Feeling Commandments
and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God, you and your son and your daughter and your male and female servants and the Levite who is in your town, and the stranger and the orphan and the widow who are in your midst, in the place where the Lord your God chooses to establish His name. Deuteronomy 16:11 NASB
You shall rejoice – “Now listen. I command you to feel good. I command you to feel joy. And if you don’t, then I will punish you.” Does that make any sense to you? Can you actually command a person to feel a particular way? If you think like a Greek, then such a command is nonsense. You might be able to command me to do something, but you can hardly command me to feel a certain way. And that’s the problem with how we understand joy. The same Hebrew word, samah, that we investigated in Isaiah 35:10 is used here, as a commandment. “You shall rejoice,” says YHVH. What? How can God command me to feel? That’s crazy! Ah, unless you are Hebrew. In Hebrew, samah is an action that elicits a feeling. So God commands me to act in certain ways and those ways produce the feelings of joy. He commands me to bring the offering, to sing, to clap, to dance, to express my gratefulness with mirth and revelry. And what do you know? I discover I am filled with joy.
Want to feel inspired? In Greek thinking you would meditate on the idea of inspiration. You would analyze the concept, search for the underlying psychological factors, develop a causal theory. In Hebrew, you go outside and view the sunrise. Or you listen to Handel. Or you hold your infant close to your chest. Analysis has nothing to do with it. You do—and then you feel.
We all recognize how feelings are tied to music. I love the Blues, but sometimes they make me cry. Why? Because the music gets into my soul. I don’t need to analyze the chord structure of a Blues riff in order to weep. It’s the music that affects me, not tonal scale. So it is with Hebrew thinking. It’s really hardly thinking at all, at least not in the sense that we Westerners “think” about “thinking.” Hebrew thinking is much more like bathing. It’s sliding into the hot water and letting the feelings of the liquid and the flow overwhelm your senses. Hebrew “thinking” is experiencing the reality, not analyzing the causes. So God is perfectly capable of commanding feelings because what is really happening is that God is commanding you and me to act in certain ways that birth the feelings. “You shall rejoice” means that you and I shall do what rejoicing people do.
Dance, shout, sing, carry on, laugh, eat, play, drink, make merry, jest, joke and have a good time. And all of that is rejoice.
Once a man I met in South Africa complained to me that he could not believe in a God who would allow children in his own community to be destitute, malnourished and discarded. I told him that he would never understand such a God until he got out of his chair and did something about the plight of those children. You do, then you ask, then you feel, then you worship. So, pick yourself up and go make some joy.
Topical Index: rejoice, joy, samah, Deuteronomy 16:11
I always hated Alice In Wonderland. A totally visceral reaction, with no analysis behind it. How many people have told me (or I read it), that they love the book. Not me. Not one thing in it. I can’t stand any of it.
What is there to like about waking up on the wrong side of the looking glass? To see yourself the wrong way first? To have to muddle your way out of the illusion of reality before you ever get to reality? The only fun to be had has got to be perverse, like yanking an unbearably obnoxious loose tooth.
An enemy did this. An enemy, in an evil hour for mankind, turned the signpost around that spelled out perfectly clearly the way to life and the way to death, and we have been confused ever since. Backwards and upside down, we cling to all the fatal things and flee from all the good stuff. We are afraid of our shadows and run down our fragile identities like a raging bull with lances in the chest. We are our own worst enemies, while at the very same moment we feed our engorged but insatiable egos to the point of blessed blackout from the carnage.
Take joy for example (Look! We already are!). Now how much more straightforward can you get it? I can be happy when I do the things of happiness. How simple is that? But in my muddled mind, I had it all backwards. I thought I had to be happy first before I could do those fun things. (Here I am saying the obvious again. Like, this is so duh.) But the cleverer I got, the farther away I got from being able to just be happy. There were so many rules I had to follow before I ‘got’ the Happy Reward. I had to eat the vegetables first. I had to sweat the A first. I had to fix the unfixable before I could fix the rest. I had to work all night before I could sleep. I had to be lost before I got found. Stupid rules. (Wait! Where did I put that Torah?) There could be no more diabolically perverse pathway to happiness than the one I thought I had to tread. Why did I think I had to walk it? Because it was the one in front of my face. The landscape was black, so I thought black was my color. The way was down, so I thought I was a loser. The love I needed so much was not where I thought it should be, so I thought I had to put it there. Rules. I saw my world full of rules that promised me that I would be happy at the perfection of them. I saw them, and I thought they had come down from the Father of Lights. Why? Because I thought He was like me, making up rules as He went; chasing after rabbits down bunny trails like a hound chained to the track called Reality.
