LEPER HUGGING

To recap a little, so far in our study of Mark, we see how Yeshua was first introduced to those reading this Gospel. Paul’s letters had been circulating among the various congregations for some time, as they preceded the writing of the Gospels, and actually provide the first glimpses into the believer communities. Mark’s Gospel is the first written account, though, of Yeshua’s ministry.  Imagine if this was all new to you and you hear about this Man for the first time this way.  He’s not like anyone else you’ve ever heard about or known. He does things no one ever has.  Who exactly is He?

One of the first things He does is stir up a demon who has evidently been resident in a man with this unclean spirit all along but no one knew it. Though I do wonder if that didn’t explain some of this man’s personality quirks. Not only does this demon speak through this man probably for the first time, but the demon knows who Yeshua is – He’s “the holy One of God!” (1:24).  What in the world does that mean to those people witnessing this in the synagogue that day?  Holy One of God? This is a first, for sure.  

Have you ever been somewhere when a demon manifests its presence and starts talking? It’s pretty creepy. But Yeshua calmly takes charge, though nothing like this has ever happened to those folks in the synagogue that day. Having once been an angel before the demon joined Lucifer’s rebellion, he (it) would certainly know Yeshua by His Spirit. (Much to think about there.) As we know, Yeshua tells him (it) to be quiet and leave the man.  No priests or Pharisees were able to do that!    Then He heals Peter’s mother-in-law, so they learn that He also has healing power over sicknesses.  This results in many others in the village showing up at Peter’s front door who were healed as well. 

If that isn’t enough, Yeshua is then encountered by….. a dreaded leper!  This horrendous disease meant excruciating social isolation besides the pain of disfigurement for a victim of the disease. Somehow the news of Yeshua has come to this man of all that He has done and he takes the risk to come to Him with the great hope that he too can be healed.  Can we even imagine what this man must have been through, from the first evidence of the disease and then undoubtedly having to leave his home, and his livelihood, with no one, even his loved ones, wanting to come near him. Was he a poor peasant? Or perhaps he was even a Pharisee. Whatever identity he once had was no longer his. Now he was only a leper.   

The man asks Yeshua, with much trepidation I would think, not really knowing how Yeshua would respond, “If You are willing….”   My bible says, “Yeshua reached out His hand as He touched him and said to him, “I am willing, be cleansed” (1:40-41). Can you just picture the inhaled gasp of those around them when Yeshua reaches out and touches the man, as they all back up together as if it was choreographed?  

Whenever I read that story, I always hear Yeshua kind of choke up a little as He says that He is willing. This poor man would have been relegated to being an “unclean” person by everyone he knows, and certainly by the priests and religious folk.  Was he once maybe even one of them? We don’t know. He certainly couldn’t go near anything having to do with the Temple. 

But this Son of God who is devoid of “religion” in all the ways in which He reveals the true Heart of God, reaches out to the man in what in Hebrew is called Rachamim.  It’s my favorite Hebrew word. Pronounced as rakh-a-meem, it means compassion. 

Despite the fact that at least one of my English translation bibles uses the word pity right there, rachamim  is not pity but compassion.  The difference is that pity looks down on a person with a kind of sad “tsk-tsk, that’s really a shame for them” perspective, while compassion gets down in the mud with the person to help lift them out of it.  Compassion gets in there, wherever there is, to lend a hand, to be there for them, to help. Whoever he was, he was a man whom Yeshua regarded as a man like anyone else in great need, and responded to him with God-like compassion.  Isn't that what Yeshua did for us all ultimately - He got down in the muddy soil of the earth in every sense to lift us out of all that has kept us victimized by the “fall” of mankind into sin and unbelief. 
 
Yeshua wasn’t just feeling sorry for the man, He didn’t have to touch him; He healed others without touching them.  But the touch was part of the healing.  I wonder how long it had been since this man had felt any human touch.  Reaching out and putting His hand on the man was a way of saying “I accept you as the person you are.  I don’t see you as a diseased man, I just see you as a man whom God considers worthy of His love.” A tender touch, as that must have been, means I care about you. Human touch goes a long way to bring comfort and encouragement to any of us.

