Category: A Drash to Start the Day

His Presence is Always Present

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In the Manual we read about God’s presence. There was the time He decided to go down and see what was happening in Sodom and Gomorrah, He also went down to see what the humans were doing at Babel, His presence filled the Tabernacle and the Temple, and how many times have there been when you were worshipping and you felt the presence of the Lord all around you?

It’s really nice, isn’t it? For me, I feel spiritually relaxed, unburdened and often I cry: the tears just come all on their own. Tears of joy, of comfort and of peace.

The problem is that it doesn’t last. We feel His presence, we can actually even sense His touch: that sort of chill that goes through you. I remember when I first experienced that as the Ruach haKodesh (Holy Spirit) physically entered me. I felt totally ethereal, like I was spirit. It happened about 18 years ago, and it still gets to me, emotionally and physically. I still get all teary-eyed when retelling it.

Whenever we feel His presence it is wonderful. Why then don’t we feel it all the time? After all, God is omnipresent, is He not? That means that He doesn’t really “go down” to anywhere- He is already there. God is always right here, just a hand’s reach away from us, ready to grab us as we fall or hold us back when we go rushing into disaster.

His presence is always present, so why don’t we always feel it? The truth is painfully simple: we can’t come into His presence because we are too into ourselves. The Holy Spirit may live within us, but we have to give it more room if we want to feel it more often. A small paper cut on the finger will hurt when we get it, and then we get used to the pain and it seems that it no longer hurts, until we get lemon juice in it. WOW! Then you remember you have the cut!

The Holy Spirit is much nicer than a paper cut, but the idea is the same. We become inured to it’s presence and we forget about it. We don’t remember it’s there until we pour some lemon juice on it, the lemon juice being our sinful actions, words or feelings. When we are doing something sinful we are then reminded by the Spirit that it is still there. It causes us pain, and helps us to want to wash off the sin like we wash out the lemon juice.

With a paper cut, we put a bandage over it to stop it from hurting. How many of us have put on a spiritual bandage to prevent ourselves from feeling the Ruach when it wants to remind us it’s there?  Every time we do not “die to self” so that the Spirit can live more fully within us, we are placing a band aid on the Ruach. The more bandages on the Ruach, the less likely we will feel the sting of sin when we do something wrong in God’s eyes. And the more we cover it, the less we sense His presence, so it seems that God is not near us. But He is near- He is right there, at your side, at my side, holding out His hand and asking us to take hold.

If you want to feel the presence of the Lord more often, more intently, and more completely, remove the bandages. Allow the soreness of sin to remind you quickly and painfully that you are not doing as the Spirit leads.

We are a container- we are filled with ourselves and with the Spirit, but the container can only hold so much. If you want more Spirit, you need to make room by getting rid of more of yourself. I used to be frightened to death by that statement (literally, since this fear of losing myself meant that I was rejecting the truth about Messiah Yeshua); but now, after I faithfully took that leap and accepted Messiah, I find that I am not really losing who I am, I am just becoming a better me. The more the Spirit leads me  ( scratch that, change it to this):  the more I allow the Spirit to lead me, the better a person I am.

I have been given the gift of humor, and I used to misuse it by making people laugh with nothing but bawdy jokes, and I used foul language to shock the humor out of people. I can tell you this: it worked a lot, but it also got me in a lot of trouble. I still find exotic humor (OK, OK…yes, I admit it, they’re dirty jokes) funny but I have “toned it way down”, and I can still be funny without being sinful. Richard Pryor was one of the funniest men I ever heard, and he was well known for being filthy, but he was also exceptionally funny (when he started out) on the Ed Sullivan and the Tonight shows, and there were no dirty jokes allowed on those shows. The spirit of humor God gave me is like anything else from God- how well I use that gift is based on how much I let the Spirit guide me in it’s use.

God is always here, he never leaves, He never sleeps, He doesn’t need to hit the head; God’s presence is always present. It’s us, it’s me, it’s you, it’s the flesh that prevents the Spirit from being felt and it’s our self-absorbed nature that numbs us to God’s touch.

All any of us needs do to feel God’s presence is to reach out to Him, but to do that we need to let go of whatever we are holding on to. What you are holding on to, you need to determine for yourself.

We Need to Forgive Everyone, but We Need Forgiveness Only From God

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When was the last time you visited Psalm 51? That’s what David wrote after being convicted by Natan the Prophet of the sins he committed against Uriah and Bat Sheba. Yet David knew who he really sinned against- God, first and foremost; David said that against God, and God alone, did he sin.

That doesn’t mean David didn’t realize the effect of his actions against these people, but God is the one who gave us the commandments and when we violate even the simplest of these laws, regulations and ordinances, we have sinned against God directly. Even if the actions are directed to another person, it is against God that we have sinned.

So, we ask forgiveness of God, and we should ask forgiveness of the person we have sinned against, too. If that person decides to forgive us, that is good for them.

No, I didn’t get that wrong: when someone forgives us it is good for them because God doesn’t tell us to be forgiven by others, He tells us to be forgiving of others. When we forgive we are doing what is right in God’s eyes. No person can forgive someone their sin- only God can do that. Your act of forgiveness is actually between you and God; likewise, the sin itself is between that person and God. Your forgiveness of others helps you, not them. They have to deal with God for forgiveness on their own.

