Rebuild by The Barking Fox

What happens when people are cut off from their history? That would be like wiping the memory of a computer network, only worse. That must be why God's book devotes so much space to telling the story of his people.  
Deuteronomy 1:1-3:22; Isaiah 1:1-27; Job 12:23; Acts 7:1-60, 17:26-28; 1 Corinthians 15:32
Click here to download a transcript of this podcast: Connecting with Our Collective Story
 
Here’s something from Moses that I have always appreciated because of the unusual names he mentions:
And the Lord said to me, “Do not harass Moab or contend with them in battle, for I will not give you any of their land for a possession, because I have given Ar to the people of Lot for a possession.” (The Emim formerly lived there, a people great and many, and tall as the Anakim. Like the Anakim they are also counted as Rephaim, but the Moabites call them Emim. The Horites also lived in Seir formerly, but the people of Esau dispossessed them and destroyed them from before them and settled in their place, as Israel did to the land of their possession, which the Lord gave to them.)
Deuteronomy 2:9-12 ESV
Moses goes on to say:
Today you are to cross the border of Moab at Ar. And when you approach the territory of the people of Ammon, do not harass them or contend with them, for I will not give you any of the land of the people of Ammon as a possession, because I have given it to the sons of Lot for a possession. (It is also counted as a land of Rephaim. Rephaim formerly lived there—but the Ammonites call them Zamzummim—a people great and many, and tall as the Anakim; but the Lord destroyed them before the Ammonites, and they dispossessed them and settled in their place, as he did for the people of Esau, who live in Seir, when he destroyed the Horites before them and they dispossessed them and settled in their place even to this day. As for the Avvim, who lived in villages as far as Gaza, the Caphtorim, who came from Caphtor, destroyed them and settled in their place.)
Deuteronomy 2:18-23 ESV
Once we get past the odd names, we realize that Moses has summarized the history of the Middle East up to the point when the people of Israel are about to take possession of Canaan. Most of his opening remarks in Deuteronomy tell the history of Israel, starting with God’s Covenant promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He reminds the second generation of Hebrews who came out of Egypt what their parents should have told them: that they are the people of God, chosen to carry his Covenant of redemption to the whole world, starting with the base of operations God will establish through them in the Promised Land of Israel.
The transmission of collective memory is more important than we may think. Without it, our tendency is to default to a visionless—and hopeless—outlook of “eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” If there is no point in our existence, and no hope of anything better for the future, we might as well make the best of things right now. Or, as some might say, “He who dies with the most toys wins.”
That’s a sad commentary on what throughout history has been the default setting of God’s highest creation on earth. Even the Covenant people of Israel tended to think about themselves that way, which is why Moses, the Prophets, and the Apostles frequently reminded them about their identity, heritage, and future. That’s exactly what Stephen was doing when he made his defense before the Sanhedrin. Judea’s leaders in his day hadn’t forgotten their special place in God’s plans, but they needed help connecting the great events of Israel’s past with the greater events happening right in front of their eyes.
We still need such reminders. All nations do. Eventually we’ll all come under the global Commonwealth of Israel when Messiah reigns from Zion, but until then the most consistent record we have of God’s involvement in human affairs is our history. It’s clearest in the history of Israel and the Jewish people down to our time. When we study that history, and when we teach it to our children and churches and communities, we are telling them that there really is a God who made us and who is redeeming us just as he promised.
That, by the way, is why Moses mentioned the history of the Edomites, Moabites, Ammonites, and even those peculiar Zamzummim. God had plans for each of those nations, just as he has plans for all nations. Job tells us that:
He makes nations great, and he destroys them;
he enlarges nations, and leads them away.
Job 12:23 ESV
Paul expanded on that thought in his dialogue with the men of Athens:
And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, for
“In him we live and move and have our being”;
as even some of your own poets have said,
“For we are indeed his offspring.”
Acts 17:26-28 ESV
Our responsibility is to teach our children our own national stories, both good and bad. Spanish children must learn about the Inquisition and expulsion of the Jews, but they also must learn of the heroic struggle of 800 years that freed their nation from Muslim occupation. American children have to understand the stain of institutionalized slavery, but they must also understand the godly principles built into our national fabric that compelled us to correct that and other injustices. Children in Ghana can’t ignore the struggles of post-colonial independence, but they gain dignity and hope in learning about the powerful kingdoms like the Asante Empire that preceded the colonial era.
Every nation and people have stories like this, and every child must learn those stories. It’s how we connect with our fathers and mothers extending back to the beginning, and how we connect with the Author and Finisher of our collective story.
 
