As a Christian, sometimes it is easy to separate myself from others. I think it is only a natural reaction, since a part of the Christian spiritual path is sanctification, which means to be set apart. What does that mean though? Should I live in a box? Should I judge others and condemn them because they are not like me, and forcefully push people away?
Rather, I think being set apart is more that there is a noticeable difference about you, something that people should be attracted to, not turned off by. In the same way, I don't feel my role as a Christian should be one of pushing people away, but embracing them. This does come with careful moves though. Jesus hung out with the prostitutes and drunkards, but he didn't do what they did. He also had a strong core of friends that were believers like him. Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 6:14 "Be not unevenly yoked with unbelievers." So, granted my girlfriend or my best confidant shouldn't ever be someone who I'm not on the same page with spiritually. But this says something positive, not just negative. That if I am evenly yoked, then I will be doing the right thing. For we are in the world, not of the world. But to be in the world, we can't be living in a protective bubble. God knows you're human, you're going to make mistakes, but sometimes that's the only way we learn. Let's learn how to be evenly yoked, whatever that might mean for yourself.
Still, too many times, I think we let other things separate us. Not just our religion. Think about politics. There's such a division there between Republican and Democrat that even Christians part ways at the subject. I've been convicted lately to submit myself to other believers, no matter what their political stance. Because in the end, everything is learned through submission, and I think we can really learn something from each other if we just lay aside ourselves. Sounds like what Jesus told us to do, right?
We should never put our worldview or political opinion before others, and especially never before the word of God. We should be asking ourselves, "What does the Bible say about this?", instead of relying on our own judgment on such issues.
It seems like most of our problems in the world are because we distinguish between one another. Think about patriotism and nationalism. These things are based on pride and separation. "We are the best." and "You are not us." Peace is ultimately acceptance. Let God be the judge of man. Think about the Olympics and how much fun everyone has watching them and the athletes playing the games. But we've lost something when we're so far gone in our national pride that we forget that the others we are competing against deserve just as much love and respect. When people are killed over such petty things, something has totally gone wrong. It's because we are separating ourselves, instead of accepting each other, having fun, and learning from our differences.
We're all human, right?
Think about Cain and Abel. The first children. The first brothers. Yet they grew separate. Cain was jealous of Abel because he felt inferior. He felt this separation because he focused on their differences and grew envious. Abel was a shepherd, Cain was a farmer. Abel's sacrifice was praised by God, and Cain's wasn't because he didn't offer up his best. Instead of changing and learning from Abel's praiseworthy heart, he killed him because he was jealous and angry. He felt unloved, different, and rejected, yet did not know how to process these emotions.
All this can be pretty hard to discern and get right. I think so many times because of our upbringing and religious backgrounds, we get too religious, too one sided, when really we should be becoming more relational. Not in that we should conform to the ways of this world, if we're Christian, but relational in that our walk is about our relationship with God and others.
The law is summed up in that we should love God with all our being, and then love others as ourselves. The two are dependent on one another. For I can't love my brother, if I don't first find love from God. And I can't possibly love God if I hate my brother.
Therefore let's love each other, and be good to each other. And everything will be alright, ok?
LOVE,
jordan
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
On the West Florida Republic Parkway (for David)
The hair on my arm shivers,
rippling like fur in hot wind.
I hold my hand out
the window,
over the interstate railing,
notched and curved like an animal spine.
Two tree lines tunnel me through,
the road pointing up
at the sky,
an array of creatures.
Each distinct,
with a face, a tail.
There’s a whole genus,
a whole Kingdom.
A man reads from Ezekiel,
on the AM radio.
There’s Living Creatures so tall, that they are
dreadful,
four faces each, fur and wings
covered in eyes.
They suffer unto me
how God will be forever.
I look
up at these beings.
I know that when I die,
it won’t end.
That when the world passes away,
it won’t end.
It goes on.
Like if my car were to break down now,
how it would be such a long way back home.
The road keeps looking up,
seeing which one will run out first,
the path or the sky.
Neither ever will.
They loop around.
We never notice,
even when we pass away from here.
