Author: Steven R. Bruck
Be Careful What You Ask For
If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.
I love golf. I have been playing since I was a teenager. For about 30 years I didn’t swing a club and now that I am retired, I am able to get back into the game.
My game hasn’t been as good as it was: no surprise there. However, I should be capable of playing what we call “Bogie Golf” and I am getting closer to that goal.
What’s this got to do with anything? I’m getting to that.
When I pray, I constantly ask God for better self-control so that I can pray as David prayed: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable to Thee, oh Lord, my rock and my redeemer” “(Psalm 19:14.) I have often written how God always answers prayer, and sometimes (in my life) he has told me that when I ask him to change me that he will, but I have to work at it, too. I have to learn to call on his Ruach haKodesh (Holy Spirit) to help me achieve that change. This is what happened to me earlier this week while playing a round of golf- God answered my prayer by giving me the opportunity to practice self-control. Here’s what happened…
I was playing a pretty good game for our 9-hole round (league play) but starting at the 6th hole I screwed up a number of shots and ended up with a really bad score for that hole. I got a little teed-off at myself, and from that point on the game went downhill at an alarming speed until I ended up with a score that was nearly 10 strokes higher than I usually get. For 9 holes, no less!
I was angry, using language I shouldn’t, and smacking my club into the ground (at least I wasn’t throwing it like I did when I was a teenager.) I was also embarrassed because later, after cooling down a bit, I realized that I failed to do what God had been giving me a chance to do- be acceptable before him, and also honor him by acting in a way that others would see my self-control, which is one of the Fruits of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23.)
Needless to say, I apologized to my golf partner for my actions next time we got together, which was two days later to play on a different course.
I am patient with others when I teach but I confess I have little patience with myself, never accepting less than what I think I should be able to do. So, on my way to this next game, I was praying and asking forgiveness for my lack of self-control. I also asked God to continue to help me, and that’s when I knew, yes I just knew, that I was going to have another bad game. Not that I wanted another bad game but I knew that even though he is God of all the universe, he would give me another chance to show that I could pass the test. Which meant that, no matter how hard I tried, I was going to hit into the water, duff shots that I shouldn’t duff, find nearly every sand trap on the course and probably end up with another really lousy score.
But this time I was ready for it!
(I did have a lousy score, again, but not as bad as the other day and this time I maintained my self-control throughout it all.)
This story is the reason today’s message is about being careful what you ask for. God always answers prayer: sometimes it is “OK”; sometimes it is “OK, but not now”; and other times it is just plain “NO!” The tricky part is that when God is willing to answer our prayers, his answer isn’t always what we expect or when we expect it, but it is always just what we need, just when we need it. God answered my prayer to have better self-control by giving me the opportunity to work on it through my golf game. At first, I didn’t realize this, and that is why I failed so miserably at it. Through more prayer and the leading of the Ruach, I was able to discern what really happened that day I did so poorly: God was answering my prayer. I asked, he answered and I messed it all up. I wanted God to just intervene, to just re-wire my brain-housing group so that I would automatically have better self-control so I could be more like he wants me to be.
I forgot how a long time ago when I asked God to change the way I think about something, he gave me this answer: “It doesn’t work that way.” He gave me the insight to see that the way it’s done is we each have to work at those things we ask God to change in ourselves. It is up to us to work with God to make that change happen. And God will provide the opportunity, which is why we need to remember that through the experience of having tsouris in our life, even something as insignificant as a golf game, we can learn how to channel his Spirit to overcome our troubles.
I am somewhat proud to say that I was able to figure this one out fairly quickly and hope that going forward I will remember when I ask God for something to remain always on the alert for his answer.
I recommend that you do the same.
Video for Be Careful What You Ask For
Yeshua Confirms Lack of Torah Signals the End
No video today.
Usually, when someone takes a single line or passage from the Bible and uses it to make a point, I become a little leery because that generally indicates something else is missing. I am going to do that very thing today, and hope to still be able to validate what I say.
The line I am talking about is Matthew 24:12, which says (Complete Jewish Bible) :
…and many people’s love will grow cold because of increased distance from Torah.
This is taken out of the paragraph in which Yeshua is telling his Talmudim (Disciples) about the End of Days. I believe that most of you reading this are familiar with what was said about wars and rumors of wars, famine, earthquakes, etc., and as hard as I could I did not see this specific statement about “distance from Torah” in either of the other Gospels.
