"Rekindling the Ambers"

When Yaakov (James) first became a follower of his brother Yehoshua, he found himself vibrating with excited about his newfound faith of the path of The Way. Yaakov became incredibly dedicated to reading Torah. He would find himself among the greatest of joys when in prayer, raising his voice in praise in songs to Elohim (G-d), and he was enthusiastic to share his faith with all who would hear.

Yaakov too found great joy amongst the company fellow faithful walking the path of faith and he was eager to speak of Yehoshua at any and during all times. He found excitement within the many questions in his eagerness to learn. Yaakov had enjoyed a wonderful adventure of discovering Yehoshua's ordained mission. During the very early days of his new and re-born life in faith, his heart was continually filled with superseding joy and spiritual bliss.

After an extended period of time of this most exhilarating experience in the presence of Ha' Moshiach (The Anointed One), Yaakov slowing would find himself in an anti-exuberant decline of his spirit. For some reason, he was no longer flying high at the zenith of the joy of faith any longer. He began to feel the nagging troubles of life again. The weight of everyday life amid the world of man began to creep in disturbing his peace.

The periods of experiencing exhilaration of HaShem (G-d) had begun to become less infrequent. Yaakov was unsure what was bringing about this sudden change. He would attempt to force excitement in evangelism again, but deep within his works seemed hallow. The scriptures were not quite as life giving as had seemed before. Worshipping in song became greatly less fulfilling than it once had been.

Yaakov was not prepared to leave Elohim Avinu (G-d the Father) or turn from his faith but yet was struggling. He went through the motions, reading Torah with an attempted dedication in petitions, yet Yaakov was struggling with why it was seemingly more difficult to experience joy among the path of The Way which was his so easily previously. Why did he not yet enjoy that same pure and genuine devotion which he once had?

‘Am I doing something wrong?’’ He wondered. Yaakov could not seem to come to a reasonable answer. Could it be that perhaps what Yaakov had experienced amid the early days of his awakened faith was due to a hallow excitement which was waning amid having discovered something new? Perhaps the deflation of excitement was purely emotional and not made real within his spirit. Or was the reason of his emotional and spiritual deflation something altogether different.

Perhaps Elohim was leading Yaakov through something for a His divine purpose. A great many of the Faithful may have very similar experiences upon their path of faith. While it remains true, we enjoy at times and in certain seasons of inner joy of great passion before Yehoshua, The Way can at times seem as though the path of faith brings us through many highs and lows amid our spirit. A great many of us might say, “Sometimes I’m doing well, yet other times I’m experience a depression of the thrill in which we discovered The Way.”

For it is true that at times we greatly experience the presence of Elohim Avinu (G-d the Father) and rejoice amid His peace and yet at other times we may also experience great frustration, solemness, dryness of spirit, unsettling disappointment and spiritual apathy; all the while we are unsure as to why. Is this normal and should it be acceptable? Is it permissible that in times of misery, loneliness and emptiness would merely be part of the life of the faithful?

It is that for some faithful, it has been a series of seasons since having had any real and genuine passion before Yehoshua. We must inquire if might better to endeavor to live the life of the faithful in reading scripture more diligently, by being more devout in our petitions or deepen our dedication in witnessing more.

To say that is common for many to experience a “honeymoon stage” early in the exuberance of their faith would seem daunting. in our shadowed distancing it remains true that this is the most opportune time for the when the new among the path of The Way who yet holds the burning ambers of passionate faith before Elohim; this presented opportunity shall make eager the faithful to grow in greater communion with Yehoshua, yearning to further their discovery of the greatness of Yehoshua.

It is also true that amid the trail of life and after a time passes following disheartening disappointments and after going through many highs and lows amid their journey of faith, the faithful come to a dangerous intersection. There, at the crossroad, the dangers of passivity and apathy await lurking for opportunity to spring up the unexpecting faithful. The fire which at was once a raging inferno of devout passion seems distant and estranged. After several attempts to rekindle those once raging fires of passion in order to reproduce a life of exhilaration amid truth of the path, disappointment or disillusionment slowly seeps in.

