“Would You think me irreverent if this time I do not let you go?”
The disciples tried to make you get into the boat after you walked to them upon the waters and calmed the sea, but You sent them and their boat away . . . without You!
John lay on Your breast at dinner, enjoying the presence of the One with Whom he spent a most memorable Sabbath the night he first followed You, but now You were hanging on a tree, and in the final heaves of that once comforting chest, you said, “Son, behold your mother!” And death took You! And You were gone!
Miriam clung to you when she realized you were her resurrected Raboni, her Teacher, her Master, the One who delivered her from demons. “Don’t cling to me!” You said. “I’ve not ascended unto my Father.”
Your Disciples walked with you out to Bethany on the 40th day of the Omer. Just a friendly walk with the Lover of their souls, and then a cloud took You . . . just like that! You were gone!!
When I finally see You face-to-face;
When I bow in the presence of Your Majesty;
When I fall prostrate before my King;
When I finally get through the throngs that will be vying for a chance to touch You;
When it’s my turn…Please don’t think me irreverent, this time, if I don’t let You go!
Would You Think Me Irreverent?
10 Men. 1 Woman.
Zechariah 8:23 says there is going to come a time when 10 men from the nations will grab the hem, the tzit tzit (the fringed tassels), of a Jew, and they will say, “We are going with you because God is with you.” If we are not at that place, we are quickly approaching it. The Church is coming back to its Jewish roots. Believers are longing to see life Biblically (Hebraically) and not from a Greek mindset as we have been doing since the days of Aristotle and the Age of Enlightenment. The nations are becoming a large part of Israel, the Bride of Messiah. The 10 men from the nations are awakening!
In rabbinic understanding, in order to start a synagogue or to pray effectively, there must be a minion which is made up of 10 men, usually. According to Zechariah, 10 men WILL embrace the Jewish roots of their faith and be the catalyst for the nations to come. Is one of those men — YOU?
But Mark 5 tells me of a woman. She wasn’t from the nations. She was very sick, had been that way for twelve years. She was not supposed to appear in public because not only did her perennial hemorrhaging make her unclean, but those who touched her would be unclean as well. But she was in a desperate situation, having spent all that she had and the doctors still left her in that same sickened state. She had nothing to lose. Rejection had been her life before, so to be rejected by appearing in public was nothing new. She had heard “No” a million times before. She had been told, “There is nothing I can do.” So she had nothing to lose. She pressed her way through a crowd to get to Yeshua.
I don’t know if she had ever heard the rabbis read the Scripture about “the sun of righteousness rising with healing in his wings” (his tzit tzit) (Malachi 4:2), but she was about to test its veracity. There was the Son of Righteousness, some had said. He was in front of her, encompassed by the crowd! And there were His wings (fringed tassels — tzit tzit) trailing him as he walked. There was no prophecy of her as it was of the 10 men.
This one woman reached out and grabbed his tzit tzit, and her whole world changed. The blood stopped. A miracle took place in her body, and the King of the world stopped to address her: “Woman, Your faith has made you whole!”
“What faith??” I can hear her asking. “My desperation? All of my life’s experiences that brought me to this point? You saw faith, Healer. I saw my only hope! I saw that crawling on the ground to get to you was no worse than being ostracized from the hub of Jerusalem. So I did it!”
10 men will!
One woman did!
Is that woman — YOU!!!
You Have An Open Invitation
What if God told you when He would meet with you? Would you go? Would you stop the world so that you could make this appointment? Would it take the utmost priority in your schedule? What if He told you the conditions under which to approach Him? Would you meet those conditions?
Adonai declared to the children of Israel that He would meet with them as a people during several times throughout the year. In Leviticus 23:1-2, “The LORD said to Moses, ‘Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘These are my appointed feasts, the appointed feasts of the LORD, which you are to proclaim as sacred assemblies.’” We believe that Adonai is speaking so vociferously in the underscored words. Adonai says these feasts are His. He has appointed moments in this space-time continuum when He will meet with His people. These times have been appointed. To us, that means we cannot change these times. They cannot be altered. They are set in stone. He has declared these times to be sacred, a time when the Divine meets the human and the human is allowed entrance into the presence of the Divine. Wow! Imagine—all of God’s people on those days assembling themselves to worship the Creator and to hear from Him! Imagine this—that one of the most assured ways of meeting with Yeshua is on the days He selected!
Maybe you never thought that Leviticus 23:1-2 was a clarion call to you! Maybe you thought you were not included in these appointed feasts of the Lord! Maybe you thought that these appointments were no longer in effect! Or just maybe you have always been curious about them but didn’t know how to go about securing more information!