The KJV says, “And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.”; the NKJV says, “And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.”; and (lastly) the NIV says, “Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold…“.
All of these versions indicate an increase of lawlessness and iniquity, which is, by definition, distancing oneself from Torah, is it not? So Yeshua, by telling us that in the end times there will be more and more people rejecting the Torah, is identifying what Christianity is doing, and has been for centuries. Since even before the end of the First Century, the Gentile “Church” fathers have been working to separate themselves from Judaism, which is the very root of the tree they have been grafted onto. I ask you- if a branch separates itself from the root, how can it be nourished? How can it hope to survive?
When I would teach Messianic Judaism to new Believers I used this example: Remeber the Bugs Bunny cartoon where Elmer Fudd chased Bugs into a tree? Bugs would be out at the end of a branch, and Elmer would be sitting on the branch attached to the bole of the tree, sawing away at the part Bugs was on. Laughing, Elmer would say, “I’ve got you now, you silly wabbit!” and as soon as he sawed through the branch, the tree fell down with him it in, and Bugs remained suspended in the air.” After we all had a chuckle, I would tell them that this is what Christianity thinks is possible- to separate themselves from the tree they are connected to and yet still remain “saved” from destruction.
Yeshua is telling his Talmudim that as more and more people reject the Torah, which leads to lawlessness and iniquity running wild, the End of Days (in the Hebrew it is called the Acharit haYamim) will be getting closer. And the rest of the passage states that those who hold out to the end will be delivered. That means, obviously, obedience to Torah will not gain our salvation, but it will secure it.
We are saved through faith, but faith demands obedience to Torah and Yeshua is saying here that those who remain obedient will be among the saved. Like it or not, God’s commandments are valid throughout time, until the new earth and new Jerusalem come from heaven. And even after that, Torah will still be valid, only under the New Covenant, it won’t need to be written on a scroll because, as Jeremiah tells us, it will be written on our hearts.
If you have been told that the Torah was “nailed to the cross with Jesus”, or any other such teachings, anything to indicate that Torah is for Jews but Christians have the Blood of Christ, well…that’s not according to Jesus. Messiah told us all that distance from the Torah will result in loss of salvation, and since John says the Word (Torah at that time) became flesh, obviously referring to Yeshua, that means that those who reject Torah also reject Yeshua.
How many of you think that rejecting Yeshua will result in your salvation?
Parashah Pinchas 2018 (Pinchas) Numbers 25:10 – 30:1
If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.
We left the last parashah with Phinehas (Pinchas) killing the Israelite man and Midianite woman to stop the plague. Now God makes a covenant that the lineage of Pinchas will be the High priests forever because of his jealousy for God. God commands Moses to go to war with Midian but first, a new census is taken because the prior generation has died in the desert. No further mention of the war is given at this point but we return to it in Chapter 31.
The daughters of the Zelophead (who had no sons) request an inheritance and God makes a new statute which identifies the Order of Inheritance regarding family inheritance of land in Israel.
God tells Moses his time has come so Moses asks God to place someone in charge of the people, and God chooses Joshua.
This parashah ends with God having Moses remind the people of the requirements for the offerings that were to be made daily, as well as the festivals that he first told us to honor in Leviticus.
Moses is told he is going to die and his first thought is of the people he has led for the past 40 years. He isn’t concerned about how will he die, will it hurt, will he be taken up into God’s bosom- no thoughts for himself and total concern for those that he will leave behind. This action on Moses’ part shows us the type of person he was: thoughtful, concerned for others, humble even unto death (sound familiar?) and obedient.
Today what I would like to talk about is why God is having Moses repeat the offering instructions to the people before he dies. When I read this I had to ask myself, “Why? Why is God having Moses remind the people about something that they already have been told and have written down for them?” The answer seems to be because God knew that these offerings were a central part of the daily life of the Children of Israel and, as such, must be followed. They are so important they bear repeating.
Again, why? Because without those daily activities of worship and annual celebrations of the Lord the people would easily fall into corruption. And we see that happening throughout the remainder of the Tanakh: when the leadership fails to enforce the daily offerings and festivals, the people fall into sin and worship the gods of their neighbors.
It is like the old adage: good habits are hard to develop and easy to lose, whereas bad habits are easy to develop and hard to lose.
