A Short Delay
He who testifies to these things says, “Yes, I am coming quickly.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. Revelation 22:20 NASB
Come – In the penultimate verse of Scripture, John exclaims what we have all felt at one time or another. “Come, please come, and let’s get on with it!” The problem with this verse is not our fervent desire to see Him return. It is the statement, “I am coming quickly.” Almost two thousand years have passed since that promise – and yet we wait. Perhaps Heschel is right.
“God will return to us when we shall be wiling to let Him in – into our banks and factories, into our Congress and clubs, into our courts and investigating committees, into our homes and theaters. For God is everywhere and nowhere, the Father of all men or no man, concerned about everything or nothing. Only in His presence shall we learn that the glory of man is not in his will to power, but in his power of compassion. Man reflects either the image of His presence of that of a beast.”[1]
Heschel delivered these words in a speech in 1938! Has anything improved since then? Is God more present in the world since then? Have we let Him in to every aspect of our lives in the last eighty years, or have we systematically removed God from our institutions, our governments, our justice system or social and ethical behavior? Have we as Mankind become more like Him or more like the beast within us?
Do you really think God wants to come back to this world? Do you really think that Yeshua, the Jewish Messiah from the Hebrew God, would be welcomed here?
What the world lacks is kavanah. What believers lack is kavanah. What I lack is kavanah! The world lacks kavanah because it is too arrogant to recognize the sovereignty of YHWH. Believers lack kavanah because they are too preoccupied with their own petty lives. I lack kavanah because I am afraid – afraid of the demand that it will place upon me. What is kavanah? “It is attentiveness to God, an act of appreciation of being able to stand in the presence of God.”[2] It is living my life according to God’s heart. It is feeling as He feels about His purposes and His creation. Kavanah leads directly to brokenhearted existence. It is the way of the prophets. Most of us want nothing to do with this shattering experience. We do not want to be attentive to God’s heart because feeling as He feels will crush us. We would rather withhold our total abandonment and devotion in order to pretend that we are in control.
But the history of Mankind is a nightmare. Without kavvanah the King will not return and the nightmare continues.
Topical Index: kavanah, come, Revelation 22:20
[1] Abraham Heschel, Man’s Quest for God, pp. 150-151.
[2] Ibid., p. 84.
SORRY: Yesterday’s post “BIG” did not include the link to the web site to show the comparisons. It turns out that the information is a download Powerpoint so I can’t actually provide a link, but you can find it by googling this:
Allah’s Universe Space Science – Islamic Study Group
Yes, I realize it is an Arabic site, but that doesn’t change the content.
When?
When will He come?
“And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world
as a witness to all nations, and then the end will come.” Mat 24:14
“. . . as a witness to all nations”
Are you and I witnesses? Are we?
Are our lives reflecting His image, His purposes, His heart?
Skip asks us, “Do you really think God WANTS to come back to this world?”
Would he be welcomed here?
How many witneses will it take? How much kavanah is needed? How convinced are we
that God can change mankind’s nightmare?
The “Christian” world today sees this world in free-fall and believes Jesus will
come back when it’s at its worst.
Yet Jesus Himself has gone on record as saying He’ll come when the
“gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness
to all nations.”
That sounds like good news!!!
~Wherefore He saith, Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light~
(Ephesians 5.14)
~ I AM sending you to open their eyes; so that they will turn from darkness to light, from the power of the adversary to God, and thus receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who have been separated for holiness by putting their trust in Me ~ (Acts 26.18)
Kavannah. (Both) awake and aware. What does it take to “wake up?” Have we become so “dull” and dim? Has life become a trudge or drudge? Is it, as one might say.. “same ol’- same ol’? Or same “stuff”- different day?
What make the difference? – It seems “every man” needs a “wake-up” call.. I (personally) like to call this the “aha” moment.. As simply put as I am capable of, ( I love simplicity!) – the recognition and realization of “this is truth!”
Of course, what we need is “Exhibit A.” – I’m from Missouri..- “show me.”
“If” I place my hand on a hot stove, – May I now “expect” to be burned.. “why?” Every choice (especially the stupid ones!) is followed by a consequence! One might say, -it is the “voice of experience..”- you ever been “burned” before? Do you (also) now wear the scar? A “scar of remembrance?” For whatever reason, (yes, stupidity, many times it seems..)- we are scarred all over. I’m covered with them..- and so are you. No one, (no, not one) goes through this life- “scar free..”- Not even One who is “both” the son of man -and- the Son of God!