It is the challenge of many faithful who have settled into a life of meritocracy, spiritual powerlessness with a certain degree of spiritual indifference to shake off the dust of the trail of difficulty and hardship. Sadly, many continue to live this way without the due consideration proffered to Elohim Avinu in acceptance of this less than honest and devoted faith. After all, we proclaim we are people of faith, and our beliefs are just.

In that we are gather among other faithful in church and are seemingly diligent in our actions to lead a righteous life. We must yet come to understand the realization that though while there may be an abundance of scripture learning in our heads, we greatly fail to employee the direction of faith upon The Way, failing to fully engage our faith. That is often that some in error only feel within their misguided hearts that Elohei Chasdi (the G-d of my kindness) is scriptural only when accompanied by great spiritual fervor, the employment of the word “resting” is many times an erroneous attempt to spiritualize and justify a passionless life of passivity and dryness of heart which lacks the thirst-quenching yearning to remain among the presence of Yehoshua at all times.

Multitudes of faithful in their dryness, are left with no alternative than that of living under the drudgery of religious obligation following prescribe ordinances almost as though doing so while sleepwalking. While it is true we too are drawn to feel that the sum total of the abundant life before Elohim Avinu calls us to merely attending the weekly church ritual and offering up our tithes. We come to falsely believe that as for long as we are practicing these two base principles, we fulfill our obligations before Elohei Tseva'ot (The G-d of Hosts).

It is quite the average thing that deep within many of the faithful carry with them an enormous undercurrent of guilt resulting from their distancing of scripture and through their neglect of meaning petitions before Elohei , lacking the commitment of witnessing more or their refrain from whatever their particular list of “supposed to do's” is.

It is far too often that the Pastor whose message they sit before greatly contributes to heaping of guilt upon their concerned souls at each meeting. Yes, it remains that within our hearts we know the truth, yet most of us have been taught the abundant truths of being faithful. The faithful remain united in familiar principles of faith, for example that our sins are forgiven, that we remain children of Elohim, that we are redeemed in faith through obedience to our Master's ordinances, that Yehoshua lives within each of us... it is all about our devoted relationship with our Redeemer and we share that we must love Elohim Ma'uzzi (the G-d of my Strength) and love one another as He loves us.

Why then is it that these powerful and amazing faithful truths do not completely totally transform our lives on an everyday basis? What reason could be acceptable that we find ourselves far too often strayed from the path of The Way not always walking in or experiencing His presence amid the grind of day-to-day life? How is it that many times we that while believe the truth, yet observe ourselves living contrary to what we’ve believed? Scripture shares with us examples of of this purely human fragility.

Paul tells us within Qorinti 'im I/Corinthians 1 12:21. ‘‘And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee: nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you.” The truths in scripture is such as this and grants us common knowledge in which we may all agree of the great importance of the community of the faithful, together.

Yet, it remains to be our tendency to find ourselves expending the majority of our time in isolation, completely independent from one another. Some would presume that this is true even more so within a Virtual Congregation such as Forgiven Temple Ministries.... for they see the body of the Church as out of sight and therefore, out of mind. The body of the church remains always The Faithful. Whether gathered beneath a single roof or scattered beneath many roofs yet one in faith and commitment.

As we are each aware that our transgressions have been forgiven and the wages of our sin forgiven in the sacrifice and resurrection of Yehoshua Ha' Moshiach, and yet due of our unwillingness to closely follow The Way and because of this, some of our choices are ill advised and distant from His path which brings to arise within us the unsettling experience of guilt bringing us to feel as though we are separated or cut off from HaShem. Much of this brought about by our self-determined decisive in separation from the body of the church as a whole.

We, the faithful, understand Yehoshua remains both within us and all about us, yet we continue to often find ourselves feeling estranged and distant from Elohim Avinu {and the church body} as though He were far away or that He must pre-occupied with other things as His attention to us often lost through short sightedness.