Needless to say, the man was entirely, completely and immediately healed. Can you picture what it would have been like for that man to be given back his life.  Or to witness all that happening – nothing you would have ever expected. I'm guessing once whole again he gave Yeshua one very big hug and I can just hear Yeshua laughing in delight with him. After all, what would Yeshua have felt in all this? Joy, I would imagine. And a great sense of godly satisfaction to have been able to restore the man to wholeness. He may have been the one who was the most blessed. We’re rarely told of His responses to much of went on. You have to get those insights from the Holy Spirit when you give them some prayerful pondering.  

I wonder, could this now healed person have been the man whose house Yeshua later went to for the famous dinner when He was anointed by a woman who poured a jar of precious oil over His head (Mark 14:3)?  That dinner was held in the home of a man who was obviously healed but, unfortunately, was still identified as “Simon the leper.”  Was that him? If so, did Yeshua remain friends with this man after He healed him? This possible relationship causes me to wonder what other kinds of relationships Yeshua maintained in His travels and experiences. He and His men had to eat somewhere, or rest somewhere. How would you like to have had them drop by for a while when in the area where you lived?  Oh yeah! I often think He was a lot more human than we imagine Him to have been. 

In a sort of related way, this all brings to mind how useless religion can be when it is devoid of the godliness of compassion.  Keeping all those religious rituals which were added to what God gave Israel in the Torah, actually distanced those from God who were seeking God’s approval for their piousness. They entirely missed what God wants for and from His people. Sometimes a simple hug is being Lord-like and pleasing to God. 

Perhaps the Holy Spirit might make you aware of someone who just might need a touch, or a hug and to be told that God knows just what they’re going through and that He’s there with them. I met the sweetest lady in her 70’s in the Dollar Store last week. She was obviously trying to make a decision about what to buy and seemed perplexed. I started to chat with her and soon she told me about her adult son who ill who lives with her and she wasn’t sure what would be a good juice for him as he is now a diabetic. I showed her how to see how much sugar is in the jars of juices and I wound up praying with her about this son she was so concerned about. She was a believer and said she felt like God had sent His love and comfort to her right there in the Dollar Store. What a joy that little encounter was – for both of us. And yes, we did share a hug.

If you’ve done things like that for someone, then you know that the person isn’t the only one to be blessed. The Lord lets us know He’s pleased by sharing a moment of His joy with us. Yeshua who must have had a great many moments like that, just quiet-like inside, just between Him and His Abba.  

With Eyes of Love

I was introduced to a young man at church yesterday by the pastor.  We began to talk and it turned into a significant conversation. He has been part of YWAM excursions into other nations and has received some training by significant names such as Reinhardt Bonke on evangelism crusades and other large meetings. But now his heart is for individual persons and to be functioning as an evangelist to bring people to the Lord personally. He told me of his experiences of him and another man going into economically depressed areas of the city. I sensed how much he really cared for those people and longed for them to know how Jesus can change their lives for the better. 

But despite what looked like a good beginning with about five men they met on the streets, it never went anywhere. The men they spoke with initially didn’t all come the next time they had arranged to meet. My new friend was somewhat discouraged but ready to find out how to make it work next time.  And so we migrated over to two big comfy leather chairs in the lobby set up for folks wanting to chat and we talked until just about everyone had left the church and then we stood in the parking lot for a while more.  There is so much to talk about in the Lord!

He had mentioned being an introvert, which tells me he would be more comfortable on a one-to-one situation or a few persons than in a crusade. This led to talking about how some of the people he’s wanting to minister the Lord to might also feel. How can he make them comfortable with what he might want to share with them, especially if what he’s saying is new to them? What would cause them to begin to trust him to even begin a friendship?  In the case of the few he met who didn’t show up for the next meeting, he had told them, “Let’s get together again for a bible study.”  Now mind you, we’re talking about a really poor section of town. What was a “bible study” likely to mean to those folks?

Consider what ‘study’ anything would mean to them:  School, right? Good chance most of them dropped out of school having failed or were totally disinterested in what they considered boring teachers had to say.  Possibly in some cases, they can’t even read very well. I know I’m stereotyping here, but we’re talking about severely economically challenged inner city folks.  Saying something like “Let’s get together for a bible study” would just seem like what they would have zero interest in. They are using up a lot of energy just dealing with daily issues and a bible study is just another thing that they anticipate failing at, something to give them more rules they can’t keep. That’s most people’s idea of Bible study until they get to know who Father God really is through Jesus. They're likely thinking of do’s and don’ts from a God whose standards they know they can’t meet.  

