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.

We may wonder why God does not directly intervene to help in the midst of our plight; we may pray anguished prayers beseeching heaven’s intervention to deliver us from evil. Many of our brothers and sisters around the world are undergoing persecution, being murdered for the sake of their faith; others languish in prison or “reeducation” camps, being labeled as “enemies of the State,” brutalized, ostracized, marginalized, rejected, and forsaken of the common welfare of others. We shed tears over the burning of churches; we are repulsed by acts of violence against God’s people; we protest that Christians are regarded as political enemies for honestly questioning the logic and veracity of governmental mandates. We are often misunderstood, or worse, vilified for honoring the truth. We are made outsiders, segregated outside the camp, maligned as lepers and deplorables… Indeed, the world system hates us, and for the sake of our faith “we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered” (Psalm 44:22; Rom. 8:36).

So where is God in the midst of our alienation and tribulation? As followers of Yeshua we are called to walk in the truth, to do justice, and to walk humbly with our God. More: we are to die to ourselves, love our enemies, and be faithful to God even in martyrdom. In these darkened days, however, this means walking through the darkness of the valley of the shadow of death, for it is apparent that worldly culture has decisively rejected the truth of God and regards those who esteem it as its enemies. “The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel against the Lord, and against his Messiah, saying ‘Let us break their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us'” (Psalm 2:3-4). Prophetically, we know what is on the horizon; we foresee the terrors of the “End of Days.”

The test of faith in our circumstances, as has always been for God’s people, is to remain steadfast in our conviction of God’s love despite the darkness that surrounds us (Isa. 50:10). The test is summed up by C.S. Lewis this way: “We’re not doubting that God will do the best for us; we’re wondering how painful the best will turn out to be” (Collected Letters). We can’t stay in the limbo of such questioning forever, however; we must shake off our misgivings and find settled determination to press on in faith: Our Lord has a crown and a kingdom prepared for us, and he will give us what we need in the way to attain unto it.

There is a difference between knowing about God in your head and knowing God in your heart… Unlike a merely intellectual idea of faith that passively assents to theological propositions or creeds, trusting in the Lord (i.e., bittachon: בִּטָחוֹן) is an emotional commitment to God’s presence in the midst of the sorrows of our lives; it is the struggle of hope that affirms we are not truly alone, abandoned, helpless… Trust goes beyond the “head knowledge” to engage God personally, existentially, and from within the whirlwind of harrowing pain and pain’s fearful loneliness. Authentic theology is “dialogical” — a conversation of the heart with God – seeking, yearning, protesting, lamenting, and struggling with life’s inscrutabilities and unfathomable questions as it appeals to God for the assurance and comfort of the Holy Spirit. Trust finds courage to voice to our sorrow and fears, inviting God into the midst of our brokenness, often yielding to tearful silence in unknowing expectation. As Dorothy Soelle wrote: “Prayer is an all-encompassing act by which people transcend the mute God of an apathetically endured reality and go over to the speaking God of a reality experience with feeling in pain and happiness” (Soelle: Suffering). This is perhaps the deepest meaning of the Shema – to listen for God’s heart in the midst of your struggle; learning to encounter God’s love in the place of your brokenness and need (Job 13:15).

 

Hebrew Lesson:

 

• Psalm 44:22 Hebrew page (pdf)

 

Reflecting on the role of suffering in the heart of faith, Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945) – who was murdered by the Nazis – once wrote: “Here is the decisive difference between Christianity and all religions. Man’s religiosity makes him look in his distress to the power of God in the world: God is the deus ex machina [i.e., “quick fix”]. The Bible [on the other hand] directs man to God’s powerlessness and suffering: only a suffering God can help” (Letters and Papers from Prison). Bonhoeffer’s comment alludes to the difference between an “Elohim” (אֱלהִים) conception of God as the omnipotent power and Judge of reality, and the “YHVH” (יהוה) conception of God as the compassionate Source and Breath of life – the Suffering God who empties himself to partake of our condition – to know our pain, to bear our sorrows, to heal us from the sickness of spiritual death, and to touch us in the loneliness of our exile… The Spirit enables us to “groan” in compassion, directing us away from the impulse to “kill the pain” to accept it as part of our lament and need for connection with God.

 

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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.”