The one who has sinned needs forgiveness from God- the sin is between the sinner and God. God is the ultimate judge, He is the one who will decide if we get to sit under our own fig tree and enjoy our wine, or if we spend eternity out of His presence, in misery and darkness gnashing our teeth.

Forgiveness is a wonderful remedy for the pain of being sinned against. Truth is, the only way to make the pain go away is to forgive the person who caused it. That isn’t easy to do, but it is the only remedy. Maybe that’s why God commands us to be forgiving? He wants us to be happy and, therefore, He tells us to forgive (so that we can be happy.)

Maybe that’s also why God is so willing to forgive us? It makes Him happy, too, and helps Him to remove the pain of being ignored and rejected by the ones He loves so much (He is much better at it than we are. Thank God for that, right?)

Yeshua tells us to “…seek ye first the kingdom of God,…” when He is talking to the crowds during the Sermon on the Mount. Within the context of this speech He has been talking about our relationships with each other, about leaving our gift at the altar to make reparations with those we have sinned against, about forgiving each other as God forgives us, and that’s when He tells us to not seek things of the world but things of God. The world seeks vengeance, God seeks forgiveness and reconciliation.

When it comes to things of God, forgiveness is definitely near the top of the A-List. Forgiveness is a natural result of loving each other and since Yeshua said the two greatest commandments are to love God and love each other, forgiveness (in my book) comes in at a very close third.

Shaul tells us to run the good race. If we are to run the race well, we need to understand and remember that to love God, love each other, and forgive each other is the Win:Place:Show of the most important race we will ever be part of.

We must forgive others and we should ask for forgiveness from those we have sinned against, but always ask forgiveness from God first and foremost because that is the most important forgiveness there is, and the only forgiveness you need.

Truth is Simple

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Walter Scott wrote a poem called Marmion and it was in that poem that he wrote, “Oh, what a tangled web we weave, When first we practise to deceive!”  It shows the fruitlessness of lying, but more than that: it shows how convoluted things become when we leave the truth.

One of the country’s greatest writers and humorists, Mark Twain, said, “If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.”

Let’s not forget what Yeshua said about the truth: the truth will set you free.

Truth is simple, and that’s the truth. Truth has no image to maintain, no “spin” is needed, but as with most things that are simple, the truth is often hard to take.

“Yes, those pants make your butt look bigger.” That’s the truth, but if you speak it, the truth is that you will be sleeping on the couch.

In fact, humans (at least in our society, it seems) are so averse to hearing the truth that if you say something that is truthful, such as telling someone who is doing a poor job at something (even if you are their supervisor and it is your responsibility to do so), if you just come out and tell them they are doing a lousy job, you are in trouble with HR. Not them; you! Because you told the truth, but you didn’t think about their feelings. How can we think about someone’s feelings, in a society where we are all victims, and still tell the truth?

If we “sugarcoat” the truth so much that it tastes good, then how much “good” can it really do?

The bottom line about truth, which it seems no one wants to hear, is that we are not really in total control or complete charge of ourselves. We never have been and we never will be. We are all interrelated, we cannot be without each other, and we cannot survive totally on our own.

As Yeshua said, we are all a slave to something: either a slave to God or a slave to sin. The only real freedom we have is to choose what we will be a slave to.

People want to hear what they want to hear. The truth is not something they want to hear, so the world tells us lies and teaches us to be liars. If someone looks silly in the clothes they have on, don’t say they look silly, tell them they look fine. If someone doesn’t do the job the way they are supposed to, don’t tell them, don’t fire them or pay them less. And don’t “upset” the poor workers- give them a raise just like the good workers get. And when someone says God doesn’t exist, or that His laws are done away with, don’t disagree with them and don’t tell them you believe He does exist and that His laws are still valid because you shouldn’t upset them.

I am not saying that we should talk to each other in a totally callous and unfeeling way, but we need to be truthful. We need to be able to tell the truth compassionately. If someone looks silly we should say that we don’t think the clothes they are wearing look right, and they would look better if they wore something that matched better. We don’t have to say they look silly, but we should say they would look better because what they are wearing doesn’t do them justice. That’s telling the truth in a compassionate way, don’t you think?

If someone is not doing their job correctly, we need to tell them, and we can do that simply by telling the truth: there is an accepted way of doing this job and you haven’t been following that process. Here is the way this is to be done and you need to do it this way. If you think you have a better way, great- talk to me about it and we will see if it can work, but in the meantime, you need to do it this way.

The ultimate truth is that God is in charge, that we can’t understand His ways, and that we need to trust Him to do what is best. That same truth continues: we don’t have control over what we don’t have control over. People are, for the most part, cruel, self-centered and sinful. Sorry, that’s the truth- the Bible is pretty clear on that, as is our own life experience. We have our occasional good ones, and I hope you are one of those, but we are sinful and our nature is to sin: we are sinful sinners, and the more readily we accept that truth, the easier it is to see how much we need Messiah Yeshua (Jesus) to help us to overcome ourselves. That’s the only chance we have for being in God’s presence when all is done, and the best way to improve ourselves. You can’t change what you don’t know is wrong.

The ancient Greek aphorism, “Know thyself” is a call to truth. Know who you are, what you are capable of, and why you do what you do. I don’t think we need to go through years of psychoanalysis to do this, we just need to accept the truth unabashedly and with courage. Cowards hate the truth, hero’s seek it out. Which are you?

