For the week of September 28, 2024 / 25 Elul 5784

Nitzavim & Vayeilech
Torah: D’varim/Deuteronomy 29:9 – 31:1-30
Haftarah: Isaiah 61:10 – 63:9

For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not be quiet, until her righteousness goes forth as brightness, and her salvation as a burning torch. (Isaiah 62:1)

Have you ever found yourself unable to stop talking? There are many reasons for that. Some people like the sound of their voice. Some have no respect for others. But then there are times when something is so vital that silence is not an option. That’s what was happening with the prophet Isaiah here. Though taking a closer look at the passage, it might not be Isaiah who was the one who couldn’t keep quiet, but rather God himself.

God’s concern for Jerusalem is such that he can’t stop talking about it. It might seem strange to think about God this way. But let’s not miss the point. God is so concerned for Jerusalem that he will speak about it until his heart’s desire for this city is completely fulfilled.

Tragically, God’s insistence in addressing this issue hasn’t prevented people from trying to shut him up. And that includes those who claim allegiance to him. Of course, they would never admit to this, all the while subtly and not-so-subtly denying or deflecting his words.

They may redefine Zion from being an actual place, the hill from which Jerusalem was derived. They claim it should be taken metaphorically as a generic, immaterial “people of God” sort of thing. They don’t realize the damage they do when they twist the very real David’s City into a spiritual transnational collective. Spiritualization of real things can feel so bright when it, in fact, undermines God’s grand plan for all creation. Similarly, focusing solely on how the messianic good news transforms individuals not only neglects God’s grand global narrative, it robs those same individuals of the fullness of God’s design for their lives.

Others, refusing to spiritualize literal promises to a literal people, limit God’s concern to the ancient past. Either Jerusalem had a sufficient taste of its destiny at some point, perhaps in Solomon’s day, or it lost its claim to God’s promises due to disobedience. Both of these perspectives misrepresent the passage. No matter how glorious Jerusalem was in Solomon’s day, it in no way measured up to what is described here. And as for the effects of disobedience, to think that Israel’s failures annul God’s promises is to betray great ignorance of Scripture. God is absolutely determined to bring Jerusalem to a glorious future.

God will not be silenced! He will fulfill every word of this prophecy. The world will behold a Jerusalem fully right with God as it does his will in every way in the earth. It will be fully delivered by God from all its troubles. However its reputation has been affected by its own poor judgments through the centuries, God’s delight in this city will be evident to all.

Because this matters to God so much, he calls others to join him in his cry:

On your walls, O Jerusalem, I have set watchmen; all the day and all the night they shall never be silent. You who put the Lord in remembrance, take no rest, and give him no rest until he establishes Jerusalem and makes it a praise in the earth (Isaiah 62:6-7).

The redemption of Jerusalem through the Messiah is central to all that God is doing in and through his creation. To claim to follow the Messiah but neglect God’s heart for the Holy City is to be callous toward him.

If you are a follower of the Messiah, have you stopped to think that perhaps what’s important to God should be important to you? There is so much confusion over the place of Israel in God’s plan, and yet God’s passion regarding Jerusalem’s future is clear. If he won’t stay silent on this, why would you?

Scriptures taken from the English Standard Version

For the week of September 21, 2024 / 18 Elul 5784

Ki Tavo
Torah: D’varim/Deuteronomy 26:1 – 29:8 (English 26:1 – 29:9)
Haftarah: Isaiah 60:1-22
Originally posted the week of September 1, 2018 / 21 Elul 5778

Then Moses and the Levitical priests said to all Israel, “Keep silence and hear, O Israel: this day you have become the people of the LORD your God. You shall therefore obey the voice of the LORD your God, keeping his commandments and his statutes, which I command you today.” (D’varim/Deuteronomy 27:9-10)

Why do Moses and the priests say to the people of Israel: “This day you have become the people of the LORD your God”? Were they not already God’s people? Didn’t God direct Moses and his brother, Aaron, almost forty years earlier to tell Pharaoh, King of Egypt, to let his people go (e.g. Shemot/Exodus 5:1)? God’s considering Israel as his people was based on an already established relationship, rooted in their forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. That’s why God said to Moses when he first spoke to him at the burning bush: “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey” (Shemot/Exodus 3:8-9).

