Judeo-Christian Clarion — Teaching Moments

There was a song that we sang years ago that went like this: “Give me oil in my lamp, keep me burning.” We want to look at the lamp in the temple.

Did you ever wonder why at the time of creation it says that there was evening and there was morning the first day? Why did God start His creation with night? Let’s look at the beginning of Genesis and see exactly what it says.

Every year in Israel they celebrate Tu Bishvat, which is celebrated on the 15th of Shevat (Hebrew calendar). It is also called Rosh HaShanah La’llanot, literally, “New Year of the Trees.”; We want to look at Psalm 1 and reflect on the lessons we can derive from our botanical analogy.

We have looked at the topic of trees several times this year. We saw that trees play a big part in life. Today we want to look at another tree, the Tree of Life. We saw that Yeshua/Jesus died on a tree that brought us life: Yeshua, the Living Torah, the Word of God. Once again we want to take a closer look at another tree that brings us life: the Tree of Life.

Maybe your family is one of those whose mother saved everything you did in school. She has every one of your school pictures and all of your artwork. Well, this is what God does. He records everything good and bad that we have done and one day He is going to open those books and we are going to stand before Him while it is all read to us.

If I am in Yeshua (Jesus) and He is in the Father and I am in God, then how could I ever be alone? Even if I feel alone, I am not because God is in me. He is with me always.

As we enter into a time of thanksgiving, a time of celebration, the holidays can be anything but joyful. Our trials and tribulations can bring us nothing but sorrow. So how do we learn to put our trust in God so that we can have that joy, that peace that comes from knowing Him, so that we can trust Him in our times that seem like the only way is for us to help ourselves?

Most believers can quote John 3:16, but I don’t think that we really grasp the meaning of this verse. This is the time that we traditionally celebrate the birth of Yeshua/Jesus. But do we really grasp what it is that we are celebrating? Let’s take a closer look.

So the question is, are you a Hebrew? And you may say, “No!” but I’m sure that after you read this you may say, “Yes, yes I am.”

February is called the love month. We send people cards and letters telling them just how much we love them. We buy flowers and candy and even expensive jewelry to show just how much we love them. It makes us feel good to do these things and to say these things. So I ask this simple question: when it comes to God, is it enough just to tell God that we love Him?

Many people are keeping Lent at this time, but we need to prepare our hearts not just for this time that remembers the past, but we need to prepare our hearts for what is coming in the future.

The Bible tells us in James 4:4, “Adulterers, do you not know that friendship with the world means hostility toward God? So whoever decides to be the world’s friend makes himself God’s enemy.” So, can we actually believe that we are good Christian people and yet actually be God’s enemy? What exactly is friendship with the world?

“For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was” (James 1:23-24). We so often think that the Bible speaks only to unbelievers, but the Bible is speaking to believers. You have to ask yourself, how can a person who believes in the One True Living God and who claims to be redeemed forget who he is?

When Yeshua (Jesus) was speaking to Nicodemus about being born again, Yeshua made a very interesting comparison about people being born again and the wind. We want to take a closer look at this and see if we can understand more clearly about this passage.

What does it really mean to walk with God? Will He actually come down and take a walk with us, and what do we have to do to walk with Him?

Do you have leprosy? I am sure your first response to this is “NO!” But we want to take a closer look at this subject because there is a spiritual leprosy that many people do not know about.

Our Heavenly Father is always looking and watching over us. Nothing is hidden from His sight. Nothing happens that He is not aware of. He sees all and He knows all, but like a mother He comforts us. The Bible tells us this in so many passages, and this is what we are going to take a closer look at.

Is it important to have the cross of Calvary always in our forethought? The cross is an instrument of suffering and death. So should we dwell on the cross of Yeshua day and night? There is only one place where we can find our salvation, our forgiveness, and our cleansing, and that is at the cross where the precious shed blood of Yeshua was spilt.

Philippians 4:4 tells us to rejoice in the Lord always. But we find it so hard to rejoice in affliction, when times are bad, when life just doesn’t seem to be kind to us. And yet that is when we are to rejoice the most. When we suffer, that is when God is the closest to us.

We want to look at the Nazarite and what he has in common with the Believer. Numbers 6:1-21 speaks to us about the vow of a Nazarite. We know that Samson and John the Baptist were both Nazarites, and even Paul had taken the vow once or twice in his life. These rules may seem strange, such as not eating anything from the grapevine, not being defiled by a dead person, and not even cutting one’s hair. But these were rules of holiness.

Auld Lang Syne is a Scottish song that came out about 1787. It means “Old Long Ago” or “Old Times Sake.” It is a song about friendship. At twelve midnight on December 31st we begin anew, but every day and even every moment is a new beginning. We must make the most of every minute because no one knows what the next minute will bring.