The truth is that the truth often sucks. That’s the way it is, and the truth is you can’t change that. To accept it is the first step on the path to peace, really. I am not saying to be apathetic, to be a fatalist and say that you can’t make any changes or do anything, or that everything happens because God is in charge and, thereby, blame the Lord for your own failures to act. I am asking you to remember that old adage about accepting what you can’t change, changing what you can, and knowing the difference.

Trying to do what we can’t do is frustrating and leads to anger and disappointment- those are the kinds of things that lead to the Dark Side. Anger, unforgiveness, frustration of wanting someone else to do what you think they should do and living with the fact that they won’t is the kind of mindset that will prevent you from doing what God wants, which is to forgive them and love them, anyway. When we learn to focus on what we can do and not obsess over what we can’t change we will be much happier, and set a better example of what God wants us to be.

The truth will set you free from frustration and disappointment, and when you are truthful in a compassionate way you can not only be free, but help others to be free, too.

And that, my friends, is the truth.

What’s in a Name?

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A rose. by any other name, would smell as sweet. So said Juliet in the play “Romeo and Juliet.” She was making a point: just because Romeo’s last name was that of the family’s enemy, Romeo, himself, was okay. His name was irrelevant.

Is that the same with Yeshua, mostly  known by the world as Jesus? Is there really a difference?

The etymology of Jesus is that Yeshua, the Hebrew name that means ‘God’s salvation’, could not be translated into Greek because culturally, religiously and in every other way the Greek’s had no such identity to refer to: think of trying to interpret the word “snow” into the language of the people living on Easter Island, who have never seen or had snow, ever, in their history. So what happened with Yeshua is that when translating into Greek they used a transliteration: a word that sounds like the name, which was “Jesu.”  When Latinized, Jesu became Jesus.

Christ comes from a similar evolution of words: Mashiach (Anointed One) also had no Greek counterpart so, using the bastardized Hebrew-Greek of the Septuagint, Maschiach got to be Cristos (the act of spreading oil on a shield, representing the anointment by oil) and that became Christ. So Yeshua ha Maschiach became Jesu Cristos, then (finally) Jesus Christ.

That brings us back to the original question: what’s in a name? For Juliet, Romeo’s name meant nothing, but is that true for God and for His Messiah?

We are told that all who call on the name of the Lord will be saved, so that begs the question: does it matter to God which name we use? If ‘Jesus’ is a non-name, but ‘Yeshua’ is known to people as ‘Jesus’, when we call on the name ‘Jesus’, or pray in the name of ‘Jesus’, does it have the same level of authority that His real name, ‘Yeshua’, has? Now that I think about it, is ‘Yeshua’ OK? Didn’t the angel tell Yosef to name the child ‘Immanuel’? That means “God with us”. To me, ‘God with Us’ and ‘God’s Salvation’ are much more powerful and authoritative than some translated transliteration. Right?

Aren’t we also told in Revelations , a well as in the writings of different prophets, that the Messiah will be given a new name? A name that only He knows? That seems to impart a lot of importance to which name we use.

Yitzhak (Isaac) was named that because Sarah laughed when the angel told Abraham he would have a son. And Yakov (usurper) was named that by means of his birth (grabbing Esau’s heel) and he lived up to that name, right? And didn’t God tell Nathan the Prophet to change the name of Solomon to Jedidiah (beloved of God) because God loved the child? And didn’t God tell Hosea what names to give his children so that they represented what God wanted the people to know? It seems that names are very important to God.

Jewish folklore (I just learned this) also puts great importance on the name. It is referred to as kishmo ken hu–“Like his name, so is he” (1 Samuel 25:25). Traditionally, at birth the Hebrew name given is something that the child will (hopefully) grow into and represent later in life; then, an English (or whatever language is appropriate) name with a similar meaning is also given.  My English name is Steven Robert (my mother liked Steven and Robert is after one of my fathers best friends) but the Hebrew is Shaul Baer. I doubt very much that my parents gave me a Hebrew name then the English, since they were not religious or knew the Lord, so my Hebrew name came from the translation of the English. Actually, there is some truth to my names: the Hebrew should have been first, then the English, but in my case it is backward, and I was a breech birth, so maybe….?

Where does all this bring us? It brings us here: if names are so important, does that mean all who have called on ‘Jesus’ are not saved? Does the name ‘Jesus” has no value to God? When we pray in the name of ‘Jesus” are those prayers ignored?

Of course, I can’t speak for God or Yeshua; personally, I think that using the name ‘Yeshua’ is important and shows the proper respect for the one who bears it.

We are told, over and over, that God knows the heart. I think, knowing God’s compassionate and understanding nature, if we are truly repentant and come before God with a broken spirit and a contrite heart, as David did (Psalm 51), then the names or words we use are secondary to what our heart is “saying”, as far as God is concerned. Therefore, my answer to , “What’s in a name?”  is that the name is important and deserves to be honored, but so long as our heart is in the right place and our T’Shuvah before the Lord is genuine, names and even words are unimportant. Those that are mute from life, who can’t even speak in their minds, can communicate with God, can’t they? If there is someone who recognizes God as the only true God and knows, spiritually, that He exists but just has never heard the name or read the Bible, is God going to ignore that person just because he doesn’t know with which name to call upon Him?

