Can we do תפילות prayers for:
Harold Smith
That through them The האור Light, רפואה The Healing and The ואהבה Love of ישועת יהוה Yeshuath YHWH may come back to הארץ The Land of Israel?
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"…let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Garden of God." Revelation 2:7 | |||
by haRold Smith based in Jerusalem, Israel "...but Yeshua said, 'Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the Kingdom of heaven'." Matthew 19:14 "And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them and said, 'Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the Kingdom of heaven'." Matthew 18:2-4 "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an jot, not a tittle, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the Kingdom of heaven'.", but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the Kingdom of heaven'." Matthew 5:17-19 What is interesting to note in these passages above is that these words are all spoken to those who considered themselves to be disciples - believers in Yeshua. So, what is it about little children that Yeshua said of such was the Kingdom? Is it because they have no reason or intelligence to question? Or, is it that they come to learn without preconceptions? Their learning is of observance and by hearing the one who is teaching. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Voice of the One Who IS the Word of God. Such it must be with those of us who believe Him today. We must come to Him like a child with a clean slate for Him to write upon our hearts His directives - not our own. (Romans 10:17, John 1:1-14 click on highlighted verse to see scripture). What is the gospel message? Words mean things and if the Life of Yeshua is the benchmark by which all things are measured, including other scripture - then what do the.words on the pages of the Book reveal to us about the gospel? They say that Yeshua went about preaching the "gospel of the Kingdom of God". Not one time does it ever say that He preached the "gospel of salvation" as we have been taught. - neither from Him nor from the disciples. (Matthew 4:23, Revelation 19:10). We must remember that every word written in the Book was written by Hebrews, to Hebrews - there were no "Christians" around when these words were penned. The term "Gentile believer" is oxymoronic. The Gentiles who believed participated in this sect of Judaism called haDerek Notzarim - "The Way of the Nazarene" and they gathered in the synagogues as part of the family of YHVH to learn of the only One True God of Israel. The "good news" of this gospel to those Hebrews is that the Kingdom the Holy One of Israel established with the first son, Adam, which had been abrogated by his disobedience to the Father, has now been restored by the obedience to the Father of the second son, Yeshua - Israel's kinsman redeemer. (Acts 24:10-14, Acts 15:19-21, Numbers 27:11). There is not one place recorded in the Book where this gospel of the Kingdom He was proclaiming was questioned by the Jews He was speaking to. Why is that? Because the Jews He was speaking to already understood they were a nation established under the umbrella of the One True God in whose Presence is Salvation - the Holy One of Israel. They were looking for the promised Messiah who would restore what had been lost by their revolt of Him as their King. Yeshua came as that Messiah for the "lost sheep of the house of Israel" and to "reign over the house of Jacob" in the restored Kingdom of God - not to establish a new religion and not to replaced Israel with another people as the proponents of that New Pauline Religion called "Christianity" would have us believe (Acts 1:6-7, 1Samuel 8, Luke 1:33, Matthew 15:24). The Kingdom of God tells us whose it is, the Kingdom of heaven tells us where it is - but there is only one Kingdom. The Hebrew word for kingdom is mamlakah and means dominion, reign, sovereignty over a realm. Yeshua says in Luke 17:20-21 that this Kingdom does not come by "observation" but that it is "within" and, again in John 18:36 that His Kingdom is "not of this world". The mistake the Jews made then and most who call themselves believers still make today is in looking for a physical Kingdom set here on the earth and, while that will be the ultimate manifestation of His Kingdom, that manifestation cannot be realized until the principles of His Kingdom are first established within the hearts of those that will possess the Kingdom. (Daniel 7:22, Romans 8:19).  Even though this Kingdom is not observable with the natural eye, scripture shows us that it has distinguishable features. Hebrews 1:8 (quoting from Psalm 45:6-7) states that Yeshua will reign as King over the Kingdom of God with a Scepter of Righteousness. The Hebrew word for scepter is shebet meaning "the mark of authority of a tribe or clan". The Greek word for sceptre is rhabdos and is what has come to be known as a shepherd's "crook". This is the same Greek word translated in Revelation 2:27 as a "rod of iron" meaning it to be a standard that does not bend or yield - not something to whack with. The Paleo Hebrew character for the letter "lamed" is a shepherd's crook and means "belonging to".. The Ten Commandments are the Constitution of His Kingdom for His governance of His people - a redeemed people rescued from bondage by His Grace to be brought into the realm of the Peace of His Presence. The Paleolitic Hebrew definition (the set of characters used before Hebrew became a language) of shalom (Peace) is the authority to bring order to chaos. Casting aside His Constitution is to allow chaos to reign in our lives (the realm of His Kingdom if we are given to Him) in the guise of enlightenment - our own set of rules and regulations cloaked as "morals". (see The Present Presence) The apostle Sha'ul defined the Kingdom of God in Romans 14:17 as the peace and joy found in righteousness. Righteousness is a way, a manner of living life. We know this because the same Sha'ul also teaches us by listing what the "unrighteous" are in 1Corinthians 6:9-10 - and that list is comprised completely of deeds of behavior. Yeshua said the judgment that has come into the world is because men refused to bring their deeds of behavior into the Light for reproof to see if those deeds are wrought in God - or not. The Greek word used for "judgment" in this passage is krisis and the root word of judgment is "to judge" which means to decide (yes, a crisis is what the Father uses to bring us to a place of decision). The meaning of krisis is a separating, sundering, a separation. To hate evil is not some emotional reaction but a behavioral movement from darkness into the Kingdom of Light. To hate your brother is to despise, to disparage, to separate yourself from him and move into darkness. (John 3:16-21, Exodus 20:5, 1John 3:15-16, Luke 6:22, see The Judgment). "Now therefore, IF you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel." Exodus 19:5-6 God's purpose, from the beginning, was to have a Kingdom of Priests that would be a "Light to the Nations" so the rest of the world might see and desire to come into the Presence of the Goodness of this One True God of Israel. Throughout scripture He is defined and defines Himself as the God of Israel - not the God of mankind. (see the One Covenant series for a detailed explanation). The purpose of the establishment of the Kingdom was to have a culture of righteousness comprised of justice, mercy and faith that would be observably set apart from the rest of the world. We have traditionally been taught to think of justice as a court of law, but the justice of the Kingdom has more in common with the Father's Nature of selflessness, looking upon the things of others as more important than my own, than with rules and regulations. To live in, to abide in this Kingdom requires an adherence to His code of conduct - His Constitution. The guidelines He gives us for living in the Ten Commandments are the principles by which His Justice is established in our hearts - the realm of the Kingdom. Matthew 23:23-24, Micah 6:8, Philippians 2:4, see the Law of Grace). Yeshua said to some followers "do what they say (the words of Moshe/Torah, i.e., what is written) but not as they do (the Pharisees)". He called them "blind chairs". (mis-translated "guides") because there was a seat of Moshe, the authority given to Moshe from YHVH, that the Pharisees claimed to occupy. But, they had their own doctrines (oral law) that they said superseded the written Torah - His Constitution. Hence, the conflict facing Nicodemus, a Pharisee - either abiding by the traditions handed down to him and that he taught, or embracing the Living Torah, Yeshua for Who He says He Is. This is the same conflict facing us today. There is only one thing scripture tells us Yeshua ever pointed to that could nullify the word of God in our lives - that would be the traditions not found in scripture but handed down to us by men. Today, many have allowed the culture of the tradition of men to supercede what is written on the pages of the Book and, by so doing, nullify the Word of God in their lives without realizing it. (Matthew 23:3, Matthew 23:24, Mark 7:13).  This gospel of the Kingdom of God described in scripture is not about personal salvation - in spite of what the traditional, popular mantra has become. One of the traditions of men handed down to us is the concept of what it means to be "born again". Simply looking into the words found on the pages of scripture, we find there is only ONE verse of scripture in the entire Book where the Greek phrase, "gennao anothen" (born again), appears and it is in the passage from John 3:3-11. The Greek gennao (born) means of men who father children. It is a variation of the Greek genos meaning born into a family. From a Hebrew perspective, it means to bring one to a way of life. The Greek word anothen (translated "again") actually means from a higher place, of God. Thus, to be "born again" is more appropriately translated to be brought into a family whose Father is God that maintains a higher standard of life from the rest of the world. The phrase, "born again", is not referenced in the Tenakh (the Original Book). Why is that? It is because the Hebrew people ARE the family. In fact, when answering Nicodemus in this passage, Yeshua chastened him for being a Rabbi, a teacher of Israel, and NOT understanding what it means to be born of the Spirit - to be the embodiment of the Living Breath bestowed upon the Jews (Hebrew nephesh, (Genesis 2:7, John 20:21-23). What Yeshua was saying to Nicodemus was that we (the Jews) KNOW the Source of Life because it is through the people of Israel that Breath of Life has been bequeathed. The traditions the Jews embraced separated them from the Spirit of that Life, thus necessitating a re-alignment for a Jew to "return" into the proper orientation and awareness of Who He is in Truth. Yeshua went on to say in this passage that without first becoming a member of this family of the Father's (Israel), which requires an embrace of this higher standard of Life set apart from the rest of the world (the Commandments), a person cannot SEE the Kingdom of God (v3). A person must first embrace His family, Israel, in order to even SEE there is a difference from the world. Only after making that point does He go on to say then does the opportunity present itself that through water (repentance) and spirit (revelation through Ruach haKodesh) one ENTERS the Kingdom of God (v5). It is from this understanding that Sha'ul could make the statement that "not all Jews are Jews", speaking of those who are in the family but have not embraced the manner of Life presented by Yeshua (Romans 2:28-29). To be born again is not a confession of belief or an ideology - it is a manner of life. You say you believe in Yeshua? Scripture says the demons also believe - and tremble. Believing, in and of itself, is not what sets those of the Kingdom apart from the rest of the world. Yeshua continued in this same chapter of John 3 to say that the judgment men incur as a result of following those traditions is a separation from the the Present Presence. They suffer judgment because Light has come into the world and they refused to bring their deeds into the Light of Who He says He is. These principles of His Kingdom are not "moral guidelines". They are the definition of Light. God is Light, therefore, if this is His Kingdom, it is a Kingdom of Light. It is a universal phenomenon that Light and darkness cannot exist in the same space at the same time. We have been given the choice to determine our station in eternity - whether we will live in the Light of righteousness, of Truth; or whether we will live in the darkness of lies, what our own will and the will of men purpose are the rules for living. The definition of darkness is the absence of Light. IF we choose to fashion the deeds of our lives after the righteousness of Life Yeshua exampled, we know the Father lives in us as Light and we have Peace. Altering the words of the code of conduct to fit our purposes, to excuse our behavior, causes movement away from the Kingdom of Light. This is the judgment that Light has come into the world that men love darkness more than they loved the Light. (James 2:19, 1John 1:5, 1John 3:24). Real Peace, shalom, does not settle in our heart until we decide to abandon our deeds of whoremongering and drunkenness that results from giving ourselves to other gods of the flesh and embrace the Scepter of Righteousness exampled in the Life of Yeshua. It is not until we determine that we are not going to give over to darkness anymore - even if it kills us - that the Power found in His Virtue (from the Greek word dynamis which means inherent power, and where we get our English word dynamo) causes us to overcome. This is what scripture means to "give no place to the devil". If we do not allow darkness in our life - we have access to the Present Presence and His Peace that passes all understanding. The Ten Commandments are given to us to define what is the darkness that separates us from residing in the Peace of YHVH's Light (1John 2:29, Ephesians 4:27, Isaiah 43:11).  What was the manner of Life Yeshua exampled that kept Him in the Light? He said it was because He kept the Commandments of the Father (John 15:10). What Commandments was He speaking of? Each time Yeshua was directly asked "how to obtain eternal life", His response was the same - to keep the Commandments. He even repeated them so that there would be no misunderstanding as to what they were. Our deeds determine whether we are walking in the Light of righteousness or in the darkness of the deeds of our flesh. The Commandments were given to an already redeemed people as instructions on how to live - as the definition of what is Light and what is darkness in order for them to remain in the Presence of that Light. The only difference between the covenant of the Tenakh (Original Book) and now is that these words, once etched in stone, are now written on our hearts by the Holy Spirit - BUT THEY ARE STILL THE SAME WORDS. (Matthew 19:16-22, Luke 10:25-28, also Mark 10:17-21, and Luke 18:18-22, - Jeremiah 31:31-33). What the blood sacrifice of the kinsman redeemer did was to pay the price of reclamation to restore what the Father established in the Garden of Eden, being One in relationship with a man, and was subsequently sold into bondage through the disobedience of the first son. This is why, on the cross, Yeshua said to the thief, "Today, you will be with me in the Garden of God." In Hebrew, there is no word for "paradise" - there is only "gan edan", garden of God (Revelation 2:7 as well). The complete, physical restoration of the whole of creation will then take place at the end of the millennial reign of Yeshua. (1Corinthians 15:44-45, John 3:16, 1Corinthians 15:20-28). The good news of this gospel is that the Kingdom, that had once been under the curse, has now been restored to its rightful owner and, as a result through the sacrifice of Yeshua, Ruach haKodesh (the Holy Spirit) has been shed abroad for all who adopt the culture of God's Kingdom to come and partake of the Goodness of the Holy One of Israel. We, who were once afar off can now come and be adopted into this family, Israel, who is sanctified by the Father of Light (Acts 2:38-39, Acts 26:15-18). But we must first become as a child and approach Him without preconceptions about Who He says He Is.
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"Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: They shall prosper that love you." (Psalm 122:6) (prosper - from the Hebrew, "shalav", meaning "to be at rest") Please visit the website http://hethathasanear.com for other articles and videos or for information if you feel led to contribute to this ministry. Click here to watch the short movie Maranatha!. | |||
 Shalom Alechem B'Shem Yeshua HaMashiach. (Peace be unto you in the Name of Jesus the Messiah) haRold Smith Jerusalem • Israel http://hethathasanear.com harold@hethathasanear.com | |||
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