Much had transpired since that time. This week’s parsha (Torah reading portion) takes place about forty years later. The bulk of the generation who had been slaves in Egypt have died by now. They died, not simply due to natural causes, but God’s judgement upon their faithlessness when first faced with the prospect of taking the Promised Land (see B’midbar/Number 13-14). Could it be that due to the previous generation’s obstinance, Israel’s peoplehood status was lost, and that it was not restored until Moses and the priests made this pronouncement? Could it be that they are not only being given a second chance to take the Land, but also in terms of their divine chosenness?

It is difficult to overstate how farfetched such a conclusion is. From God’s promises to the forefathers to his continued involvement with Israel in spite of their attitude and behavior throughout their wilderness wanderings, God couldn’t make it any clearer that he was absolutely committed to them. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be reading about their getting ready to enter the Land again.

If their status as God’s people isn’t in question, then what’s with this kind of wording? Could you imagine, my taking one of my adult sons aside and saying, “Today you have become my son”? Or maybe you can. Relationship is a complex thing, whether it be of a very personal nature as in me and each of my children or on a broader scale as in a leader and his or her community. My children will always be my children, but they may or may not grow up to embrace their heritage and their destiny. That’s up to them. That which establishes the parent-child relationship is one thing, that which fully expresses it is another.

This generation of Israel was different than the one before. Tragically, their parents didn’t reflect the reality of who they were as God’s people and suffered as a result. Their status as God’s chosen was no different from the next generation, but their children embraced who they were in a way they (the previous generation) did not. The reality of this difference would be evident in the days and years ahead.

Relationship with God must not be taken for granted. Remember, the ones who survived the ten plagues, celebrated the first Passover, crossed the sea, ate the manna, received the Torah, and on and on, failed to trust God when it was time to enter the land of promise. Peoplehood in and of itself doesn’t guarantee embracing it. This is why the next generation needed to hear this affirmation. The true essence of their peoplehood was not solely based on their past, but upon the reality of who they were at that moment, a moment that needed to continue from that day onward.

Scriptures taken from the English Standard Version

For the week of September 14, 2024 / 11 Elul 5784

Ki Teitzei
Torah: D’varim/Deuteronomy 21:10 – 25:19
Haftarah: Isaiah 54:1-10
Originally posted the week of September 2, 2006 / 9 Elul 5766 (edited)

You shall not see your brother’s ox or his sheep going astray and ignore them. You shall take them back to your brother. And if he does not live near you and you do not know who he is, you shall bring it home to your house, and it shall stay with you until your brother seeks it. Then you shall restore it to him. And you shall do the same with his donkey or with his garment, or with any lost thing of your brother’s, which he loses and you find; you may not ignore it. (D’varim/Deuteronomy 22:1-3)

I can remember very clearly when I was young learning a very important principle regarding personal property. It was “finders keepers, losers weepers.” This was very easy-to-remember. Just in case you are not familiar with this saying, it means if you found something someone lost, it was yours to keep. Of course, if I did happen upon something of significant value, I was expected to look around to see if the possible owner might be nearby. But if not, whatever it might be, it became rightfully mine.

As one who claims to respect the authority of Scripture, the verses I quoted at the beginning challenge (or should I say contradict?) this principle. God calls us to return lost things to their original owner even if we don’t know who the person is or if they live far away. Moreover, we are to take care of the thing found until the person comes looking for it.

Godly directives such as these should lead us to ask certain questions. Does this apply to things of small value? For example, if I find twenty-five cents in a vacant parking lot, should I take it home and wait for someone to claim it? What about perishable items? Perhaps in that same vacant lot late at night after the grocery store is closed, a bunch of ripe bananas is found. Would it be wrong for a homeless, hungry person to eat them? Looking again at these verses, they are referring to items of substantial and lasting value, not things of little value or perishables.

Another question has to do with how long we should hold on to something before the original owner loses his claim to it. The passage does not speak of a time limit. Perhaps if it were an animal, then it should never be slaughtered, but would it be okay in the meantime to milk it, if it were a milking animal, or to shear its wool if it were a sheep, or to use its services if it were a work animal? I don’t know. And if the item were a cloak—which today might be a coat, jacket, or sweater—should it be put away in a closet forever just in case the owner comes to claim it? Again, I don’t know.