Cover image generated by Grok, created by xAI.
Music: "Song of Glory,” The Exodus Road Band, Heart of the Matter, 2016.

Paul made a lot of quotes and references to Moses and the Prophets. Maybe we should study Moses and the Prophets if we want to understand what he really meant. 
Numbers 30:2-36:13; Jeremiah 2:4-28, 3:4, 30:10-11, 31:31-34; Romans 8:26-30, 11:25-32; 2 Corinthians 1:20; Hebrews 8:8-12
Click here to download a transcript of this podcast: Guaranteed Inheritance
 
It would have been helpful in my high school years if I had known that Paul was a Jewish scholar who based his writings on Messiah Yeshua’s living example of what Moses and the Prophets taught. We didn’t learn that in my Presbyterian school, nor in my Southern Baptist church. Instead, we learned soundbites from Paul, such as the verse that says all things work together for good for God’s people.
There’s nothing confusing about that unless we want to find out why things work together for good. That’s when we read the context of the verse, and we find this:
Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
Romans 8:26-30 ESV
So does God give us free choice, or has he predetermined everything from the beginning? Whatever the answer is, Jesus must be at the center of it, because Paul says so here:
For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory.
2 Corinthians 1:20 ESV
We know about the promises of new life in Christ, eternal salvation, and peace that passes understanding, so having Messiah’s death and resurrection as the guarantee of these things is comforting. It’s when we try to make sense of Paul’s references to Israel’s prophets that we get confused. After all, Christ made all things new, starting with a brand new covenant. So why do Paul and the other New Testament writers spend so much time quoting Moses and the Prophets and telling us about Israel?
It’s because the New Covenant is all about Israel. The New Covenant is spelled out in Jeremiah 31 and Hebrews 8. In Jeremiah 30, which sets up the New Covenant passage, we find this:
Then fear not, O Jacob my servant, declares the Lord,
nor be dismayed, O Israel;
for behold, I will save you from far away,
and your offspring from the land of their captivity.
Jacob shall return and have quiet and ease,
and none shall make him afraid.
For I am with you to save you,
declares the Lord;
I will make a full end of all the nations
among whom I scattered you,
but of you I will not make a full end.
I will discipline you in just measure,
and I will by no means leave you unpunished.
Jeremiah 30:10-11 ESV
This is why Israel is so important – not just to native-born Jewish people, but all people everywhere. God intends to have his Covenant world order, which is Messiah’s Kingdom. He decided long ago that he would establish that Kingdom by and through Israel. All other tribes and peoples and nations and tongues eventually come under it, which is why Israel will be the only nation still standing in the end. That’s why Israel’s Messiah opened the way for us all to be adopted into the family of Abraham, along with the native-born.
Another way to look at this is through inheritance. Israel’s tribes were to receive their inheritance after liberating God’s covenant land, which was called Canaan at the time. Before the tribes entered Canaan, Reuben, Gad, and half of Manasseh asked to receive land on the east side of the Jordan River, which was ideal for their flocks and herds. I surmise that God allowed that since that territory also had been promised to Abraham. However, there was a condition:
So Moses gave command concerning them to Eleazar the priest and to Joshua the son of Nun and to the heads of the fathers' houses of the tribes of the people of Israel. And Moses said to them, “If the people of Gad and the people of Reuben, every man who is armed to battle before the Lord, will pass with you over the Jordan and the land shall be subdued before you, then you shall give them the land of Gilead for a possession. However, if they will not pass over with you armed, they shall have possessions among you in the land of Canaan.”
Numbers 32:28-30 ESV
That was a reasonable condition, and the tribes carried out their promise. But notice that, even if they hadn’t, they still would have inherited land. God had predetermined that Canaan, the core of his holy territory, would be settled by Israel. The only question was who would settle where. The people would make that choice. Reuben, Gad, and half Manasseh chose to inherit on the east side of Jordan and help their kin secure their inheritance on the other side. Yet even if they hadn’t helped their brothers, everyone would still have inherited something. Whether that included every individual is another matter, because individuals could remove themselves from the equation by refusing to participate. The nation, however, and the foreigners who joined them, did receive an inheritance, just as they and we will receive an inheritance when Messiah’s Kingdom is established in Zion.
The question for us is the same as the question for the tribes long ago: do we want to help our brethren gain their inheritance, or will we sit at home while God comes through for them? All Israel will be saved in the end, but it’s better if we work together.
 
