By Joseph Shulam.
Our congregation in Jerusalem is Roeh Israel. The English translation of our congregation’s name is Shepherd of Israel. Last Shabbat, When the time came to open the Torah cabinet and the Torah Scroll was taken out of the iron fireproof metal safe, my eye caught the difference between the two poles of the Torah Scroll handles. One side was thick and fat, and the other, the scroll around the wooden handle, was skinny.
According to the Hebrew calendar, this year is now 5784, the month is Av, and the date is 16 – Av – 5784. We have a different calendar. As you can see, it is 3000 years older than the Gregorian calendar, which is only 2024.
Those size differences in the Torah scroll holder prompted me to bring up some points in this week’s Jerusalem Prayer List.
Thousands of years before Christopher Columbus discovered America in 1492. Years before, Martin Luther nailed his thesis on the church door and birthed the Protestant movement. Centuries before, no human ears heard about Charismatic Evangelical Churches (which are multiplying and keep dividing and competing with each other, like the turtle eggs on the beaches of the Mediterranean Sea). Every year, in every Jewish Community worldwide, the Torah Scroll is read weekly. A Torah scroll is handwritten by a scribe with organic ink made in the same formula as the ink of the Torah Scrolls, which Yeshua read in his Bar-Mitzvah in Nazareth.
Now, in the heart of Jerusalem, very, very close to the center of Jerusalem, Jewish disciples of Yeshua the Messiah and guests from all around the world meet every Shabbat, take the handwritten scroll out of the metal safe, open the scroll in the right place where every synagogue in the world is reading from the same texts in the ancient tradition the exact words written thousands of years ago in the same language.
Last Shabbat, when the scroll was brought out of the metal safe and handed over to a guest to carry it around the congregation, everyone sang the verse from Isaiah the prophet’s text in chapter 2:2-3. Guests and members from at least a dozen countries attending and visiting our congregation, singing these ancient words and witnessing the living present-time fulfillment of Isaiah’s ancient prediction:
“Now it shall come to pass in the latter days That the mountain of the LORD’S house Shall be established on the top of the mountains And shall be exalted above the hills, And all nations shall flow to it. Many people shall come and say, “Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, To the house of the God of Jacob; He will teach us His ways, and we shall walk in His paths.” For out of Zion shall go forth the law, And the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.” (Isaiah 2:2-3 NKJV).
I am sharing these words with you, dear brothers and sisters; every Shabbat that Marcia and I are in our congregation in the heart of Jerusalem is an emotional time for us. We feel the prophetic wings of God’s angels flapping in the air of Jerusalem and God’s prophetic words spoken by Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Hosea, and Amos and all of God’s prophets in the Bible, being fulfilled one after another and the times are a changin. The stars are lining up according to God’s prophetic promises. In Jerusalem and the land of Israel, people who are sensitive to the Spirit of God and the wings of prophecy – are getting anxious with every move and every bomb and explosive that Hamas and Hezbollah shoot at innocent civilian populations.
I realize that many Christians and Churches in the West are not plugged into this electricity; some don’t even know where the light switch is to turn the lights on! But you dear brothers and readers, you who read the Torah and the Prophets in obedience to the command of the Apostles and leaders of the church, specifically to the non-Jews in the church as it is recorded in Acts chapter 15:20, clear and strong recommendation for our non-Jewish brothers and sisters:
“For Moses has had throughout many generations those who preach him in every city, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath.” (Acts 15:21 NKJV).
The Torah reading on this Shabbat (August 24, 2024) is from Deuteronomy 7:12-11:25. The name of this Torah portion is Eikev (as a result of—because).
The reading of this next Shabbat from the prophets is from Isaiah 49:14 – 51:3.
We will read from Hebrews 11:8-13 and Romans 8:31-39 from the New Testament.
This week, I will center my teaching with the Haftarah—the portion from the Prophets, Isaiah 49:14 to Isaiah 51:3. The importance of these words of Isaiah is relevant for us today, for Jews and Gentiles, for disciples of Yeshua, and for anyone who has a feeling for history, ancient and present.
In reading Isaiah 49, the prophet Isaiah clearly speaks and calls people from far off, from the far islands, geographically distant nations, to hear and see what God is planning for the future. The prophet gives the reader his credentials:
“God has called me and commissioned me to speak these words to you!”
The prophet’s declaration is not diplomatic but very clear:
“And He has made My mouth like a sharp sword; In the shadow of His hand, He has hidden Me, and made Me a polished shaft; In His quiver, He has hidden Me.” “And He said to me, ‘You are My servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified.’” (Isaiah 49:2-3 NKJV)
In this text from Isaiah, the servant of the Lord is the nation of Israel—not a person. The second thing to notice is that the prophet declares that God has made Israel, the subject of this statement, a polished shaft, i.e., a sword. Israel is God’s servant, and Israel is in whom God will be glorified. It is God’s plan for Israel to glorify God in the future.
