spirit is about action!
Ruach HaKodesh =describes the creator when he is DOING something!!
The Ruach… the Holy Spirit – describes when YHWH does something!!
The first occurrence of HS = Gen 1:2 - “and the Spirit of God hovered over the surface of the water.”
The Spirit is not separate from YHWH – it is Him.
The purpose of the Ruach HaKodesh – by being in us… is to actively motivate us to follow him and to give us the strength and wisdom to carry on and do so!... to separate us and cause us to be HOLY.
Scott says…”Without spirit of Yah in us, all we have is the spirit o f man.”
1 Corin 2 – Shaul is talking about spirit of man.
Man has unique ability --b/c of spirit of man in him…( which the rocks and flowers don’t) – to invent things…. so we can do the things of man.
The spirit of YHWH is given to man to know the things of YHWH…
if we don’t have His Spirit in us, then we react to things the way the world teaches us to react… and we live the way the world teaches us….
IF we don’t have the Spirit of YHWH in us… then we can’t possibly be living in His time-space continuum… his plans… His Torah…
And you can be absolutely certain that if we don’t have His Spirit in us… then we run around accepting whatever lie the world wishes to tell us.
*
Another mission of the Ruach HaKodesh is to separate things.
Kadosh = Kof- dalet- shin
Ka = the sun rising over the back of the head… but that the sun is behind us…
Dosh = thrashing floor.
So Kadosh = that which follows or is behind the threshing floor…… agricultural – as with all Hebrew words!
So when farmer brings harvest – that which fell to floor was good and chaff was blown by wind…
The good part of the wheat followed the thrashing floor and was kadosh.
*
The Ruach is the idea that you experience the results of it….but you cannot see it….only the effects of it!
Something unseen is being described by something we can relate/ see.
So can you understand why hasatan wants to corrupt what I can see?
This is one of the major reasons why Torah given.. even though Torah created and sustains universe….
Physicists say … “Whatever created the universe, sustains the universe.”
Who knew?!! - this is exactly what the Word says over and over again!
But … man takes things that are about the reality of the universe and they turn it into a theological issue!
Ie - They took the torah and made it a theological issue.. ie should we keep it or not?
The reality is … that to even ask “Should we be keeping Torah – is like asking … should we be breathing!”
George Barna :
Although most all Americans claim to be Christians …
….less than one out of ten …..(Scott believes it is much less) –
demonstrates such knowledge through their actions. “
I find it interesting that I already said to you… based on the Word, the Ruach HaKodesh describes the ACTION of YHWH…
Seems like I might be implying that … if your actions don’t line up with the Word/ the Torah… then there isn’t any Spirit of YHWH in your heart!
Hmm…
Barna said….. These people have an intellectual assent to things written in the scriptures … but their actions do not demonstrate that they understand the Word.
We were raised in system to learn ABOUT Noach and ABOUT Jacob etc…
….but now Father is restoring all things…
….. that we may know “their hearts”…
Mal’Akhi 4:6 cjb p 90 “he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the hearts of the children to their fathers…”
Again – we have often said that this is not families getting along… this is about we the children turning back and living what the Patriarchs did – back to Torah! Amein!
Barna goes on to say that the patterns of his poll results suggest that parent’s are not focused on guiding their children to have a biblical world view… (because they don’t have one themselves!) and that schools and church’s are not teaching a biblical world view ( to see the world as YHWH says).
What does this mean for what we have been studying?...
It means that children are not being taught that there are two basic time-space continuums… / ways of being in this world…
--- you can follow YHWH’s instructions/ Torah –
--- or you can follow the pagan ways of the world and accept anything you like as truth… You will not be free and you will not be able to see or understand Truth.
*
Where do you live??
Bombs blew up this week… in this country… and there will be “answers” and someone declared “guilty”… you watch and see how those “answers” make sense…
I guarantee you – they won’t … but people in the world… who have been shocked in the place that they live.. will accept any answer…
And it will all go away…
But one of the things that happened on Monday in Boston…
Was to make our nation a little more like the rest…
Maybe now some of us are starting to get – that at any time… things can change…
Evil is getting darker in this world…
And if we choose – we can live in YHWH’s continuum where HIS light is getting brighter… and we can see the things of this world even more clearly…
But there is no middle ground…
Your sold out – intensely , passionately pursuing HIM… or you aren’t.
You live alive and alert and thankful for each moment…
Seeing the sheep for the sheep …
….and the wolves – even in sheep’s clothing … for the wolves….
Seeing and knowing what is going on around you… and knowing who really is in charge… not being in fear… and not being blind…
But trusting HIM… knowing that YHWH is in charge, YHWH is on the throne… YHWH is in control…
This is your invitation… to run passionately after HIM – eyes wide open and fixed on HIM…. An invitation to move ..
Maybe you have left the world’s pagan continuum…
But you haven’t decided how passionately you want to pursue HIM.
I invite you to midrash…. To search for HIM with all the passion and intensity and desperation that you would your lost child….
b/c there is no time to do anything less….
Your life depends on it….
And HIS light in this dark world depends on it.
AMEIN.
No comments:
Post a Comment