Author: Steven R. Bruck

Straining Out the Gnats

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In Matthew, Chapter 23 Yeshua is addressing the crowds and talking about the hypocrisy He sees in the Pharisees. He discusses how, in essence, they are more concerned about looking superior in people’s eyes then they are concerned with doing what is righteous in God’s eyes. They go through the motions of being righteous but they do not have righteousness as their goal. Instead, they seek the praise of men instead of acceptance by God.

Today I want to talk about one of the better known verses, Matthew 23:23-24:

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You pay tithes of mint, dill, and cumin, but you have disregarded the weightier matters of the Law: justice, mercy, and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel. 

I see this all too often in the discussion groups I am a member of. There are many well-learned and knowledgeable people in these groups and I respect their understanding and years of study. However, when I see a discussion on a specific topic devolve into insulting accusations and judging of each other, I have to ask myself: is the topic a camel or a gnat?

Now don’t get me wrong: I enjoy discussing anything that has to do with God, Yeshua and the bible as much as anyone else, but what happens too many times is that the discussion turns ugly. People stop trying to edify each other or work to better understand God’s meaning because pridefulness rears its ugly head.

We are told not to judge others because how we judge others will be used to judge us. OK- everyone knows that, but how many people really understand what it means?  I am sure all of us have seen someone who thinks they are God’s own spokesperson, judging others and telling them that they are wrong, or that they will go to hell, that they are apostate, are demonically controlled….whatever. They accuse and abase people who may only need to be gently led into the truth of the Torah. But by being superior and judgmental, they are no better than the Pharisees Yeshua accused of hypocrisy. They turn people away from God by declaring themselves as an example of a godly person then acting in a way that is completely opposite of what they say they represent.

And why do they do this? Is it justified to call someone a sinner because they may say it is OK to wear a polyester blend? Or because someone else says it is fine to use the name “Jesus” in prayer? Is there anyone out there, really, who is authorized by God to determine who is going to hell and who isn’t? Are any of you in the place of God?

Oh, yes, I know what the prideful will say: “We are told that we will judge the earth and I am only judging you righteously.” Yes, there are those who will judge the earth…but not yet!

Who are we, any of us, to tell someone else today what God will decide about them later? Are we in the place of God? Are we above the messengers of God?

Let’s look at Y’hudah (Jude) 1:8-10:

But even the archangel Michael, when he disputed with the devil over the body of Moses, did not presume to bring a slanderous judgment against him, but said, “The Lord rebuke you!” These men, however, slander what they do not understand, and like irrational animals, they will be destroyed by the things they do instinctively.…

King David tells us in Psalm 8 that God made us just a little lower than the angels. Well, if an archangel, the highest of all the angels, is willing to submit himself to God’s authority by not judging one who anyone and everyone knows is certainly deserving of judgement (Satan), then who are we to do so to each other?

I am not against discussing details and minutia that is in the bible. I mean, c’mon- I’m Jewish! If any of God’s creatures loves a good argument, it’s a Jew, right? So what am I kvetching about? It’s the pridefulness of people which a discussion will bring out when one is not paying attention to the more important things- compassion, understanding, forgiveness, and respect.

The gnat of a topic is strained while the sin of pridefulness is swallowed.

When someone says that they are ‘judging righteously,’ I hear nothing more than, “I know better than you and you need to acknowledge that by agreeing with me!” Maybe that person does know better, but does that give them the right to judge me? As a person? As a believer? As a child of God? Do they have the insight to see my heart? Do they have some special gift that can reach out across the Internet and know my inner desires?

No, it doesn’t. No one has that ability, unless God gives it to them, and I am pretty sure from what I have read about God that He wouldn’t give them that ability so that they can abase and insult people.

Again…don’t get me wrong. I am NOT saying we should allow others to sin without telling them about it. Far be it that we ever do that- their blood is then on our heads. NO! We must advise people when we see them sinning, or when they have a dangerously wrong interpretation of the Word of God. What I AM saying is that we must do this compassionately, with forgiveness for their ignorance (“Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do”) and also for their inappropriate response (if you get one) when we tell them.

