Mishpatim - Rules for the Road

I've been here from the beginning. Just about 30 years ago.

And I've been teaching this seder Parsha for about that long. It's easy one after hearing Kira present. I feel like I should just get out of the way. She did a great job.

And I told her so when she came forward that I wish more kids were here right now cuz they could hear that cuz I really love it. When are children and young adults can give good teachings. Let you know we're doing something right? Hallelujah. So welcome, this is church. The Messiah.

please pray with me, Lord, thank you for your instruction for your Ability to receive our praise and worship. Thank you for listening to our prayers. Thank you for being with us for not leaving us as orphans. Thank you for your presence. Your guidance, you're leading your protection, your Providence, your peace. Bless us in this short teaching. Ask this in Jesus name. Amen. And amen. Welcome

so anyone remember being a new driver, Yeah. Did your did your parents make? You learn some of the rules of the road before they let you let you go out on the road like what?

Stay in your lane.

Stay in your lane, don't hit the bridge abutment.

if you see flashing lights behind you, Speed up.

Pullover.

If you're on a divided highway and the school bus flashes lights in the opposite lane, do stop or keep going. You know these are some simple things that if we don't know what to do we can cause all kinds of problems.

I remember stopping for a school bus once. and, Flashing lights to bridge here. Looking in my rearview mirror. There's a Ford Galaxie coming in about 50 miles an hour up on my rear end. What do I do? School bus lights are flashing.

I decided I would break the law and try to get out of the way of the Galaxy 2 who was coming down the road. This man was on his way to see his father and a hospital. He been told that he had minutes before. His father would be going on to be with the Lord or into the next life and he wanted to get there in time and he driven 70 Mi. He didn't see me, he didn't see the school bus. He was a block away from the hospital that's all he saw. He totaled my car. And I violated the law, but I didn't die. But I remember that. I remember I'm not supposed to better do it anyway, so God gives us kind of wisdom to do the right thing in the right moment. Even if it doesn't always make sense. But these are some laws. Do we have to buy a bed? Bye-bye in in the state of Ohio and if you're teaching someone to drive, if you want them to be roughly familiar with this book before they go out on the road. And not know what they're doing. Everyone agree. Good. Good. Hallelujah. Where we're at? So, where we're at? Where in Exodus it snow snow surprise to anybody. We have celebrated the first Passover and Passover is coming up so we're supposed to be celebrating the Passover and this whole sequence of history as if we were there. So try to put yourself in the mindset of the Israelites. In the wilderness. I recognized some of the laws are going to be talking about maybe aren't is applicable today as we might think they are, but Kira made a good point. Yes, they are applicable, they're very applicable when you look at them in the Broadview, not in the legalistic point-by-point, exactness.

We've crossed the Red Sea. We seen this incredible Miracle. We're at the Mountain of God. God has given the Ten Commandments to all of us to all of mankind, perhaps with fire. And the fire of his word has touched each of our hearts and said, how are you going to deal with this commandment? And so we've received this right thing teaching by God and he's touched us with his fire and now we're sitting having a meeting with God. And we're going to be given some Commandments before Moses leaves us. To be with God and God apparently he's going to go with Moses. He's not going to be here telling us what to do. Little bit scary and God goes. I better give them some basic rules. Principles of life applications of principles to live by while we're gone.

You remember the first time you took the car out? Was it scary or you excited?

Summer's excited somewhere. Terrified.

And, and you drove on with confidence. I drove on with conference, I didn't stop. No, I think you.

Do what?