For in that we know Yehoshua loves us unconditionally, we at times still feel more connected to Him when we are determined in His ordinances’; and if we’ve been missing the mark {to sin, being less than perfect}, we tend to feel heavy in our own condemnation. Yehoshua declares in Yochanan/John 4:10, “If thou knewest the gift of G-d, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.” and yet there are times when we fall short and in our foolishness are not satisfied in HaShem and in Yehoshua alone. We amid our self-imposed separation endlessly seek for other things to fill and satiate our yearning thirsty hearts.

Most all of us could probably offer examples of this distant yearning as well. How many scriptural truths have we each personally learned with great excitement when at first, we have discovered them, yet now we fall short of the invigoration in experience them; we don’t always walk in them, or we're unsure of the gate of our walk along the path of The Way.

We perhaps at times for the most part fall short of walking in the abundant life we’ve all heard promises of. Now is time for us to mind our gate along the path of "The Way." The truth is in an unfortunate number of times of our lives we struggle to even manifest a shallow, half-hearted, far too passive, and intellectual faith.

We have a tendency during day-to-day life to be more focused on the outward bustling's of the world rather than the inward passions of our faith. We tend to be more familiar with the seen and share a half-eyed view of the unseen. In our natures, at times our love is often cold. Today, seemingly hospitality is rarely understood. True heartfelt godly compassion far too often escapes us. Scriptures such as “fervently love one another from the heart’’ (Petros I/1 Peter. 1:22), or “I long for you all with the affection of our Christ, Jesus’’ (Philippians 1 ; “pray without ceasing’’ (Tasloniqim I/1 Thessalonians 5:17), all among the world of faith seems beyond our grasp, feeling foreign to some degree.

It is often rare for brothers and sisters to stay current with one another on a deeply heartfelt level. We as the faithful do a poor job keeping short accounts. To a great degree, the faithful today tend to appear at meetings once or twice a week and then large distant from one another during the remainder of the week. This comes to illustrate an expression of a weak and neglected faith; a far cry from The Way illustrated by Yehoshua and yet another example of our poor spiritual health both individually and collectively.

A pure desire to proselytize before lost, to aid the widows and coddle the orphans or to visit the with prisoner and to lay our down our lives for the benefit of a dying world are all far too rare among us. We have fall into the trap of thinking we have enough to deal with in our own back yard, let alone reaching out to another. Our daily lives and schedules each day are rife really in attentions of making money, running errands and spending the evenings secluded within our homes; so, we can recover from our exhaustion.

If some form of outreach is going on, many times it is coming from a hearty attitude of obligation that “we should be doing this.” The feelings of “I have to” or “we ought to do this” are far too common motivations rather than reaching the out to the world with a consistent, genuine, compassionate and complete holy love. Participating in outreach merely because we’ve been motivated following a recent message of inspiration yet is very short lived. The latest push or campaign for outreach shall only be temporary. Campaigns do not hold durability.

The latest sermon we’ve heard most usually only motivates us in the short term. Even the greatest words of wisdom soon find their inspiration to be short lived as we once again retreat into the routine of our daily lives; lives which are not centered upon scripture, ordinance and the love of Elohim Avinu. The inspiration we’ve which drive us from a book which has recently been passed around will soon evaporate. So much of our Faith is made up of hearing the truth, agreeing with it, then tucking it away in our back pocket until it fades away.

We somehow have convinced ourselves that we now think we have the reality, as we’ve heard it before. As one begins to speak on a particular topic or read a scripture that we’re already familiar with inside our hearts, we very quickly say “I’ve heard this before, I know this and I’ve got this already.”

We sadly and mistakenly believe we subscribed to this reality as we have agreed with this misguided idea years ago. To a large degree, we’ve become sermon samplers. That is to say, the pinnacle of our spiritual gate is the Sunday meeting where we seemingly remaining faithful to the reading of the Word and though we hear an inspiring message we yet then simply return home again to our busy of the flesh. The definition of a good Pastor has been understood as someone who is talented enough in oration abilities to hold our interest, entertaining and stimulating us for a 60-minute session each week. We must take head to understand the body of our church requires consistency dieting on inspiration with an appreciative fullness of those in whom we trust to Sheppard us.