We need to have the spiritual maturity to know when someone’s mind won’t be changed, and the emotional maturity to accept that they have a right to their own opinion. I have ended discussions nicely when I see that we are at loggerheads. In doing this I have been accused of being afraid of the truth, or stubborn, or lukewarm. I regret to say that I have been called worse things than that, all because I asked people to stop talking about something that we disagree on.

To bring it all together, let me finish by reiterating that discussion is valuable when it edifies people and can serve to help everyone involved better understand God’s word. My concern is that we all need to be aware of our innate pridefulness and remain humble with each other, discussing with love and respect for each other, as well as for God’s word, and to also remember that we are not to judge the world- not yet.

Therefore, we need to be careful when we enter into discussions about God, bible, or how to best obey the commandments. We need to be compassionate, understanding, forgiving and spiritually mature in our handling of both learned and neophyte Believers.

Any topic is only a “gnat” because the way we treat each other is a “camel.”

Speak truth to each other with humility and compassionate understanding, and until God Himself assigns us a throne in heaven we should follow the example of the archangel Michael and submit to God’s authority to judge others.

 

 

Parashot VayYakhel and Pekudey 2018 Exodus 35 – 40:38

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This Shabbat we have a double parashah, which brings us to the end of the book of Exodus.

Moses gathers all the people and asks that they voluntarily give the materials needed for the construction of the Tabernacle. The people give freely, and in fact, they give so much Moses has to tell them to stop bringing any more because there is too much for the work.  God appoints men with extraordinary skills to supervise the work and both men and women help. This is a totally united effort, and the chapters relate in great detail every single item, how it was all constructed in exacting detail and in perfect accordance to God’s commandments.

The Haftarah for these readings are from 1 Kings telling about all the work Hiram led in the construction of the Temple in Jerusalem and Solomon’s prayer.

After the Tabernacle is set up and anointed God’s presence fills it with a cloud so thick Moses cannot enter. This also happens in 1 Kings after the construction of the Temple is completed. In both these cases, the work was done in a whole-hearted way to honor God, and once completed as God ordered it was acknowledged by God as acceptable in a very visible manner with the indwelling of His Ruach (Spirit) in physical form.

Let’s look at 1 Corinthians 6:19:

Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? 

We are also a temple when we invite the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit) to dwell in us. As such, are we constructing ourselves with as much fervor, love and obedience to detail that the people did in these readings? Do we voluntarily give of ourselves to others, and these people did to God? (That which you do tho these, my brethren, you do unto me-Matthew 25:40)

When we read these passages, it seems redundant and a little boring, if you will, because there is so much detailed minutia about every little thing. The reason for this is to show how all the people paid attention to what God told them to do. Now, it’s one thing to build a structure and another thing altogether to build up holiness in ourselves. Yet, the message is the same for both: when we do what God asks of us, as He asks us to do it, we will be successful and then God will bless our efforts with His presence.

When I first came to God I did so intellectually, and after three months or so of attending Messianic Shabbat services, I felt I wasn’t any different from before. That’s because I was still being an intellectual Believer, not a spiritually open Believer. It wasn’t until I was spiritually open and emotionally empty that I was able to receive an anointing from the Rabbi and then I felt the Ruach haKodesh enter my body. That was a moment that has lasted my entire lifetime. If you are interested in hearing it, you can go to this video: Steve Bruck Testimony

Over the years I am afraid I have become inured to that wonderful sensation of the Ruach filling my soul, and I miss it. I know that it’s my fault I don’t feel it as often as when I started to believe. In Psalm 51 King David asks God to “Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation;” : I also want to feel that joy again, that elation when I first felt the Ruach enter me.

My “temple” needs repair so that I am once more in accordance with God’s instructions. And those instructions aren’t as detailed as the ones we read this Shabbat; no, they are very much simpler. In fact, they are in Micah, 6:8:

And what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?

