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James 1:22
“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves”. The reading portion assigned for this week starts with the rulings of freeing slaves every seven years (Exodus 21:2). This law of release also applies to fields that are to be let fallow one year out of seven. The purpose of these rulingss is to keep people from oppressing each other, as well as to establish a sense of priority in our hearts. Hashem doesn’t want us to spend our lives aimlessly increasing our wealth at the cost of our relationships and and responsibilities towards human beingsas well as towards our spiritual walk, which also needs attention. When the people of Israel did not obey the law of release, God sent Babylon against them. The seventy years of Babylonian captivity correspond to the seventy jubilees they did not observe (Jeremiah 25:11). The earth is God’s and everything in it. He makes the rules and He gets His due, you can make sure of it. The part that compliments this week’s reading portion is in the Book of Jeremiah. As the Babylonians besieged Jerusalem, through the mouth of Jeremiah the Lord convicts the people about not observing the jubilee (Jeremiah 34:8-10). As they obeyed, word reached the Babylonian army that Hophra was coming up out of Egypt with an army to raise the siege. It is not that the Egyptians loved Israel so much, it is just that whoever controls Israel controls the Via Maris, the main trade route between Egypt and Assyria. Here is where the story changes. When Israel sees Egypt coming to its rescue causing the lifting of the Babylonian siege, they renege on their repentance. They bring their slaves back to labor. They maybe thought they played a good one on God, until Jeremiah unveiled God’s retributive plan. You can read it in chapter thirty-four of the Book of Jeremiah. Through Abraham, God made a covenant with mankind which cannot be broken (Genesis 15). But the fact that this covenant cannot be broken does not exclude retributions for us breaking it. Though these retributions may not be fatal, they are nevertheless drastic (Jeremiah 34:13-22). In the same manner, when a person goes under Hashem's redemptive covenant made with the world through Yeshua the Messiah, that person becomes liable to the obligations of its contract. Inclusion under Hashem’s covenant is free, but there are particulars to the terms. As we read Scripture, it is important for us to understand the particulars of our contract. In this day and age of literacy, the only excuses we have for not knowing is distraction, disobedience, or indifference, and all are bad. James admonished the Israeli community of believers in these very pertinent words, Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves (James 1:21-22). May we also take these words to heart!
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James 1:22
“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves”. The reading portion assigned for this week starts with the rulings of freeing slaves every seven years. This law of release also applied to fields that are to be let fallow one year out of seven. The purpose of these commandments is to keep people from oppressing each other, as well as to establish a sense of priority in God’s people. God doesn’t want us to spend our lives aimlessly increasing our wealth at the cost of human beings and our spiritual walk, which also needs attention. When the people of Israel did not obey the law of release, God sent Babylon against them. The seventy years of Babylonian captivity correspond to the seventy jubilees they did not observe. The earth is God’s and everything in it. He makes the rules and He gets His due, you can make sure of it. The part that compliments this week’s reading portion is in the Book of Jeremiah. As the Babylonians besieged Jerusalem, through the mouth of Jeremiah the Lord convicts the people about not observing the jubilee (Jeremiah 34:8-10). As they obeyed, word reached the Babylonian army that Hophra was coming up out of Egypt with an army to raise the siege. It is not that the Egyptians loved Israel so much, it is just that whoever controls Israel controls the Via Maris, the main trade route between Egypt and Assyria. Here is where the story changes. When Israel sees Egypt coming to its rescue causing the lifting of the Babylonian siege, they renege on their repentance. They bring their slaves back to labor. They maybe thought they played a good one on God, until Jeremiah unveiled God’s retributive plan. You can read it in chapter thrity-four of the Book of Jeremiah. Through Abraham, God made a covenant with mankind which cannot be broken (Genesis 15). But the fact that this covenant cannot be broken does not exclude retributions for us breaking it. Though these retributions may not be definitive, they are nevertheless drastic (Jeremiah 34:13-22). When a person goes under the redemptive covenant God made with the world through Yeshua the Messiah, that person becomes liable to the obligations of its contract. Inclusion under God’s covenant is free, but there are particulars to the terms. As we read Scripture, it is important for us to understand the particulars of our contract. In this day and age of literacy, the only excuse we have for not knowing is disobedience or indifference, and both are bad. James admonished the Israeli community of believers in these very pertinent words, Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves (James 1:21-22). May we also take these words to heart! 1 Corinthians 10:11
Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come. After God delivered the Children of Israel from Egypt with His mighty Arm He commanded them, Only he, (any given future Jewish king) must not … cause the people to return to Egypt … '(Deuteronomy 17:16). Because of this commandment, some in Jewish religious circles conclude that once someone returns to Israel, to the Land of their ancestors, it is a sin to leave it again. But was the commandment to be applied solely within a geographical understanding? Eight centuries later, the Children of Israel had gone full circle. Subject to a coup within the royal house they fear the fury of Nebuchadnezzar. The remnant from Babylonian deportation decides to seek refuge in Egypt. They seek the advice (or approval) of Jeremiah the prophet who tells them to stay put in Israel and trust God. They reject the counsel and go anyways taking Jeremiah with them as a prisoner (Jeremiah 46). God must have foreseen this event for having warned the children of Israel before they even entered the Promised Land (Deuteronomy 17:16). It is easy to judge and criticize the Children of Israel for this blatant disobedience. “Oh, how children love to judge their parents, especially teenagers!” Yes; we can look at them and say, “Why? Why didn’t they trust God and obey the commandment, especially when Jeremiah told them? Can’t they remember all the bounty and power God showed them in the past …etc …” Yes it is easy to react that way, but the only way to have mercy and compassion on others is to have a good