God's Bible College

The book of Numbers in Hebrew is called B’Midbar, which means ‘In the Desert’. It is given this name because the book opens by declaring that God spoke to Moses in the desert (Numbers 1vs1). Given the premise that nothing in the Bible is insignificant, it stands to reason therefore that the statement declaring God spoke to Moses in the desert becomes quite significant. A midrash from the Jewish sages states, the Torah was given through the context of three things: Fire, Rain and the Desert. God descended through a cloud of lightning, thunder and rain to Mount Sinai; when He spoke to Moses the Bible explains fire came out of His mouth (Deut 4vs33); and He delivered the Torah in the desert.

Genesis depicts the desert as a place of exile, with little human habitation, a place of wild animals, bandits and in subsequent Jewish thought, the abode of demons. The desert does not appear to be an area people would naturally flock to. There is no water or anything else of substance to offer humans. Yet it is to the desert that God sends His heroes. On one hand the desert represents a desolate, violent and lawless area. On the other hand, the desert context is spiritually positive with God delivering His Torah to the world. What’s the connection between God and the Desert?

The word ‘Midbar’ in Hebrew means ‘Desert’. The same consonants that form the word ‘Midbar’ מדבר also form the word ‘Medaber’ מדבר which is the Hebrew word for ‘Speak’. There are no vowels in Hebrew thus ‘Midbar’ and ‘Medaber’ appear the same in Hebrew. Further, the root of ‘Midbar’ מדבר is ‘Davar’ דבר which is the word for ‘Word’ and actually creates the verb ‘To Speak’. This completes the picture quite nicely. Where does God speak? He speaks in the Desert. 

The desert is a place free from distractions, a place free from the idolatry so often prominent in cities. In the quiet of the desert you can hear God’s voice. And so God sends all His heroes there. Moses goes to the desert, Elijah spends time in the desert, David escapes from Saul there, Israel wanders through the wilderness and even Jesus is driven by the Spirit into the desert. Jesus knows He is special at a young age, but He needs to learn to hear God’s voice, so the Spirit compels Him to go to the desert. The place where God speaks. 

A friend of mine (David Pileggi) often calls the Desert, Gods Seminary. And it’s truly an apt description. The desert is a place of preparation. Often the people God calls are not yet equipped and need a place of training. It’s interesting to see that the place where God speaks, where he trains His heroes for the tasks ahead, is also the place of the enemy. Jesus goes into the desert to hear the voice of the Lord and at the same time has to fight the Devil. Similarly, we also need to learn to hear the voice of the Lord. Often not from a place of rest but from a place of testing (not a literal desert). It is a comfort to know that there is someone in Heaven who had to struggle with that too. 

Did Yeshua ever declare He was Messiah?

Perhaps one of the more frustrating things about the Gospels is that Jesus never seems to tell people He is the Messiah. When people actually figure it out He often gives instructions to be quiet and not to tell anyone. Which on the surface seems incredibly self-defeating for your mission if your mission is to be the Messiah and for people to follow you as such. 

Linguistics is the scientific study of languages in three major aspects: language form, language meaning and language context. It is in the Hebraic context, the use of and meaning of the language of Jesus (Hebrew), that Jesus does indeed share His Messiahship and mission, and He does so at the beginning of His ministry. Right at the start! 

Luke 4 details the introduction to the ministry of Jesus, setting the scene in His hometown synagogue of Nazareth. Jesus (Yeshua), obviously a trained Bible reader, is handed the Isaiah portion for the Haftorah reading from the Prophets. After reading from Isaiah 61 He delivers His first recorded teaching, a one line sermon. Chapters and Verses were not introduced into the Biblical text until the 13th Century (for Chapters) and 16th Century (for Verses). In the English translation we can easily note that Yeshua, in reading Isaiah 61vs1-2, does not finish the last sentence, drops a sentence from the text and even adds a sentence altogether. If I stood up to read a portion from the Gospel of Matthew, and as I read I inserted some Psalms, a little bit of Pauline text and finished with a dose of Revelation, I might be asked to justify why I did not read the text as it was plainly written? What Jesus does though is perfectly applicable to His Jewish context and linguistic hermeneutic. He is ‘allowed’ to do what He did, due to the way Hebrew language is constructed and how it is used and applied to Biblical interpretation during the 2nd Temple Period, the time of Jesus. Remember, Jesus’ comment on this passage ‘Today, this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing’ (Luke 4vs21). The real question we should ask ourselves then is, what was fulfilled in the scripture? 

