Author: Steven R. Bruck

Parashah V’etchanan 2020 (I besought) Deuteronomy 3:23 – 7:11

Leave a comment

Moses reminds the people of the fact that he, Moses, is not allowed to enter the land and all those who rebelled against God have died off, leaving this generation to take possession. He assigns three cities as a City of Refuge for the tribes of Gad, Reuben, and Manasseh in the land east of the Jordan.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

Moses goes on to remind the people of how God chose them to be an example of a people who live according to fair and wise laws so that all the other people can learn from their example. He tells them God never appeared in any form to them, so they shouldn’t make any form of anything and worship it. If they live according to the laws God gave them, which Moses has taught them, then they and their children will live long in the land; however, if they worship any other god they will be ejected from the land and scattered throughout the earth.

Moses reviews the Ten Commandments, which he received in the presence of the people, and reminds them (there’s a lot of reminding in this book) of how they were afraid to hear God’s voice and told Moses to be their Intercessor, which God said was a good thing for them to do.

Moses gives us the Shema and V’ahafta prayers.

Moses tells the people when they are in the land to utterly destroy the pagan idol worshipers, as well as the symbols and altars of their gods, and not to intermix with the indigenous people in any way.

Well, what have we here?  We have the Shema, the watchword of the Jewish faith, which is first and foremost the definitive declaration of the one true God and of Monotheism.

We also have the V’ahavta (“and you shall love”) prayer, which is recited after the Shema at every Jewish service that is held, everywhere in the world.

Deuteronomy is a book of retelling, of reminding, and of warning. These two prayers, however, are unique to this book, alone. Just about everything else in Deuteronomy is referencing what happened previously in the Torah, but not these two prayers. Perhaps there is a reason for that?

If you ask me, and even if you don’t, I will tell you my thinking on this (after all, it is my ministry): these two prayers are the pathway to salvation. They tell us that the LORD, Y-H-V-H is our God and the only God. We must love him with everything we are- heart, mind, and soul- obeying and teaching our children to obey his commandments. And, to ensure these commandments never are forgotten, we must bind them on our hands and before our eyes so that we are reminded of them when we go to sleep and when we wake up, and also place them on the gateposts of our house and on our doors so we see them going out and coming in. By doing these things we will never forget them, and (hopefully) by being constantly reminded of them we will do them. And if we do them, we will be righteous in the eyes of the Lord.

Now, I am sure many of you are thinking, “We aren’t saved by works but by faith, so how can Steve say these prayers are the pathway to salvation?” That is a good question, and my answer is that, at that time, the only pathway to salvation was through obedience to God’s instructions, which Moses is reminding them of now. If they learn nothing else from all that Moses is saying, by remembering the Shema and the V’ahavta they will know all they need to know to stay on the proper path.

The way we have placed God’s instructions before our eyes, on our hands, and on the doorposts of our house and gates is through the use of the Tefillin and a Mezuzah.  For those who may not be familiar with these things, let me finish today’s message with a little Jewish 101 lesson about the Tefillin and the Mezuzah.

The Tefillin (also called Phylacteries) are little black boxes with prayers inside that are tied to the left arm (which is the arm closest to the heart) and on the forehead, with the box on the bicep and between the eyes on the forehead. The strap is wrapped on the arm 7 times, and around the hand in the shape of the Hebrew letter Shin (“S”), to represent Shaddai, a name for God. The Tefillin contain four chambers, each chamber containing a prayer. The prayers inside are the following:

1–2. Kadesh(Exodus 13:1–10) and Vehayah ki yeviacha (Exodus 13:11–16): These describe the duty of the Jewish people to always remember the redemption from Egyptian bondage, and the obligation of every Jew to educate his children about this and about G‑d’s commandments.
3. Shema(Deut. 6:4–9): Pronounces the unity of the one God, and commands us to love and fear Him.
4. Vehayah (Deut. 11:13–21): Focuses on God’s assurance to us of reward that will follow our observance of the Torah’s mitzvahs.