There are other cases, however, when a person may sincerely struggle with anger and disappointment with God, such as during a time of great tragedy and personal loss. Questions can arise from the conviction that God is ultimately responsible for whatever happens in our lives – both the good and the bad, and this can lead to confusion and anger over what has happened. The reasoning behind the conviction that God is responsible goes something like this. God has all power; he could prevent anything from happening, but he did not prevent this thing (i.e., tragedy) from happening. Having the power to prevent something from happening and choosing not to do so is to allow that thing to happen. Therefore since God allowed this to happen, he is responsible for its occurrence….

Now some might want to defend God by saying that he cannot prevent some things from happening, for instance, he cannot prevent the free choices of moral agents, so he is unable to intervene and stop their occurrence. Indeed there are many things that Almighty God cannot do. For instance, God cannot make a rock so heavy that he cannot lift it; he cannot make a four-sided triangle; he cannot lie or commit suicide; and he cannot overrule the will of free moral agents without violating the essence of what makes them responsible for what they do. Therefore God is not responsible for the evil actions of others.

However, even if we concede that God cannot overrule the will of free moral agents, it does not explain why God permits other tragedies such as natural disasters, accidents, diseases, famines, birth defects, and so on to occur.  After all, God is in the “midst of the whirlwind” and controls all the “natural” forces of creation. He is the LORD of Creation, the author of reality, and by his power he upholds all things. Events such as earthquakes, hurricanes, floods, tsunamis, plagues, and famines are part of the created order, though this order has somehow been affected by the “fall” of mankind with the loss of the original vision and goal for the creation (Rom. 8:20). Consequently the natural world is dangerous, difficult, unpredictable, and tragic, though it nevertheless is under God’s supervision and control.

Read more “Struggling with Anger at God…”

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.

The Scriptures teach us, however, that beauty is part of the very composition of things; the design and form of whatever exists, and that the revelation of beauty attests to the glory of God. Beauty is not simply “in the mind of the beholder,” but is objectively real, as part of the very structure of reality. Consider, for example, the flower that blooms, the bird that sings, the star that shines, and the sunset that suffuses the evening skies. “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament proclaims his handiwork; day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge” (Psalm 19:1-2).

The beauty of the natural world is grounded in mind of God, since God actively created and designed creation for his purposes and pleasure (see Gen. 1:1, 31; Rev. 4:11). The creation bears witness to the brilliance of the Creator, and the imprint of God’s handiwork is evident in the concinnity, order, and marvels of the natural world itself. This is particularly evident in the case of man, who is endowed with a conscience, or an intuitive “moral compass” that discerns the demands of justice and understands right and wrong. The conscience serves as an inner witness that speaks peace, harmony, and goodness when the moral law is observed, and unhappiness, disorder, and evil when it is disregarded or suppressed. As I’ve mentioned before, the ancient Greek mindset regarded what is beautiful as what is good, whereas the Hebrew mindset regarded what is good as what is beautiful. The difference is one of orientation. Doing our duty before God, obeying “the moral law within,” is what is truly beautiful, not merely appreciating symmetry, order, harmony, and so on. Beauty is a type of the good, in other words, and justice expresses the truth of the good in relation to oneself and others. Beauty is also a type of truth, since what is truly beautiful expresses and reveals truth, whereas what is not truly beautiful expresses what is false. The spirit of man attests to the reality of the Creator and realizes its ontological indebtedness to God (Rom. 1:20).

Theologically, the “beauty of the LORD” (נעם־יהוה) can be understood as the effulgence of God’s manifold perfections, everything about his heart and character that evokes ecstatic wonder, solemn awe, and irresistible attraction in his conscious creatures. It is the brightness and loveliness of God, the “charm of his unsurpassed excellence,” his perfect justice and infinite compassion for his creation. The LORD is “the Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he” (Deut. 32:4). The beauty of the LORD is likened to the purity of Divine Light, the radiance and splendor that is incomprehensibly mysterious and good. The New Testament says “For God, who said “Let light shine out of darkness,” is the one who shined in our hearts to give us the light of the glorious knowledge of God in the face of the Messiah” (2 Cor. 4:6). Yeshua is the Divine Light; the Radiance and Beauty of God manifest in the flesh (1 Tim. 3:16). “He is the radiance of the glory of God (הוּא זהַר כְּבוֹדוֹ) and the exact imprint of his nature, who upholds the universe by the word of his power” (נוֹשֵׂא כל בִּדְבַר גְּבוּרָתוֹ; Heb. 1:3). “All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made” (John 1:3).

