LENT 2014 FINAL CUT

LENT 2014 MEDITATIONS

 

ASH WEDNESDAY

 

5.3.2014

I have nothing to give G-d. But I can be with Yeshua Adonai in the desert.

 

 

MEDITATION I

5.3.2014

ENTER THE WILDERNESS IN THE POWER OF THE RUACH HAKODESH
On Ash Wednesday, if you believe that observing Lent is the practice of a religious habit or the  fulfilling of a religious or ritual duty, your focus will be on ‘giving up’ something! Meat, cigarettes, facebook, alcohol, prayerlessness, you can keep adding to that list of something or the other that you want to ‘give up’ to earn the favour of G-d.

Do you believe that by ‘giving up’ this or that sin or foolishness or impurity or failing, you may draw nigh to G-d? Religious people have been practicing such ‘giving up’ tricks since the dawn of time. The Ayyappa bhaktas ‘give up’ things for 40 days. So too, the Muslims observing Ramadan. The Hindus have an array of ‘fasts’ for one reason or the other. So too the Buddhists. All of it can be categorized as religious self-mortification, or what the Word of G-d calls ‘works of the flesh’.
But how then am I to enter the season of Lent? There is nothing to give up. Rather, there is much to gain! Does it make much sense to remember that I am dust that will return to dust. Or should one get marked with an ashen cross? Such things are possible, but then? Beyond that? What? I mean, it is possible and perhaps profitable to look at things in a traditional, orthodox manner and one may thus enter the Lent season. To what avail?
It seems to me that the way for me to go into Lent is to go in with a spirit of faith in Yeshua Adonai that will help me identify with Him spiritually.

As we well know,  there is  a spirit in which Yeshua Mashiach entered into the desert to fast for 40 days and 40 nights. Lent represents this season that the Master spent in the wildreness.
Luke 4: 1 Then Yeshua, filled with the Ruach HaKodesh, returned from the Yarden and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness 2 for forty days of testing by the Adversary.
That is the way to enter the season of Lent with Yeshua Adonai. Be full and controlled by the Holy Spirit, be led into the season, the 40 days and 40 nights, by the Ruach HaKodesh. Know also that the temptation does not lie in what or how much you ‘give up’ for 40 days and 40 nights as a token of your love for Yeshua Adonai. Rather, understand when and how those temptations will knock at your door bringing in their wake the exact understanding and wisdom that Yeshua Adonai found.
1. You will be hungry exceedingly for one thing or the other and you will be tempted to ignore or forget the primacy of the Word of G-d to gain that thing for which you hunger. Will you choose to live by every Word of G-d? What does that mean?
2. You will be shown all the kingdoms of the habitable world in a moment of time [in the twinkling of an eye] and offered all its power and authority and their glory (all their magnificence, excellence, preeminence, dignity, and grace). You will hear that beautiful voice say:

Luke 4: 5 The Adversary took him up, showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world, 6 and said to him, “I will give you all this power and glory. It has been handed over to me, and I can give it to whomever I choose. 7 So if you will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 Yeshua answered him, “TheTanakh says, ‘Worship Adonai your God and serve him only.’ And it shall be so, the rest of your life.
3. You will be taken by a glorious Angel of Light to Jerusalem or holy places that religious people might compare to Yerushalayim. There you will be tempted to exalt yourself and test G-d by making tall claims of being the/a Son of G-d and seek spectacular recognition for the same based on your personal or your sect’s interpretation of the written word of G-d. In that instant, you will ignore that impulse to tempt G-d and you will be blessed!
Having stood fast in this specific cycle of temptation, you will return from the season of Lent full of and under the power of theRuach HaKodesh.

Luke 4: 13 When the Adversary had ended all his testings, he let him alone until an opportune time.

14 Yeshua returned to the Galil in the power of the Spirit, and reports about him spread throughout the countryside. 15 He taught in their synagogues, and everyone respected him.

You will also find that [roll of] the book of the prophet Isaiah, open it and (unroll) the book and find the place where it is written:
Luke 4: 17 and he was given the scroll of the prophet Yesha‘yahu. Unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written,

18 “The Spirit of Adonai is upon me;
therefore he has anointed me
to announce Good News to the poor;
he has sent me to proclaim freedom for the imprisoned
and renewed sight for the blind,
to release those who have been crushed,
19 to proclaim a year of the favor of Adonai.”

20 After closing the scroll and returning it to the shammash, he sat down; and the eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 He started to speak to them: “Today, as you heard it read, this passage of the Tanakh was fulfilled!”

You too can/will believe this Scripture has been fulfilled for you at the end of the season of Lent.
Luke 4: 40 After sunset, all those who had people sick with various diseases brought them to Yeshua, and he put his hands on each one of them and healed them.

May it be so with each one going into Lent full of a spirit of faith in Yeshua Adonai, the Living One, full of the Holy Spirit, going through Lent full of theRuach HaKodesh and the Word of G-d. And when we exit the season of Lent, let it again be as people full of the Ruach HaKodesh  who have grace to lay hands on broken people and heal a broken world.
Shalom! Amein.

 

MEDITATION II

7.3.2014

 

WE ARE NOW GOD’S CHILDREN!
Yeshua Mashiach did not have any bad habits or ‘sin’ in His flesh to ‘give up’ or ‘mortify’. Lent, therefore, is not a time when can ‘follow’ Yeshua (as a role model) to purify or cleanse oneself of ‘sin’ in the flesh. There is a  secretive doctrine in some so-called ‘christian’ sects and cults that errs in that it posits that Yeshua came with a fallen human nature in the wake of fallen Adam and purified Himself to become the Son of G-d. This doctrine claims that he was only a man who became G-d or ‘realised’ G-dhead (akin to the claims of the adepts in the Dharmic religions). Such cults believe that Yeshua was tempted from ‘within’ – from his ‘self’ or ‘ego’ or ‘sin in the flesh’.

What does it mean that Yehsua was driven of the Ruach HaKodesh into the desert to be ‘tempted’?
Those who desire to ‘fast’, ‘give up’, ‘get rid of’, ‘crucify’, ‘deny oneself’ of indwelling ‘sin’ or ‘lust’ or ‘bad habits’ or ‘excesses’ follow universal, standardised human prescriptions, common to most religions.

But Yeshua Mashiach was not driven into the desert of the Ruach HaKodesh for such an undertaking.

Lent is not about ‘giving up’ or ‘denying onself’ or bowing down and mourning about something or the other. Lent is about knowing and learning how NOT TO RECEIVE certain suggestions/insinuations that come from the Evil One, the Adversary whom Yeshua Maschiach encountered in the wilderness and overcame as the Word of God.

John 1: 14 The Word became a human being and lived with us, and we saw hisSh’khinah,
the Sh’khinah of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth.

What were the insinuations or suggestions made to Yeshua by the Adversary in the desert?
Suggestion 1: If you are the Son of G-d, USE YOUR POWER to miraculously turn stone into bread. The suggestion to exalt oneself spiritually to meet one’s own wants or desires by supernatural means or technical means.
Suggestion 2: Bow down and worship,  that is, acknowledge and RECEIVE DIABOLICAL POWER that can give you ‘power’ over all the kingdoms of the world in ‘time’, including all that lies in those kingdoms – the souls, the riches, the influence, etc.
Suggestion 3: DISPLAY YOUR POWER as a spiritual person by leaping off the top of the Temple imagining that angels will catch you when you are falling. This is about twisting the Word of G-d into a false Rhema that can endanger one’s being.
None of these suggestions were received by Yeshua Mashiach. They came from a realm or kingdom He had by nature nothing to do with.
John 14:30 “I won’t be talking with you much longer, because the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me;[He has nothing in common with Me; there is nothing in Me that belongs to him, and he has no power over Me.]
The desert is where this is established. So too, in the heart of the disciple.
Thus, the central Lenten learning is:
John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God.
And again, one understands this through faith in the Son of G-d, the Word of G-d, through illumination by the Ruach Ha-kodesh.
1 John 3:1 See what [an incredible] quality of love the Father has given (shown, bestowed on) us, that we should [be permitted to] be named and called and counted the children of God! AND SO WE ARE! The reason that the world does not know (recognize, acknowledge) us is that it does not know (recognize, acknowledge) Him.
2 Beloved, WE ARE [EVEN HERE AND] NOW G-D’S CHILDREN; it is not yet disclosed (made clear) what we shall be [hereafter], but we know that when He comes and is manifested, we shall be as God’s children] resemble and be like Him, for we shall see Him just as He [really] is.
This is the central understanding one comes to in the desert. This is the understanding of Yeshua Mashiach, the Word of G-d and the Ruach Ha-kodesh.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom! Amein.

 

MEDITATION III

7.3.2014

INSIDE THE ORCHARD OF G-D

 

It seems to me that I have entered a pleasant place, the Orchard and the Garden of G-d.

One who is taught of G-d understands the being and work of Yeshua Mashiach inside the Orchard, the Garden. Here there are four layers of understanding and the consequence of the unveiling of the four layers is Wisdom.
This is Wisdom which can be understood easily and, yet, sometimes cannot be understood easily.

Understanding comes by the Ruach HaKodesh.

The four basic modes of Scripture interpretation:
(1) P<shat (“simple”)—the plain, literal sense of the text, more or less what modern scholars mean by “grammatical-historical exegesis,” which looks to the grammar of the language and the historical setting as background for deciding what a passage means. Modern scholars often consider grammatical-historical exegesis the only valid way to deal with a text; pastors who use other approaches in their sermons usually feel defensive about it before academics.

But the rabbis had three other modes of interpreting Scripture, and their validity should not be excluded in advance but related to the validity of their implied presuppositions.
(2) Remez (“hint”)—wherein a word, phrase or other element in the text hints at a truth not conveyed by the p<shat. The implied presupposition is that God can hint at things of which the Bible writers themselves were unaware.
(3) Drash or midrash (“search”)—an allegorical or homiletical application of a text. This is a species of eisegesis—reading one’s own thoughts into the text—as opposed to exegesis, which is extracting from the text what it actually says. The implied presupposition is that the words of Scripture can legitimately become grist for the mill of human intellect, which God can guide to truths not directly related to the text at all.
(4) Sod (“secret”)—a mystical or hidden meaning arrived at by operating on the numerical values of the Hebrew letters, noting unusual spellings, transposing letters, and the like. For example, two words, the numerical equivalents of whose letters add up to the same amount, are good candidates for revealing a secret through what Arthur Koestler in his book on the inventive mind called “bisociation of ideas.” The implied presupposition is that God invests meaning in the minutest details of Scripture, even the individual letters.

 

MEDITATION IV

8.3.2014

 

BEWARE OF THE ONE WHO COMES WITH AN ‘IF’

In the desert, the Evil One, the Adversary, brought and spoke the unholy word IF to Yeshua Mashiach.

1. This is the pattern to the Temptation.
   IF.
   I WILL GIVE YOU ALL THIS, IF.
   IF.
   The IF is the Adversary’s attempt to make you doubt your identity in G-d and in Yeshua Mashiach.
   The IF is also the conditionality the Adversary seduces you with to gain power and riches and influence in this world and aeon.

But G-d’s love and the Mashiach’s love have no conditions attached.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. IT’S FREE.

That’s it!
Isaiah 55: 1 “All you who are thirsty, come to the water! You without money, come, buy, and eat! Yes, come! Buy wine and milk without money — it’s free!
The I WILL GIVE YOU ALL THIS, IF is the Tempter’s attempt to turn you from the Pantocrator – the Infinite Origin, Ain Sof, Source and Sustainer of Life, the Creator. the Father-Mother G-d, Adonai Tzavaot, El Shaddai, Ruler of All, the Almighty One – to the Cosmocrator, that powerful yet disgraced, secondary, created, finite spirit(ual) Imitation entombed in a variety of forms we know as idols or as wandering spirits seeking to possess human vassals.
Luke 4: 3 Then the devil said to Him, IF You are the Son of God, order this stone to turn into a loaf [of bread].
Luke 4: 6 And he said to Him, to You I WILL GIVE ALL THIS power and authority and their glory (all their magnificence, excellence, preeminence, dignity, and grace), for it has been turned over to me, and I give it to whomever I will. 7 Therefore IF You will do homage to and worship me [just once], it shall all be Yours.
Luke 4: 9 Then he took Him to Jerusalem and set Him on a gable of the temple, and said to Him, IF You are the Son of God, cast Yourself down from here;
The IF is the doubt about ones own identity and that of G-d, the Good One, brought by the Subtle One, the Evil One, to Adam and Eve in Eden, which is Delight.
Genesis  3: 5 For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing the difference between good and evil and blessing and calamity.
THEY WERE ALREADY LIKE GOD, IN HIS IMAGE! But they were convinced that they had something lacking in their fellowship with G-d.
Do you feel something is lacking in the desert? It’s a lie.
John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive and welcome Him, He gave the authority (power, privilege, right) to become the children of G-d, that is, to those who believe in (adhere to, trust in, and rely on) His name— 13 Who owe their birth neither to bloods nor to the will of the flesh [that of physical impulse] nor to the will of man [that of a natural father], but to G-d. [They are born of God!]
The Evil One is trying to monkey with who you are. You have received and welcomed Yeshua Mashiach. No more IF. No more listening to that I WILL GIVE YOU ALL THIS IF, the muddied waters. You have everything in the Maschiach. Already.
I WILL GIVE YOU ALL THIS IF was the temptation to gather or reap THE FRUIT OR CONSEQUENCES OF KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD AND EVIL, which is DEATH or separation from the wisdom and goodness of G-d or the TREE OF LIFE.
What was it that the Evil One gave them?
Knowledge that leads to death. The torment or excitement of having to figure out your identity, to perennially wonder if you are good or bad, accepted by G-d or rejected, constantly searching for and sifting everything to categorise it all as good or evil, right or wrong, pleasurable or painful, useful or useless, progress or regression. Always learning, ever wandering.
Yeshua Mashiach could not succumb to the Tempter’s IF and I WILL GIVE YOU ALL THIS, IF.
He knew something else: IT IS WRITTEN. Indelibly. Eternally. Beyond all doubt and desire for knowledge, possession, power and the desire to be like G-d.
What is written?
Luke 10: 18 Yeshua said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. 19 Remember, I have given you authority; so you can trample down snakes and scorpions, indeed, all the Enemy’s forces; and you will remain completely unharmed. 20 Nevertheless, don’t be glad that the spirits submit to you; be glad that your names have been recorded/written in heaven.”
Upon whom is it written?
It is not a text written in a book. You and I are WRITTEN/ INSCRIBED upon by G-d, the Pantocrator. The Word of G-d, Yashua Mashiach, has written/inscribed Himself in you and I.
A metaphysical, cosmic event of incomparable import has taken place in me, that is in my body, mind, spirit, intelligence, experience, understanding. For ever. It cannot be deleted or disrupted.
Isaiah 49: 14 “But Tziyon says, ‘Adonai has abandoned me, Adonai has forgotten me.’ 15 Can a woman forget her child at the breast, not show pity on the child from her womb? Even if these were to forget, I would not forget you. 16 I HAVE ENGRAVED/INSCRIBED/WRITTEN YOU ON THE PALM OF MY HANDS.
It is done. It is accomplished. It is finished.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.

Shalom! Amein.

 

MEDITATION V

13.3.2014

 

WHAT YESHUA SAW IN THE WILDERNESS
What did Yeshua Mashiach go out into the wilderness to see? What did the Ruach Ha-Kodesh want him to see?

Mathew 11:7 “What went ye out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind?”
What did Moshe see?
Exodus 3: 1 Now Moshe was tending the sheep of Yitro his father-in-law, the priest of Midyan. Leading the flock to the far side of the desert, he came to the mountain of God, to Horev. 2 The angel of Adonai appeared to him in a fire blazing from the middle of a bush. He looked and saw that although the bush was flaming with fire, yet the bush was not being burned up. 3 Moshe said, “I’m going to go over and see this amazing sight and find out why the bush isn’t being burned up.” 4 When Adonai saw that he had gone over to see, God called to him from the middle of the bush, “Moshe! Moshe!” He answered, “Here I am.”
But then, Moshe had only stumbled upon the Burning Bush. He wasn’t led to it the way Yeshua was led into the desert by Ruach HaKodesh. Rather, Adonai revealed Himself to Moshe. Thus:
Exodus 3: 13 Moshe said to G-d, “Look, when I appear before the people of Isra’el and say to them, ‘The G-d of your ancestors has sent me to you’; and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what am I to tell them?” 14 God said to Moshe, “Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh [I am/will be what I am/will be],” and added, “Here is what to say to the people of Isra’el: ‘Ehyeh [I Am or I Will Be] has sent me to you.’” 15 G-d said further to Moshe, “Say this to the people of Isra’el: ‘Yud-Heh-Vav-Heh [Adonai], the G-d of your fathers, the G-d of Avraham, the G-d of Yitz’chak and the G-d of Ya‘akov, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever; this is how I am to be remembered generation after generation.
Who does Yeshua Mashiach say He is?
John 8: 58 Yeshua said to them, “Yes, indeed! Before Avraham came into being, I AM!”
In times of yore, the great I AM went out to call Moshe to his destiny. But now? What did the great I AM, the Word become flesh, go out into the wilderness to see?
THE ADVERSARY.
The Word become flesh had to meet the Adversary. For the Adversary does not come against G-d alone. He comes against G-d’s most beloved – the Human Being. Humanity itself.
John 1: 14 The Word became a human being and lived with us, and we saw his Sh’khinah, the Sh’khinah of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth.
It was important that the Adversary too, got an inkling of Yeshua’s Sh’khinah. And, while it was important that Yeshua Mashiach meet the Adversary of both G-d and Humanity in the wilderness, it was even more important that the Adversary meet the One who would crush his head underfoot – Yeshua Mashiach, Son of G-d and Son of Man.
In the wilderness, the Sh’kinah of the Father’s only Son, destroyed the thoughts, the suggestions and insinuations that the Adversary brought to him. The Sh’kinah now dwelt in a Human Body and could meet the Adversary thought-to-thought and destroy him.

2 Corinthians 10: 4 because the weapons we use to wage war are not worldly. On the contrary, they have God’s power for demolishing strongholds. We demolish arguments 5 and every arrogance that raises itself up against the knowledge of God; we take every thought captive and make it obey the Messiah.
Yeshua Mashiach was led out into the desert by Ruach Ha-Kodesh to know that the Sh’kinah dwelt in Him bodily with authority to deny the power of the Adversary’s thoughts, imaginations and suggestions.
Psalm 118: 10 The nations all surrounded me; in the name of Adonai I cut them down. 11 They surrounded me on every side; in the name of Adonai I cut them down. 12 They surrounded me like bees, but were extinguished [as quickly] as a fire in thorns; in the name of Adonai I cut them down.
Luke 10: 19 Remember, I have given you authority; so you can trample down snakes and scorpions, indeed, all the Enemy’s forces; and you will remain completely unharmed.
This is what Yeshua Mashiach went out into the wilderness to see and accomplish. It had nothing to do with the Law that Moshe brought. The Law veils the Adversary and puts the focus on human beings with their foibles and fallible nature seeking to fulfil principles of morality. But Yeshua Mashiach came with the Ruach HaKodesh, the Sh’kinah, to unveil the Adversary and his patterns and to scatter them to the wind.
John 1: 17 For the Torah was given through Moshe; grace and truth came through Yeshua the Messiah.
John 8: 23 Yeshua said to them, “You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. 24 This is why I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not trust that I AM [who I say I am], you will die in your sins.”
John 11: 25 Yeshua said to her, “I AM the Resurrection and the Life! Whoever puts his trust in me will live, even if he dies; 26 and everyone living and trusting in me will never die. Do you believe this?” 27 She said to him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of G-d, the one coming into the world.”
Acts 4: 11 “This Yeshua is the stone rejected by you builders which has become the cornerstone. 12 There is salvation in no one else! For there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by whom we must be saved!
In the wilderness with Yeshua Mashiach, the Ruach HaKodesh makes all this known to us who read this. Your hearts will be filled with faith. The Adversary will no more have power over you. For the Sh’kinah rests upon you too.
And this is your inheritance in Yeshua Mashiach:
Romans 10: 6 Moreover, the righteousness grounded in trusting says: “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend to heaven?’” — that is, to bring the Messiah down — 7 or, “‘Who will descend into Sh’ol?’” — that is, to bring the Messiah up from the dead. 8 What, then, does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart.” — that is, the word about trust which we proclaim, namely, 9 that if you acknowledge publicly with your mouth that Yeshua is Lord and trust in your heart that G-d raised him from the dead, you will be delivered.

