Hand To Hand

When we look around as believers we can see opportunity to express to others the truth that is the mercy of God. That truth is the life that was led by our Messiah, Yeshua (Jesus). When we look at His life, it can be difficult to imagine being that nice or kind or wise, or at least that is true for me. There is a question that comes to mind for me when I read about His life, and I think it may come to mind for others. How did Jesus know what to do in each situation if He laid down His deity when He became a man? There is a scripture that seems to give us a clue, from the Sermon on the Mount.

Matthew 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.
18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.
19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Jesus was Jewish by birth, which makes sense since the promise was to Abraham for His descendant to lead the people. Being perfect, He kept the Law perfectly. He was in fact the only one ever to do so. So when we see Jesus life and actions, what we are seeing is the Law lived out in front of us. As those who are meant to follow Him, to be like Him, and to say and do what He said and did, what does this mean for us believers?

This is an important point to consider, to pray about, and to spend time asking God about for each of us personally, I suggest.

Prayer
Father, we exalt You as the Most High King of the universe. You are the only One whose kingdom shall ever reign. Let Your kingdom come to this earth more today. Give to us Your abundant provision. When we miss the mark of the Law, please forgive us. Help us to grow into Your ways. Heal us and deliver us. Send revival. In Yeshua’s (Jesus’) name. Amen.

Never Stop Searching

When we are early believers, we can be very big on searching out things in the scriptures. We may also accept what others say that we respect. Over time, it can be easy to let things go by the wayside and assume that what we know is right. We can become weary in searching out the scriptures for the truth. It is easier to let the leaders at our church decide what is right and what is wrong, and do those things. This happened before in history.

Exodus 20:18 And all the people saw the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking: and when the people saw it, they removed, and stood afar off.
19 And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not God speak with us, lest we die.

The presence of God is an awesome thing. If we trust in God to take care of us, that He is on our side, then we are in wonder at His presence like a small child at the presence of their father. However, if we do not trust that He is on our side, we can become afraid at His presence and move away. We can ask for another person to tell us what God is saying. This is what happened to the children of Israel. There is a definite result on our walk with God if we do this.

Psalms 103:7 He made known his ways unto Moses, his acts unto the children of Israel.

Moses knew God in a very close way such that he understood why God did what He did. He knew God’s ways. The children of Israel knew Him from a distance and saw what He did. They were observers, not so much active participants. There response was was out of a fear from a lack of trust. They know Yahweh was God, but they thought He would either kill them or let them die. God tried to teach them through the signs and wonders that He was on their side.

The God we serve is on our side. He has given us specific commands and ways to live. If we understand that He is indeed our everything to keep us alive, including our joy, we will never stop searching and seeking. This is what God truly wants from us, His kids.

Prayer
Father, we exalt You. You along are our worthy King. Let Your kingdom be on this earth Lord. Give us Your overwhelming abundant provision. forgive us when we stray from Your ways. Teach us to walk more closely with You. Keep us in Your safe keeping. Heal us and deliver us. In Yeshua’s (Jesus’) name. Amen.

Lest We Forget

We are told in scripture of the story of the children of Israel in the wilderness. The wilderness they were in was a barren desert. God led them in the desert forty years because they had not believed Him and wanted to return to Egypt.

Numbers 32:7 And wherefore discourage ye the heart of the children of Israel from going over into the land which the Lord hath given them?
8 Thus did your fathers, when I sent them from Kadesh–barnea to see the land.
9 For when they went up unto the valley of Eshcol, and saw the land, they discouraged the heart of the children of Israel, that they should not go into the land which the Lord had given them.
10 And the Lord’s anger was kindled the same time, and he sware, saying,
11 Surely none of the men that came up out of Egypt, from twenty years old and upward, shall see the land which I sware unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob; because they have not wholly followed me:
12 Save Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenezite, and Joshua the son of Nun: for they have wholly followed the Lord.
13 And the Lord’s anger was kindled against Israel, and he made them wander in the wilderness forty years, until all the generation, that had done evil in the sight of the Lord, was consumed.

God had delivered them many times yet they denied Him and His deliverance by wanting to return to Egypt. We serve this very same God. He wants to prosper us and give us all of His promises. We have a God that saved the Israel from the plagues in Egypt. He set them free and made them wealthy with silver, gold, and livestock in one day. He parted the sea that they could cross on dry land. He had the sea close over the Egyptians that pursued them and killed their pursuers. He provided bread from heaven. He provided meat to eat. He provided water from a rock, and all three of these in a barren desert. If we understand that this is our God, we can know that He will provide as promised when we ask.

Prayer
Father, we exalt You. You alone are our King. We so much need You in our lives. Let Your kingdom come to this earth Lord. Today send us Your overwhelming provision. Forgive us our iniquities, for we are a frail people. Strengthen us by the might of Your right arm. Give us the courage to believe. We want to trust in You. You are the One that heals and delivers. Come quickly. In Yeshua’s (Jesus’) name. Amen.

