July 2nd, 2010
Numbers 27:15-21. Then Moses spoke to the LORD, saying: 16 “Let the LORD, the God of the spirits of all flesh, set a man over the congregation, 17 who may go out before them and go in before them, who may lead them out and bring them in, that the congregation of the LORD may not be like sheep which have no shepherd.” 18 And the LORD said to Moses: “Take Joshua the son of Nun with you, a man in whom is the Spirit, and lay your hand on him; 19 set him before Eleazar the priest and before all the congregation, and inaugurate him in their sight. 20 And you shall give some of your authority to him, that all the congregation of the children of Israel may be obedient. 21 He shall stand before Eleazar the priest, who shall inquire before the LORD for him by the judgment of the Urim. At his word they shall go out, and at his word they shall come in, he and all the children of Israel with him—all the congregation.”
People were filled with the Holy Spirit thousands of years before Pentecost. And people knew and kept the Torah before it was given at Mt. Sinai.
Tags: baptism of the holy spirit, dispensationalism, holy spirit
Posted in Keeping Torah, Parsha 41 - Pinchas, Theology, Torah | 7 Comments »
June 28th, 2010
While you are able.
Good job, SCOTUS.
The Supreme Court has ruled that the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution protects an individual right to own and use firearms, at least in their own homes. That’s definitely a step in the right direction.
CS Monitor reports:
In addition to Stevens, Justice Stephen Breyer wrote a dissent that was joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor.
“The Framers did not write the Second Amendment in order to protect a private right of armed self-defense,” Breyer wrote. “There has been, and is, no consensus that the right is, or was, fundamental,” he said. “No broader constitutional interest or principle supports legal treatment of that right as fundamental. To the contrary, broader constitutional concerns of an institutional nature argue strongly against that treatment.”
“Justices” Breyer, Ginsburg, and Sotomayor are either complete imbeciles or bald-faced liars. There is no reasonable alternative. Either way they have no business judging anything.
Tags: 2nd amendment, arms, constitution, gun rights, guns, rights, supreme court
Posted in Politics | No Comments »
June 26th, 2010
Numbers 22:2-25:9
Micah 5:6-6:8
I Corinthians 1:20-31
Proverbs 26:2 As the bird by wandering, as the swallow by flying, so the curse causeless shall not come.
There seems a discrepency between the idea that we are created in God’s image to the extent that our words have creative force, that there is power in our prayers, and the opposing idea that a curse has no power unless it is deserved and that a prophet can speak neither blessing nor curse unless God allows it. There is truth on both sides if properly understood.
We were created in God’s image, but we are not exact copies, the earthly tabernacle was a corruptible copy of the one in Heaven, the feast days are shadows of the reality that is the Messiah, and mankind is an imperfect, much scaled down replica of God. Unlike him, we cannot create something out of nothing by merely speaking. We need something on which to build. We are unable to get our own dirt, so we have to make do with what we can find.
When Balaam tried to curse Israel, he failed because, as a prophet, he could only prophecy what God told him. His patron, Balak, understood the principle of Proverbs 26:2, that a curse undeserved has no effect, so he took Balaam to first one place and then another, thinking that a different perspective might give Balaam the hook he needed to make the curse stick. But he misunderstood the nature of a real prophet: prophesy comes from God and no other. If a prophet speaks truth, then his words are the words of God, and God can no more curse the righteous than could Balaam. Hence Balaam’s statement that “[YHWH] has not seen iniquity in Jacob, neither has He seen perverseness in Israel.” It was not that Israel had no sin at all, but that God had chosen to forgive them. Like a husband who chooses to overlook his wife’s flaws, from God’s point of view, Israel had no sin to which a curse could attach.
Finding no fault in Israel, Balaam showed Balak how he might create one that God could not overlook by seducing them into idolatry. This is the “doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to cast a stumbling-block before the sons of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols and to commit fornication.” (Revelation 2:14) Eating “things sacrificed to idols” does not refer simply to eating meat from sacrificial animals, but to actively participating in the sacrifice. Those who teach God’s people that it is acceptable to engage in pagan rituals and abandon God’s law so long as their “hearts are in the right place” are today’s Balaam. They cause God’s people to commit sins that he cannot overlook, opening them to whatever curse the enemy might choose to throw.