                  

The Mezuzah is nailed to the door jamb on the right side as you enter, and the top is angled towards the house. Inside the Mezuzah is a scroll with the Shema written on it.

These two articles are essential things for every Torah observant Jew to own, although you usually only find the Orthodox and Chasidic Jews using the tefillin. However, the mezuzah is often found on every Jewish home, even those who are not very observant. It seems to be a tie to our heritage that isn’t easily broken (thank God for that!)

These symbols of obedience can remind us of one of two things: they will remind us that we are obedient, or they will remind us of how we haven’t been obedient. Either way, the one good thing is that they remind us of what we should be doing, and so long as God is not out of sight, he won’t ever be that far out of mind. So even those who have the mezuzah on their doors, which to them is nothing more than a decoration, they are still, despite themselves, being reminded of God and his commandments which should be followed, And who knows? Maybe one day they will suddenly come to realize how far short they have come to what they should be doing, do T’shuvah (turning from sin), and repent of their apostasy.

From my lips to God’s ears! Amen and Amen!

Thank you for being here and please share these messages, subscribe and (maybe) check out my books.

Until next time, L’hitraot and Shabbat Shalom!

 

Who Do We Believe?

Leave a comment

I don’t know who to believe anymore.

There are now just as many experts saying “Do this” as there are experts saying “Doing that is useless.”

I’m not talking today just about wearing masks or using some medicine, but who do we believe about anything?

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

And, of course, this being a ministry, it’s time to segue into the next topic, which is if we can’t believe experts in medicine, how can we believe “experts” regarding God, the Messiah, and what’s in the Bible?

I believe (pardon the expression) the best answer I can give you is to start off not believing anyone…believe me when I say that.  By starting off with not believing anything you hear from anyone, at least you know that you won’t be fooled from the git-go.

But you can’t go through life never believing anything, so the next step is, after listening to what you have been told, ask the one telling you where they got their information from, and then go to that source and verify the information for yourself. If they say it is in the Bible, ask for the book, chapter, and verse. If they say they heard it, ask where they heard it. If they say they read it, ask where they read it.

And if they can’t answer any of these questions, then don’t accept what they say as truth until you can find the reference or source to ensure that what you are being told is correct.

It is hard enough to discern when someone is purposefully lying to you, but the hardest lie of all to recognize is the one which comes from someone who thinks they are telling you the truth.

That’s why no one uses lie detectors anymore; it’s because the lie detector doesn’t really identify a lie, it identifies when someone knows they are lying. So, if someone believes “Finders Keepers, Loser’s Weepers” is a truth, then in their mind, if they find your wallet which you left on your desk, and they take it, to them it is not stealing. Later, when asked if they stole your wallet during a lie detector test, they would say they didn’t, and it would register as the truth.

How many traditional Christian and Jewish teachings have we heard that are untrue? Jews teach that Yeshua is not the Messiah and Christians teach that Yeshua did away with the Torah.  Both are untrue but have been taught as truth for millennia, and because these lies come from people who believe them, we believe them, too. We are being lied to by people who are credentialed, knowledgeable, generally trustworthy, and honest.  We believe them because they believe themselves; there’s another term for this type of event, and it is “the blind leading the blind.”

So, nu? Who do we believe?

We believe no one; at least, not right away. We listen, we observe, and then we verify. And if you can’t verify it, then you consider how truthful it might be based on what you already know. And if none of that works, then, well…go with your gut feeling. That’s right, I said go with your gut feeling. Remember that even Mr. Spock told Captain Kirk there are times when logic won’t help.

I believe we are all created in God’s image, and despite the fact that I am not positive what that means (although I did post a message about this recently- you can find it clicking on this link…LINK), I think there is some inherent, instinctive sense of God in everyone, which we call our “gut” feeling.