John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom! Amein.
MEDITATION VI

15.3.2014

 

I CRUCIFIED YESHUA. I AM CRUCIFIED WITH YESHUA.

 

Isaiah 49: 14 “But Tziyon says, ‘Adonai has abandoned me, Adonai has forgotten me.’ 15 Can a woman forget her child at the breast, not show pity on the child from her womb? Even if these were to forget, I would not forget you. 16 I have engraved you on the palms of my hands.
In the wilderness, one understands one’s true nature. The Old Adam says: Adonai has abandoned me, Adonai has forgotten me. Therefore the Old Man falters and stumbles daily in the heat.
The Last Adam (Yeshua Mashiach), on the other hand, remembers and depends on G-d constantly and walks in the Spirit, filled with the Spirit, as it were. The Ruach HaKodesh blows in Him and through Him.
John 3: 31 “He who comes from above is above all. He who is from the earth is from the earth and talks from an earthly point of view; he who comes from heaven is above all. 32 He testifies about what he has actually seen and heard, yet no one accepts what he says! 33 Whoever does accept what he says puts his seal on the fact that G-d is true, 34 because the one whom G-d sent speaks G-d’s words. For G-d does not give him the Spirit in limited degree — 35 the Father loves the Son and has put everything in his hands. 36 Whoever trusts in the Son has eternal life.
G-d does not give Him the Ruach Ha-Kodesh in a limited degree.
One cannot get rid of the Old Man by means of spiritual techniques or fasting or prayer or self-mortification or ‘putting oneself to death’. These are means and methods resorted to by religious people and Pharisees, yogis and cultists, human potential practitioners and the like. No harm in that they put in such efforts, these are the actions of seekers after G-d. But it’s all too much effort and looking for a lost coin in dark nooks and corners and bylanes and alleys without a lamp!
How is one to gain access to the Last Adam, Yeshua Mashiach, the New Man, the New Creation?
See this!
I HAVE ENGRAVED YOU ON THE PALM OF MY HANDS.
Know this!
I am the nails that pierced his hands and thus He received me.

Romans 5: 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in that the Messiah died on our behalf while we were still sinners.
Understand this!
Zechariah 12: 10 and I will pour out on the house of David and on those living in Yerushalayim a spirit of grace and prayer; and they will look to me, whom they pierced. They will mourn for him as one mourns for an only son; they will be in bitterness on his behalf like the bitterness for a firstborn son.
Know this!
I am the nails that He received to engrave me on the palms of His hands.
Do this!
Mourn for the One I have pierced!
Thus, there are no spiritual techniques left to reach out to G-d or find Him or connect to him, except by faith and only faith. The faith that though I crucified Yeshua Maschiach, yet by His goodness and grace, I am now crucified with Yeshua Mashiach!
Galatians 2: 20 When the Messiah was executed on the stake as a criminal, I was too; so that my proud ego no longer lives. But the Messiah lives in me, and the life I now live in my body I live by the same trusting faithfulness that the Son of G-d had, who loved me and gave himself up for me. 21 I do not reject G-d’s gracious gift; for if the way in which one attains righteousness is through legalism, then the Messiah’s death was pointless.
The days of spiritual striving and techniques, works and efforts to know and understand Yeshua Mashiach come to an end when this gift of faith is received from above as a gift from G-d.

This criminal has been executed. This criminal has been received into the Body of Christ by being (nailed to) engraved in His palms. The iron nails melt and become part of the New Creation hidden inside the Body of Christ. The hardness becomes a softness, a gentleness.
Revelation 21: 5 Then the One sitting on the throne said, “Look! I am making everything new!” Also he said, “Write, ‘These words are true and trustworthy!’” 6 And he said to me, “It is done! I am the ‘A’ and the ‘Z,’ the Beginning and the End. To anyone who is thirsty I myself will give water free of charge from the Fountain of Life.
It is done! It is finished. It is accomplished.

Believe this!
Yeshua Mashiach went out into the desert full of the Ruach Ha-Kodesh, full of the waters of the Fountain of Life. The Adversary knew nothing about His secret Spring. He thought he had a kingdom, power and glory to offer to and tempt Yeshua Mashiach with. But:

John 18: 36 Yeshua answered, “My kingship does not derive its authority from this world’s order of things. If it did, my men would have fought to keep me from being arrested by the Judeans. But my kingship does not come from here.” 37 “So then,” Pilate said to him, “You are a king, after all.” Yeshua answered, “You say I am a king. The reason I have been born, the reason I have come into the world, is to bear witness to the truth. Every one who belongs to the truth listens to me.”
I can be with Yeshua Mashiach in the wilderness or desert and drink from the Spring. It’s free. There is no charge for it! No secret doctrine to hide from others, no copyright, no exclusivity.
Isaiah 55: 1 “All you who are thirsty, come to the water! You without money, come, buy, and eat! Yes, come! Buy wine and milk without money — it’s free!
Ho, everyone!! Come, see what I have found. A Spring of Life.
Come, drink what I am drinking. Waters of Life.
You without money, come! It’s free. You will find rest for your souls!

John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!” 39 (Now he said this about the Spirit, whom those who trusted in him were to receive.)

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom. Amein.

 

MEDITATION VII

15.3.2014

 

DO NOT FEAR G-D. LOVE G-D.

I think I have to repeat this. Again and again. To self and others.
The one who fears G-d is but a pagan.
The one who loves G-d is in heaven.

If someone brings the fear of G-d to you, if someone comes with a pointing finger, judgement and condemnation, if someone comes with a proof text or a threat of punishment and hell, smile and tell that person: G-d is love.

Nowhere is it written: G-d is fear.
What then? Must one fear G-d’s love?
Indeed, that exactly is what most people fear.
People replace the love of G-d with their infantile fear and, worse, spread abroad that plague of fear.

1 John 4:18 There is no fear in love. On the contrary, love that has achieved its goal gets rid of fear, because fear has to do with punishment; the person who keeps fearing has not been brought to maturity in regard to love.

 

John 15: 9 “Just as my Father has loved me, I too have loved you; so stay in my love.

 

John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!” 39 (Now he said this about the Spirit, whom those who trusted in him were to receive.)

G-d is the River of Love.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.

Shalom! Amein.

 

MEDITATION VIII

17.4.2014

 

THE DARKNESS CANNOT COMPREHEND LIGHT

 

 

John 1:5 The light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not..

I had understood this in certain ways before. But I have come into a deeper understanding.
“Comprehended” is the Greek word katalambano. It is a compound of the words kata and lambano. The word kata carries the force of something that is dominating or subjugating. The word lambano means ‘to seize’ or ‘grab hold of’. When the two words are compounded, they mean to seize, to pull down, to tackle, to conquer, or to hold under one’s power.

Therefore, this verse could be translated, “Darkness does not have the ability to suppress or to hold the light under its domain.”

 

 

MEDITATION IX

17.4.2014

 

THIS IS MY BELOVED SON, IN WHOM I AM WELL PLEASED!

 

Luke 7: 24 When the messengers from Yochanan had gone, Yeshua began speaking to the crowds about Yochanan: “What did you go out into the desert to see? Reeds swaying in the breeze? 25 No? then what did you go out to see? Someone who was well dressed? But people who dress beautifully and live in luxury are found in kings’ palaces. 26 Nu, so what did you go out to see? A prophet! Yes, and I tell you he’s much more than a prophet. 27 This is the one about whom the Tanakh says, ‘See, I am sending out my messenger ahead of you;

he will prepare your way before you.’

People went out of the way to see Yochanan in the desert. They heard his message and repented and were baptised. They awaited the coming of the Mashiach. And now the Mashiach had been revealed, baptised by Yochanan and having the witness of the Father: ‘This is my Beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased!’

Matthew 3: 16 As soon as Yeshua had been immersed, he came up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, he saw the Spirit of God coming down upon him like a dove, 17 and a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, whom I love; I am well pleased with him.”

But what went Yeshua Mashiach out into the wilderness to see? He did not go there to see the Adversary. Rather, the Adversary who had been hunting for Him via Herod and after the Slaughter of the Innocents, now found Him. For He had finally been revealed as Mashiach. And the Adversary had his own doubts that he wanted cleared.

But what went the Mashiach out into the desert to see?

This is what he saw in the desert and He was obedient to it while He was in the desert and even after He came out of it.

Isaiah 53: 1 Who believes our report? To whom is the arm of Adonai revealed? 2 For before him he grew up like a young plant, like a root out of dry ground. He was not well-formed or especially handsome; we saw him, but his appearance did not attract us. 3 People despised and avoided him, a man of pains, well acquainted with illness.Like someone from whom people turn their faces, he was despised; we did not value him. 4 In fact, it was our diseases he bore, our pains from which he suffered; yet we regarded him as punished, stricken and afflicted by God. 5 But he was wounded because of our crimes, crushed because of our sins;

the disciplining that makes us whole fell on him,and by his bruises* we are healed. 6 We all, like sheep, went astray; we turned, each one, to his own way; yet Adonai laid on him the guilt of all of us. 7 Though mistreated, he was submissive — he did not open his mouth. Like a lamb led to be slaughtered, like a sheep silent before its shearers, he did not open his mouth. 8 After forcible arrest and sentencing, he was taken away; and none of his generation protested his being cut off from the land of the livingfor the crimes of my people, who deserved the punishment themselves. 9 He was given a grave among the wicked; in his death he was with a rich man. Although he had done no violence and had said nothing deceptive,

10 yet it pleased Adonai to crush him with illness, to see if he would present himself as a guilt offering.If he does, he will see his offspring; and he will prolong his days; and at his hand Adonai’s desire will be accomplished. 11 After this ordeal, he will see satisfaction. “By his knowing [pain and sacrifice], my righteous servant makes many righteous; it is for their sins that he suffers. 12 Therefore I will assign him a share with the great, he will divide the spoil with the mighty, for having exposed himself to death and being counted among the sinners, while actually bearing the sin of many and interceding for the offenders.”

Yeshua Mashiach saw his entire mission and destiny laid out before Him in the scroll of the book, in the wilderness.

May Yeshua Mashiach give you, those who read this, the Spirit of Wisdom and Revelation so that you can see what He saw in the desert about Himself. You can clearly see the Lamb of G-d and be made righteous because of His sacrifice. Yeshua Mashiach wanted to see His offspring – US. And by His sacrifice, He brought us forth as His children; He accomplished Adonai’s desire.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE!

Shalom! Amein.
MEDITATION X

22.3.2014

 

AKEDAT YITZHAK
Isaiah 53: 1 Who believes our report? To whom is the arm of Adonai revealed? 2 For before him he grew up like a young plant, like a root out of dry ground.
Mathew 11:7 “What did you go out to the desert to see? Reeds swaying in the breeze? 8 No? then what did you go out to see? Someone who was well dressed? Well-dressed people live in kings’ palaces. 9 Nu, so why did you go out?
Desert stretches. Sand. Rocks. Hills. Insects. Reptiles. The Sun. Heat. Cactii.
30 years were behind Him and yet He had never seen these things up close as now. The Ruach Ha-Kodesh opened His eyes. His ears were opened up much earlier.
Psalm 40: 7 (6) Sacrifices and grain offerings you don’t want; burnt offerings and sin offerings you don’t demand. Instead, you have given me open ears; 8 (7) so then I said, “Here I am! I’m coming! In the scroll of a book it is written about me. 9 (8) Doing your will, my G-d, is my joy; your Torah is in my inmost being. (Complete Jewish Bible)
OR better still:
Psalm 40: 6 You take no delight in sacrifices or offerings. Now that you have made me listen, I finally understand–you don’t require burnt offerings or sin offerings. (New Living Translation)
The Desert Stretches. The land is full of people who do not trust G-d.
Mark 9:19 “People without any trust!” he responded. “How long will I be with you? How long must I put up with you? Bring him to me!”
And then, He took the sand and let it trickle down through His hands.
Genesis 22: 15 The angel of Adonai called to Avraham a second time out of heaven. 16 He said, “I have sworn by myself — says Adonai — that because you have done this, because you haven’t withheld your son, your only son, 17 I will most certainly bless you; and I will most certainly increase your descendants to as many as there are stars in the sky or grains of sand on the seashore.
Was Avraham obedient? To what? To the order to sacrifice his son in the desert? To continue the practice of the savage idolatrous nations around him who believed in human sacrifice to Moloch? Was it the Ruach Ha-Kodesh that prompted him to this act? No. More likely a spirit, a primal elemental spirit, a remnant of the culture of human sacrifice that prompted him, that sought to exploit his love for G-d, out of a misplaced zeal for G-d, to want to sacrifice his son to the unknown G-d who had driven him out of Ur of the Chaldees.

But G-d turns evil to good. So, Avraham:
Mathew 11:7 “What did you go out to the desert to see? Reeds swaying in the breeze? 8 No? then what did you go out to see? Someone who was well dressed? Well-dressed people live in kings’ palaces. 9 Nu, so why did you go out?
Akedát Yitzḥák.
Genesis 22: 9 They came to the place G-d had told him about; and Avraham built the altar there, set the wood in order, bound Yitz’chak his son and laid him on the altar, on the wood. 10 Then Avraham put out his hand and took the knife to kill his son.
What did he hear and what did he see? The Ruach Ha-Kodesh came to open his ears and eyes. The old notion of a G-d who demands human sacrifice was passing away. The New was already here. The spirit of the Prince of this World was cast out from Avraham’s being and life.
Isaiah 45: 7 I form light, I create darkness; I make well-being, I create woe; I, Adonai, do all these things.
Genesis 22: 11 But the angel of Adonai called to him out of heaven: “Avraham? Avraham!” He answered, “Here I am.” 12 He said, “Don’t lay your hand on the boy! Don’t do anything to him! For now I know that you are a man who fears G-d, because you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.” 13 Avraham raised his eyes and looked, and there behind him was a ram caught in the bushes by its horns. Avraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering in place of his son. 14 Avraham called the place Adonai Yir’eh [Adonai will see (to it), Adonai provides] — as it is said to this day, “On the mountain Adonai is seen.”
The era of human sacrifice was put behind for ever. A singular human being realised, was enlightened, too see that G-d provides something better.
The Scapegoat. The One who would die for another. Yeshua Mashiach.
In the desert stretches of Time, Yeshua saw the Plan unravel with Himself at the Centre of it.

Author. Perfecter. Finisher.
Isaiah 53: 9b Although he had done no violence and had said nothing deceptive, 10 yet it pleased Adonai to crush him with illness, to see if he would present himself as a guilt offering. If he does, he will see his offspring; and he will prolong his days; and at his hand Adonai’s desire will be accomplished. 11 After this ordeal, he will see satisfaction. “By his knowing [pain and sacrifice], my righteous servant makes many righteous; it is for their sins that he suffers. 12 Therefore I will assign him a share with the great, he will divide the spoil with the mighty, for having exposed himself to death and being counted among the sinners, while actually bearing the sin of many and interceding for the offenders.”
It was not just Avraham or Yitz’chak or the ram that needed the Scapegoat. It was all of Creation – the Garden Eden or Delight that had turned into Desert, would be redeemed by One Sacrifice. The Scapegoat was readied in the Desert of the World to make it bloom.
Isaiah 43: 18 “Stop dwelling on past events and brooding over times gone by; 19 I am doing something new; it’s springing up — can’t you see it? I am making a road in the desert, rivers in the wasteland. 20 The wild animals will honor me, the jackals and the ostriches; because I put water in the desert, rivers in the wasteland, for my chosen people to drink, 21 the people I formed for myself, so that they would proclaim my praise. 22 But you haven’t called on me, Ya‘akov; because you have grown weary of me, Isra’el.
So Avraham, and O you children of Avraham, what did you go out into the desert to see? Nu, why did you go out?
Hebrews 11: 17 By trusting, Avraham, when he was put to the test, offered up Yitz’chak as a sacrifice. Yes, he offered up his only son, he who had received the promises, 18 to whom it had been said, “What is called your ‘seed’ will be in Yitz’chak.” 19 For he had concluded that G-d could even raise people from the dead! And, figuratively speaking, he did so receive him.
He concluded that G-d could even raise his son, or people, from the dead!
What Avraham had concluded, having seen with eyes of faith or by trusting with his heart, Yeshua Mashiach, the Scapegoat, knew to be His Destiny in the Desert.
John 11: 25 Yeshua said to her, “I AM the Resurrection and the Life! Whoever puts his trust in me will live, even if he dies; 26 and everyone living and trusting in me will never die. Do you believe this?” 27 She said to him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.”
Desert stretches. Sand. Rocks. Hills. Insects. Reptiles. The Sun. Heat. Cactii.
Stoned. Whipped. Cast outside the Holy City of Yerushalayim. Condemned. Hung on the Tree.
John 8: 52 The Judeans said to him, “Now we know for sure that you have a demon! Avraham died, and so did the prophets; yet you say, ‘Whoever obeys my teaching will never taste death.’ 53 Avraham avinu died; you aren’t greater than he, are you? And the prophets also died. Who do you think you are?” 54 Yeshua answered, “If I praise myself, my praise counts for nothing. The One who is praising me is my Father, the very one about whom you keep saying, ‘He is our G-d.’ 55 Now you have not known him, but I do know him; indeed, if I were to say that I don’t know him, I would be a liar like you! But I do know him, and I obey his word. 56 Avraham, your father, was glad that he would see my day; then he saw it and was overjoyed.” 57 “Why, you’re not yet fifty years old,” the Judeans replied, “and you have seen Avraham?” 58 Yeshua said to them, “Yes, indeed! Before Avraham came into being, I AM!” 59 At this, they picked up stones to throw at him; but Yeshua was hidden and left the Temple grounds.
What went you out into the desert to see? Nu, why did you go out?
Psalm 118: 17 I will not die; no, I will live and proclaim the great deeds of Yah! 18 Yah disciplined me severely, but did not hand me over to death. 22 The very rock that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone! 23 This has come from Adonai ...27 Adonai is G-d, and he gives us light. Join in the pilgrim festival with branches all the way to the horns of the altar.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE!
Shalom. Amein.