Each of us has to choose for ourselves. Being Jewish I am much more comfortable with the Hebrew name ‘Yeshua’ than with ‘Jesus’, which represents many bad things to Jewish people. And for that same reason I understand the vast majority of Gentiles are more comfortable with Jesus. I don’t think God cares that much which name we use, but I do think Yeshua appreciates being called upon with His real name. Just my opinion.

As for me and my house, we will call upon the name of Yeshua, because well, …that’s His name.

Forgiveness Doesn’t Prevent Suffering

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To err is human; to forgive, divine. How true. And we (should all) know that forgiveness is not just commanded of us, but it is the only way for those that have been hurt to heal. The pain doesn’t go away by reliving the event- it goes away by forgiving and moving on.

And the forgiveness we receive will be based on the forgiveness we give (read Matthew 6:14 if you don’t know that already.)

Now, here’s the kicker: the forgiveness we receive from God is immediate, but we don’t fully realize it until we are dead. Meanwhile, here on Earth we have to suffer the consequences of the sin that we committed.

Actually, I will go as far as to say that, since everyone sins and most people don’t care if they do or not, the ones that usually suffer the most from sin are not the sinners, but the ones sinned against. Oh, yes- the sinners will suffer, but that is also just like forgiveness in that those who sin and continue to sin will cause great pain and suffering while alive, but when they are dead, without the forgiveness of Messiah to protect them, their suffering will be exponentially worse than any and all the suffering they caused while alive. When you find it hard to forgive someone, as I do, try to remember that little tidbit of information and picture in your mind, just for a moment, what they will be facing on Judgement Day and what they will have to endure for all eternity.

As bad as what they may have done, what they will have done to them is much worse.

Let’s see a few examples of what I am talking about from the Manual: Abraham is certainly with God and forgiven for the lies he told about Sarah, causing her to be taken as wife for two different kings, but the people under that king suffered; Moses is most certainly with God and forgiven of his sin of murder and at the rock at Meribah, but he didn’t get to enter the Promised Land; David is most certainly with God and forgiven of his sins of adultery and murder but the son he produced from it died; thousands died from the plague because of the census David ordered; the kingdom was torn apart because of the sins of Solomon and, eventually, because of the sins of the kings of both Shomron (the Northern kingdom, Israel) and Judea, the Jewish people were scattered amongst the Nations and taken into captivity.

Here were sins committed by people that God forgave, yet there was great suffering by many others, who had nothing to do with the origin or commitance of that sin.

Sin sucks; it hurts people that we don’t mean to or want to hurt, and it hurts us, too. The worst thing about sin is that it drives a wedge between us and God. The greater the number of sins, the greater the distance between us and God. The good news is that God is everywhere, so even though sin separates us from God, spiritually, He is still always right there, at arm’s length and ready to reach out His hand so we can take hold of it when we ask for forgiveness: there is no distance between us and God (caused by our sins) that puts us beyond God’s reach.

For me, the desire to not sin, my T’Shuvah, is based mainly on wanting to please God. It is also based on not wanting to hurt anyone, and finally it is also based on my desire to not have to suffer. I am not talking about eternal suffering, because I have that one covered- thank you, Yeshua, for your kippah of forgiveness that protects me from myself for all eternity. No, I mean I do not want to suffer here and now. If I hurt God by sinning against Him, I hurt. If I hurt others by sinning against them, I hurt. It is the Ruach HaKodesh, God’s holy spirit living in me, that causes me pain when I sin. Before I accepted Yeshua and asked (and received) the Ruach, it didn’t hurt me; well, maybe a little, but not as much as now. So now, knowing the pain of sin, I don’t want it!

Sin is one of those things that hurts now and hurts later; it hurts you and it hurts others, and the only way to avoid it is to just not do it. And yet, even if we sin less and less every day (that is an attainable goal) we will still be sinned against and be hurt by the sin of others. The only way to stop that pain is to forgive them.

Ah, but that….is another story!

God’s forgiveness of our sin is like His Kingdom: it exists, but hasn’t arrived yet. God’s forgiveness is given when asked for but not realized until later, yet the suffering our sin causes is here and now, and the “Earthly” consequences of that sin are unavoidable.

Prophet or Psychic?

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Necromancy is strictly forbidden by God. The dead are dead and we are to leave them alone. Remember how much trouble King Shaul got into when he called up the spirit of Shmuel? Not a very happy “seance reading” when the spirit you call up says that you will be joining it for dinner, is it?

