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John 14:8
"Adoni, show us the Father,” The Children of Israel blew it. Impatient for the return of Moses they make themselves a god of gold. They did not transfer their loyalty to an idol of gold. Unfamiliar with the idea of an unseen god with no image or temple, they concretized the unseen One who had qualified Himself by taking them out of Egypt into the similitude of a calf. Hashem seems to have an issue with identity theft. Israel played the harlot during her betrothal so God calls off the wedding. The first covenant made at Sinai is already broken. Israel, the bride is technically allegeable to the death penalty. Justice is an invariable concept. When justice is not paid, we give way to injustice and God cannot be found to be unjust. Justice has to be given its due but here where Moses found a legal loophole: it doesn’t matter by whom it is paid. In this case, Moses negotiates with Hashem. Moses drives a hard bargain. Knowing that the Father wants to destroy Israel but that he also himself found favor in the sight of God, Moses places himself on the side of Israel. He stops talking in 'I', ‘You’, and ‘them’ terms, but uses ‘we’, and ‘You”. Therefore if God kills Israel, He has to also kill Moses. Moses saves the day by identifying himself with Israel, by putting his own life on the line alongside Israel. As a result, by the righteousness of one, the whole nation is saved. This is a very important concept foreshadowing Messiah’s mission. Having heard Moses’ pleas, Hashem rewards his sacrificial stand and shows His True compassionate nature by renewing the broken covenant. It will be the same covenant but renewed, not a new covenants such, this 'renewed covenant' (brit Chadasha) carries the same terms as the first one. Hashem does so because of His own character and desire. In the third chapter of the Book of Exodus, as the Almighty Creator of the Universe reveals His identity to Moses,. He uses the words “HEHIYEH ASHER HEHIYEH”, or “I Will Be That I Will Be” (Exodus 3), which means something to the essence of “I Am the Eternal Existential Being and I keep Covenant Forever’. In Exodus thirty-four, Hashem continues revealing His identity. He does so using a list of thirteen attributes. These attributes represent the Father’s compassionate nature and are a central motif in Jewish liturgies. Because Hashem is forgiving and compassionate, there will be a wedding in Horeb after all. It is so funny that so many people think that divine grace and forgiveness is something our Master Yeshua brought, and that it didn’t exist before. Yeshua’s grace was only a reflection of the Father’s never-changing willingness to atone and forgive. Yeshua came to show and represent the Father's eternal comapssion to us. Do we forget that it is actually God who so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life (John 3:16)?
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John 1:18
No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father's side, he has made him known. We all want peace in the world. The Torah tells us that peace comes from studying the Sacred Text. Speaking of studying the Torah in the World to Come, Isaiah prophecies and says, All your children shall be taught by the LORD, and great shall be the peace of your children (Isaiah 54:13) (The Hebrew text uses the tetragrammaton for the word ‘Lord’ in this verse; it therefore refers to seeing God). John says that in this present time, ‘No one has ever seen God’; In fact seeing God leads to death. But Isaiah prophecies that in the established Messianic Age … your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. In another place the prophet adds, And the glory of the LORD (tetragrammaton) shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together … (John 1:18; Isaiah 30:20; Isaiah 40:5).’ When speaking of the dynamics of His relationship with the One whom He called Father, Yeshua compared Himself to Manna coming from Heaven. In the Talmud, bread and rain from Heaven are parabolic of Torah: the Word of God’s teaching coming to God’s people. Yeshua compared His teaching of God (whom He had seen (John 1:18)) to the manna that came down from heaven to feed the people in the desert. When people who had known Yeshua from a young age challenged His claim of coming down from heaven, Yeshua, who is at the Father's side, (John 1:18), answered and said, It is written in the Prophets, 'And they will all be taught by God.' Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me--not that anyone has seen the Father except he who is from God; he has seen the Father. Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. … (John 6:45-51)." In essence, Yeshua, said, ’In Me is fulfilled Isaiah’s prophecy Isaiah 54:13). Since no-one can see the Father and live, if all God’s children are to be taught of the Father, it needs to be done by proxy. I am the ‘Proxy’. This resonates of the words the children of Israel 'Let me not hear again the voice of Adonai my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.' About which Hashem said, 'They are right in what they have spoken’. So He then added: ‘I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him’ (Deuteronomy 18:16-18). May we all be taught the words of the Father through His Messiah. Only then will we finally have peace in our hearts, … and in the world! Matthew 5:13
"You are the salt of the earth …” The Heavenly Voice spoke the Ten Statements in a rumbling earth wind and fire show defying any pyrotechnic event (Exodus 20:18). The Almighty Creator of the universe continues expounding on the universal Constitution that until this day forms the basis of the world’s main calendars (the seven day week with one day of rest) as well as defines the basic laws of morality and civil conduct. At that point, the Children of Israel confess their incapacity to hear the Heavenly Voice. They beg Moses to intercede; they ask him to hear the Heavenly Voice and relate to them later what It said. So many people today say, “God told me such and such …” I do not doubt that God still speaks to or through people, but looking at Scriptures, it seems that such events were fearfully awesome. What human indeed can hear the very Voice of God?! The Almighty approved of Israel’s request to ask for an intercessor. Here is what He said through Moses, "The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers--it is to him you shall listen-- just as you desired of the LORD your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, 'Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.' And the LORD said to me, 'They are right in what they have spoken. I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him (Deuteronomy 18:15-18). Maybe God recognized Israel’s leader’s healthy fear of Him which according to Solomon is the beginning of wisdom (Proverbs 9:10). Because of our sinful nature, we cannot directly hear the Voice of the Almighty God. We need an intercessor. This intercessor is the way by which we enter in the Holy Presence. This Intercessor earned His position by being faithful and obedient unto death. Though His atonement work was finished from the foundation of the world, He was manifested to us in these last days as Yeshua HaMashiach (2 Timothy 1:9-10), One who has delight in the will of His (and our) Father (John 6:38; Hebrews 4:15). Like Moses, this Intercessor helps us hear the Great Voice of God. We understand the message and nature of the Father through His Words, but mostly through the example of His life. Like the High-Priest does in the Holy of Holies on the Day of Atonements, Yeshua, our High-Priest in the heavenlies brings our petitions to the Father (Hebrews 9). As He was to the world of His generation, so He sent us to be in the world of our generation (John 17:18). May we then also, as Moses did in His generation and Yeshua does in ours, consider the helpless spiritual state of those around us and bring them the Word in a more palatable form. May we help them ‘see the lightening without feeling the bolt! ‘ Yeshua explained it as being the ‘salt’ of the earth. As salt makes food more palatable and nicer to the taste, so we ought to live in way that the witness of messiah in our life makes the understanding of God’s ways more palatable to people. |
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