This is a pivotal text because, in scripture up to Isaiah chapter 49, God’s servant is consistently the nation of Israel, not a person. However, in Isaiah chapter 49, God’s servant transitions from the nation of Israel to an individual person who serves in the role of “God’s servant” and savior!
In this same chapter of Isaiah 49, we see that the Lord has realized that the nation is not able to fulfill the commission of being a harbinger of salvation and redemption for the world. Therefore, in Isaiah 49:6, Israel’s task in the future is to be a light to the Gentiles, a light to the whole world.
I, Joseph Shulam, believe Israel, the nation, is a light to the world. With all our weaknesses and mistakes, God has used the Jewish nation to be a shining light in almost every area of culture and science. You can compare the number of Jews who have received the Nobel Prize with the number of 1.5 billion Muslims. Compare and see the light shining from the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob with that of the seed of Ishmael and Esau.
However, the most important light Israel continually shines from coast to coast, from north to South, is that universal Jew, the seed of Abraham and David. The one that was crucified by the hands of Rome and by the mouths of Jewish politicians who shouted, “Crucify Him!”
God speaks from the mouth of the prophet Isaiah:
“But Zion said, “The LORD has forsaken me, and my Lord has forgotten me.” “Can a woman forget her nursing child and not have compassion on the son of her womb? Surely, they may forget, Yet I will not forget you. See, I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands; Your walls are continually before Me. Your sons shall make haste; Your destroyers and those who laid you waste Shall go away from you.”(Isaiah 49:14-17 NKJV)
It is evident in this passage that God has never rejected Israel, nor will God reject Israel, His bride. Jeremiah 31:35-37 states this in words that cannot be misunderstood. Most Christians, and especially pastors, only teach from Jeremiah 31:31-34. They purposefully ignore and hide the text from Jeremiah 31:35-37. Here is the whole text. Please pay attention to the fact that if tomorrow the sun is shining by day and the stars and the moon by night, these are divine signs that God has not and will never reject Israel.
“Behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the LORD. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, “Know the LORD,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity and their sin, I will remember no more.”
Thus says the LORD, who gives the sun for a light by day, The ordinances of the moon and the stars for a light by night, who disturbs the sea, and its waves roar (The LORD of hosts is His name): “If those ordinances depart from before Me, says the LORD, Then the seed of Israel shall also cease from being a nation before Me forever.”Thus says the LORD: “If heaven above can be measured, And the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done, says the LORD.” (Jeremiah 31:31-37 NKJV)
The false Christian doctrine was born in the 4th Century AD near Istanbul, Turkey, which states that the church has replaced Israel, that God has rejected Israel, and that the holy City of Rome in Italy has twisted and falsified the very roots and foundation of all of Christianity.
Only the restoration of our faith in the paradigm pattern and substance of the church we read about in the New Testament is the authentic and genuine body of the Messiah. I am not judging anyone who sincerely is doing their best to be a faithful disciple of the Messiah. We will all be judged on judgment day, not according to which denomination or Christian Church or sect one is attached to, but by faith, love, and keeping God’s commandments!
Don’t be satisfied with the status quo of your denomination or sub-denomination, from the “Churches” of Rome and Constantinople, of Germany to Indiana, and of Scotland to Nashville, Tennessee, and on and on and on…. Keep seeking and learning calmly ways to follow and live according to the commandments of Jesus and the Apostles in the New Testament. Do not be happy and satisfied with the 38.000 Christian denominations, most of whom don’t know who they are or from where they originated when their church was created or where it was created.
Of course, in every denomination and “non-denominational denomination,” there are some very sharp, well-informed, and well-meaning preachers, pastors, and members. Any Church or Christian denomination that claims that it was started and born in Scotland in the 18th Century, in Germany in the 16th Century, or Indiana in the 19th Century is not a biblical church that God ordained. The only church God ordained was born in Jerusalem, Israel, in the 1st Century CE and founded at the feast of Pentecost = Shavuot when the Holy Spirit filled the 120 disciples of Yeshua in an upper room on Mt. Zion in the city of David, Jerusalem.
Restoration of the New Testament Church also necessitates the re-establishment of the relationship and identification with the city of Jerusalem, as in the first Century CE. The relationship of the Church with Jerusalem and with the nation of Israel is essential for those churches and denominations that seek authenticity and insist on being patterned in the spirit and teaching of the restoration of the church and the restoration of Israel.
Isaiah 49 is the point at which the role of God’s servant switches from Israel to an individual Jew, who receives the place and role of Israel. This does not mean the replacement of Israel because the Son of God, the Messiah, is the ultimate Jew, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham, and the Son of God uniquely and especially from birth to death to resurrection from the dead.
This is an important truth that enables the prophet Isaiah to present the picture of the Messiah as the fulfillment of all the Messianic prophecies in chapter 53. In chapter 53, there are 20 (some say 33) prophecies of the Messiah that define and describe the life and path of suffering and rejection and, finally, the power of salvation that this rejected Messiah brings for all sinners.
