Tag Archives: Jesus

FFOZ TV Review: Speaking in Parables

November 6, 2013 James Pyles Leave a comment

Episode 18: It may be surprising to many Christians that the use of parables was not unique to Jesus but was rather a Jewish literary art form that had been developed over centuries. Viewers will learn in episode eighteen that Jesus used parables not as riddles but stories to help clarify his points. Jesus’ parables attempted to make it easier for his listeners to grasp his words. Like the other rabbis of his day, Messiah used parables to serve as simple explanations and illustrations to help us understand his message about the kingdom.

-from the Introduction to FFOZ TV: The Promise of What is to Come
Episode 18: Speaking in Parables

The Lesson: The Mystery of Speaking in Parables

This is another First Fruits of Zion (FFOZ) perspective on a common “attribute” of Jesus, in this case, how he taught using parables, that for me, revealed more about how Christians think than about the topic itself. I always assumed that the parables of Jesus were metaphors designed to communicate complex concepts and ideas in a simple manner. This is probably because in my previous career as a psychotherapist, using metaphors was a common method I employed to accomplish the same thing.

But apparently, it’s generally understood in the Church that Jesus used parables to confuse his listeners and to hide the truth from the Jewish people. He spoke in riddles in order to prevent the Jews from repenting and returning to God, which, if repentance had occurred, would have resulted in Israel entering the Messianic Age.

According to FFOZ teacher and author Toby Janicki, it’s easy to understand why modern Christians might get that idea:

His disciples approached him and said, “Why is it that you speak to them in parables?” He answered them and said, “Because to you it is given to know the secrets of the kingdom of Heaven, but to them it is not given. For to one who has, it will surely be given, and he will have extra, but for one who does not have, even what he does have will be taken away from him. That is why I speak to them in parables. For in their seeing they will not see, and in their hearing they will not hear, nor do they even understand.

In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Yeshayah that says,

‘Listen well, but you will not understand. Look closely, but you will not know. Fatten the heart of this nation, and make its ears heavy and seal its eyes, so that it will not see with its eyes or hear with its ears or understand with its heart or repent and be healed’.”

–Matthew 13:10-15 (DHE Gospels)

This seems to be another case of misunderstanding what appears to be a plain message because we are not approaching the words of the Master using a historical, cultural, and Rabbinic Jewish lens. Toby used to introduce himself in earlier episodes by saying he is a Gentile who is practicing Messianic Judaism, but in the past few episodes, he has described himself as a Gentile who studies Messianic Judaism. I’m becoming increasingly convinced that such a framework is truly required by Gentile Christians if we’re ever to get past our own cultural and historic misconceptions of the Gospels and hear and understand what Jesus is actually saying to his original audience and to us. Maybe we could use a few parables to get that message through our own “thick skulls.”

Toby said the way to understand Matthew 13:10-15 is to go to the section of the Book of Isaiah from which Jesus was quoting:

He said, “Go and say to this people, ‘Surely you will hear, but you do not comprehend; and surely you see, but you fail to know. This people is fattening its heart, hardening its ears, and sealing its eyes, lest it see with its eyes, hear with its ears, and understand with its heart, so that it will repent and be healed’.”

–Isaiah 6:9-10 (Stone Edition Tanakh)

Toby told his audience that the conjunction “but” as in “but you do not understand” would better be rendered as “and”. If we substituted the word “and” for “but” in the scripture from Isaiah 6, it would read more like God telling Isaiah that He wants the prophet to relate a message of repentance, but that the people are not going to listen to him.

Otherwise, it looks like God is saying, through Isaiah, that He wants the people to repent, but He also is making it impossible for them to hear the message and obey. Sort of a cosmic “bait and switch,” with God playing the role of the infinite trickster in relation to Israel. This is very reminiscent of how some Christians say God only gave the Torah (Law) to Israel to prove to them that it was impossible to obey, setting them up to understand why they needed grace and Jesus Christ in order to be saved; setting them up to realize that the Torah was never, ever meant to be a permanent lifestyle for the Jewish people, even though the Torah, Prophets, and Writings are replete with messages indicating that both the Torah and the Jewish people would forever exist before God.

Jesus quoted Isaiah 6:9-10 in order to explain that he was like Isaiah, a prophet preaching repentance to an Israel that was already spiritually blind and deaf, unable to see or hear or understand in order to repent and be healed (although in a Jewish context, being healed wasn’t just individual salvation, but the healing and restoration of the entire nation of Israel).

We have arrived at the first clue:

Clue 1: Jesus did not use parables to blind eyes or deafen ears.

In fact, the opposite seems true. Jesus knew his audience was already spiritually blind and deaf, and maybe he thought using simple parables instead of complex theological arguments would make the message of repentance and restoration easier to understand.

But what exactly is a parable and who typically uses it as a teaching method? For the answer to that question, the scene shifts to Israel and FFOZ teacher and translator Aaron Eby.

Aaron said that parables were used long before Jesus as a common teaching tool by prophets and even by other Rabbis who were contemporaries of the Master. Aaron quotes Ezekiel 17:12 and the parable of the eagle that plucks off a treetop (watch the episode to hear Aaron’s explanation of the parable) to make his point.

Aaron related that the word for parable in Hebrew is mashal, and that the Sages often used a mashal to explain something that was highly conceptual and difficult to understand. Aaron, like Toby, told his listeners that a mashal was designed to make something easier to understand, not take a plain idea and turn it into a riddle. In fact, in the day of Jesus, it was completely normal and expected for a Rabbi to teach using parables, so the disciples and followers of Christ expected it.

We return to Toby in the studio and come to the second clue:

Clue 2: Parables were a common teaching device used to simplify complex concepts.

Toby takes us to another Gospel scripture to further explain why Jesus taught in parables:

With many parables like these, he spoke to them the word according to what they were able to hear. Other than with a parable, he did not speak to them. But when his disciples were with him and no one else was with him, he would explain everything to them.

–Mark 4:33-34 (DHE Gospels)

This still seems like Jesus is using parables to obscure the truth but explaining everything to his disciples privately, however Toby said we need to consider another perspective. One that, once I heard it, I realized I’d been taught before.

The Rabbis of that time taught using a dual teaching method. They taught the common people, the simple farmers and shepherds, using parables in order to make difficult theological issues better understood. However to the disciples who continually studied under their Rabbinic Master, the teacher would relate these same concepts in a more formal and legal manner, since they were better equipped, being the Master’s students, to understand in greater depth.