 

MEDITATION XI

25.3.2014

 

YOM KIPPUR
Mathew 11: 7b “What did you go out to the desert to see? Reeds swaying in the breeze? 8 No? then what did you go out to see? Someone who was well dressed? Well-dressed people live in kings’ palaces. 9 Nu, so why did you go out?
Why did Yeshua Mashiach go out into the desert, driven there by the Ruach HaKodesh? Would I want to follow Him there? Indeed, for it is in the desert that you can see with His eyes, Ruach HaKodesh-enlightened eyes.
Yeshua was on a reconnaissance mission. He was reconnoitering His future and destiny.
It was here into the desert that He would be driven as the scapegoat, the goat offered to Azazel laden with the sins of the world, metaphorically speaking and yet literal in its universal effect. Outside the city gates, outside the camp, He would be the One to bear the iniquities of every human being past, present and future. All of humankind’s iniquities would be laid on One who was innocent.
Isaiah 53: 1 Who believes our report? To whom is the arm of Adonai revealed? 4 In fact, it was our diseases he bore, our pains from which he suffered; yet we regarded him as punished, stricken and afflicted by God. 5 But he was wounded because of our crimes, crushed because of our sins; the disciplining that makes us whole fell on him, and by his bruises* we are healed. 6 We all, like sheep, went astray; we turned, each one, to his own way; yet Adonai laid on him the guilt of all of us. 9b Although he had done no violence and had said nothing deceptive, 10 yet it pleased Adonai to crush him with illness, to see if he would present himself as a guilt offering.
Leviticus 16: 8 Then Aharon is to cast lots for the two goats, one lot for Adonai and the other for ‘Az’azel. 9 Aharon is to present the goat whose lot fell to Adonai and offer it as a sin offering. 10 But the goat whose lot fell to ‘Az’azel is to be presented alive to Adonai to be used for making atonement over it by sending it away into the desert for ‘Az’azel. 21 Aharon is to lay both his hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the transgressions, crimes and sins of the people of Isra’el; he is to put them on the head of the goat and then send it away into the desert with a man appointed for the purpose. 22 The goat will bear all their transgressions away to some isolated place, and he is to let the goat go in the desert.
And of this, the High Priest Caiaphas prophesied:
John 18: 12 So the detachment of Roman soldiers and their captain, together with the Temple Guard of the Judeans, arrested Yeshua, tied him up, 13 and took him first to ‘Anan, the father-in-law of Kayafa, who was cohen gadol that fateful year. 14 (It was Kayafa who had advised the Judeans that it would be good for one man to die on behalf of the people.)
In the desert Yeshua saw that it would be good, His destiny to die on behalf of the people.
John 18: 10 Then Shim‘on Kefa, who had a sword, drew it and struck the slave of the cohen hagadol, cutting off his right ear; the slave’s name was Melekh. 11 Yeshua said to Kefa, “Put your sword back in its scabbard! This is the cup the Father has given me; am I not to drink it?”
When He returned from the desert, he got an inkling yet again of what it meant to be the goat offered to Azazel.
Luke 4:14 Yeshua returned to the Galil in the power of the Spirit, and reports about him spread throughout the countryside. 15 He taught in their synagogues, and everyone respected him. 16 Now when he went to Natzeret, where he had been brought up, on Shabbat he went to the synagogue as usual. He stood up to read, 17 and he was given the scroll of the prophet Yesha‘yahu. Unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written,
18 “The Spirit of Adonai is upon me;
therefore he has anointed me
to announce Good News to the poor;
he has sent me to proclaim freedom for the imprisoned
and renewed sight for the blind,
to release those who have been crushed,
19 to proclaim a year of the favor of Adonai.”
20 After closing the scroll and returning it to the shammash, he sat down; and the eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 He started to speak to them: “Today, as you heard it read, this passage of the Tanakh was fulfilled!”
But, then He foresaw his destiny yet again in the actions of those who heard Him. The world of the ‘faithful’ too was but a wilderness in which Azazel waited for the scapegoat to be offered to him, not knowing that this ‘scapegoat’ was unlike the ones that had been offered before. This offering would cleanse the people forever, not only Jews but Gentiles too.
John 1: 9 This was the true light, which gives light to everyone entering the world. 10 He was in the world — the world came to be through him —yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to his own homeland, yet his own people did not receive him.
John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God.
Luke 4: 28 everyone in the synagogue was filled with fury. 29 They rose up, drove him out of town and dragged him to the edge of the cliff on which their town was built, intending to throw him off. 30 But he walked right through the middle of the crowd and went away.
They took him to the cliff to throw Him over it, even as it is done to the scapegoat. But it was not yet time for the offering. And the cliff that He was to be thrown off was the Cross.
Here it is – the effect of Yeshua made the scapegoat offered to Azazel.
Galatians 3: 13 The Messiah redeemed us from the curse pronounced in the Torah by becoming cursed on our behalf; for the Tanakh says, “Everyone who hangs from a stake comes under a curse.” 14 Yeshua the Messiah did this so that in union with him the Gentiles might receive the blessing announced to Avraham, so that through trusting and being faithful, we might receive what was promised, namely, the Spirit.
All who have sinned and fallen short of the mark (hamartia – a mistake or error in judgment, having missed the mark) have to face punishment, death. But what if One who was innocent gladly embraced the punishment for the iniquities of all the guilty ones? Would Azazel have any power over such a Person? Over such a Scapegoat?

And what if this Person actually, through acceptance of His punishment on behalf of many, erased the sins of all who believe in Him?

Hallelujah! The Yom Kippur for Humankind had finally arrived to be celebrated each day!
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom. Amein.

 

MEDITATION XII

28.3.2014

 

I AM GIVING YOU MY SHALOM!
Azazel had always been waiting on the other side of the cliff, in the place called ‘the end of all flesh’, awaiting his share of souls since Adam transgressed. In a sense, he had been given the Key of Death. Every soul that sinned was his by right. Therefore:
Jude 1: 9 When Mikha’el, one of the ruling angels, took issue with the Adversary, arguing over the body of Moshe, he did not dare bring against him (the Devil) an insulting charge, but said, “May Adonai rebuke you.”
The Archangel knew that the body of every sinner belonged to Azazel. And knew that only Adonai had the power to redeem the bodies that belonged to Him. And from Adam until Yeshua, none could be redeemed from the power of Edom, the other side of the cliff, except perhaps Enoch and Elijah.

Over every body, even if the person had sought to love G-d and serve G-d, Azazel could demand a right because in that body lay sin and the body had sinned too – he held the key of Hades and Death.
Now Yeshua Maschiach walked in the desert and His body weakened as he hungered. Azazel came to him to flaunt his right to tempt and consume humans because of hamartia. “Now the Devil was the subtlest beast of the field.” But the Adversary had never met One who did not belong to him and over whom he could not pronounce his dominion because of Adam’s transgression.
He had never met one like Yeshua Mashiach.
Romans 5:18 In other words, just as it was through one offence that all people came under condemnation, so also it is through one righteous act that all people come to be considered righteous. 19 For just as through the disobedience of the one man, many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the other man, many will be made righteous.
Galatians 4: 3 So it is with us — when we were “children” we were slaves to the elemental spirits of the universe; 4 but when the appointed time arrived, God sent forth his Son. He was born from a woman, born into a culture in which legalistic perversion of the Torah was the norm, 5 so that he might redeem those in subjection to this legalism and thus enable us to be made God’s sons. 6 Now because you are sons, God has sent forth into our hearts the Spirit of his Son, the Spirit who cries out, “Abba!” (that is, “Dear Father!”).
The Saviour had appeared, the promised Maschiach willing to take upon himself all the sins and iniquties of every human being and its punishment. The ‘goat’ was now in the desert, scouting the scene, training his body and mind, anticipating with joy his soon-to-be walk towards Edom carrying the iniquity of the humans He loved and for whose sake he was willing to give himself up and die.
What was the ‘fate’ the goat to Azazel suffered in tradition?

The priest laid his hand upon its head and confessed, or literally placed upon it, all the sins of Israel. The priest then tied half a piece of red cloth to the goats horn and had the goat given to a ready man, who led it to a particular remote spot in the wilderness. There the ready man pushed it backwards down a jagged cliff, killing it. In the instant the goat died, the red cloth tied to its horns turned white, as well as the remaining half that remained at the Temple. In this moment that the cloth turned white  the sins of Israel were cleansed. And yet, this ritual had to be practised every year!
Isaiah 53: 4 In fact, it was our diseases he bore, our pains from which he suffered; yet we regarded him as punished, stricken and afflicted by God. 5 But he was wounded because of our crimes, crushed because of our sins; the disciplining that makes us whole fell on him, and by his bruises* we are healed. 6 We all, like sheep, went astray; we turned, each one, to his own way; yet Adonai laid on him the guilt of all of us.
Isaiah 63: 1 Who is this coming from Bozrah in Edom with his clothes stained bright red? Who is this dressed in splendor, going forward with great strength? “It is I, the Lord. I am coming to announce my victory. I am powerful enough to save you.” 2 Why are your clothes red and your garments like those who trample grapes in a winepress? 3 “I have trampled alone in the winepress. No one was with me. In my anger I trampled on people. In my wrath I stomped on them. Their blood splattered my clothes so all my clothing has been stained. 4 I planned the day of vengeance. The year for my reclaiming you has come. 5 I looked, but there was no help. I was astounded that there was no outside support. So with my own power I won a victory. My anger supported me. 6 In my anger I trampled on people. In my wrath I made them drunk and poured their blood on the ground.” 7 I will acknowledge the Lord’s acts of mercy, and sing the praises of the Lord, because of everything that the Lord has done for us. He has done many good things for the nation of Israel because of his compassion and his unlimited mercy.
And Azazel got his first good look at Him. And found the One of whom it is written:
Ezekiel 3: 9 Yes, I am making your resoluteness harder than flint, as hard as a diamond.
The Maschiach would come to him again over the edge of the cliff, raised up on a cross on the Mountain of the Skull (Golgotha), outside the Holy City, with His blood-ransom. And Azazel would lose the Keys of Hades and Death to Him and the souls over whom he had power, he would lose everything to the Sun of Righteousness who was rising with healing in His wings.
Every goat that had been offered to Azazel over the edge of the cliff had died broken upon the rocks in Edom. None of them had returned. But this ‘goat’ would return from the dead, having made atonement for the sins of the world, for the ‘power’ of Azazel had no hold over Him.
It was before He went out to be the ‘goat’ sent out to Azazel that Yeshua Maschiach declared:
John 14: 30 “I won’t be talking with you much longer, because the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me;
And then again:
John 14: 25 “I have told you these things while I am still with you. 26 But the Counselor, the Ruach HaKodesh, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything; that is, he will remind you of everything I have said to you. 27 “What I am leaving with you is shalom — I am giving you my shalom. I don’t give the way the world gives. Don’t let yourselves be upset or frightened.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE!
Shalom. Amein.

 

 

MEDITATION XIII

29.3.2014

 

EXCHANGE THE BLACK BOOK FOR THE LORD OF LIGHT!
Every so-called ‘Christian’ or ‘disciple’ or ‘believer’ who has used the Bible to judge and condemn others has strayed from the path of Yeshua Mashiach. The world has had enough of this condemnatory, judgemental Christianity and, having tolerated it for so long, is about to be allowed by G-d to turn around and destroy those who have spread this ‘good news’ of how G-d is angry and vengeful and ready to devour and destroy all sinners.
The Pharisees enjoyed reading the Torah and having read it and tied it to their foreheads and arms and wherever else they wanted to tie it to, ended up judging and condemning everyone else. They saw only themselves as ‘justified’ and ‘righteous’.
When Yeshua Mashiach came, He looked curiously at such and realised that they had turned the Book of Light into the Black Book. From their Black Book came only bleakness and gloom and doom. With their interpretations, they turned light into darkness and judged and condemned the very ones for whom the Saviour had come. They sat on their thrones of judgement and condemned the prostitutes, tax collectors, homosexuals, drunkards, thieves, liars, heretics, etc. If they had been allowed and if they could have done so, they would gladly have killed every one of these miserable sinners, wretches who they concluded had no right to life or to live.
Therefore the Mashiach came with Light. Brilliant unapproachable Light. The Light. Light that the self-righteous, even if they quote the Black Book to justify all their thoughts, words and deeds towards other human beings whom they consider as lower than themselves because they have the Black Book, cannot comprehend.
John 1: 9 This was the true light, which gives light to everyone entering the world. 10 He was in the world — the world came to be through him — yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to his own homeland, yet his own people did not receive him.
John 1: 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not suppressed it.
The darkness of the New Pharisees, the judgemental Christians, cannot comprehend the Light. Though they have much to say about it, they actually suppress it.
Can they stand in the Light that Yeshua Machiach brings?
John 9: 39 Yeshua said, “It is to judge that I came into this world, so that those who do not see might see, and those who do see might become blind.” 40 Some of the P’rushim nearby heard this and said to him, “So we’re blind too, are we?” 41 Yeshua answered them, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin. But since you still say, ‘We see,’ your guilt remains.
Now, these judgemental Christians can see everything that is wrong with everyone and they are so sure that they alone are so right. If you are sceptical, they will point to the Black Book and say “This Book is going to kill you!”
John 9: 41 Yeshua answered them, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin. But since you still say, ‘We see,’ your guilt remains.
Yes, SINCE you still say “We see”, your guilt remains.
There is a way out though, a way back from the Black Book to the Book of Light, even if the Light is so bright that you dare not look into it and can only say: Have mercy on me!
James 2: 8 If you truly attain the goal of Kingdom Torah, in conformity with the passage that says, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well. 13 For judgment will be without mercy toward one who doesn’t show mercy; but mercy wins out over judgment.
Mathew 5: 7 “How blessed are those who show mercy! for they will be shown mercy.
Mathew 7: 1 “Don’t judge, so that you won’t be judged. 2 For the way you judge others is how you will be judged — the measure with which you measure out will be used to measure to you.”
Therefore the time is coming, says Adonai, when the world will turn upon a Christianity that has judged and condemned people from its Throne of Self-righteousness using the Black Book and the Name of Yeshua Mashiach.
The measure with which it meted out condemnation and judgement to the sinners will be the same measure used to weigh the self-righteous.
Mathew 9: 10 While Yeshua was in the house eating, many tax-collectors and sinners came and joined him and his talmidim at the meal. 11 When the P’rushim saw this, they said to his talmidim, “Why does your rabbi eat with tax-collectors and sinners?” 12 But Yeshua heard the question and answered, “The ones who need a doctor aren’t the healthy but the sick. 13 As for you, go and learn what this means: ‘I want compassion rather than animal-sacrifices.’ For I didn’t come to call the ‘righteous,’ but sinners!”
Luke 15: 1 The tax-collectors and sinners kept gathering around to hear Yeshua, 2 and the P’rushim and Torah-teachers kept grumbling. “This fellow,” they said, “welcomes sinners — he even eats with them!”
The Friend of Sinners is right here, right now, to greet every human being with love and mercy.
John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God.
Do not fear the preachers and teachers of the Black Book.
Come to the Author of the Book of Light, Very Light of Very Light, Begotten, Not Made.
Emmanuel.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE!
Shalom. Amein.

 

MEDITATION XIV

29.3.2014

 

THE WORSHIP DRUG

 

The Adversary keeps the talmidim of Yeshua Mashiach drugged with ‘worship’, especially with the hypnotic musical choruses that drone on and on in loops like mantras so that they will not learn how to pray or be able to pray. The Adversary does not fear ‘worship’, which is a passive act of devotion or adoration (even if they lift their hands up, wave them, shake their butts and hips and generally hop around or dance). The Adversary fears prayer because it is through prayer that the strongholds are demolished. Prayer is the fire-arrow of the Holy Spirit that finds its demonic targets with accuracy. The New Age churches are tranced out on worship. The day is coming when they will suffer because they did not understand what sustained prayer, the sword of the Spirit, is and how this fiery sword must guard the Tree of Life. The gates and the walls of these cities will be broken down because of prayerlessness and then, where will the worshippers run to or dance?
Mathew 26:40 He returned to the talmidim and found them sleeping. He said to Kefa, “Were you so weak that you couldn’t stay awake with me for even an hour? 41 Stay awake, and pray that you will not be put to the test — the spirit indeed is eager, but human nature is weak.”
Luke 21: 36 Stay alert, always praying that you will have the strength to escape all the things that will happen and to stand in the presence of the Son of Man.”
Do you think it is so hard to pray? You’ve been trying but it doesn’t seem to work?
Do not fear. Do not worry. Do not struggle. Do not feel condemned.
Zechariah 12: 10 and I will pour out on the house of David and on those living in Yerushalayim a spirit of grace and prayer; and they will look to me, whom they pierced.”
Drink deep of this Spirit of grace and prayer (another translation says ‘the Spirit of grace and supplication’ – the Spirit that enables you to make known all your thoughts and desires and needs and fears to the G-d who is Love and then to pray on in His Spirit according to His thoughts and desires and needs and ways.)
See? There is a Helper who helps you pray. Dive in.
1 Chronicles 4: 10 Ya‘betz called on the God of Isra’el: “Please bless me by enlarging my territory. May your hand be with me! Keep me from harm, so that it will not cause me pain.”

G-d granted his request.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE!
It’s free.
Shalom. Amein.

 

 

30.3.2014

 

LAST THOUGHTS
Psalm 115: 3 But Eloheinu is in Shomayim; He hath done whatsoever He hath pleased.
4 Their atzabim (idols) are kesef and zahav, the ma’aseh (work) of the hands of adam.
5 Peh (mouth) they have, but they speak not; einayim (eyes) have they, but they see not;
6 Oznayim (ears) they have, but they hear not; af (nose) have they, but they smell not;
7 They have hands, but they handle not; raglayim (feet) have they, but they walk not; neither speak they through their garon (throat).
8 They that make them will be like them; so is kol asher bote’ach (every one that trusteth) in them.

 

 

 

 

MEDITATION XV

31.3.2014

DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT!

Galatians 4: 4 but when the appointed time arrived, God sent forth his Son. He was born from a woman, born into a culture in which legalistic perversion of the Torah was the norm, 5 so that he might redeem those in subjection to this legalism and thus enable us to be made God’s sons.
This culture of legalistic perversion of the written Word of God continues to prevail. Few there be who escape it. It is institutionalised in the denominations, sects and cults that use the name of Yeshua Mashiach to oppress the sinner. The Friend of the Sinners is veiled by the Framework of Condemnation and Death. The priests and pastors become judges and executioners. Both sinners and the sheep inside these folds have to suffer the onslaught of the culture of legalistic perversion in silence and with tears.
John 1: 16 We have all received from his fullness, yes, grace upon grace. 17 For the Torah was given through Moshe; grace and truth came through Yeshua the Messiah.
Galatians 4: 21 Tell me, you who want to be in subjection to the system that results from perverting the Torah into legalism, don’t you hear what the Torah itself says?
What does the Torah itself say?
John 5: 39 You keep examining the Tanakh because you think that in it you have eternal life. Those very Scriptures bear witness to me, 40 but you won’t come to me in order to have life!
The denominations, sects and cults are run by Pharisees, by and large, who are unable to draw people and retain them under their thumbs without sitting in Moses’ seat and pointing their fingers at the tax collector, the prostitute, the gluttons, the lepers, the lame and the blind, the demon-possessed, the weary and heavy-laden – judging them and then condemning them to death.
They are individually and collectively SAUL.
Acts 8: 1 and Sha’ul gave his approval to his murder. (Stephen’s).
2 Corinthians 3: 6 He has even made us competent to be workers serving a New Covenant, the essence of which is not a written text but the Spirit. For the written text brings death, but the Spirit gives life. 7 Now if that which worked death, by means of a written text engraved on stone tablets, came with glory — such glory that the people of Isra’el could not stand to look at Moshe’s face because of its brightness, even though that brightness was already fading away — 8 won’t the working of the Spirit be accompanied by even greater glory? 9 For if there was glory in what worked to declare people guilty, how much more must the glory abound in what works to declare people innocent!
DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT!
Luke 24: 33 When they came to the place called The Skull, they nailed him to a stake; and they nailed the criminals to stakes, one on the right and one on the left. 34 Yeshua said, “Father, forgive them; they don’t understand what they are doing.”
DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT!
What was Yeshua to do with those who do not understand what they’re doing? He declared them innocent from the Cross! Around Yeshua Mashiach were those who had belonged to two cultures of legalistic perversion – the Judaic and the Roman. And neither was interested in the compassion or Light and healing that He had brought in His body. They had chosen Death over Life.
Luke 23: 11 Herod and his soldiers treated Yeshua with contempt and made fun of him. Then, dressing him in an elegant robe, they sent him back to Pilate. 12 That day Herod and Pilate became friends with each other; previously they had been enemies.
1 Corinthians 2: 6 Yet there is a wisdom that we are speaking to those who are mature enough for it. But it is not the wisdom of this world or of this world’s leaders, who are in the process of passing away. 7 On the contrary, we are communicating a secret wisdom from God which has been hidden until now but which, before history began, God had decreed would bring us glory. 8 Not one of this world’s leaders has understood it; because if they had, they would not have executed the Lord from whom this glory flows.
Oh, the glory of it! The glory of what proceeds from the Lord of glory. None of the leaders of this world, the Pharisees who run the denominations, sects and cults, the legalists, the judges and executioners, have understood it! If they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory!
Oh, the glory of it!
DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT!
This is the glory of the Mashiach! And this is the glory of His talmidim.To be one of those who have been declared innocent by Yashua Maschiach through His suffering and death as the Scapegoat! And to know those who have been declared innocent too! And to declare people innocent, in turn! So few know this!
The Pharisee dies in everyone to whom this has been declared. The New Creation declares this!
John 8: 6b Yeshua bent down and began writing in the dust with his finger. 7 When they kept questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “The one of you who is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Then he bent down and wrote in the dust again. 9 On hearing this, they began to leave, one by one, the older ones first, until he was left alone, with the woman still there. 10 Standing up, Yeshua said to her, “Where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 She said, “No one, sir.” Yeshua said, “Neither do I condemn you. Now go, and don’t sin any more.” 12 Yeshua spoke to them again: “I am the light of the world; whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light which gives life.”
Galatians 2:20 When the Messiah was executed on the stake as a criminal, I was too; so that my proud ego no longer lives. But the Messiah lives in me, and the life I now live in my body I live by the same trusting faithfulness that the Son of God had, who loved me and gave himself up for me.
John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of G-d, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of G-d.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE!
Shalom! Amein.