Cover image generated by Grok, created by xAI.
Music: "Song of Glory,” The Exodus Road Band, Heart of the Matter, 2016.

If certain people were forerunners of Messiah, could certain nations be forerunners of Messiah's Kingdom? What might that look like if it were possible?
Numbers 25:10-29:40; Jeremiah 1:1-2:3; Leviticus 25:8-12; Isaiah 54:9-10; Ezekiel 37:24-28; John 14:20-29; 2 Corinthians 3:17; Philippians 4:4-7
Click here to download a transcript of this podcast: A Shadow of the Kingdom
 
When the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, it probably never occurred to them that the date on the Hebrew calendar was Tammuz 17 in the year 5536. It probably also never occurred to them that the bell in the Pennsylvania State House where they were assembled bore an inscription from Leviticus 25, the full reference of which is:
And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you, when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his clan.
Leviticus 25:10 ESV
That inscription was chosen by Isaac Norris, Speaker of the Pennsylvania Assembly, in 1751 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the founding of Pennsylvania. As a Quaker who knew the Bible, Norris understood the spiritual significance of his choice of inscription for what we now know as the Liberty Bell. So also were the Signers of the Declaration aware that their actions were based in the authority of the Creator and humanity’s relationship to him. That’s why the Declaration began with an affirmation that all men are created equal, and that their rights come from the Creator, not from human government. That’s also why they appealed to the Creator in the closing words of the Declaration:
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States. . . .
Reflecting on the Declaration, Samuel Adams of Massachusetts said,
We have this day restored the Sovereign to Whom all men ought to be obedient. He reigns in heaven and from the rising to the setting of the sun, let His kingdom come.[1]
This is the context in which the United States of America came into existence as a nation dedicated to proclaiming liberty. The Founders realized that the liberty they proclaimed was imperfect. Within the borders of the new nation were many thousands of enslaved persons, as well as indigenous nations whose sovereignty in their own territory was in question. The America of 1776 also reflected the global civilization in which women generally had less status and freedom than men. Nevertheless, the Founders who signed the Declaration of Independence, and those who adopted the Constitution as the supreme law of the land after the Revolution, understood something many Americans in our day have forgotten: that our system is self-correcting.
What makes our system self-correcting is its establishment on the biblical truth that God created every human being with intrinsic value. As his images, or representatives, in the earth, we humans have the capacity to think for ourselves, to make judgments, and to act on our conclusions.
With such great freedom comes great responsibility. We submit to the Sovereign Creator, but we have license to dialogue with him and even argue our ways before him. Who knows but that he might take our views under consideration and alter his decrees, as he did in the matter of Zelophehad’s daughters? The Torah as originally given specified only males could inherit. That established an injustice for families like Zelophehad’s, in which the only offspring were daughters. God found their complaint justified, and adjusted his commandments to allow for female inheritance.
Arguing a case before the court of heaven, however, is not the same as defying that same court. Zimri of the tribe of Simeon did just that when he led the way in an idolatrous sexual revolution with the women of Midian and Moab. That same kind of revolution brought disaster on Israel on the 17th day of Tammuz, when Moses discovered the Golden Calf and broke the tablets of the Torah God had just given him. God pronounced judgment on those who had joined the rebellion, and the tribe of Levi responded to carry out his sentence. In the same way, God pronounced judgement on Zimri and his followers, and Phinehas the Levitical priest carried out the sentence by executing Zimri and the Midianite woman with him. In both cases, the righteous response to the evil that could have destroyed Israel resulted in a greater good. The Levites became the priestly tribe responsible for the holy things of God, and Phinehas the priest became the first recipient of God’s Covenant of Peace.
God promised to establish the Covenant of Peace with the entire Commonwealth of Israel. That Covenant, empowered by the Spirit of God, operates in the Torah principles that are the framework of our Judeo-Christian civilization. It is the Covenant Messiah Yeshua bestowed on his disciples, saying,
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.
John 14:27 ESV
This kind of peace is far more than the absence of conflict. It’s the shalom of God – the wholeness that comes through identity in him, both for individuals and for nations. That kind of peace endures even in times of war and violence, and even when the need arises for people of peace to take righteous action against those who would rob the world of peace. It’s the kind of peace that Paul meant when he wrote, “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:7).
This is why our Republic is worth defending. It is not perfect, but it is a representation of the Kingdom of God, just as certain individuals in the Bible are representations of Messiah. We still await the full manifestation of Messiah’s Kingdom. In the meantime, we work through human institutions to uphold God’s peace and shine its light into the realm of darkness.
 