Many faithful remain caught up in an endless cycle of total and utter dependency on the “meeting high.” In that we remain desperate for validation and affirmation, the ungrounded faithful travel from one meeting to the next in order to either “feel something” or just hear a “word” of encouragement from Yehoshua for our lives. All the while, the faint in faith neglect and forget to apply the words that Yehoshua has already spoken within scripture.

So many of the so called “words from our Lord” which are delivered to faithful are become merely the words of men which contain empty promises. Among the larger gatherings which are now showcased with powerful and overwhelming music with a rousing feel good sermon and which has become the venues of a man centered gospel.

There for some remains an addiction to these things which then become dangerous distractions. In great frequency we have become ‘‘…. henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive;’’ (Ephsi'im/Ephesians 4:14). In the absence of a belief system other than the intellectualized on we hold within our heads and minding a set of “faithful rules” to govern our behavior, it is true that much of the time we are indistinguishable from unbelievers.

Scripture provides us a different illustration of what the faithful's life is to be like. Amid the New Testament is offered an account of a people whose lives were which were completely totally transformed through faith. These people were betrayed, considered radical, found to be able to access the supernatural and full of power. They shared life together because they wanted to (Acts of the Apostles 2:1, 42, 46). They gave up all their possessions for one another (Acts of the Apostles 2:45). There were surprisingly frequent miracles performed among them, with many being added to their number (Acts of the Apostles19:11, 2:47, 16:5).

The witnessing faithful traveled over land and sea simply to seek fellowship (Qorinti'im I/1 Corinthians 16:6, Romi'im/Romans 15:23, Acts of the Apostles10:32). The devoutly faithful remained intent on maintaining unity. They loved the truths of Yehoshua and exerted extensive amounts of time working through difficulties (Acts of the Apostles 15, Qorinti'im I/1 Corinthians 1:10, Acts of the Apostles 13:42-44, 17:32).

There remained a fervent love and affection for one another and a tenacious, passionate love for Elohim Avinu (G-d the Father) (Qorinti'im II/2 Corinthians 6:11, Petros I/1 Peter 4:8, Acts of the Apostles 13:52). In short, their lives rattled consciousness of the world. So, what happened to us? How did we become so unsettlingly passive? Had we lost something along the way? Had we forgotten something? Had something changed? How have we today become so different from those who stood up the path of Yehoshua in His time?

If we were to examine the current state of the faithful from a worldwide perspective, we would see we are not far too different today as we might have been before as a whole. If you look at the practice of Christianity from a global perspective, many of the characteristics of the early Christians yet still remain. Moreover, in the Western and the more modernized and social societies, we are not nearly like the early faithful of scripture.

In the more civilized and developed nations such as the United States, our hearts tend to be more “closed off” as we find ourselves so incredibly focused on our personal lives rather than on "The Body." We have a tendency to be stifled both inside and out. We are seemingly much more emotionally held back, greatly 'domesticated' in intellectual pursuits, exceedingly distracted and led too easily by the flock, rather than by the Sheppard.

We are far more financially secure, high-minded and greatly educated. We are “ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth” (Timotios II/2 Timothy 3:7). We know our scripture greater than we know our Savior (Yochanan/John 5:39, 40). We are more enthralled in going to church more than we love our brethren and BEING the Church. (Qorinti'im I/1 Corinthians 11:17)

Amid the present culture there is a vast and widespread disfunction among Elohim's people. This may largely be attributed to the fact that we have become less skilled in the spiritual disciplines of the inner man, the workings of the inner heart and we fail to see and walk correctly among this unseen and now unfamiliar realm. Within the world of man today, we hold a graven tendency to intellectualize our faith. The great and disheartening truth is that we think an intellectual belief is sufficient to please Elohim.