I want the Tabernacle of my body to be acceptable to the Ruach haKodesh, and to allow it to fill me so much that I can’t be inside it any more. We call that “Dying to Self” and it is the aim (or should be) of everyone who worships God. I am not confessing I have fallen from faith; no, not at all! It is my faith that makes me want to be better and be more acceptable to God than I am now. But I do confess I need to work at it more, just as Shaul told us in Philippians 2:12-13:

–continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.

Let each of us, starting this very moment, renew the work on our own Tabernacle and continue to perform whatever maintenance we need to do so that we are always acceptable to God, so that His Ruach can fill us as He filled the Tabernacle in the desert and the Temple in Jerusalem.

This completes the book of Exodus (Sh’mot), and in accordance to tradition we cry:

                                                                                                            Hazak, hazak, v’nit’chazek!

                                                                                             Be strong, be strong, and be strengthened! 

 

A Drash on The Ant and The Grasshopper

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For those that may not be familiar with the fable, here it is:

One bright day in late autumn a family of Ants were bustling about in the warm sunshine, drying out the grain they had stored up during the summer, when a starving Grasshopper, his fiddle under his arm, came up and humbly begged for a bite to eat.

“What!” cried the Ants in surprise, “haven’t you stored anything away for the winter? What in the world were you doing all last summer?”

“I didn’t have time to store up any food,” whined the Grasshopper; “I was so busy making music that before I knew it the summer was gone.”

The Ants shrugged their shoulders in disgust.

“Making music, were you?” they cried. “Very well; now dance!” And they turned their backs on the Grasshopper and went on with their work.

                                                                        There’s a time for work and a time for play.

The grasshopper was only concerned with what was fun and easy to do than with the hard work of preparing for his future. He was more interested in enjoying the warmth, ease of life and pleasant weather of the season without any concern for the changes to come. The ants, being more industrious, self-disciplined and aware of what was coming were working hard to meet the needs for the winter. In other words, they took a more mature view of their existence and knew that after the pleasures of the summertime winter was coming, and it would be a hard time to survive through.

I see this as the same sort of attitude that we see with Christians who only want to hear about the joy of salvation, about how much Yeshua (Jesus) loves them and how wonderful it will be when Messiah returns and they are raptured into the clouds to be with God forever. Nice stuff, really, but what about all the other things that God tells us will happen in those End Days?  How are they preparing to live through the Tribulations promised to occur in Revelation? How are they going to be able to maintain their faith is it is only based on the wonderful things about God?

God is going to destroy nearly 2/3 of the earth, including what is up in the sky, here on the land and down in the sea. Even the stars and heavenly bodies will be affected. And there is no guarantee that you and I won’t be here when it happens. There will also be persecution of those that worship God and reject the Antichrist. If someone is all about love and joy and acceptance, then how will they maintain their faith in God when the enemy of God offers them even more? Those who’s faith is based on the “nice” stuff will have that offered to them right now! They will be told, “You don’t have to wait, you can be powerful, happy, and have whatever you want right now if you simply accept my rule and bow down to me.”

Truth be told, God promises eternal joy, peace and comfort if we bow down to Him, too, so how can we know who we should bow down to? Maybe, just maybe, by reading the bible and being open to all that it says, the good and the bad, the joy and the tribulations to come, so that we will be able to recognize the lies of the enemy when we hear them. We need to be like the ants working hard (at our salvation) to prepare for winter. Those who only want to hear about joy and love are like the grasshopper, making pleasant music but not preparing for the hard times ahead.

The grasshopper will bow down to the enemy because he is all about the good times, and when things get hard he will be starving (spiritually) and will look for comfort from anyone who offers it.  But the ant, who knows what to expect, will reject the enemy because he knows what is coming and is preparing for it.  When things are hard, he will be (spiritually) prepared to last through the winter.

We need to be like the ant and not have blinders to the reality of the terrible things that will come before and when Messiah returns. He is not coming back as the Lamb of God- He is coming back as the Son of David, the conquering King of the world and it will be a real mishigas!