The prophetic portion begins with רוּחַ אֲדֹנָי יֱהֹוִה עָלָי יַעַן מָשַׁח יְהֹוָה אֹתִי, ‘the Spirit of the Lord is on me’. Luke connects everything to the Spirit. Jesus is born of the Spirit, and now He is anointed by the Spirit, whereas Matthew focuses on the royalty of the Messiah. Matthew has the visit of the Magi, the majestic gifts and the proclamation as King. Luke presents the poorer side of Jesus, with more details of the Messiah at a younger age. Now after coming out of the desert, having been sent there by the Spirit, Luke presents the ministry of Jesus beginning with the Spirit of God on Jesus. 

Connecting the next portion of the sentence is the Hebrew word Ya’an, often translated as ‘because’. The literal Hebrew word for ‘because’ is ‘Ki’ and doesn’t sound anything like ‘Ya’an’. ‘Ya’an’ comes from an old root word, and is not often used, meaning to pay attention, implying the purpose of something important to be heeded. It is used linguistically to stress the importance of what follows. A modern day schoolteacher would make use of the word ‘Ya’an’ to inform the class that what follows in the instruction is fundamental and needs the class’ full attention. What follows in the Isaiah passage is quite important, which is מָשַׁח יְהֹוָה אֹתִי. Literally the verb L’Mashiach means to anoint/make a Messiah/make an anointed one. The Messiah is indeed an anointed one. Our translations express this sentence as ‘God has anointed me.’ All kings of Israel and some prophets were anointed. Each king is essentially a ‘little messiah’. However another way to say this in English is ‘God has made me Messiah’. After Yeshua reads this portion He sits down and as all the eyes of the synagogue are on Him, He states, ‘Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing’. Jesus did say that He was the Messiah. He was quite clear and He declared it right at the start! 

Compassion of the Messiah

The Feeding of the Five Thousand is a very familiar miracle of Jesus. Quite possibly because apart from the Resurrection it is the only miracle occurring in all four of the Gospels. After hearing of the death of His cousin, John the Baptist, Jesus seeks some solitude near Bethsaida. In doing so Jesus reveals to us some of His humanity. His cousin and colleague in ministry has been brutally murdered and He needs some time for prayer, reflection and to work through emotions. However, crowds gather and follow after Him. Instead of demanding some quiet time to Himself, when Jesus landed on the shore ‘He saw a large crowd, and He had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So He began teaching them many things.’ Mark 6vs34. 

This passage reveals one the greatest characteristics of the Messiah, His compassion. Hemla in Hebrew, compassion, is one of my favourite words. The Gospels are finely crafted texts. The words chosen are very important and certainly are not superfluous. Compassion is linked to the Sheep and the Shepherd in this miracle. 

Early Jewish Believers looked on Yeshua (Jesus) as the new Moses, the one that had been prophesied to come. Deuteronomy 18vs18, ‘I will raise up for them a prophet like you’. Thus some of the characteristics of Moses would be found to be similar in the coming prophet ‘like Moses’. The Gospels pair Compassion, Sheep and Shepherds together, drawing from a long oral tradition concerning the first Moses and link them with Jesus the Messiah. 

Question ~ why was Moses allowed to lead the Children of Israel out of Egypt? That’s a pretty big assignment for anybody to undertake and it would take someone of special character to participate. Out of all the available heroes God could choose, He chose Moses. So what are the characteristics of a Hero of God? When we look at the characteristics of Moses, we see that he is a murderer - Moses slew an Egyptian. We also see that he is a liar - Moses covered up the body and tried to hide what he had done. Next we discover that Moses is a coward. Once the truth is out that he has committed murder, he flees to Midian instead of facing the consequences. Moses then spends the next 40 years in Midian, he marries the daughter of a pagan priest, raises a family and becomes wealthy tending stock animals. In those 40 years he neither returns to Egypt to discover the plight of the Hebrew slaves nor appears to dwell on the Israelite captives. So that’s the Hero type? A selfish murderer, liar and coward? Not exactly the qualities we would look for in a hero!

So when was Moses ready to lead the people? When did God find His hero equipped for the task? For help in answering this question there is a midrash on Moses that we could draw on. And it links into the Gospel’s depiction of Jesus as He supplies the miracle to the multitudes. A midrash is a method of Jewish exegesis to help answer difficult questions raised by the text, or to fill in gaps not described in the Biblical narrative that are perhaps only hinted at. The word Midrash comes from the verb ‘to seek, study, inquire’ and the actual word Midrash occurs twice in the Hebrew Bible. Example: in 2 Chronicles 13vs22 we read ‘in the midrash of the prophet Ido.’ 