There is a famous poem written by Robert Frost that we want to look at in part. This poem reminds me of a passage of Scripture in Luke 10.

As believers we like to quote Ephesians 3:12. But we forget sometimes whose presence we are entering into. We forget that God is holy and we also need to be holy, and to be holy we must have a reverence and a fear of the Lord.

As believers, we are always talking about salvation, but what exactly is salvation? We want to take a closer look into this word and its meaning.

So many times we bring our anxieties and concerns before God because we live in a time of uncertainty. We see Jeremiah coming before God with a question that has been echoed all through time: “Why does the way of the wicked prosper?” We want to look at God’s response and how it pertains to us today.

In Part 1, we looked at God’s response to Jeremiah when He was discouraged about the wicked who prosper. In Part 2 we are going to continue looking at these horses.

We want to continue looking at God’s response to Jeremiah in Jeremiah 12:5 and how it relates to us, looking at the 3rd and 4th horse of Revelation.

We have been doing a series on running with the horses. We will continue by looking at the fifth seal and what it says about persecution and martyrdom.

Over the last several months we have been looking at each of the seven seals as we look at God’s response to Jeremiah. This month we will look at the sixth and seventh seal.

In part 5, we saw that God tells us to be dressed ready for service and to keep our lamps burning. To do this, we must pray without ceasing, always in His Word, fighting the good fight—for our fight is a spiritual fight. Let’s look at how a lifestyle in Messiah is all about the armor.

We have been looking at God’s response to Jeremiah as he asks, why do the wicked prosper?”  Jeremiah 12 1-5 “You are always righteous, Lord,  when I bring a case before you. Yet I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live […]

We have been looking at Jeremiah 12 these last several months and now we want to conclude our series by looking once again at the question and God’s answer. Jeremiah 12:1-5 “You are always righteous, Lord,  when I bring a case before you. Yet I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the […]

Storing up Treasure in Heaven Mathew 6:19-21 tells us, “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal,  but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.  For where […]

We have heard so much over the years about Social Justice.  A big part of this is the divide between the rich and the poor. But being children of the Most High, we want to hear from God’s Word regarding this subject. As always we want to live by God’s Word and not by man’s […]

While Yeshua was going through  Samaria one day, He stopped at Jacob’s well to rest. While He was resting His disciples went to get food and when they returned they urged Him to eat as John tells us in, John 4:31-38  “Meanwhile His disciples urged Him, “Rabbi, eat something.”  But He said to them, “I […]

There is probably no other verse in the scriptures than Ecclesiastes 3:1-6, that is so popular even in the secular realm.  The song “Turn, Turn, Turn (There is a Season) became one of the rally songs of the Vietnam War in the 1960’s. It was a song of protest and had very little to do […]

Matthew 5, which we call the Sermon on the Mount, is a very well known portion of Scripture, especially the Beatitudes, but is probably the least portion that is lived out in our walk with God. Matthew 5:3 tells us this, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” The […]

There was a saying years ago, “Don’t cry over spilt milk,” or some said, “There is no use in crying over spilt milk.”  No matter how you say it, you have to ask  yourself why did they say it?  Well, I think that milk is something that we feel we will never run out of  […]

The Declaration of Independence states this, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. —” We want to take a closer look into this statement, because this was […]

The Bible talks a lot about being ready. We want to look at these Scriptures to see if we are truly ready to do what God is asking us to do. Matthew 3:3, “For this is the one referred to by Isaiah the prophet when he said, “THE VOICE OF ONE CRYING IN THE WILDERNESS, […]

We are always hearing about living for God, but what about living with God. The purpose that God created was so that He could dwell with man. Yet, He did not create man as a spiritual being like Himself. But He created man to have a physical body, with an eternal spirit. You have to wonder […]

Ephesians 4:1-6 tells us,  “Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, being diligent to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. […]

In this month of November, we take time to share a meal, and to give thanks for a bountiful harvest. This is what Thanksgiving is all about.  Maybe we don’t appreciate this time for what it is really about because we do not grow a garden, or we do not know what it takes for […]

This is a time when people celebrate the Word that was made flesh. So there is no better time than to see what it means to have the Word dwelling with us. We say that we are people of the New Covenant and rightly so. We even call our Scriptures “The New Covenant.”  The New […]

Have you ever felt like you are going through a drought in your life, a dry period, where it seems as though life has become so mundane, so routine, so uneventful, like the heavens have closed their ears to your prayers?  It is as if you are in a desert, a parched land, all alone. […]

Today we hear about the persecuted church, but it is not only the church, the people of Israel are also persecuted, and many other faith’s as well. As we look we will see that there is a mark of the persecuted. Genesis 4:14-15 tells us this about Cain, “Behold, You have driven me this day […]