[1] Excerpt from a speech attributed to Samuel Adams, August 1, 1776, quoted in Rev. Charles E. Kistler, This Nation Under God: A Religious Supplement to American History (Boston: Richard G. Badger, 1924), 71, https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uva.x001180994.
 
Cover photo: Liberty Bell inscription (National Park Service photo).
Music: "Song of Glory,” The Exodus Road Band, Heart of the Matter, 2016.

Messiah Yeshua gave us power to trample over scorpions and serpents. Does that mean the ones slithering on the ground, or the ones crawling through our hearts?
Numbers 19:1-25:9; Micah 5:7-6:8; Genesis 3:1-24; Psalm 140:1-3; Matthew 23:33-36; Luke 10:19-20; John 3:13-15; Acts 28:1-6; Romans 3:9-20; 1 Corinthians 10:1-13; 2 Timothy 3:1-9
Click here to download a transcript of this podcast: Watch for Snakes
 
When Messiah Yeshua said he had given his disciples authority over serpents and scorpions, did he mean that literally? If so, then maybe there is some truth to the legend of Saint Patrick driving the snakes out of Ireland. 
It’s true that the Apostle Paul suffered no harm when a Maltese viper bit him, but that actual event doesn’t give us the full picture of what Yeshua meant. The literal is important, but it’s only the start of our understanding. Actual events and characteristics are the basis for symbolic and abstract meanings that in time develop transcendent meanings of their own. Thus, the legend of St. Patrick and the snakes of Ireland isn’t really about reptiles, but about the man of God’s impact on the pre-Christian pagan culture of Ireland. That becomes clear when we look into the biblical symbology of snakes, or serpents.
Let’s first look at Yeshua’s statement about giving his disciples authority over serpents. It’s in Luke’s Gospel:
Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall hurt you. Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.
Luke 10:19-20 ESV
This isn’t a statement about some mystical power, but about the identity of Yeshua’s followers. They are no longer identified with the world, but with the King of the world. That means they are no longer susceptible to the world’s woes – as in, they can’t be conquered by the world anymore, even though we all know that in this life we still suffer trials and troubles. As for the serpents, it helps to remember that Yeshua and his cousin John the Baptist both referred to the spiritual leaders of Israel in their day as serpents and a brood of vipers. So maybe Yeshua wasn’t actually conferring power over rattlesnakes, but over religious systems that have the appearance of godliness, but deny its power.
The transcendent status of identity with the King is something that only the Creator can bestow. Only the Creator is above all things. That’s why the Messiah must somehow fuse the divine nature of the Creator with the mortal nature of humanity. How that happens is a topic for another time. For now, it’s enough to understand that this is what Yeshua’s followers proclaimed of him, and what he said of himself. He even said this in the context of his connection with a serpent:
No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.
John 3:13-15 ESV
This is a reference to something that happened to Israel as they wandered in the wilderness:
From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom. And the people became impatient on the way. And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food.” Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. And the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.
Numbers 21:4-9 ESV
Anyone who has spent time in a desert knows that serpents are part of the landscape. Thus, the first thing we should understand about this account is that the fiery serpents weren’t an innovation God created specifically for the occasion of smiting the complainers among the Hebrews. They were there all along, but for some reason they weren’t a problem until that moment. What changed?
This is where we look at the meaning of symbols. The first serpent mentioned in the Bible is the one Satan chose as his instrument of deception in the Garden of Eden. That serpent spoke enticing lies to Eve and her husband, weaving in bits of truth to disguise the venom in his message. That was enough to persuade our first ancestors to depart from the Creator’s way, and as a result be ejected from his presence.
That is why serpents and the venom of serpents are associated with lying lips, violent hearts, and wicked motives. The unwary, gullible, and self-indulgent person is easy prey for such reptilian tactics. Actually, no one is immune, and everyone falls prey to serpents from time to time. The cure is to cling to God – not by holding up a bronze snake as a talisman or charm against sickness, but by proclaiming allegiance to the Creator of the Universe, learning his ways, and obeying his commands. That’s the lesson Paul teaches from Israel’s woes in the wilderness:
We must not put [Messiah] to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer.
1 Corinthians 10:9-10 ESV
This is the dilemma: we either rise above the serpents in the power of Messiah, or we fall prey to them. Worse yet, we might even become the serpents and end up biting our brethren.
 