It's scary being left behind. It's kind of like the movie Home Alone. It's kind of scary. You got to deal with it. So Moses is about to go up on the cloud. In the end, the end of the cloud and onto the mountain and you can debate. Whether those are the same place or not, they might be, they might not be into the cloud and then onto the mount not going to get into the Nuances of that argument. There was a golden calf, incident, were about to have, and then Moses goes up on the cloud again. 442 up into the cloud and onto the mountain again for 40 days. And then, and then he tells Moses about the contributions in the Tabernacle. That's where we're at. We're in Mich by team. What team is both a partial represented by a pee in the masoretic text and a Seder represents by Sonic in the in the in the masoretic text in the column in the in the margin right near this verse there's a pay or a parish Parsha. And there's a Sonic. So it's both the Parsha and the Seder. We're only doing the Seder which is about this long. And the part is about this long. So the partial you can see is 21y. +, 324 18 and the satyrs 21 1 through 22 23, the same exact starting word for Some of the parshas insajderi men. So it's when I say misbah team, I know I'm teaching the Seder but the same time I'm kind of thinking about all those years I did the whole Parsha and I'm kind of Not in an argument with myself, but it's it's I don't want to go too far. I want to keep it relatively short with agreement with the stator and not get too carried away with the rest of it. So I'll be back in two weeks to finish this Parsha with the third seder of Mesopotamia.

Mizpah team. So this is the whole thing. The Parsha.

With me. I hope it's not too complicated today in the in the in the Seder we're going to only look at the first three things. Now you have to figure out who are these people where God is giving these these applications of principles to former slaves. who had been beaten and personally injured in theirs, in their servant in their servitude in Egypt, who had no property And so what does God think of the three first most important things to teach these former slaves who been beaten and who had no property? What's he think? What's he think you should teach them first? How to treat slaves, how to not hurt people and how to respect property.

Pretty simple will get into the other things later. And then a couple weeks from now, I'll be doing the ratification of the Covenant. Customer support team. Tell me words. We use a semi septennial cycle.

Twice and 7 years. The cycle dates to probably 16th VC when Torah reading was illegal. According to the Greek seleucids punishable by death and the set. The sages probably said, you know what? This week we're supposed to be studying

Creation, but we don't have any Torah. How can we read bereshit? The story of creation and one of the guys might have said, Isaiah talks about the creation. Also what's through the prophets. So this is the idea of maybe how we got this idea of. It's it's it's a good idea to read the prophets so long with the Torah. That's how we got the idea to read a prophetic. Reading that relates to the instructions of God at Sinai. It's pretty cool.

So what's a seven-year cycle? These Cycles are connected by way of tally words or Desiree shevat which is an ancient Jewish hermeneutic principle. You can look at the three sets of ancient Jewish, hermeneutic principles and see that's a very common. When used, if you find a word here, that's neat. Word particular puts an early word in the reading and you find the same word over here in Isaiah, it would be good to read Isaiah along with Exodus That's what that's what that goes around. Shavah means that the tally words cut from the same cloth and the first one is shafaat. Shafaat. It is a verb and a noun means judge and govern and the the related word that the satyrs parshas titled after is Mich pot, misbah team is plural of mishpat Justice or an ordinance. So God has given the ten principles of Life which we call the Ten Commandments. And now he's giving the Israelites some guiding decisions based on these ten principles so the rooted in the Ten Commandments which God has just given. And now he's saying this is how you do it. This is how you make these rulings. These are some example ruling. You're going to be alone. Now, you figure it out.

You're going to be driving the car for the first time. Figure it out. Don't run over three mailboxes.

Nikhar. This is an interesting word if it's printouts, not car. That means to know or respect. Nick car means foreign or different at the same word slightly different vowel. One means to know and respect this one this week being bar in her difference. and sometimes in that readings this week, if you read the word, but This. But this it's the word in the car different from the thing before it, it doesn't mean Foreigner. That's a whole other word. I means different from

it doesn't mean Foreigner, and then people

Is also.