Messianic Pastors David & Juanita Weiss and the Kingdom Life Messianic Congregation, a kehillat of Jewish & nonJewish believers in Messiah Yeshua, cordially invite you to share with us as we celebrate these appointed times with Yeshua as the center:
ROSH HASHANAH/YOM TERUAH (The Feast of Trumpets) Yom Yom Teruah *Monday, September 14, 10:30 A.M. *Saturday, September 19, 10:30 A.M., Concert with Messianic Worship Leader Jimmie Black from Beit B’resheet, St. Louis, MO
YOM KIPPUR (The Day of Atonement) *Erev Yom Kippur, Tueday, September 22, 7:00 – 9:00 P.M. *Yom Yom Kippur, Wednesday, September 23, 10:30 A.M.
SUKKOT (The Feast of Tabernacles) Sukkot (September 27 – October 5) *Erev Sukkot, Sunday, September 27, Bible Study in the Sukkah, Wednesday, September 30, Hoshana Rabbah (Great Hoshana), Sunday, October 4 (Morning Service at the Campground), *Shemini Atzeret, (8th Day Assembly) *Simchat Torah, (Joy of the Torah), Tuesday, October 6, 7:00 – 9:00
You have an open invitation to have several feasts with Adonai and to celebrate Yeshua HaMaschiach! Join us at any or all our celebrations!
He’s waiting for your RSVP.
TRUE VS. TRUTH
In Numbers 14, Moses sends the spies out to scout the Land of Canaan — all 12 of them. They scout the land for 40 days. Ten of them bring back a negative report. What they report is TRUE, which is the reality they discern with their senses. BUT it is not TRUTH. Yeshua called Himself the Way the TRUTH and the life! Anything that is not seen through His filter, though it may be TRUE, it is NOT TRUTH!!
It was TRUE that there were giants in the land . . . but that was not TRUTH!
It was TRUE that there were walled cities . . . but that was not TRUTH!
It was TRUE that these giants were powerful . . . but that was not the TRUTH!
Their untruthful statements stir the people to unrest.
Caleb, one of the spies, along with Yehoshua, brought the good report
They tried to get the people to listen to TRUTH, not what is TRUE
TRUTH —
“Adonai said we can take it so let’s go do it; He said it is ours;
“He has given it to us; so let’s possess it!”
They didn’t want to hear TRUTH!
They were too busy focusing on the walled cities, the giants, and they were so busy seeing themselves through the eyes of the enemies, what was true, indeed!!! But it was not TRUTH!
All night long they complained against TRUTH (Have you ever done it?)
All night long they murmured (Have you ever been there?)
“We should have died in Egypt
Or at least in the desert
Now we’ll die here
Our wives & children will be taken as plunder
Why not go back to Egypt”
Moses and Aaron fall to their faces in repentance.
YEHOSHUA the son of Nun tears his clothing and intercedes:
HE is the PRODDER, prodding his people to trust God. He says,
“This land is very good!
If the Lord is pleased with us,
He will lead us into the land!
Don’t rebel!
Don’t be afraid!
We will swallow them up!
Their protection is gone;
The Lord is with us!”
It is TRUTH that he speaks to them in the face of what’s TRUE.
Then they tried to stone TRUTH
!
Then God Himself, the voice of TRUTH speaks, but His TRUTH is not in their favor!
PRAYER: Father, we battle all day with TRUTH and what is TRUE! We have many times chosen what’s TRUE! Forgive us! Forgive us for complaining against TRUTH and even trying to silence it! Yeshua, you ARE TRUTH! Help us to see ourselves and this world from the TRUTH of your eyes. Amen!
Passover Seder
CONGREGATIONAL PASSOVER SEDER
Saturday, April 4, 2015, 5:00 p.m.
Kingdom Life Messianic Congregation
1280 Bells Mill Road, Chesapeake, VA 23322
Cost: Adults – $22 per person Children (12 & under) – $11
(includes full seder with meal: appetizers, orange chicken with caramelized onions, honeyed carrots, potatoes, green beans, dessert, and all the spiritual food of the Seder Plate)
E-mail us if you wish to attend or text Pam at (757) 277-4759
This Appointed Time helps you make the connection between Passover, the Crucifixion and the Resurrection — between the Old and the New. Taste the symbols of the Seder Plate and be transported to the Exodus from Egypt to the night of Our Lord’s Sacrifice and finally to the the Marriage Supper of the Lamb! Your faith in the promises of God and the God who promises will be strengthened!
Call us soon! Seating is limited!
What To Do With Martyrs!
Terrorists walk into a synagogue while rabbis are in morning prayer and hack them mercilessly. Isis marched thirteen Coptic Egyptian Christians out to the beach and beheaded them, their blood crimsoning the ebbing waters. They lit aflame a Jordanian fighter pilot inside the cage in which they held him. These are just three instances of atrocities that ISIS has committed against Jews, Christians, their own, and the West. The world was appalled at these events, and so the world should be.
