Rabbi’s Reflections – Saturday, January 4, 2019
Shabbat Shalom,
I want to write a brief exhortation on this Shabbat. My Scripture text is 2 Corinthians 5:20a We are therefore ambassadors for Messiah. Begs the question, “Well, are we?”
A while back (October 18, I looked it up) I wrote briefly on this subject. Today I want to expand on it. Too often we get full of ourselves. We feel like we have a right to act out. We use the biblical account of Yeshua overturning the tables of the money changers as our excuse to act up. Our families (and especially children) get the worst of our attitudes and emotions. This ought not to be the case.
In every situation, we have a calling to be “ambassadors for Messiah.” Too often, I’m afraid, Yeshua has to shake His head and, if justice were to be served, disapprovingly pull my credentials as one of His followers.
Let’s take a moment here to consider what it means to wait, especially in light of being Yeshua’s ambassadors while waiting. Rudyard Kipling wrote in the first verse of the poem “If,” “If you can wait, and not be tired by waiting…” Also, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote the last line of “A Psalm of Life,” “Learn to labor and to wait.” Really? Longfellow ends “A Psalm of Life” with the thought, “Learn to wait.”
Enough from Kipling and Longfellow. I hope you are reading this RR to learn something of what God wrote and thinks (He wrote His thoughts in the Bible).
Rabbi Trail: Before I quote from Psalm 27, I want to say that we prayed Psalm 27 every Shabbat at Shomair while both of my younger daughters were deployed (Berelyn in Iraq (Army) and Jacquelyne in Turkey (Air Force)) back in 2003, until we memorized it.
The last verse of… Psalm 27:14 Wait for Adonai. Be strong, let Your heart take courage, and wait for Adonai.
Waiting for God is one thing, but waiting in line for a person is something else, or is it? After all, every person is God’s precious creation. I had a friend years ago who said every time she was in line (at the bank, grocery store, post office or anywhere) she felt like God was giving her a break to seek Him. She would immediately begin to pray to God and for the people around her. That’s how an ambassador responds to waiting.
God is calling His people to slow down. Read that again, slowly. We don’t know how to wait. We live in the world of instant everything. If you still have a TV that works (you may recall I cut the cable), notice how many commercials are based on the idea that we should not wait. “Buy now, pay later.” “Hurry, these won’t last.” “Pop it in the microwave.”
Rabbi Trail: If you don’t have 5 minutes to cook grits and are tempted to use instant grits, avoid the temptation. If you don’t have 5 minutes to cook grits, don’t eat grits. Instant grits are an invention of the devil and they taste like it. One last thought… if you put sugar on grits, you’re a yankee and we should kick you out of the South, with the love of Yeshua, of course. End RT.
Another Rabbi Trail: Since Diet Coke is harmful to you and microwave anything is harmful to you, the worst thing you can do is microwave a diet coke. Don’t try it, doing so may alter the space-time continuum. End ART.
Seriously… While it’s Shabbat, think about this. “Lord, teach me to wait. Help me to be Your ambassador in all things, especially when waiting.”