Clue 3: Jesus taught the common people as they were able to hear him.

Remember that Mark describes Christ’s use of parables as, “he spoke to them the word according to what they were able to hear.” He used parables because that’s what the people were able to hear. They wouldn’t have understood a more detailed and technical explanation in the same way the disciples understood.

What Did I Learn?

I had a basic understanding that parables were metaphors in the purpose of their use, but this episode presented parables and their nature in greater detail than I had access to previously. It’s also another example (for me) that God does not desire to hide information, to trick people, to be an agent of confusion, but rather, He wants us to understand, to trust, to believe, and to realize that a Sovereign God is a just and honest God. Sovereignty doesn’t mean God will pull a “bait and switch” just because He’s entitled to as Creator of the Universe.

I also saw again how in lacking a proper Jewish contextual, legal, historical, and cultural framework when we read the Apostolic Scriptures or any other part of the Bible, we will misunderstand, sometimes tremendously misunderstand, who Yeshua is, what he taught, and why he taught it. The Messianic “good news” will be tinted an alien shade of “Gentile,” resulting in a “Goyim-friendly” New Testament that is required to remove continual Jewish Torah covenant obligation so that it can be replaced with something newer and “better.”

As I said before, when Toby introduced himself as a Gentile who studies Messianic Judaism, it revealed something about me and how I approach my faith. I really do believe and accept the FFOZ premise that Messianic Judaism is a method by which non-Jewish believers can and must study in order to comprehend God, the Messiah, the Bible, our Jewish companions in the faith (and outside the faith), and ourselves better. Otherwise, we’re missing out on a great deal of understanding and truth.

I don’t think anyone intended this part of the episode to be adapted in this way, but I wonder if when Jesus (and Isaiah before him) said that “this nation, and make its ears heavy and seal its eyes, so that it will not see with its eyes or hear with its ears or understand with its heart or repent and be healed,” they realized these words could possibly be applied to much of the Christian church today?

Oh, one more thing. The top image on each of these FFOZ TV reviews is just a screenshot, not an embedded link to the video. The link to the video is just under the italicized introduction to the review as the title of episode, such as in today’s case, Episode 18: Speaking in Parables.

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The Door and the Capstone

November 5, 2013 James Pyles Leave a comment

Yeshua has been exalted to the Father’s right hand (to the position of supreme authority) to bring Israel to repentance and forgiveness, but repentance and forgiveness for what? This is a very important question, and one that is almost never asked or answered. Let’s do that today!

In part the answer you give to this question will be based on your presuppositions and your theological conditioning. Many people will reflexively say, “to repent for not having received him when he first came.” But is this answer satisfactory? I am afraid the answer must be, “Not at all!” That is, not if you want to be consistent and logical! Why am I saying that this reflexive answer is inadequate?

-Stuart Dauermann
“The Risen Messiah and Israel’s Return to Torah”
Interfaithfulness.org

I hope I don’t make a complete mess of the points Dr. Dauermann made in his blog post, but when I read it, a whole area of questions and (hopefully) answers opened up in my mind. One of the questions was one that some Christians ask me from time to time: “Why do Messianic Jews need Jesus?”

With all of the emphasis on Torah and Torah observance seen in the Messianic Jewish and Hebrew Roots worlds, it can look to an outside Christian viewer like Messianic Jews don’t require Jesus for personal salvation. It’s actually an interesting question, because prior to the first advent, there was a perfectly acceptable system in place for Jewish people to be reconciled to God and have their sins forgiven. That system had existed (off and on, relative to the destruction and rebuilding of different versions of the Temple) for thousands of years.

Then suddenly, Jewish and Biblical history seemed to take a sharp left-hand turn:

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.

–John 14:6 (NASB)

All of a sudden, the system that God established many, many centuries before was no longer good enough. Faith and devotion to God (the Father) wasn’t good enough. An additional requirement was attached to the list, one that was never presupposed in the Torah and the Prophets. A very specific faith in and devotion to the Messiah, Son of David.

Progressive Revelation could probably answer that one, but I have problems with the concept. I have problems with the idea that I, as an average Christian guy with no special religious education or background, could know God more fully than a man like Abraham who was called God’s friend, or Moses, who was the greatest prophet ever known in Israel. But progressive revelation says I know stuff that those guys never had a clue about.

I don’t think the Bible could be that disjointed. If the entire Bible we have today is all “God-breathed,” then it can’t contradict itself. The Tanakh (Old Testament) mentions little or nothing about personal salvation. Any redemption, reconciliation, and restoration recorded in its pages all has to do with the redemption of Israel, the nation, the people as a body, as if they were all one man.

I know exactly why I need Jesus and what he provides me, because I had no hope of a relationship with God before Messiah. Every single Jewish person who has ever lived was born into a relationship with God, whether they choose to acknowledge that fact or not.

But what are we supposed to do about John 14:6?

His first sign fails to place the Messiah into proper perspective as the Jewish king who must remain subservient to HaShem. I know how it comes about that non-Jews in particular feel the need to focus on the Messiah as the center of their spiritual universe. I will describe it in terms of entering into a house. When one’s goal is to enter a house, one’s focus must be on the door as its key feature. Rav Yeshua identified himself as the door through which all who wish to approach the Father must enter (viz:John 14:6). But once one has entered, the door must no longer remain the primary focus of attention, because the purpose of entering the house is further inside. Continuing to focus on the door turns one back toward the outside rather than toward the original goal inside. There are reasons for doing both, but the priority is inside rather than outside. But those who remain outside, as in a regrettably real manner Christians have done for many centuries, cannot see the Father who is behind the door but can see only the door. Perhaps it might be said that their relationship with the Father inside consists solely of speaking through an only partially-opened doorway. Thus they continue to view the door itself as their central focus.

Now, I must caution everyone not to make of this analogy anything more than an illustration. It is not intended as an allegory of salvation, or the kingdom of heaven, or any other particular notion. It is not intended to deny the validity of anyone’s spiritual relationships or intentions. Its sole purpose is to challenge a too-narrow focus that misses a bigger picture. For all the splendid significance of the Messiah, and his impact on everything, he is not himself everything. The Father is where everything consists and exists, and too many fail to “grok” Him and this perspective.

I’m quoting from a Jewish person’s comment on one of Derek Leman’s blog posts. This comment drew some immediate criticism, since it seems to devalue Jesus in favor of God the Father, so the commenter followed up by saying, “One does not denigrate the door by focusing on the object for which the door exists. The door will always be the means for entering in. The question is whether one will do more than merely enter.”

