Clean and Shaven by Flickr User Stefan Ray, CC License = Attribution, Noncommercial
Click image to open a new tab/window to view the original image and to access the user’s full photo stream at Flickr.
I have cats. Not just one cat, and not just one color of cat. That means I also have hair on stuff. Not just one hair, and not just one color of hair. My cat’s hair likes to travel with me wherever I go. If I wear dark colored clothing, I wear light-colored cat hair with it. If I wear light-colored clothing, I wear dark cat hair with it. But I love my kitties, so I carry a lint roller. But there are times I wish I could just take a razor and shave off all their cat hair, so maybe I wouldn’t run late to all the places because of forgetting that I needed extra time to try to get all the hair to stick to the roller instead of me.
In today’s reading from Numbers 8:1 through Numbers 8:14, we begin a new week and a new portion. Parashah 36 is called, in Hebrew, B’ha’alotkha, which means “When You Set Up” in English. In this reading, God is giving Moses more information on setting up the tabernacle, and He begins by talking about the menorah. We get a description of the menorah, how it is a work of hammered gold, and then God tells Moses to make sure to have Aaron light the lamps in such a way that the light shows in front of the menorah.
The next section talks of pulling the Levites out from among the rest of the Israelites to prepare them for the service of the tabernacle. The first thing God tells Moses to do after separating the Levites is to cleanse them, and then He gives instructions on exactly how to cleanse them. They are to completely shave their bodies, and then they are to wash their bodies and their clothing. After they are cleansed, they will bring sacrifices, and then Aaron can present them to all the people.
As I searched for pictures to represent the clean shave, I came across a number of different types of shavers and razors. Suddenly, I thought about how much those Levites might have appreciated some of the shavers we use today. I wonder just how much they had to deal with razor burn after shaving desert-toughened skin with a straight-edge.
And that leads me to another type of cleansing where the Word of God which is sharper than a two-edged sword is able to shave off the layers of sin that threaten to keep us separated from Our Creator. His Word will cut as deeply as necessary to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, so we can be free. But sometimes, even when we know something is bad for us, we resist allowing God to cut it away. But if we will trust God and allow Him to coat us with the oil of the Holy Spirit, we can freely get rid of our five-o-clock shadow of sin instead of resisting until we end up with spiritual razor burn.
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May 24, 2014
Posted by Crystal A Murray (aka CrystalWriter) |
Bible Study, Nonfiction, Torah Commentary | Bible Commentary, Bible study, cleansing, Complete Jewish Bible, God, Israel, Levites, Lord, Numbers, razor burn, Scripture, sin, Torah Portions, two-edged sword, Yahveh |
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Territorial Battles by Flickr User Thomas Izko, CC License = Attribution
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In Proverbs 21:31 (AMP), we are given the following wisdom…
The horse is prepared for the day of battle, but deliverance and victory are of the Lord.
So we do all we can to prepare to take a stand and to fight if necessary, but in reality, the battle against sin truly belongs to The Lord. Paul said he kept doing the things he didn’t want to do, and he kept failing when he tried to do the right things, because sin reigned in his mortal body. That doesn’t mean we quit fighting, but it does mean that it takes something (or Someone) greater than our personal self-control to wage and win this war.
In today’s reading from Leviticus 16:25 through Leviticus 16:34, we are still reading God’s instructions for the priest making atonement for the sins of Israel. We’re told that the man who takes the scapegoat outside the camp must wash his clothes and bathe before he can return to the camp. And then we’re told that the person who takes the hides and dung from the offerings and burns them outside the camp must also bathe and wash his clothes before he can return to the camp.
I see the verses above as a sort of physical representation of the symbolic steps we take as we change from who we are without Christ to who we will become with Him. These steps include confession (we saw that over the head of the goat yesterday), repentance, sending our sinful behaviors away from us, burning up any remnants of sin, and then washing our bodies and clothes (baptism) to show that we are fresh and new without even the smells of “old goat” or “smoke” of sin remaining on us.
And this walks us perfectly into the next part of today’s portion where we learn about The Day of Atonement on the tenth day of the seventh month. We learn that the community is to take a complete Sabbath on this day, and that atonement will be made to purify them. While this high holy day is prepared for with fasting, self-assessment of sins and weaknesses, confession and repentance, the day of Yom Kippur is a day of complete and total rest, and a day of self-denial. It is the actual day when the high priest would go into the Holy of Holies, and the congregation would wait in silence to see if he would come back out to them alive to declare their salvation.