Cover image generated by Grok, created by xAI..
Music: "Song of Glory,” The Exodus Road Band, Heart of the Matter, 2016.

Somewhere between self-esteem and self-abasement is the place where we learn who our Creator made us to be.
Numbers 16:1-18:32; 1 Samuel 11:14-12:22; Ezekiel 36:24-28; Luke 17:7-10; Romans 13:8-10
Click here to download a transcript of this podcast: The Credit We Should Care About
 
Why should we love our neighbors? Paul puts that commandment in context in his letter to the Romans:
Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
Romans 13:8-10 ESV
If we don’t understand love, we are in danger of missing the godly power contained in this commandment. Consider, for example, this 20th century American proverb:
“It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.”
This bit of folk wisdom is often attributed to President Harry Truman. President Ronald Reagan had his own version of the proverb inscribed on a plaque that rested on his desk in the Oval Office. Neither of them originated the quote, but both had a hand in popularizing it. It’s a solid observation on human nature, but in typical American fashion, it reduces the matter to the question of productivity.
If all we want are results, then we’re going to miss what God is doing in our lives and the lives of others. We’re also in danger of missing the larger perspective of God’s plan of redemption and our part in it. This is why we can’t get away from that divine concept of love.
It’s not a design flaw that people want to get credit for what they have done. Praise and recognition motivate us to do better, and that is as God intended. As in all things, however, self-love can be toxic if we indulge in it. That’s why we must learn to love our Creator, the Author of love.
It’s really a matter of who is at the center of our esteem. That place is reserved for our Creator, not for ourselves or for anyone else. That’s the point of this lesson from Messiah Yeshua:
Will any one of you who has a servant plowing or keeping sheep say to him when he has come in from the field, “Come at once and recline at table”? Will he not rather say to him, “Prepare supper for me, and dress properly, and serve me while I eat and drink, and afterward you will eat and drink”? Does he thank the servant because he did what was commanded? So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, “We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty.”
Luke 17:7-10 ESV
If our Creator isn’t in the picture, then we’re simply doing the work for the work’s sake. Taking pride in our accomplishments, whether we get the credit or not, is commendable, but it’s not enduring unless it’s done in honor of the Creator. We live and breathe for his sake, not our own. We hope that he will give us credit, and we rely on his promises of eternal reward in a better place, but he is worthy to be served regardless of what we get out of the bargain.
This is the kind of attitude that helps us endure tremendous adversity. We’d like to walk immediately into that land flowing with milk and honey, but would we know what to do with such a paradise? In our present fallen state, we might think it was made solely for our comfort. Before long, we would squander its resources and begin fighting one another over what’s left.
That’s exactly what happened to God’s Covenant people of Israel in the wilderness. Things didn’t turn out the way they expected, and instead of rising to the occasion, they chose time after time to grumble, complain, and rebel. Men like Korah took issue with Moses and Aaron, asserting that they could do a better job at leading the people. They cared very much about who got the credit for whatever good things happened, and who got the blame for the bad things. Of course, they had their own ideas of what was good and bad – meaning that things would be bad if anyone other than themselves were in charge.
That’s the problem of having anything or anyone other than our Creator as the focus of our lives. He is taking us somewhere and he wants to make sure we succeed when we get there. That’s a big reason why troubles and trials happen. It happened to our Hebrew ancestors in the wilderness, and it’s happening to us right now. In fact, we’re going through the process God explained to Ezekiel long ago:
I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God.
Ezekiel 36:24-28 ESV
This process has been happening to both halves of God’s Covenant people of Israel for quite some time. It’s how God is redeeming his holy Name, even after we have brought shame to him. Which means that he alone gets the credit for all that’s being accomplished, and that’s what we should really care about.
 