I’ve provided the link above to the blog post in question so you can read the entire record of comments for additional context. However, I believe we can take an added dimension to John 14:6 out of this. It may not answer all of the questions we have about Jewish access to God pre vs. post-Jesus, but I think the metaphor gives us a better understanding of Jesus as a “door.”

Saying that the sin[s] for which Yeshua was exalted for to bring Israel to repentance and forgiveness was/were the sin[s] of not accepting Him when he first came is also inadequate when considered against the broader background of scripture. Is the Messiah connected in any manner with dealing with sin more broadly considered, and is the repentance with which He is connected specifically identified anywhere? The answer is “Yes.”

The Messiah is our sin-bearer, and it is a form of crazy circular reasoning to imagine that the sin which he bears on our behalf is our failure to receive him. While we shall see that this is part of Israel’s sin, it is NOT the aspect of Israel’s sin that is in focus here.

Now we can return to Dauermann and his perspective of the Jewish Messiah and Messiah’s role in Israel’s redemption. Is it only personal salvation, one individual at a time and nothing else? Was the sin that Israel committed that Jesus must atone for Jewish rejection of Jesus? I agree with Dauermann. That’s crazy. Did the sin that Jesus came to save the rest of us, the non-Jewish world, from the rejection of Jesus…or all of our disobedience before God?

The entire Book of Ezekiel chronicles how Israel fell away from life with God through rejection of his commandments. In this, I like to quote from biblical scholar Preston Sprinkle who demonstrates how Ezekiel clearly teaches that just as Israel’s deterioration and exile, a form of national death, was connected with her failure to walk in the statutes and judgments of Torah, so her national resurrection and renewal would necessitate a divinely engineered national return to obeying the very same statutes and judgments, the nuts and bolts of Torah living. It is not that Israel causes her return to the Land through her return to his statutes and judgments, but that Israel is restored to the land where she is restored to Torah obedience and life with God.

This is what I get out of Ezekiel as well, and it adds to the picture of Messiah and Israel’s redemption I’ve been trying to paint in one way or another for the last eighteen months. Israel’s sin historically has always been its failure to walk in God’s commandments and statutes, the Torah. God has always called Israel back to Him through Torah. Messiah’s Gospel message was always, “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand,” (Matthew 4:17). Repent of what sin? Failing to walk in God’s laws. Yeshua atones for Israel’s sin of failing to walk in the Torah and calls his people Israel to return to God’s statues.

Messiah’s first coming ushered in the very beginning of the New Covenant, but the enactment of the New Covenant, as described in Jeremiah 31, is a process, not an event. It won’t be completed probably until the second coming of Messiah. It is true that God never intended that only the blood of bulls and goats should be the eternal atonement for Israel. Messiah was required for a better and permanent atonement, just as the New Covenant is God’s law written on the circumcised heart, not merely on a scroll, but he doesn’t “undo” all that God previously decreed, including the Torah, the Temple service, and the primacy of national Israel.

Messiah adds to and completes the framework of Israel, the litany of prophesies, the entire collection of promises God made to the Jewish people from Abraham forward. Messiah is the culmination, the capstone, the piece to the house that, at the very top of the structure, holds everything together, allowing all of the other parts to rest against him, and he supports everything.

In a very real way, the capstone is also the doorway into the structure. Without the capstone, everything that was built, everything from Genesis through Revelation, would fall apart. That includes Israel, the Torah, Judaism, the Jewish people, the grafting in of Gentiles, all that there is that God has intended to accomplish. You don’t pour the foundation, let it set, build the house on it, put the final piece, the capstone, in place, and then pull the foundation out from under the house. It would collapse as if built on sand instead of cement. The capstone doesn’t take the place of any of the other pieces, but it is the key piece that ensures all of the other pieces stay solidly in exactly the positions they need to be for the structure to stand.

In that sense, you could say that everything God built before the coming of the Messiah was important and even vital to the overall structure, but it was incomplete. You can also say that even though the capstone exists and is being laid in place, it is not in its final position yet. Otherwise everything that needed to be done would be done, and we would have no need for a second coming. We would already be living in complete and eternal peace.

And a quick look at the world around us tells me that hasn’t happened yet.

Now I have a better image in my mind of the role of Messiah, both for the Jew and for the Gentile. Piece by piece, I’m putting my puzzle together and seeing what the picture that’s forming is telling me. Day by day, I’m getting a better understanding of who Messiah is and the multi-level set of roles he has played, is playing, and will play in our world and how he fulfills the need of all mankind as a doorway into the house of God and in holding together that house.

Perhaps the very universe itself would cease to exist if the capstone were to vanish. Perhaps we would all be locked outside in the cold and dark without the presence of a doorway. All we have to do is open the door and go inside. All we have to do is realize that the capstone gives us absolute assurance that we live in the strong and comforting shelter of the Rock.

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The Next Reformation of the Church

October 31, 2013 James Pyles 26 Comments

Nearly five centuries ago in Central Europe, an unknown Augustinian monk decided to nail 95 theses to a church door, sparking a religious revolution felt to the present day.

Reformation Day, the anniversary of when Martin Luther began the Protestant Reformation, is an observance remembered by hundreds of American churches in the modern day. While the exact date of Luther’s call to theological debate was Oct. 31, or the Eve of All Saints’ Day, many Protestant congregations choose to observe the occasion on the last Sunday in the month. This year, Reformation Sunday will fall on Oct. 27, with Protestant denominations such as Lutherans, Presbyterians, and Baptists drawing attention to the past.

by Michael Gryboski, Christian Post Reporter
“Churches Remembering Martin Luther With Reformation Sunday Observance,” October 27, 2013
ChristianPost.com

Yesterday I had the pleasure of celebrating Reformation Day at a wonderful inner-city Anglican church in Melbourne, St. Matt’s Prahan, speaking on Rom 3:21-26.

It’s a great day to get your Luther on, unleash your inner Calvin, channel some Bucer, reconnect with your “sola” power panels, thank God for Tyndale, and play with your Ridley and Latimer action figurines. But such a day does lead to a question or two. Is Reformation Sunday a bit like commemorating a divorce, vindicate the violence between Protestants and Catholics, reinforce old prejudices, rent further apart the already fractured body of Christ, become an exercise in Roman Catholic bashing, and Anabaptist drowning?

by Michael F. Bird
“Reformation Sunday Reflection”
Patheos.com

I’d never even heard of “Reformation Sunday” until Sunday before last when my Pastor briefly mentioned it from the pulpit. Last Sunday, Reformation Sunday, he gave a short presentation about this day during the “announcements” portion of the service. I didn’t take notes but near the end of his presentation, Pastor said something that sounded like the Church needing a Reformation again.

