Sunday, September 27, 2009

The Lord Bless You and Keep You - Aaronic benediction

Hi and shalom!
About 35 to 40 people assembled at the Howard Miller Community Center, Zeeland Michigan, on both last Friday and Saturday to study how the Jewishness of Jesus could transform their life.
The main speaker was David Bivin, noted author of Shedding Light On The Difficult Words of Jesus, and lesser known fact, married to his wife 40 years the last week of September.
"Is there anyone here who would like prayer for anything before we start," adding, "I have my oil here from Jerusalem to anoint you, and we will believe God to prepare all of us to be students over the next 2 days."
Learning that contemporaries of Jesus - Yeshua, went through a process of education in the Torah, between 5 and 15-years-old, some of that group went on to be disciples, aprentase under a Rabbinic, i.e. indentured servants, and serve in that capacity for 2 to 5 years, then either become Rabbinics themselves or return to life before their discipleship program and continue study while running the family business, was quite intriguing.
I thought to myself, We have disciple so narrowly defined in seeming comparison, a follower suggesting a somewhat passive role as compared to an indentured servant, one who is actively going about serving their teacher.

Professor Bivin's work has focused much on the synoptic Gospels and their compared and contrasted accounts of the life and ministry of Jesus. You would best be served to read his original title, or the second, Shedding More Light On The Difficult Words of Jesus edited by Lois Tverberg and Ann Spangler, Zondervan Publishing.
I come away from the workshop encouraged to share with others, not by correcting and or informing, but perhaps be more questioning when the opportunity presents itself and suggest this or that to perhaps stimulate interest in further exploration of Jewish roots of our faith in Yeshua.
As Ms. Tverberg put it during her remarks, "Be a bridge not an island."
One common thread that seemed to exist for all who attended was the notion of how do you share this information with others once returning to your place of residence.
Mr. Bivin quipped, "Learn Hebrew and Greek."
"Buy 1, 2, 3 cases of our books and hand them out."
One other suggested, "Be an influencer for change."
This blog thus our time together, here is designed to be that, an influence for change on perhaps several levels, but the most basic, to encourage us all to keep trusting in our Savior, and know He is still working with you and I, his
indentured servants..
Am glad to be back home, but will recall this opportunity for a long time to come, and share more soon.
His presence be with you today. Write soon please!
Mellow Roc

3 comments:

Trekkie4Ever said...

Glad you are back! And what a wonderful time you must have had. I hope you took a lot of notes or bought the CDs to the class.

Doug Ward said...

I'm glad you had a chance to do this. I went to one of his seminars 8 or 9 years ago and loved it.

suzanneu said...

This is really good advice to be a bridge, not an island.