Help For Us

Today as I was thinking about writing it occurred to me that we need help. We are imperfect beings serving a perfect God. How can we do that? There is a desire in us all to be right, and to do right, if we are believers. This is a good thing, I would suppose. But the truth is we cannot get it right all of the time. So, that seems to leave us in a dilemma. What are we to do? Scriptures give us some thoughts on this point.

Psalms 105:1 O give thanks unto the Lord; call upon his name: make known his deeds among the people.
2 Sing unto him, sing psalms unto him: talk ye of all his wondrous works.
3 Glory ye in his holy name: let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord.
4 Seek the Lord, and his strength: seek his face evermore.
5 Remember his marvellous works that he hath done; his wonders, and the judgments of his mouth;

If we will but praise our God, then we can know that we shall be saved. For we will not be prefect until He returns. But at His returning shall all His people be restored. We shall all be made perfectly in His image. Until them we are to cry out to Him and praise His holy name. He alone is worthy to be praised. He alone is our help in troubled times outwardly and inwardly. To God be the glory!

Prayer
Father, we exalt You. You alone are our God. You alone have a kingdom that is worth living in today and forever. Send us Your kingdom todsay. Help us in our weakness. Give us your abundant provision today. Restore us when we fall, granting us Your forgiveness. Be our king, letting Your will be in this earth as it is with You today. Heal us and deliver us. In Yeshua’s (Jesus’) name. Amen.

What Is To Come

Can we know as believers what is coming in our future. It is interesting when God does what He wants according to His plan and His timing, and we are amazed. These are definitely interesting times we are in today. It appears that we are headed for a time when the world is oing to faced with the reality of God. We have the signs in the sky. We have people bringing great harm to others. When we are headed into these troubled times, I am reminded of a scripture.

Luke 21:28 And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.

This was Jesus telling us of times to come. And then there is Paul in his letter to the Thessalonians.

Thessalonians 1:16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:
17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.
18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words.

God shows signs in the heavens to let us know. He rules the heavens and sets those signs in place.

Let us watch and wait, ready to see our Messiah return!

Prayer
Father, we prais eand exalt You. Send Your kingdom among us. Give us our provision for today, and forgive us whaen we fail You. Heal us and deliver us. Open our eyes to see the signs and Your ways. In Jesus’ (Yeshua’s) name. Amen.

Thankful Love

We can all express to God our love for Him in many ways. The scriptures are filled with examples, the most notable is our Messiah dieing for our sin. That act of love, laying down one’s life for others, is indeed the model we are all called to. But is there a practical way we can do this? The scriptures speak of this in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians.

Ephesians 5:4 Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks.

It may seem simple, yet it is clear that God has called us to a different sort of life from that we had in the past or what we can expect to see in the world. It is to give thanks instead of treating others like they do not matter. All men are God’s creation and are children of God. If we treat them as God treats us, then they will have opportunity to see and experience how God feels toward them.

Today’s message is simple. Let’s show the world who God really is. Let’s treat the world like God treat’s us. Let’s give thanks to God for His mercy and grace toward us.

Prayer
Father, we love You and exalt You. You are worthy to be praised. Send Your kingdom today Lord. Give us Your abundant provision today. Forgive us our mistakes and lead us to Your ways. Let the earth be like heaven. Send us healing and deliverance. Show Yourself powerful that all may know You alone are God. In Jesus’ (Yeshua’s) name. Amen.

A Child Is Born

This is a portion of a scripture that foretells of the birth of the Messiah. It is from Isaiah who prophesied about the one that would come and be born of a virgin.

Isaiah 9:6 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
7 Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.

This truly is a beautiful description of our Messiah’s birth and mission to us. You may wonder why I have selected this scripture today. It is because we are about to enter the Feast of Tabernacles. This feast has a several points of importance. On of these is that this feast must be kept after Jesus returns and is reigning on the earth. Once he has defeated the enemies of Israel and is ruling in Jerusalem, Zechariah says we must keep the feast.

Zechariah 14:17 And it shall be, that whoso will not come up of all the families of the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, even upon them shall be no rain.
18 And if the family of Egypt go not up, and come not, that have no rain; there shall be the plague, wherewith the Lord will smite the heathen that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles.
19 This shall be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all nations that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles.
20 In that day shall there be upon the bells of the horses, HOLINESS UNTO THE Lord; and the pots in the Lord’s house shall be like the bowls before the altar.

It is also important for another reason. John tells us something of this day.

John 14:14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

The word “dwelt” here is actually the word “tabernacled”. So Jesus tabernacled among us when He became flesh. It is very interesting to understand the time frame of Jesus birth. This can be traced to when Zacharias was in the temple ministering to God and the angel appeared. He did this according to his lineage, placing him there at a certain time of year. His wife becomes pregnant with John the Baptist. Mary is visited by the angel and the Holy Spirit overshadows her. Jesus is placed in her womb and she goes to visit her cousin Elisabeth who is pregnant with John and John leaps in his mother’s womb at six months, which would be about December. Forty weeks later our Messiah tabernacles among us, making it about the September-October time frame. The September-October time frame is the Feast of Tabernacles which is seven days long, begins with a high holy day, and then has another high holy day tacked on the end. If Jesus was born on the first high holy day, he would have been circumcised on the eighth day, another high holy day. All of Israel would know of this, and it would explain why Mary and Joseph were making the journey to Jerusalem with her so far along – all men had to be in Jerusalem on the first day of the Feast of Tabernacles.