I can see his point.

We had recently discussed my viewpoint on John MacArthur’s conference Strange Fire. I know Pastor, in last Sunday’s evening service, delivered a sermon called “Should We Put Out Strange Fire?” (I’ll have to listen to the recording when it’s posted online).

I don’t want to rehash all that, but I do want to use the topic as a jumping off point for why the Church (big “C”) needs another reformation. Yes, I agree with my Pastor, but I think the direction and form of that reformation is a lot different in my eyes than they are in his.

Last Sunday, my Pastor preached on Acts 16:1-5. It’s just amazing how much insight and information he can draw from a simple five verses in scripture. For instance, one of the things Pastor said by way of introduction (I’m working from my notes, here) is that Paul always visited the synagogue when he arrived at any location. By the time he left, he had founded a separate church and believing Jews would leave the local synagogue and join the church, presumably with Gentile believers.

Naturally I chafed at this summary, as it depicts the Jewish worship and devotion to the Jewish Messiah as not Jewish at all, but rather a “Christian” activity wholly divorced from Judaism…and that’s an important distinction.

The information he presented did not denigrate the Jewish people in the slightest, but it was still designed to separate the Jewish believer from Judaism. This has been the source of more than a few debates between us.

The “sister” blog post to this one is called What Church Taught Me About Jews and the Torah, and ironically, uses portions of Pastor’s sermon to fill in the gaps of my argument supporting Jewish continuing observance of Torah within the body of Messiah.

As I write this, he hasn’t read that blog post, nor have we been able to discuss it. I know that no matter how logical an argument I make, and no matter how well I think I’ve supported it in scripture, theologian that he is, Pastor will find numerous other scriptures to use to refute my opinion.

And yet, for me, the “Jewishness” and the “Judaism” of Jewish faith in Messiah is inescapable. Pastor sees the Church as a new entity that separated itself from Judaism, sort of like the train of God’s plan extending forward from Torah and the Prophets “jumped the tracks” at Acts 2 and took a whole different trajectory into the future, leaving the original path (and the covenant requirements, blessings, and promises along with them) abandoned. I can’t read the way most Christians see the development of the faith back into the Tanakh.

That’s why the general viewpoint of Messianic Judaism, including the perspective of Postmissionary Messianic Judaism makes more sense to me than Fundamentalist Christianity and Progressive Revelation. In order to celebrate Reformation Sunday as a significant holiday in the church, I have to conclude that the idea of Progressive Revelation must extend into the post-Biblical period and was active as recently as five hundred years ago, if we are required to see the Reformation as a Revelation of God.

And if it’s not a revelation from God, then it’s just another set of theologies and doctrines created by human beings who are trying to understand the Bible, God, and who we are as Christians.

You can’t have it both ways.

I could write a whole other blog post (and I probably will at some point) about whether or not the Holy Spirit continues to be manifest in our world or not (Pentecostals say “yes,” Fundamentalists say “not so much”). But for the moment, let me assume that God didn’t abandon us all for the past two-thousand years with only various translations and copies of copies of copies of the Bible to speak for Him. Let’s assume God actually cares about us enough to whisper in an ear or two from time to time.

And let’s assume that such whispers might even contain instructions for the periodic “course correction” of the great ship of the oceans called “the Church.” Obviously the authors of the Reformation felt the ship was off course and made efforts to steer her in a better direction. Obviously, they wouldn’t have made such changes if they didn’t believe it was within the will of God. Otherwise, they’d just be a bunch of guys reading what they wanted to in the Bible and acting out of their interpretations.

But then, it’s not like people don’t do stuff like that sometimes.

Yes, I believe God’s Presence still makes itself felt in our world. I don’t think we can put God in a box. Oh yes, we can make our boxes and say we’ve put God inside because it’s a perfect fit, but I think God has other ideas about Himself. He said that the tabernacle was not truly His home, since all the Earth is His footstool, so to speak. What makes us think we can make a theological box that is big enough to “fit” God yet small enough for us to carry around with us?

I can’t argue with history. Good, bad, or indifferent, the Reformation happened and it sent ripples across the timeline that still rock our boats today.

But the Church (and all of its little churches, hundreds of them, thousands of them, all the little denominations, movements, and streams) has gotten really static. Even suggesting a paradigm shift meets with strong resistance. Inertia can be such a difficult thing. So hard to push start the truck on a cold morning when all it wants to do is to stay in its nice, comfy garage.

I really do think that the Church needs another Reformation. I think that by the time Messiah gets back, it will go through a whopping big one, whether we’re ready for it or not. I think that the beginnings of such a Reformation are already evidenced in our world. I write about those beginnings all the time. I wrote about one just recently and will continue to do so.

I can’t prove what I’m about to say, but I believe it’s a credible suggestion. I believe the next big Reformation for the Church is the restoration of Messianic Judaism. The Church was artificially carved from Judaism probably in the second and third centuries of the Common Era. Before that, it was one of a number of functioning Judaisms in occupied Israel and the Diaspora. I think Paul was instrumental in spreading this Judaism to both Jews and Gentiles in the Roman empire of his day. I think that he, like the ancient prophets of the Tanakh who came before him, intended that the Messianic promise should move forward in history as Israel’s path of redemption and restoration, with Israel as the light and Messiah as the light bearer, attracting the people of all the nations to that light to join in Messiah’s body…a Jewish body…a Judaism.

The next Reformation for the Church is for the Church to stop seeing itself as a separate thing and to stop seeing Judaism as dead. The next Reformation of the Church is to come alongside the resurrected Judaism of Messianic Judaism, the reborn Jewish faith stream of “the Way,” and to cease requiring Jews to become Christians and to leave being Jews and being part of Judaism and Israel and instead, for the Gentile Christians to realize that we must join them, not them joining us.

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When Will Being A Christian Be Enough?

October 22, 2013 James Pyles 9 Comments

Strange Fire by John MacArthur is basically an attack on anything and everything related to the charismatic movement and the various movements descended from it, as if the whole of it were composed of one monolithic set of doctrines and practices that all of us espouse. It invalidates anything that smacks of the supernatural or of emotion freely expressed in God’s presence.

