Many of us deal inner conflicts, self-reproach, and meagerness of faith… It is reported that on his deathbed Rev Zusya said, “I am not afraid that the Holy One will ask me, ‘Zusya, why were you not more like Moses?’ Rather, I fear the Holy One will say, ‘Zusya, why were you not more like Zusya?'” This Hasidic story is interesting because, on the one hand, how could Zusya be anyone other than he is? and on the other, why is Zusya afraid that he is not who he should be? Zusya’s parable reveals that there is an inner conflict in his soul. He senses that has not lived as he ought, that he has failed himself (and God), and that he is lost in the rift between the ideal and the real… His struggle, then, is with himself. Who he is and who he thinks he should be are at odds within his heart.
The question of who we are supposed to be haunts us, and consciousness of the failure to practice our ideals leads to a sense of guilt, anxiety, and shame. For those who believe in Yeshua the question is essential to the question of what it means to be an authentic disciple. How are we to live before God and be accountable for what we do? For instance, we read Yeshua’s message in the Sermon on the Mount and we eventually realize – if we are honest with ourselves – that it is not within our nature to be able to do as he teaches, and this leads us to a despair not unlike that which Zusya experienced. A divided house cannot stand….
Rev Zusya’s despair can be remedied only by overcoming the inner divide through a personal relationship with Yeshua, for salvation is not simply deliverance from the accusations of conscience (i.e., the verdict of the law) but constitutes the healing grace that delivers us from ourselves. Yeshua did not die on the cross to simply take away our sins, but to create within us indestructible new nature that it no longer enslaved to the power of sin. The message of the gospel is that your heart can, and ultimately will be, transformed by the miracle of God.
Salvation is not a matter of “religion” or of man’s attempt to justify himself by some kind of reformation of character. Yeshua is not the “second coming of Moses,” after all. Try as you might to live a “good life,” keep the commandments, and aspire to elevate yourself spiritually, you will eventually come to realize that it is impossible to change yourself. You will then be faced with a decision: either to deceive yourself about who you are, or to be honest and confess your wretched and hopeless condition. This is the “lawful use of the law,” that reveals the “ought-to-be” self so that the gap between the ideal and the real becomes unsurpassable, and we know ourselves as lost sinners who are in peril over ourselves…
In our natural estate we are “fallen,” shattered of heart, full of trouble “as the sparks fly upward.” As Simone de Beavoir once wrote: “In the very condition of man there enters the possibility of not fulfilling who he is” (Ethics of Ambiguity). The breach between who we are and what we ought to be creates a sense of alienation from ourselves, a “shadow self” that we deny, suppress, or try to control. In a moment of rare lucidity, the “natural man” cries out to God: “What do you want from me?” This is the moment when truth has its opportunity, when the heart is stirred to confess its need for deliverance and to accept God’s love, despite the brokenness and incoherence of life.
When we escape from the “hard yoke” of our laws, and our vain attempts at self-justification, we do not encounter yet another set of laws, or yet another heavy yoke, but rather we take hold of the love of God, a personal love, and we engage in relationship with God as the central (and unifying) reality of our lives. Deliverance from ourselves is not found in religious (or “spiritual”) recipes of any kind but in our connection with the truth of who God really is, trusting in his love and healing for all that we are, have been, and ever shall be, amen.
“Salvation is of the LORD,” which means that God does the work of righteousness within you. When you say “I can’t,” you are either looking at yourself or at God. If you are looking at yourself, “I can’t” is better understood as “I won’t,” and the problem then is a lack of faith. On the other hand, if you are looking to God, “I can’t” is followed by “but You can, O Lord” and faith trusts that God will complete the good work that he has begun in you.
It has been said that God sends each soul into the world with a special message to deliver, a revelation that only he or she can disclose… No one else can bring your message to this world – only you can do this. And since God is entirely unique, you are called to be who you were created to be, and not someone else. As George MacDonald once said, “I would rather be what God chose to make me than the most glorious creature that I could think of; for to have been thought about, born in God’s thought, and then made by God, is the dearest, grandest and most precious thing in all thinking.” That’s the good news of the gospel, friends: God not only saves us from ourselves, he remakes us to be true bearers of his image and likeness. He works all things together for his glory and our good. Amen, let it be so, O Lord.
By the grace of God I am what I am.”