But how should we as Believers respond?
When Stephen was martyred, consider the aftermath:
On that day a great persecution broke out against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. 2 Godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him. 3 But Saul began to destroy the church. Going from house to house, he dragged off both men and women and put them in prison. 4 Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went. (Acts 8:1-4)
They buried him, they mourned him, but they never stopped preaching the Word for which Stephen had given his life so selflessly. We oftentimes get caught up in the snapshot of what we consider reality as opposed to what God sees. Our Omniscient God, like Stephen, knew that stoning was not the end of Stephen’s life; it was the beginning of a movement. It was the beginning of revival. Hallelujah!!! It was the beginning of creation moving closer to its completion.
The Coptic Egyptian Christian who called on the Name of Jesus before he was martyred does not want our response to his martyrdom to be just astonishment, sadness, or despair. I’m sure what he would want is an explosion of the Word of God. It’s what I would want if I were a martyr! Most importantly, it’s what God wants.
Believers in Yeshua, we cannot be so taken aback by the world’s heinous behavior when the world does only what it knows to do — evil!!! Our job is to do what we have been called to do: share indiscriminately the Good News of the Word.
Yes, we will pray for the salvation of the world and of the enemies of Messiah. But there will be martyrs! The Word speaks of it. So, over a martyred body, let’s declare Yeshua is Lord and allow that martyred seed to be the catalyst for the explosion of the Gospel. Only then can we hasten the return of Messiah who will finally put an end to all that is evil!! So be it!
It’s a Set-Up!!!
Ever been surrounded by job loss on one side, a wayward child on another, and medical issues on yet another side? At that point you wonder:
- Where is God???
- Why am I in this situation??
- Did He bring me out to destroy me?
What I realize from my experience with God is that “It’s a Set-up!”
When the Children of Israel left Egypt, they left with great rejoicing! After over 400 years of slavery they were free. That is . . . until God intentionally leads them into what appears to be a trap. This is what he tells Moses: “Tell the Israelites to turn back and encamp near Pi Hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea. They are to encamp by the sea, directly opposite Baal Zephon” (Exodus 14:1).
Apparently, the Children of Israel were hemmed in with mountains on all sides and the Red Sea in front of them. You have to wonder: A Trap? Or a Set-up? The Children of Israel saw it as a Trap! God saw it differently. This is what He says to Moses: “When Pharaoh sees their location, he will think ” . . .
- ‘The Israelites are wandering around the land in confusion, hemmed in by the desert.’ (NIV)
- ‘The Israelites are confused. They are trapped in the wilderness!’ (NLT)
- ‘They are wandering aimlessly in the land; the wilderness has shut them in.’ (NASB)
- ‘They are entangled in the land, the wilderness hath shut them in. (JPS)
God intentionally sent His children into what seemed to be a trap . . . and here is the reason: “I will get Me honour upon Pharaoh, and upon all his host; and the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD.” (Exodus 14:4 JPS). IT WAS A SET-UP!
Consider this New Testament scenario: Yeshua has just worked miracles among the crowd in Matthew 14:22: “Immediately Yeshua made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side.” Consider the word “made.” He coerced them! He told them! He gave them an order. As I read this passage, here is my dialogue with Yeshua:
- ME: But Yeshua, there is going to be a storm at sea and the disciples will be in the midst of it.
- YESHUA: I know.
- ME: Then why are you sending them out into the very midst of it?
Say it with me: IT’S A SET UP!
YESHUA: I’m trying to show you My glory! I want you to see a glimpse of Who I really am! I’m trying to bring you deeper into My presence!
Say it with me again: IT’S A SET-UP!!!
Whatever you’re facing today, you are not in it alone! It is true that some things we bring upon ourselves, but God can use even those things to set us up for a blessing! Between a rock & a hard place!??? Between Migdol, Baal-Zephon, Pi-hahiroth and the sea?? IT’S A SET-UP!!! Out on a boat in the midst of the storm!!! IT’S A SET-UP!!! Stop seeing things as Pharaoh did or as the Children of Israel did. It’s not a trap! IT’S A SET-UP!
Let Him get what He wants: Honor & Glory!! He’s worthy of ALL of it!!
Shalom Oveerecha,
(Peace & Blessings)
God’s Calendar
As I left the shopping center last night, my eyes were drawn to the moon. There it stood, a round, beautiful, white orb in the eastern sky. I smiled — not at the moon, per se, but at the moon’s Maker. I knew, without a doubt, that it was the middle of the Hebrew month Tevet. A full moon always occurs during the middle of the Hebrew month.
The Creator aligned the stars, planets and moons to his making! He said in Gen. 14:1, “Let there be lights in the vault of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark sacred times, and days and years.”