-R Loren Sandford
“Real Holy Spirit Fire Out”
CharismaNews.com

For Thursday’s “morning meditation,” I’m going to publish my own commentary on John MacArthur’s recent Strange Fire conference in Sun Valley, California, or rather, the implications of such activities when one member of the body of Christ apparently attacks another. It’s like my liver wants to eat my pancreas because my liver doesn’t think my pancreas is an authentic member of my body.

Hey! Don’t I have anything to say about it? After all, I need all those organs inside of me so I can stay alive and healthy. Doesn’t my liver have enough to do processing all of the toxic junk that enters my body through the environment (including what I eat) without going after all the other stuff inside my body that keeps me alive?

But enough about MacArthur, Strange Fire, and all that…at least in detail. What I want to know is why being “a Christian” isn’t enough?

Recently I became aware of the buzz surrounding a new book, soon to be released, by a prominent cessationist who has been around for a long time.

Reading MacArthur, you’d think all charismatics espouse prosperity teaching. We do not. You’d think we are all Word of Faith adherents when, in fact, they constitute a small minority and promote a doctrine many of us oppose.

-Sandford

Oh yuk! More divisions and doctrines.

Before now, I’d never heard of the debate between Cessationism vs. Continuationism. I have heard of Prosperity Theology (and am not impressed), but I had to look up Word of Faith to figure out what all that’s supposed to mean.

I’ve written before about how different religious streams are basically Systems human beings use as an interface between themselves and the Bible as well as between themselves and God. We use this sort of interface, like the Graphical User Interface (GUI) of your computer, to help us talk to and understand what otherwise would be inaccessible to us. You use the GUI of your computer to interact with the computer’s software and hardware. You use your religious systems to interact with the Bible and with God.

But as anyone who has used a computer can tell you, the interface isn’t a perfect environment and it has inherit limitations. So does any religious system, even yours.

I’ve talked with my Pastor before about the various Christian denominations and why he’s attracted in a certain denominational direction. Obviously, I lean in my own direction, though it’s far from the fundamentalist world of my Pastor. I’ve also lamented as to whether or not I’ll make a good Christian, but what I’m really saying is that I wonder if I’ll ever make a good and true “demominationalist.”

I know, you probably think of my “denomination” as “Messianic Judaism,” but that has a few problems (I’m going to write on related topics pretty soon), not the least of which is whether or not a Gentile Christian can practice Messianic Judaism or any other Judaism. With apologizes to Toby Janicki and his classic introduction of himself on the FFOZ TV show A Promise of What is to Come, I have my doubts.

On the other hand, Toby could be right, at least in the sense of the future, Messianic Kingdom. My Pastor tells me that “the Church” was formed in Acts 2 and although it started as a completely Jewish religious entity, with the addition of Gentiles and finally, when Gentiles became the “majority stockholders,” so to speak, it became separate from the rest of Israel and developed into its own “thing.”

I disagree.

The Jewish religious stream of “the Way” in the first century CE was the culmination of everything that came before it in Jewish and Biblical history, the apex of a dream, where Gentiles could join a Jewish religious stream in a way that resulted in reconciliation and justification before God without the Gentiles having to convert to Judaism or take on the Torah in the manner of Jewish people. In that sense, “the Church” wasn’t a new thing but it did a new thing…allowing the Gentiles in as equal members without necessarily equal Torah responsibilities.

It’s not that way now, thanks to all kinds of terrible things that happened in the decades and centuries to follow the destruction of Herod’s Temple, but I firmly believe it will be that way again for all of us when Messiah returns. There will be one, valid, thriving, religious stream that has evolved from Abraham, from Sinai, from the life of Messiah, that was always Jewish and will again be Jewish that we, the people from the nations who are called by His Name, are allowed to join, in a manner defined by Jewish authorities with the approval of the Holy Spirit (Acts 15) and commanded by Messiah (Matthew 28:19-20).

But it won’t look much or anything like “the Church” looks like right now.

Fundamentalism, Charismatics, Word of Faith, Prosperity Theology, Calvinism, yada, yada, yada, will all be swept away from the lived experience of any approved believer and disciple of the Jewish Messiah when he establishes his throne in Jerusalem.

I can imagine there will be Christians and Jews who will resist the Kingship of Messiah in those days. I can imagine there will be a lot of people who will have great difficulty surrendering their pet theologies, doctrines, and dogmas, all of which have been invented in the last two-thousand years, and most of which have been invented only in the past several centuries (or even decades).

It will be enough to be a disciple of the Master. Put in “church-friendly” language, it will be enough to be a Christian.

Religious Jews practice Judaism by definition. In those days (and maybe as a foreshadowing, even today), Gentiles who are disciples and worshipers of the Jewish Messiah King will also “practice Messianic Judaism” in the manner defined for us by Messiah.

And it will be enough.

So try not to become too attached to all of that stuff we argue about now in the blogosphere, on websites, at conferences, in books we write and publish, stuff preached from the pulpit, discussed at the bema, taught in Sunday school, yada, yada, yada.

Learn to accept the idea that someday you may have to let go of most or all of your much-vaunted doctrines and dogmas, because being a disciple of Messiah as he desires us to be will be enough.

It will be enough.

Dayenu.

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The Face of the King

October 20, 2013 James Pyles 16 Comments

The sticks on which you write will be in your hand before their eyes. Say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God, “Behold, I will take the sons of Israel from among the nations where they have gone, and I will gather them from every side and bring them into their own land; and I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel; and one king will be king for all of them; and they will no longer be two nations and no longer be divided into two kingdoms. They will no longer defile themselves with their idols, or with their detestable things, or with any of their transgressions; but I will deliver them from all their dwelling places in which they have sinned, and will cleanse them. And they will be My people, and I will be their God.

–Ezekiel 37:20-23 (NASB)

Tales of the Messianic Era series

This is a time yet to come. This is a time when God will restore all of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel as a single, united people. The kingdoms will not be divided as they were in days of old. One Israel under One God.

“My servant David will be king over them, and they will all have one shepherd; and they will walk in My ordinances and keep My statutes and observe them. They will live on the land that I gave to Jacob My servant, in which your fathers lived; and they will live on it, they, and their sons and their sons’ sons, forever; and David My servant will be their prince forever. I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant with them. And I will place them and multiply them, and will set My sanctuary in their midst forever. My dwelling place also will be with them; and I will be their God, and they will be My people. And the nations will know that I am the Lord who sanctifies Israel, when My sanctuary is in their midst forever.”’”