Cover photo by Photo by Vitaly Gariev, September 22, 2025, on Unsplash.
Music: "Song of Glory,” The Exodus Road Band, Heart of the Matter, 2016.

We expect the judgment of God on the wicked. What we'd rather not consider is that God's judgment also comes on the shortsighted. 
Numbers 13:1-15:41; Joshua 2:1-24; Proverbs 29:18; Hosea 4:6; Luke 1:5-25, 57-66, 19:43-45; Acts 5:1-11; 1 Peter 2:10-12
Click here to download a transcript of this podcast: Visitation Vision
 
The Bible tells of wicked people like Pharaoh of Egypt, Goliath of Gath, Ahab and Jezebel of Israel, Haman the Amalekite, and Herod of Judea. We consider them evil and wicked because of their blatant opposition to the word of God and the people of God. We are encouraged when we read that justice was done to them, even if it didn’t happen as quickly as we would like or quite the way we expected.
But what about the people who weren’t noticeably wicked? What about those who seemed to be genuinely nice people, but who didn’t go far enough in obedience to God?
Those in that category include Ananias and Saphira, the couple who withheld part of the price they received from a land transaction when they made an offering to the apostles, and Zacharias, the elderly priest who questioned the angelic messenger who told him he and his wife would become the parents of John the Baptist. Because of those missteps, Ananias and Saphira died, and Zacharias lost his voice until his son was born. We could also include Judas, the man who betrayed Messiah Yeshua thinking he was doing the right thing, and in the end was driven by guilt to hang himself.
Many good people named in scripture suffered bad consequences simply because they chose not to seek God’s counsel on a matter and relied on their own understanding and preferences. The record goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden, where our first ancestors acted entirely on what they saw and desired. It might have been different if they had considered God’s vision for them and for the earth before making their choice to eat the forbidden fruit.
It’s reasonable to expect God’s people take his perspective into account. Yet it seems that the Bible’s warnings to and judgments of God’s people happen precisely because they disregard his ways. Even those who keep the letter of his instructions and commands often stumble and fall in this way. That’s why Yeshua wept over Jerusalem, the Holy City where God placed his name. We read about that in Luke’s Gospel:
And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”
Luke 19:42-44 ESV
Parents should understand the logic in this. We discipline our own children, not our neighbor’s children. We hold our children to a higher standard because they are part of our family. If we want the family to have a future, we must have a vision for its survival and prosperity, and we must transfer that vision to our children. That’s why we teach our children the rules of the house and expect their obedience. We might also do this with the children of close friends and neighbors, but we still draw a distinction unless they become part of our family somehow.
Even with careful training, though, it still happens that children depart from the way of the family. Perhaps they never identified with the vision of the family, or perhaps they rejected it in favor of something more appealing, or perhaps there might have been no vision imparted to them. That can happen after several generations, as the ties that hold the family together become less important, and eventually cease to matter. The people living in the same house may go through the motions of being a family, but there is no substance giving meaning to those motions. When trials come, such as a health crisis, a serious brush with the law, financial collapse, or an unwanted pregnancy, there is no vision to offer guidance on how to respond in a way that best ensures the family’s survival. With lack of vision, the responses come as often as not from a flight or fight reaction based on individual preservation rather than mutual commitment to the common identity and shared future.
When we extend this family model to a people and a nation, we see how societies and civilizations drift into decay. This is how people perish when there is no vision to keep them from casting off restraint. In a crisis, or even in daily decisions to buy beer and a lottery ticket rather than pay the bills, there’s very little reckoning of what consequences might come, or how to deal with them when they do.
That’s why Yeshua wept over Jerusalem. His people had lost the ability to reckon with the visitation of divine accountability that was to come on that generation. It’s the same reckoning that came on their ancestors when the Ten Spies returned with a fearful report about the land God had promised his Covenant family as their inheritance. Those men weren’t wicked; they were respected tribal leaders. That means they were husbands, fathers, productive members of society, and generally good guys. So were Caleb and Joshua, but those two men had the vision of Israel and Israel’s God that the good men who spied out the land with them lacked.
The sad conclusion in the days of Caleb and Joshua, and in the days of Messiah Yeshua, was that the people of vision were too few to contend with the loud voices of the people who thought they had too much to lose from following God’s leading in the trials before them. They weren’t wicked, just shortsighted. That’s how the time of their visitation caught them unprepared.
 
