Shaking Things Into Place

I got fitted for a bra the other day and once you get past the uncomfortableness of revealing way more to a complete stranger than you desire the end result is worthwhile. Allowing someone who has majored in your weakness to assist you in dealing with the intimate areas of your life can make a remarkable difference in helping you shape up your presentation to the world. This is what the Holy Spirit does for us, He helps us shape things up in our lives that without knowledge or courage we wouldn’t be able to do ourselves. If we allow Him to He comes in and helps to shape up the areas we are resistant for others to see. Sometimes we have to get out of ourselves to allow someone in so that we can become the person we are destined to be.

I must admit it did help that the one who was assisting me was my stepdaughter instead of a complete stranger. Of course, not even she would have seen all of what hid behind layers of clothing before this event, but it always helps to have someone close to you expose you privately than a complete stranger. This is why relationship with Yah is so critical. When we recognize that he is our Father, and we are no longer just servants, but friends of God then we begin to embrace His counsel for our lives realizing that what he desires for us is better for us. He is not grossed out by our battle scars or intimidated by our belly rolls, he instead instructs us as to how we can shake things into place. This was the remarkable part about this experience for me. As you get older, and especially if you are well endowed, your body begins to form into the prostrate position without any assistance from you. However, manmade apparatuses meant to push you back into place, so to speak require a little help from you and gravity. So, once you put your bra on and move from the upright position to the tilted forward position you can then shake your girls into the cups of the bra, once again experiencing that youthful position with just a little nudge from gravity. We have to shake the ugliness of death from us so that we can embrace the fullness of life in Him. Once we do that then things can be shaken back into their proper place.

I always chose bras without wires, until my bra fitter explained to me that I must have been wearing the wrong size bra if I could feel the wire. Sometimes we are trying to contain big dreams in bowls that are too small. We can’t be afraid to upsize when our dreams are too big to fit in our current cups. Having the right size makes all the difference in having quality support. So if people around you can’t see the vision Yah has put in your heart you may need to enlarge your territory. Perhaps you are wearing the wrong size cup, so to speak. We should always be hard wired into Christ, he is the one size fit all support that we need.

Now, once we are faced with the reality check that our size has shifted, we need not be upset that we are larger than we expected. Enlarging our territory is naturally what occurs when we have matured. Now there are things we shake into place, and then there are things that He puts into place. The natural only reflects the spiritual principles that are at work, but it’s the spiritual picture that we need in order to experience life. Know that our life doesn’t consist of the abundance of things, in fact it’s really the simple things in life we take for granted that has the greatest impact on our purpose. It’s the little things we overlook that builds the big things in our future. We would be amazed at the big revelations we miss that Yah tries to show us in the simple things of life. Who would have ever thought a bra fitting would lead to an article that shares such a profound and simple truth.

Barren Motherhood

As desperate as you are to give birth there is a little boy or girl somewhere equally as desperate to have a mother like
you.  The combination of the two is a winning result.  So raise your head and sing aloud ye that did not bring forth,
who escaped the pains of travail for your strength shall be needed to rear children in need of a mother.

So that the rejected child becomes the chosen and the barren becomes the mother.  For we were chosen by the Father, and as a result rejected by the world.  For if ye were of the world they would love you, but because ye are not of the world the world hates you. (John 15:19)  Therefore, don’t let the enemy convince you that you are not beloved of Yah, because your value is not based on your ability to produce in the natural, for remember the Father desires Godly seed.  Godly seed is never born in the natural, only those that are born again by the supernatural love of Yah revealed in our expression to others of our love of Him.

The Strong Milk of Mom

At first glance these two pictures may look like the scribblings or doodlings of a child, but they make up two characters in the Hebrew Language that reflect a direct picture of what Yah designed a Mother to be.  Unlike our Greek inspired English language which focuses on what we think, Hebrew language is based on what we do.  It is in this understanding that many of us can relate more to Hebrew scriptures that appear from a Greek perspective to be an oxymoron, yet from a functional point of view make perfect sense.  For instance, in my previous post I mentioned several scriptures and one in particular seem to contradict itself.

(Psa 113:9)  He maketh the barren woman to keep house, and to be a joyful mother of children. Praise ye the LORD.
How is it possible that a barren woman can be a joyful mother?  In English it would make little sense, since in our language the birthing of a child and a mother is synonymous.  We have created compound terms to identify the exception to this rule, i.e. stepmother, adopted mother, etc…  However, by understanding the language of the bible we will gain an even greater understanding of this term as Yah intended.  The characters above represent the first and thirteenth character of the Hebrew Alephbet.

