Rabbi’s Reflections – Wednesday, August 28, 2019
Shalom *|FNAME|*,
Rabbi Trail: Here is a link to a talk by Dan Juster (our shileach). https://tikkun.tv/the-four-pillars-for-yeshuas-2nd-coming/ It is a little less than an hour long. Because it includes Spanish translation, it is helpful if you know Spanish or want to improve your Spanish. End RT.
As I said above, Dan Juster is our shileach. “Shileach” (pronounced “Shil-ay-ach”) is the Hebrew word for “apostle.” It means “one who is sent.” The “Capital ‘A’ Apostles” were the original 12 (oops 11, then 12 again). The title “apostle” (notice the little “a”) has been abused a bunch especially in recent years.
Like all titles in the kingdom of God, we must be very cautious about who is called what. We should be especially careful about anyone who is self-appointed to any office. An office title indicates anointing and should be assigned through the laying on of hands (not your own hands).
Generally, a title in the kingdom should help identify an anointing that has been obvious for some time to a large number of people. Also, titles do not transfer from community to community. An elder in one community does not have the privilege of going to another community and declaring himself to be an elder.
Satan has an illegitimate counterfeit for every legitimate gift of God. Whatever God creates that is good, Satan has a corruption that is bad. This is true of people too. A gifted shileach will be right much more than he is wrong.
Back to Dan… when we refer to him as our shileach, we are recognizing the part he played in planting our congregation 22 years ago. We are also recognizing the work he has done to establish the Tikkun network of congregations and ministries.
The evidence is in his co-leaders, Asher Intrater, Eitan Shishkoff, Paul Wilbur. These are men he chose more than 40 years ago. Then there are so many more, too numerous to count. This is proof of spiritual vision that the natural eye does not reveal.
Let’s give thanks to God (and pray for) our earthly leadership. They are each a gift from God.
Week 35
Memory Verse: John 15:4 Abide in Me, and I will abide in you. The branch cannot itself produce fruit, unless it abides on the vine. Likewise, you cannot produce fruit unless you abide in Me. 5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. The one who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for apart from Me, you can do nothing.
171 8/26 Monday: John 11; Matthew 21:1-13
172 8/27 Tuesday: John 13
* 173 8/28 Wednesday: John 14-15
174 8/29 Thursday: John 16
175 8/30 Friday: Matthew 24:1-31
Question of the day: How do we approach (what I like to call) a strict trinitarian?
Answer: A strict trinitarian is one who believes that God is 3. I have to be careful here, because I believe that too. But I believe the important ending… “God is 3 in 1.”
It’s a lot like you. You’re made in God’s image, and you are 3 in 1. You have a physical body (the one that is involved in the 5 senses), a soul (your personality), and a spirit (the part of us that relates to God). We don’t have a whole person when we remove any one part from the other two.
Yeshua hit this pretty hard when He answered Philip. John 14:8 Philip said to Him, “Master, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” (dayenu) 9 Yeshua said to him, “Have I been with you for so long a time, and you haven’t come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me? The words I say to you, I do not speak on My own; but the Father dwelling in Me does His works. 11 Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me—or at least believe because of the works themselves. (I had to stop somewhere, but you can keep reading the Bible.)
One last word from the Bible on the spirit of man… 1 Corinthians 2:11 For who among men knows the things of a man, except the man’s spirit within him? In the same way, no one knows the things of God except the Ruach Elohim. 12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God—so we might come to know the things freely given to us by God.
That is the “born again” experience. When the Spirit who is from God (the Rauch Elohim) is made alive through faith in the Son of God, Yeshua HaMashiach, we come to life in Him. Colossians 1:27b …Messiah in you, the hope of glory!