Tag: id

One Way the Enemy Will Divide and Conquer

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I read an article recently that was a review of a particular cruise ship. The writer was in the ship’s Disco and saw many people dancing, all to a different song because they were all wearing headphones.

That’s right- people dancing together on the dance floor, but no one dancing with anyone else.

Back in the ’70s and ’80’s we were worried about “cocooning”, which was people staying in their homes and communicating through technology instead of actually getting out of the house and talking to each other in person. That worry has long since gone away, not because we stopped doing it but because it became the standard way to communicate.

For over 20 years my wife, Donna and I have taken an annual, anniversary cruise…we LOVE cruising! We also always try to get an assigned dinner table so that we can meet people and every night, despite how hectic it can be touring and doing all the activities offered on a ship, we can settle down and look forward to (at least) one stable activity. It sort of brings the day to a proper ending.

It saddens us that so many of the major cruise lines are now going from assigned times and tables to what is called Freestyle Dining, where no one has an assigned time or table. To me, it is a form of cocooning.

When I read about these people in the Disco, which (by definition) should be a social gathering to meet and get to have fun with other people, dancing individually to their own music, I realized this is the epitome of divide and conquer. And it certainly isn’t in accordance with how the Bible says we should be with each other.

God gives us rules for social interaction: he tells us how we should act with each other, and how we should not act with each other, but it always emphasizes how we are to be a community.

The Enemy of the Lord will want us separated, alone and lonely in order to make us behave the way he wants us to. Within a community, we can edify and encourage each other, but when alone we are vulnerable to any number of attacks, emotional and physical, which makes it easy for us to be influenced to do the wrong things.

I guess most people who read that article thought it was a cool idea- being able to take my partner to the disco and if we like different types of music, we can still dance together but each to our own music. They are repeating what the world says is good- be your own person, do your own thing, dance to your own music. This type of behavior encourages pridefulness, self-dependence, and forming of individual ethical standards- all the opposite of who God says we should be.

The Enemy is very smart and would make one really great therapist because he understands our basic, animal desires better than we do. Freud developed modern psychoanalysis, and he called one part of our personality the Id, which is the part of our emotional makeup that is our basic, hedonistic desire for immediate gratification. On a spiritual level, we would call it Iniquity. The Enemy knows all about this and uses it against us, to bring us away from godly actions (good works, if you will) and redirect us to self-dependence and individual gratification.

When you are focused on yourself and being who you feel you should be, you lose sight of being who God wants you to be.

The Enemy wants us to dance to our own music and ignore everyone else’s music; he wants us to be sitting alone in our house, playing on Facebook or Instagram or YouTube. The Enemy wants us to text and drive, to review Facebook notifications while walking across the street, and to live our own life, alone, secluded and vulnerable.

That is his plan to divide us from God so that he can conquer.

I use Facebook (obviously!) but limit my exposure. When I am done with my messages, I catch up quickly on notifications, then I get off Facebook and go to the gym or ride my bike, or do anything else. I don’t text that much and when I am home, my phone is usually sitting on the dresser in my bedroom being charged.

Are you cocooning yourself? If you took a good look at yourself in the mirror would you see someone who is living their life interacting in person with other people, or are you just looking at a “selfie” image?

We have to stop living on our own and make sure we are in a community of like-minded people so that we will not be separated from God. Yes, use email; yes, keep your Facebook account; yes, take your phone everywhere with you but NO!- do not live through these devices. Live your life with other human beings, interacting face-to-face and touch, sense, hear and speak as part of a living community.

Wanting what I do or doing what I want

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It’s the dilemma that (I believe) all those who are Born Again suffer with: am I doing what I want to do to please God, or am I doing what I want to do because it pleases me?

Shaul (Paul- that nice Jewish boy from Tarsus) had this problem, too. He tells us about it in his letter to the Roman Believers (7:15):

I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.

The Talmud tells us we are all born with the yetzer hara (the evil inclination) and only years later does the yetzer hatov (the good inclination) develop. The yetzer hara can, when controlled by the yetzer hatov, be made useful for it is the desire to have things that are pleasing to us, and so having a spouse, a house, a job- all these can be attributed to the yetzer hara and, when controlled by the yetzer tov, these desires of our hedonistic hearts can be channeled into useful and Godly activities.