(xάριτι δὲ θεοῦ εἰμι ὅ εἰμι)
Hebrew Lesson
- Ezek. 36:26a Hebrew page (pdf)
All thinking is a form of believing, and therefore there is no truth apart from faith. The scientist who carefully observes phenomena, for instance, is a person of faith who believes that an external world exists, that it is knowable by the human mind, that the future “resembles” the past (i.e., the uniformity of nature), that causal relationships exist, that the scientific method is able to reliably use logical inference to reach tentative conclusions, and so on. Indeed, the entire scientific worldview relies on metaphysical assumptions no less than any other religious view.On a practical and existential level, then, we note that everyone trusts and makes decisions based on metaphysical presuppositions that they (sub)consciously assume to be trustworthy. Regarding such assumptions, (i.e., axioms of ultimate meaning and “consequential weight”), we are constrained to give account, though we cannot settle the truth of such assumptions using the science or a naturalistic worldview without begging questions…
In the Scriptures God’s Name is revealed as YHVH (יְהוָה), which means “He is Present.” The Name is formed from the words hayah (“He was”), hoveh (“He is”), and yihyeh (“He will be”): הָיָה הוֶה וְיִהְיֶה, indicating God’s omnipresence. Note that all the letters of the Name are “vowel letters,” which mean they evoke breath and life. This is the Name revealed to Moses thousands of years before the advent of other religions (Exod. 3:14), and indeed it is the Name associated with the nishmat chayim (נִשְׁמַת חַיִּים), the “breath of life,” imparted to Adam in the orchard at Eden (Gen. 2:4). It is therefore the original Name of God “breathed out” to mankind. The Name Yeshua (יֵשׁוּעַ) means “YHVH saves.” There is no other Savior beside Him, there is no other Name, there is no other LORD. “For I am the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.” Only Yeshua the Messiah can deliver you from the wrath to come (1 Thess. 1:10).
It is written in our Torah, “The LORD your God will return as you return (ושׁב יהוה אלהיך את־שׁבותך), and will have mercy upon you, turning to gather you back…” (Deut 30:3). This has both a present and prophetic application. First, in the present hour, if you turn to God, he will show you compassion, and he will “gather back” all those distant and fragmented parts of yourself into shalom and wholeness. He will restore your lost days; he will bring you out of exile and give you comfort in Yeshua. He makes all things new. “Draw near, therefore to God, and he will draw near to you” (James 4:8). Second, the LORD will return to earth as the Jewish people return from their captivity, and he will restore Zion during the time of the final redemption. The LORD will turn captivity into mercy; he will turn in his compassion to his people. As it is written: “I will be found by you, declares the LORD… (והשׁבתי אתכם אל־המקום) and I will bring you back to the place…” (Jer. 29:14).
Do you sometimes have trouble trusting God? Do you wrestle with fear, anxiety, or worry? Does an inexplicable dread or sense of hopelessness sometimes oppress you? Do you secretly wonder what’s wrong with you – and whether you are truly saved, after all? Please hang on. Doubting and questioning are often a part of the journey of faith, and we don’t have to be afraid of our questions, concerns, and difficulties… Being full of “certainty” is not the same as being full of faith, after all, since many sincere people are sincerely self-deceived, while many others experience fear, loneliness, and trouble as a result of their faith. There is so much we simply do not know, and it is dishonest to pretend otherwise. God knows your heart and its struggles; he knows all your secret fears. Thankfully, there is a special prayer included in the holy Scriptures for those times when we feel especially unsteady or insecure: “Lord, I believe, help thou my unbelief…” (Mark 9:24) Here we may bring our (lack of) faith to God for healing….
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945), a German pastor who was surrounded by the atrocious evil of Nazi Germany and who was murdered at their hands, regarded stupidity as more dangerous than outright evil, since stupidity is a type of irrationality, a chosen ignorance of what is real and true. Against such willed ignorance we are often defenseless, since any reasoning that appeals to transcendental moral truth finds no traction, carries no weight, and has no effect. The devil, then, seeks first of all to stupefy people, that is, to drug them or flatter and persuade them to think that there is no need to engage in serious thinking or to humbly question their assumptions… As William James observed: “A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.” The antidote to unthinkingly accepting the biases and inculcated prejudices of the world is to humble ourselves by learning to sincerely respect the Reality of God: “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; but fools despise wisdom and correction.”
It is written in our Scriptures: “The wicked in his proud countenance does not seek; God is not in any of his thoughts” (Psalm 10:4). Indeed the willful denial of reality is an affront to heaven, contempt shown for the gift of life, and sacrilege of all that is worthy (Psalm 14). It is sheer folly to regard life apart from the fear of the LORD, for that is reishit chokhmah – “the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 111:10).
In this present world it is a struggle not to be afraid… We see through a glass darkly; our heart’s desire is often thwarted; we often walk in uncertainty; our prayers may seem to go unanswered. There are many tribulations, sorrows, and pains; we are grieved and often feel lonely; we sometimes struggle to hold fast to our confession and hope; we feel alarmed over the insanity and depravity that pervades the culture around us; we feel powerless to stop the juggernaut of unrestrained evil, yea, we lament over the battle within our own hearts — our own inner fears, outrage, and wretchedness.
Some people tend to blame God for their troubles. They get angry. They ask “Why me?” Their hearts turns hard and they become bitter over the course of their lives… I suppose such people assume that if they are generally well-mannered and occasionally helpful to others, they have the “right” to expect a life of relative ease, and if that does happen, they feel disappointed with God. As Tevye ironically said to God (in the Fiddler on the Roof): “It may sound like I’m complaining, but I’m not. After all, with Your help, I’m starving to death.”
The nature of beauty has been an enduring mystery to artists and philosophers over the millennia, and various attempts have been made to define it. For example, some have defined beauty as an order, arrangement, and harmony of some kind (understood either as objective qualities inherent in something beautiful, or as a subjective sentiment of a person experiencing something that is esteemed as beautiful, and most often as a combination of both). In other words, something is regarded as beautiful because it possesses a certain arrangement of qualities that evoke pleasure or satisfaction in the mind or heart of a person.