In our lives today, we should not enter lightly into the atonement we have under the blood of Yeshua. Yes, He does all the work. Yes, His blood completely cleanses us. But to say we should not prepare for that holy moment would deny us of the knowledge of the awesome work Christ (our High Priest) does on our behalf. How can we value the depth of what He has delivered us from if we go in with our eyes closed and never look at the pit? How can we even know which side we’re on until we understand where the enemy occupies in his stand against our souls? Yes, Yahveh Almighty is The One who will win the victory for us; who has already won the victory through the blood of Christ, but let us prepare for the battle to stand for Him that we can cheer with everything in us when we hear His voice as He declares our salvation.
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April 7, 2014
Posted by Crystal A Murray (aka CrystalWriter) |
Bible Study, Nonfiction, Torah Commentary | Adonai, Almighty, battle, Bible, Bible Gateway, Bible reading, Bible study, blood, cleansing, Complete Jewish Bible, Creator, crystalwriter, Day of Atonement, God, holy, Holy Bible, horse, Israel, Leviticus, Lord, offering, Old Covenant, Old Testament, Parashah, Portions, priest, Proverbs, sacrifice, Scripture, The Complete Jewish Bible, Torah, Torah commentary, Torah Portions, Torah Reading, Word, Word of God, Word of the Lord, www.biblegateway.com, Yahveh, Yahweh, Yeshua |
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Crystal Writes A Blog 
Razor Burn
Clean and Shaven by Flickr User Stefan Ray, CC License = Attribution, Noncommercial
Click image to open a new tab/window to view the original image and to access the user’s full photo stream at Flickr.
I have cats. Not just one cat, and not just one color of cat. That means I also have hair on stuff. Not just one hair, and not just one color of hair. My cat’s hair likes to travel with me wherever I go. If I wear dark colored clothing, I wear light-colored cat hair with it. If I wear light-colored clothing, I wear dark cat hair with it. But I love my kitties, so I carry a lint roller. But there are times I wish I could just take a razor and shave off all their cat hair, so maybe I wouldn’t run late to all the places because of forgetting that I needed extra time to try to get all the hair to stick to the roller instead of me.
In today’s reading from Numbers 8:1 through Numbers 8:14, we begin a new week and a new portion. Parashah 36 is called, in Hebrew, B’ha’alotkha, which means “When You Set Up” in English. In this reading, God is giving Moses more information on setting up the tabernacle, and He begins by talking about the menorah. We get a description of the menorah, how it is a work of hammered gold, and then God tells Moses to make sure to have Aaron light the lamps in such a way that the light shows in front of the menorah.
The next section talks of pulling the Levites out from among the rest of the Israelites to prepare them for the service of the tabernacle. The first thing God tells Moses to do after separating the Levites is to cleanse them, and then He gives instructions on exactly how to cleanse them. They are to completely shave their bodies, and then they are to wash their bodies and their clothing. After they are cleansed, they will bring sacrifices, and then Aaron can present them to all the people.
As I searched for pictures to represent the clean shave, I came across a number of different types of shavers and razors. Suddenly, I thought about how much those Levites might have appreciated some of the shavers we use today. I wonder just how much they had to deal with razor burn after shaving desert-toughened skin with a straight-edge.
And that leads me to another type of cleansing where the Word of God which is sharper than a two-edged sword is able to shave off the layers of sin that threaten to keep us separated from Our Creator. His Word will cut as deeply as necessary to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, so we can be free. But sometimes, even when we know something is bad for us, we resist allowing God to cut it away. But if we will trust God and allow Him to coat us with the oil of the Holy Spirit, we can freely get rid of our five-o-clock shadow of sin instead of resisting until we end up with spiritual razor burn.
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May 24, 2014 Posted by Crystal A Murray (aka CrystalWriter) | Bible Study, Nonfiction, Torah Commentary | Bible Commentary, Bible study, cleansing, Complete Jewish Bible, God, Israel, Levites, Lord, Numbers, razor burn, Scripture, sin, Torah Portions, two-edged sword, Yahveh | Leave a comment