What I do know is that we need to take our responsibility toward the care of other people’s things seriously. There is more to biblical property rights than the prohibition regarding stealing. My losing something does not cancel my ownership of an item. I also have an obligation to others to ensure that I do my part in returning lost items to their original owner. How we deal with some of the implications of these directives must at least start with accepting our God-given responsibilities.

Whether it is this or another directive, we need to allow the Bible to confront and contradict our long-held life principles. It may even confront and contradict what we thought God was saying to us more recently. If we want to walk in God’s ways, we need to hear what he is saying about all of life and live accordingly.

All scriptures, English Standard Version (ESV) of the Bible

For the week of of September 7, 2024 / 4 Elul 5784

Shoftim
Torah: Devarim/Deuteronomy 16:18 – 21:9
Haftarah: Isaiah 51:12 – 52:12
Originally posted the week of August 26, 2017 / 4 Elul 5777

How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns!” (Isaiah 52:7)

This week’s Haftarah (excerpt from the Hebrew prophets) includes what might be the prophetic high mark in all Scripture (if I am exaggerating, then I should only correct myself by saying “one of”). The great prophet Isaiah makes this proclamation after much of ancient Israel had been overrun and scattered by the brutal Assyrians, while the remaining region known as the Kingdom of Judah, where he lived, had barely escaped the same fate. Moreover, God had revealed to Isaiah that it was only a matter of time before Judah would be exiled by the next great world power, Babylon. Yet like much of the Bible’s prophetic literature gloom and doom is tempered with words of hope.

And a good deal of the last third of Isaiah’s book contains some of the Scripture’s brightest light and this one verse I quoted is the brightest (or one of the brightest) of them all. The picture painted here is one of relief and excitement due to a messenger’s appearing upon the hills surrounding Jerusalem as he announces good news of peace and deliverance.

The core of this hopeful expectation is found in the promise of the eventual reign of Israel’s God. This is what makes this proclamation so climactic. For it is God’s being established as king – first and foremost over Israel and then extended to the entire creation – that is the supreme goal of Scripture. But doesn’t the Bible teach that God was, is, and will always be king? Yes and no. Ultimately that is always true. The traditional Jewish way to address God in prayer as “Lord God, King of the universe” is certainly correct. But in another sense, God’s rule over the earth is dependent upon the submission of human beings. From the beginning, God desired that people do his will on earth as it is in heaven. Our failure to do so undermines his reign.

Through the Scriptures we see this played out in the story of Israel. The spotlight of divine revelation shone on this particular people to demonstrate to the whole world how God’s reign was to be lived out. Or not, as was the case. And in case I need to remind you, any nation would have similarly failed, for this is the state of human nature. But in the genius of God, through his commitment to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, he made a way to establish his rule on earth in spite of human dysfunctionality. And that’s good news!

And that’s the good news first proclaimed by messengers in around Jerusalem two thousand years ago. The Middle English word, “gospel,” based on the Old English, “godspel” (meaning “good tale”), is the translation of the Greek word “euangelion,” the term used in the Greek New Covenant Writings (New Testament). Euangelion is the word that was used to translate the Hebrew for “good news” in this verse. Therefore, the good news expressed through the proclamation of the coming of the Messiah is summed up in: “Your God reigns.” The early Jewish followers of Yeshua, therefore, were announcing that through his coming the long-anticipated reign of God over Israel (and the whole world) had come.

The power of the Greek word euangelion is made even greater by its use outside the Jewish community. This is the word commonly used to describe proclamations about Caesar, the Lord and King of the Roman Empire. To proclaim the Good News of the Jewish Messiah, was to announce the reign of the earth’s true king. In other words: Yeshua is King and Caesar is not. The subversive nature of Gospel proclamation is in full keeping with the essence of Isaiah’s’ prophesy – through the Messiah the reign of the God of Israel has come.

Knowing Yeshua is not simply a personal, private spiritual experience designed to comfort adherents by giving them a ticket to heaven. It is about welcoming the rule of God into our lives, allowing him to be Lord in every way. And that’s not just something that lives inside a tiny spiritual vault called our hearts. It’s a reality that is to affect every part of us and to be lived out in every aspect of life, because our God reigns. That’s good news!

All scriptures, English Standard Version (ESV) of the Bible