 

 

MEDITATION XVI

 1.4.2014

YOU HAVE BEEN DECLARED INNOCENT!

Who is it who has authority to declare people innocent?
Yeshua Maschiach.
Leviticus 16: 7 He (Aharon) is to take the two goats and place them before Adonai at the entrance to the tent of meeting. 8 Then Aharon is to cast lots for the two goats, one lot for Adonai and the other for ‘Az’azel. 9 Aharon is to present the goat whose lot fell to Adonai and offer it as a sin offering.
Luke 4: 17 and he was given the scroll of the prophet Yesha‘yahu. Unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written, 18 “The Spirit of Adonai is upon me; therefore he has anointed me to announce Good News to the poor; he has sent me to proclaim freedom for the imprisoned and renewed sight for the blind, to release those who have been crushed, 19 to proclaim a year of the favor of Adonai.”
Yeshua stood before the tent of the meeting, the meeting of two types (goats) in One. Here there was no question of lots! Rather:
Hebrews 10: 4 For it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins. 5 This is why, on coming into the world, he says, “It has not been your will to have an animal sacrifice and a meal offering; rather, you have prepared for me a body. 6 No, you have not been pleased with burnt offerings and sin offerings. 7 Then I said, ‘Look! In the scroll of the book it is written about me. I have come to do your will. 9 and then, “Look, I have come to do your will”; he takes away the first system in order to set up the second.
The One who takes away the first system has the authority to set up the second system with Himself at the centre. He can
DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT.
The ram was ready at the Tent of the Meeting. But was it about Yeshua Mashiach meeting with the Father? Yes. And more.
Leviticus 16: 9 Aharon is to present the goat whose lot fell to Adonai and offer it as a sin offering.
He was ready to be made the sin offering. To offer Himself up for the sake of the people. The righteous on behalf of unrighteous people.
To bring YOU and I to G-d.
Leviticus 16: 15 “Next, he is to slaughter the goat of the sin offering which is for the people, bring its blood inside the curtain and do with its blood as he did with the bull’s blood, sprinkling it on the ark-cover and in front of the ark-cover. 16 He will make atonement for the Holy Place because of the uncleannesses of the people of Isra’el and because of their transgressions — all their sins; and he is to do the same for the tent of meeting which is there with them right in the middle of their uncleannesses. 17 No one is to be present in the tent of meeting from the time he enters the Holy Place to make atonement until the time he comes out, having made atonement for himself, for his household and for the entire community of Isra’el. (LY: ii) 18 Then he is to go out to the altar that is before Adonai and make atonement for it; he is to take some of the bull’s blood and some of the goat’s blood and put it on all the horns of the altar. 19 He is to sprinkle some of the blood on it with his finger seven times, thus purifying it and setting it apart from the uncleannesses of the people of Isra’el.
John 19: 5 So Yeshua came out, wearing the thorn-branch crown and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, “Look at the man!” 6 When the head cohanim and the Temple guards saw him they shouted, “Put him to death on the stake! Put him to death on the stake!” Pilate said to them, “You take him out yourselves and put him to death on the stake, because I don’t find any case against him.” 7 The Judeans answered him, “We have a law; according to that law, he ought to be put to death, because he made himself out to be the Son of God.” 8 On hearing this, Pilate became even more frightened. 9 He went back into the headquarters and asked Yeshua, “Where are you from?” But Yeshua didn’t answer.
1 Peter 3: 18 For the Messiah himself died for sins, once and for all, a righteous person on behalf of unrighteous people, so that he might bring you to G-d. He was put to death in the flesh but brought to life by the Spirit; 19 and in this form he went and made a proclamation to the imprisoned spirits, 20 to those who were disobedient long ago, in the days of Noach, when God waited patiently during the building of the ark, in which a few people — to be specific, eight — were delivered by means of water.
1 Corinthians 5: 7 Get rid of the old hametz, so that you can be a new batch of dough, because in reality you are unleavened. For our Pesach lamb, the Messiah, has been sacrificed.
Isaiah 53: 6 We all, like sheep, went astray; we turned, each one, to his own way; yet Adonai laid on him the guilt of all of us. 7 Though mistreated, he was submissive — he did not open his mouth. Like a lamb led to be slaughtered, like a sheep silent before its shearers, he did not open his mouth.
Hebrews 9: 11 But when the Messiah appeared as cohen gadol of the good things that are happening already, then, through the greater and more perfect Tent which is not man-made (that is, it is not of this created world), 12 he entered the Holiest Place once and for all. And he entered not by means of the blood of goats and calves, but BY MEANS OF HIS OWN BLOOD, THUS SETTING PEOPLE FREE FOREVER. 13 For if sprinkling ceremonially unclean persons with the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer restores their outward purity; 14 then how much more the blood of the Messiah, who, through the eternal Spirit, offered himself to God as a sacrifice without blemish, will purify our conscience from works that lead to death, so that we can serve the living G-d! 15 It is because of this death that he is mediator of a new covenant [or will]. Because a death has occurred which sets people free from the transgressions committed under the first covenant, those who have been called may receive the promised eternal inheritance.
DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT!
SET PEOPLE FREE!
Now you know who can do that. And how it was done!
It is done!
Believe it! Rejoice!
G-d and His Mashiach, Yeshua, have DECLARED YOU INNOCENT!
DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT.
John 19: 28 After this, knowing that all things had accomplished their purpose, Yeshua, in order to fulfill the words of the Tanakh, said, “I’m thirsty.” 29 A jar full of cheap sour wine was there; so they soaked a sponge in the wine, coated it with oregano leaves and held it up to his mouth. 30 After Yeshua had taken the wine, he said, “It is accomplished!” And, letting his head droop, he delivered up his spirit.
Christ, our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed.
The Blood is testimony in Heaven. The Blood is testimony on Earth. The Blood is testimony on the other side of the Cliff, before Azazel.
YOU HAVE BEEN DECLARED INNOCENT.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE!
Shalom! Amein.

 

MEDITATION XVII

2.4.2014

 

THE SPIRIT OF LEGALISM

 

 

As soon as the Gospel of Grace is proclaimed powerfully in a place, soon after Satan arrives with Legalism, Accusation, Condemnation and Judgementalism. Those who know the Grace of Adonai Yeshua Mashiach will remain steadfast in it and not drink of the spirit of Legalism or pay heed to its purveyors who are called ‘Pharisee’.

However, very few know how to discern between these two spirits. The vast majority of believers are bound by the spirit of Fear and Legalism spread abroad in the churches by Pharisees. The spirit of Yeshua Mashiach teaches us, we who have received ‘grace upon grace’, to discern the spirit of the Pharisee and keep a safe distance from it inside of oneself.

Matthew 16: 5 The talmidim, in crossing to the other side of the lake, had forgotten to bring any bread. 6 So when Yeshua said to them, “Watch out! Guard yourselves against the hametz of the P’rushim and Tz’dukim,”7 they thought he said it because they hadn’t brought bread. 8 But Yeshua, aware of this, said, “Such little trust you have! Why are you talking with each other about not having bread? 9 Don’t you understand yet? Don’t you remember the five loaves of the five thousand and how many baskets you filled? 10 Or the seven loaves of the four thousand and how many baskets you filled? 11 How can you possibly think I was talking to you about bread? Guard yourselves from the hametz of the P’rushimand Tz’dukim!” 12 Then they understood — they were to guard themselves not from yeast for bread but from the teaching of the P’rushim and Tz’dukim.

That was a descriptive metaphor, because like yeast, legalism can spread and permeate an entire fellowship, congregation, or denomination before one even realizes it.

These days the Pharisees do not even come in surreptitiously like ‘yeast’. They come in aggressively and bring into bondage entire congregations. One is reminded of this lovely translation:

Galatians 4:21 Tell me, you who want to be in subjection to the system that results from perverting the Torah into legalism, don’t you hear what the Torah itself says?

That ‘perverting’ goes on in high gear. And it comes couched in terms like ‘submit’, ‘obey’, ‘get out’, ‘step down’, ‘correct’, ‘discipline’, ‘covenant’, ‘second class believer’, etc. It’s the lexicon of perverting Grace into Legalism. It’s a con too. It is a ‘covenant’, yes, but it is the Old Covenant of ‘bondage’ and ‘bears children for slavery’ – Mt Sinai and Hagar. It’s all about power, control and manipulation.

Further, those who resort to legalism are the perfect demonstration of knowing nothing of the Spirit of Grace and are in fact helpless when it comes to actually helping and healing the sick. So they resort to the next best solution – Legalism. Imposing the Law on others can bring about a semblance of ‘healing’ and ‘order’. But it is akin to the doctor who can only treat the symptoms but not the disease. In other words, a ‘quack’ of sorts.

 

 

MEDITATION XVIII

4.4.2014

WATER AND WINE

John 1: 17 For the Torah was given through Moshe; grace and truth came through Yeshua the Messiah. 18 No one has ever seen G-d; but the only and unique Son, who is identical with G-d and is at the Father’s side — he has made him known.
Azazel, living on the other side of the Cliff, in Edom, the Adversary, had not seen G-d. Yeshua Mashiach made G-d known to him when he came to tempt him. The Adversary wanted to find out whether or not the Mashiach would hold fast to the identity He had in his union with the Father from the beginning and make it known. Yeshua’s identity was steadfast and as the Word of G-d, identical with G-d, he countered the three insinuations of the Adversary. The Adversary then left Him. Little did he realise that soon the Mashiach would soon return bearing his shed Blood as the Scapegoat that takes away the sin of the world.
John 1: 29 The next day, Yochanan saw Yeshua coming toward him and said, “Look! God’s lamb! The one who is taking away the sin of the world! 30 This is the man I was talking about when I said, ‘After me is coming someone who has come to rank above me, because he existed before me.’
And then, Azazel’s kingdom would cease to exist.
Revelation 11: 15 The seventh angel sounded his shofar; and there were loud voices in heaven, saying,
“The kingdom of the world
has become the Kingdom
of our Lord and his Messiah,
and he will rule forever and ever!”
The kingdom of the Adversary consists of bitterness and tears. But it is done with and is passing away. Instead, the Kingdom of Adonai Yeshua is here, right in the midst of us. It is a Person, it is Yeshua and Ruach Ha-Kodesh and the Father inside of us.
Luke 17: 20 The P’rushim asked Yeshua when the Kingdom of God would come. “The Kingdom of God,” he answered, “does not come with visible signs; 21 nor will people be able to say, ‘Look! Here it is!’ or, ‘Over there!’ Because, you see, the Kingdom of God is among you.”
1 John 4:4 You, children, are from God and have overcome the false prophets, because he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.
The false prophets cannot see Yeshua as the Scapegoat, the innocent Lamb that carries away the sin of the world.
Isaiah 53: 5 But he was wounded because of our crimes, crushed because of our sins; the disciplining that makes us whole fell on him, and by his bruises we are healed. 6 We all, like sheep, went astray; we turned, each one, to his own way; yet Adonai laid on him the guilt of all of us. 7 Though mistreated, he was submissive — he did not open his mouth. Like a lamb led to be slaughtered, like a sheep silent before its shearers, he did not open his mouth.
The false prophets see Yeshua as a fallen human being carrying sin inside him like every other human being. Then they work hard like Yogis to get rid of that inner sin. They struggle to cleanse themselves of their own sin by their own efforts. They believe, like Easterners, that Jesus was a Yogi who cleansed himself of the sin inside his body and therefore earned the Resurrection. They could not understand Him when he said:
John 11: 25 Yeshua said to her, “I AM the Resurrection and the Life! Whoever puts his trust in me will live, even if he dies; 26 and everyone living and trusting in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
These false prophets have no Scapegoat sent out to Azazel to carry their sins away into the desert and over the Cliff. They have no Scapegoat before Adonai to be sacrificed and whose Blood cleanses the temple entirely. They are slaves to their self-efforts, take pride in their ability to overcome sin, consider themselves superior to other humans.
Luke 18: 9 Also, to some who were relying on their own righteousness and looking down on everyone else, he told this parable: 10 “Two men went up to the Temple to pray, one a Parush and the other a tax-collector. 11 The Parush stood and prayed to himself, ‘O God! I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity — greedy, dishonest, immoral, or like this tax-collector! 12 I fast twice a week, I pay tithes on my entire income, . . . ’ 13 But the tax-collector, standing far off, would not even raise his eyes toward heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God! Have mercy on me, sinner that I am!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his home right with God rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but everyone who humbles himself will be exalted.”
They will not receive the forgiveness and righteousness and identity given and guaranteed by G-d the Father because the Scapegoat carried their sins away into the desert. They do not know the Scapegoat broken on the altar of the Cross, the Innocent One sacrificed in place of the Guilty Ones who cleanses His Temple and all human beings with the blood of His One Sacrifice. They think there is something more to be done.

But: IT IS DONE!
Isaiah 53: 7 Though mistreated, he was submissive — he did not open his mouth. Like a lamb led to be slaughtered, like a sheep silent before its shearers, he did not open his mouth. 11 After this ordeal, he will see satisfaction. “By his knowing [pain and sacrifice], my righteous servant makes many righteous; it is for their sins that he suffers. 12 Therefore I will assign him a share with the great, he will divide the spoil with the mighty, for having exposed himself to death and being counted among the sinners, while actually bearing the sin of many and interceding for the offenders.”
IT IS DONE!
Believe this, you will be free. No more bitterness. No more tears.
Exodus 15: 22 They went out into the Shur Desert; but after traveling three days in the desert, they had found no water. 23 They arrived at Marah but couldn’t drink the water there, because it was bitter. This is why they called it Marah [bitterness]. 24 The people grumbled against Moshe and asked, “What are we to drink?” 25 Moshe cried to Adonai; and Adonai showed him a certain piece of wood, which, when he threw it into the water, made the water taste good.
Have you found that certain piece of Wood that makes the bitter water turn into sweet water that tastes good?
But wait, there is more to it than just coming upon that certain piece of Wood that makes the bitter water taste good. The cup runs over!
John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!” 39 (Now he said this about the Spirit, whom those who trusted in him were to receive later — the Spirit had not yet been given, because Yeshua had not yet been glorified.)
Have you received the Ruach HaKodesh?
Yea, Yeshua Adonai has more than just good tasting water for us. He has Wine too. That is what his Blood is, it has become the Wine for us. Now we can quench our thirst with Living Waters and be drunk with the Wine, the Blood of His Cleansing Power.
John 2: 1 On Tuesday there was a wedding at Kanah in the Galil; and the mother of Yeshua was there. 2 Yeshua too was invited to the wedding, along with his talmidim. 3 The wine ran out, and Yeshua’s mother said to him, “They have no more wine.” 4 Yeshua replied, “Mother, why should that concern me? — or you? My time hasn’t come yet.” 5 His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” 6 Now six stone water-jars were standing there for the Jewish ceremonial washings, each with a capacity of twenty or thirty gallons. 7 Yeshua told them, “Fill the jars with water,” and they filled them to the brim. 8 He said, “Now draw some out, and take it to the man in charge of the banquet”; and they took it. 9 The man in charge tasted the water; it had now turned into wine! He did not know where it had come from, but the servants who had drawn the water knew. So he called the bridegroom 10 and said to him, “Everyone else serves the good wine first and the poorer wine after people have drunk freely. But you have kept the good wine until now!” 11 This, the first of Yeshua’s miraculous signs, he did at Kanah in the Galil; he manifested his glory, and his talmidim came to trust in him.
The best is yet to come. The good is already here. We go from better to better.
John 1: 16 We have all received from his fullness, yes, grace upon grace.
Luke 22: 17 Then, taking a cup of wine, he made the b’rakhah and said, “Take this and share it among yourselves. 18 For I tell you that from now on, I will not drink the ‘fruit of the vine’ until the Kingdom of God comes.” 19 Also, taking a piece of matzah, he made the b’rakhah, broke it, gave it to them and said, “This is my body, which is being given for you; do this in memory of me.” 20 He did the same with the cup after the meal, saying, “This cup is the New Covenant, ratified by my blood, which is being poured out for you.”
John 7: 37b “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking!”
I thirst. Do you?
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE!
Shalom! Amein.

 

MEDITATION XIX

4.4.2014

THE WRITTEN TEXT BRINGS DEATH, BUT THE SPIRIT GIVES LIFE!

2 Corinthians 3: 4 Such is the confidence we have through the Messiah toward G-d. 5 It is not that we are competent in ourselves to count anything as having come from us; on the contrary, our competence is from G-d. 6 He has even made us competent to be workers serving a New Covenant, the essence of which is not a written text but the Spirit. For the written text brings death, but the Spirit gives life. 7 Now if that which worked death, by means of a written text engraved on stone tablets, came with glory — such glory that the people of Isra’el could not stand to look at Moshe’s face because of its brightness, even though that brightness was already fading away — 8 won’t the working of the Spirit be accompanied by even greater glory? 9 For if there was glory in what worked to declare people guilty, how much more must the glory abound in what works to declare people innocent!
Yeshua Mashiach gives us confidence. And it is never in ourselves, but in G-d. What is this confidence we have? That we serve the New Covenant, THE ESSENCE OF WHICH IS NOT A WRITTEN TEXT BUT THE SPIRIT.
We have the confidence to get beyond the written text to its essence, to the living Ruach Ha-Kodesh. Even to the words that are as Spirit and Life.
Yochanan 6: 63 The Ruach Hakodesh is that which is making alive, the basar (flesh) does not profit anything. The dvarim which I have spoken to you are as Ruach and they are as Chayyim (Life).
2 Corinthians 3: 6b FOR THE WRITTEN TEXT BRINGS DEATH, BUT THE SPIRIT GIVES LIFE.
Some glory in the written text which brings death (and yes it has a glory!) because with that text one can declare people guilty. That is a great power – to be able to point to a written text and speak it out as a curse or a judgment or a condemnation or as spiritual execution over human beings. To declare people guilty.
Mattityahu 23:1 Then Moshiach spoke to the multitudes and to his Talmidim, 2 Saying, Upon the Kisei Moshe (Chair of Moses) sit the Sofrim and the Perushim. 4 And they tie up heavy [extra-Biblical, Mt 4:4; 15:3,6-9; 22:29] loads, hard to bear, and they place them upon the shoulders of men, but they, with so much as a finger, are not willing to lift the oppressive burdens.
This is the work of the written text, that which is upon the stone tablets that are hung as millstones round the necks of those who submit to the letter. The letter can only declare people guilty and place heavy loads, hard to bear, upon the shoulders of men. It can do nothing to help lift the oppressive burdens.
Therefore, the Mashiach had to come. And he cried out:
Mattityahu 11: 28 Come to me, all you who are burden-weary and heavy laden, and I will give you Shabbos menuchah. 29 Take my ol (yoke) upon you and learn from me, for I am anav (humble) and have shiflut (lowliness) in lev (heart), and you will find menuchah (rest, security [RUTH 1:9]) for your nefashot (souls, YIRMEYAH 6:16]. 30 For my [Moshiach’s] ol (yoke) is easy and my burden is light. [See Mt 23:4]
2 Corinthians 3: 9b How much more must the glory abound in what works to declare people innocent!
How much more? Can you and I measure it?
John 3: 34 because the one whom God sent speaks God’s words. For God does not give him the Spirit in limited degree — 35 the Father loves the Son and has put everything in his hands.
John 20: 19 In the evening that same day, the first day of the week, when the talmidim were gathered together behind locked doors out of fear of the Judeans, Yeshua came, stood in the middle and said, “Shalom aleikhem!” 20 Having greeted them, he showed them his hands and his side. The talmidim were overjoyed to see the Lord. 21 “Shalom aleikhem!” Yeshua repeated. “Just as the Father sent me, I myself am also sending you.” 22 Having said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Ruach HaKodesh!”
John 1: 16 We have all received from his fullness, yes, grace upon grace. 17 For the Torah was given through Moshe; grace and truth came through Yeshua the Messiah.
Matthew 12: 6 I tell you, there is in this place something greater than the Temple! 7 If you knew what ‘I want compassion rather than animal-sacrifice’ meant, you would not condemn the innocent.
This is the glory of the New Covenant! This is the glory beyond the written text that brings death! This is the glory beyond that which worked death, by means of a written text engraved on stone tablets! This is the glory beyond that which worked death, by means of a written text engraved on stone tablets!
The Father-heart says: ‘I want compassion rather than the death of animal-sacrifice!’ In other words, He is not pleased with the death of any sinner or any wicked person. Nor is He pleased with anyone who puts sinners to death using the written text!
Yeshua Mashiach said: If you knew what “I want compassion rather than animal-sacrifice” meant, you would not condemn the innocent!’
Then one can know that the glory abounds in what works to declare people innocent!
DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT.
Such is the confidence we have through the Messiah toward G-d. He has even made us competent to be workers serving a New Covenant, the essence of which is not a written text but the Spirit. For the written text brings death, but the Spirit gives life.
1 Corinthians 5: 7 Get rid of the old hametz, so that you can be a new batch of dough, because in reality you are unleavened. For our Pesach lamb, the Messiah, has been sacrificed.
DON’T WEIGH PEOPLE DOWN WITH GUILT!
DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT!
Get rid of that written text that is used to declare people guilty. Receive from the Mashiach the words that are Spirit that can declare people innocent because the price or ransom for their redemption has been paid by His Blood.