However, what we really need to do is that which is pleasing to God, and to know what that is is to first learn to not trust ourselves. We are, by nature, self-centered, self-important, self-absorbed and NOT self-controlled. That which is of us is not that which is of God; that which is of God (the Ruach HaKodesh) is in those of us who have accepted Messiah Yeshua and asked for the Spirit, which we must learn to listen to. It is the small, still voice of God that Elijah heard, and not the loud shouting of the yetzer hara that Ahab listened to.

The Ruach tells us what God wants us to do whereas the yetzer hara tells us what we want to do, which is to please our physical bodies, to be the center of all things and to have more toys than everyone else, no matter what it takes to get them.

The yetzer hatov is not, in my opinion, the same as the Ruach HaKodesh. The yetzer hatov is, in Freudian terms, the ego, controlling the basic, animal desire for self-gratification, which is the Id. The Ruach HaKodesh is more like the Superego, which deals with the morality of what we take (Id) or ask for (Ego) from the world.

I am not an expert in the field of  psychology, but I think the above simile is feasible as an example. We all want what we want- that is as primal as the need for self-preservation. Maslow (back to the Psych 101 class) had 10 levels of self actualization, which describes how he believes the human psyche works. We start at the very basic needs- food, water, shelter, and advance from physical needs, to safety, to love, to esteem, and finally to the highest levels where we have morality, understanding and acceptance.

The science of human psychology is fascinating, and having been in sales for a long time, I am glad that I have a fair understanding of human nature- it is essential to being a successful salesperson. But what really helps is to know the Lord, to know what He wants from us (that means to read the bible, duh!) and to have the Ruach HaKodesh to lead us. It’s OK if you have developed your Superego, if you are at the tenth level of self-actualization, if you have studied under the Guru, whatever- it’s all good to be a “humanly” moral and self-actualized person. But that isn’t someone with the spirit of God leading them. The Ruach will never lead you incorrectly, whereas human leadership is more based on what we want and what the world says you should be. It can’t be any other way: social morality is defined by the culture, right? It may be OK to cane a child in the Philippines for breaking the law, but not in the USA. Therefore, to be a morally upright person means to be in accordance with the moral and ethical norms of the society in which you live.

To be a godly person means to be within the moral and ethical norms of God’s word- the Torah. Human morality is based on your social or geographical environment, but God’s morality is based on what God says it is. It is universal. The bible tells us over and over what God wants of us; Old Covenant or New Covenant doesn’t matter- both are based on the Torah. Yeshua (Jesus) taught nothing but what is in the Torah, so the Torah is where we all need to start and where we all need to stay.

Religion is in the same category as social morality- each one is developed by people and each one has it’s own rules about right and wrong. The Torah is the foundation for all the Judeo-Christian religions, but so many different religions have built on the Torah in so many different ways that it is now buried under so many rules and canon that we don’t even see it anymore. Even within Judaism, the one religion that is closest to honoring the Torah as it was given to us by God, has almost over-ridden it with the Talmud, a document made by people. And there are 7 different forms of Judaism today: how can that be? One God, one Torah, but 7 ways to worship?

Oy! No wonder we’re all so screwed up!

The bottom line is the one that counts, right? So, nu? what’s the bottom line? It’s this:

God has no religion.

Read the bible, forget what religion tells you to do, and when you (if you haven’t yet) accept:

  1. that Yeshua is the Messiah God promised us;
  2. accept Him in your heart;
  3. ask God for forgiveness through the sacrificial atonement Yeshua completed for you;
  4. ask that the Comforter, the Ruach HaKodesh, the Holy Spirit, be given to you and indwell within you

then you will have the ability to know what to do and what not to do from God’s perspective (so long as you teach yourself to listen to the  Ruach.) 

In the meantime, try to live by this rule:

If the world likes it, most likely God doesn’t.

That’s easy enough to understand, isn’t it?

Overcoming Sin is a Team Effort

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All who call on the name of the Lord will be saved- Joel (2:32) certainly knew what he was talking about.

Oh, I am sure there are many of you out there who were thinking Romans 10:13- big surprise: there’s nothing “new” in the New Covenant writings. Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING in there is from Tanakh. Yeshua quoted Torah, Shaul (Paul) quoted Torah, they all spoke about the writings of the Prophets (Nevi’im) and every law God gave to Moses is validated in the B’rit Chadashah (Good News), so the next time you read your KJV or NIV and it references something said in the letters to the new Messianic synagogues Shaul began with a quote from Yeshua, go further back and you will find that Yeshua quoted it from Torah.