     Aleph (equivalent to “A” in English) is the first character of the Hebrew Aleph Bet and if you have a KJV bible as well as possibly many others you can turn to the 119th Psalm there you will find as the subheading of every eight verses all twenty two characters listed either in modern Hebrew or its English equivalent name.  Unlike English letters Hebrew characters double as having its own numeric value, they are names with meanings, they have an abstract as well as a concrete meaning, and when placed together with other characters paints a picture of the function of the word.  This character is the picture of an ox’s head and since an ox is considered a strong servant its meaning is strength.  It also stands for first.

  Mem (M) is the thirteenth character of the Hebrew Aleph Bet and the numeric value for mem is forty.  Since water was the method of punishment Yah chose to judge the earth by water has been associated by the Hebrew people as that which produced chaos. Hence, one of the meanings of this word is chaos, but its primary usage applies to any liquid including blood.  The character itself is that of a wave and therefore would by extension apply to waves of any kind including, sound waves, light waves, etc…

One of the most covalent bonds for producing glue is found in the substance water when we take that in consideration in understanding the function of the word (am) which is “Mother” in Hebrew we see something amazing concerning our purpose.  A mother is one who represents “strong glue”.  As we all know glue holds things together, and likewise a mother is one who holds the family together.  One doesn’t have to give birth to a child in order to have that quality, one just needs to know who they are in Christ, which is revealed by His word, and walk in that role in order to be one.  The contentious woman tares down her home with her hands, but a mother builds her home with her heart.

(Pro 21:19)  It is better to dwell in the wilderness, than with a contentious and an angry woman.
(Pro 27:15)  A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike.

Hence, to be a mother in the Hebrew sense reveals that you don’t take part in strife and division within the family, but rather you search for ways to bring the family together.  You look for, “whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.“(Php 4:8)  Because the beat of your heart is to find that place of peace and your greatest desire is that those you love will be in that place too.  You hate the things the Father hates, as He said,

These six things doth the LORD hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, An heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, A false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren. (Pro 6:16-19)

Why does a mother hate these things?  Because every one of the things on this list causes division amongst family, and a mother is one who is all about unity, all about gathering to fellowship at the table, all about bringing health and wholeness to those she love.  This isn’t merely something she does, this is who she is.  Therefore, she will build, and encourage, strengthen, and inspire, and if necessary correct you if she knows you can do better, or your actions will lead to that which she hates which is disunity, and she will do so in that loving manner that only a mother can.  If the voice of the mother is silenced by taking on the headache of having to compete in the dog eat dog world of the man, and if her function of keeping the family together is not met, then who will meet it?  What will happen to the family?  Without a mother to keep the family together and without a father there to be the strength of a house the only thing we can produce is weak and divided homes, reproducing after themselves.  I want to leave you with these questions to ponder in this post.  As a mother is the life that I am living before my children bringing unity to the family or division?  Am I building my home with the strength of the Father’s Love or tearing it down with the lust of my own desires?  Are the desires of my heart all about me or are they about helping others reach greatness with me?  Just as in giving birth a mother has to know when to push (pray until something happens) and when to breathe (exhale, knowing that only in Yah’s timing will the necessary shift occur).

 

A Message to the Barren Mom

We are all familiar with the stereotypical fairytale view of a stepmom and let’s just say that the depiction of such women have been less than savory and truly needs to have a twenty first century makeover. As one I suppose I take considerable offence, yet I can indeed understand as a stepmom without my own biological children how difficult it could be to care and love children that are not your own. Yet, I also stand as a living example that it can be done and might I add exceptionally so. Marriage under the best of circumstances is not an easy institution to keep afloat but a blended family doesn’t make it easier, but it is doable.   As believers with the love of Yah shed abroad in our hearts we are instructed that we can do all things through Christ.^{Phil. 4:13} Just as it is the Father who takes a solitary soul and places them into a family, the Father also takes one who has not borne children of her own, yet makes her an incredible mother. In most cases biological mothers don’t receive their just due them when it is deserved, so therefore you can imagine the position of the “fill in mom” who comes on the scene especially when there is still a biological mom in the picture. Let’s just say it is not a job that one would willingly take without being led by the Lord.   Thirty eight without children borne from the seed of my husband and incubated in my womb was not the plan, but nonetheless, I am very grateful that despite my own desires I took the plunge in choosing to embrace this role.

