Weekly Torah Lesson
Shabbat Nachamu (Comfort)
Parasha: V’et chanaan “and I pleaded..”
Torah: Devarim 3:23 – 7:11
** I remember the time in my life when I decided that I had to remove every “image” from myself and my home. At that time I had a couple of gold crosses, a gold “pepper corn”, statues of elephants and a large wooden fountain that had a human like face carved into it. It took a couple of days but I managed to give away the gold, throw away the elephants and burn the fountain! I have a friend who won’t sit in a room that has pictures of “Jesus” on the wall. In all of this “zealousness” to comply with the instruction, there is a level of “understanding” that might be different than another’s. We know that The Holy Spirit will lead us to the “understanding”. It is up to us to fulfill that understanding in our lives.
4:9 Only take heed to yourself, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things which your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life: but teach them to your sons, and your sons’ sons; 10 Specially the day that you stood before Avinu Elohekah in Horev, when Avinu said to me, Gather me the people together, and I will make them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days that they shall live on the earth, and that they may teach their children. 11 And you came near and stood under the mountain; and the mountain burned with fire to the middle of heaven, with darkness, clouds, and thick darkness. 12 And Avinu spoke to you out of the middle of the fire: you heard the voice of the words, but saw no similitude; only you heard a voice. 13 And he declared to you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even ten commandments; and he wrote them on two tables of stone. 14 And Avinu commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and judgments, that you might do them in the land where you go over to possess it.
15 Take you therefore good heed to yourselves; for you saw no manner of similitude on the day that Avinu spoke to you in Horev out of the middle of the fire: 16 Lest you corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image, the similitude of any figure, the likeness of male or female,
I’ll scatter you among the nations, and you shall be left few in number among the heathen, where Avinu shall lead you. 28 And there you shall serve gods, the work of men’s hands, wood and stone, which neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell.
29 But if from there you shall seek Avinu Elohekah, you shall find him, if you seek him with all your heart and with all your soul. 30 When you are in tribulation, and all these things are come on you, even in the latter days, if you turn to Avinu Elohekah, and shall be obedient to his voice;
** “..obedient to His voice..” Turning away from the “demon-idols” that other nations worship which includes destroying all of the “images” of those demon-idols.
31 (For Avinu Elohekah is a merciful El;) he will not forsake you, neither destroy you, nor forget the covenant of your fathers which he swore to them.
4:37 And because he loved your fathers, therefore he chose their seed after them,
25 And it shall be our righteousness, if we observe to do all these commandments before Avinu Eloheinu, as he has commanded us.
7:1 When Avinu Elohekah shall bring you into the land where you go to possess it, and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites, and the Girgashites, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than you; 2 And when Avinu Elohekah shall deliver them before you; you shall smite them, and utterly destroy them; you shall make no covenant with them, nor show mercy to them: 3 Neither shall you make marriages with them; your daughter you shall not give to his son, nor his daughter shall you take to your son. 4 For they will turn away your son from following me, that they may serve demon-idols: so will the anger of Avinu be kindled against you, and destroy you suddenly. 5 But thus shall you deal with them; you shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire.
6 For you are an holy people to Avinu Elohekah: Avinu Elohekah has chosen you to be a special people to himself, above all people that are on the face of the earth. 7 Avinu did not set his love on you, nor choose you, because you were more in number than any people; for you were the fewest of all people: 8 But because Avinu loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn to your fathers, has Avinu brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of slaves, from the hand of Paro king of Mitzryim. 9 Know therefore that Avinu Elohekah, he is El, the faithful El, which keeps covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations; 10 And repays them that hate him to their face, to destroy them: he will not be slack to him that hates him, he will repay him to his face. 11 You shall therefore keep the commandments, and the statutes, and the judgments, which I command you this day, to do them.”
** If anyone tells you that “anything that distracts you from worshipping “god”, is a demon-idol. Don’t believe them! This is a deliberately vague statement that is designed to “water down” the commandment. The “image prohibition” is all about doing “obeisance” to something. We have to know exactly what we are worshipping before we can determine if the things that we do have is a forbidden image. If the “image” that you own is meant to represent the way or the thing that you worship, it is probably a forbidden image. In my situation, the elephant statues were probably not a “forbidden image”. In my “zealousness”, I got rid of every image in my home. It worked for me. You have to determine what will work for you.
Here is what Yeshua teaches,
“20 Our fathers worshipped in this mountain; and you say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. 21 Yeshua said to her, Woman, believe me, the hour comes, when you shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father. 22 You worship you know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews. 23 But the hour comes, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeks such to worship him. 24 Avinu is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.” (Joh 4:20-24)
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