The truth about one’s identity in Yeshua Mashiach, the Risen One, the New Man: “You are holy, you are blameless, you are without accusation. You are filled with the fulness of G-d.” Believe it. Be happy.
Go tell it on the mountain and the rooftops and in the alleys and bylanes!
Receive the Ruach Ha-Kodesh!
DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT!
Come. Take. Eat. Drink. Be happy. It’s free.
Shalom aleikhem! Amein!

 

 

MEDITATION XX

5.4.2014

COME!
Even when Yeshua Mashiach walked in the desert, his hunger growing as he fasted for 40 days, his thoughts were about those He had come to redeem. The Ruach HaKodesh had driven him into the wilderness so that the Adversary would get an idea of who was coming to crush his head and take over the kingdoms of the world. Yeshua rejected the Adversary’s temptings. Thus, He was full of the Holy Spirit and when He returned from the desert.
Luke 4: 17 and he was given the scroll of the prophet Yesha‘yahu. Unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written, 18 “The Spirit of Adonai is upon me; therefore he has anointed me to announce Good News to the poor; he has sent me to proclaim freedom for the imprisoned and renewed sight for the blind, to release those who have been crushed, 19 to proclaim a year of the favor of Adonai.”
This has been G-d’s work from the beginning.
Genesis 2: 9 Adonai, G-d, called to the man, “Where are you?” 21 Adonai, G-d, made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.
Yeshua came for the lost sheep of Isra’el. He did not come to call the self-righteous. The self-righteous have no need for Him and the Gospel of Light. But the lost ones do. And His call to them is always:
COME!
Matthew 11: 28 “Come to me, all of you who are struggling and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!”
Mathew 4: 19 Yeshua said to them, “Come after me, and I will make you fishers for men!”
Have you been to churches where the leaders think they’re big authorities and they act tough and tell the congregation “We don’t care if you leave the church!!” Or have you met leaders who say “We want only holy people in this church! If you can’t be holy and fulfil the rules and regulations, “Get out!”?” Have you been deceived by sect and cult leaders who say: “We are ‘special’ and know something ‘special’ and if you don’t accept it or understand it and obey us, ‘Get out’?”
It is best then to turn to Yeshua Mashiach, the Light of the World. He always says:
COME!
John 6: 37 Everyone the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will certainly not turn away.
He will certainly not turn you away even if all these big shots do that to you! He is infinitely patient and kind to sinners struggling to overcome the world, flesh and Satan. Do not be afraid of those who threaten you and ask you to ‘Get out’ of the church or want you to conform to their half-baked, ideas about an unloving Yeshua. The Mashiach always has time and help for you. He is not a hard taskmaster!
COME!
KEEP COMING!
KEEP DRINKING!
Revelation 22:16 “I, Yeshua, have sent my angel to give you this testimony for the Messianic communities. I am the Root and Offspring of David, the bright Morning Star. 17 The Spirit and the Bride say, ‘Come!’ Let anyone who hears say, ‘Come!’ And let anyone who is thirsty come — let anyone who wishes, take the water of life free of charge.”
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom! Amein.

 

MEDITATION XX1

6.4.2014

ESCAPING THE SPIRIT OF ERROR!
This conundrum about the peccability-impeccability of Yeshua Mashiach (what theologians term Christology) can be bypassed or escaped through coming to a spiritual understanding of the Scapegoat(s) and the Paschal Lamb if one listens carefully to the Ruach HaKodesh.
Once you understand who the Scapegoat (s) and Paschal Lamb is, you will realise that those who teach that Yeshua Mashiach came in a fallen human nature which was sinful, and that He was schizoid and schizophrenic in His being (as opposed to being integrated with and integral to the Trinity) as the higher and lower natures inside Him battled it out daily, are plain ignorant, confused and, at worst, in deliberate error.
Confusion is not from G-d. To believe that Yeshua came in a fallen nature, like Adam after the Fall, is to have received that ancient spirit of Hinduism or some other Eastern mystical spirit that works to convince humans that human beings with fallen nature (dualists, trapped in maya, or ignorance) can become G-d.
The practitioners of this doctrine, even if they veil their teaching as ‘christian’ are no different from Hindu Yogis and other such spiritual seekers who are trying to get rid of/crucify/mortify/kill/make dead their ‘flesh’ or ‘sinful human nature’ to become G-d.
Those who opened the spirit-doors for these ‘strange’ spirits to possess the simple and genuine disciples or followers of Yeshua Mashiach include a Doctor of the Early Church like Gregory of Nazianzus (c .329-389), theologians like Karl Barth (1886-1968) and T.F. Torrance (1913-2007), preachers like Edward Irving (1792-1834) and the Irvingites, other cult creators like Dr John Thomas (1805–1871) of the Christadelphians and Johan O Smith (1871-1943) founder of the Norway-based Smith’s Friends cult (1871-1943) along with his sidekicks Sigurd Bratlie, Elias Aslaksen and Aksel Smith (all dead now).
G-d is good! For those who remain confused over the nature of Yeshua Mashiach, it’s easy to come to clarity.
John 8: 23 And Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach was saying to them, You are from mattah (below); Ani Hu from ma’lah (above). You are of the Olam Hazeh; I am not of the Olam Hazeh. 24 I said, therefore, to you that you will go to your mavet in your averos (sins), for if you do not have emunah (faith) that Ani Hu [YESHAYAH 41:4; SHEMOT 3:14-16], you will die in your chatta’im.
John 14: 26 But the Melitz Yosher (Praklit, Advocate, Counselor, Helper in Court), the Ruach Hakodesh which HaAv will send b’Shem of me, He will teach you all things and will remind you of all things which I told you. 27 Shalom Hashem I leave with you, my Shalom I give to you, [BAMIDBAR 6:26; TEHILLIM 85:8; MALACHI 2:6] not as the Olam Hazeh gives, I give to you; let not your levavot be troubled [14:1], nor let them be ones of morech lev (cowardliness, Rv 21:8). [CHAGGAI 2:9 TARGUM HASHIVIM]
May you be free! May you be kept from the spirit of error. May you remain close to the heart of Yeshua Mashiach!
Shalom! Amein.

http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/2012/12/19/you-asked-did-jesus-assume-a-fallen-human-nature/

 

MEDITATION XXII

6.4.2014

THE GOOD SHEPHERD

It’s quite simple.

34 The word of Adonai came to me: 2 “Human being, prophesy against the shepherds of Isra’el. Prophesy! Tell them, the shepherds, that Adonai Elohim says this: ‘Woe to the shepherds of Isra’el who feed themselves! Shouldn’t the shepherds feed the sheep? 3 You eat the choice meat, you clothe yourselves with the wool, and you slaughter the best of the herd; but you don’t feed the sheep! 4 You don’t strengthen the weak, heal the sick, bandage the broken, bring back the outcasts or seek the lost; on the contrary, you tyrannize them with crushing force. 5 So they were scattered, without a shepherd, and became food for every wild animal — they were scattered. 6 My sheep wandered around aimlessly on every mountain and hill; yes, my sheep were scattered all over the land, with no one to search for them or look after them.

7 “‘Therefore, shepherds, hear the word of Adonai: 8 “As I live,” Adonai Elohim swears, “because my sheep have become prey, my sheep have become food for every wild animal, since there was no shepherd, since my shepherds didn’t look for my sheep, and instead my shepherds fed themselves but not my sheep,” 9 therefore, shepherds, hear the word of Adonai! 10 Adonai Elohim says, “I am against the shepherds. I demand that they hand my sheep back to me. I will not allow them to feed the sheep, and they won’t feed themselves either. I will rescue my sheep from their mouths; they will be food for them no longer.”

11 “‘For here is what Adonai Elohim says: “I am taking over! I will search for my sheep and look after them, myself. 12 Just as a shepherd looks after his flock when he finds himself among his scattered sheep, so I will look after my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places where they were scattered when it was cloudy and dark. 13 I will bring them back from those peoples, gather them from those countries and return them to their own land. Then I will let them feed on the mountains of Isra’el, by the streams and in all the livable places of the land. 14 I will have them feed in good pastures; their grazing ground will be on the high mountains of Isra’el. They will rest in good grazing grounds and feed in rich pastures on Isra’el’s mountains. 15 Yes, I will pasture my sheep; and I will let them rest” says Adonai Elohim. 16 “I will seek the lost, bring back the outcasts, bandage the broken, and strengthen the sick. But the fat and the strong I will destroy — I will feed them with judgment.” 17 “‘As for you, my flock,’ Adonai Elohim says this: ‘I will judge between sheep and other sheep, between rams and billy-goats. 18 Wasn’t it enough for you to feed on the best pasture and drink from the clearest water? Did you have to trample the rest of the pasture and foul the remaining water with your feet? 19 So now my sheep eat what you have trampled with your feet and drink water fouled by your feet.’

20 Therefore here is what Adonai Elohim says to them: ‘I will judge between the fat sheep and the thin sheep. 21 Because you push them with your flanks and shoulders and butt all the weak ones with your horns, till you scatter them in every direction; 22 therefore I will save my flock; they will no longer be prey; and I will judge between sheep and other sheep. 23 “‘I will raise up one shepherd to be in charge of them, and he will let them feed — my servant David. He will pasture them and be their shepherd. 24 I, Adonai, will be their God; and my servant David will be prince among them. I, Adonai, have spoken.

John 10: 11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 14 I am the good shepherd; I know my own, and my own know me — 15 just as the Father knows me, and I know the Father — and I lay down my life on behalf of the sheep. 16 Also I have other sheep which are not from this pen; I need to bring them, and they will hear my voice; and there will be one flock, one shepherd.

STAY CLOSE TO THE GOOD SHEPHERD. Take the human ones with a pinch of salt.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.

Shalom. Amein.

 

MEDITATION XXIII

6.4.2014

TREASURES OF OLD ARE AS NEW

Whenever I am sick of the rabid pastors and preachers of New Age churches, usually aping a certain type of American church and scrounging money from them too, apart from spouting doctrines of holiness via hatred for people they consider unholy, I return to the Malankara Syrian Marthoma Church – in Bangalore, to the Marthoma East Church. Here one does not have to focus on weird pastors and preachers, their petty, bigoted doctrines and performing-monkey style of harassing people to make them feel guilty or to win converts to their particular little sect.
The Orthodox Liturgy is the masterpiece and bypasses all such humans and the pitiful antics of preachers who seek to impress and draw people to themselves and their pet theories. The Liturgy is a ‘way’ that is paved with the Word of G-d and four readings from Scripture that lead the sensitive soul from penitence to repentance over both sins of commission and omission into the presence of a munificent G-d who makes Himself known to the hungry soul in the Holy Qurbana (the Eucharist or Holy Communion), and one returns with the peace that passes all understanding.
There is no one to look down upon, only the crying need to be wary of the leaven of the Pharisees, and to watch and pray and practice the presence of G-d during the week to return yet again, rejoicing, into the munificent G-d’s presence. The Holy Qurbana ensures that, unless you are looking for emotional or rock n roll driven highs. Old is gold, the New Age churches (and I’ve been to too many of them) are pale imitations of the wisdom of the Ancient of Days.

If you have been cheated, beaten, robbed, hammered into submission, exploited financially and finally discarded by New Age church practitioners (you will know them by their hatred of the mainstream churches)or those who preach and practice separation and division, even cults that preach that all churches other than their own are ‘harlot’, there is simplicity in Christ and genuine hope for you. Come to the Liturgy, walk this ‘way’ and you will come into glorious holy communion with Yeshua Mashiach, the Father and the Ruach Hakodesh.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.

Shalom. Amein.

MEDITATION XXIV

9.4.2014

MEET THE AUTHOR , NOT THE BOOK!

Imagine a book. No one knows exactly who wrote it when and where and how (of course, there are some manuscripts and stuff that archaeologists and other experts sift through to anchor their ‘faith’ in the Book). And its author(s) and readers imagine they know why it was written.
The objective was to make it the ONE BOOK TO RULE THEM ALL. What better way to do that but to claim that the Author was G-d and to connect it to a ‘chosen’ People? The People of the Book. G-dBook and its People. The Author and His Readers. The Lawgiver and His obedient (or disobedient) ones.
The Book incarnates itself, inscribed in the bodies and minds of a people as a series of laws and a maze of spiritual puzzles, snaking its way through interpretations and dividing itself as a mainstream and streams of sects and cults it is venerated by and set up above the people, meant to be studied ad infinitum because by means of a sleight of hand, or rather, word, its author(s) managed to convince a particular type of reader(s) that the Universe and its Maker IS the Book.
Such readers are duty-bound to defend the Book as G-d. Any questioning the Book, its origins, its authors and certain ensuing interpretations are seen as a direct attack on G-d. The penalty for such truancy, of course, could be anything from mere criticism to condemnation to excommunication and ostracism to death, depending on the times one lives in.
The Book had been around for quite a long time and deified and worshipped as G-d and had been well used to bat people on the head with to make them fall in line with G-d’s so-called intentions and ways.
Once upon a time, G-d decided to play a ‘trick’ on the Book Worshippers. They had kept claiming that He was the Word whereby matter, space, time and living souls had been brought into being. This Word, they had managed, somehow, to confine in the pages of their Book. The Genie in the Box. The Djinn in the Lamp. G-d had thus been forced to ‘live’ inside the grooves of copper plates, the inscriptions on papyrus or the black text bound in leather a long whiles. Now, it was time to break out of the shackles of the script, he thought, and script something original and new.
And how?
John 1: 14 The Word became a human being and lived with us, and we saw his Sh’khinah, the Sh’khinah of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth.
Hebrews 1: 2 But now, in the acharit-hayamim, he has spoken to us through his Son, to whom he has given ownership of everything and through whom he created the universe. 3 This Son is the radiance of the Sh’khinah, the very expression of God’s essence, upholding all that exists by his powerful word; and after he had, through himself, made purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of HaG’dulah BaM’romim.
And Yeshua Mashiach told the Book People something that made them angry!
John 5: 39 You keep examining the Tanakh because you think that in it you have eternal life. Those very Scriptures bear witness to me, 40 but you won’t come to me in order to have life!
He said worse things:
John 8: 52 The Judeans said to him, “Now we know for sure that you have a demon! Avraham died, and so did the prophets; yet you say, ‘Whoever obeys my teaching will never taste death.’ 58 Yeshua said to them, “Yes, indeed! Before Avraham came into being, I AM!” 59 At this, they picked up stones to throw at him; but Yeshua was hidden and left the Temple grounds.
Yeshua Mashiach claimed something else too about Himself:
John 2: 18 So the Judeans confronted him by asking him, “What miraculous sign can you show us to prove you have the right to do all this?” 19 Yeshua answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up again.”
And He made a promise:
John 14: 25 “I have told you these things while I am still with you. 26 But the Counselor, the Ruach HaKodesh, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything; that is, he will remind you of everything I have said to you.
The Book-People had no clue as to the Incarnation. They had never expected the Author trapped inside the Book to break free of the shackles of the Book of the Law and its interpretations and take on flesh and blood and stand amongst them. So they threw the Book at Him and crucified Him.
1 Corinthians 2: 8 Not one of this world’s leaders has understood it; because if they had, they would not have executed the Lord from whom this glory flows.
Thus, when the Word-made-Flesh departed this world so that He could send us the Ruach HaKodesh, those who had encountered Him returned to pen and book. In the beginning, the purpose of writing was clear.
John 20: 31 But these which have been recorded are here so that you may trust that Yeshua is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by this trust you may have life because of who he is.
Over time, things returned to how they were before the Word became flesh. Some people sat down and managed to imprison the Djinn back in the Lamp, the Genie back in the Box. They called it the Canon. They locked away Yeshua Mashiach in a second part of the Book and gave it a title called THE NEW TESTAMENT. They turned the Living God, the Mashiach, the Risen One, into a written text and a set of laws. The Book became another written script to be thrown at those who would not worship it but who preferred to ‘have life because of who he is’.
1 Corinthians 3: 6 He has even made us competent to be workers serving a New Covenant, the essence of which is not a written text but the Spirit. For the written text brings death, but the Spirit gives life.

John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!”

The rivers flow from Yeshua Machiach, the Scriptures are only the pointer, a signpost, the shadow, a memory, a witness, a testimony – they are not the rivers! They are representations, images of the Source, the rivers and the possiblities in the rivers. The rivers are Him!
John 5: 39 You keep examining the Tanakh because you think that in it you have eternal life. Those very Scriptures bear witness to me, 40 but you won’t come to me in order to have life!
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.

Shalom! Amein.

 

MEDITATION XXV

9.4.2014

 

MISSING THE LOVER FOR HIS LETTERS

 

People are silly, even stupid. They exchange the Living Adonai Yeshua Mashiach for a black leather bound book! They exchange the Living Word of G-d, a Person, for a written text! It’s like making love to your lover’s letters instead of being in bed with her!

Song of Solomon 1; 15 Look at you, my love! How beautiful you are! Your eyes are doves!

Song of Solomon 3: Night after night on my bed I looked for the man I love. I looked for him, but I didn’t find him.2 “I will get up now and roam the city,through the streets and the open places, I will look for the man I love.” I looked for him, but I didn’t find him. 3 The guards roaming the city found me. “Have you seen the man I love?” 4 Scarcely had I left them,when I found the man I love. I took hold of him and would not let him go …

Can you escape the virtual reality of the Book and come to the reality of the Lover? The virtual reality is the pitiable condition of all who worship sacred books and use them as books of law to be obeyed instead of knowing them as tasty morsels of what awaits the Bride when she meets the Bridegroom! Bibliolatry versus knowing the Person of Adonai Yeshua!

 

John 5: 39 You keep examining the Tanakh because you think that in it you have eternal life. Those very Scriptures bear witness to me, 40 but you won’t come to me in order to have life!

Song of Solomon 2: 16 My darling is mine, and I am his, as he pastures his flock among the lilies.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.

