Tag: demons

Parashah Re’eh (behold) Deuteronomy 11:26 – 16:17

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This parashah, as with the entire book of D’Varim (Deuteronomy) is a retelling of all the things that have happened over the past 40 years, with a reordering of the commandments, rules and regulations under which the people of Israel must live. These rules cover how to properly worship the Lord and how to properly treat each other.

We can go over these rules again and again, and as often as we review them, we break them. It’s almost as if we think we need to learn them so that we can be certain we know which of God’s laws we are breaking.

Oy!

I am not going to review the rules this parashah contains, mainly because of what I just said- we all know what we are supposed to do. Even sinners who sin because they like to- they know what they are supposed to do, too! As strange as it may sound, I respect their honest rejection of God more than the hypocrisy of many “Christians” who claim to love the Lord but are really judgmental, self-important and bigoted.

It’s real simple- God loves us, and because He loves us He wants us to be with Him for all eternity. But there’s a problem with that- He is holy, pure and perfect, and from a spiritual viewpoint we’re a little lower than whale poop. You can’t store snow in a hot oven, can’t drive a car looking in the rear view mirror (at least, not very far), and you can’t have sinfulness associated with God.

He’s perfect and we’re …well…we’re “us”- you can see how that throws a monkey wench in the plan of salvation, can’t you?

The Torah was given to the children of Israel because God loved them and wanted them to be with Him. The Torah, if followed perfectly, would allow us to be in total communion with God. He also loves everyone else, and Israel was never meant to be the only people to be with God; they were chosen to be a nation of priests who are responsible to teach the other nations, by example, how they should act. When God gave the Torah to the Jewish people it was both a blessing and an obligation.

Unfortunately, the Jewish people did not live in accordance with Torah, and even though their example was more what NOT to do than what to do, the other nations chose to follow the wrong example. The truth is that the commandments and regulations that God gave the Jewish people, which were to be taught to all the nations, were screwed up by the Jews and then screwed up even more by the nations. The “religions” that came from Judaism have devolved into so many factions and have so many different rules of their own, many of which are directly in opposition to what God says to do (read my book), that it’s hard to believe any of them really know who God is or what He wants, at all.

That’s why it took Messiah Yeshua’s sacrifice to enable us to have our sins washed clean so we all can be with God. Where human nature made Torah (alone) unable to bring anyone into communion with God, Messiah made it possible for everyone.

That doesn’t mean Torah is useless or done away with! The laws in there are still valid because grace from sin is not license to sin. You can believe Yeshua is the Messiah- big deal! Every demon in hell knows that for a fact- they’ve seen Him in person! And you can ask for forgiveness but that doesn’t do it- you need to ask and mean it, and show that you mean by living it! You need to walk the walk- talking the talk is not enough. And when you are ready to walk the walk, the Torah is your only road map.

Salvation is free to have with the asking, but keeping it will be costly. You need to give up hedonism, you need to pay your way with good works that represent your heartfelt desire to live as God wants you to. You need to give up your desires for worldly things and want only the spiritual things.

And you also need to keep your feet on the ground with your head on your shoulders- too many people get so “spiritual” they can’t relate to anyone, especially new Believers. They scare the pants off of them and are like the crows that come and eat the good seed that is on the ground before it can take root.

Yeshua told His disciples to be as gentle as doves and wise as snakes- we all need to be that way. We need to have spiritual eyes and realistic heads.

It really is just this easy: love God and love each other. Treat God as He says you should and treat each other as you want to be treated.  You won’t ever be able to do it perfectly, but the more you do these things, the better you will become at it and the easier it will become to do them.

Salvation is yours for the asking. It is very easy to get, and very hard to keep. No one can take your salvation away from you, but you can throw it away.

Here’s a word of advise- don’t!

 

Zombies and Vampires

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I was thinking about zombies and vampires the other day, but not the kind that eat brains (no threat to me) or suck your blood.

I was thinking of the “emotional” kind. The emotional zombies that have no real feelings for anyone or anything, and the emotional vampires that suck the very joy and love of life right out of you.

I was, in a previous life, married to an emotional vampire. I pray for her, even though (I am sorry to say) thankfully I have not had to have any contact with her for years. She is the mother of my children, whom she has emotionally damaged, through spitefulness and drugs (she has fed them ADHD drugs since they were tots, even though there has never been any medical diagnosis of it.) Now the poor kids (who are adults) are emotional zombies- they have never had the chance to feel anything that they haven’t been conditioned to feel.

I am sure you have met people like them. The emotional vampire who is so needy for attention and love that he or she demands from you whatever goodness you have, they take all the compassion and understanding you can give, and suck it out of you until you don’t even feel anything, anymore. Then you become an emotional zombie, wandering around apathetic and drained. Getting involved in relationships that damage and destroy you even more, all the while looking for someone to give you what you have lost. Or, like in the vampire stories, you now have such a need to fill yourself up again with love and compassion that you become an emotional vampire, yourself.

The only way to kill these vampires is with a stake in the heart: not a wooden stake with a point at the end, but with the execution stake of Yeshua, the Messiah. Through prayer and with the love of God these pitiful “demons” can be saved.

I pray for the salvation of my “ex” not because she deserves it- after all, which of us does? I pray for her because she needs it- more than anyone I have ever met, she needs to know the love and compassion of Messiah Yeshua and of God, our Father, which she has rejected (not surprisingly- vampires hate the light.) I also pray for her so that if she turns to God, maybe she will be able to help my children turn. I pray for them too because, well, they’re my kids. Duh! Despite the hatefulness and Tsouris they have given me (most of it because that is what they were conditioned to do), they are old enough to make up their own minds. However, in their defense, they haven’t ever been given a real chance to do that, so I pray for them to reconcile to me and Donna, and to God. It’s more important they reconcile to God, of course.

We don’t want vampires or zombies in our life. After all, they are destructive, evil and a bad influence. However, it is our responsibility as followers of Yeshua to go into the darkness. He ate and drank with sinners because, as He told us in Mark 2:17, He came to heal the sick- the healthy do not need a doctor. Emotional vampires and zombies are very sick, inside, and they need our help.

The thing to remember is that the doctor wears a mask and gloves not just to protect the patient from being infected, but so that the patient doesn’t infect the doctor. We need to be aware of the power of the vampire- they have a strong will and can often seem to be doing good to us, all the while they are sucking us dry. Be careful, be aware, be loving and be understanding, But also be safe.

No greater love is there than that one should give his life for a friend- that is true, but giving our life for a friend is different than throwing it away carelessly.

If, and when, you come across these emotional vampires and zombies, the way to destroy them is to save them. Let them see in you the joy and peace that the Ruach HaKodesh brings, and direct them to God. Keep your distance enough to protect your blood and brains. They are devastatingly hungry for love, for understanding and for peace of spirit, but don’t know how to get it. They take and take and take. but never can satisfy their hunger. That’s because humans don’t have enough in us to fill them, but God does. He never runs out; God never has a lack of love or a famine of affection, and He is always willing to listen.

Vampires ans zombies are out there, and when we find them (or more likely when they find us) we must direct them to God because He is the only one who can save them.

 

 

 

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.