–Ezekiel 37:24-28 (NASB)

More over, united Israel will be ruled by One King, King Messiah, Son of David. But look at this. Messiah, the King of Israel and Ruler of the World will be their prince forever.

That would be pretty hard to do if Messiah were merely mortal. Of course, in the Messianic age, many will be resurrected, never to die again, so we could say the same of Messiah. But as a Christian, I must believe that Messiah is more.

God also says that the people of Israel, the Jewish people, will “walk in My ordinances and keep My statutes and observe them.” I know I recently wrote about all this, but I’m going through my notes on my recent reading of the latter portion of Ezekiel, so I thought this would be a good time to try to pull them together. I hope I can avoid repeating myself too much.

One puzzling thing I found was this:

Then I heard one speaking to me from the house, while a man was standing beside me. He said to me, “Son of man, this is the place of My throne and the place of the soles of My feet, where I will dwell among the sons of Israel forever.

–Ezekiel 43:6-7 (NASB)

I checked a large number of translations of Ezekiel 43:7 and all except one said that the Divine Presence would inhabit Ezekiel’s Temple, the Temple of the Messianic Era, forever (Young’s Literal Translation says “to the age”). You can read the larger context of that chapter to confirm that God is speaking of inhabiting the Temple of Jerusalem in the Messianic age forever. Why is this such a big deal?

I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.

–Revelation 21:22 (NASB)

This describes events after the arrival of the New Jerusalem, after the thousand-year reign of Messiah, after all that had to come to pass has come to past. Humanity is restored in the Garden as such, and God dwells with His people as He did in the beginning.

So how can God dwell in Ezekiel’s temple forever if in the New Jerusalem there is no temple. More to the point, God and the Lamb are the temple. I’m not even sure what that means. I posed the question to a friend of mine and he suggested that as human history ends and we all move into eternity, maybe “forever” ends, too. After all, Messiah said that the Torah wouldn’t pass away until heaven and earth passed away (Matthew 5:18). At some point, heaven and earth, as we understand them, must pass away and something eternal must come in their stead.

Still, one of the things I’m trying to accomplish on this “mission” is to discover any dissonance between how the Tanakh (Old Testament) and the New Testament depict the Messiah and the age to come. The above definitely seems to qualify.

Alas, you who are longing for the day of the Lord,
For what purpose will the day of the Lord be to you?
It will be darkness and not light…

–Amos 5:18 (NASB)

We all want the Messiah to come to rescue and repair our broken world, but we also forget that it won’t be *poof* Messiah comes and instantly everything is fixed. There is going to be terrible war against Israel’s enemies which probably will include everyone. It won’t be pretty. Good thing the Church will be raptured up to Heaven for those seven years (I say this somewhat tongue-in-cheek).

Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, “These who are clothed in the white robes, who are they, and where have they come from?” I said to him, “My lord, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

–Revelation 7:13-14 (NASB)

Wait a minute. Who is coming out of the tribulation?

Verse 14 doesn’t identify these people beyond saying that they are the ones who came out of the great tribulation, but they can’t be the Church, at least from a Christian point of view, since the last we see of the Church on earth is in Chapters 4 and 5. Everything in Chapters 6 through 19 is about the tribulation which the Church misses…

…or do they (we)?

It was also given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him. All who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain. If anyone has an ear, let him hear. If anyone is destined for captivity, to captivity he goes; if anyone kills with the sword, with the sword he must be killed. Here is the perseverance and the faith of the saints. (emph. mine)

–Revelation 13:7-10 (NASB)

What are “saints” doing on earth during the tribulation and undergoing such harsh conditions for the perseverance of their faith? Of course, they could be people who came to faith after the Church was raptured, but would they be called “saints?” Usually people in the Church are called “saints.”

The doctrine of the Rapture didn’t come along until the 17th century, so it wasn’t as if the concept most Christians are pinning their hopes and dreams on has been around since the beginning. In fact, Googling “rapture doctrine” returns a series of links, many of which lead to web pages (of unverified validity) that criticize this very recent Church doctrine.

2 Thessalonians 2:3 speaks of apostasy or “falling away” of the faithful that will occur when many are deceived by the “man of lawlessness.” I can’t directly tie any “falling away” to Christians expecting a rapture to Heaven that never arrives, but I could very well believe that a lot of Christians will indeed fall away once the tribulation starts and they’re still here during the war between Messiah and Israel’s enemies. Why weren’t we given the break and free passage to Heaven we were promised from the pulpit?

I’m not saying all this to be mean-spirited but as a cautionary tale. What if Amos 5:18 is talking to believers, explaining to us that we shouldn’t be so quick to desire the coming of Messiah because it will be “the great and terrible day of the Lord.”

“I kept looking in the night visions,
And behold, with the clouds of heaven
One like a Son of Man was coming,
And He came up to the Ancient of Days
And was presented before Him.
“And to Him was given dominion,
Glory and a kingdom,
That all the peoples, nations and men of every language
Might serve Him.
His dominion is an everlasting dominion
Which will not pass away;
And His kingdom is one
Which will not be destroyed.”

–Daniel 7:13-14 (NASB)

This is obviously a vision of Messiah’s coming, but I’ve always wondered why Daniel phrased it “one like the Son of Man?” Here we have a description of the Son of Man’s Kingdom never being destroyed, we have a vision of him coming on clouds of heaven (as opposed to just being born and being a great but totally human Jewish leader as most of Judaism believes of the Moshiach), and we get the sense that he is more than human.

Renowned Talmud scholar Daniel Boyarin wrote a book called The Jewish Gospels: The Story of the Jewish Christ, which I reviewed on more than one occasion. Boyarin, who is Jewish and not a believer, makes a credible case for why a large number of first century Jews in Israel and the diaspora came to faith in Yeshua (Jesus) as Messiah. Part of his evidence for why Yeshua would be seen as a legitimate candidate for Messiah comes from Daniel 7.

This classic and mysterious Jewish text by a well-known but possibly not a well understood prophet may be one of the keys to unlocking the identity of Moshiach. I sometimes receive criticism from Jewish people for my continuing faith, but somewhere between traditional Christian evangelism and Jewish anti-missionaries, may be an unbiased truth in the reading of the Bible. We must seek it out in order to escape our “religious blinders” about Messiah, so that we can see him as he truly is, not as how one doctrine or another imagines him to be.