Posted in Keeping Torah, Marriage, Parsha 40 - Balak, Theology, Torah | No Comments »
June 24th, 2010
And “hikers” were “arrested” by Iranians somewhere near the Iraq-Iran border. Seriously? Someone, somewhere finds something shocking about this? If you, as an American of European descent, went hiking on the Iraq-Iran border (or pretty much anywhere else between Israel and India), I’d be more surprised if you were not detained by the local authorities or pretenders.
Tags: hikers, iran, middle east, Politics
Posted in Politics | No Comments »
June 19th, 2010
Numbers 19:1-22:1
Judges 11:1-33
John 3:9-21
A few thoughts on Chukat:
- Red is the color of mortality and blood. A heifer is a cow that has never calved. The red heifer was to be completely consumed along with cedar, hyssop, and a scarlet thread. Cedar, hyssop, and scarlet appear to be a reference to the cross. The ashes of the red heifer were collected, mixed with water, and used to ritually cleanse a thing or person from contact with death. Water is typical of the Holy Spirit. In summary, something mortal and which bears no fruit is completely given over to God in association with the death of Yeshua on the cross. In combination with the baptism of the Spirit, it saves us from death. This sounds like Yeshua’s words to Nicodemus in John 3.
- When Miriam died, there was no water to drink, and perhaps no water to mix with the ashes of the heifer to purify the people after her death. The people did not mourn her, but mourned themselves and their own discomfort. Shortly after that, they were sent back into the wilderness by the king of Edom. When Aaron died, the people mourned for thirty days and then defeated the king of Arad.
- Bronze represents judgment. When the people rebelled again and were punished through poisonous snakes, God told Moses to erect a bronze serpent on a pole in the middle of the camp. When the people were bitten by the consequences of their sin, they could look up and see the judgment of God on a stake and be healed. Reference again the words of Yeshua in John 3.
Numbers 19:1-22:1
Judges 11:1-33
John 3:9-21
Tags: baptism, chukat, chukkas, forgiveness, hukath, redemption, repentance, salvation, sin, unclean
Posted in Parsha 39 - Chukat, Theology, Torah | No Comments »
June 16th, 2010
Is it too late to change my voter registration???
Just kidding!
I would love to vote for Alvin Greene, though, just to say I did.
Posted in Politics | No Comments »
June 12th, 2010
Numbers 16:1-18:32
I Samuel 11:14-12:22
Romans 13:1-10
Order and hierarchy have been inherent in God’s plan from the very beginning, whether among the angels, in the Garden of Eden, among men, or within families. Although the laws that govern spiritual authority are not as readily subject to experiment and objective verification as the laws that govern chemical reactions, they are just as real and just as inviolable. A man who continually drinks dilute amounts of drano will eventually suffer from alkaline poisoning whether he learned the lessons of high school chemistry or not. He might get away with it for a short while, but the consequences of his actions will catch up with him. The same is true of those who reject spiritual authority. Women who reject the spiritual covering of their fathers or husbands, men who reject the authority of God’s anointed prophets and judges, children who reject the authority of their parents…They might live indefinitely believing that they have chosen their own path, that they have found freedom in self-governance. Really, they have left one service for another and gained nothing lasting in the transaction. After all, who is more free? The slave whose master will defend him and who trusts him with a great deal of autonomy? Or the escaped slave who has no resources, no shelter, and who has become an open and defenseless target for abuse and re-enslavement by another master? The latter may appear to have more freedom in the immediate sense of having no allegiance and no duty to a higher power, but in the long run, his available choices will be severely limited and possibly eliminated altogether.
Numbers 16:1-18:32
I Samuel 11:14-12:22
Romans 13:1-10
Tags: antinomianism, authority, feminism, korach, korah, korakh, lawlessness, libertinism, rebellion, witchcraft
Posted in Keeping Torah, Leadership, Parsha 38 - Korach, Theology, Torah | No Comments »
June 9th, 2010
I would be very interested in hearing some realistic solutions to the problems in Israel and in the Middle East in general. I haven’t heard any good ones yet.