It always comes down to this: we have to choose what we will believe in. We learn from reading and listening to others, and those who have experience, credentials, and knowledge are worth listening to. We should give more credence to experienced and knowledgeable people, and remember that emotional appeal is a dangerous thing because our emotions are hard to control and often go against our better judgment.  We should trust, to some extent, our instincts, but temper them with knowledge and maturity.

Here is the scary thing: no matter why you believe something, you are going to be held accountable for that belief and how you live in accordance with that belief. What that means, in simple language, is that you can’t blame anyone else for how you live your life.

Let’s finish up by again asking “How do we know what or who to believe?” The answer is to believe whatever you choose to believe.  You can base that choice on any number of things, but the bottom line is that you must choose and you will be the only one held accountable for making that choice.

So, choose carefully, choose wisely, and do not be lazy about this choice because you will have to live with it; not just for the rest of your life, but throughout eternity.

Thank you for being here; please share these messages with others and don’t forget to subscribe to both my website and my YouTube channel.

Until next time, L’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

Marketing the Mark of the Beast

Leave a comment

We all know that the Devil is a liar. In fact, he is the father of all lies, and when he wants to destroy your soul for all eternity, I can guarantee that he will NOT come up to you and say:

 “Hi, there. I’m Satan, nice to meet you. I am here to condemn you to eternal damnation, so just sign here and we can get started.”

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video. 

 Nope, it ain’t gonna go that way. What he will do is market himself as someone who is here to help everyone, especially you. He will entice you with health, or wealth, or whatever your heart desires which is tied to earthly things. He doesn’t know our minds, but he does know our iniquities, and what human hearts desire, and that is how he can turn us from godly to satanic, in a heartbeat.

And if you are thinking, “Oh, no. Not me! I will resist the Devil!” you might be one of the first ones to accept that mark.  We have to realize that we aren’t smarter or more cunning than Satan, so we have to always be aware of our weaknesses in order to stay alert. False confidence is a tool for the Devil to use against us.

The concentration camps of the Nazis had a saying over the entry gate which was “Arbeit Macht Frei”, which means “Freedom through work”. The Jews that were selected for the showers thought that they were getting cleaned, which was probably welcomed since the traveling arrangements were disgusting. Yet, what they thought was something being done for them, was actually something being done to them. It was known as The Final Solution.

The Enemy of God will also make us think he is here to help. We are told he is a false prophet, and that he and his minions will have supernatural power which will cause many people to fall away from the faith. And let me tell you this- it will be easy for him (or maybe, her?) to do.

Don’t think so?  Well, just look at how easily people today are being controlled by the media. Look at how easily the anarchy which is growing in America is not only allowed, but encouraged by many of our leaders.  Look at the level of deep-seated resentment there still is between the races. I believe the really racist people, of whatever color, are the minority, but this country has been appeasing the noisy minority for decades now, while the silent majority allows it to go on.

The mark of the beast may not be a physical thing on our foreheads and hands, or it may be, who knows? It doesn’t really matter because the reason we take the mark will have nothing to do with what it is, but with what we are promised. We will be promised peace, racial equality, subsistence payments, free health care, and any number of earthly things that appeal to our financial and emotional senses.

There are some saying wearing a face mask is like accepting the mark of the beast. Well, I think that is a little over the top, but there is something to what they say regarding accepting something we are told to do without taking the time to verify whether or not it is really effective or necessary.

The current pandemic is more dangerous than just catching a sickness: the real danger is how easily people are being frightened and how polarizing the effect has been on the populace. There is no middle ground and no acceptance of individual rights: we are being told to wear a mask to protect others, appealing to our desire to help each other, when it may be that all we are really doing is learning to do what we are told to do. I am not talking about wearing masks being good or bad, I am talking about people being controlled by fear, and falling for the line that “Do this to show you care.”

No one really cares or they would have been wearing masks long before Covid-19. Any flu or even a common cold is potentially deadly to the high-risk group that today everyone is concerned about. And what will happen after there is a vaccine? We know from experience that vaccines do not eliminate a virus, so even after there is a vaccine will we wear masks to keep someone from getting sick? If there’s a vaccine, is it then OK to take off the mask and let them get sick? What if they can’t get to the vaccine? What if they can’t afford it? What if they are asymptomatic but sick, and by the time they show symptoms it will be too late?