I may suffer for my own sins, but this Man is “decidedly different” He may have suffered every trial we also face (as humans) but this Man, “the son of man” and Son of God, the One who is Truth incarnate suffered (also) for someone else’s sake!
Friend, – do you not know?
~ He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His wounds we are healed ~ (Isaiah 53.5)
Why is this One called “Redeemer?” or “Deliverer” or “Savior?” or LORD?
(for whosoever shall call upon the Name of the LORD- “shall be saved!”)
Oh? – is it as easy as: “LORD, – save me?” (is this, too easy?) Is He “only” a prayer away?
Again (and again!..) We must (continually) ask: “What do the scriptures say?” These are a written record of His- story.
~You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about Me, ~ (John 5.39)
Amazing. So “close”- and yet..- so far away.. – Wow! The scriptures (the tanakh) testify concerning a Person!
May we (together) pull over and “park” right here for a moment? Yes, – “selah!” (stop.- and think about this!)
And I quote: (beware those “bible thumpers!” – lol!)- Oh please, yes!- I want to be one of those “Bible-thumpers!!” And why would that be? (I’m glad you asked!)
Are you listening? Or have you (by now) “turned away” to other more “tired and trivial” matters?
Enter, (once again) “kavannah”- What a wonderful word! -It is.. (drum roll?)- “focused attention!”
Stop!- May I have (if only for a moment)- your “full and undivided attention!” Is this possible?
~ bringing into captivity “every thought?” -to the obedience of Christ? ~
“Torah keepers”- is this “also” the instruction of YHWH?
The scriptures. Yes, the “Tanakh.” (These are they that testify of “WHO?”) A man, the second Adam, the son of man, the one Mediator between God and man, – The Messiah! (amen!)
It is written: (Luke 24)
~ but the next day, while it was still very early, they took the spices they had prepared, went to the tomb, and found the stone rolled away from the tomb! On entering, they discovered that the body of the LORD Yeshua was gone! They were standing there, not knowing what to think about it, when suddenly two men in dazzlingly bright clothing stood next to them. Terror-stricken, they bowed down with their faces to the ground. The two men said to them,
~ Why are you looking for the living among the dead? ~
He is not here; He has been raised. Remember how He told you while He was still in the Galil, ‘The son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be executed on a stake as a criminal, but on the third day be raised again’?”
Then they remembered His words;
and, returning from the tomb, they told everything to the Eleven and to all the rest. The women who told the emissaries these things were Miryam of Magdala, Yochanah, Miryam the mother of Ya‘akov, and the others in their circle.
But the emissaries didn’t believe them; in fact, they thought that what they said was utter nonsense! However, Kefa got up and ran to the tomb. Stooping down, he saw only the burial cloths and went home wondering what had happened.
That same day, two of them were going toward a village about seven miles from Yerushalayim called Amma’us, and they were talking with each other about all the things that had happened. As they talked and discussed, Yeshua himself came up and walked along with them,
but something kept them from recognizing Him.
He asked them, “What are you talking about with each other as you walk along?” They stopped short, their faces downcast; and one of them, named Cleopas, answered Him, “Are you the only person staying in Yerushalayim that doesn’t know the things that have been going on there the last few days?” “What things?” He asked them. They said to Him, “The things about Yeshua from Natzeret. He was a prophet and proved it by the things He did and said before God and all the people. Our head cohanim and our leaders handed Him over, so that He could be sentenced to death and executed on a stake as a criminal.
And we had hoped that He would be the one to liberate Isra’el! Besides all that, today is the third day since these things happened; and this morning, some of the women astounded us. They were at the tomb early and couldn’t find His body, so they came back; but they also reported that they had seen a vision of angels who say He’s alive! Some of our friends went to the tomb and found it exactly as the women had said, but they didn’t see Him.”
He said to them, “Foolish people! So unwilling to put your trust in everything the prophets spoke! Didn’t the Messiah have to die like this before entering His glory?”
~ Then, starting with Moshe and all the prophets, He explained to them the things that can be found throughout the Tanakh concerning Himself.
They approached the village where they were going. He made as if he were going on farther; but they held Him back, saying, “Stay with us, for it’s almost evening, and it’s getting dark.” So He went in to stay with them. As He was reclining with them at the table, He took the matzah, made the b’rakhah, broke it and handed it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized Him. But He became invisible to them.
They said to each other, ~ Didn’t our hearts burn inside us as He spoke to us on the road, opening up the Tanakh to us? ~