Shalom. Amein.

 

APRIL 10

The gravest threat to secularism comes from the religious fanatics to whom secularism guarantees the freedom to preach and propagate their belief-systems, all of which are focused on the overthrow of secular principles and values and seek to usher in the ‘kingdom of (whichever idol) G-d’ and to supercede secularism with theocracy. Therefore, the original meaning of the ‘secular’ must be retained: denoting attitudes, activities, or other things that have no religious or spiritual basis. And the false definition of ‘secular’ as ‘showing equal respect to all religions or belief systems’ must be demolished if the ‘secular’ world is to be protected from the antediluvian purveyors of theocracy.

 

MEDITATION  XXVI

10.4.2014

ENTER THE RIVER, GO WITH THE F-L-O-W

Life in the Ruach Ha-Kodesh is pictured as flowing water, rivers or living streams. And the flow is never overwhelming, at least to one who steps into this Life.
John 1: 4 In him was life, and the life was the light of mankind.

John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!”

Revelation 22: 22 Next the angel showed me the river of the water of life, sparkling like crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. 2 Between the main street and the river was the Tree of Life producing twelve kinds of fruit, a different kind every month; and the leaves of the tree were for healing the nations — 3 no longer will there be any curses.
Whoever has this Life imparted by and of the Ruach Ha-Kodesh is in no haste. They are not tossed about by their emotions or ‘holy’ desires. They are not preachers or teachers who need to point fingers at sinners and shout out their pet doctrines and dogmas either from the pulpit or in the streets.
The ones who have this Life, F-L-0-W!
Isaiah 42: 42 “Here is my servant, whom I support, my chosen one, in whom I take pleasure. I have put my Spirit on him; he will bring justice to the Goyim. 2 He will not cry or shout; no one will hear his voice in the streets. 3 He will not snap off a broken reed or snuff out a smoldering wick.
Have you watched the preachers who are putting on their pet performances? Leaping about, gesturing, roaring and raving and ranting? Demanding and forcing people to pay their tithes, dance and sing, holding out veiled and not so veiled threats, painting a picture of a G-d of exactitude, vengeance and hatred, exalting themselves as exorcists, and so on and so forth.
One must be patient with all this and be at rest even when one is confronted by the flood of muddied waters, rushing and clamoring, keen to sweep people off their feet and to drown them; the effect is emotional, disturbing and dominating.
But the River of Life, the flow of the Ruach Ha-Kodesh is different.
Isaiah 30: 15 For this is what Adonai Elohim, the Holy One of Isra’el, says: “Returning and resting is what will save you; calmness and confidence will make you strong — but you want none of this!”
Matthew 11: 28 “Come to me, all of you who are struggling and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
Psalm 23: 1 Adonai is my shepherd; I lack nothing. 2 He has me lie down in grassy pastures, he leads me by quiet water, 3 he restores my inner person.
The river of Life, the Living Waters, the river of the water of life, sparkling like crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb, the quiet water, all gentle.
Matthew 8: 23 He boarded the boat, and his talmidim followed. 24 Then, without warning, a furious storm arose on the lake, so that waves were sweeping over the boat. But Yeshua was sleeping. 25 So they came and roused him, saying, “Sir! Help! We’re about to die!” 26 He said to them, “Why are you afraid? So little trust you have!” Then he got up and rebuked the winds and the waves, and there was a dead calm.
John 3: 7 Stop being amazed at my telling you that you must be born again from above! 8 The wind blows where it wants to, and you hear its sound, but you don’t know where it comes from or where it’s going. That’s how it is with everyone who has been born from the Spirit.”
They are flowing with the river of the water of Life that sparkles like crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. Hush! If you are irritated, be still! Shalom!
Ezekiel 47: 47 Then he brought me back to the entrance of the house, and I saw water flowing eastward from under the threshold of the house, for the house faced east. The water flowed down from under the right side of the house, south of the altar. 2 Next he led me out through the north gate and took me around outside to the outer gate, by way of the east gate, where I saw water trickling from the south side. 3 With a line in his hand the man went out toward the east and measured a thousand cubits [one-third of a mile] and had me wade across the stream; the water came up to my ankles. 4 He measured another thousand and had me wade through the water, which reached my knees. He measured another thousand and had me wade through water up to my waist. 5 Finally he measured a thousand, and it was a river I couldn’t cross on foot, because the water was so deep one would have to swim across; it was a river that could not be waded through. 6 He asked me, “Human being, have you seen this?” Then, guiding me, he got me back to the riverbank. 7 After being returned, I saw on the bank of the river a great number of trees on the one side and on the other. 8 He said to me, “This water flows toward the eastern region and continues down to the ‘Aravah. When it enters the sea, the sea of stagnant water, [the Dead Sea,] its water will become fresh. 9 When this happens, swarms of all kinds of living creatures will be able to live in it wherever the streams flow; so that there will be a vast number of fish; for this water is flowing there, so that, wherever the river goes, everything will be restored and able to live.
This is how life in the Ruach Ha-Kodesh is, this is how one enters the F-L-O-W. This is how one is immersed, baptised in the F-L-O-W.
Isaiah 28: 16 therefore here is what Adonai Elohim says: “Look, I am laying in Tziyon a tested stone, a costly cornerstone, a firm foundation-stone; he who trusts will not rush here and there.
Do not be deceived by ‘holy’ activity, by ‘holy’ performances, by the ‘holy’ sheen. All that rushing here and there, all the play-acting.
Instead, come to the river of the water of life. Flow into it, flow with it.
Psalm 46: 5 (4) There is a river whose streams gladden the city of G-d, the holy habitation of ‘Elyon.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom. Amein.

 

 

MEDITATION XXVII

12.4.2014

YOUR GLOOM CAN BECOME LIKE NOON

Lent. Indeed, Yeshua Mashiach went fasting in the desert for 40 days and 40 nights. And then when He returned from the wilderness, the fast He undertook for the rest of His ministry is written about in Isaiah 58.
John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God. 14 The Word became a human being and lived with us, and we saw his Sh’khinah, the Sh’khinah of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth. 15 Yochanan witnessed concerning him when he cried out, “This is the man I was talking about when I said, ‘The one coming after me has come to rank ahead of me, because he existed before me.’” 16 We have all received from his fullness, yes, grace upon grace. 17 For the Torah was given through Moshe; grace and truth came through Yeshua the Messiah. 18 No one has ever seen God; but the only and unique Son, who is identical with God and is at the Father’s side — he has made him known.
Does your pastor force fasts upon you? Has fasting become the Law in your church? Are you fasting to become an exorcist? Or, are you punishing yourself for your many sins of omission and commission by fasting? Are you trying to show your piety to people in the church by saying “See, I am fasting, how holy I am!”? Yes, what is the intention behind your fast?
Isaiah 58: 3 ‘Why should we fast, if you don’t see? Why mortify ourselves, if you don’t notice?’ “Here is my (G-d’s) answer: when you fast, you go about doing whatever you like, while keeping your laborers hard at work. 4 Your fasts lead to quarreling and fighting, to lashing out with violent blows. On a day like today, fasting like yours will not make your voice heard on high. 5 “Is this the sort of fast I want, a day when a person mortifies himself? Is the object to hang your head like a reed and spread sackcloth and ashes under yourself? Is this what you call a fast, a day that pleases Adonai?
6 “Here is the sort of fast I want — releasing those unjustly bound, untying the thongs of the yoke, letting the oppressed go free, breaking every yoke, 7 sharing your food with the hungry, taking the homeless poor into your house, clothing the naked when you see them, fulfilling your duty to your kinsmen!” 8 Then your light will burst forth like the morning, your new skin will quickly grow over your wound; your righteousness will precede you, and Adonai’s glory will follow you. 9 Then you will call, and Adonai will answer; you will cry, and he will say, “Here I am.” If you will remove the yoke from among you, stop false accusation and slander, 10 generously offer food to the hungry and meet the needs of the person in trouble; then your light will rise in the darkness, and your gloom become like noon. 11 Adonai will always guide you; HE WILL SATISFY YOUR NEEDS IN THE DESERT, he will renew the strength in your limbs; so that you will be like a watered garden, like a spring whose water never fails. 12 You will rebuild the ancient ruins, raise foundations from ages past, and be called “Repairer of broken walls, Restorer of streets to live in.”
Because Yeshua had set his heart upon fulfilling this kind of fast, the Father satisfied all his needs during those 40 days in the desert and also, later, as He walked among those with no faith and little faith, people oppressed and damaged and lost.
John 3: 31 “He who comes from above is above all. He who is from the earth is from the earth and talks from an earthly point of view; he who comes from heaven is above all. 32 He testifies about what he has actually seen and heard, yet no one accepts what he says! 33 Whoever does accept what he says puts his seal on the fact that G-d is true, 34 because the one whom G-d sent speaks G-d’s words. For G-d does not give him the Spirit in limited degree — 35 the Father loves the Son and has put everything in his hands. 36 Whoever trusts in the Son has eternal life.
FOR G-D DOES NOT GIVE HIM THE SPIRIT IN LIMITED DEGREE.
Luke 4: 14 Yeshua returned to the Galil in the power of the Spirit. 16 Now when he went to Natzeret, where he had been brought up, on Shabbat he went to the synagogue as usual. He stood up to read, 17 and he was given the scroll of the prophet Yesha‘yahu. Unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written,
18 “The Spirit of Adonai is upon me; therefore he has anointed me to announce Good News to the poor; he has sent me to proclaim freedom for the imprisoned and renewed sight for the blind, to release those who have been crushed, 19 to proclaim a year of the favor of Adonai.” 20 After closing the scroll and returning it to the shammash, he sat down; and the eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 He started to speak to them: “Today, as you heard it read, this passage of the Tanakh was fulfilled!”
Yes, IT IS DONE! Now, you can be filled with the Ruach Ha-Kodesh. In a moment. In the twinkling of an eye. There is no need for any human mediator other than Yeshua Mashiach. Trust Him.

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.

Shalom! Amein!

 

 

MEDITATION XXVIII

13.4.2014

THIS IS MY BELOVED SON, WHOM I HAVE CHOSEN, LISTEN TO HIM!

Palm Sunday. The crowds sang Hosanna to Yeshua Mashiach in their momentary joy and realisation that He was indeed the Son of David, King of the Jews. A week later, some of them would be wondering why the King had to suffer humiliation and die a criminal’s death. Others might have reversed their views about Him and joined the crowds of priests and Pharisees crying out for Him to be crucified. Many of them might have turned atheist and despondent.
Luke 24: 21 And we had hoped that he would be the one to liberate Isra’el!
And the hope of those two despondent disciples on the road to Emmaus was not belied. They were liberated in two ways:
Luke 24: 27 Then, starting with Moshe and all the prophets, he explained to them the things that can be found throughout the Tanakh concerning himself. 30 As he was reclining with them at the table, he took the matzah, made the b’rakhah, broke it and handed it to them. 31 Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. But he became invisible to them. 32 They said to each other, “Didn’t our hearts burn inside us as he spoke to us on the road, opening up the Tanakh to us?”
And there was more to the Liberation!
Mark 11: 11 Yeshua entered Yerushalayim, went into the Temple courts and took a good look at everything. 12 The next day, as they came back from Beit-Anyah, he felt hungry. 13 Spotting in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to see if he could find anything on it. When he came up to it, he found nothing but leaves; for it wasn’t fig season. 14 He said to it, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again!” And his talmidim heard what he said.
That Fig Tree was the Law of Moses. “For the Law came by Moshe.” The Fig Tree was the Israel that by means of the Law forged and propagated enmity towards other human beings, towards the Goyim even while it did not fulfil the just requirements of the Law. Jesus caused it to wither away, even before the time it ought to have brought forth fruit. Because its fruit would have meant death to every one who transgressed the Law of Moses.
Yeshua short-circuited the Law that inevitably leads to condemnation, judgement and execution of all sinners. The withered Fig Tree is the sign of liberation for His talmidim from the Temple courts, the priests, teachers and doctors of the Law, the Pharisees , the Temple hierarchies. It was replaced by the Tree of Life, Yeshua Mashiach, full of grace and truth. This Tree of Life had appeared in the barren desert land of Israel groaning under the oppression of Moses’ Law given at Sinai.
Isaiah 53: 1 Who believes our report? To whom is the arm of Adonai revealed? 2 For before him he grew up like a young plant, like a root out of dry ground.
Here was liberation from the Fig Tree of Israel with its exclusivist ideology that Jews and Gentiles were separate and that the Goyim were scum! That Fig Tree has withered away! Believe it!
Ephesians 2: 13 But now, you who were once far off have been brought near through the shedding of the Messiah’s blood. 14 For he himself is our shalom — he has made us both one and has broken down the m’chitzah which divided us 15 by destroying in his own body the enmity occasioned by the Torah, with its commands set forth in the form of ordinances. He did this in order to create in union with himself from the two groups a single new humanity and thus make shalom, 16 and in order to reconcile to God both in a single body by being executed on a stake as a criminal and thus in himself killing that enmity. 17 Also, when he came, he announced as Good News shalom to you far off and shalom to those nearby, 18 news that through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father.
The Fig Tree of a ‘superior’ Israel forged into being by means of the enmity occasioned (or inscribed in people’s minds) by the Torah, dividing human beings into sects, denominations, religions, castes, creeds, ideologies, gender, slave and free, into ‘elect’ and ‘damned’, priest and prophet and lay – that enmity is finished with – destroyed inside the Body of Christ, crucified for ever!
That Fig Tree has withered away, do you see? And have you then beheld the Tree of Life?
Yet, the ‘followers’ of Christ have replanted that accursed Fig Tree. They say they are the ‘elect’ and others are ‘Goyim’ (heathen, infidel, pagan). Once again, that Fig Tree that can never yield fruit seeks to bloom with its branches – sects and denominations. It seeks to propagate the condemnation of the human beings for whom Yeshua died! Once again, the hierarchies are set up – priests and lay people, pastors and prophets and authorities and laws and works, persecution and condemnation of those who disagree with doctrine and dogma and seek Life instead!
Well did the poet William Blake wonder of such:
Mutual Forgiveness of each vice,
Such are the Gates of Paradise,
Against the Accuser’s chief desire,
Who walk’d among the stones of fire.
And the dead corpse, from Sinai’s heat,
Buried beneath His Mercy-seat.
O Christians! Christians! tell me why
You rear it on your altars high?
But those who have been liberated are outside this vicious cycle. They have escaped the Wheel of Karma. They are those who have been grafted from that withered Fig Tree and the wild Olive Tree – the old trees of slavery to the Law and to sin – into the New Vine.
Romans 11: 24 For if you [Goyim] were cut off from the wild olive tree and grafted unnaturally into the cultivated olive tree, how much more shall those who belong to it naturally be grafted into their own olive tree. 25 For I do not want you to be unaware, Achim b’Moshiach, of this raz (mystery), lest you be wise in your own estimation, that a hardening in part has come over Yisroel, until the full number of the Goyim has come in; 26 And so Klal Yisroel shall be delivered, as it is written: “Out of Tziyon shall come the Go’el (Deliverer, Redeemer); He will turn away, remove peysha from Ya’akov (Jacob), 27 “And this will be My Berit (covenant) with them, when I take away their sins” YESHAYAH 59:20-21; 27:9.
So then, what shall we hear on Palm Sunday? Whose voice shall we listen to? The voice of the Old Jews (the withered Fig Tree) or the voice of the New Jews (legalistic Christians)?
Neither.
Luke 24: 21 And we had hoped that he would be the one to liberate Isra’el!
And He has come! Hosanna in the Highest! The Liberator has come and we know Him as Yeshua Mashiach. He takes Jews and Gentiles out of their old desert ground and grafts them into Himself, the Tree of Life, the New Vine. Behold! New Creation! Hallelujah!
Mattityahu 3: 17 And, hinei, a bat kol (a voice from heaven) came out of Shomayim, saying, ZEH BNI AHUVI ASHER BO CHAFATZTI (This is my Son, the beloved, with whom I am well pleased).
And yet again:
Lukas 9: 34 an anan (cloud) came and was overshadowing them, and while they entered into the anan they were afraid. 35 And a bat kol came from the anan (cloud), saying ZEH BENI BECHIRI, ELAV TISHMAUN (This is my Son the Chosen One, listen to him. [YESHAYAH 42:1; TEHILLIM 2:7] 36 When the bat kol became silent, Rebbe Melech HaMoshiach was found alone. And they were silent, and reported to no one in those yamim anything of what they had seen.
And yet again:
Yochanan 2: 5 The Em of Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach says to the mesharetim, Asher yomar lakhem ta’asu (Do whatever he tells you). [BERESHIS 41:55]
Be liberated today.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom. Amein.

 