All of these questions are valid, so why don’t we just decide to wear the mask from now on? Anyone who currently wears a mask to prevent others from getting sick, if you ever take it off then you must not really care but are doing it because you have been told you have to.

And that is how it will be with the mark of the beast. People will be suckered into a false sense of doing good for others, and that is when they will accept the mark, whatever it is.

You have to think about what you do, and not trust anything you hear from any media, whether news or social. People are liars when they know they are lying, and even worse liars when they think they are telling the truth.

Here’s the message for you today: always use discernment and seek the truth. NEVER accept anything you hear from anyone, and I mean A-N-Y-O-N-E! Not from friends, not from family members, not from your doctor, not what the politicians say (oy, never from politicians!), and not from your Pastor, Priest, or Rabbi.  Don’t believe anything from anyone until you have verified it for yourself, or you may just find yourself wearing a mark you never knew you accepted.

Remember: the devil won’t tell you that you are taking the mark of the beast; he will lie through his teeth in order to get you to accept whatever it is that he is offering which he tells you is to help you.

If you disagree with anything or everything I have said here today, please consider this one last thing: the Enemy of God will make you fall from Grace by convincing you that what you are doing is the right thing.

Thank you for being here, and please don’t believe anything I have said until you verify for yourself that it makes sense according to what you read in the Bible.

Please share these messages with others, subscribe to my website and YouTube channel, and remember that I always welcome your comments.

Until next time, L’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

Is God a Racist?

Leave a comment

In a manner of speaking, yes, he is.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

When the daughters of Zelophehad asked for a judgment from Moses about inheriting their father’s land, God told them they are to marry within their own tribe (Numbers 36:6.) God also said that when dealing with other peoples, the children of Israel are not to intermarry, and repeats this constantly throughout the Bible (Deut. 7:3; Joshua 23:12; 1 Kings 11:12, just to name a few places.)

So it is pretty clear that God is a racist, wanting to maintain a pure-blooded nation to serve him; in other words, there are to be no Mudbloods (for you Harry Potter fans) within the children of Israel.

Even Yeshua tells the Samaritan woman that he has come only for the lost sheep of Israel, going as far as to imply she and her people were like dogs ( Matthew 15:26).

Yet, we know that God is a God of love and compassion for all people. He has told us that he doesn’t want any sinner to die (Ezekiel 18:23), which includes Gentiles. So how can he love everyone yet tell his chosen people to be racist?

Well, the answer is fairly simple: God is not a physical racist, he is a spiritual purist, meaning he doesn’t want anyone to worship other gods. He wants spiritual purity, not racial purity.

We can see this throughout the Bible. For example, Rahab was a Canaanite, but she was accepted and adopted as a member of the people of Israel when she converted. Moses’s wife, Zipporah, was raised as a Midianite and her father was a chief and priest of Midian, yet when she married Moses she converted to his form of worship. And when Ruth converted from her Moabite paganism, not only was she accepted by God, but he made her an ancestor of the Messiah!

Many times in the Torah we read how God commands that any person who sojourns with his chosen people, meaning converts to worship of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and lives by God’s instructions, is to be considered as much a child of Israel as a native-born.

People who are racists hate those who are of different skin color or nationality or religion; they judge by what they see. However, as we are often told, God doesn’t judge as people do because he sees the heart and mind. Yes, God is a racist, in a way, but not based on the color of their skin or the place they were born- God judges based on what they worship, how they live, and how they treat others.

If we want to label the type of racism God demonstrates, it is the type where he is against all who worship any other god or thing than himself and reject his instructions on how we should live and treat others.

God isn’t concerned about marrying out of your religion or someone of different skin color; what God is concerned about is that you both believe in him, accept Yeshua as your Messiah and Savior, and live your lives in obedience to the instructions he gave us as best you can.