He’s already marked everything for us. It’s done! We don’t need to try to “create” anything new! We don’t need an astrologer, a soothsayer or a fortuneteller. He’s marked it all!
I know that the full moon is called, by some, the “harvest moon” for farmer; the “hunter’s moon” for hunters; and attributed to all kinds of superstitious lore, but do you know that there was a full moon, probably the biggest, brightest full moon ever, the night the Children of Israel left Egypt? There was a full moon on the night Yeshua was born, the night Yeshua wept in the Garden of Gethsemane, and on the night of his crucifixion. All purposeful!! Only God!!!!!
He was the one who commanded us to watch for and observe the new moon each month so that we honor and follow His unique calendar and the arrival of His special holy days. So I have decided to align my life with what God is doing. Even though I live under the Gregorian calendar, I will not set my sights there. I will live according to it in the natural, but NOT in the spiritual! January is January in the natural, but Tevet is spiritual; it is the month God has ordained!
I will set my sights upon what He said He has designated for us, so that I will know the “sacred times, the days and the years,” not to worship the moon or any other celestial being, but to observe it to follow His Calendar.
Do you want to discover what God is doing? Well, let’s align our lives with His times. And when you see a crescent moon, a full moon or just a sliver of a moon, please know that God ordered it to be so at that time and He ordered it for you.
Jews pray at the sight of every new moon. Let me pray this prayer over you during this month of Tevet: “May it be Your will, O LORD our God and God of our fathers, that you renew for us a good month in our Lord Yeshua the Messiah! Amen!”
Chodesh Tov! Have a blessed month!
(Tevet ends January 20th and the month of Shevat begins on the 21st.)
Bethsaida: The Path He Took #7
“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes” (Luke 10:13).
My Israel tour group entered the grounds of what was once the town of Chorazin — scattered stones around the ruins of a synagogue. That’s all that was left. That “Woe” that Yeshua pronounced upon the city is still in effect. No longer a living city, it is now a national park.
From there we walked toward Bethsaida, which means “House of the Fishermen.” It, like Chorazin, is a victim of its faithlessness to the presence of the Messiah, an expanse of leveled ruins. Before Bethsaida sank into spiritual coldness, however, Yeshua called three disciples from that city, one of them Phillip.
The paved road that led to this fallen city — a part of it is still there! The tour guide invited us to sit around this stone path. He said the stone pavers dated to the time of Yeshua and that Yeshua would have walked this road on his trips to and from Bethsaida. Around that road we sang, “I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back, no turning back.” I’m sure that road reminded us of the path that we, ourselves, take to walk with him.
It was time to go. I lingered behind, wanting to STAND, SIT, or even LIE PROSTRATE on that same road! It didn’t matter how many other feet had trodden its path. I wanted to sit for a while and think of Him. The mountains of Israel were still there. They had watched the Son of God come and go, traveling from Chorazin to Bethsaida. The voices of the mountains were silent, their emotions dulled, but their eyes were opened to me. I imagined him walking across those stones with the disciples, teaching them about the Kingdom.
I could have stayed at that sight a little longer . . . The tour guide Gideon hit us with an actuality — Yeshua walked that road — and then it was time to go. But somehow I had to capture the moment. When everyone had left, I gave my camera to Larry and he hurriedly memorialized that moment for me.
“No turning back!” Thank You, Yeshua, for walking that road.
“The Desert Blooms”: From Israel #5
We rode through the tribal land of Judah, which encompasses the southern part of Israel. What beautiful mountains and desert! I envisioned Abraham walking that land en route to Egypt … and Moses fleeing there when he ran from Pharoah and made a temporary home in the land of Midian. It was in that area where we saw the very isolated community of the Druze, descendants of Moses’ father-in-law Jethro. The tour guide told us that they guard the secrets of their religion, only divulging them among the ancients.What was so amazing is that even though the land looked barren and uninhabitable, the Israelis have learned to make the desert blossom according to the prophecy of Isaiah. Rows of date palms snap to military formation in the desert heat (bottom). Fields of corn abound under white plastic canopies which protect the plants from UV Rays, allowing them to grow faster and yield a greater harvest (bottom). God has blessed this land so that the Israelis are able to cultivate where nothing has ever grown, and to plant corn, tomatoes and cucumbers even in the winter.As He has brought His people back into the land, so has He made the desert come back to life. Along the Dead Sea, fresh water pools are popping up, reminding us that in the Garden of Eden, water would come up from the ground to water its fauna and foliage. Here, one is not gripped by the impossibility of such an event! These pools prove that such irrigation could have easily occurred!
Not only did I see God as a God of His Word, but I hear Him promise make a promise to you as he has made it tom me: to make an oasis in our deserts and to resurrect our inner man in this life, not just the world to come! #holdingtothepromise
Connect with Us