An interesting word but I'll leave it at that Miss fatim. Miss pot. So okay I will apologize, a little bit of this, a little bit of Hebrew instruction. If you see, I am on the beginning of a word, generally it modifies. It's called it modifies the words indicate, instead of the verb, it indicates a place in instrument or a concept two examples. Me to Bar in the desert like David bar. David bar Mead bar is mem the bar. The bar means word. Matter thing need the bar means the place of giving or doing the word matter thing that's kind of complicated, but it's easy. It's the place of the doing of the verb. You might think of it as that's how I think of it. Modifies, I like the M modifies pneumonic. They're kind of helps. You remember it? Mishpat, mishpat, mishpat, emish part is the place or active rendering, right judgment? So misbah team is the place or active rendering, right? Judge Sony ancient world, the ruling law government, all these ideas were centered and one person your Father unit, your grandfather, the head of the tribe would be the shift. Thought he'd be, the judge should be the one. Who tells you, how you should live. David have you ever told your family had a live? Yeah, it's a it's a place where the dad Grandad kind of has to reside, right? Amen. Getting other granddad's in here. Yes, have you ever done this? Yes, we have. We know, we have a responsibility to render. Good judgment, good righteous judgments. We don't judge arbitrarily, we consider things and do them carefully. So in the ancient world, this was rendered usually in one person and in in the case right now miss spot, these are the mizpah team of God. So God is the person who's giving these rules these applicable principles etcetera of living. Who's that person for us? You sure. Is that person for us? Jesus Christ. Is that person for us any question? Good. I like that. Okay, Claude and Mountain. How many days and nights was Moses on the mountain while he went up for 40 days and 40 nights, they came down, there was this golden calf incident and then he went up again for forty days and forty nights. And then some say, that's the last time you went up, he was only there for Eighty Days. But some say, if you read the text, it says he says he goes up the second time and ask her for a repentant. He's, he's asking for forgiveness for the Israelites and then comes down it, goes back up and gets the Ten Commandments are. Some some believe that Moses went up three times, forty days and forty nights each, and that's how I like to read it. You can argue with me on that, I'm fine with that. I don't disagree with the idea that it could be interpreted 80 days instead of 120, but I like this idea. It just kind of works because it's it's the time between Shavuot Pentecost and Yom Kippur. It kind of works out in a calendar and it makes sense that God would do it that way. But if you disagree, it's okay. This is just an idea from reading a text Not just an idea is based on text. So is real needed. Some guidance. God has given them the 10 stated principles of life with applications and rules before being left alone. Moses and God. We're about to leave Israel alone, 14, 40, 80 or 120 days. So you nail Ave gave the former slaves. Some rules regarding how to treat each other and others and Kira did a great job on teaching. This this week, we have 24 mizpah team in the state or out of 53 in the three weeks that we're going to be setting the Parsha. The times were in this year. So this is an interesting year because in the Christian calendar were in Lent, now that might not be meaningful to some of you. I don't know, but many times in my life, I've gone forward. And the the priest is or the or the or the pastor have met. The dust and to dust you from Dustin dust in or made of dust. We're going to be dust. We were dust and we're going to be dust. But we were created out of this so it's a glorious thing, but it's a humbling thing. And it's, it's wonderful to think of that once a year. And so, Many Christians throughout the world, Chris Protestant and Catholic etcetera. Celebrate this Ash Wednesday and we just had Ash Wednesday, this last Wednesday

The pope will not did not officiate this year because of his illness, but he usually officiates that big service in in the Catholic church. But also this year, Where in Ramadan? I know you would normally put Ramadan together with Lent. They're kind of.

Different.

Is Lynn. Christians worldwide have a month of prayer and fasting in Ramadan. Muslims worldwide, have a month of prayer and fasting,

How should we live?

In the Seder. We have some people who are Israelites and we have some people who are other than Israelites. He's talking about. Foreigners know he's talking about other people. Not foreigners different word. Same basic word. Even with differences of belief in our world, belief and practice, we should treat each other with dignity and respect. if they devout Muslim came into the service today, I would try my best to treat them with dignity and respect acknowledging that each of us is created in God's image and in God's likeness

God's image sell them or icon and likeness the moot. Be like God, Jesus said we're to be peacemakers in a world, that knows no. Peace blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called sons of God in the context of what's going on in Israel. And

That whole area. This causes us some tension. But we still have responsibilities to be peacemakers to strive to be peacemakers. But what if peace is impossible.