hard and honest look at ourselves. A rule for Jewish judges was that if a judge could not see within himself the fault of the person he was to judge, he would be self-righteous and therefore not fit to judge him. Seeing the fault of others in ourselves provides us with the Spirit of the Judge of the earth who took on sin upon Himself so he could judge us righteously (Isaiah 11:1-4). He asks us, Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye(Matthew 7:3)?. We must remember that, these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come (1 Corinthians 10:11). A good honest look at ourselves easily reveals the spirit of fear and compromise which stifles our effectiveness for Him as well as eats at our trust in obeying His word of personal revelation to us. It is at the end of our lives that we realize how we have missed the boat. We see then how we have allowed fear and personal interest to provoke us to compromise and choose a life of seeming safety instead of launching out like Abraham into the bright future that could not be altered no matter what. May we learn from the Children who tried to find safety returning to their old lives. May we learn that we are safer in a desert surrounded by enemies if God is with us that in that within a shaded walled garden with supplies yet without God. We need this lesson to help us face the days to come. We need to live it today so we can teach it to our children for their days to come … and their children’s! Matthew 6: 24 (KJV)
No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. About 3,400 years ago the people of Israel learned that Egypt was an unreliable staff. Not only did they learn that Egypt was no match for God, but that the fish, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic didn’t really cost nothing, but came at the price of servitude to Pharaoh, the god of the land (Exodus 11:5). Ultimately God Himself challenges Pharaoh’s pride, destroys his army, and takes his country down a few notches. The only option at freedom for Israel was to throw itself at God’s mercy in total devoted obedience to His will. About eight centuries later, both Israel and Egypt are found to learn the same lesson. Pharaoh Hophra thinks himself to be god and Israel seeks refuge under his provisions. Judea had been told to submit to Babylon and live (Jeremiah 27:12), but stubbornly refused, which eventually caused its destruction and seventy years captivity. Those left from the captivity see themselves again under Babylonian attacks and seek refuge under Ophra of Egypt, thus absolutely rejecting Jeremiah’s advice to stay put in Israel (Jeremiah 42). In the end, Israel finds itself between the Babylonian army coming as locusts to destroy Pharaoh and Egypt (or ‘between ‘Iraq and a hard place’’) (Jeremiah 46:23; Exodus 10:4, 12-14). The only option again for Israel will be to throw itself at God’s mercy in total devoted obedience to His will. Today Israel faces the same dilemma. Having a divine destiny to re-conquer and repopulate the Promised Land, Israel is discovering that the political credit and financial support it receives from the international community may come at the price of heavy compromises including the giving up of Jerusalem. Again, Israel has to make hard choices, and throw itself at God’s mercy in total devoted obedience to His will. On a homiletical level, this lesson may apply to us all. In the global economy in which we live, when someone sneezes in Asia or the Middle East, our whole economy gets sick with a cold. Suddenly, that far away ‘sneeze’ echoes and sends shivers into our very pocket books and ability to provide for our families here at home. The good news is that as believers and followers of God, we have the admonition from Yeshua to not rely on the shaky uncertainty of an international economy already so sick that it is actually dead, only made to look alive by the life support of political lies and pretences (Matthew 6; 19-34; Philippians 4:19). Most of the time also, success in business in a capitalistic society comes at the price of aggressive financial maneuvers that go against the principles of Torah and God’s commandment to not practice usury, but to give in love preferring the welfare of others before that of our own. We all have hard choices to make!, and ultimately need to throw ourselves at God’s mercy in total devoted obedience to His will! Matthew 2:15
"Out of Egypt I called my son." We read in the Torah that before entering the Promised Land, Moses warns for eventual kings of Israel not to, cause the people to return to Egypt in order to acquire many horses, since the LORD has said to you, 'You shall never return that way again' (Deuteronomy 117:16). Abraham settled in Egypt because of financial distress (Genesis 12:10). His grandson Jacob also brought the whole nation of Israel birthed from his loins to Egypt because of famine (Genesis 47). Up to the times of the Roman Empire Egypt was the place of wealth and plenty, of comfort and ease. It was also the center of idolatry with a culture and lifestyle in opposition to God’s ways. The Almighty had reversed the trend started by the patriarchs. He was finally going to give His first-born Israel a country of his own so the people could settle and live in Hashem’s ways. Hashem warns them: “do not let trade and comfort tempt your future king to make you return to Egypt”. If we remember, this was the constant temptation in the desert. As soon as something went wrong they cried, “Oh my, why have we left the comfort of Egypt?” Trade and comfort is also what made Lot, Abraham’s nephew leave his uncle’s side for the wicked city of Sodom. This warning seems to echo through time on deaf ears when nearly a thousand years later we read that in spite all of Jeremiah’s pleading and reminding, the remnant from the Babylonian exile seeks refuge in the arms of Pharaoh (Jeremiah 42). As believers and followers of our Master Yeshua, we are destined to problems, trials, tests, even to suffering. This is an age of uncertainty and like the Children of Israel we have left it to go after the visions of the bright future outlined in God’s promises. Like Noah we are building for the future while everyone enjoys life as if everything was going to last forever (Matthew 24:38). Many have travelled that way before us, by faith, seeing Him who is invisible, having never received the promises, and like for them, God has provided something better for us (Hebrews 11:27; 39-40) . It is easy to become wary of the way and to desire the lives of others who have settled down for the devil’s arrangements on the planet (Luke 4:6). As we hear the sounds of war, of bankruptcy, and of the general evil around us, let us rebuke that temptation and keep our eyes towards the promises of the ‘World to Come’. When we finally enter the last phase of this Messianic age, when Messiah rules on earth and justice covers the land like water covers the sea. We will then look back and wonder, ‘what did ‘Egypt’ have to offer me anyways!” May it come soon Abba, even in our days! |
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