I also like to hear about the joy and peace we will have for all eternity when the Acharit HaYamim (End Days) have run their course. It’s great news!  And not only do I look forward to that day, faithfully expecting it to happen, but I also know of the terrible things we will have to get through BEFORE all that good stuff is here, with just as much faithful expectation.

And because I do know what is coming, I am prepared to get through it.

Many people I have known over the years since I accepted Messiah wear rose-colored blinders. They only want to hear about God’s love for them, and every discussion ends up, one way or another, with something along the lines of God loves us and He protects us and He is wonderful, yadda-yadda-yadda. Yes, God is all those things, and He is also judge, jury and executioner of the nations. As much as we can count on His promises of joy we can count on His promises of judgement. And that judgement is not going to be fun.

The grasshopper had fun while the sun shone, but his end was not a happy one, whereas the ants survived the tribulations of winter by working hard to prepare.

Judgement Day will be the worse type of winter you could ever imagine, so let me leave you today with this one question: are you a grasshopper or an ant?

What “Under the Law” Really Means

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This is not going to be a scholarly treatise on the differences in the Greek words used for “law”, or that Torah means “teaching”, or anything that involves anything more than just some common sense and a basic understanding of God’s plan of salvation.

So let’s start with how God’s plan of salvation works. It’s really quite simple: God gave the Torah through the Jewish people to all people so that we would know two things, and just two things. They are:

  1. How to worship God; and
  2. How to treat each other.

When we do as God tells us we should be doing, we are living in accordance to His will and thereby not sinning. When we do that which God says we should not do, then we are rejecting God’s commandments, which is called “sinning.” When we sin, that sin separates us from God and if we die in our sin we cannot be with Him throughout eternity. Salvation is available to those that ask for it and do not die in their sin.

Salvation starts with the Torah, which tells us how to not die in our sin by staying within God’s will. The problem we run into is that no one is able to live in accordance with Torah, so we all will die in our sin, unless we happen to die as we are exiting the Temple in Jerusalem right after performing a sin sacrifice.

Oh, wait a minute! The Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed! That’s OK because God has us covered for that one; again, all part of the plan.

Right from the start, even before God gave us Torah, He knew this would all happen so He had a back-up plan. That plan is called Messiah. The Messiah would present Himself as a sin sacrifice for all people, and through His sacrifice we would be able to atone for our sin, even though the Temple is no longer available to us. Messiah’s sacrificed “trumped” the animal sacrificial system that was what we needed before Messiah came.

Today we try to live our lives as God told us we should (Torah) and when we fail to do that we ask for forgiveness, which we can receive as a result of our T’shuvah (repentance) and by means of the substitutionary sacrifice of Yeshua haMashiach.

That’s it! God gave the world the Torah (through the Jewish people) and because we couldn’t obey the Torah as we should, He sent Messiah Yeshua (again, through the Jewish people) to suffer the penalty we all (Jew and Gentile) deserve so that we can overcome sin and be in God’s presence for all eternity.

Now that we have a basic understanding of how salvation works, the next step is to understand the difference between being under the law and obedience to the law.

Under the law is a term used in the New Covenant writings to describe a system that understands salvation to be a result exclusively from obedience to rules and regulations. It doesn’t account for a desire to obey as a result of love for God. Faith is not needed in this system because salvation is only possible through performance.

Obedience to the law means that we choose to obey the rules and regulations that God gave us as a means of proving our T’shuvah (repentance) and comes from a desire to please God. It is not a means to gain salvation. Salvation is only possible through faith; we obey because we love God and show that by obedience to His word.

The Torah is the User Manual for staying in God’s will. We obey the Torah because we want to show God that we fear Him (as in honor and respect) and to show others how God wants them to act. We should obey Torah as a love response to God’s kindness, His sovereignty and His authority.

When we are obedient to Torah we are not doing so to “get into heaven”, but because we want to do as God says and because we respect and honor Him.

Obedience to Torah is not a means to be saved, it is a way to show God how much you love Him. In John 14:15 Yeshua told His Talmudim (disciples) that if they loved Him, they would obey Him: everything He taught was directly from the Torah, so to love Yeshua means to obey the Torah.