And the children of Zion, rejoice and jubilate with the Lord your God, for He gave you the teacher for justification, and He brought down for you rain, the early rain and the late rain in the first month.

–Joel 2:23

I had to go to Chabad.org to find a translation that describes Messiah as a teacher. Most Christian Bible translations render “He gave you the teacher” as something like “He has given you the early rain…” (NASB translation).

The Douay-Rheims Bible says “he hath given you a teacher of justice,” and Young’s Literal Translation says “He hath given you the Teacher for righteousness.”

The Jewish understanding of Messiah is that, among other things, he will come to teach us what we need to know of his ways and how we should serve him. Christianity expects a warrior, a priest, and a King, but we miss how he will teach us the Torah of justice and righteousness, tzedakah if you will (see my review of the FFOZ TV episode Seek First the Kingdom for a more detailed description of the relationship between tzedakah [charity] and justice and righteousness).

So what can we conclude from my brief (and hardly comprehensive) review of Messianic prophesy?

Messiah will come as the One and eternal King of Israel, return the exiled Jews to their Land, the Land of Israel, and unite them as a one people in one Kingdom ruled by one King Messiah forever.
The “law of the land” (Israel) will be Torah, and the Jewish people will walk in God’s statues and ordinances as in days of old, but with the Torah written on their hearts rather than on scrolls.
The Divine Presence will once again inhabit the third and final Temple in Jerusalem forever (though we have difficulty reconciling this with Rev. 21).
There will be “saints” going through the tribulation who suffer and who are killed for the sake of their faith, drawing into sharp dispute the accuracy of the modern doctrine of “the Rapture,” which states “the Church” will be literally removed from earth and into Heaven for the entire length of those troubled days.
The Messiah is the Son of Man and the Prince, who seems to be more than a man, who will reign eternally, who will come on the clouds of heaven, possibly in direct contradiction of modern Jewish religious thought (for the most part) which states Messiah will be completely human with no supernatural (and certainly no Divine) nature.
Of his many roles in the age to come, Messiah will be a teacher of justice and righteousness.

Who is the King in the age to come? Who is Messiah, Son of David, Son of God?

Christians know him as Jesus Christ. Most religious Jews see him as King Messiah. Any similarity between the two is faint at best and at worst, nonexistent.

But if you believe in a Messiah at all as either Christian or Jew, you have a duty to set aside your preconceptions and what you have been taught (and what has been assumed by your religious stream for hundreds of years) and investigate for yourself what the scriptures say. In my case, this is paying close attention to any dissonance that may occur between the Old and New Testaments. Messiah is an objective being, apart from our need to paint his portrait one way or the other. Instead of seeking his portrait, I need to see his face.

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The Messianic Kingdom is not a Democracy

October 15, 2013 James Pyles 26 Comments

For centuries, Jerusalem has been a holy place for Jews, Christians, and Muslims. It has been referred to as both the Center of the Universe and the Eternal City. Jerusalem has also been called the City of Peace despite the fact that it has often been the object of bloody battles over religion and territory.

Today, Jerusalem is a city within a city. Surrounded by Arab East Jerusalem and Jewish West Jerusalem is the ancient Old City, an area of some 220 acres. The Old City is encircled by walls built in the sixteenth century by the Ottoman emperor Suleiman the Magnificent. Visitors may enter the Old City through one of seven large gates.

Inside, the Old City is divided physically and culturally into four sections: the Jewish Quarter, the Muslim (Arab) Quarter, the Armenian Quarter, and the Christian Quarter. These divisions are not totally segregated, however, and include some overlap of cultures. Nevertheless, Jewish and Arab children go to separate schools…

-Deborah da Costa
from the Author’s Note of her book
Snow in Jerusalem

In her affecting but message-driven debut children’s book, da Costa relays the story of two boys who live in Jerusalem’s Old City Avi in the Jewish Quarter and Hamudi in the Muslim Quarter. A fluffy white cat wanders between the homes of the two boys, relishing the scraps each feeds her. Then weeks pass without any sign of the cat, alarming each boy. Looking skinny and dirty, the cat at last visits Avi, who then follows her to Hamudi’s neighborhood, where the youngsters begin to argue, each claiming the cat is his. As a rare snowfall begins, the boys stop bickering and, fearing that the beloved animal will freeze, follow her through Jerusalem to a dark alley where they discover four kittens in a box. As the mother purrs loudly and rubs against the boys, they conclude, “She does not want us to fight…. She wants peace.”

-from the Publisher’s Weekly review of the same book
found at Amazon.com

Tales of the Messianic Era series

My wife checked this book out of our local library (along with a dozen other children’s books) for our four-and-a-half year old grandson, Landon. I took last Friday off of work and spent the day with the little guy. After arts and crafts at the library, lunch of (homemade) macaroni and cheese, two or three episodes of Jonny Quest (1964), Legos and other toys, we got down to the business of reading. Da Costa’s “Snow in Jerusalem” was one of the books he wanted me to read to him while he was enjoying a mid-afternoon snack.

I enjoyed reading the book and especially the feeling of actually walking the streets of the Old City between the Jewish and Arab quarters, but reading the Author’s Note at the very end stopped me cold. I realized that this was a book promoting peace, not just between the characters Avi and Hamudi in the book, but between peoples and cultures. That’s not a bad thing certainly, but there was a further undercurrent suggesting a perpetual sharing of all of Israel, sub-divided between Jewish Israel and Arab Palestine.

That’s a popular solution for the conflict between these two people groups, especially among political and social liberals, but it flies in the face of the Bible and I believe is an affront to God. To be clear, I don’t think peace between all the different people of the world is the affront, but I do believe carving up Israel into different chunks for different people like separating the white and dark meat of a turkey on Thanksgiving is.

The word which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.

Now it will come about that
In the last days
The mountain of the house of the Lord
Will be established as the chief of the mountains,
And will be raised above the hills;
And all the nations will stream to it.
And many peoples will come and say,
“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
To the house of the God of Jacob;
That He may teach us concerning His ways
And that we may walk in His paths.”
For the law will go forth from Zion
And the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
And He will judge between the nations,
And will render decisions for many peoples;
And they will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will not lift up sword against nation,
And never again will they learn war.

Come, house of Jacob, and let us walk in the light of the Lord.