A few words about the Torah portion of Ekev from Deuteronomy 7:12 – 11:25! This verse is one of the most important verses in the whole Bible:
“Then it shall come to pass, because you listen to these judgments, and keep and do them, that the LORD your God will keep with you the covenant and the mercy which He swore to your fathers.” (Deuteronomy 7:12 NKJV).
There are similar verses in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. I want to concentrate on the New Testament because of the length of this week’s study in the Jerusalem Prayer List. John 15:10:
“If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.”
Those who think that God has changed his paradigm from the so-called Old Testament to the New Testament ought to re-read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation and see and understand that it is the same God who had the children cross the Red Sea on dry ground and demanded obedience and following God’s commandments as a part of the understanding that Grace will fill and instruct and bless and forgive those who sincerely do their best to follow and obey God’s commandments.
The New Testament has the same teaching in more than one place:
“By faith, Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to the place which he would receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. By faith, he dwelt in the land of promise as in a foreign country, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise, for he waited for the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God.” (Hebrews 11:8-10 NKJV)
Also, in our Torah portion, we find the following words of God to Moses and Israel!
“If you should say in your heart, ‘These nations are greater than I; how can I dispossess them?’— you shall not be afraid of them, but you shall remember well what the LORD your God did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt: the great trials which your eyes saw, the signs and the wonders, the mighty hand and the outstretched arm, by which the LORD your God brought you out. So shall the LORD your God do to all the peoples of whom you are afraid. Moreover, the LORD your God will send the hornet among them until those who are left, who hide themselves from you, are destroyed. You shall not be terrified of them, for the LORD your God, the great and awesome God, is among you. And the LORD your God will drive out those nations before you little by little; you will be unable to destroy them at once, lest the beasts of the field become too numerous for you. But the LORD your God will deliver them over to you and will inflict defeat upon them until they are destroyed. And He will deliver their kings into your hand, and you will destroy their name from under heaven; no one shall be able to stand against you until you have destroyed them. You shall burn the carved images of their gods with fire; you shall not covet the silver or gold that is on them, nor take it for yourselves, lest you be snared by it, for it is an abomination to the LORD your God.”(Deuteronomy 7:17-25 NKJV)
I am highlighting these words of Moses because we are in the middle of a harsh and cruel war with Hamas in Gaza and their partners, who are a proxy of Iran. These words are like antibiotics to my ears and heart. They are words of God spoken to Moses and the children of Israel at the time of the exodus from Egypt and somewhere on the east side of the Jordan River before they crossed the Jordan River into the land of Canaan.
The instruction of God through the voice of Moses and with Moses’s stuttering voice. I believe that every word and every principle that Moses is speaking to Israel standing on the shores of the Jordan River is relevant and imperative for us in Israel these days. But not only for us who live in Israel but also for you worldwide. The goals of the radical Muslims in Iran, Gaza, and Lebanon are one and single. The goal of our enemies is the destruction of Israel, and by this, they think that they will receive God’s promises to Isaac and Jacob – the ownership of the Land of Israel. Destroy the seed of Isaac and establish the bond’s woman, Hagar’s son Ishmael, in the false belief that the sons of Ishmael will inherit the land promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as an everlasting inheritance.
The disciples of Yeshua and those who seek God and His truth must immediately review and refocus their attitude and place their spiritual future with Israel. These events follow the pattern of the Biblical prophets that predicted the return of the Jewish people back to the land given by God to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and their seed as an everlasting possession. Every promise of God was and is fulfilled and accomplished from the dawn of history to the end of history. The turning of this ball called earth back to the promises of God of a new heaven and earth where righteousness will be our flag, and Justice will be our dining room table and foundation until Yeshua returns.
Our future holds and stands to the promises of God of Israel. The world will see the land of Israel flourishing, the Jewish people being saved as the Apostle Paul promised in Romans 11:25-27, that all of Israel will be saved and justified and the righteous of God will continue to keep His faithful promises to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and will restore the people of Israel to the land and peace will rule both Jews and Arabs. I look forward to seeing the land to the people of Israel, happy to believe and live according to the promises of God to the children of Israel during the exodus. People in the land of Israel, both Jews and Arabs, will enjoy seeing with their own eyes the land of Israel in peace, and that generation will see the promises of God in this land of Israel. All humanity will see with their own eyes the return of Yeshua in his shop and relax at home, waiting for the rest of God’s promises to be fulfilled at the right time and in every detail.
For now, I urge you all to become partners with Israel during this war. Little old Israel is being attacked by Seven different hostile enemy entities: Hamas from Gaza, the Palestinian terrorists in Judea and Samaria, Lebanon and the Hamas, the Hezbollah from Lebanon in the north, and the Houthis from Yemen in the South (and I am adding the situation with Egyptians that are trying to play a fair game and see the restoration of Israel protected and successfully living in peace with all of our neighbors and flourishing in both the material things and the promises of God – like all of Israel will be saved.)
Stand with Israel and with the Jewish communities in your country, state, and city. Israel, as a people and a country, is the vehicle of salvation for all the nations, and the King Messiah is still the King of the Jews.