They say happiness is a choice, in this upside down world. That is not technically correct. I wish to correct it. Choice: choice IS happiness. Choice itself is the conduit of joy. When I can choose, then I can fulfill my reality in creation. I was born to choose; not to run. I perceive any diminution of choice as misery, and it is. Paradise is 360 degrees of choices, as far as the eye can see, and beyond. There. In that place. With choice spread out before me like a banquet: there is bliss.
A whirling dervish knows that unrestrained, unplanned, unmeditated, ‘free’ movement IS the action of joy. To already be there in my own skin; to not have to step through a looking glass of self deceit that an altered state of reality has to provide the dervish to get there: this, this honour have all His saints. We have the freedom to act joy because we have had our choices returned to us: we can turn freely in all the directions that we have repented for the chains of sin in, and see choice again. Free. Free to jump for joy. Joy is not chasing that elusive bunny: joy IS that bunny! All the hounds of hell are the illusion…
So, we can sum up the last two days by saying:
Greek = “I think, therefore, I am”
Hebrew = “I do, therefore, I am”
Rick, I love your comment. Abba is helping me deal with my years of ingrained Greek mind set.
I so appreciate Skip’s TW’s that are a tremendous help along this journey.
Amein.
This is great! I think that I get stuck in the “feel then act” cycle, but I really need to “do then feel” instead! honestly I’ve found that in studying Torah recently I’ve lost the sense of joy in the Lord and it’s become a thing of intellectual questioning the authenticity of the text. I’m not exactly sure how to find that joy again where reading Torah brings joy and closeness to Adonai. I think I think too much. When this happens, what should I do to feel again? I miss that sense of wonder and closeness.
Amanda, I am afflicted in the same way. I drive myself crazy over thinking everything. Skip’s teaching is helping me, and I would like share my perspective.
My mindset of late has been to open wide my arms in the morning and grab life. Scoop it up while ‘laughing at the future’. I have no idea what will unfold, but like the woman of valor, I gaze on the history of His faithfulness and know it will all work out. Next, I just live in the moment of my day. I ask the Lord to equip me to manifest His image in me, walk humbly, do justice, love others and not get stuck on MY agenda. I don’t obsess or get too concerned about evangelism, or my sales numbers, I just try to live in His image moment by moment.
When I get home, I love my wife and 11 year old son with autism, by attending to them. Loving them. Only after dinner has been prepared, consumed and cleaned up, bath taken and some “wrestle time with dad” do I take a bit of time for me. Now, this is a description of a Yetzer ha tov day, which of course doesn’t happen with complete consistency, but when it does it brings shalom and joy. Moment by moment, choosing to exhibit the image (character) of G_d yields tangible results. There is so much less pressure when life is lived ‘in the moment’. I don’t have to be a saint the rest of my days. I just need to be one at this moment.
Now, may the G_d of Israel grant me, all of us, increasing success and consistency, to have more days as a faithful image bearer.
Amein! Feeling good is doing good, day by day, on a daily basis, walking in His image/nature, seeking His pleasure, and in return we get pleasure. HalleluYAH.
Love your comment, Bill. Shalom!
Thank you Skip, it is good to think through these things to understand. I find no confusion here or difficulty in Greek / Hebrew thought. Surely having come to know such a GOD, YHWH and Who He is; to rejoice as He commands would be the natural out working of that seed of His word – rejoice. Joy is continually resident deep within and can obey to overcome. But I confess there are times when darkness seems to prevail and we fall under the weight of burden, uncleaness and sin. I believe He knows our need and so He commands us; then we must here YHWH and determine to rise in obedience in His strength and rejoice to take hold of the victory we have in Messiah. When we consider the context of this scripture we have no excuse and the is nothing to hold us back. Surely is the that day we have longed for, prayed for and lived for through all our trials and tribulations. How can we not estatically express our love for our Beloved Bridegroom.
Faith-Facts-Feelings: Digging Deeper
Elohim: “Abraham, take your son, your only begotten son, whom you love, [Isaac], and sacrifice him to Me.”
Abraham: “Did God [just] say..?” or to quote the Deceiver. “Hath God said?”
Abraham’s answer? “I will.” (or, as Another once said) “Not my will, but Thine be done”
The faith of Abraham won the day. He surrendered to what God wanted him to do, but let us consider both the facts and the feelings “of the moment..” Yes, let us also “Be here.. now.”
Let’s play “what if?” The facts first. Abraham waited a very long time for this “son of promise” (Isaac, btw..). So long, in fact, that Sarah suggested (yes, it was her own lack of faith -or patience!) Abraham, let’s help God out! – I know a shortcut! Here is Hagar, my handmaiden..” – “Go and have a child with her.”