Someone doesn’t have to be in a poor inner-city situation though to relate to feeling this way about God. I’m speaking in extremes here but how many people are actually interested in a good intellectual discussion on the bible when they’re really hungry for food, or strung out on drugs, or they are in the middle of a divorce or just lost their only source of income, or their kids are in trouble and they don’t know what to do? Or for that matter, there just is no one who cares enough to look them in their eyes with eyes of love that say they care, or who will give them a hug, no matter what they may look or smell like. These things could apply anywhere, not just the inner-city. 

What people need is to experience the love of God.  We all need that!  We may have a quest to get people saved, to bring them to salvation because we ourselves know how good and safe and wonderful it is to belong to the Lord, but Jesus wants us to make love our quest first. It's not a matter of our performance, it's a matter of being like Him! I suggest doing so will result in the rest falling into place. The Lord will then lead us to be doing what He’s put in each of our your hearts to do, what He’s created each of us for.  It starts with getting in touch at a deep level with Jesus’ love for people, for individual persons, not just people in general - including His love for you personally. May I suggest taking a read through 1 Corinthians 12:1-8a, the love chapter, and thank the Lord as you make your way down that love-list.  By thanking Him, I don’t mean a perfunctory saying of the words “Thank you, Lord.”  I mean really relating to Him yourself and letting Him respond to you as you express a thankful heart to Him.  And I’m not talking about doing a “bible study” with yourself, I’m talking about getting in touch deep inside yourself with the Jesus who brings the Father’s love to you this way. 

We’ve all experienced God's love for us personally on different levels if we’re His. But there's always so much more. How about His faithfulness to be there for you, no matter what? He has known your innermost secrets and yet never once spoken or conveyed words of judgement or condemnation to you, there's only acceptance and tender-hearted love, even if He disciplined you for a while. Are you aware that once you repent of something He never brings it up to you again, because He doesn’t keep an account of your wrong doings? How long suffering is He with us always. If you ever feel condemned by God, that you’ve hopelessly failed Him, that’s not the voice of the Father you’re hearing; it’s the voice of the Accuser, the devil. Don’t listen to him. Turn to the Lord, repent where you need to, and fall into the loving arms of Jesus who always forgives.  Love isn’t so much a feeling as it is coming to know the faithfulness and kindness of our God. Sometimes it’s also about new revelations of His majesty. 

Yesterday during worship in church I experienced something not new to me but “new” in the sense of awesome in the fresh revelation it always brings. Jesus lives inside of us, right? Get in touch with Him within you and worship as if from Him. By that I mean, worship as if you are one with Him, not just you yourself worshipping – worship as if you are Jesus as He would have worshipped His Father while on earth and the Holy Spirit is likely to share with you some very precious insights between the Father and the Son.  But this time for me it was more than that.  I don’t recall the song we were even singing exactly but the worship leader began to speak about the Father, the very thing I was experiencing. Through the words and the worship what opened up to me was the unfathomable love Jesus had for His Father, His absolute trust in His goodness.  And here's the "more" part: I had the sense of the profound unity and satisfaction, the great sense of accomplishment of Jesus with Abba the rescue of the world and how They had done it together!

Words are always so inadequate when trying to explain things of the Spirit. But being in touch with Yeshua’s worship of the Father from within yourself will open up to you perhaps a deeper worship – Jesus’ worship and oneness with His Father. Yesterday’s revelation was that I suddenly had an awareness at a level I hadn’t known before of that the love of Jesus was entirely for His Father and all the rest came out of that love relationship between Jesus and His Abba.

I was briefly with an old friend when I was in Israel recently. He has been in an evangelistic ministry on the streets of Israel for over thirty years. I hadn’t seen him in a number of years but I was struck with the love that poured out of his eyes when we met again.  Joy flooded his face and permeated his smile, at me and others as I watched him, even when he was interrupted by someone who was sure he only wanted to hear what they had to say. He wasn’t annoyed. Instead love just oozed out of this man. He’s taken a lot of persecution while preaching the gospel on the streets of Tel Aviv over the years, but all he’s got to give is love. His words were so surrendered to the God he loves I wanted to climb inside of his heart and know Him the way He does. 