We no longer seem to live a "felt sense" of our Faith and so we walk in cataract faith. We often think that just because we agree with the concepts and precepts that we now believe. This is not always so. Romi'im/Romans 10:10 tells us that “For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”

Yet we often hear people say, “What do you mean exactly by my heart?” Or people will say, “I believe it in concept, but that’s about as far as it goes…” The scriptures tell us, “Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it flow the issues of life.”- (Mishlei/Proverbs 4:23) Within our general lack of understanding of the spiritual mechanisms and inner workings of the heart, this is foreign territory for many, therefore creating great issues of separation from one another and the presence of Yehoshua.

Now is the time to rebegin anew! We must begin with asking ourselves some highly important questions: How satisfied are we in our petitions? Are we indeed filled with Rauch Ha' Kodesh (Holy Spirit, the very breath of Elohim Himself) and we filled with the power of Elohim or are we comfortably distant from any devoted time with Elohim alone? We must begin to realize that the daily battle of life is won amid dwelling within peaceful the quiet, unadorned, muddy trench of time alone with Elohim and Yehoshua.

When it is that we may be still, when we are empty and devoid of the concerns of the world of the flesh, when there is no outside stimulation, when the busyness has come to a quieted calm and when the distractions have ceased; when the show is over and when the pain of loneliness encompasses us; this is exactly when we truly get to see what we really have with Elohim.

How much do we really know our Redeemer Himself? So much of our Faithful activity has become a replacement. It has become a replacement for the reality. We have chosen other activities to become a substitute for a contented heart that is satisfied with a rich inner life and simple devotion to our Rock and our Redeemer. We have a variety of addictions other than an addiction to Faith.

Do not allow this understanding to condemn us, dishearten us or cause us to resign in hopelessness. Moreover, in facing the truth remains the first step in true and lasting spiritual growing. It is absolutely critical that we have good quality Kingdom fruit, that the fruit which remains is true. We all may have less fruit than we believe. This is all a reality from which we cannot escape. For in the time of the return of our Redeemer, He desires to reap abundantly from what He has sown in us.

There yet remains a true hope. In that there is still time, we may begin to cultivate a much rich inner life of depth and real experience of Yehoshua which leads to lasting and consistent fruit in our lives. We’ve been given such a wonderful a lasting salvation, we have been completely set free, and we are completely renewed and cleansed by the sacrifice of Yehoshua, we are complete in Him and we have been given above all, more than we could ever ask or request.

For we are not locked into a prison of living only as mere men (Qorinti'im I/1 Corinthians 3:3). The inner life of the faithful remains critical. Everything we do outwardly comes is first born within. Yehoshua stated “a tree is known by its fruit.”- (Matityahu/Matthew 12:33) The quality and abundance of fruit which a tree bears, is a result of the quality of the inner life of the tree. People are the same. The fruit we bear for Elohim is a result of the life we have within. The things we say or don’t say, the manner in which we respond to life’s situations and the way we treat other people all come from the inner life, all is first born within. We must remain ever mindful of this undeniable truth.

So, how do we dedicate ourselves knowing the loving depths of Ben Elohim? What does it truly mean to believe and how do we actually remain faithful to ourselves as an example before others? How do we trust? How do we obtain the reality of Faithful truth in order that our lives are completely filled with His power instead of merely intellectual concepts?

The purpose of scripture is to explain, to instruct with hopefully simplicity, these remain the concrete foundations of the faithful's experience. Moreover, these truths of scripture stand firm to help the reader develop a skill set through which they are able to experience and walk within the spiritual realities of the Kingdom of Elohim. Scripture is intended to be a practical guide for the feasting of spirituality, to reveal the unseen and for the subjective. Let us then now go forward into the incredible journey of our Faith and of Elohim so that we, together, as the Body of the Church, may rise to great and wonderous spiritual heights together in Faith and favor!

In faith, be His love and light, knowing you are loved and filled with His Grace,

Pastor Mark