Can’t we all just get along? Umm, no. Israel is completely surrounded by governments (and peoples) who have sworn to kill them all–men, women, and children. They can’t simply forgive and forget. They can’t turn their backs or relax even for a moment. And the Palestinians, whoever they were, whatever their origins, have been hopelessly ghettoized for so long that large segments of their population are no longer capable of living productively with others.
Israel should give the Palestinians their own country. The Palestinians are led by thugs who themselves are pawns for the neighboring Arab states that want nothing more than to kill all Jews. Every attempt at giving the Palestinians more autonomy has been doomed by political maneuvering and insane (literally!) violence against Israel. Even if Hamas and company could all be buried in a deep, mass grave, the Palestinians don’t have a great pool of leaders waiting to take over.
The Jews should give up and go home. And where would that be if not the home of their ancestors? It would make as much sense to suggest that any Cherokee who have found their way to Georgia be sent back home to Oklahoma. Even if we ignored the continuous presence of Jews and other Israelites in the Land for more than three thousand years, at the very least, they have the same right of conquest as every other people. The Coosa were driven out by the Cherokee who were driven out by the English who might soon be driven out by someone else. It’s the way the world has always worked.
The Palestinians should all move to friendlier Arab countries to be with their own kind. Again, what countries would that be? Nobody wants them. Jordan, Egypt, and Syria don’t want them. In fact, they would much rather the Palestinians stay in Israel as a destabilizing force. They are pawns without a single real friend in the world, some willingly but most probably ignorantly. They have nowhere else to go. Maybe those non-Israelis who want the Palestinians to leave Israel could volunteer their suburban homes to house a family or two or three?
There are no clear good guys in that mess, and there are far too many bad guys. The only clear thing in my mind is that the land of Israel, especially that land between the Jordan and the Mediterranean, is a special place to God. He entrusted it to Israel once, and although he removed them from it for a time, he promised to give it back to them. The ultimate title to the land has already been established. It is not on the negotiating table.
Tags: hamas, islam, israel, jewish, jews, middle east, palestine, palestinians, zionism, zionist
Posted in History, Politics, Theology | 3 Comments »
June 5th, 2010
I thought it might be fun to see how far we’ve come since Daniel Amos sang this song in the early 80s. I was wrong. This was a depressing exercise. We have lots of gadgets, but Taylor was right that “some things never change”.
“(It’s the Eighties, So Where’s Our) Rocket Packs”
from the album Vox Humana
Words and Music by Terry Taylor
©1984 Twitchen Vibes Music (ASCAP)
It’s the eighties
It’s the eighties so where’s our rocket packs?
It’s the eighties so where’s our rocket packs?
Go anywhere, we strap them on our backs
1. (It’s the eighties so where’s our rocket packs?)
I thought by now I’d walk the moon
And ride a car without no tires
And have a robot run the vacuum
And date a girl made out of wires
No thing’s don’t change that much, do they?
We are still out of touch, by now we should discover
Just how to love each other, like Klattus’ robot man
Your looks have killed again
2. (It’s the eighties so where’s our rocket packs?)
I thought by now we’d live in space
And eat a pill instead of dinner
And wear a gas mask on our face
A President of female gender
Though progress marches on, (new day)
Our troubles will grow strong
And my expectancies, become my fantasies
You turn my blood to sand, the earth stands still again
My hopes are running low
things moving much too slow
No space men up above
And we’re still so very far from love
3. (It’s the eighties so where’s our rocket packs?)
I thought by now we’d build a dome
Around the world, control the weather
In every house, a picture phone; communicate a little better
But some things never change (replay!)
You are still acting strange
No way that I can see, this way we will be free
La la la la la la,la la la la la 7,6,5,4,3,2,1 Lift off!
(It’s the eighties so where’s our rocket packs?)
Repeat 1, 2, 3
(It’s the eighties)
Tags: love hate technology politics
Posted in History, Love, Politics, Science | No Comments »