What drew people to Jesus wasn’t just the miracles, or the loaves and fishes, but what He said that made sense to them. He spoke to them in ways they could relate to: seed planting, sheep tending, losing and finding coins…. He talked to them in their language, even though He could no doubt have discoursed on doctrinal issues way beyond what any learned Pharisee could have. He related to them where they were. His love was seen and heard and brought acceptance to them in the familiar circumstances of their lives. But some of our ways of attempting to bring people to Him don't seem to match up to His ways, as I see it. 

And while I'm on the subject, mind if I share a few concerns on evangelism?  I’m not inclined to think the Lord meant for us to feel satisfied that we’ve done our job if people just recite a prayer after us after we've given them the "God has a wonderful plan for your life" abbreviated evangelism spiel. With little coming from them in spontaneous heart-felt response to God, what does that tell them about how they are to relate to Him? That's not to say that some actually do get no-kidding really saved this way, but on the whole, if they are introduced to Him with a ‘canned’ speech, how does that teach them that they can talk to God naturally? Its not a good intro to Him as I see it. Another thing that troubles me, while I’m sharing all this. Do we tell people they’re going to heaven because of the repeating of a few sentence as do some gospel presentations without any introduction to the requirement to walk holy before the Lord?  But even then, holiness is not something taught, it’s caught. It’ll be rules and have-to’s if they don’t see it modeled in love, first for the Lord, and then toward others because we largely live out our love for God through our relationships. 

If hearts aren’t touched somehow, then the words of our presentation may sound promising while we’re talking to them, but do they stick? Jesus taught His men how to reach others through discipleship. And discipleship should be about relationship. The early church met house to house in relationships that undoubtedly functioned as a form of discipleship by those who had walked with Jesus or the sharing and the caring for one another that took place wouldn’t have happened as it did. Did you ever think of how He turned one of the Sons of Thunder and into the apostle of His love? 

Real discipleship isn’t a weekly class for an hour or two.  It’s what my brother and I once learned from a man who gave us his time and his heart as we followed him around for a while. He simply said, “Welcome to my life” and we spent a short season of our lives with him but it was a game-changer for us and I’ve never forgotten the difference that experience and he made in our lives. 

What if each one of us welcomed into our lives one other person. And then a while later your disciple learned from you and did the same thing. Multiplication in Kingdom math would exceed what 1+1 does naturally. Here’s how it works:  You’re the 1. Let’s say you disciple two other people in a given period of time.  That’s 1+2 =3.   In time you and your two disciples are each discipling two other folks; that’s the 3 of you now discipling six others. That’s 3+6=9.  Then the 9 of you are each discipling another set of two folks: 9+18=27, and on it goes. What if most people in your fellowship did that? If you all had someone into whose life you are imparting what you know of the Lord including just being their friend?  Let’s say 30 people are discipling two people a year who then go on to disciple two others, etc.  I’m terrible at math and maybe I wouldn’t get the numbers right, but I figure that’s 810 people being led into maturity in the Lord. That’s maximum church growth not just in numbers but in solid relationship and commitment.  Such discipleship relationships generally continue throughout life as friendships in the Lord, which is how the Lord intended them to be.  I don’t know about you, but that gets me pretty excited:  Doing the stuff of the Kingdom!  Yeah!! 

I will also say that such relationships will also cause you to be sure you’re right with God, and with men, lest you misrepresent the Lord to your disciples.  God set it up that way so that we are always aware of how our walk with the Lord affects others. That’s not a burden, that’s a security built into the ways of the Kingdom; we love others and want only good for them so we live accordingly. Discipleship works both ways, for the disciplee and the discipiler to the benefit of both. Befriend someone this way and your life will be all the richer for it.  We can all invest in the lives of someone else with whom we can share how we live our lives in the Lord.  If you don’t feel ready, ask the Lord to make you ready. Clean up your life – for the sake of someone else. It’ll bring you more joy than you can imagine.