While the barren woman is looked upon with shame and pity, and many scriptures share such sentiment I think it behooves us to also be aware of the times and seasons we are living in and make our assertions in light of this fact. For as many scriptures as I can find on the barren woman being cursed, I can find just as many of her being praised in the Lord.

They that were full have hired out themselves for bread; and they that were hungry ceased: so that the barren hath born seven; and she that hath many children is waxed feeble. (1Sa 2:5)

 

He maketh the barren woman to keep house, and to be a joyful mother of children. Praise ye the LORD. (Psa 113:9)

 

Sing, O barren, thou that didst not bear; break forth into singing, and cry aloud, thou that didst not travail with child: for more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married wife, saith the LORD. (Isa 54:1)

 

For, behold, the days are coming, in the which they shall say, Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the paps which never gave suck. (Luk 23:29)

 

For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband. Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. (Gal 4:27-28)

 

I believe these scriptures above would indicate just such sentiment, and indeed as we see the ugliness that is becoming of our world no one can deny that we are living in some questionable days. The days Messiah warned us concerning, where father shall be divided against son, and son against fathers, mother against the daughter, and daughter against the mother.^{Lk 12:53} Realizing this it is in our best interest to keep our eyes on those who are in this world lost rather than be consumed with longing to produce new ones. Please don’t misunderstand if you can have children and you are in the Lord have as many as you can, the kingdom of darkness needs the children of light rather they realize it or not, and the greatest potential of producing children of light will come from those who are of the light producing seed who will do as Abraham did which gave him such favor, raise his household and his children after him.^{Gen. 18:19} This said of him before he even had the son of promise.

This article is written to encourage those mothers who chose to be one to children that you didn’t bear yourself, yet loved as though you did. This woman is not an ordinary woman, she is an extraordinary woman. She makes the sacrifices biological mothers in many cases didn’t, or wouldn’t. She chooses to love children who may not reciprocate her love, and she chooses to be a mother when being the friend would be more convenient. She takes the mantle God has given mothers to nurture their children in the world when their own mothers wouldn’t. Her assertive and disciplined tactics may be misunderstood or not appreciated by those to whom she gives it, but her reward is in heaven and it is from her Father that she seeks it. Hence, in the majority of these scriptures we are called to rejoice, to sing aloud, to be joyful. In spite of the saying, “anyone can have a child but not anyone can raise them”. I am living proof to the fact that this is a lie, not anyone can have a child, and yes anyone who has the love of Yah shed in their hearts can raise them. If you are a selfish person seeking worldly glory then motherhood will not be for you even if you had thirty children, and the evidence of our society proves that. In fact I would say it’s the mother’s who choose to be one in spite of their ability to birth one that proves to be the least selfish person. She chooses to love a child that will have their allegiance with their birth mother no matter what she does. She endures the mocking when she instructs the child towards right when they want to go wrong. She continues to pray and hope for the best for those who don’t hope the best for her. No, indeed, not just any woman could do it, only a woman of God could pull off such a job, and I am here to tell you that you do it well.

I am blessed to know such women in my life and honored that Yah chose me to be one. I would be lying to you if I said I didn’t have my moments of hurt, pain, and disgust, but I no longer believe that Yah has cursed me because I don’t have any children of my own. There are too many women I have been a mother to, to believe that. I’d rather say that it takes a woman like me to appreciate the value of having children to not have one so that others who can will put real value on that which is real rather than that which is not.

Making a home, loving your husband, and raising children to the Glory of Yah is the best job there is. As an African American woman with the history of a people who had their children stripped from their arms and sold like livestock we have had to endure too much to ironically willingly give our children away to the same system that forced them out of our arms to begin with. Yet, I witness so many mothers who take for granted a position they were honored to have to become slave to a system that will never pay them the value their worth. Make no mistake being raised in a system with this sort of thinking at its root is not something that can easily be undone. It requires renewed thinking with clear understanding of your true purpose to keep from giving up and losing heart.