Below is a list of Wikipedia’s definition of what “psychic powers” are composed of:

  • Apportation – Materialization, disappearance or teleportation of an object.
  • Aura reading – Perception of energy fields surrounding people, places and things.
  • Automatic Writing – Writing produced without conscious thought.
  • Astral or Mental Projection- An out-of-body in which an astral body becomes separate from the physical body.
  • Bilocation or multilocation – Being in multiple places at the same time.
  • Clairvoyance or Second Sight – Perception outside the known human senses.
  • Death-warning – A vision of a living person prior to his or her death.
  • Divination- Gaining insight into a situation, most commonly through a ritual
  • Dowsing- Ability to locate objects, sometimes using a tool called a dowsing rod.
  • Energy medicine- Healing by channeling a form of energy.
  • Faith healing- Diagnosing or curing diseases using religious devotion.
  • Levitation- Bodily levitation and flying.
  • Mediumship or channeling – Communicating with spirits.
  • Precognition, premonition and precognitive dreams – Perception of events before they happen.
  • Psychic surgery- Removal of diseased body tissue via an incision that heals immediately afterwards.
  • Psychokinesis or telekinesis – The ability to manipulate matter by the power of thought.
  • Psychometry or psychoscopy – Obtaining information about a person or object, usually by touching or concentrating on the object or a related object.
  • Pyrokinesis – Manipulation of fire.
  • Remote viewing – Gathering of information at a distance.
  • Retrocognition or post-cognition – Perception of past events.
  • Scrying- Use of an item to view events at a distance or in the future.
  • Telepathy- Transfer of thoughts or emotions in either direction.

There are 22 different psychic powers here. Some we read about in the Bible as being revelations from God, such as predicting the future (this is, in fact, one of the tests of whether or not someone is a true prophet), healing, and astral projection (being lifted up in the spirit, such as Daniel was.)

Talking to the dead is also included. On TV there is a show called the Long Island Medium, and she seems like a nice person, but her life is devoted to telling people that her psychic powers allow her to channel and talk to their dead loved ones. Are you wondering why am I concerned about a TV show with a lady who can talk to the dead?  After all, we also have ghost chasers and survival experts now searching for BigFoot (you would think searching for food would be hard enough!) on TV, so why worry about a medium?

It’s because I see this as just another “nail in the coffin” to Godly spirituality in our society. TV is so prevalent and consumes so much of our children’s time (and our own, as well), not to mention that humans will believe anything if they hear it said enough times, that whatever is heard or seen on TV is sure to become a fact to many people. Think about conversations you have with people- how many talk about a TV character as if it were a real person?

This TV medium, from the little I have caught having to watch the commercials, seems to always tell people exactly what they want to hear. I never see her say that, “Your Dad said he is glad that he is dead- now he doesn’t have to hear your whiney voice anymore.”, or “Your husband says he is in eternal suffering and can hardly wait for you to join him.” No…it seems that all she says to people is how their parents or friends loved them and are watching over them and are happy now. It’s all happy-happy, lovey-dovey heavenly stuff. But the Bible tells us differently, doesn’t it? Aren’t we told that only a few are chosen? That the gate is narrow? That there will only be a remnant? How is it that this medium only finds the few, happy and blessed people? If you were to say maybe she is in “touch” only with those that are in heaven, the ones that are Yeshua’s sheep, then why would those people, being followers of Yeshua, even allow her to contact them, since what she does is strictly forbidden by God?

The Bible is clear: a true prophet will tell us what God wants us to know. In my opinion, those who are psychically channelling the dead are telling us only what we want to hear, and doing that in order to get us to accept their sinfulness as proper and, thereby, trap us into sinning, also.

What God tells us is proper in His eyes almost always seems to be the opposite of what the world tells us we should do: God says love others and take care of them, the world says watch out first for Numero Uno. God says to worship Him and the world says to worship money, material things, sports stars, celebrities and fancy cars. God says to love one another in a holy and faithful way while the world says sex out of wedlock is not only acceptable, but practically expected.

All I am trying to say in this Drash is that you need to be aware of what is happening around you- be sensitive to your surroundings and don’t believe what you hear on TV or in the newspapers. And never, never, NEVER believe what someone tells you about God without checking it out in the Bible for yourself. I am amazed, although not surprised, at how lazy people are, even when it comes to their eternal soul. I mean, really? You are going to watch a TV show about who Jesus “really was” and take that as gospel instead of reading the real Gospel? Or see a movie that says Moses and Rameses were brothers? We really don’t know which Pharaoh was the one that ruled when Moshe went back to Egypt. In fact, Moshe was 80 years old when he went back and the average lifespan for a human back then was much less than that, so there is little reason to even think that the Pharaoh Moshe went to was the one he knew when growing up.

We need to be aware of what we are hearing, what we read, and especially what our children are exposed to. In order to make sure they grow up knowing what they need to know to protect them from falling into the traps of the Evil One, we need to know the truth, first, and we need to know what they are being told. The only way to get your kid to tell you about their day is to wait until they are adults (just joking): seriously, the way to get our kids to communicate with us is to communicate with them. Have dinner together without TV, without the I-Phone and without interruption. Talk to them as you would talk with another adult and allow them to talk as they feel comfortable (watching the language, of course) so they can feel that what they say is important to you. And it should be- they are telling you how to raise them, what to teach them and how to protect them. I think it is more important to listen than to speak when dealing with our children (not that I am any better at this than anyone else: in fact, my kids don’t even talk to me anymore.)

Salvation is from faith and trying to follow what God tells us to do; eternal suffering is from the Enemy telling us what everyone else is doing and that we should be like them. God on one side, Satan on the other, and us in the middle.

That’s why we need to watch every step we take and stay focused on the right path.

Do You Whisper in the Hallway?

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We went to Virginia Beach this past weekend to watch my niece get married. Mazel tov, Heather and Joey!!

We stayed at a nice resort hotel, with long hallways that were more like echo chambers, and everyone who passed by talked loudly, laughed loudly, let their kids scream and make noise, and always before 0700 and after 2100.