The midrash recounts the story of an important incident that occurs while Moses is watching the flocks one day in Midian. One sheep wanders away from the rest of the flock. You actually see this midrash played out in the Dreamwork's animated movie The Prince of Egypt. Instead of abandoning the foolish sheep to its self-inflicted state to be torn apart by wild animals, Moses (with the voice of Val Kilmer) goes off in search of the lost one. He climbs over rocks and through briars, scuffing his arms and legs in the process. In the end he finds the lost sheep lying exhausted under a rock. As he bends down to carry the sheep back on his shoulders, then suddenly the bush nearby catches fire, and God speaks to His hero. God could see the compassion in the heart of Moses for the one lost, foolish sheep and He knows that His hero is ready to lead the People of Israel. Moses is finally ready. Moses has added the quality of Compassion in his heart, and that is the quality God is looking for in His heroes. 

When you look at other heroes of God in the Bible, we see their flaws, their sins and failings, but we also see the characteristic in them that made them heroes. If you want to be a hero of God, then you need compassion too. 

A Time for Hope

There is a time for everything under heaven, the Wise Man once said (Ecclesiastes 3). Happy New Year and according to the Gregorian Calendar, welcome to 2016. It is common that when the clock ticks over from one epoch to another, like a year or a century, that there are times for celebration and looking to the future and sometimes for reflection and pondering the past. Often both at the same time. 

Looking forward at the new year to come, the time ahead seems fraught with difficulties. In the build up to inaugurating 2016, several events in Paris, Moscow, Jakarta, Madrid, New York and Sydney were cancelled or reduced. The world enters 2016 a little jittery, economies teeter on the edge of recessions, despite oil being lower than ever nothing seems to actually be cheaper at all (except oil), terrorism casts an ugly shadow that only seems to get longer and reach further into our cities, and our leaders appear quite powerless to solve any of those problems. Thankfully as believers it is good to remember that God remains King of the Universe and He sits on the Throne.  As Lord of Time He is in control, and that is a comforting thought. Without God ruling and reigning as He does, the world would indeed be hopeless. 

But there is a time for Hope, Tikvah in Hebrew. When the apostle Paul condensed all of the Christian Faith down into three words he wrote ‘… these three things remain, Faith, Hope and Love and the greatest of these is … not Faith!’ (Which will have to be the subject of another post! 1 Corinthians 13vs13). Now before I get labeled as a heretic let me be clear. Faith in the Messiah is extremely important. He who believes and is baptized will be saved, says the Messiah. However, Scripture reminds us that the greatest of these is Love. This does not diminish Faith in anyway. Too often though, Hope is forgotten that it is in this short list. And Hope is such a powerful word. 

It is the apostle Peter who instructs us to be prepared to give a reason for the hope that we have (1 Peter 3vs15). He does not say we need to give a reason for our Faith. Why not? Why not be prepared to defend the Faith. Probably because this world simply just does not care. No one cares about our Faith anymore. They don't want to know. Don't get me wrong, I love apologetics. We are now in a world that has embraced the subjective lie that truth is relative and that there are no absolutes. One person’s truth is just as valid as another person’s truth. Who's to judge? It’s very hard to argue against. People are ok if we believe in Jesus, just as long as we don't try and tell them about it. The world says: “You believe in Jesus, that’s wonderful. Now you and Jesus just sit over there but me and my crystals will be just fine over here, thank you. Don't try and impose your reality on my reality. I’m ok!” 

Peter also does not urge us to give a reason for our Love. Generally the world doesn't demand from us a reason why we are good. People don't usually say, “I saw you help your neighbour out yesterday. Stop that, stop being nice. You should not do that, it’s bad to be nice. Stop loving!” Love is not the realm only of the believer. Love is a chief characteristic of God. The designer has put it inside His design and Love is in all of his Creation. Perfect Love casts out all fear. 

We can not trust our governments to solve the problems, and we can not trust in our economies to secure our future. We can trust in God and Him alone. In a world without God, when the lights go out and you close your eyes for the very last time, all is lost, it’s all gone. This short life becomes pointless and meaningless and there is no hope. It’s depressing. But we don't think that way. Our trust is in the Lord who lives. We believe He is on the Throne and He is in control. We believe that Messiah did not remain dead and that He did rise to life and so shall we. And that means that there is Hope. Hope that things will get better, hope that the dawn will come and chase the darkness away. And no one, not even the Enemy, can take that Hope away. We can always be prepared to give a reason for the Hope that we have. When people ask us about the future of 2016, we can share Hope to a hopeless world. We do not need to be a trained evangelists to share why we have hope. We just have to open our mouths and be honest. It’s personal and not offensive simply to say, ‘For this reason I have Hope. Because God is Alive and I will live too’. Looking forward into 2016 is indeed a Time for Hope. 

