Light In Torah

    The book of Joshua is not only about our journey, literally fighting with the armor of God for the inheritance, but it's really an incredible book on leadership. One of my favorite books for leadership is Nehemiah. But Joshua—wow. Talk about incredible leadership, let alone stories like King David and the way that he handled situations. Joshua chapter 8, we defeat Ai. We take our past failures, and we utilize them to guarantee victory in the future. We follow the instructions of the Lord. He sets up the enemy, and victory is won. After victory, it's really important to remember: who was it who gave you the victory? Really, a major focus of Deuteronomy chapter 8 is, once you've accomplished something, to remember it was God who did it for you. Yes, you're responsible for doing your part, but God is the one who orchestrates and makes things happen. You know, as the Apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians chapter 3, he says, "I plant the seed, Apollos waters, and God g...

In our last two studies, we drew parallel comparisons between Yeshua, living water, and the Word. We saw that even death—the most profound event that could render someone ceremonially unclean—cannot affect living water or the Word of God. This week, in the Torah portion  Chukat , the prophetess Miriam dies (Num. 20:1). We are now forty years after the children of Israel left Egypt, and an entire generation has died off in the wilderness, leaving the entire community of Israel unclean. At the beginning of this Torah portion, we are introduced to the red heifer—a ritual that specifically deals with counteracting the effects of death within the camp of Israel. And as I mentioned a few studies ago, the red heifer is back in the news. This morning, it is only fitting that we pay tribute to this woman, who is responsible for the entire Torah—God's instructions—that we have today. How, you might ask? If it were not for Miriam, there would have been no Moses. Not only was she responsible f...