Jesus said to His disciples early on in their relationship, “Follow Me and I’ll make you fishers of men.”  I have often wondered, if we aren’t fishing, are we really following?  The young man that I met yesterday is surely fishing, but he wasn’t using the right bait.  Love is the bait, not bible studies, not first off anyway. Relationship building comes first if we want to see changed lives. The words of the gospel without somehow conveying the love of the gospel isn’t really the gospel. Just saying “Jesus loves you,” or “God loves you” is so abstract to someone who doesn’t know what real love which they can trust means. And that applies to all levels of society.  It takes loving people to convey His love to others. Jesus said to “pursue love” (1 Cor. 14:1).  It’s a good place to start – for yourself, and those whose lives you will touch for Him and for eternity. 

Saving A Marine on Veteran's Day

It's Veteran's Day. November 11, 2010. My neighbor, Patrick, called to tell me a very drunk Marine in full dress uniform was asleep on my doorstep. Patrick tried to get him up. Couldn’t. Tried to call our neighborhood Security. Couldn’t get through. He called me to tell me, suggesting I might want to call 911. I looked out the window and sure enough there was the Marine in full dress uniform. Now he was sitting in the rocking chair that I fished out of the trash a while back and painted blue, his uniform an almost matching color, his eyes closed, rocking ever so slightly.

Lord, what do you want me to do? No sense of alarm. Peace. I knew the Lord was in this. I stepped out the door and quietly said, "Soldier," not to frighten him. He managed to lift his eye lids and look at me briefly. It was obvious he was still pretty drunk. "Are you okay?" He answered very quietly and with some difficulty, "Yes ma'am." He did ask me not to call the police. I assured him I wasn't going to and said, "If God brought you to my doorstep it’s for a reason. He evidently is reaching out to you." He just licked his lips like he was dry and continued rocking, eyes staring blankly ahead. No he didn't want any water. And no he didn't want a cup of coffee. He had no idea where he was or, "worse yet," he said, he didn't know how he got there. Angels, I expect, had hand delivered him to me.

I managed to find out he had joined the Marines at 18 and was now 30 and had returned from Iraq recently. I asked him if anyone had ever told him that God loves him and has a plan for his life? "The Lord saved me when I was five," he said. So where are you with the Lord now? I asked. Well, when he joined the Marines, he somehow lost touch with Jesus, it appears. I asked him if he wanted to get right with Him now. It's obvious, I told him, that the Lord wants you to know that He has you on His radar screen and that He knows exactly where you are and He's protecting you, or He wouldn't have brought you to my doorstep.

"Is it bad if I don't want to pray out loud?" he asked me. No, it's not bad, I told him. If you want to pray inside yourself and talk to Him, it's Him you need to talk to, not me. You can just tell Him, "Jesus, forgive my sins. Here's my life." He sat staring for a few more minutes, and I could see a battle going on inside of him. Then he stopped rocking and closed his eyes and sat completely still for a few minutes. Then looked up at me briefly, and I knew he'd just given his heart back to Jesus. When I asked him if he had, as it was obvious it would have been hard for him to say it, he responded again with, "Yes, Ma'am." I said, "Welcome home, J., to the Lord." I offered him my hand and for the first time he looked right at me as he took my hand and held it for a few seconds and I saw the person he is, not just a lost and drunk Marine.

Then I said, I know you've been trained to not show emotions, but I see an awful lot going on in your eyes. What's happening, J? At this he managed to whisper, "I miss my grandpa." He had died recently, he told me. He had told his grandpa about Jesus when he was eleven years old, but he doesn't know if he recieved the Lord or not and he was scared. I assured him he would have to leave that in Jesus' hands, but the important thing today was that he had put his own life into Jesus' hands.

He had called a buddy to come and get him, handing me the phone to tell the buddy, David, where he was. When David arrived, J managed to stand up. I was surprised to see how tall he was. He further surprised me by turning to me and hugging me and saying, "Thank you, Ma'am." I walked him to the car and handed him over to David, as a new man, even if he was still a bit wobbly. Hopefully, this will be a Veteran's Day he will never forget. Nor will I.

Infinite Compassion

My mom went home to be with the Lord on August 26th, 2010. She was 92 and the sweetest Jewish lady you’d ever want to meet. OK, true, the photo was taken a few years earlier, but she was still beautiful, and yes, that's her own brown hair with hardly any grey hair. I can’t imagine anyone having anything but good things to say about her. She’s known the Lord since 1977, having come to the Lord in her sixties. A Jewish woman of that age with an orthodox Jewish upbringing coming to the Lord was not a usual occurrence at that time. (Still isn't.)