I also realize that biological mothers suffer from the same frustrations on the other end from being burned out both the mother embracing her biblical role as well as the one who doesn’t. Raising children is an overwhelming responsibility when combined and infused with all the other issues of life. Raising children is like taking out a 401K plan you will have to put in years of work before you will see the fruit of your labor. The biological mom who puts in the time is the same as the homeschooling adopted or stepmom who takes up the same torch. Only major difference is the biological mom will more than likely get the praise due her from her seed while the stepmom may have to wait until she is face to face with her Maker to receive hers. However, I am telling you stepmom or adopted mom who has taken up this mantle to raise another’s child in the fear of Yah don’t give up or lose heart. Remember, that you do what you do not for them, though they are the beneficiaries, but you do what you do because of who you belong to.

Rejoice because your heavenly Father is pleased with your act of faith, and in the end you will hear words greater than any pension plan mankind can think up to be accepted by the One who has an eternal position in a place where time doesn’t matter, and it is there that your reward will be waiting for you. Remembering we look not at those things which are seen, but those things which are not seen. ^{2 Cor. 4:18}  You have come too far to give up.

To the mom at heart who never married, yet birthed amazing seed in the Spirit that had been dropped in the natural, know that your labor is not lost in Yah. Your reward if you faint not will not be discarded, and the husband you searched your entire life for has not moved from His throne. We are espoused to Messiah and even if we never have a family (husband /children) biologically in this life we can have a multitude of seed in the Lord. Don’t give up on that, don’t lose heart. Marriage in this life is just our opportunity to practice our love walk with Him anyway. Know that you are in good company for Paul had no wife or kids, Yahushah had no wife or kids, yet they raised more children in the Lord than those who had ten. Yahushah raised up twelve children who went on to multiply into 70.

Choose to be a living testimony, whether or not Yah gives you children of your own or not. Choose to adopt those who have been left behind on this Spiritual journey to greatness and nurture them into a secure understanding of the love that their Father has for them as you have been commissioned. My prayer is that more women who profess Messiah as their Savior will embrace their call to Godly motherhood. They will yearn the praise of their own husbands more than the praise of the world, and at the end of the day her children will call her blessed not just because she gave them physical life, but because she was willing to embrace her Biblical role to speak and train her children in the way of life.

A New Harvest

Yah is doing some amazing things and restructuring my heart and understanding which I believe comes as a package.  We can’t really make room in our heart to love those who have nothing but contempt for us or who do us wrong without getting an understanding.  As we are a week away from Shavuot we must recognize that these days we are commanded to count represent days, represents weeks, represents years.  Yahushah said the fields are already white for harvest, but the laborers are few.  I encourage you to get out there and find your harvest for the field is ever before us and Yah is waiting on us, we are not waiting on Him.

A Chosen People

In this assignment to restore the ancient Hebrew characters to God’s children the journey has brought about new friends in new places. As I consider the diversity of my enlarged family and the beautiful diversity that exists within it, I am reminded of scripture. Scripture does not endorse superior races the concept is an evolutionary term that has been used to divide groups of people based on their cultural, geographical, and external differences. The word “race” as we use it won’t even be found in scripture.   For that matter none of the sons that Noah had which repopulated the earth that we have today would use color as a means of division. What we find are nations, tribes, and tongues. While the differences are inherent the focus is not on external appearances but on differences that are based on geographical location and speech, those things which makes relating to one another difficult. However, the beauty of it all is that God would use the very thing he used to divide us at the Tower of Babel to bring us back into the household of faith in the Upper Room. Today He is doing the same thing in restoring us back to himself he is using that which divided us to bring us back together. I have been blessed to meet family who by the world’s definition have been taught to either be foreigners, strangers, or enemies based on strained or purposely divided histories, but how Yah reached over all the boundaries of past hurts and flawed teachings to make of a divided people a peculiar treasure.

The world teaches through the guise of evolution that there is a Superior race, yet scripture reveals the truth of the situation. It is a worldly philosophy that is the counterfeit to the word of God. So if you have been taught or subscribe to that I pray that this article will set you free. If you have been wounded by others because that mindset has been used to make you feel inferior or less than, then this truth shall also make you free. The bottom line is this, there is no evolutionary chain, no Neanderthal man, cave man, or barbarian these terms are made by man and not scripturally sound nor found. The Children of Israel were a chosen people not a superior people. As many of us are awakening to our Hebraic heritage there are some who may not know or subscribe to any biological ancestry to the tribes of Israel and then there are those who are quite aware who they are and of what tribe they belong. Yet, I want you to know that we ought not to boast if we find our link naturally in one of the tribes, nor should we feel as if we are the forgotten stepchild if we find ourselves in only through being grafted. Because truth be told scripture didn’t make a difference by the blood seed even before Christ walked the earth. The law that was given in Mt. Sinai was for the native born and the stranger who sojourned amongst them.