Those people showed absolutely no restraint or consideration for others, and demonstrated to their children how to be the same way.

The Bible tells us that we should treat each other as we want to be treated, and that means not only when we are in need. It means all the time, it means thinking of others instead of just doing “our own thing”, and it means setting an example for our children. Walking down the hallway in a hotel is passing by where other people may be working, sleeping at any and all hours of the day, or maybe just trying to relax watching TV. It is not the place you have casual conversations standing between the open doors of your rooms. You wanna talk, fine- go in the room. I understand that there are weddings and reunions, and people are a little tipsy and maybe forgetful that they should be quiet, but that’s no excuse.

Having a reason to explain why one is acting badly is not an excuse for doing so.

We seem to think that so long as we have an reason, that is an excuse, and others should deal with it. That may be how it works in the physical world, but from what I read in the Bible (what do you think?) God is not interested in excuses- He demands action. God demands and desires our obedience always: I say demands and desires because He knows, as has been evident since the creation of humans, that what God demands is more often not done. That’s why even though He demands our obedience, because He is compassionate and understanding He desires to see us actually obey. His laws and commandments are for our good, and His love for us is why He gives us these laws. His love also is why, despite knowing our rebellious, stiff-necked ways, He desires to see us obey. When we obey, He can give us the full measure of blessings He wants to; when we disobey, because He is holy and trustworthy, he cannot do all for us He desires to do. You see, He is God, and when he tells us that obedience is rewarded and disobedience is punished, He means what He says so by His own promises to us He cannot bless those who reject Him. He can allow blessings to fall upon everyone- as it says in the Bible,  it rains on both the just and the unjust. So, too, unrighteous people may seem to be doing really well, but in the long run, when it really, really counts, they will be losers. Ultimate, eternal losers.

In all cases, however, God will be trustworthy to bless when He says He will, and trustworthy to judge as He says we deserve to be judged. Just because we have an excuse doesn’t mean we will be excused.

Those that have ears, let them hear.

Back to the hallways:  always be thinking about others. In the midst of your joy, and despite your sorrow, consider others and their needs. You can still have a lot of fun while traveling, or even in your own home, without having to  interrupt or be bothersome to others.

Being considerate is another form of loving the Lord. Yeshua said that those who do good thing to others are doing the same to Him.  It’s easy to see that when we give food to hungry people, or donate clothing to the poor. It isn’t always as easy to see that just whispering in the hallways is also a way of doing good to Yeshua by doing good to others. It can be that simple.

Think about this next time you are in a hotel and walking to your room. Then, try to be understanding when you realize that you will, most likely, be the only one in that hotel who does.

Is Your Flesh Weak or Strong?

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Yeshua said of His Talmudim (Disciples), when they couldn’t stay awake with Him as He prayed that night after the Seder, that their spirit was willing but their flesh was weak.

I wonder if, with all due respect to Yeshua, He didn’t get that backwards.

I know that there are many times my spirit (actually, His spirit within me) tells me the correct thing to do, but my flesh outweighs it and I do something else. In that case, isn’t the flesh stronger than the spirit? Doesn’t Shaul say, in Romans, that he does what he doesn’t want to do, and doesn’t do that which he wants to? Is his spirit strong and willing and his flesh weak? It seems to be the other way around, doesn’t it?

We are creatures of the flesh- we have to be. We are born into the flesh, we live in the flesh, and we will be flesh until we die and are resurrected in new bodies which will be born of the spirit. Until then, we are flesh and the flesh is powerful.

When we have the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit) within us, we are guided by that spirit to do what is right in God’s eyes and we are comforted by His presence, which that spirit brings. But we are still flesh, and when my spirit says to go get some food for a person who is asking for help, it is my flesh that makes excuses for not doing so: I am in a rush, I don’t have any small change, the cafe is all the way across the street, whatever. It is the flesh that says to do what I am doing and not care for that person in need, even when both the spirit and flesh say it will only take 5 minutes. The difference is that the spirit says, “Oh, come on- this will only take 5 minutes” and the flesh says, “You’re late- you don’t have even 5 minutes to spare.”

The spirit is right and the flesh is wrong, but the spirit requires discipline to follow and the flesh is always the easy way out. That’s the problem, isn’t it? When we are flesh, in a world controlled by flesh, the flesh is the easy way and the spirit is the hard way.

So the only thing to do is exercise your spirit until it is stronger than your flesh. Pray, force yourself to help others, make sure you get some time with other Believers and listen to their stories of how they have strengthened their spirit, and decide for yourself who is going to rule you. Yeshua said we are all slaves to something, so decide: will you be a slave to your flesh, or a slave to God’s spirit?

For me it is an easy decision: I want to do what God wants me to do. Yet, as much as I want to, it is a hard thing to actually do. Maybe that’s why so many are called but few actually get to the end. In fact, we are all called because God says (check it out in Ezekiel) that He is not happy with the death of any sinner; He would rather we all turn from our sin and live.  That means we are all called.

It’s only those who can exercise their spirit to be stronger than their flesh that will make it. Just saying you believe isn’t enough- even the Enemy and every one of his demons believe. It is the ones who believe, have turned from their sin and produced fruit (the offering of good works that we need to present to God at Judgement Day) whose spirit has been strong enough to win out over their flesh.