It is impossible ride until Jesus returns and solve this issue. Thank you for that clarification. What if peace is impossible? It is impossible Rob until Jesus returns.

I remember the disciples asked Jesus Lord, how is it possible that anyone can be saved? You know what they said what he said back? It's impossible. Jesus actually said to the disciples it's impossible. How is it possible possible? And I think there was a. And a break. And then he said, but With God. All things are possible.

But it is impossible. But we're supposed to be peacemakers. It's impossible, but it's possible. Doesn't make any sense. Rob. I know that's just what Jesus said.

Does anyone not have questions?

If you got this down I don't this is this is kind of hard, you know, I've been given the keys to the car and I'm going out for my first time and I hope I don't wreck and I'm going along. Trying not to crash the car. Trying to be a peacemaker in a world that knows, no peace. And that's the job. That's the task of a Christian in the world today in my best. I thought he'd opinion did someone ask a question Lupe? Okay. She's been very nice.

Respond. Your shoe is this person for us. That's all I'm going to say on that sis to duplicate slide.

so,

God and Moses left the Israelites alone.

and gave them some misbah teams applications for living did Jesus leave us any applications for living

No. He did, I have not made a complete list.

If I did all the books in the world nevermind I made a list of 18. I thought 18 is a good number means life and so I thought that's cool I'm going to leave it at 18 and I got I got to add one more so 19 life principles that I've kind of extracted from Jesus teachings. Love one. Another this is an application.

Does it relate to the Ten Commandments? Yes, but it's not one of them. It's, it's an application of the teachings of the Ten Commandments, forgive others. Well, that's not an attempt. It kind of is, at least the application of it judge not, don't judge anybody, God's the judge Jesus is a judge serve others, seek God's kingdom. First, be humble, Not a milk. Toast. If you see someone doing something wrong to someone else, you should try to stop it, but humility is to be humble before God and know what's right and wrong and try to act accordingly, depending on the circumstances, love your enemies. Love your enemies. I don't want to do that. Well, that stuff, he said to do it. Do onto others. Store up. Treasures in Heaven. Not here on Earth, be a peacemaker. Be a peacemaker. 2nd half have faith believes have, be merciful to others. Give generously seek, God's will avoid hypocrisy, don't say something and do something else. Keep Jesus Commandments. The teachings. He gave us, which is continuing to give us

The one that the one that I keep thinking Jesus gave me is love your wife.

Okay, I'm doing that God.

Okay, and I get lots of help.

If I do one thing. Well, I'll do other things as well, be light and salt. Don't lose your Light. Be a light in the world. Be sold to those around you beef seasoning season life, make life, interesting help life be interesting for other people know that God provides. And this is one that I just assistance is so big in my life right now. Pray, sincerely, I'm praying for so many things going on and this congregation and around the world. I can't even count them. There are days when I start to pray and I just go like this.

And he knows. And sometimes words help and sometimes they don't because they're so big. You can't pray them. But the spirit prays for us, the Bible says that pray sincerely. Now, Jesus talks a lot about prayer and I'll one of the places he talks about prayer is the persistent Widow, Parable, the nudnik Widow, who wouldn't leave the unrighteous judge alone. The Widow wanted Justice against her oppressors. The unrighteous judge refused to hear her refuse to judge in her favor, but the Widow wouldn't stop. She kept persisting the judge told himself. I'll give her justice social stop bothering me, that new, Nick Widow. Jesus, that here, what the unjust judge won't God. Do justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night, will he be slow to help them? I tell you, he will quickly give them justice, but when the son of man comes this, will he find faith on the earth? What's that last sentence mean? When the son of man comes, we find faith on the Earth?

When the son of man comes, will anybody be praying?

If you have faith, pray.

Jesus is concerned that we might stop praying.

He don't want us to stop praying.

