Author: Steven R. Bruck
The Holy Spirit is God’s Modem to Humans
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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:
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If Something Is Available To Us Is That The Same As We Deserve It?
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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.
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Parashah Balak 2018 (Balak) Numbers 22:2 – 25:9
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Even those people who are somewhat familiar with the bible have heard of the talking donkey story. They may not know of the spiritual meaning and the protection God provided for his people, which is the true lesson of the story, but they remember something about an ass that talked.
Balak is the king of Moab who hires Balaam, a sorcerer that also seems to know (and is able to hear from) the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to curse the Israelites that are passing through his land. At first Balaam confers with God who tells him not to go because the people are God’s chosen and blessed. Balaam tells the kings representatives, who return with the bad news to the king. The king sends higher ranked people with promises of even more wealth, and Balaam asks God again if it is OK to curse the people.
God tells him to go if he must but warns him it won’t turn out well. Balaam ignores the warning and leaves. On the way his ass turns aside three times from the main road, infuriating Balaam to the point when he gets off and starts to beat the beast. That’s when the ass talks to him and asks why she is being whipped? The truth of the matter then comes out, as God open’s Balaam’s eyes and allows him to see the angel of death with his drawn sword waiting for Balaam to come within reach. If not for the ass turning aside (because she saw the angel at each of the three places) Balaam would have been killed. Realizing his sin he says he will return, but the angel tells him to continue and that he must say whatever God tells him to say.
Balaam gets to the king and tells the king that whatever God tells him to say he must say. The king also ignores this warning and the first time Balaam confers with God he ends us blessing the people. Balak is angry for Balaam doing so, but Balaam reminds the king that he can only say what God tells him to say. Two more times Balak tries to get Balaam to curse the people, and two more times they are blessed. In anger Balak tells Balaam he better run back home before harm comes to him, and Balaam says first he must tell Balak and the other kings there with them what will happen in the future. God gives Balaam a prophetic message about the eventual rule of Israel over Moab and the other countries, then he leaves.
This parashah ends with the people being seduced by Moabite women into worshiping Baal and after a plague is sent to punish the people Pinchus (son of Aaron) spears an Israelite prince and the Moabite woman he was flagrantly showing off in front of Moses, which ends the plague.
It is later, in Numbers 31:16 that we learn the idea of using Moabite women to seduce the Israelite men into bringing a curse on themselves was the brainstorm of Balaam.
You may be aware that for every Parashah reading, there is an additional reading from some other part of the Tanakh. This is called the Haftorah reading. Today’s haftorah is from Micah 5-6:8. This is what I want to talk about today.
It is supposed this is at the time when Manasseh was ruling as king of Judea. That was one of the most sinful and degraded times throughout the history of Judea. Through Micah God asks what he has done to the people to make them turn so far away from him. He reminds them of all that he has done to save them, to support, protect and nurture them since he brought them out of Egypt. The haftorah ends with Micah 6:8, considered by the Rabbis to be the most important prophetic utterance in all of scripture:
It has been told thee, O man, what is good: only what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God.
Simple, isn’t it? There are 613 commandments in the Torah, and the Christian world believes there are over a thousand commandments in the New Covenant writings. In truth there aren’t any- everything in the New Covenant is from the Old Covenant. Yet, with all the commandments, laws, regulations, ordinances and rules that God has given to all of us we are told that there are only two important commandments: to love God and to love each other (Deut. 6:5, Leviticus 19:18 and Matthew 22:36) and that all God requires of us is to love justice, be merciful and walk humbly with him.
It really is like Moses told the children of Israel when he said these commandments are easy to do (Deut. 30:11.) Just love God, love each other, be merciful and humbly obey God by doing as he has instructed (this is how I interpret “walk humbly with your God.”)
How many times do we forget all that God has done for us? I include myself in this group and confess I often get angry and frustrated (in the opposite order) when something small and insignificant goes wrong. I forget all that God has provided for me, all that he has done and can continue to do. It seems so silly of me that in spite of his wondrous miracles and blessings I get pissed when I lose Internet connection for a minute. I misuse God’s name when I curse out the screw that stripped when I was trying to tighten it and I yell at others when they have done nothing wrong because I am having a bad day.
Has anyone ever done this: in the middle of a really bad day stopped to think that it is only because of God’s many blessings in your life that you are even there, alive and able to experience that bad day? I know I haven’t, and I also know that I should. I would think it impossible to continue to feel bad after that realization.
I once wrote a post called “SWISH!” which stands for So What, I‘m Saved, Halleluyah! I wrote that and felt it for a day or so, then forgot all about it. Oy! Vat a schmendrick!
God has done, is doing and will continue to do wonderful and miraculous things for us. The world isn’t such a great place to be in but God can overcome the world, and those who worship God and try to obey all he has said we should do will be blessed- that is God’s promise (Deut. 28.) So, when things go bad or when we feel tempted by the world and it’s fleshly rewards, we need to SWISH; we need to remember Micah 6:8; we need to remember that as humans we tend to forget what was done for us and revel in our own authority and power (even though we really have neither) turning from God’s ways and thinking we are OK in doing so.
It’s this simple: first we have to repent of our sin. Then we must accept Yeshua as our Messiah so that through him we can receive forgiveness. Then all we need to do to remain in good standing with the Lord is this: love God and people, show mercy, act justly and live humbly.
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What to Say When There’s Nothing to Say
No video today.
I didn’t have anything in mind this morning and just as I was typing the title for today’s post it came to me: we need to understand when to shut up.
I can speak very well on this topic because (as the saying goes): “Those who can’t do, teach” and I have never fully learned how to shut up when I should. Consequently, the problems I have had that are associated with not knowing when to shut up have at times been quite serious.