We need to remember to pray daily, to worship the festivals God gave and when we celebrate holidays (not to be confused with Holy Days: the former are man-made and the latter are God commanded) we should celebrate only those that still honor God and do not replace the festivals he gave us in Leviticus, which are repeated here in this parashah. Only by repetitive worship can we maintain our faith and the strength of that faith, especially in light of our leader’s sinfulness and distracting activities.
When I say “repetitive” I do not mean to repeat prayers and perform actions robotically: what I mean is that we need to develop a regular prayer life and to remember the festivals God told us to celebrate. The ones he reminds us of in this parashah are the daily offerings, Shabbat and new moon, New Year, Day of Atonement and the pilgrimage festivals. Daily, monthly and annually we perform these rites and celebrate these festivals so that worship becomes a regular part of our lives. Every time throughout history that this cycle of worship was broken, the people fell into corruption.
What is your personal worship cycle? Do you pray every day? Do you honor the Lord by celebrating his festivals as he said you should? Too many people (both Christians and Jews) do not honor the Lord by celebrating the festivals as instructed. God isn’t very pleased with a half-way attitude when it comes to our worship of him. Another thing I have noticed: when you pray, who are you praying to? Is it to God or is it to Jesus? Jesus isn’t the answerer of our prayers- he is the intercessor. There is a big difference between intercession of prayer and interception of prayer.
The take-away for today is that we all need to develop a regular cycle of worship: daily and continual prayer, festival celebration as God said to (excepting for the sacrifices, of course) and constant reading of the Bible to remind us of who we are worshiping. Look at your life with spiritual eyes and see all that God has done, and is doing for you, and above all be appreciative for whatever you have. It may be great or it may be small, but if you have anything then thank God for it. He will hear and, knowing what you need, provide what is best for you.
Sometimes it is very hard for us to believe God is working for good in our lives, and that is what faith is all about- steadfastly believing God loves you and wants only the best for you when your life at that moment makes it impossible to believe. These are the times when the cycle of worship we have been talking about today helps us maintain our faith.
Video for Parashah Pinchas 2018
The Holy Spirit is God’s Modem to Humans
If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.
I am a retired IT Professional, and a life-long Nerd of the First Order, so I tend to see things in a technological way.
A Modem, as most of you already know, is a device that allows us to use the Internet. Modem is an acronym for Modulate-Demodulate, and the way it works is to change an analog signal to a digital signal and back again.
You may remember how in June of 2009 you were required to either get a new digital TV or get an adaptor so you could watch TV at all because all TV signals went to digital.
Now we all know that a Modem takes something which our devices cannot understand and translates it into something they can understand.
In 1 Corinthians 2:14 Shaul (Paul) is telling the people that without the Holy Spirit we cannot understand the things of the spirit, i.e. of God. What he tells them is:
The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.
So what does the Holy Spirit do? Well, according to Shaul it acts as a means of interpreting the messages from God. In other words, it translates what we cannot understand into something we can understand.
Hey! Wait a minute! That’s what a modem does. Yes, that’s right- the Ruach HaKodesh is God’s modem for humans because when we have the Spirit we can understand the things of the Spirit. It translates what God is saying in “holy digital signal” into the “unspiritual analog signal” that we humans have to deal with until we are born again.
This is the basis for what I call the circular reasoning of faith: we need to have faith to accept the Spirit, which we need to help us understand what we are reading in the Bible but we need to understand the Bible to lead us to faith, which is what we need to accept the Spirit which we need to ….. well, you see what I mean.
If you don’t have your divine modem in operation it must be because you haven’t faithfully accepted Yeshua as the Messiah, as your Messiah and /or your faith in God is weak. If this is you, please read the Bible and accept, whether you believe it or not that God is real, that Yeshua is the Messiah and pray to God for help in believing. That’s how I started my road to salvation, and it has led me to a strong faith in God, salvation through my Messiah Yeshua and a good understanding of God’s word. Real faith is accepting without proof, and initially even without really believing but remaining open-minded.
The one best thing about God’s modem for humans is that when we use it to pray we never get this:
Video for The Holy Spirit is God’s Modem to Humans
If Something Is Available To Us Is That The Same As We Deserve It?
If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.
How many times do we hear on the TV or radio that the product being advertised is one that “you deserve to have?” For instance, Lasik (the laser eye treatment) is now better than ever so you can have the eyesight you deserve.
Here are some other examples I found in an article on a Google search (italics added):
“”You deserve Virgin Mobile.”
“You deserve NEW, NOW!” shouts a billboard for a housing development in the San Francisco Bay Area.