Always pray and don't lose. Heart is what he was teaching the disciples. So since some people like dramatization, I found some really good pictures. Here's the Widow, begging to the unrighteous judge. He doesn't look like he's very cognizant of what she's praying about. Here, he absolutely doesn't want to hear it. And they sending her off and she's crying. But she chases him and persists after him. Begging him even while she's running after the judge. And here, he just gives up. There are about 12 pictures in the sequence but I only thought I'd give you these for the good sequence from freebibleimages. Org. Nice site. Appoint, judges and officials. So we're in. Miss fatim from the word shafaat judge. To judge, judge. Mizpah team judgment team rulings Mesopotamian appoint judges show team and officials should cream in all your Gates. Now whenever you read this in a in any context really what are the gates of the human body?

Eyes ears, mouth nose. You don't want things coming in that shouldn't be coming in if it tastes bad, don't eat it. If you're saying something bad about someone else, don't say it. That's don't let things go out. That shouldn't go out, don't let things come in, that shouldn't come in, you shouldn't be looking at things, you shouldn't be looking at. You shouldn't be hearing lifting two things. You shouldn't be listening to. You shouldn't be smelling things that you shouldn't be smelling. Well, I remember gas mask training a long time ago. We were told to take off our gas masks. It wasn't good.

I was exposed to things. I didn't want to smell.

Don't do that. If you got the choice. so, Every once in awhile, I feel this compulsion to honor Clint Connor of blessed memory and Martha Campbell who is still living in very much with us. Who love the Amplified Bible.

Martha Campbell one day when I was teaching on the Lord's Prayer said, why don't we say the Lord's Prayer from the real Bible, you know, the Amplified I said, well, we could do that. And every once in awhile, I think I will do that. But anyway, this is from the Amplified Bible Colossians 3:15 and let the peace, which is soul Harmony which comes from Christ, rule or act like an Umpire continually in your hearts, the siding and settling with finality, all questions that arise in your minds and that peaceful state of him acting in your hearts and Minds to which, as members of Christ's one body, you were also called to live and be thankful and appreciative giving praise to God, always.

Christ is like an Umpire. Like a judge like an official in all of your Gates and in your heart. Realize, he's there allow him to help you in your life to guide you and your decisions. Amen. so,

That's misbah team. Jesus has given us. He's giving us some misbah team, some judgments and rulings about how we should live, but he also didn't leave us alone. God and Moses left the Israelites alone. Jesus hasn't left us alone. He says he has not, the father will give you a helper account for an encourager. A mediator to be with you forever. All those are appropriate translation. I will not leave you as orphans, the world will see me, no more because I'm going on. But you will see me even though I'm not here, physically, you'll see me. You'll see me in each other. You'll see me in your actions. You'll see me in your thoughts. You'll see me as a judge and your heart. As a judge in your Gates, you will see me because I live. You also a live, you'll know that I'm in my father. And you and me, and I and you. The helper, the holy spirit, will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that. I've taught you and said to you, let not your hearts be troubled. Neither let them be afraid. We haven't been left alone. We have missed the team and we also have his presence. That's way better than the Israelites had. Some selected principles for living in the world. We live in love one another

That's important, love your enemies. Even those you don't think should be living.

I pray about.

Everyone. in the Mideast crisis and in the other crises because I think God Can Jesus can

Encounter everyone and is encountering many and when he encounters them, I pray that they will and I will receive him and receive his instruction. Even my enemies sometimes especially my enemies judge not don't judge them. Pray. Be humble. Do what you need to do, but do it in total? Humility to the Lord. Pray. Sincerely have faith. Be merciful and be a peacemaker. These are just a few selected principles. For the world, we live in. Any questions or comments?

Saul Good. Lord, we pray that you will guide us and lead us. And how we should live in this crazy world that you've left us in. You have given us principles of life and you've given us your presence, please help us to rely on, not only the principal but also on your presents. And moving forward. We ask this in Jesus name, amen and amen.