Why is this Night different from all other Nights?

Shalom and Merry Christmas. It might surprise many to know that several thousand Israelis will visit churches across the Old City of Jerusalem on Christmas Eve. Jewish people going to church at Christmas, who knew? What is it that attracts Israeli Jews, predominately secular, to go to Christian Churches at this time? In the words of the Jewish son asking his father on Passover ~ “Why is this night different from all other nights?”

Israelis are a curious people, they love to travel, to explore, to taste and to question the world around them. They live and breathe a life amongst antiquity, surrounded by ancient stones that tell stories of past civilizations and peoples. They are literally imbedded in history, and the ancient story of Christmas is no less attractive for the curious Israeli seeker. 

Israelis gather into groups, find themselves a guide, bus into Jerusalem from Tel Aviv, Beersheba and Haifa and walk around the Old City visiting all the Churches. They go Church hopping, in a good way :) Looking, watching, pondering what Christians are doing on this special night. Unfortunately, not every Church is welcoming, imagine that! Not so at Christ Church, we do exactly the opposite. At Christ Church we have Carols in the Church from 6pm onwards and the Church is filled to the brim, standing room only as Jewish people listen to Christians worship in song. We provide Christmas cookies and the traditional warm ‘mulled wine’ to drink and take the chill from the cool night. Then we gather the people in their groups and speak to them about Christmas. We start by saying, “I’m not going to tell you a Christian story. I am going to tell you a Jewish story!”

The Jewish Story of Christmas ~ The Christmas story is not a Christian story, it’s a Jewish one through and through. It’s a story about a Jewish boy, born to Jewish parents, in a Jewish town, who is the promised Jewish Messiah. Amazingly more than two billion people are going to read and hear that story over the next 24 hours. This Jewish story has captured the hearts of so many people in the world. You don't want to miss out do you? And many will take a Bible home with them that night. Imagine that!

It’s an incredible story set amidst constant tension. A shameful pregnancy, a humiliating birth surrounded by strange visitors, Jewish shepherds and Gentile kingmakers, the childhood flight to Egypt from a megalomaniac despot and visiting angelic beings. Somehow in all this tension a baby makes it all better. You don't know how, you just know that it does. And it’s beautiful. 

For a brief moment in time a window to Heaven opens, you can feel it. For a brief moment in time people are ready to hear the good news. For about two weeks in and around Christmas the openness is so surprising. Then the window closes again and hardness creeps in to the world. This night is very different from all other nights.

Light and Salvation

There are many pairings in the Hebrew Bible of words, thoughts and phrases. Words get grouped together and become over time synonymous with each other. David prays in Psalm 27, ‘Whom shall I fear?’ with the pairing of Light with Salvation in reference to God, ’The Lord is my Light and my Salvation’. Out of all the possible words to choose from how did Light come to be paired with Salvation? 

Light appears as the first order of Creation. God creates Light first among all things. Yet this light of Creation was different to the light we visibly see in our daily lives of the present. God’s light is very special. Almost by definition it has to be. God’s light is not of the same substance as the light that emanates from the sun. We see that in the Creation order with the sun being made on day 4 of Creation yet God’s light existed from day 1. 

The light that comes from the sun is different from God’s light. God’s light can distinguish good from evil, the sun’s light cannot. The light from the sun chases away the night’s darkness. It provides light for my family and for the thief who comes to steal. It provides light for the doctor to heal, the liar to lie and for the killer to kill. But God’s light is different. When God made Light He did something with it. He moved it. When God moved the Light, what remained behind in the place of the Light? Darkness. ‘And God separated the light from the darkness’ (Genesis 1vs4).

God’s Light continued to play a role in human history. One of the plagues of Egypt was Darkness. Darkness for the face of Egypt and the Egyptians but Light for Israel in Goshen. The light of God could distinguish the good from the bad. A Midrash (Jewish Commentary) of the Exodus tells a story that the Light would move independently for every Israelite. It was impossible for the Israelite to wander off into the darkness. The Egyptians of course noticed this in their slave population. So when an Egyptian would need to cook food, he would have to go bring an Israelite into the kitchen so light would be available to cook with. The Midrash is a story, not to be taking literally. It shows again how God provided for His people, and how they could be a blessing to even their own oppressors, and to show that God’s Light can move. 