“The most original people deserve the most original vodka,” reads the tagline on a series of ads for Stoli.
Weight-loss products from motivational speaker Tony Robbins claim to give you “the body you deserve” (thin and healthy).
A 2012 book from the popular financial writer Suze Orman promises “the future you deserve” (rich and happy).”
Skipping the Internet and going “old school” I used a thing called a Dictionary to look up what “deserve” means. It says, “to be worthy of or entitled to” and the word “deserved” means “merited; earned.”
So what is my “beef” about this morning? It’s about the UN-deserved attitude of entitlement that people have today which is promulgated and enforced by advertising. The air waves bring us the news (fake and designed to disturb) as well as the TV shows we watch, whether you have cable, satellite or stream them. And who is in charge of the air waves? If you’re asking me (and I assume you are) it is not ABC, or CBS or CNN- it is the one who the Bible tells us is in charge of the air, the Prince of the Air…Satan! (Ephesians 2:2)
I grew up in the 50’s and 60’s and my attitude toward people is highly influenced by what I was conditioned to think watching TV as a child. Yes, I used the word “conditioned” because that is what advertising does to us. Nearly 1/3 of every hour of TV is advertising and we watch hours of TV every day. That equates to hundreds of hours of advertising every year. I was in Sales for about 15 years and learned that the career most closely related to sales is psychology. One of the most important lessons I ever learned as a sales professional is that people don’t buy what they need, they buy what they want, and sales is a means of making people think what you have is what they want. The advertising focus when I grew up was that a product was needed and helpful, but now it is focused not on needing the product but deserving it. When we deserve something we think “I want what I deserve; I want what I have earned; I want what I am entitled to have- give me what is mine!”
This pseudo entitlement goes beyond just products and services- it can even influence our spiritual position. People think that they are entitled to be saved, that they have earned their salvation because they go to church every Sunday or keep a Kosher house (although they don’t stay Kosher outside the home.) People think that they deserve to have what they want because that is what they are told (over and over) every 20 minutes while watching TV. The message that sticks in our self-absorbed and hedonistic brains is this: if I want it I deserve it! The result is that people believe because God made salvation free to have that I deserve it, I am entitled to it and I don’t have to do anything to keep it.
No, you aren’t and yes, you do! None of us automatically deserves anything. Even though salvation is free to all who ask, we don’t deserve it and we aren’t entitled to it. And we have to work hard to keep it. Salvation is here for us to have ONLY because God is gracious and loving. And very, VERY merciful.
Moses tells the children of Israel in Deuteronomy 9:6 they aren’t in the land because they deserve it but because the other nations have so terribly sinned that God is ejecting them. He further tell them that they are stiff-necked and if (and when) they also reject God they will also be thrown out of the land.
This message isn’t just for the children of Israel going into the land- it is for every single one of us today. Salvation comes through faith, and faith must be based on a humble and repentant attitude. We need to ask for forgiveness and we need to ask for salvation- we are not deserving or entitled to it. But because of the conditioning from advertising which we are constantly and inescapably exposed to, we begin to think that we are entitled to everything.
I am not saying that we should get rid of all advertising- we can’t. Advertising is an essential thing to have so that we can know what products and services are available to us. What I am suggesting is that we use discretion and common sense when we are exposed to advertising. And we definitely need to point out to our children how wrong are many of the things advertisers try to tell us. We need to remember that what we are told by people selling things is focused on our sinful nature- there is not one moment of advertising I can think of which appeals to our better nature, other than animal rescue commercials. Maybe those commercials that ask for funding of charitable organizations, too, but other than that it is all about me me me and what I deserve to have.
Today’s message is that you must stay humble in the light of your remarkable amount of entitlement; remain steadfast and frugal despite the fact that you deserve to have so many of these wonderful products. Remember that you really don’t deserve anything other than that which you have worked for. Salvation is something we ask for and receive freely, but it takes a lot of work to keep it. We have to live our lives for God and not for self in a world that is all about self. That, my friends, is hard work. And if you stay the course, keep your eyes focused on your eternal reward and not just something that you can get from E-Bay then you will do well.
You don’t deserve salvation and you aren’t entitled to happiness or peace of spirit, but you can have it for free because God is gracious and loving. And once we accept it we then need to work hard to keep it. Just like the land God promised to Abraham’s descendants, they received it as God’s gift but once there they had to deserve to stay in it by obeying God.
Things are no different today.