I share this with you about my Mom to let you know of the Lord's faithfulness in the last moments of our lives when we’re His. She went through three difficult days (death is still an enemy!) during which we watched her detach from this life, including saying goodbye to us, to a life that no longer had any meaning to her – only the people did, and even to Lizzie, our doggie, whispering to her, “You’ve been a very good puppy dog.”

Nothing was left to be said. We had said all the I love you’s, and thank you for being you’s. We had asked for forgiveness of each other years ago for any way we had hurt each other. After all, I was an unsaved teenager at one time – that’s cause to ask for forgiveness in itself. There was only love. It had been a privilege to be her caretaker, to honor my mother this way. I know that not every mother is as delightful and as easy to be with as mine, so she made caring for her easy. She was a role model of goodness, graciousness and generosity of heart to the end, even in the way she died.

That Saturday my daughters and their families, consisting of two sons-in-law, six grandchildren and three dogs went to the beach. Mom was always called "Gra," short for Grammom. The kids wrote her full name and "Gra" underneath in the sand. Libi whose name means "My heart" in Hebrew, wrote "We love you" under her name and drew a heart around the names in the sand upside down. "So she can read it from heaven either way if she's looking down," she said. We took a few moments to thank God for Gra and to remember things we loved about her. We were comforted in the Lord that she was in a much better place, but still, we deeply missed her as we left the beach, all of us together for the first time without her.

Two days later, to soothe our souls, my daughter Jenny and I went into the quaint little town she and her family live close to on the ocean here in Florida. We had lunch at a French restaurant, and dessert in a Belgian one. In the town is a synagogue which is over 100 years old, with beautiful stained glass windows and charming architecture. Jenny wanted to show it to me so we found an open door and went in. Three people were speaking together and turned to greet us with questioning looks on their faces as to who and why we were there as the service (It was Shabbat) was already over. Jenny had been there once before for a service and when she reminded them, they recognized her.

The older man, who turned out to be the 90 year old rabbi, greeted us warmly with an accent that sounded like my Grandmother's, a combination of English and a Russian Yiddish accent. Standing with them was a lady, also elderly, who was obviously in emotional pain. She had a handkerchief to her face and was crying, or trying not to.

Jenny asked the woman in a most tender voice why she was crying and she began to tell us, also in an accent, that a member of her family had died in Poland and she was unable to get to the funeral or be with her family. She was grieving terribly, not just for the family member she obviously loved, but also because she couldn’t be with her family so they could share their grief together. (Obviously, there was no Yeshua in her life or her deceased family member to take the sting out.) I asked her if she was the Rebbitzin (rabbi’s wife). Yes she was.

We then told her how we had just lost my Mom, so we now were sisters in grief. Jenny and I put our arms around her and cried with her. She had her head on Jenny’s shoulder while I put my arms around her too and just let the comfort of the Holy Spirit ooze into her as we silently prayed for His comfort to come to her. We just held her and let her hurt and cry and grieve while we loved on her.

That we too had just lost a loved one changed Mrs. Rabbi's sorrow from what was happening to her to sharing what three women were experiencing together. My thoughts went to something Paul once said which we were now experiencing: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Yeshua our Messiah, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God" (2 Cor. 1:3,4). It is often in comforting others that we are comforted.

Coming To God's Defense

I’d like to come to God’s defense, not that He needs me to. I often hear it said, and even preached, that God gave Israel the commandments, all 613 of them, to teach mankind that we can’t keep them. As if that statement sums up the whole of the Law (Torah) and God’s entire motive for giving it to Israel. But was that how Yeshua (Jesus) saw the Law? The Law, Christians are often told, was to show how much we need Yeshua. Of course, we need Him. Entirely and completely. But let me ask you this? Would God as Yeshua revealed Him to us demand of His people what they would be incapable of? Would Abba God set it up so that anyone who longed to do His will would live in constant frustration, failure and fear of the consequences of displeasing Him? Is that what your heart tells you is true of the God you know and love?