During the Exodus itself, God guided His people through the wilderness in the form of Light. A pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. The light once again moved. It acted as a guide for Israel in the desert, but also as a fiery shield to wall off the advancing Egyptian army. The Light of God was enduring, a guide in an unknown world, protection against the adversary, a comfort in the midst of danger, and overall part of the redemption from bondage into freedom. Light became synonymous with the redemptive activity of God. It entered Jewish prayer life. A call to experience the Light of Heaven in present day reality. Salvation became part and parcel of all that encompassed the Light of God. 

The prophet Isaiah declares, ‘Arise shine, for your Light has come’ and yet the next sentence reminds us that ‘Darkness covers the face of the people.’ (Isaiah 60vs1-2). The call is to reflect the Light of God, in all its redemptive and healing power. To be Lights to the Nations. As we bring the light of God, we bring Salvation. Light is paired with Salvation. Light and the messianic hope to a dark world. Remember that God’s Light can move. So if we leave, then the Light leaves with us. 

Wrestling with the Scriptures

Question - What is your faith rooted in? Let me suggest that your faith is not in your Bible. Your faith is in the risen Messiah. If Messiah did not rise from the dead then it does not matter which Bible you are reading. The whole exercise would be pointless. Thus knowing that our faith is in the risen Jesus (Yeshua in Hebrew) it should not overtly concern us then which Bible we prefer to read. As our faith is not in the Bible, it's in Jesus. As a very smart man, Jaroslav Pelikan, once said, ‘If Christ is risen, nothing else matters and if Christ is not risen, then nothing else matters’. Recalling that the disciples did not have a Bible, they show us how they secured their faith in the risen Messiah to the point of martyrdom. 

What is the nature of the Bible? It is unlike any other book. We call it the Holy Bible because indeed that is its nature, it is Holy and Special in more ways than we know. It is also Divine Language. God's language is not like our language. His words create, they are eternal, they change the present and future in ways our language cannot. In Jewish thought the Bible is Divine Language. God does not speak with any superfluous words. He does not talk for the sake of talking. So the words that God chooses to speak are important, moreover even the sounds of those words are important, and just as important are the words that are not chosen or not said. The nature of the Bible, the Divine Language, then demands the reader to delve deeper. To look for more meaning and to search every possible corner of the text for extra details and information. If it’s so special, it needs special attention. The Hebrew tradition is to wrestle with the Bible. 

When the Hebraic mindset thinks about wrestling with the Bible, it does not mean it in a negative way. Such as ‘For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood …’ Ephesians 6vs12. Here Paul refers to a spiritual battle involving a struggle against angelic powers. Instead the picture of wrestling with the text comes from the Patriarch Jacob, who wrestled with God and as such is tied into the meaning of the name Israel. 

A friend of mine, a Jewish Believer, Alan Gilman has a teaching ministry based out of Ottawa. He writes an insightful teaching called TorahBytes. Alan follows the Torah portion of the week and recently wrote on Jacob wrestling with God. In that article he highlighted that while seemingly the concept of a mere human wrestling with God would be preposterous, but indeed it took place, Jacob knew there was something important to be gained, a blessing that he would not let go of until he had it. For all of Jacob’s faults he had a deep sense of the important things of life and Jacob’s tenacity was commended by God with a blessing. 

To read more from Alan follow the link here, and to subscribe to his weekly portion you can email him at info@torahbytes.org 

It is in that same tenacity that wrestling with the Scriptures is paired. The Bible as Divine Language contains within it deeper meanings and countless blessings. Tenaciously we wrestle with the text, searching for more of God, another meaning to the Words of the Lord, and not letting go until we have received that blessing of wisdom.  

An example of wrestling with the Divine Language by focusing on the importance and choice of words used by the text. In the famous narrative of the Akedah, the Binding of Isaac in Genesis 22, we find Isaac and Abraham journey up a mountain to make a sacrifice to the Lord. Isaac asks his father ‘I see the wood, the knife and the fire, but I don't see the lamb. Where is the lamb?’ Abraham replies that ‘God Himself will provide the Lamb’. After Abraham has been tested and passed that test he looks up and sees a ram caught by its horns. He goes and takes the ram, sacrificing it in place of Isaac. In wrestling with the text, looking for more in the details, we see that Abraham told Isaac that God would indeed provide a Lamb, but God did not. Instead God provided a Ram. The words Lamb and Ram are very different in Hebrew. The Bible specifically states that God will provide a Lamb, And so it is assumed then that God will indeed do this. Thus from the time of Abraham the promise remains that at some point in time God will indeed provide a Lamb and the wait for the Lamb of God begins. Messianic aspiration is met with expectation when John the Baptist greets his cousin and declares Yeshua (Jesus) to be the Lamb of God.