Are you exercising your spirit? If not, you had better hit the bricks, get on the bike, and start doing a few spiritual push-ups every morning. Only God knows how much longer you have, so don’t delay because He isn’t likely to give you any notice.

Sin is Sin

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I read an article this morning about a Lesbian Minister who has performed over 700 same sex marriages in the DC area. She said that many of the couples have already been together for decades, and that the “paper” makes them feel that they are finally “legal.” She said it was uplifting, that the services are full of love, and that she feels one of the most important things to do to maintain a long relationship is to constantly say to each other, “I love you” and to always ask forgiveness.

It all sounds nice, and despite the fact that I cannot agree with the lifestyle choice, I am impressed that these relationships, of themselves, have shown to be ones of duration. Let’s face it- heterosexual marriage today is no better than a crap-shoot: your chances are better to be divorced than to be together. If same sex relationships are more long-lasting, that’s something no one can argue is a bad thing.

The downside is that it is not right in God’s eyes. The idea of a gay minister is,to me, an oxymoron, but it is a reality that we all have to face in todays world. And, as I have said before, although homosexuality gets a lot of attention, it is just one of the many sins we all commit. I may not be homosexual, but I do many other things that are sinful: in my thoughts, my words against others, and in how I act, as well. I try to forgive but I am still angry about things done against me, unfairly, that happened many years ago. Not “red-in-the-face-yelling” angry, just not feeling the sense of closure that comes when you know the one who screwed you got their comeuppance. Not revenge, so much, as knowing that God has judged in my favor. You see- there’s a sin, right there: I want God to judge them and find them guilty of the sin they committed against me, but I should be asking Him to forgive them that sin for what they really need is His love and salvation. No one has ever come close to really doing anything so terrible to me that they should burn forever in hell. I want revenge, yes- there! I’ve admitted it. And that, in God’s eyes, is not any different than if I was homosexual- sin is sin.

Why I title this the way I do is because in the midst of the lasting and loving relationship this Minister described has been her experience to witness, these people are still living in sin. Maybe they have the approval of human law, but it is not approved under God’s law.

Do you know about LGBT churches? Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender churches, Christian and Jewish, that allow and encourage openly gay (as if that would make a difference to God, who sees everything and who knows the heart) members and clergy.  And this isn’t new. Even in the days of the Temple there were the cult prostitutes, and all the way back to Lot we know of the sexual misdeeds of the men of Sodom and Gomorrah. Homosexuality has probably been around ever since we had more than two of any particular gender.

Does that make it right? No. Does that make it normal? No, and Yes: no, in that God says it isn’t the way we should be, and yes, if we describe “normal” as something that one will usually find existing within a population. And there can be no argument that homosexuality has existed in human populations for thousands and thousands of years.

So…what do we do, those of us who are told we should hate the sin but love the sinner? I can’t speak for you, but I have family members who are actively and openly gay, and I love them. I love being with them, I see their long-term relationship partners as much a part of my family as they do, and I welcome them into my house and my heart.

I just don’t agree with their sexual orientation. That’s no different than if they were liars, or kleptomaniacs, or had adulterous relationships. Actually, I would prefer homosexual to the other sins, if I had to make a choice. And since I also am a sinner, if I am asked about my position, I state it but I don’t “judge” them as being any more sinful than I am.

What “gets me” is when the gay community says that they have a right to make their own choice and the rest of us shouldn’t treat them any differently, then turn around and in the same breath demand that we agree with their stand that it is not a sin to be homosexual. Of course it’s a sin- God spells it out clearly, so just admit it. You want to live that way, fine, I don’t- I have as much right to disagree with what you do as you have to do it! So stop being so hypocritical and just admit that you do what you do because you choose to do it- don’t blame genetics, your mothers hormones, or society.  There are more than enough cases of homosexuals returning to a heterosexual lifestyle as there are the other way around to make an argument that it is a choice. Just live your life and let me live mine; make your choices and let me make mine. Stop saying the Bible is wrong, God is wrong, and I am wrong just because you don’t like the consequences of your chosen lifestyle.

Many of those who have chosen to be Believers and live in accordance with the Word of God have suffered bigotry, torture and death, just as many Gay people have.  The truth is that what is really normal in the world is godlessness. The majority of people in the world do not worship the one, true God as He says He should be worshipped. Even within the religions that profess to be God-fearing, they make up their own rules and traditions that overrule God’s word- the same thing Yeshua resisted and told us was wrong when He was walking the Earth.

That’s what my ministry is all about: God has no religion.

Gay, liar, murderer, gossiper, foul-mouthed and nasty, bigoted, hateful, self-serving: all are the same in God’s eyes, all are sinful. And God doesn’t grade on a curve- sin is sin, and any sin separates us from God. It is only through Yeshua that we can have any hope of being with God.

Here’s the final statement on this for today: if you ask me do I think that Gay people can get into heaven, based on all I have said so far, I would have to say….yes. If they accept Yeshua as their Messiah and try to live as He did, if they do T’Shuvah and turn from their sin, then yes- I believe they can enter heaven because sin is sin- I sin, you sin, everyone sins. Those of us who have asked for God’s forgiveness in the name of Messiah Yeshua and done T’Shuvah, still sin. If I am right that homosexuality is a sin, and that every sin is the same to God, then if you are heterosexual and eat pork, you have the same chance of getting into heaven as the gay, kosher person. And remember this: Yeshua told us there is no marriage in heaven, there won’t be sexual relationships, so being gay or heterosexual is only an Earthly condition. It won’t matter who you like to kiss after you are dead.