MEDITATION XXIX

14.4.2014

FLEE THE GOSPEL OF GREENBACKS

Mark 11: 11 Yeshua entered Yerushalayim, went into the Temple courts and took a good look at everything…
Weird Scenes in the Goldmine! That was the title of an old Doors album I used to listen to. And, indeed, that is what these denominations and sects and cults have become – goldmines. The goldmines are controlled and run by parasitic leech-pastors and their accomplices who are building their own egotistic kingdoms on earth. They are good slave-masters too, seducing the ‘faithful’ with promises of gold if they parted with their gold. “Give money to us wonderful pastors and G-d will give you hundredfold,” they cry out, sounding as pious as wolves!
I was just remembering some of the weird scenes I’ve come upon having taken a good look at everything in these ‘temples’ where the the pastor-preacher-prophets set themselves up as final “authority” to whom all the sheep must ‘submit’ and be shorn in turn for their special sheepskins (greenbacks).
For instance, there’s this one guy who yells and screams at his ‘disciples’ to ‘lay your wallets on the altar’. Whose altar? His pulpit, of course. The silly sheep, of course, imagine that they are placing their wallets on an imaginary altar in heaven and the pastor-preacher goes laughing all the way to his earthly home, his wallet stuffed with the content of their wallets, and feeds his belly at the finest restaurants and other choicest delights.
There’s this other guy who also yells and screams about how if you do not give your tithes to HIS church (if you unfortunately go there), you are dishonoring G-d. Well, seeing as these pastors are usually unable to find a job in the world and earn an honest living, one cannot blame them for resorting to this ‘tithe-business’ in the ‘temple’. You are not allowed, supposedly, to put the ‘tithes’ into some needy person’s pocket whom you might see on the roadside or someone who is in trouble. It has to go into this pastor’s wallet or the church committee’s wallet, you see!!
Then there are the mega-projects, the visionary projects meant to turn every nation (especially demon-controlled India) into a Christian nation! But what that means is to bring the money in so that the pastor and his wife and kids can be set up with millions for life because they own the trust, the properties, the gold and the silver which, of course, was G-d’s reward to them for their faithfulness to the principle of shearing the sheep!
Mark 11: 15 On reaching Yerushalayim, he entered the Temple courts and began driving out those who were carrying on business there, both the merchants and their customers. He also knocked over the desks of the money-changers, upset the benches of the pigeon-dealers, 16 and refused to let anyone carry merchandise through the Temple courts. 17 Then, as he taught them, he said, “Isn’t it written in the Tanakh, My house will be called a house of prayer for all the Goyim. But you have made it into a den of robbers!”
The mega-project of the Jewish Second Temple with coins embedded between the gigantic stones, came to a perfect end when it was razed to the ground. Likewise, beware of those who use the call to prayer to expand their ‘influence’ and generate wealth for their ministries and earthly kingdom!
Mathew 24: 24 As Yeshua left the Temple and was going away, his talmidim came and called his attention to its buildings. 2 But he answered them, “You see all these? Yes! I tell you, they will be totally destroyed — not a single stone will be left standing!”
There’s this other place I went to where all the sheep were led one evening by a ‘prophet’ with visions to spread out across the four walls and push at them while making prayers to G-d to increase their ‘church’ from 400 people to 20,000 people. Oh G-d, we want a mega-church with mega-influence and mega-revenue, went up the cry!
Or think of this other performer-pastor in designer clothes and Yankee accent who keeps praying and ‘declaring’: “G-d, lead me to the top businessmen in this City, they have fatter wallets in their pockets than the stupid sheep I have now. Help me meet the CEOs of the Silicon Valley companies, help my hands dip into their profits so that me and my family can become famous and be jet-setting super- duper pastor stars on earth!” The point, of course, is that it is not the G-d of Israel who listens to such prayers and answers them, but the great god Mammon!
The other trick is, like those in a cult I used to know, to ‘believe’ that all the riches of the Gentiles, the unbelievers, the pagans, the scum of the earth, belong to the ‘believers’ and so every enterprise that is set up by the ‘church’ is meant to siphon off the money of the ‘unbelievers’ into the coffers of the ‘saints’. This is a business strategy of which, in their view, Yeshua Mashiach is the CEO, and a ruthless CEO at that, as demonstrated by the actions of his ‘disciples’ who have amassed millions worth of real estate and other corporate assets all tightly sewn into a family network that is fed by the money of simpleton ‘believers’.
Mark 11: 11 Yeshua entered Yerushalayim, went into the Temple courts and took a good look at everything…
He listens to all the talk in the ‘churches’, especially the New Age American-model ones, and observes the actions of those driven by love of money, yearning for riches and serving Mammon.
Matthew 19: 23 Then Yeshua said to his talmidim, “Yes. I tell you that it will be very hard for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. 24 Furthermore, I tell you that it is easier for a camel to pass through a needle’s eye than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.”
James 5: 15 Next, a word for the rich: weep and wail over the hardships coming upon you! 2 Your riches have rotted, and your clothes have become moth-eaten; 3 your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat up your flesh like fire! This is the acharit-hayamim, and you have been storing up wealth!  4Listen! The wages you have fraudulently withheld from the workers who mowed your fields are calling out against you, and the outcries of those who harvested have reached the ears of Adonai-Tzva’ot. 5 You have led a life of luxury and self-indulgence here on earth — in a time of slaughter, you have gone on eating to your heart’s content. 6 You have condemned, you have murdered the innocent; they have not withstood you.
The time is coming when the wailing will surely come to these wallet-driven ‘churches’ of Mammon, when the hardships come to them and destruction comes upon them. Jesus did not have money. Jesus carried no money. Jesus never asked people for money. He never hinted at His needs. Money that was given to Jesus and His disciples was held in a community purse and used to feed the poor. Or it was kept in the hands of someone like Judas!
These wallet-focused pastor-preacher-prophets and ‘churches’ are the New Jews. For the Jews in Jesus’ day believed that riches were a sign of God’s favour. Remember Shylock the Jew in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice! This was because the Law of Moses promised temporal blessings for obedience. Jesus’ parables and teachings were a shock to the Jews because they challenged the thinking that prosperity was a sign of acceptance and approval from God.
Acts 3: 5 The crippled man fixed his attention on them, expecting to receive something from them. 6 Kefa said, “I don’t have silver, and I don’t have gold, but what I do have I give to you: in the name of the Messiah, Yeshua of Natzeret, walk!”
Today’s pastor-preacher-prophets want to do miracles and healings, but like the shamans and witchdoctors they condemn, they also want to be paid for it! It’s best to flee from these ministers of Mammon and their ‘gospel of greenbacks’ the moment one gets a whiff of it from their persons or the institutions they manage and run.
1 Timothy 6: 10 For the love of money is a root of all the evils; because of this craving, some people have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves to the heart with many pains.
Are you seeking for something better than what these people are seeking after?
John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!”
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom. Amein.

 

MEDITATION XXX

15.4.2014

LEAVING BAVEL THE GREAT BEHIND!

The preoccupation of whole segments of ‘christianity’, especially the New Age sects and ‘churches’, with Yeshua Mashiach as some kind of ‘money-making machine’ for the ‘faithful’, is frightening.
For instance, I have come across ‘christian’ leaders and their crowds who are being taught that G-d’s will is that they become billionaires and millionaires. These people are praying that the Lord ‘raises up’ millionaires and billionaires who are adherents of this strange Evangelical, legalistic doctrine and flavour of religion.

Now, that is something! The argument is that the rich people of the ‘world’ do not know how to use money to ‘honour’ G-d but, and you better believe it, ‘christian’ millionaires and billionaires would know how to use money perfectly well!!!
Mark 11: 15 On reaching Yerushalayim, he entered the Temple courts and began driving ou t those who were carrying on business there, both the merchants and their customers. He also knocked over the desks of the money-changers, upset the benches of the pigeon-dealers, 16 and refused to let anyone carry merchandise through the Temple courts. 17 Then, as he taught them, he said, “Isn’t it written in the Tanakh, My house will be called a house of prayer for all the Goyim!”
The issue, according to these New Age pastor-preachers, is resolved if everyone prays to be a ‘christian’ businessman and succeeds in that venture. The trumpet call of the day is for ‘christian’ entrepreneurship which is believed to be ‘superior’ to the efforts of everyone else who makes money on this planet and plays with dough, as it were!
It’s interesting that soon after Yeshua Mashiach drove out all the money-changers, merchants, profiteers and other sundry money-making monsters out of the Temple, his disciples saw that the fig tree which He had cursed had withered away all the way to its roots!
Mark 11: 20 In the morning, as the talmidim passed by, they saw the fig tree withered all the way to its roots. 21 Kefa remembered and said to Yeshua, “Rabbi! Look! The fig tree that you cursed has dried up!”
Revelation 18: 1 After these things, I saw another angel coming down from heaven. He had great authority, the earth was lit up by his splendor. 2 He cried out in a strong voice, “She has fallen! She has fallen! Bavel the Great!” She has become a home for demons, a prison for every unclean spirit, a prison for every unclean, hated bird. 3 “For all the nations have drunk of the wine of God’s fury caused by her whoring — yes, the kings of the earth went whoring with her, and from her unrestrained love of luxury the world’s businessmen have grown rich.”
This desire to get rich!! What a powerful source it has! And what a consequence it has, in this world and, then, the next!
Luke 6: 24 “But woe to you who are rich, for you have already had all the comfort you will get!
James 5: 1 Next, a word for the rich: weep and wail over the hardships coming upon you! 2 Your riches have rotted, and your clothes have become moth-eaten; 3 your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat up your flesh like fire! This is the acharit-hayamim, and you have been storing up wealth!
Revelation 18: 11 The world’s businessmen weep and mourn over her, because no one is buying their merchandise any more — 12 stocks of gold and silver, gems and pearls, fine linen and purple, silk and scarlet, all rare woods, all ivory goods, all kinds of things made of scented wood, brass, iron and marble; 13 cinnamon, cardamom, incense, myrrh, frankincense, wine, oil, flour, grain, cattle, sheep, horses, chariots — and bodies — and people’s souls. 14 The fruits you lusted for with all your heart have gone! All the luxury and flashiness have been destroyed, never to return! 15 The sellers of these things, who got rich from her, will stand at a distance, for fear of her torment, weeping and mourning. 21 Then a mighty angel picked up a boulder the size of a great millstone, and hurled it into the sea, saying, “With violence like this will the great city Bavel be hurled down, never to be found again! 23 the light of a lamp will never again shine in you, the voice of bridegroom and bride will never again be heard in you. “For your businessmen were the most powerful on earth, all the nations were deceived by your magic spell.”
Revelation 13: 16 Also it forces everyone — great and small, rich and poor, free and slave — to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead 17 preventing anyone from buying or selling unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name.
What then shall we say?
Proverbs 15: 16 Better little with the fear of Adonai than great wealth coupled with worry. 17 Better a vegetable dinner with love than a stall-fattened ox with hate.
Money begets worry. The love of money is the root of all evil. Lent inscribes within me the understanding from above through the Ruach HaKodesh that it’s better to have a meal of herbs at the table of love with Yeshua Adonai than be offered all the kingdoms of the world and everything in them in a moment of time.

Luke 4: 5 The Adversary took him up, showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world, 6 and said to him, “I will give you all this power and glory. It has been handed over to me, and I can give it to whomever I choose. 7 So if you will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 Yeshua answered him, “The Tanakh says, ‘Worship Adonai your God and serve him only.”

Yes. Put this lust for money and being a ‘christian’ businessman serving Babylon the Great behind.
Genesis 22: 13 Avraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering in place of his son. 14 Avraham called the place Adonai Yir’eh [Adonai will see (to it), Adonai provides] — as it is said to this day, “On the mountain Adonai is seen.”

 

Adonai will see to it. Adonai provides. What does he provide which sets one free from this unholy love of money and desire to be a businessman who can get rich and become powerful? What can be better than that?

John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!” 39 (Now he said this about the Spirit, whom those who trusted in him were to receive.)

COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.

Shalom. Amein.

 

MEDITATION XXXI

16.4.2014

NO ONE CAN COME TO YESHUA UNLESS THE FATHER DRAWS HIM

Luke 7: 24b Yeshua began speaking to the crowds about Yochanan: “What did you go out into the desert to see? Reeds swaying in the breeze? 25 No? then what did you go out to see? Someone who was well dressed? But people who dress beautifully and live in luxury are found in kings’ palaces. 26 Nu, so what did you go out to see?
This is what the Ruach Ha-Kodesh kept asking during this season of Lent. He brings back the same question again and again to bring about clarity. When Yeshua Mashiach asked this question, there was a second implicit question linked to it.
Matthew 16: 13 When Yeshua came into the territory around Caesarea Philippi, he asked his talmidim, “Who are people saying the Son of Man is?” 15 “But you,” he said to them, “WHO DO YOU SAY I AM?” 16 Shim‘on Kefa answered, “You are the Mashiach, the Son of the living G-d.” 17 “Shim‘on Bar-Yochanan,” Yeshua said to him, “How blessed you are! For no human being revealed this to you, no, it was my Father in heaven. 18 I also tell you this: you are Kefa,” [which means ‘Rock,’] “and on this rock I will build my Community, and the gates of Sh’ol will not overcome it. 19 I will give you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven.
Having been under the ‘influence’ of a twisted spirit of error that proclaims Yeshua Mashiach as a ‘sinful’ descendant of Adam and its cult followers for almost two decades, I can testify that G-d has brought me to the place where I can say: “You are the Mashiach, the Son of the living G-d.” I have found Him in the desert of this world, amidst the sand dunes of the religions, amidst the ruins of the ‘christian’ religion and the confusion of the denominations, sects and cults.

Matthew 24: 23 “At that time, if someone says to you, ‘Look! Here’s the Messiah!’ or, ‘There he is!’ don’t believe him. 24 For there will appear false Messiahs and false prophets performing great miracles — amazing things! — so as to fool even the chosen, if possible. 25 There! I have told you in advance! 26 So if people say to you, ‘Listen! He’s out in the desert!’ don’t go; or, ‘Look! He’s hidden away in a secret room!’ don’t believe it.
One cannot know Yeshua Mashiach by looking for Him in the desert or in the wind or in palaces or in temples made with human hands or among those who memorise the written ‘word of G-d’ to practice legalism and sit in authority and judgement over others, or in the Bible colleges run by theologians as an ideological ‘business’. One can know and confess the Son of the Living G-d only if the Father in heaven reveals Him. Otherwise, one is stuck with the caricature of the Son of Man!
John 20: 10 So the talmidim returned home, 11 but Miryam stood outside crying. As she cried, she bent down, peered into the tomb, 12 and saw two angels in white sitting where the body of Yeshua had been, one at the head and one at the feet. 13 “Why are you crying?” they asked her. “They took my Lord,” she said to them, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” 14 As she said this, she turned around and saw Yeshua standing there, but she didn’t know it was he. 15 Yeshua said to her, “Lady, why are you crying? Whom are you looking for?” Thinking he was the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you’re the one who carried him away, just tell me where you put him; and I’ll go and get him myself.” 16 Yeshua said to her, “Miryam!” Turning, she cried out to him in Hebrew, “Rabbani!” (that is, “Teacher!”)
Matthew 23: 1 Then Yeshua addressed the crowds and his talmidim: 2 “The Torah-teachers and the P’rushim,” he said, “sit in the seat of Moshe. 3 So whatever they tell you, take care to do it. But don’t do what they do, because they talk but don’t act! 4 They tie heavy loads onto people’s shoulders but won’t lift a finger to help carry them. 5 Everything they do is done to be seen by others; for they make their t’fillin broad and their tzitziyot long, 6 they love the place of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, 7 and they love being greeted deferentially in the marketplaces and being called ‘Rabbi.’ 8 “But you are not to let yourselves be called ‘Rabbi’; because you have one Rabbi, and you are all each other’s brothers. 9 And do not call anyone on earth ‘Father.’ because you have one Father, and he is in heaven. 10 Nor are you to let yourselves be called ‘leaders,’ because you have one Leader, and he is the Messiah!
When the Father reveals the S-n of G-d, understanding dawns and liberty comes! The eyes and ears and heart and mind are opened.
Matthew 23: 13 “But woe to you hypocritical Torah-teachers and P’rushim! For you are shutting the Kingdom of Heaven in people’s faces, neither entering yourselves nor allowing those who wish to enter to do so. 15 “Woe to you hypocritical Torah-teachers and P’rushim! You go about over land and sea to make one proselyte; and when you succeed, you make him twice as fit for Gei-Hinnom as you are! 16 “Woe to you, you blind guides! You say, ‘If someone swears by the Temple, he is not bound by his oath; but if he swears by the gold in the Temple, he is bound.’ 23 “Woe to you hypocritical Torah-teachers and P’rushim! You pay your tithes of mint, dill and cumin; but you have neglected the weightier matters of the Torah — justice, mercy, trust. These are the things you should have attended to — without neglecting the others! 25 “Woe to you hypocritical Torah-teachers and P’rushim! You clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence. 26 Blind Parush! First clean the inside of the cup, so that the outside may be clean too. 27 “Woe to you hypocritical Torah-teachers and P’rushim! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look fine on the outside but inside are full of dead people’s bones and all kinds of rottenness. 28 Likewise, you appear to people from the outside to be good and honest, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and far from Torah.
Mark 12: 1 Yeshua began speaking to them in parables. “A man planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a pit for the wine press and built a tower; then he rented it to tenant-farmers and left. 2 When harvest-time came, he sent a servant to the tenants to collect his share of the crop from the vineyard. 3 But they took him, beat him up and sent him away empty-handed. 4 So he sent another servant; this one they punched in the head and insulted. 5 He sent another one, and him they killed; and so with many others — some they beat up, others they killed. 6 He had still one person left, a son whom he loved; in the end, he sent him to them, saying, ‘My son they will respect.’ 7 But the tenants said to each other, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him, and the inheritance will be ours!’ 8 So they seized him, killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. 9 What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come, destroy those tenants and give the vineyard to others! 10 Haven’t you read the passage in the Tanakh that says, ‘The very rock which the builders rejected has become the cornerstone! 11 This has come from Adonai, and in our eyes it is amazing’?
Matthew 23: 37 “Yerushalayim! Yerushalayim! You kill the prophets! You stone those who are sent to you! How often I wanted to gather your children, just as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings, but you refused! 38 Look! God is abandoning your house to you, leaving it desolate. 39 For I tell you, from now on, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of Adonai.’”
John 6: 44 No one can come to me unless the Father — the One who sent me — draws him. And I will raise him up on the Last Day. 45 It is written in the Prophets, ‘They will all be taught by Adonai.’ Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me.
John 1: 11 He came to his own homeland, yet his own people did not receive him. 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God.
John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!” 39 (Now he said this about the Spirit, whom those who trusted in him were to receive.)
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom. Amein.

MEDITATION XXXII

17.4.2014

EAT THE FLESH OF YESHUA, DRINK THE BLOOD OF YESHUA

If you are trying to sell me the idea that Yeshua Mashiach came to enforce morality – the distinction between good and evil, right and wrong – by quoting the Bible, don’t bother. These very same morals have been touted universally by a variety of wise men way before Yeshua made His appearance.
If you are trying to sell me the idea that Yeshua Mashiach came to implement Moses’ Law by bringing people into its bondage, don’t bother. Legalists are Pharisees and, for sure, Yeshua was not one of them. Rather, the Pharisees killed Yeshua because He had authority that superceded their legalism.
If you are trying to sell me the idea that Yeshua Mashiach came to put His own ‘self’ to death – along with the demand that you and I put our ‘selves’ to death – don’t bother. I’d rather head back into deep Hinduism or Buddhism, both of which existed before Yeshua, and taught the techniques for the same erasure of self or death to the ‘ego’.
If you’re trying to sell me the idea that Yeshua Mashiach came as a ‘healer’ or miracle-maker, don’t bother, for there have always been healers in every religion and even in secular spheres.
If you’re trying to sell me the idea that Yeshua Mashiach came to divide people into two categories – those who go to hell and those who go to heaven – and bring fear into their hearts, don’t bother. All the religions have used the same ruse.
If you’re trying to sell me the idea that Yeshua Mashiach came to make me feel superior to the pagans and infidels and sinners and to think that I am ‘elect’ and they are ‘damned’, don’t bother. For, He did not come for the righteous but the sinners and the sick.
Tell me, has there ever been anyone innocent, sinless, righteous and compassionate who would take MY sins upon Himself and accept the punishment for MY sins, bear the judgement, condemnation, torture and execution for the same? Has there ever been anyone who loved me like this and gave Himself for me with the result that I might not be sold in bondage to all those ideas mentioned above but instead be liberated, made whole, set free by the Son of G-d?
Galatians 2: 20 When the Messiah was executed on the stake as a criminal, I was too; so that my proud ego no longer lives. But the Messiah lives in me, and the life I now live in my body I live by the same trusting faithfulness that the Son of God had, who loved me and gave himself up for me. 21 I do not reject God’s gracious gift; for if the way in which one attains righteousness is through legalism, then the Messiah’s death was pointless.
Matthew 26: 1 When Yeshua had finished speaking, he said to his talmidim, 2 “As you know, Pesach is two days away, and the Son of Man will be handed over to be nailed to the execution-stake.”
Yeshua knew what was to happen to Him so that I might be set free.
Leviticus 16: 9 Aharon is to present the goat whose lot fell to Adonai and offer it as a sin offering.
Leviticus 16: 10 But the goat whose lot fell to ‘Az’azel is to be presented alive to Adonai to be used for making atonement over it by sending it away into the desert for ‘Az’azel.
Matthew 27: 46 At about three, Yeshua uttered a loud cry, “Eli! Eli! L’mah sh’vaktani? (My God! My God! Why have you deserted me?)” 50 But Yeshua, again crying out in a loud voice, yielded up his spirit. 51 At that moment the parokhet in the Temple was ripped in two from top to bottom; and there was an earthquake, with rocks splitting apart.
Hebrews 13: 10 We have an altar from which those who serve in the Tent are not permitted to eat. 11 For the cohen hagadol brings the blood of animals into the Holiest Place as a sin offering, but their bodies are burned outside the camp. 12 So too Yeshua suffered death outside the gate, in order to make the people holy through his own blood. 13 Therefore, let us go out to him who is outside the camp and share his disgrace.
Exodus 12: 1 Adonai spoke to Moshe and Aharon in the land of Egypt; 3 Speak to all the assembly of Isra’el and say, ‘On the tenth day of this month, each man is to take a lamb or kid for his family, one per household — 4 except that if the household is too small for a whole lamb or kid, then he and his next-door neighbor should share one, dividing it in proportion to the number of people eating it. 5 Your animal must be without defect, a male in its first year, and you may choose it from either the sheep or the goats. 6 “‘You are to keep it until the fourteenth day of the month, and then the entire assembly of the community of Isra’el will slaughter it at dusk. 7 They are to take some of the blood and smear it on the two sides and top of the door-frame at the entrance of the house in which they eat it. 11 “‘Here is how you are to eat it: with your belt fastened, your shoes on your feet and your staff in your hand; and you are to eat it hurriedly. It is Adonai’s Pesach [Passover].
1 Corinthians 5: 7 Get rid of the old hametz, so that you can be a new batch of dough, because in reality you are unleavened. For our Pesach lamb, the Messiah, has been sacrificed.
Hebrews 9: 11 But when the Messiah appeared as cohen gadol of the good things that are happening already, then, through the greater and more perfect Tent which is not man-made (that is, it is not of this created world), 12 he entered the Holiest Place once and for all. And he entered not by means of the blood of goats and calves, but by means of his own blood, thus setting people free forever. 15 It is because of this death that he is mediator of a new covenant [or will]. Because a death has occurred which sets people free from the transgressions committed under the first covenant, those who have been called may receive the promised eternal inheritance. 24 For the Messiah has entered a Holiest Place which is not man-made and merely a copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, in order to appear now on our behalf in the very presence of God.
John 6: 53 Then Yeshua said to them, “Yes, indeed! I tell you that unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life in yourselves. 54 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life — that is, I will raise him up on the Last Day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives in me, and I live in him. 57 Just as the living Father sent me, and I live through the Father, so also whoever eats me will live through me. 58 So this is the bread that has come down from heaven — it is not like the bread the fathers ate; they’re dead, but whoever eats this bread will live forever!”
1 Corinthians 11: 23 the Lord Yeshua, on the night he was betrayed, took bread; 24 and after he had made the b’rakhah he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this as a memorial to me”; 25 likewise also the cup after the meal, saying, “This cup is the New Covenant effected by my blood; do this, as often as you drink it, as a memorial to me.” 26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord, until he comes.
John 19: 30 After Yeshua had taken the wine, he said, “It is accomplished!” And, letting his head droop, he delivered up his spirit.
John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom. Amein.