I am Jewish, my wife was raised Catholic, so within Judaism, I was wrong to marry her, but we both believe in God and Yeshua and try to live as God wants us to live. And, yes, there are some things that are different: we have different levels of spiritual maturity, we aren’t both exactly on the same page when it comes to Kashrut, and we differ in passion for reading the Bible, but what is important is that we both worship God and accept Yeshua as our Messiah; the rest of the stuff we are constantly working on, as is everyone else.

God is not a racist like we understand racism, and he is not a bigot as we understand bigotry, but he is absolutely determined that everyone should worship him and live their lives as he has instructed us. If that is racism, well, so be it!

Here’s the difference: human racism condemns the racist to hell, whereas God’s form of racism saves their life and brings them into eternal joy.

Thank you for being here and please subscribe and share. I always welcome your comments.

Until next time, L’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

Stress Management 101

Leave a comment

The world is quite stressed-out right now.

(There won’t be any video today. )

Whether you believe Covid-19 is a deadly disease and we all should be in isolation wearing a mask, or you believe we should all live like always because the Covid-19 isn’t any worse than any other flu, maybe just more contagious, everyone is stressed-out by this pandemic.

Whether orchestrated by China, encouraged by politics, both or neither, the economy is suffering, people are scared, the media is doing their usual fear-mongering, and the numbers we depend on have proven, to any reasonable person, that they are totally undependable.

So, nu? What to do?

My suggestion is that we all take a ride in Mr. Peabody’s Wayback Machine.

Go back to the last time we had a serious scare from a disease, such as H1N1, or the Asian Flu, but don’t go back so far that medical technology was non-existent, or (at least) much less developed than it is today. Let’s go back as far as, say, Legionnaires Disease. We survived all those diseases, and there were thousands upon thousands who died. And we did it without shutting the country down.

We survived the ridiculous gas prices in the 70s that caused so much stress; we survived the Cuban Missle Crisis, although to be fair, most of us didn’t know what was happening until it was nearly over. We survived the credit crunch of the early 80s.

And we will survive this.

The riots and lootings are, in my opinion, less a result of racism (although it is a catalyst) than it is of the stress that the country is under. When stressed out and frustrated, we get angry, and when we cannot contain our anger, we lash out. Unfortunately, racism is a very real and sinful part of America, and when you take that constant burning ember and throw the fuel of frightened people, misleading reports, lost jobs, lost income, forced isolation, and loss of personal rights, well…you get what is happening today.

So here’s the reason we went back in time: we need to remember that this is all the same stuff, different day, and we WILL get through it so long as we don’t give in to it.

For those who believe in God: keep the faith, Baby! God is in control, even when everything else is out of control, and what we are going through may be nothing more than God sitting back and saying to himself, “OK. Let’s see what they have learned.”

Look to God for the strength to maintain your faith and be faithfully patient for this to all blow over. Sooner or later the people will be tired of being lied to and controlled- Americans today may be weak and gullible, much more so than when I was a kid, but we are still full of attitude. Sooner or later, Americans- yes, even the ones that are easily fooled- will open their eyes, and then they will be really mad, but this time at the right people.

It IS frustrating to have vacations and family events canceled because of a political agenda, but think about what it was like for the first century Judeans under Roman rule, or even further back- the exiles living in Babylon. Think of the Jews in Sushan when Haman declared they are all to be killed. They were scared and frustrated, but they maintained their faith and God brought them through it.

He will do the same for those who believe in him. It may be the Acharit HaYamim, the End Days, are upon us. If that is the case, then all this mishigas is just the start, and it will get much worse. If that’s the way it is, then that’s the way it is, and so long as we maintain faith, we will be OK. Maybe not in this plane of existence, but this life isn’t what’s important- the next life is what we need to plan for.

Keep your eyes on the prize, don’t be turned from the pathway to salvation, and gird yourself for trouble. You will be going through hell, but you won’t be stopping there, and the other side is where God is waiting for you.

