Anyway, on to the Torah Portion!
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Parasha VaYera is the 4th portion in Genesis and goes from Genesis 18:1-22:24. It is the continuation of Abram's/Abraham's life.
We saw in the last Torah Portion how YHVH brought Abram
out of the land of his fathers and brought him to Canaan. We see that there were a lot of tests, and sometimes Abram did fail those tests.
But in this Torah Portion, we are going to see what happens when
YHVH follows through and is faithful to us as we are faithful to Him!
We see in this Torah Portion how YHVH finally fulfilled
His promise to Abraham. Abraham had to wait 25 YEARS
before Sarah had a son. If we think about it, it is a lot like what is going on now.
We have been waiting, and waiting, and waiting, and....
Anyway, We have been waiting all this time for Yahshua to return
and He hasn't come back. Recently we have had an outburst of people
saying that the tribulation is this day or that day, including some "Torah Teachers", but Yahshua made it VERY clear NOT to follow them:
Matthew 24:23-27
“If anyone then says to you, ‘Look, here is the Messiah!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe.
24 “For false messiahs and false prophets shall arise, and they shall show great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the chosen ones.
25 “See, I have forewarned you.
26 “So if they say to you, ‘Look, He is in the desert!’ do not go out;
or ‘Look, He is in the inner rooms!’ do not believe.
27 “For as the lightning comes from the east and shines to the west,
so also shall the coming of the Son of Aḏam be.
What Yahshua said here is the same thing that is happening now. We
know though that He said things have to happen before His return(Matthew 24). We have no authority to make any plans about when Messiah will return.
In fact, we will be rebuked and condemned if we do, because putting
a date on when He will return makes it look like He lied when He
says that no man will know the day or the hour. That doesn't mean
however that we should just play around and say,
"Oh, we won't know when Messiah will return,
so we can do whatever we want." like modern christianity does.
We have to be prepared always and look for the times and seasons.
But putting dates months and years in advance is something
that the Scriptures is very much against. We have to be patient and wait,
just like Abraham and Sarah had to wait and be patient for their son Isaac.
In fact, from their mistakes, we can learn how YHVH wants
us to act when we "think" He is delaying. Remember though,
YHVH doesn't delay. We just get TOO IMPATIENT!!
Amen!
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Genesis 18:1-2
And YHVH appeared to him by the terebinth trees of Mamre,
while he was sitting in the tent door in the heat of the day.
2 So he lifted his eyes and looked, and saw three men
standing opposite him. And when he saw them,
he ran from the tent door to meet them, and bowed himself to the ground,
In chapter 18 we read how 3 men came to meet Abraham.
But we can see an unusual thing happen here in verse 2.
Abraham, seeing these men, runs to them and bows to them.
2 things that I found interesting. 1st of all, Abraham is 100 YEARS OLD.
Even back then that was senior citizen age. He was an elder and
as we saw in the previous chapters a rich and famous one, so he
really shouldn't have had to run, UNLESS these men weren't just normal men.
The 2nd thing I found interesting is that Abraham bowed to them.
This man, 100 years old, extremely wealthy and very famous in his time,
bowed to these 3 men. Now, how could these be just 3 ordinary men,
or even 3 officers or rulers. He didn't bow down to the king of Sodom
when he met him. These weren't just your average Billy, Bob,
and Joe walking down the road. Now, at a 2nd glance we could
think that these may be angels. Now, could 1 or 2 of them have been?
Sure. But not all 3 of them could have been angels because we see time
and time again in the Scriptures that when men bowed to angels, the angels told them to stand up and not to be afraid. We see a perfect example in Revelation:
Revelation 22:8-9
And I, Yoḥanan, saw and heard these matters. And when I heard and saw, I fell down to worship before the feet of the messenger who showed me these matters.
9 And he said to me, “See, do not! For I am your fellow servant,
and of your brothers the prophets, and of those who are
guarding the words of this book. Worship Elohim.”
So just who did Abraham bow down to?
There is only one person, and it is answered to us in verse 3:
Genesis 18:2-3
So he lifted his eyes and looked, and saw three men standing opposite him.
And when he saw them, he ran from the tent door to meet them,
and bowed himself to the ground,
3 and said, “YHVH, if I have now found favour in Your eyes,
please do not pass Your servant by.
YHVH! He saw YHVH.... wait a minute...
Exodus 33:20
But He said, “You are unable to see My face, for no man does see Me and live.”
There is only one person this can be, YHVH in the flesh, Yahshua!
We keep seeing Him over and over again in Genesis showing
Himself in different ways, because remember 2 things:
1. Names in Hebrew shows the character of that person
AND
2. Because of that, we can see YHVH's character in different names and ways. Like Yahshua means salvation, Melchizedek means king of righteousness,
and El Shaddai means God Almighty.
Because of this we can see who we know as Yahshua in
many different ways, not just as salvation. I mean, in the last days,
do you really think He is going to come JUST to save us?
Yes, that is a part of it, but He is also going to come as
YHVH Elohim Tsevaot, Melek Tsadik Ha'shalom;
YHVH God of Hosts, King of Righteous and Peace!