But what if it was true? Let’s see, the Commandments were given to Moses, according to some estimates, approximately 1491 B.C. That would mean it would be about 1500 years till Yeshua’s resurrection and the Holy Spirit was given when His followers were counted by God as having kept Torah “in Him” because He fulfilled it completely. Let’s consider 40 years to be a generation; that would be 375 generations – millions of people – attempting to observe the commandments unsuccessfully. Why would people continue such a futile endeavor generation after generation? Perhaps a more important question is, what would such unrealistic requirements say about God and what kind of relationship He supposedly would be wanting with His people if it were true?

Perhaps some of you feel that God is always expecting of you what you seem to be unable to fulfill but should be able to. That would foster an awareness of something you need to do to somehow get right with God, yet you just never get there. That’s what it feels like to live under a demanding God whom you cannot satisfy. Does that kind of consciousness of failure make for a loving and trusting relationship in which you find rest in Him? Or does it leave you always somewhat stressed, continually conscious of how you’ve missed the mark He’s requiring of you? That is what it’s like to live under what we call legalism. But legalism is what comes from adding to God’s commandments, not from the commandments themselves. Unless, of course, God really did mean for Israel to live in continual exasperation until Messiah came. Their relationship then would be like demanding of a paralyzed man that he get up and walk on his own, knowing he is incapable of doing so. That’s irrational. Well, we certainly wouldn’t say that about Yeshua. He’s not irrational! But neither is His Father. If we somehow, even a little bit, envision the God of Israel as the irrationally demanding God of the Old Testament (Covenant), that is likely to bleed into our concept of what God expects of us under the New Covenant, despite how good we may see Yeshua. Could how some of us see God in relation to the Law be the cause for difficulty in entering into Messiah Yeshua’s rest?

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God Is In The Visuals

A friend and I were having an e-chat about how we each “see” God. I asked her how she imagined or pictured the Lord. I’m a pretty visual person. I have to kind of picture things to process them. God is in the visuals for me, though not exclusively of course. I do see God all around me. His fingerprints are everywhere. He’s in the harmonies of colors and the way shapes fit together. He’s in the ripples and the reflections in a pond or a puddle as they shine back the heavens above them. He’s in the flight of the herons that frequent our pond lifting undulating wings majestically while flying down stream. At times they seem to reveal God's smile at all the beauty He's created.

He’s in the pebbles on the path, each little one -- How did it get there? What made it that shape? Did God design each one specifically to His liking? I see the Hand of the Sculptor in them. I see the twist of several kinds of vines wrapping themselves around each other, reminding me of the way our lives weave in and out of each others’, and the reaching out of the tendrils to grasp hold of something other than itself for support. My eyes go to the grey-green-brown varied textures in each tree bark reminding me of the varied textures of experiences in our lives that serve to enable us to stand upright and strong as we grow in the Lord.

And that’s just what happens three times a day while walking my dog, Lizzie, in whose little face, when she looks into my eyes with her faithful devotion and unconditional love, is as the affection of God to me. What wonder. Part of my gratefulness to God continually is for eyes that see.

But I also picture Yeshua (Jesus). All the time. In my imagination. The stories about Him in the Bible are real life experiences to me. I go with Him in them. I figure God gave us imagination and then tells us stories for the very purpose of having us picture what took place in them and who was involved so we can project ourselves into the stories and respond to them, even internalize them. Not all, but many. Yesterday I read, “Jesus, perceiving that they were intending to come and take Him by force to make Him king, withdrew again to the mountain by Himself alone” (John 6:15). “Lord,” I said, “Take me with You.” I want to go and be with Him, I want to see Him when He’s alone with His Father, when no one else is around, to know Him that way too.

I can’t tell you I was granted a visual of this, at least not yet, but I did ask Him, “Lord, were you transfigured when you were alone with your Father so that you were in touch with Your glory? Did that only happen once or did it happen often? Or were you confined to Your humanity, humble before Abba, even stretched out and face down?”

As I ask these questions, I can “see” Him, humbling Himself before Abba, prostrate before Him. Even envisioning this again now humbles me. Makes me be still inside as if I’m in the presence of holiness. Then, as much as I am able, I try to picture Him glorified: “And He was transfigured before them; and His face shone like the sun, and His garments became as white as light” (Matthew 17:2). But I realize I’m incapable of seeing Him this way, with His Face as bright as the sun which we cannot endure looking at directly. His whole being emanating pure light! I cannot see this as it must have been, but I can surely feel the Holy Spirit within me responding to my even wanting to, as silent worship wells up within me.