MEDITATION XXXIII

18.4.2014

WHO DO YOU WANT TO HANG?

Beloved, who do you think Yeshua is? Who do you say He is? Were you there when they crucified My Lord? Do you want to hang him? Who do you want to hang?
Mathew 16: 13 When Yeshua came into the territory around Caesarea Philippi, he asked his talmidim, “Who are people saying the Son of Man is?” 14 They said, “Well, some say Yochanan the Immerser, others Eliyahu, still others Yirmeyahu or one of the prophets.” 15 “But you,” he said to them, “who do you say I am?” 16 Shim‘on Kefa answered, “You are the Mashiach, the Son of the living God.” 17 “Shim‘on Bar-Yochanan,” Yeshua said to him, “how blessed you are! For no human being revealed this to you, no, it was my Father in heaven. 18 I also tell you this: you are Kefa,” [which means ‘Rock,’] “and on this rock I will build my Community, and the gates of Sh’ol will not overcome it. 19 I will give you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven.
Where is Yeshua from? Is He man or G-d?
John 19: 5 So Yeshua came out, wearing the thorn-branch crown and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, “Look at the man!” 6 When the head cohanim and the Temple guards saw him they shouted, “Put him to death on the stake! Put him to death on the stake!” Pilate said to them, “You take him out yourselves and put him to death on the stake, because I don’t find any case against him.” 7 The Judeans answered him, “We have a law; according to that law, he ought to be put to death, because he made himself out to be the Son of G-d.” 8 On hearing this, Pilate became even more frightened. 9 He went back into the headquarters and asked Yeshua, “Where are you from?” But Yeshua didn’t answer.
The Father did not reveal who Yeshua was to Pilate, who was confused as to what to do with the innocent One who had been brought to him to be sentenced to death. Nor was He revealed to the Pharisees who wanted Him dead. The Father has not revealed Yeshua as the Son of G-d to many. For instance, the cult I was trapped in for years believes Yeshua was only a man, a sinner like fallen Adam and his descendants, who bootstrapped himself into being G-d by purifying Himself of the ‘sin nature’ inside of Him. Like Pilate who sentenced Him to death, these people along with Pilate say: ‘Look at the man!’ The Pharisees did not know that He is the Son of G-d but were upset that He had equated Himself with G-d by saying that He was indeed the Son of G-d! Yet Kefa was given the spirit of wisdom and revelation whereby He could see that Yeshua was the Son of G-d in the likeness of man!
Mark 15: 33 At noon, darkness covered the whole Land until three o’clock in the afternoon. 34 At three, he uttered a loud cry, “Elohi! Elohi! L’mah sh’vaktani?” (which means, “My G-d! My G-d! Why have you deserted me?”
Have you been there, inside that deep cry of agony? The moment in which Yeshua knew and felt the inexpressible weight of the sin of all of humanity – past, present and future – laid on Him. Have you been inside that place of utter darkness, enshrouded by the sin of the world, laid on one Man, the one sinless Scapegoat?
This was ‘the moment in time’ that He had agreed to with the Father in contrast to the Adversary’s temptation to give Him all the kingdoms of the earth ‘in a moment of time’. But it was to be the darkest moment in His life!
Luke 4: 5 The Adversary took him up, showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world, 6 and said to him, “I will give you all this power and glory. It has been handed over to me, and I can give it to whomever I choose. 7 So if you will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 Yeshua answered him, “The Tanakh says, ‘Worship Adonai your God and serve him only.’”
Yeshua remained true to His destiny on earth as the sinless Scapegoat and Paschal Lamb.
John 1: 29 The next day, Yochanan saw Yeshua coming toward him and said, “Look! God’s lamb! The one who is taking away the sin of the world!
Yeshua remained true to His destiny as the Goat to be sacrificed as the final sin-offering to G-d.
Leviticus 16: 9 Aharon is to present the goat whose lot fell to Adonai and offer it as a sin offering. 15 “Next, he is to slaughter the goat of the sin offering which is for the people, bring its blood inside the curtain and do with its blood as he did with the bull’s blood, sprinkling it on the ark-cover and in front of the ark-cover. 16 He will make atonement for the Holy Place because of the uncleannesses of the people of Isra’el and because of their transgressions — all their sins; and he is to do the same for the tent of meeting which is there with them right in the middle of their uncleannesses.
Yeshua remained true to His destiny as the Goat to be burdened with the sins of all humanity and driven into the desert to die as the Scapegoat.
Leviticus 16: 10 But the goat whose lot fell to ‘Az’azel is to be presented alive to Adonai to be used for making atonement over it by sending it away into the desert for ‘Az’azel. 20 “When he has finished atoning for the Holy Place, the tent of meeting and the altar, he is to present the live goat. 21 Aharon is to lay both his hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the transgressions, crimes and sins of the people of Isra’el; he is to put them on the head of the goat and then send it away into the desert with a man appointed for the purpose. 22 The goat will bear all their transgressions away to some isolated place, and he is to let the goat go in the desert.
Mark 15: 12 Pilate again said to them, “Then what should I do with the man you call the King of the Jews?” 13 They shouted back, “Put him to death on the stake!” 14 He asked, “Why? What crime has he committed?” But they only shouted louder, “Put him to death on the stake!” 16 The soldiers led him away inside the palace (that is, the headquarters building) and called together the whole battalion. 17 They dressed him in purple and wove thorn branches into a crown, which they put on him. 18 Then they began to salute him, “Hail to the King of the Jews!” 19 They hit him on the head with a stick, spat on him and kneeled in mock worship of him. 20 When they had finished ridiculing him, they took off the purple robe, put his own clothes back on him and led him away to be nailed to the execution-stake. 22 They brought Yeshua to a place called Gulgolta (which means “place of a skull”). 25 It was nine in the morning when they nailed him to the stake.
Isaiah 52: 14 [For many the Servant of God became an object of horror; many were astonished at Him.] His face and His whole appearance were marred more than any man’s, and His form beyond that of the sons of men—but just as many were astonished at Him.
Humanity and G-d turned their eyes away from this Spectacle of Horror hanging on the Stake, the Tree, the Cross. The Spectacle that bore the punishment for the marring of humanity and paid the price for the sins of the world, for the redemption of humanity, for your salvation and mine.
Isaiah 63: 3 I have trodden the winepress alone, and of the peoples there was no one with Me. 5 And I looked, but there was no one to help; I was amazed and appalled that there was no one to uphold [truth and right].
In His agony and pain, He remembered the prophecy about Him in Psalm 22 and cried out:
Mark 15: 33 At noon, darkness covered the whole Land until three o’clock in the afternoon. 34 At three, he uttered a loud cry, “Elohi! Elohi! L’mah sh’vaktani?” (which means, “My G-d! My G-d! Why have you deserted me?”
Psalm 22: 1 My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? Why are You so far from helping me, and from the words of my groaning? 2 O my God, I cry in the daytime, but You answer not; and by night I am not silent or find no rest. 6 But I am a worm, and no man; I am the scorn of men, and despised by the people. 7 All who see me laugh at me and mock me; they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, 8 He trusted and rolled himself on the Lord, that He would deliver him. Let Him deliver him, seeing that He delights in him! 14 I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax; it is softened [with anguish] and melted down within me. 15 My strength is dried up like a fragment of clay pottery; [with thirst] my tongue cleaves to my jaws; and You have brought me into the dust of death.
The Lord of Life was brought into the dust of death! The wages of our sin was the punishment and death laid on Him! Now, believe that, beloved! And be free of sin and its wages.
Isaiah 53: 1 Who has believed (trusted in, relied upon, and clung to) our message [of that which was revealed to us]? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been disclosed? 2 For [the Servant of God] grew up before Him like a tender plant, and like a root out of dry ground; He has no form or comeliness [royal, kingly pomp], that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him. 3 He was despised and rejected and forsaken by men, a Man of sorrows and pains, and acquainted with grief and sickness; and like One from Whom men hide their faces He was despised, and we did not appreciate His worth or have any esteem for Him. 4 Surely He has borne our griefs (sicknesses, weaknesses, and distresses) and carried our sorrows and pains [of punishment], yet we [ignorantly] considered Him stricken, smitten, and afflicted by God [as if with leprosy]. 5 But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our guilt and iniquities; the chastisement [needful to obtain] peace and well-being for us was upon Him, and with the stripes [that wounded] Him we are healed and made whole.
We are healed. We are made whole. With the stripes that wounded Him.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom. Amein.

 

 

 

 

MEDITATION XXXIV
19.4.2014

HE DESCENDED INTO HADES

1 Peter 3: 18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit. 19 After being made alive, he went and made proclamation to the imprisoned spirits— 20 to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built.
The first picture is Yeshua’s joy at discovering and delivering the Lost Sheep – from its waywardness, its captivity, its wounds, hurts, isolation and wandering – and gathering it in with His Love.
Ephesians 1: 7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace 8 which He lavished on us. In all wisdom and insight 9 He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him 10 with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, THE SUMMING UP OF ALL THINGS IN CHRIST, things in the heavens and things on the earth.
Ephesians 1: 7 In Him we have the pedut (redemption, Geulah release on payment of ransom) through the [kapporah] dahm of Moshiach [YESHAYAH 53:10-12; DANIEL 9:26; BAMIDBAR 19:20], the selichat chatoteinu (forgiveness of our sins), according to the osher (wealth) of His Chen v’Chesed Hashem (grace of G-d); 8 Which He lavished upon us, 9 In all chochmah (wisdom) and binah (understanding), having made hisgalus (revelation) to us of the sod of His ratzon (mystery of His will), His chafetz (good pleasure), according to the etza (counsel, plan of G-d) which Hashem set forth in Moshiach: 10 For a pekudat Hashem (stewardship of G-d), a plan for the fullness of time, gathering up all things in Moshiach, both the things in Shomayim and the things on Ha’Aretz in Him. (Orthodox Jewish Bible)

 
The second picture is the Orthodox icon which was the standard depiction of Easter in every Christian Church for a thousand years. It’s not the picture we’ve become used to, of Christ rising at sunrise, victorious from His tomb. The old ikon doesn’t show Easter morning at all. For 50 generations, our Christian ancestors knew the Easter Feast began not at sunrise, but in the midnight depths of hell, where Christ the Lord descended to crush death and destroy every human fear of condemnation and death.
Matthew 27: 51 At that moment the parokhet in the Temple was ripped in two from top to bottom; and there was an earthquake, with rocks splitting apart. 52 Also the graves were opened, and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life; 53 and after Yeshua rose, they came out of the graves and went into the holy city, where many people saw them.
That’s what the ancient Easter ikon depicts. Christ descended to hell. He’s knocked down its doors (notice the shape they fell into), broken its chains and shattered its locks (see them laying in the blackness). He stretches out his hands to an old man and woman, lifting them from their graves. They’re Adam and Eve, our first father and mother. Around them stand other figures of the Old Testament, particularly the prophets. They look on in adoration, rejoicing that the Day they so long ago predicted has come at last.
“Hell took a body, and met God face to face.
It took earth, and encountered Heaven.
It took that which was seen, and was crushed by what it could not see.”
– St John Chrysostom
The great sixth century bishop Venantius Fortunatus, in his hymn The Royal Banners, depicts Christ on the Cross, not as a suffering victim, but as a victorious King: “God is reigning from the Tree.” Christ descended into hell not as its victim but its Conqueror.
John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God. 14 The Word became a human being and lived with us, and we saw his Sh’khinah, the Sh’khinah of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth.
John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!” 39 (Now he said this about the Spirit, whom those who trusted in him were to receive.)
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom. Amein.

MEDITATION XXXV

20.4.2014

LET HIM ROLL THE HEART OF STONE AWAY!

Christ is Risen. Death has been Defeated.
Mathew 28: 1 After Shabbat, as the next day was dawning, Miryam of Magdala and the other Miryam went to see the grave. 2 Suddenly there was a violent earthquake, for an angel of Adonai came down from heaven, rolled away the stone and sat on it.
Ahhhh, the great stone of sin and shame and death has been rolled away! For the price for our redemption from the power of darkness and the Adversary has been wholly paid by the suffering Servant, the Crucified Christ.
Ezekiel 36: 25 b I will cleanse you from all your uncleanness and from all your idols. 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit inside you; I will take the stony heart out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 I will put my Spirit inside you and cause you to live by my laws, respect my rulings and obey them.
The heart of stone is rolled away and the G-d who is Light, the G-d who is Love, can now enter the cave of the isolated heart where darkness once dwelt.
1 Peter 2: 9 But you are a chosen people,the King’s cohanim, a holy nation, a people for G-d to possess! Why? In order for you to declare the praises of the One who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.
What was this heart of stone, the stone that has been rolled away?
Exodus 31: 18 When he had finished speaking with Moshe on Mount Sinai, Adonai gave him the two tablets of the testimony, tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God.
What was the consequence of these tablets of stone? A heart of stone.
2 Corinthians 3: 3 You make it clear that you are a letter from the Messiah … written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on stone tablets but on human hearts.
That which was written or engraved in stone or written in ink was ‘holy’ and yet brought DEATH.
2 Corinthians 3: 7 Now if that which worked death, by means of a written text engraved on stone tablets, came with glory — such glory that the people of Isra’el could not stand to look at Moshe’s face because of its brightness, even though that brightness was already fading away — 8 won’t the working of the Spirit be accompanied by even greater glory? 9 For if there was glory in what worked to declare people guilty, how much more must the glory abound in what works to declare people innocent!
The stone over the mouth of the tomb/grave declared the power of the stone tablets and what was written on them – the power of Judgement, Condemnation and Death over people.
Romans 3: 10 As the Tanakh puts it, “There is no one righteous, not even one! No one understands, 11 no one seeks G-d, 12 all have turned away and at the same time become useless; there is no one who shows kindness, not a single one! 20 For in his sight no one alive will be considered righteous on the ground of legalistic observance of Torah commands, because what Torah really does is show people how sinful they are.
Romans 6: 23 For what one earns from sin is death; but eternal life is what one receives as a free gift from God, in union with the Messiah Yeshua, our Lord.
The stone tablets and the heart of stone worked to DECLARE PEOPLE GUILTY. The working of the Spirit of Life in Yeshua Mashiach, Crucified and Risen from the dead, is to DECLARE PEOPLE INNOCENT!
John 11: 33 When Yeshua saw her crying, and also the Judeans who came with her crying, he was deeply moved and also troubled. 34 He said, “Where have you buried him?” They said, “Lord, come and see.” 35 Yeshua cried! 38 Yeshua, again deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying in front of the entrance. 39 Yeshua said, “Take the stone away!” 41 So they removed the stone. Yeshua looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 43 Having said this, he shouted, “El‘azar! Come out!” 44 The man who had been dead came out, his hands and feet wrapped in strips of linen and his face covered with a cloth. Yeshua said to them, “Unwrap him, and let him go!” 45 At this, many of the Judeans who had come to visit Miryam, and had seen what Yeshua had done, trusted in him.
Luke 7: 11 The next day Yeshua, accompanied by his talmidim and a large crowd, went to a town called Na‘im. 12 As he approached the town gate, a dead man was being carried out for burial. His mother was a widow, this had been her only son, and a sizeable crowd from the town was with her. 13 When the Lord saw her, he felt compassion for her and said to her, “Don’t cry.” 14 Then he came close and touched the coffin, and the pallbearers halted. He said, “Young man, I say to you: get up!” 15 The dead man sat up and began to speak, and Yeshua gave him to his mother.
Luke 8: 49 While Yeshua was still speaking, a man came from the synagogue president’s house. “Your daughter has died,” he said. “Don’t bother the rabbi any more.” 50 But on hearing this, Yeshua answered him, “Don’t be afraid! Just go on trusting, and she will be made well.” 52b He said, “Don’t weep; she hasn’t died, she’s sleeping.” 53 They jeered at him, since they knew she had died. 54 But he took her by the hand, called out, “Little girl, get up!” 55 and her spirit returned.
1 Corinthians 15: 45 In fact, the Tanakh says so: Adam, the first man, became a living human being; but the last “Adam” has become a life-giving Spirit.
John 11: 25 Yeshua said to her, “I AM the Resurrection and the Life! Whoever puts his trust in me will live, even if he dies; 26 and everyone living and trusting in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
Yes, the Stone of the Law, the Stone of Judgement, Condemnation and Death, the Stone Heart, all of it has been rolled away. Believe it, beloved, it’s true, it’s real. Rolled away, rolled away, rolled away, every burden of my heart rolled away! Exchange the Dead Stone for the Living Stone, and be trusting!
1 Peter 2: 3 For you have tasted that Adonai is good. 4 As you come to him, the living stone, rejected by people but chosen by God and precious to him, 5 you yourselves, as living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be cohanim set apart for God to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to him through Yeshua the Messiah. 6 This is why the Tanakh says, “Look! I am laying in Tziyon a stone, a chosen and precious cornerstone; and whoever rests his trust on it will certainly not be humiliated.” 7 Now to you who keep trusting, he is precious. But to those who are not trusting, “The very stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone”; 8 also he is a stone that will make people stumble, a rock over which they will trip.
There is no need to be crushed by that old stone that declares you guilty and deserving of death. There is a deep need to come to the Living Stone and receive a heart of flesh. How?
John 20: 19 In the evening that same day, the first day of the week, when the talmidim were gathered together behind locked doors out of fear of the Judeans, Yeshua came, stood in the middle and said, “Shalom aleikhem!” 20 Having greeted them, he showed them his hands and his side. The talmidim were overjoyed to see the Lord. 21 “Shalom aleikhem!” Yeshua repeated. “Just as the Father sent me, I myself am also sending you.” 22 Having said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Ruach HaKodesh!
John 7: 37 Now on the last day of the festival, Hoshana Rabbah, Yeshua stood and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, let him keep coming to me and drinking! 38 Whoever puts his trust in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from his inmost being!” 39 (Now he said this about the Spirit, whom those who trusted in him were to receive.)
John 3: 8 “The wind blows where it wants to, and you hear its sound, but you don’t know where it comes from or where it’s going. That’s how it is with everyone who has been born from the Spirit.”
John 4: 24 God is spirit; and worshippers must worship him spiritually and truly.” 25 The woman replied, “I know that Mashiach is coming” (that is, “the one who has been anointed”). “When he comes, he will tell us everything.” 26 Yeshua said to her, “I, the person speaking to you, am he.”
John 1: 12 But to as many as did receive him, to those who put their trust in his person and power, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 not because of bloodline, physical impulse or human intention, but because of God.
COME. TAKE. EAT. DRINK. BE HAPPY. IT’S FREE.
Shalom aleikhem! Amein.