By then, heaven and earth will know
the same creatures.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Home Turf
The yard wraps around,
sod piece by piece,
until it’s all squares and corners,
like the neighborhood.
The Mexicans are up top
on the roof.
I can hear hammers,
their blows muttering in tongues.
Shingles pour down like wallets,
the turbines ripped up,
laid out by the trash.
You can see the dents
from the hail.
On the roof, there’s a pole,
our flag hyperventilating;
blues and reds throwing up on the white sky.
I can see it through the front door window,
through the crack in the foyer door.
It keeps coming.
Even to the backyard you can feel it wrapping.
In the carport where the workers are,
heating up tamales in a microwave they brought.
At night, it’s quiet.
The Mexicans are asleep
in my American prayers.
I fold my knees over
on the square carpet.
At the window there’s a dark presence.
I look up afraid.
It’s our country’s flag.
Friday, August 8, 2008
Secrets of the Name
To skip all this and read an extremely more put together and professionally written article, click here.
A friend from church recently was explaining to me the significance of the name Yeshua (Jesus), which is Hebrew for "Salvation" (The name Jesus in English has no intrinsic meaning, but was transliterated from Yeshua for Western Culture. Click here for article). He began to explain how Yeshua, the person most of us know as Jesus, is connected, along with his name, to the name of YHVH, the name God gives to Moses at the burning bush experience, which means roughly "I am what I am".
One of the Ten Commandments given to the people of Isreal is "Do not take the LORD's name in vain." That name LORD, which is in all caps in most Western translated versions, is in fact YHVH. To do the name ultimate justice, the priests of Israel back then decided to just never say the name aloud, and to remove the vowels from it all together when written. Most scholars have concluded that the complete name must have been "YAHVEH" or as most pronounce it, "YAHWEH".
Either way, what the Israelites did seems to be somehow connected with the Messiah.
For one, depending on your interpretation that is, you can look at the letters of YHVH and determine alot of connections to the man Yeshua.
1. Y- the yod in Hebrew, means "hand" or "arm" and is also the 10th letter of the Hebrew language, signifying completion.
2. H- the Hey in Hebrew, means "look! or "behold", representing God's salvation and deliverance. The symbol itself looks like a half open door.
3. V- the vav in Hebrew, means "hook" or "nail". It is the sixth letter, the number of man. It represents the hooking of heaven and earth together.
4. H- once again the hey, a second "look" or "behold" God's great salvation and deliverance.
(For more advanced information regarding all this visit www.Hebrew4Christians.com; they have a good article on the Names for God here)
Ok. So what does all this mean? YHVH. The hand of God. The provision of God. The hook from heaven to earth. A Second look at provision.
From the hand of God, comes the provision of God. The Israelites salvation, and through the prophesied Mashiach (Messiah), not only theirs, but the whole world's.
But what about the hook? What connects heaven and earth? Ultimately it would have to be a man. Vav, the hook, is the sixth letter after all, the number of man. So by way of the Messiah being killed, we would be redeemed with God in heaven, as it is fortold in Isaiah 53:5, "He was pierced through for our transgressions."
Therefore, YHVH: from the pierced hand of God comes the provision, comes salvation and deliverance.
Now lets look at Yeshua.
You've always seen those little crucifixes with INRI above them haven't you? If you haven't that's alright. When Jesus was crucified, the Romans wrote over him on the cross, "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews". INRI is simply the Greek translation of each word, taking the first letter of each to make an acronym.
But they not only wrote it in Greek, as we mostly see symbolized today, but also in Hebrew, the Jews' own language.
"Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews" written in Hebrew is "Yeshua Hanetzeret V’melech Hayehudim". Notice the acronym here: YHVH.
No wonder the Jews then grumbled at Pilate and the Romans writing that above him!
I realize that this is so alot of information to take in at once, and that still for some this does not solve all their problems with the Bible and what they've been taught or brought up into. Even for those of you who are Jewish, I'm sure this is hard to swallow. I'm sure also you have a better grasp on the Torah and the Hebrew language than I have. So I encourage everyone who might stumble across this to research it more and study it for themselves.