One last thing: the Minister got it backwards when she said that couples should always ask for forgiveness. People in love should always forgive each other, whether or not they are asked. God commands that we forgive, not that we ask for it. The hurt doesn’t go away when someone asks us to forgive them, it goes away when we DO forgive them, so forgive each other.

They say, “To err is human; to forgive, Divine.” You wanna know something? they’re right!

Red Light; Green Light

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It’s zero-dark-thirty in the morning and you are on a major road going home. You are stuck at a red light: there isn’t a car in sight in any direction. Do you just go through the light or do you wait for it to turn green?

I confess I might go through it. I have been in that situation more than once, and usually I do wait (no, I am not a major party animal. As an IT guy sometimes I have had to stay really late to get upgrades completed after hours. No…really!)

They say that honesty is doing what you know you’re supposed to do, even when you’re positive that no one will ever find out. For those of us who know and worship the Lord, we understand that while no person may ever find out, nothing is hidden from God. So, do we not go through the red light because we know that is the right thing to do, or do we not go through because there could be someone watching that we don’t see?

In other words, do we obey because we want to obey, or do we obey because we are afraid of the consequences when we don’t?

I bet you can see where this is going….Yeshua said if we love Him we will do what He says, and we are also commanded to love God and love each other. In the very same breath we are also told that if we disobey we will be cursed. Obedience brings blessings and disobedience brings suffering, so do we really have a choice?

It doesn’t seem so, does it? Yet, God gives us free will, and even those that not just ignore Him, but outright reject that He even exists, are often “blessed” with riches and fame.

Or are they? Just because someone has all they could want doesn’t mean it comes from God. There is another power that has control over the worldly things that people crave. And his retirement plan is very different from the one God offers.

Should we obey from love or from the fear of retribution and punishment?

We are told that God was sickened and disgusted with the sacrifices offered to Him by the Judeans when these sacrifices were done along side sacrifices to Ba’al, Asherah, Molech, and the other Semitic gods that they worshipped before they were taken into captivity. They obeyed His commands, but he didn’t want their sacrifices because there was no love or true worship behind them. How often are we told in the Book of Nevi’im (Prophets), again and again, that the blood of bulls and sheep means less to God than obedience. Here it is clear that God wants obedience from the heart, not just going through the motions. Does that mean that if we go through the motions they won’t be accepted? Remember Cain? Cain went through the motions and his offerings weren’t accepted, were they?

I think the answer is that God wants us to love Him as He loves us, and to show that love by loving each other as we would want them to love us.

WOW!! Steve!! What a revelation! You’ve changed my life, Man!!

Yeah, yeah….I know. I am stating the obvious (did you catch the cynicism there?) but as obvious as that is, can you tell me why we still don’t do it? I think the answer is just as obvious: people that regularly do not obey the Lord are people that don’t love Him. And that includes professed “Believers.” As such, those who regularly disobey because their heart tells them to disobey (although that may not be how they see it) are doomed people. God tells us, more than once, that we should choose life and not death- He lays it out simply: if we do as He says, we live in His presence and if we don’t do as He says (in other words, we reject Him), then He will reject us.

The good news is that love is absolutely unstable and untrustworthy: that which we hate today we can love tomorrow, and vice-versa. People who hate the Lord have turned to Him and become strong and fruitful followers, and those raised with God who always thought they loved Him can turn against Him as soon as they hit real strife, such as loss of a loved one. So we need to be aware that our love for God is as fragile as the human spirit, and only God’s spirit is strong enough to get us through the horrors of living. Therefore, rely on God and don’t trust yourself.

The answer, for me, is that we obey God because we love Him and from fear of the consequences of disobedience. I think that is OK because we are, in our very nature, sinful sinners and sin is always crouching at our door. The more we love the Lord the easier it is to obey, but it certainly helps overcome the weakness of the flesh when we realize that disobedience carries consequences we don’t want.

Yeshua told the parable about the good son, remember? Even though he refused to do as his father asked initially, for whatever reason he changed his mind later and did as asked, and for that he was recognized as a better son than the one who happily and immediately said he would do as the father asked, but never got around to it. I think one lesson here is that our heart may initially reject what God asks of us because we love ourselves more than Him, but that can be overcome. Maybe not at first, maybe not right away, but it can be overcome, eventually. And let me add this: when we have the Ruach HaKodesh, the Holy Spirit, living within us and when we listen to that spirit talking to us, we can more easily overcome the flesh because we want to.

There is the letter of the law and the spirit of the law.  When we stop at the red light, even though we can go through, we are obeying the spirit of the law. To obey the spirit of the law of God, we need His spirit guiding us. If we only want to obey the letter of the law, that is what Shaul (Paul) called being “under the law”, i.e. trying to gain salvation by doing what we are supposed to do, whether we want to or not. Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise that it is impossible for us to do that, because God really wants us to obey the spirit of the law. That is a heartfelt obedience, that is doing what He wants because doing so will please Him. That is obedience from love.

Next time you come to a red light, and there is absolutely no one around, what do you think you will do? Now ask yourself, “Why?”