What a mess – when we don’t wait on God, but take matters into our own hands!
And now, for the feelings.. Off the charts, for us to imagine what went through the mind of Abraham on that sleepless night; the weeping, tossing-turning turmoil Abraham experienced on “the night before the morning after.” During the darkest blackness of that awful night, Abraham decided. It was all – his choice, -his own will.. – “I will do what God wants me to do.” I will go and sacrifice my beloved Isaac as my Friend has asked me to do.”
This is the completion and the victory of faith: Faith won the day! (Even) over (our limited understanding of) facts and feelings! Lol! – We (humans) don’t know “all the facts!” Friend, we do not know! – “the rest of the story!” But for those who walk by faith, -the best is yet to be!!
~ Early the next morning Abraham got up and loaded his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about ~ (Genesis 22.3)
The is the essence and exhibition of “shema.” This is the demonstration of “shema.” Abraham heard God – (part 1) – and? – (part 2), he not only heard, but he obeyed and acted according to the instructions of Elohim. To “shema” is to A) Trust. and B) Obey.
And? – What does the Scripture say? [ “The question” we must always ask ourselves!] “Abraham believed [and trusted] God, and it was credited to him (counted to him, imputed to him) as righteousness.”
Want to please God? Obey God. – and? (in the words of The Messiah) “if you love Me, keep My commandments!” (Please.. Do, as I ask you to do!)
Yes, it is true (amen!) Joy is “in the doing of” the will of God.
Walking by faith. Was it “easy” for Abraham? Absolutely NOT. Was it “easy” (even) for The Messiah? -Remember, He lived among us as a Man! The most “human” and “humane” human, ever to have lived!!
Did Abraham “praying without ceasing” on the way to Mt. Moriah? – or Christ on the way to Calvary?
Now tell me about how Abraham “felt” when he saw the Sacrifice, God Himself had provided!! – Was there “joy?” Joy unspeakable! – and full of glory!! Abraham’s emotions exploded!
And what of our Master? “Who for the Joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising its shame, and has [now] sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Rejoice! Rejoice, O Christian! Lift up your voice and sing!
Eternal Hallelujahs, to Jesus Christ the King!
The Hope of all who seek Him
The Help of all who find..
None other is so loving,
So good and kind.
~ I take great joy in doing Your will, my God, – for Your instructions are written on my heart ~
~ The LORD is my Strength and my Shield; my heart trusts in Him, and He helps me. My heart leaps for joy, and with my song I will praise Him! ~
Thank you Skip. This is so timely. I was really jarred realizing my once spontaneous and shameless clapping, singing, dancing, and happy talk with God had vanished from my life. This silence has occurred since I began challenging, thinking, and over-thinking my prior beliefs.
For most of my life, there was always a song, hymn or praise song playing in my heart and head. Since childhood, I would unconsciously hum, whether in school, on the job, in the grocery store, etc. Music was like oxygen, next to laughter. Needless to say, this has been a HUGE loss in the past couple of years.
Yesterday, I decided to open my mouth, joyfully, to God. Sadly, I found my mouth awkwardly closed, hesitant to sing to YHVH. I made myself start clapping. It felt silly, but only momentarily. As I clapped, my lips began to speak of HIS goodness. I was soon singing. Can’t say I’ve shouted again yet, but I will.
Thank you again for being the catalyst, encouraging the action of rejoicing. I’m recapturing one of the most meaningful ways I can express my love to The Most High, especially during this special time of Passover week, Counting the Omer, and with spring bursting forth.
On a side note, I too, love the Blues, and back-in-the-day, when I thought I had Jesus and heaven figured out, I used to tell people, “If you want to find me in heaven, go to the Blues section and wait for me. I’ll be pulling up on the back of a Harley, with Jesus”.
Shalom Shalom
Thank you for sharing such inspiration. I am right there with you.
“Hogs” in heaven? Ain’t that Sumthin’ Sumthin’. What, no Gold(en) Wings?!
Gotta love it!
My sweet grand daughter’s favourite, when she was hardly two, was “there is a JOY, joy, joy, joy down in my heart, down in my heart, down in my heart… down in my heart to stay”, and she would be shaking her legs in tune, and she still is the sweet, joyful young lady she has grown up to be. She gives us and everyone else around her such joy.
My thoughts are, you need first to be joyful to spread that joy around.
שָׂמַח samach – to cause to rejoice, gladden, make glad
Smile, and the world smiles with you! Shalom.
Kids know God in a par-logical way. My granddaughter shows me that every time she visits.
I’m sure God made little children to be our teachers 🙂