For the week of May 24, 2025 / 26 Iyar 5785

Behar & Bechukotai
Torah: Vayikra/Leviticus 25:1 – 27:34
Haftarah: Jeremiah 16:19 – 17:14
O LORD, my strength and my stronghold, my refuge in the day of trouble, to you shall the nations come from the ends of the earth and say: “Our fathers have inherited nothing but lies, worthless things in which there is no profit. Can man make for himself gods? Such are not gods!” (Jeremiah 16:19-20)
These words from God, spoken through the prophet Jeremiah, look forward to the day when the nations will acknowledge the uselessness of their ancestral traditions, including idol worship, and turn to him, the one true God, the God of Israel. This certainly foreshadows the Jewish messianic mission to the nations. From our vantage point, two thousand years after the coming of Yeshua, it’s challenging to comprehend the phenomenal revolutionary effect the early Messianic Jews had on their pagan neighbors. Led by God’s Spirit, they confronted one of the most powerful empires in history at its very foundation.
Take the great port city of Ephesus, in modern-day Turkey, for example. It was home to the so-called “great mother goddess” Artemis. It was here that a riot began because a messianic Pharisee named Paul was proclaiming that “gods made with hands are not gods” (see Acts 19:26). This is not a case of competing religions, but a cosmic clash between light and darkness. This clash has continued to the present day, to the extent that there are few places on earth where people have not turned from their empty traditions to the truth of the one and only God in the Messiah.
Perhaps you grew up in an environment that was friendly to biblical truth. It might be difficult to imagine the level of personal and societal upheaval associated with accepting the emptiness of one’s false gods. This is not so much due to the entities themselvesbut the structures of thought and social norms associated with them. It’s no wonder that even today, people lose jobs, friends, and family over accepting God’s truth.
But don’t be fooled. This dramatic, all-encompassing transformation isn’t just for those from cultures vastly different from a biblical view of the world. Not to take anything away from Jeremiah’s extraordinary prediction of Gentile nations turning from their false gods, notice that immediately preceding the beginning of this week’s Haftarah (weekly reading portion from the Hebrew prophets), we read of God’s punishing Israel for the very sin of idolatry. I like to say the Bible is always talking, not to someone else, but to the reader. No one is let off the hook. Our reading of Scripture should always result in an examination of self, not the other guy. I am pretty sure that Jeremiah’s prophecy about Gentiles turning from idols was designed to prompt Jewish repentance.
The Jewish expectation of pagans turning to the God of Israel was not to be a source of pride, but instead an opportunity to examine oneself and respond accordingly. All of us need to take a serious look at our own lives from a biblical frame of reference. Just because we claim to adhere to the truth doesn’t mean we do. We might try to assure ourselves we are okay just because we think we have the right words, attend the right congregation, have the right creed, or have the right associates. And perhaps they are the right words, and so on. Remember, even good things can become idols when we rely on them instead of God.
Scriptures taken from the English Standard Version