He is coming to restore justice and righteousness
to the world with a rod of iron(Revelation 19:15).
HalleluYAH!
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We see through the rest of this Torah Portion how Abraham started
learning to have faith in YHVH. He had enough faith to be able to
ask YHVH to save Sodom and Gomorrah, and then bargained
with Him until YHVH promised to save the cities if there were
only 10 righteous men instead of the 50 he had originally had.
He had enough courage to admit his mistake to Abimelech
in chapter 20 about Sarah. But of all the moments in Abraham's life,
the moment that truly tested his faith was in chapter 22.
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Imagine, after all the things have happened in Abraham's life,
after all the times YHVH tested him, and after all the trials and tribulations,
he finally got the blessing that YHVH promised him. He must of been
so joyful and so amazed for all that YHVH had done.
He must have been pretty glad it's was finally over, right?
Now he could rest... Or so he thought!
Genesis 22:1-2
And it came to be after these events that Elohim tried Abraham,
and said to him, “Aḇraham!” And he said, “Here I am.”
2 And He said, “Take your son, now, your only son Yitsḥaq, whom you love,
and go to the land of Moriyah, and offer him there as a burnt offering
on one of the mountains which I command you.”
Now, what would be your 1st thought if you were Abraham? I think just about everyone's opinion(probably me too) would have been, "NO WAY!!" But here is where Abraham's life takes a turn away from what most people would do:
Genesis 22:3
And Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey
, and took two of his young men with him, and Yitsḥaq his son.
And he split the wood for the burnt offering, and arose and
went to the place which Elohim had commanded him.
"WOW! He finally figured it out!(Haha!)"
That's probably what some of us are thinking.
But understand this:
If you had to leave your homeland and go to some foreign land,
following some God that you only 1/2 way knew, going
through enemy territories, having fights with your relatives over space and property(Hmm... we don't do that, do we?), then having to
save your relative and the people that he went to, having these
heavenly beings come to you and YHVH personally talk to you
over and Over and OVER again, each time saying that you were going to have a child and be a great nation, having a wife
that always nagged about her maidservant, then again
having YHVH come to you and say that you were going to have a son from your wife who is already ancient(just don't tell Abimelech that!), and then finally, after ALL this time, FINALLY you have a son,
wouldn't you just gain a LITTLE faith to follow YHVH?
To be honest, it was the same thing that happened to Yahshua with His disciples. Even after they saw all the miracles that they saw, they still didn't know what He meant when He was talking to them, and Simon Peter still denied Him 3 times. But what do we get from both of these points in the Scriptures? That
even though we may not have a good beginning, and even though we fail(a LOT!), and even though we get scared, the most important thing that matters is the end. The most important thing for YHVH isn't how we begin, and it isn't
what we do in the middle, but rather how we finish. He wants us to finish strong.
I mean, look at the whole Scripture to look for examples.
Abraham failed over and over and over again, but because He
had faith and obeyed YHVH at the finish, at the most important part, he was saved. On the other hand, Moses had a fantastic middle, leading the children
of Yisra'el out of Egypt and to Mt. Sinai, and through him YHVH gave the Torah.
But because of his one sin at the end of his life, striking the rock instead of talking to it in Numbers 20, because of that he wasn't able to enter the Promised Land.
So what can we learn from this? What we can learn is that just like Abraham,
we make mistakes. Just like Abraham, we fail. Just like Abraham, we lose faith. But, if we are just like Abraham, and have the courage to finish,
no matter what YHVH asks us to do, we will be blessed.
It doesn't matter if we were perfect and followed YHVH in all His ways
for 90% of our lives. It is the last 10% that matters. And as we see in
Abraham's life, he was blessed beyond what he could have ever imagined:
Genesis 22:15-18
And the Messenger of YHVH called to Aḇraham a second time from the heavens,
16 and said, “By Myself I have sworn, declares YHVH, because you have done this, and have not withheld your son, your only son,
17 that I shall certainly bless you, and I shall certainly increase your
seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand which is on the seashore,
and let your seed possess the gate of their enemies.
18 “And in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed,
because you have obeyed My voice.”
Who is 'The Messenger of YHVH?' We see Him several times in the Scriptures.
It is very important to see the difference between 'a' and 'the'.
A messenger can mean any messenger, but THE Messenger is
someone special, someone with greater authority then even the angelic beings. He is Yahshua! This is even more clearly shown in verse 11:
Genesis 22:11
but the Messenger of YHVH called to him from the heavens
and said, “Aḇraham, Aḇraham!” And he said, “Here I am.”
If an angel called you out of heaven, would you be like, "Oh, hi, I'm right here!" NO! You would be on the floor, panting, about to have a heart attack. No, Abraham knew who this was, and it is so amazing to think about just how many times we can see Yahshua in the Scriptures!
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May YHVH bless you and may you continue to
learn YHVH's Torah more and more everyday!
Numbers 6:24-26
“YHVH bless you and guard you;
25 make His face shine upon you, and show favor to you;
26 YHVH lift up His face upon you, and give you peace.”
Until next time...
Shalom!
Christian Montanez Dodd
Servant and Emissary of Yahshua, Child of YHVH
HalleluYAH!