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Dropping Pebbles of Kindness in Troubled Waters

Two friends and I were enjoying a mini-pot-luck dinner together this weekend. One of us was telling of a car mechanic who was rude, and had a bad attitude, not to mention not repairing her car as he should have. How as Believers should we respond to such situations? Yes, he needs to make good his work, but should she have written him off as a loser, just a bad guy to avoid? We began to pray for him, to bless him, for God to heal whatever in his heart happened to him to cause him such bitterness. Who knows, we pondered, if his wife didn’t leave him that morning, or if he has a sick child and is pre-occupied with worry? Or whatever.

We decided he needs some TLC from the Lord. She would go back, and while requiring he fix what wasn’t fixed properly, she would attempt to reach out with some word of kindness. Maybe even present that potentially life-changing question: “Has anyone ever told you that God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life?” It’s amazing what responses you get from folks when you ask them that question -- everything from tears, to smiles, to “No, no one ever has,” to “Yes, praise the Lord” (then you’ve found a sister or a brother in the Lord), to “Not me. I’ve done too much,” which certainly opens up the conversation to tell them about Jesus dying for just that reason, to make unacceptable people acceptable in God’s sight. And yes, sometimes you get rejection. On occasion someone just walks away, but rarely.

We continued to talk about how many people there are ‘out there’ who could be encouraged just by someone putting a little love in their smile or their voice as they address them. Someone who returns nastiness with niceness. There are a lot of lonely people in the world today, especially with so many family break-ups. Rejection permeates the self-image of so many. The saying, “Reach out and touch someone” may not be a bad idea. Just a touch on the arm or shoulder may go a long way to making someone feel worthy of being touched. They may not have been touched for a long time. Maybe that’s why Jesus reached out and touched the leperous man when He healed him. He could have just spoken the word to heal him. But maybe He was healing something in his soul as well as his body, letting him know he’s no longer “untouchable.”

Perhaps when we spread God's love around to someone they will then respond by sharing it with others. You know, like "Passing it forward." Only God really knows how far the ripples in the wake of a pebble of kindness goes out when we drop it into someone else’s life.

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You Can't Taste the Chicken Soup Online

How long has your family been celebrating Passover, I was asked by a new Christian friend who had just learned that my family observes Passover. To her the Exodus was only a Bible story. "Oh, about 3500 years," I responded.

If there's one thing Jewish people do, no matter how religious or non-religious we are, mostly everyone participates in a Seder. I'm pretty sure that's a work of the Holy Spirit. After all, that's a long time, 3500 years, to be telling the same story every year. God has to be in on that. We're just not all that faithful on our own.

The first year my Dad became a believer in Yeshua he conducted the Passover Seder almost entirely in Yiddish (which only some of us actually understood). He did so because Yiddish was his first language as he grew up in his Rabbi grandfather's shull (synagogue) and his heart was so tender toward Yeshua, he wanted to tie his Jewish background together with his Jewish Messiah. We were all so familiar with the story, having each heard it all our lives, that despite the language, we knew what was being said, and were touched by Dad's love for the Lord and his gratefulness to God for rescuing our people time and time again.

This year there were 14 of us at our Seder table in Jacksonville, 12 family members and two guests, one from Germany. But my son was in New York and unable to be with us. That is, not "in person." However, my daughter Jenny had a brainstorm. We "Skyped" him in and there he was on her laptop computer, big as life. Well, almost. She carried the laptop around so we could each greet him. The family kibbitzing went on between the kids and their uncle as usual, only online this time. Then we set him near the candles as my other daughter Ellen lit them and said the blessing. When it was time for the first cup of wine, he said the B'rachah (blessing) in Hebrew and English. We proceeded through the Seder with him at the head of the table -- literally because we could only see his head on the screen.

So not even distance kept us from celebrating our Passover Seder together this year. I wonder if we're the first to hold a family cyber-Seder. The only thing missing, for me was that I couldn't hug him and for him, that no matter how interactive we were able to be, he couldn't taste the chicken soup online.