So how do we wake up to the beauty of the LORD? How do we come to “see the invisible blessing” that pervades all things? How may we encounter the truth that “the whole world is filled with the irrepressible glory of the LORD” (Isa. 6:3)?

Frederick Buechner once described a “holy hush” that came over a boisterous crowd of people when they first encountered the giant redwood trees at Redwood National Park. As the people began to take in their surroundings, everything seemed to change – the loud chatter faded; the light, the atmosphere, and especially the awe of being in the presence of these enormous and ancient trees (some of which had been standing since the time of Jesus), induced a sense of smallness and humility before the glory that surrounded them.

You may have experienced this sort of awe also, perhaps while observing the starry night sky, or while watching the sun set over the mountains or upon the rim of the Grand Canyon, or when witnessing the birth of a baby, or when listening to music that touched your heart and brought tears to your eyes, and so on. Such experiences are sometimes called “self-transcendent,” since they move us outside of our ordinary consciousness in an encounter with something great, breathtaking, wonderful, and sublime…

Encountering the glory of the LORD evokes conflicting emotions within the heart, a powerful combination of fear and attraction that is sometimes called the “numinous.” The LORD our God is beautiful beyond anything we can imagine, yet were we to directly encounter him we would be so overwhelmed that we would “fall to the ground as one dead” (Rev. 1:17); nonetheless he puts his hand upon us and says, “Don’t be afraid; for I am with you.” By his gracious touch, then, we are able to look upon the radiance of his presence, to receive the vision of his majesty and transcendent beauty and loveliness. And the amazing thing is that this is what he wants; this is the very desire of his heart, after all, the prayer to the Father that we should behold his glory (see John 17:22-24). And this, I believe, is part of what is meant when it is said that we are made temples of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 3:16). ” You yourselves are like living stones being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Yeshua the Messiah (1 Pet. 2:5).

This topic relates to our Torah reading for this week, parashat Terumah. As we are drawn by God’s grace to love the Lord and to understand how truly beautiful and wonderful and kind he is to us, we will be willing to worship him and celebrate his loving glory. To be alive before God is to be alive to his beauty. Your heart will flutter in joyful excitement to sing: “Give unto the LORD the glory due unto his name; bow down to the LORD in the beauty of holiness” (Psalm 29:2). We sanctify the LORD God within us by affirming his superlative beauty, his infinite goodness, the greatness of his power, the perfections of his justice and truth, his unfathomable kindness, and his unsurpassing and everlasting love. The recognition of the beauty of the LORD is the awareness of his holiness, wherein our heart will esteem his sacred glory as our most precious and extraordinary gift. The beauty of the LORD our God is the heart of love and life and wisdom and truth, the Supreme Being of which no greater can be conceived, for ever and ever. Yehi Shem Adonai Mevorakh. Amen.

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Hebrew Lesson
Psalm 90:17 Hebrew reading:

 

• Psalm 90:17 Hebrew page (pdf)

 

 

(Originally published July 11, 2020)

“There is a way that seems right to a person, but its end is the way of death” (Prov. 16:25). There is the “seeming way” and the way of truth, and woe to the soul that cannot discern the difference! The spiritual danger here is that there is a way that seems right; as if all is well, and yet it leads to death… O the dread of ever hearing: “I never knew you (לֹא יָדַעְתִּי אתה); depart from me you who practice lawlessness” (Matt. 7:23).

It is lawlessness (ἀνομία) to reject the Torah of God that commands us to follow Messiah and know him in all our ways – including the ways of our struggles, our calls for justice, and so on… “Justice, justice you shall pursue” (צֶדֶק צֶדֶק תִּרְדּף) implies that any means to justice must be just themselves. Indeed Yeshua plainly warned us that those who willfully reject moral sense do not know him and therefore will be judged as outsiders of the truth of God. The way of the LORD (דֶּרֶךְ יְהוָה) is “to show mercy and judgment (Gen. 18:19). Amen. “If you know that He is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness (πᾶς ὁ ποιῶν τὴν δικαιοσύνην) has been born of him” (1 John 2:29).

As Yeshua plainly testified before Pilate: “For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world — to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice” (John 18:37). “Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they may have the right to the Tree of Life and that they may enter the city by the gates. Outside are all those who love and practice the lie…” (Rev. 22:14-15).

In this audio podcast (from 2020 at the outset of the Antifa and BLM violence in the USA), I discuss the meaning and importance of the “law” in the life of those who purport to be followers of the Messiah:

 

Hebrew Lesson:

 

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