Looks like we are about to have a birthday party for our King!

Prayer
Father, we exalt You. Thank You for sending to us Your Son to tabernacle among us. Let Your kingdom reign today Father. Send Your overwhelming abundant provision. Give us Your forgiveness for our iniquities. Heal us and deliver us. Bring quickly the times spoken of by the prophets that we talk of here. Show us a token for good that all men might know that You alone are God. In Yeshua’s (Jesus’) name. Amen.

Build Up

As believers we are all called to a calling of reconciliation, or so Paul has said in his second letter to the Corinthians.

2 Corinthians 5:18 And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation;

In reading this at first it may be unclear what Paul meant. I can only imagine what the Corinthians may have wondered what Paul was saying. He does explain it further as he goes on.

2 Corinthians 5:19 To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation.
20 Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God.
21 For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

Paul is saying that we were all dead in sin. Jesus died that the dead in sin could be made alive to God, being reconciled to Him. In other words, through the work of the Messiah on the cross the differences between man and God were settled once and for all. As I read the letters to the Corinthians, they were much like us. And that is the point I want to make here.

We are to reconcile people to God, not denounce them to God. It is true that there are people everywhere, even in our churches, that get life wrong. I think that is why God calls it reconciliation. If we could always get it right, then Jesus died for nothing. Guess what – we can’t. We are human and we are all in the same condition. Some may do things that are more wrong in our eyes or the eyes of society, but in the eyes of God it is the same – we are all the same and all need the work of the Messiah in our lives everyday. Spending time pointing to the faults of someone else certainly does not sound like reconciliation, right? Furthermore, who made us the judge? I believe that job is taken. We are to say and do those things that point to God as the Creator and that cause others to see that they too can be reconciled to God everyday if they so choose. In this way we can build one another up and prepare each ourselves for the soon return of our Messiah.

Prayer
Father, we exalt You. You alone are worthy to be praised and worthy of all honor. You are the one that separated the dark from the light, that set the lights in the sky. You spoke and there were heavens and earth. Your created this earth as a place for Your kingdom and we ask that You again restore it here. Send us today Your abundant prosperity. Forgive us when we get off track, and help us back. We need Your healing and deliverance. Help us and show us a sign for good that all may know that You alone are our God and do these things. In Yeshua’s (Jesus’) name. Amen.

Life Is About Choosing

Choose life. That was the message Moses gave to the children of Israel as they were preparing to cross over to the promised land. He said that they (and we) had the opportunity to choose for their lives to be blessed or cursed. He told them to choose life.

Deuteronomy 30:19 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
20 That thou mayest love the Lord thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the Lord sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.

It seems like a simple matter, right? And yet, from time to time we will choose the wrong way to go. We will not choose God’s blessing and will go off and do our own thing. We end up choosing the curses. The good news for us is that if we repent, God forgives us and gets us right back on the right track. He gave up His Son that we might have this forgiveness. He also gave Him up that we might make the right choices because the words our in our hearts and minds as a part of the new covenant.

Today, let’s encourage one another to choose life.

Prayer
Father, we exalt You. Let Your kingdom reign today all around us. Let us be lights for Your kingdom to show people the way. Give us Your overwhelming provision today Father. Forgive us when we argue with our friends and families and say mean things. Help us all to heal, inside and out. Deliver us from evil and from evil men. In Jesus’ (Yeshua’s) name. Amen.

Fasting And Prayer

For those that believe in keeping the feasts of the Lord, this is either the day after or the day of Yom Kippur. It is during this time that those that keep this feast are to fast and reflect on the need for repentance. It is a time of affliction, a time of repentance, a time for change.

Leviticus 23:26 And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
27 Also on the tenth day of this seventh month there shall be a day of atonement: it shall be an holy convocation unto you; and ye shall afflict your souls, and offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord.
28 And ye shall do no work in that same day: for it is a day of atonement, to make an atonement for you before the Lord your God.
29 For whatsoever soul it be that shall not be afflicted in that same day, he shall be cut off from among his people.
30 And whatsoever soul it be that doeth any work in that same day, the same soul will I destroy from among his people.
31 Ye shall do no manner of work: it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.
32 It shall be unto you a sabbath of rest, and ye shall afflict your souls: in the ninth day of the month at even, from even unto even, shall ye celebrate your sabbath.

This year in particular more than ever, it is a time for prayer for all believers. There is much evil in the world, as if the world had gone mad. Pray for peace in Jerusalem, and in our homes as well.

Prayer
Father, we exalt You. On this solemn day, we need Your kingdom. Give us today Your abundant provision. Forgive us when we fall short. Please take away the evil and craziness in the world today Father. Protect us, heal us, and deliver us. In Jesus’ (Yeshua’s) name. Amen.