–Isaiah 2:1-5 (NASB)

In reviewing various scriptures in the Tanakh (Old Testament) about the Messianic Era and the future King of Israel, I don’t see any references to taking the Land of Promise, which God gave to Abraham, and to Isaac, and to Jacob, and all of the physical descendants of that specific line (and notice Ishmael is not included, nor any of Abraham’s other sons) and splitting it up into Jewish and non-Jewish portions. The only “splits” of the Land involved the different areas given to the twelve tribes of Israel.

Messiah will come to return all of the exiled Jewish people to their Land and to rebuild Jerusalem as the Jewish city.

The Lord God, who gathers the dispersed of Israel, declares,
“Yet others I will gather to them, to those already gathered.”

–Isaiah 56:8 (NASB)

I will be found by you,’ declares the Lord, ‘and I will restore your fortunes and will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you,’ declares the Lord, ‘and I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you into exile.’

–Jeremiah 29:14 (NASB)

These are just a few of the examples in scripture declaring that Messiah will gather the exiles of Israel and restore them to their nation.

Peace is a wonderful thing. So is fairness, equity, sharing, friendship, and the like. But how we imagine these general concepts and their application in Messianic Days may not be how they will really play out. Remember, whether you are Jewish or Christian, the Messiah is King, not President or Prime Minister. A Kingdom is not the same as a Democracy. Citizens of a Kingdom ruled by a single Monarch do not get to vote on laws, rules, and ordinances. The King’s Word is Law.

We all assume that everyone will get what they want in the Messianic Kingdom. Perhaps that is true, but I suspect for some people it will not be so. What if you’re a Muslim and the Jewish Messiah comes to rule not only Israel (all of Israel) as a Jewish nation, but the entire planet? For that matter, what if you are a Christian and you suddenly realize just how Jewish your “Jesus” really is? What if the King establishes without any equivocation that the Jewish nation is the head of all the nations (rather than the United States of America), and that the Torah is the Law of the Land for Israel and incumbent upon all of the Jewish people? What if some portions of that Torah go forth from Zion, and apply to all the people of the nations who are called by His Name (Amos 9:11-12)?

Don’t we get a vote on this? Don’t we have a say? How could this possibly be fair? Where is God’s justice?

There will be nothing else but God’s justice on Earth during the Messianic Age. People will get what they need but not always what they want according to the will of God. We will have peace. Our swords will be beaten into plowshares and our spears into pruning hooks, but only after Messiah has led a vast army to defeat all of Israel’s enemies (including, most likely, the United States of America). God Himself will fight for Israel, crush her adversaries, and establish her security.

The Lord will be king over the whole earth. On that day there will be one Lord, and his name the only name.

–Zechariah 14:9 (NIV)

Are you getting the picture. The Lord will be one and His Name, One.

In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his resting place will be glorious.

He will raise a banner for the nations and gather the exiles of Israel; he will assemble the scattered people of Judah from the four quarters of the earth.

–Isaiah 11:10, 12 (NIV)

Not only will Messiah gather the Jewish exiles and restore them to Israel, but he will act as a banner for the rest of us, drawing us to him.

But remember, we won’t get a vote. This is Law.

The only and last functioning Theocracy (nation directly ruled by God) on Earth was ancient Israel before the people demanded that Samuel anoint Saul as King.

In the Messianic Age, that Kingdom, that Theocracy will be restored. A Davidic King, the last Davidic King will ascend the Throne in Jerusalem again, David’s Throne, which God promised to David and to his descendants forever.

For the sons of Israel will remain for many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar and without ephod or household idols. Afterward the sons of Israel will return and seek the Lord their God and David their king; and they will come trembling to the Lord and to His goodness in the last days.

–Hosea 3:4-5 (NASB)

For many, many centuries, Israel has been without a King, but it will not always be so. The King is coming. He will return. He will restore his people, the Jewish people, and all of humanity will go up to Jerusalem, and every knee will bow, to the Ruler, the Prince, the King, Messiah, Son of David, the Righteous Branch.

With respects to Deborah da Costa, while there will be peace within Jerusalem and her walls will forever be secure, it will not be the sort of peace established by a Jewish boy and an Arab boy arguing over possession of a cat and her kittens. It will be a brutally fought and hard-won peace where real adversaries will spill gallons of blood and mountains of dead flesh will decay in the sun and be eaten by carrion birds.

Enemies will be defeated in a war lead by a King whose rule is absolute. Peace will come when all of those enemies are dead, and the survivors of the nations defeated by Israel’s armies and by God must come to Jerusalem once a year to honor the King on Sukkot.

Then it will come about that any who are left of all the nations that went against Jerusalem will go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to celebrate the Feast of Booths. And it will be that whichever of the families of the earth does not go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, there will be no rain on them. If the family of Egypt does not go up or enter, then no rain will fall on them; it will be the plague with which the Lord smites the nations who do not go up to celebrate the Feast of Booths. This will be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all the nations who do not go up to celebrate the Feast of Booths.

–Zechariah 14:16-19 (NASB)

And then there will be peace.

Everyone will sit under their own vine
and under their own fig tree,
and no one will make them afraid,
for the Lord Almighty has spoken.

–Micah 4:4 (NIV)

Peace comes when the Lord Almighty has spoken it, not when we have imagined some man-made utopia and think we can make it real just by publishing enough books, television shows, and movies based on that fantasy.

All that said, we can escape the fantasy and be part of building the way to Messianic peace now, at least a little of it. But we have to grasp onto the “fringes” of the garment of God, so to speak, humble ourselves, and speak the words of the coming Kingdom and the King who is to be. We can choose that path, or deny it and inherit a more terrible end.

“…and you will come up against My people Israel like a cloud to cover the land. It shall come about in the last days that I will bring you against My land, so that the nations may know Me when I am sanctified through you before their eyes, O Gog.”

–Ezekiel 38:16 (NASB)

That choice is ours to make. The King has been patient with us, but his patience will end, and we had better be ready when it does. We are either soldiers in his army or on the side that will see defeat. We will see peace in the Kingdom or find the peace of the grave. The Holy One of Jacob neither slumbers or sleeps.

And he is the King. We must bow or be broken.

Jerusalem has been called the Center of the Universe and the Eternal City. But it is also known as the City of David. One day it will truly be the City of Peace.

"When you awake in the morning, learn something to inspire you and mediate upon it, then plunge forward full of light with which to illuminate the darkness." -Rabbi Tzvi Freeman