But that’s another Drash. Today I want to talk about the teamwork between God, the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit) and me, and you, and all of us who are trying to overcome sin in our lives.

God can and will forgive our sin, but we have to do our part. We have to be willing to follow the guidance of the Ruach. God will forgive sin, but up to a point. I know that sounds against Biblical teaching; after all, there is no sin too big for God to forgive, and the Prophets say (as Joel did) that if we call on God we will be forgiven. The teachings of the Talmudim (Disciples) of Yeshua all point to being able to have every sin forgiven. In light of this, how can I say God will forgive but up to a point?

I look back to Shomron, the Northern Kingdom. And less than two centuries after their destruction I see the nation of Judah, also destroyed and dispersed. God allowed them both to sin and fornicate with other gods for centuries before He finally had enough, at which time His forgiving and compassionate nature had to be overruled by the fact that He is still our Judge. He is a holy and righteous God, who will forgive sinners who wish to repent, and punish sinners who refuse to.

That’s the difference between those forgiven and those punished: when we work with God and the Ruach to overcome our sinful nature we can be forgiven over and over, but when we refuse to work at it, when we simply call out to God to forgive us but do nothing to sin less in our lives, then we will not be forgiven.

God isn’t stupid, and he sees the true desires of the heart. You can lie all you want to people about trying your hardest not to sin, but God knows if you really mean it or not. He is forgiving, He is loving and merciful, and He is also our Judge. When we come before Him, and we all will, He will decide based on His understanding of just how hard we really tried.

I talked with someone yesterday who told me that all who believe in Jesus Christ are saved. I disagree. Think about it: don’t the demons believe in Jesus Christ? Don’t they know that He is the son of God and the Messiah? Aren’t there many people who tell you how they believe in Him, yet you know that they are still living their lives the way they want to? Just saying you believe Jesus Christ is the Messiah and then ask for forgiveness in His name doesn’t mean you have arrived.

Sorry, Pal- it isn’t that easy; but, then again, it is that easy.

What makes your confession meaningful is the testimony to that confession you demonstrate during the rest of your life. It’s a team effort- God forgives, Yeshua’s sacrifice makes that forgiveness available to everyone, everywhere, and always, and when you ask Yeshua to ask God to send the Ruach to dwell within you (which you have to accept), then you have a guide. The Ruach is your ultimate “Life Coach”, your conscience, it’s Jiminy Cricket at your side helping you to realize what you want to do is not what you should be doing. And the final member of this team is you. It’s is up to you to work with the Ruach to overcome the desire to sin, and even if the desire never fully goes away, it’s still no excuse to sin. To get Freudian, your Id wants to sin, your Ego tells you not to, and the Superego is the Ruach haKodesh, keeping you in line morally and helping you to become more holy. But still, when all is said and done, the Id will never go away and you need to overcome it.

That’s how it works- we are all sinners, born into it and it is as basic a part of our psyche as is the desire to survive, the need for food and water, and the drive to eat all the oreo’s that exist in the world (well, maybe that one is more particular to me, alone.) In Judaism it is called the Yetzer Hara- the Evil Inclination. As we grow older, we fight it with the Yetzer Tov, the Good Inclination. When we, individually, realize and accept that God exists, that He has a plan of redemption and that Yeshua ha Maschiach is that plan, we then accept Yeshua as our Messiah, ask for forgiveness of our sins in His name and by His sacrifice we can be saved. Notice I said “can be saved”, not “are saved”- that’s what we all need to realize. It is free, it is true and it is automatic, and it is also on us to do our part to fulfil it.

“Calling on His name” has become a “tag line”, a hyped-up excuse for the real purpose of His sacrifice, which is to give us a means to overcome the result of our sins, namely sheol (hell) and eternal suffering. Yeshua’s sacrificial death atoned for us, but it doesn’t give us Carte Blanche to continue to sin. We are saved not by His sacrifice alone, but by our T’Shuvah, our “turning” from sin along with His sacrifice.

Salvation is not an individual event- it is a team effort. God, to Yeshua, to the Ruach, to you.

Get in the game; play hard; listen to and obey the Coach and win the only thing that is important: eternal peace.