Here are some great sites that have expounded all this for me:
Secrets of The Name, from www.lionlamb.net
The Hebrew Name for God, from www.hebrew4christians.com
The Letter Yod
The Letter Hey
The Letter Vav
A friend from church recently was explaining to me the significance of the name Yeshua (Jesus), which is Hebrew for "Salvation" (The name Jesus in English has no intrinsic meaning, but was transliterated from Yeshua for Western Culture. Click here for article). He began to explain how Yeshua, the person most of us know as Jesus, is connected, along with his name, to the name of YHVH, the name God gives to Moses at the burning bush experience, which means roughly "I am what I am".
One of the Ten Commandments given to the people of Isreal is "Do not take the LORD's name in vain." That name LORD, which is in all caps in most Western translated versions, is in fact YHVH. To do the name ultimate justice, the priests of Israel back then decided to just never say the name aloud, and to remove the vowels from it all together when written. Most scholars have concluded that the complete name must have been "YAHVEH" or as most pronounce it, "YAHWEH".
Either way, what the Israelites did seems to be somehow connected with the Messiah.
For one, depending on your interpretation that is, you can look at the letters of YHVH and determine alot of connections to the man Yeshua.
1. Y- the yod in Hebrew, means "hand" or "arm" and is also the 10th letter of the Hebrew language, signifying completion.
2. H- the Hey in Hebrew, means "look! or "behold", representing God's salvation and deliverance. The symbol itself looks like a half open door.
3. V- the vav in Hebrew, means "hook" or "nail". It is the sixth letter, the number of man. It represents the hooking of heaven and earth together.
4. H- once again the hey, a second "look" or "behold" God's great salvation and deliverance.
(For more advanced information regarding all this visit www.Hebrew4Christians.com; they have a good article on the Names for God here)
Ok. So what does all this mean? YHVH. The hand of God. The provision of God. The hook from heaven to earth. A Second look at provision.
From the hand of God, comes the provision of God. The Israelites salvation, and through the prophesied Mashiach (Messiah), not only theirs, but the whole world's.
But what about the hook? What connects heaven and earth? Ultimately it would have to be a man. Vav, the hook, is the sixth letter after all, the number of man. So by way of the Messiah being killed, we would be redeemed with God in heaven, as it is fortold in Isaiah 53:5, "He was pierced through for our transgressions."
Therefore, YHVH: from the pierced hand of God comes the provision, comes salvation and deliverance.
Now lets look at Yeshua.
You've always seen those little crucifixes with INRI above them haven't you? If you haven't that's alright. When Jesus was crucified, the Romans wrote over him on the cross, "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews". INRI is simply the Greek translation of each word, taking the first letter of each to make an acronym.
But they not only wrote it in Greek, as we mostly see symbolized today, but also in Hebrew, the Jews' own language.
"Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews" written in Hebrew is "Yeshua Hanetzeret V’melech Hayehudim". Notice the acronym here: YHVH.
No wonder the Jews then grumbled at Pilate and the Romans writing that above him!
I realize that this is so alot of information to take in at once, and that still for some this does not solve all their problems with the Bible and what they've been taught or brought up into. Even for those of you who are Jewish, I'm sure this is hard to swallow. I'm sure also you have a better grasp on the Torah and the Hebrew language than I have. So I encourage everyone who might stumble across this to research it more and study it for themselves.
Here are some great sites that have expounded all this for me:
Secrets of The Name, from www.lionlamb.net
The Hebrew Name for God, from www.hebrew4christians.com
The Letter Yod
The Letter Hey
The Letter Vav
Thursday, August 7, 2008
New Beginnings
I'm trying out this blog, which I hope to frequent with some good words on different subjects, likely to be Christian Spirituality and art, and how they effect and affect one another; this is what I'm most privy to right now at least.
Hope you enjoy and get something out it eventually. I wish for it not to turn to lack, but to ultimately glorify the Son of Man, Jesus, Yeshua Mashiach.
takereeasy,
&peace,
Jordan
Hope you enjoy and get something out it eventually. I wish for it not to turn to lack, but to ultimately glorify the Son of Man, Jesus, Yeshua Mashiach.
takereeasy,
&peace,
Jordan
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