Can you see the difference now? Obedience to the law is all about faith and desire to please God, whereas under the law is nothing more than a means to an end.

And since no one can be perfectly under the law, those means lead to only one end- damnation.

Many people say they love Jesus, they love the Lord, they love, love, love…but do they ever even try to love God the way He asks them to? No- they excuse and rationalize disobedience to the Torah.

Do you love God? Do you love Yeshua? If so, do you prove it by living the way God says you should, or are you living the way you want to?

Which one do you think God will accept?

Parashah Ki Tesa 2018 (When You Take) Exodus 30:11 – 34

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This parashah holds two of the most amazing and influential passages of the bible: the sin of the Golden Calf, and the 13 Attributes of God.

Chapter 32 retells the sin of the Golden Calf, and after Moses goes back up the mountain to ask God to forgive the people, he also asks God to “show me, I pray Thee, Thy glory”, which God agrees to do. When God passes by Moses He proclaims Himself, and these are what we call the 13 Attributes of God.

Today I want to talk about a very small sentence that represents a very magnificent reality: God treats everyone the same way.

In Chapter 30, at the beginning of this parashah God tells Moses to take a census of the people and that everyone has to pay a ransom for their soul. Each person counted is to give the same amount, a half-shekel. And at verse 15 God says:

The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less, than the half shekel, when they give the offering of the Lord, to make atonement for your souls.

To me this means that God is asking from each person the same amount because each person is, to God, the same in His eyes. Whether rich or poor, intelligent or unlearned, good-looking or weak of countenance, to God we are all the same. He doesn’t look at our outward appearance and cares not for our financial strength because God looks at our heart.

This is confirmed later, in Chapter 33, verse 19 when He agrees to show Moses His glory, and states:

I will make all My goodness pass before thee, and will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.

Because God is always the same, Kefa (Peter) confirms this nearly 1,500 years later, in Acts 10:34:

So Peter opened his mouth and said: “Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.”

God will not be moved or change His mind about something simply because a person is destitute, or rich, or important in the worldview. God will and does treat every single living person on Earth as one of His children. Whether or not they accept and acknowledge Him as God, or accept and acknowledge Yeshua as Messiah, God still treats them the same way.

You may be thinking, “Wait a minute! God treats all people the same way? Are you crazy, Steve?  Are you saying that God will bless sinners who reject and curse His name the same way He treats a godly person who obey’s Torah and loves Him?”

Yes, that is exactly what I am saying, and No, it is not as you may think.

When I say God treats everyone the same way I mean that God will see each person not for what the world thinks is important, but for what God thinks is important. God will not have special concern for a person’s physical well-being, or their finances, or their position the business world, or even their rank within a church or synagogue.  To God, we are all the same, and we all will be treated the same way, which is according to what we deserve.

That is how God treats everyone the same way: we all get what we deserve.

There is one exception to this: those that have accepted Yeshua as their Messiah, who work their salvation in truth, having done T’shuvah (repentance) and who fear God will not receive all they deserve because Yeshua has paid that price for us. Thank God for that! Literally.

From this lesson we need to move forward knowing that God sees everyone for who and what they are, and since we can’t we need to trust God to judge and avenge Himself as He sees fit.  We should not take the position of judge away from God because, frankly, we aren’t fit for that role. We cannot judge fairly as God does because we are human, we are in the world, we are saturated by its standards and whether we like it or not, we cannot be partial in the way God can be partial.

Admitting this is not something that should make us feel bad, it should instead give us a sense of relief. To judge is very difficult, and to judge fairly is almost impossible. I, for one, am very happy to let God do that. I have written many, many evaluations during my lifetime and they are hard to do- if any of you has done this, you know what I mean. The weight of having someone’s future, their family’s support and the person’s self-worth in my hands is a very heavy burden.  Now if we took that up to the level of judging the world, well….better to let God handle it.

Take joy in the truth that God judges everyone equally, as we deserve, and take even greater joy in knowing that because of Yeshua, we will not actually receive that which we really deserve.