Cover photo by Amir Benlakhlef, October 2, 2019, on Unsplash.
Music: "Song of Glory,” The Exodus Road Band, Heart of the Matter, 2016.

Why did the New Testament writers quote so much from the Old Testament? Maybe because they weren't starting a new religion, but following Messiah Yeshua's example of building on the foundation God established through Moses and the Prophets. 
Numbers 4:21-7:89; Judges 13:2-25; Psalm 115:1-18; Revelation 21:5-8
Click here to download a transcript of this podcast: Echoes of Heaven
 
A friend of mine is excited about how New Testament writers based their works on the Tanakh, or Old Testament. There are, he says, echoes from the Hebrew Bible in the Greek scriptures. That’s why he is publishing The Echoes Bible, which pairs New Testament books with corresponding works of the Torah. Matthew, for example, pairs with Genesis, and Romans with Leviticus.[1]
These connections give us context for the Apostolic Writings and add tremendous depth and understanding to our faith. It’s more than simply recognizing that the New Testament authors quote extensively from Moses and the Prophets; it’s discerning the continuity in the scripture from Genesis to Revelation.
Let’s look at a familiar passage from Revelation and see if it corresponds with anything in the Torah. Regarding the end of this age, when God establishes the New Heaven and the New Earth, John writes:
And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son. But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”
Revelation 21:5-8 ESV
This passage informs the Christian understanding of eternal life in heaven for the righteous, and eternal punishment in hell for the unrighteous. If we look closer, though, we see that this isn’t a scene in heaven, but on earth in the New Jerusalem. The One on the throne is God, or at least one who reigns as God’s representative. This is a point of contention between Christians and Jews. We agree that Messiah will reign in the New Jerusalem, but until he comes – or returns – we will continue to disagree on whether Messiah is God, and if Yeshua is the Messiah. Nevertheless, we can find agreement on how Messiah’s Kingdom is organized.
For one thing, it’s a heavenly Kingdom manifested on earth. That’s what we understand from passages like this:
The heavens are the Lord's heavens,
but the earth he has given to the children of man.
Psalm 115:16 ESV
God made the earth as the home for humankind and the place where he would interact with us. He has always intended to dwell with us, but for that to happen, we have to be holy as he is holy. He has been working on that for all of recorded history. That’s why he inserted himself into our reality in various ways, culminating in the person of Messiah Yeshua, whose work on the cross activates the power of God’s New, or Renewed, Covenant of redemption.
The process of redeeming and perfecting humanity and the earth is, and always has been, a partnership. God does his part, and we do ours. Jews and Christians have ways to describe this process. Both understand the need for repentance, which means turning away from whatever separates us from our Creator, and turning toward his ways of living and thinking. Those who don’t go through that process find themselves cut out of God’s redeemed reality. That’s what John writes about in Revelation.
So where’s the echo of John’s description of God’s world order? It’s in Numbers:
The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Command the people of Israel that they put out of the camp everyone who is leprous or has a discharge and everyone who is unclean through contact with the dead. You shall put out both male and female, putting them outside the camp, that they may not defile their camp, in the midst of which I dwell.” And the people of Israel did so, and put them outside the camp; as the Lord said to Moses, so the people of Israel did.
Numbers 5:1-4 ESV
This passage reminds us that redemption is tied to the Covenant nation of Israel. At the center of the camp of Israel was the Tabernacle, where the Presence of the Almighty rested. That is the pattern John describes in the New Jerusalem, which itself is a reminder that God’s Covenant nation is tied to a geographical location where his holy Temple has stood and will stand again. There is no Temple in the New Jerusalem, however, because God himself will dwell there.
This is why everyone who is defiled must be removed outside the place God has sanctified for himself and his people. Notice that God doesn’t do everything. He commands his sanctified people to remove the defiled ones from the camp of Israel, and we can infer that he will do the same at the end of the age. But first, they must sanctify themselves, which is what distinguishes them from the ones being removed.
Is there any hope for the ones being removed? There was in the camp of Israel. The defiled ones could be sanctified when that which made them unclean was resolved, but they had to go through the protocol to avail themselves of the cleansing process. It’s the same in the New Jerusalem. What happens to those who remain outside the camp at that time sounds very unpleasant, but even then our merciful God may yet hold out hope for them. That’s a matter yet to be revealed. Which means the wise course of action is to get clean and stay that way as we learn from the whole word of God.
 