What do we say when someone has lost a loved one? I have found the best thing, more often than not is to just say how sorry I am for their loss and maybe hold their hand or put my hand on their shoulder. I don’t impose myself on them with hugging or anything more than a simple touch.
When people are angry or arguing over something and you sense you have reached an impasse, then just shut up. Let them have the last word, not with a snide “Whatever!” or anything similar; just nod your head and say, “Well, I guess we’ll have to disagree.” and then shut up.
Often times the most powerful thing one can say is nothing at all.
When I was in sales I learned that the worst thing I could do was to talk after I asked a question. “Never talk after the close!” is a foundational tenet of proper sales technique. Let the other person sweat it out waiting for you to say something and more often than not they will speak and tell you what they wouldn’t have revealed if you had continued to talk.
Your silence also can be a way of allowing someone else to put their thoughts together. I have always been fast on the draw, so to speak, and I am sure that my quick responses have caused others to simply not comment, which is a sin on my part. And when they reply, listen to what they say. How often do you find yourself just waiting for them to stop talking so you can say what you want to say?
When we are concentrating on listening for when they take a breath we never really hear what they are saying.
People today are way too sensitive to any little statement or joke, and they all cry about the other person not talking to them compassionately. But who is trying to listen compassionately? If someone says something to me that is nasty or snide, and I really don’t think I deserved it, instead of complaining I should ask them quietly and humbly, “Why are you being so mean to me? If I did or said something that really upset you I am sorry; please forgive me.” Then just shut up and give them time to gather their thoughts.
I am very cynical and distrusting of humans, but still and all I will bet that if I did something like this then I would receive an apology, the tension would be lifted and we could begin to communicate again.
One last thing: when in doubt about what to say, less is more. When someone is in pain, silence can be one of the most powerful and compassionate things you can offer, along with a gentle touch of the hand and an open ear.
True humility, maturity and compassion is not shown in what we say as much as it is in what we don’t say.
What Did Jesus Really Nail to the Cross?
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One of the things I have heard often is the statement that when Jesus was nailed to the cross, the law was nailed to it with him.
This is similar to the statement that because Jesus fulfilled the law, it has been done away with.
These statements are both based on what Shaul (Paul) said in Colossians and what Yeshua said in Matthew, respectively. Both of these statements are also uniformly and completely incorrect.
Today I am only dealing with the statement Shaul made, so let’s actually see what Shaul said was nailed to the cross in Colossians 2:13-14 (from The Complete Jewish Bible):
You were dead because of your sins, that is, because of your “foreskin,’ your old nature. But God made you alive along with the Messiah by forgiving you all your sins. He wiped away the bill of charges against us. Because of the regulations, it stood as a testimony against us; but he removed it by nailing it to the execution-stake.
Before we discuss what was nailed, we need to first understand the context in which this letter was written. It was written to reinforce the message of the Good News that was first brought to the Colossians by Epaphras. This letter is written by Shaul to Gentile Believers in order to remind them how their faith in Yeshua has saved them from their previous sinful lifestyle, which condemned them to death. Throughout the letter he reminds them of the Good News message that salvation comes through continued faith in Yeshua and continued worship of God. Shaul was, essentially, giving them a pep talk to help them stay the course of faithfully following Torah, believing in God and Yeshua. I believe that all his letters have, in one way or another, a reminder that a legalistic observance of Torah as the means of earning salvation will never work, but faith in Yeshua (while still obeying Torah) is how we are able to overcome our sinful nature and be saved.
Now that we know what the context of this letter is about, we can see that when Shaul was talking about the “bill of charges against us” he meant the sins they had committed. When he says “Because of the regulations” he meant to identify the Torah and God’s commandments; this is also seen in the letter Shaul wrote to the Roman Believers where he stated that the Torah created sin, he meant that because the Torah tells us right from wrong it identifies what is sinful. And in this letter when Shaul refers to the “regulations” that create the bill of charges (or sometimes called “trespasses” in other bibles) against us he is talking about the Torah.
Now for the really important part- what was (and is) being nailed to the execution-stake? It is only the bill of charges; it is our trespasses; it is those specific sins we each have against us. It was (and is) NOT the Torah; it was (and is) not the Law; it was (and is) not anything other than the list of existing sins that stand between those people and God. When we confess our sins, repent and ask forgiveness in Yeshua’s name, those sins- and ONLY those specific, already committed sins- are what get “nailed to the tree.”
In other words, the sins we have already committed are the only things “nailed to the cross.” Nothing else is nailed, especially not sins we commit after those sins were wiped clean.
When we first confirmed our belief in Yeshua, confessed and repented of our sins asking forgiveness in his name, we received that forgiveness. Those existing sins that were listed against us, and only those sins, were nailed to a tree. Everything that happens after that is still valid and against us until we again confess, repent and ask forgiveness in Yeshua’s name. Then that list is “nailed to a tree.”
There are a lot of trees out there with a lot of paper nailed to them.
Yeshua was nailed to an execution-stake once, and that was all that was needed. His death doesn’t save us- it is because of his resurrection that we can find forgiveness through his sacrifice. His resurrection proved that his sacrifice was accepted. As such, each time we sin we need to ask forgiveness because the sins we commit from one forgiveness to another are going to be held against us unless and until we repent.
The only thing that was “nailed to the cross” was the existing list of sins. There has never been a person who didn’t sin after being forgiven; we all are sinners who always will sin. As I often say, we can never be sinless but we can always sin less. And when we sin, we must repent of that sin and ask forgiveness through Yeshua’s sacrifice.
The Torah is still valid and the regulations, mitzvot (laws) and instructions regarding the festivals are all still required for any and all people who confess that they worship the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
What we really need to nail to the cross are the wrongful teachings.