We shouldn’t boast because God makes it clear that we who are in Israel by biological connection were not chosen because of how great we were, nor were we righteous, but because of a promise that was made to Abraham. ^{Deut. 9} In the New Testament scriptures we see Yahushah making this clear to those who were of natural descent who relied on their relationship with Abraham that though they were naturally Abraham’s seed, their Father was not God, but rather the devil because of the deeds (choices) they made.^{John 8} If nothing else in this article sticks with you let this line stand out above all else, we remain a chosen people so long as we choose Christ. We do not stand with God based on merit, genealogical birthright, nor our ability to keep every single letter of the law. What Yahushah was revealing to them was Torah the New Testament reminder of the Deuteronomy nine lesson that as we come into the awakening of the truth that we remember to remain humble, because indeed we cannot boast against the branches because it is the root that bares us.^{Rom. 11:18} If we keep Torah for any other reason than because we love God then our hearts are not circumcised even if our flesh is. We mustn’t forget the lesson of the young man Yahushah points out who said he kept the commandments from his youth up, yet he still lacked something in being made complete and what he lacked was not the circumcision of the flesh, it was the one of the heart. ^{Matt 19:17-21} He reaped the benefits of keeping the Law, but chose the benefits and rejected the Giver of them when provided the opportunity. Until we identify with the Law Giver then we are lost, we are reaping the benefits of the principles of the covenant but forsaking the Giver of it. Just as the world uses the principles of God in business and reap the wealth, but takes credit for it rather than giving God the glory. They boast in being self made men rather than God blessed men and make the error of Nebuchadnezzar and find themselves pierced with many sorrows. Of course this doesn’t apply to all with wealth because we know that there were many who walked with Yahushah who had money, but money didn’t have them. This is the point, many of us must remember that even if we are biological descendants of the seed of Abraham we have no need to boast because many of us are in exile because of our ancestors disobedience. We indeed come from the same stiffnecked bunch that Moses had to contend with in the wilderness and the purpose of exile and losing our identity in the world was to humble us as sure as Joseph having to go through the pit, slavery, and prison was made to produce the same humility.

In this hour to see the things we do and to have the understanding we have we are indeed blessed, but the most significant question is now what? What are we going to do with it? Are we going to humbly reach out to our brothers and sisters who are lost and try to help them see the light? Or are we going to separate ourselves from them and boast in our knowledge of the truth while point out their ignorance? Are we going to exemplify the same compassion for them that Yah extended to us to bring us out of darkness into the Light of life? Yahushah, the prophet’s of old, the Apostle’s, and Disciples, all suffered greatly for sharing the same information we have been privileged with to share today and though our feelings have been hurt, many of us have not yet resisted unto blood as they have fighting against sin yet many of us if we are not careful will forfeit a lot of the reward that awaits us because of our brothers and sisters resistance to the truth. ^{Heb. 12:4}

                        We know the pattern scripture lays it out for us very clearly we are going to be hated for telling the truth. We are going to be resisted for confronting our brothers and sisters in their sin, but know that we are also going to be judged if we do not warn them as the Prophet Ezekiel taught, and like Jude instructs us many we will save with fear, pulling them out the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.^{Jud 1:23} It’s hard to pull something out of the fire without getting burned, it is impossible to do so without Yahushah being there with us. We have to know that this truth is going to burn people with rage as they are confronted but we are cautioned to let love prevail, recognizing that without him they are lost just as we were. It is our responsibility to show the Law Giver in the Law to those who are without law. Just as it’s the parents responsibility to train their children and not the other way around it is our responsibility to share the truth we know to those who don’t know it.

In conclusion, the restoration that Yah is doing the greatest issues we in North America will have to deal with is the rooted hatred and bigotry that has stained us as a people. We can’t be victims and victorious at the same time, nor can we be murderer’s and enter into the kingdom of Heaven. What we must do is remember the legacy of Joseph who even when he was abused by his brothers when the Father saw fit to join them together he humbly and wisely understood that all that befell him was for the purpose of preserving life and a necessary part of building him into a Servant of Yah. Likewise is that the goal for us to be in the image and likeness of Yahushah who did not count it as robbery to be equal with God, nor had a problem humbling himself as the Son of Joseph to serve His brethren. So I challenge you to walk in love both tough and tender so that we, as His chosen people, might be found faithful in the final analysis.