[1] The Echoes Bible, Bob O'Dell, Dr. John David Martin, Mark L Proeger MDiv, Dr. Susan E. Udry, eds., 2025, https://www.echoesbible.com/.
Cover photo by Johannes Plenio on Unsplash.
Music: "Song of Glory,” The Exodus Road Band, Heart of the Matter, 2016.

God's people are supposed to be the evidence that He is at work in the world. That means being the instruments of His peace - even when that peace seems far from us.
Exodus 19:1-20:23; Deuteronomy 14:22-16:17; Ezekiel 1:1-28, 3:12; Habakkuk 2:20-3:19; Ruth 1:1-4:22; Acts 1:6-8, 2:1-47, 9:1-17; 2 Corinthians 11:16-31; 1 Peter 2:9-10
Click here to download a transcript of this podcast: How to Be A Witness
 
If you’re a Christian, you’re familiar with Pentecost as the day the Holy Spirit was poured out on the church. We read that story in the second chapter of Acts. If you’re Jewish, you observe Shavuot as the day God gave the Torah to Israel. If you’re a Hebraic Christian, as one of my rabbi friends calls people like us who follow Messiah Yeshua and honor the Torah, you learn that Pentecost and Shavuot are two different words for the same holy day of the Lord.
At Mount Sinai, the God of Abraham issued his marriage proposal to the people of Israel, and when they accepted, he gave them the Ten Commandments to explain how they should live. At the Temple in Jerusalem on Pentecost, God renewed that marriage proposal, giving his Spirit as the pledge of the New, or Renewed, Covenant so his whole Torah could be written on the hearts of his chosen people – both the native born and those grafted in from the nations.
Another connection between these events is that God revealed himself in great power. He spoke at Sinai from a dark cloud, accompanied by thunder, lightning, and an earthquake. In Jerusalem, he made himself known in a mighty rushing wind and tongues of fire resting on the heads of the faithful. The people gathered in Jerusalem from many lands didn’t hear the audible voice of God as their ancestors had at Sinai, but they did hear him speaking in their native languages through Yeshua’s disciples.
Those displays of holy power testify to the reason God called and sanctified this holy people. Moses, Yeshua, and Peter tell us that we are to be his witnesses to the whole world. That’s a Kingdom mission, as Yeshua said just before he returned to his Heavenly Father:
So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
Acts 1:6-8 ESV
We appreciate messages like this. They confirm our identity and give us direction for our lives. It’s good to have something greater than ourselves to provide meaning and hope in a world filled with sorrow. But then reality hits, and we begin to realize what Paul learned soon after he encountered the risen Messiah. We might remember that the Lord had told Ananias, a disciple in Damascus, to go heal Paul of his blindness, but we probably overlook that the Lord also told Ananias,
Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel. For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.
Acts 9:25-26 ESV
Years later, Paul wrote about his suffering in one of his letters to Messiah’s community at Corinth:
Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to fall, and I am not indignant?
If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness. The God and Father of the Lord Jesus, he who is blessed forever, knows that I am not lying.
2 Corinthians 11:24-31 ESV
This is the part of the story we’d rather not hear. We like the exciting displays of God’s power, and all the blessings of being included among his set-apart people, but we don’t really understand until we walk through it that lots of suffering comes with those blessings. That’s hard, and it hurts. It hurts even more when we don’t see the spectacular displays of power coming through to rescue us and those we love in the hard times. And yet, the alternative is even worse. If we can’t hang on to our God in such times, then we might drift away in this ocean of human pain and have no lifeline or beacon to bring us back to a place of shelter.
So we hang on, believing desperately that our faith really is the substance of the peace we hope for, and the assurance of the rescue we’re not yet seeing. And when that peace finally comes, whether or not things turn out the way we wish, then we have the chance to become the beacon and the lifeline for others drowning in that ocean. That’s what it means to be God’s witnesses, in every sense of the word.
 
Cover photo by Amir Shaebe, May 2, 2025, on Unsplash.
Music: "Song of Glory,” The Exodus Road Band, Heart of the Matter, 2016.