Thank you for being here and please remember to subscribe and share these messages. I also always welcome your comments.

Until next time, L’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

Parashah D’Varim 2020 (the Words) Deuteronomy 1 – 3:22

2 Comments

We have now come to the last book of the Torah.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

It is the 11th month of the 40th year since the Israelites came out of Egypt, and Moses knows he will not be crossing over with the people, so he gathers them together and reviews the past 40 years with them. This is, in essence, his last teaching, his good-bye speech, and he wants to make sure he doesn’t leave anything out with this final warning to the people.

In this first section, he reviews their travels and events, starting with leaving Mount Horeb (Sinai) and taking them to the recent victory over the two kings, Sihon and Og, whose conquered lands he gave to the Reubenites, Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh.

This book is a recap of the travels, experiences, and teachings that the Israelites have undergone for the past 40 years. Moses states that the old generation, the ones that rebelled when they first came to the Promised Land, have all died in the desert, as God said they would, and now Joshua is to lead this generation into the Promised Land, and do so without fear because God will be going ahead of them and will protect them.

As we go through this book, there are some things I think we should be most aware of.

In Deut. 5, Moses restates “The Ten Words”, the Ten Commandments God gave us.

He also tells the people (Deut. 9) not to become proud and think they are in the Land because they deserve to be (when I read this I automatically think of Romans 11:18); no, they are there because God has kept his promise to their faithful and obedient Fathers (the Patriarchs), but the ones Moses is talking to now are rebellious, stiff-necked children. Moses reminds them of the many ways they have disobeyed and complained against the Lord for the past 40 years.

In a number of places, Moses warns the people against apostatizing and serving other gods, telling them that when (notice he doesn’t say “if”) they do, God will eject them from the land just as he did the people before them.

One of the most important chapters, in my opinion, of the entire Torah, is Chapter 28, The Blessings and Curses, where Moses tells the people exactly what blessings they receive for obedience and the curses they will suffer for disobedience.

Finally, God gives Moses and song for the people to learn (Deut. 32) and pass down throughout their generations as a testimony against them so that when they reject God and are dispersed, they will remember this song and know that what happened was their own fault.

This is Moses’ last chance to warn the people against disobedience, which is why he reviews the entire Torah, all the laws God has given, and all the times the people rebelled against them.  He reminds them of how God has protected them when they were obedient and punished them when they disobeyed and emphasizes often that as long as they do what God has told them, they will live a long and peaceful existence in the land they are about to enter.

What you must realize is that the constant admonition from Moses to obey God’s instructions is valid for everyone, not just the Israelites that lived back then. Remember: God told Moses in Exodus 19:6 that the Israelites were to be his (God’s) nation of priests, and that means these lessons that were to be learned, everything Moses reviews in this book of Deuteronomy, is just as valid for both Jews and Christians today as it was for the Israelites back then.

In fact, these instructions are for everyone in the entire world.

If you want to know what God wants from you, all you have to do is read this book, Deuteronomy.

The last thing I want to talk about today is this:

Deuteronomy 29:28: “Things which are hidden belong to Adonai our God. But the things that have been revealed belong to us and our children, forever, so that we can observe all the words of this Torah. 

Too many people want to know every single tidbit and iota of information about every single aspect of God and the Bible. Now, it is never wrong to want to know God better, and the best way to do that is to study his word, but when the need to know gets in the way of the ability to accept faithfully that all God wants us to know we have been told, then (in my opinion) it becomes a sin. God hasn’t just told us that all we need to know we have been told, but that anything else is above our pay grade, and only for him to know.

Just remember that the next time someone wants to argue about details that aren’t specifically in the Bible because reading between the lines can be a two-edged sword.

Thank you for being here and please subscribe, share these messages to help this ministry grow; I never ask for money, I just want to give people the right information so they can make an informed decision about where they will spend eternity.

Until next time, L’hitraot and Shabbat Shalom!