Articles
Spiritual Unity and Strength Needed BEFORE Physical Battles
Barbara L. Klika, MSW, Undershepherd, Life Coach
November 2021
Written for Wisconsin Christian Newspaper
Last month, I submitted Part 1 of a teaching on Rocks and Relationships. The Rocks are the Living Stones (Believers metaphor) that Messiah says will praise Him if no one else does. Relationships refer both to between human beings and between our Abba and His children.
You may ask why is this important, given all the turmoil we face in the world today? Is this just an academic exercise in the Word?
Our Messiah directed us to pray that our Father’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven. This is not only a privilege to intercede but our responsibility to do so. What other conduit has He determined but those who look to Him, praying His Word back to Him! We can’t look in the face of evil and still prevail in prayer without that intimate relationship with Messiah. We can’t prevail until we are walking in the unity He desires for us.
I say it is important because the Word says it is so. While it IS true that we are to come to our God ‘just as I am” it is also true that He calls us up, through the sanctification process, to learn to be more like Him….to have an intimate relationship with Him, in which we are known by Him, not just that we claim to know Him. Yeshua commented on this disparity, and quoted the prophet, Isaiah.
Therefore the Lord said: “These people draw near to Me with their mouths and honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me. Their worship of Me is but rules taught by men.
Isaiah 29:13 Berean Study Bible
‘These people honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me. They worship Me in vain; they teach as doctrine the precepts of men.’ ”…
Matthew 15:8 -9 Berean Study Bible
As we continue to see the wickedness being exposed around us, we need to be in such a strong relationship with our Messiah NOW that we can draw on His Strength and His Words, walking in His discernment in unity. Can you imagine a casual friend really standing with you in time of dire need? Our Messiah is NOT a casual friend and He doesn’t want us to be casual about our relationship with Him either. Most especially when we are in battle with ungodly, unseen forces!
But first and most importantly seek (aim at, strive after) His kingdom and His righteousness [His way of doing and being right—the attitude and character of God], and all these things will be given to you also.
Matthew 6:33 AMP
Preparing the Bride involves more in-depth teaching on what it means to be in relationship with Messiah because there is much misinformation or lack of information at all. Part 1 compared the knowledge of the Word (both the written and the Living Word/Messiah) as per the Father’s teachings with the relational aspects of His Kingdom, generally considered the Mother’s Teachings. Solomon warned us not to forget either, and yet we clearly have forgotten the importance of character development, maturity and the relational aspects of Messiah’s Kingdom. I believe this has been largely due to the remaining enmity between men and women that sin brought into the world.
It is our position at SAM that the Father’s Word cannot be interpreted correctly (which we understand to mean that the interpretation correctly confirms YHWH's full good character) without there being a foundation of maturity and character development first. The Holy Spirit, the Ruach of God, speaks to us but too often we haven’t really learned how to listen and correctly apply what we hear, checking it against the written Word as well…thus the multiplicity of denominations!
Part 1 concluded with seeing that Messiah was confronting those who were willing to spend a great deal of time gaining intellectual knowledge about Him and yet were unwilling to humble themselves to come TO Him. Part 2 picks up with some word studies on that difference.
Part 2: Preparing Messiah’s Bride: Rocks and Relationships
The word translated as “search” is from Strong's G2045 - eraunaō -- ἐραυνάω which means “to search, examine into.” The word translated as “willing” is from Strong's G2309 – θέλω thelō, modified by Strong's G3756 - οὐ ou , which makes it a negative, “NOT willing.” The word translated as “come” is from Strong's G2064 - ἔρχομαι erchomai which means literally “to come from one place to another, and used both of persons arriving and of those returning.” Metaphorically, it can mean “to come into being, arise, come forth, show itself…to become known, to come (fall) into or unto” or “to go” or “to follow one.” [1]
Messiah was telling them that they were willing to search out the knowledge they found in the Word, but they were not willing to actually come to Him in the sense of not just physically presenting themselves to Him, but also showing themselves to become known by Him, falling unto Him or following after Him. In this, I see confirmation of the words of Solomon:
My son, hear the instruction of thy father, and forsake not the law of thy mother:
For they shall be an ornament of grace unto thy head, and chains about thy neck.
Proverbs 1:8-9 NKJV
“Instruction” is from Strong's H4148 – מוּסָר muwcar meaning “discipline, chastening, correction.” “Law” is from Strong's H8451 – תּוֹרָה towrah which refers to:
- law, direction, instruction
- instruction, direction (human or divine)
- body of prophetic teaching
- instruction in Messianic age
- body of priestly direction or instruction
- body of legal directives
- law
- law of the burnt offering
- of special law, codes of law
- custom, manner
- the Deuteronomic or Mosaic Law[2]
- instruction, direction (human or divine)
I find this to be a very interesting use of “Torah” as law, as it relates to the mother while the word meaning discipline, chastisement is related to the father’s instructions. How are the two teachings different? Historically, it has been interpreted as meaning that the mother’s teachings are relational and are to come first for the children. Then on the foundation of the character and personal growth the formal study of the Law, the written Torah, is built through the teaching of the father.
Can you see Messiah’s reference to both kinds of knowledge in these words? He compared and contrasted the knowledge gained by searching the written Word with the knowledge gained by actually coming to Him in relationship and allowing oneself to know and be known by Him, in submission to Him, following after Him. He validated both father and mother’s teachings here. Both fatherly and motherly love together form a more complete picture of the love our YHWH has for us than either could alone.
There are several instances of the “motherly’ aspect of our Abba’s character and love for us. In the beginning, the Spirit hovered over the waters, in a sort of motherly picture of a bird hovering over her nest. We see it in the Hebrew title, “El Shaddai” which is often translated as the “All Sufficient One” but can also more literally be understood as “the many breasted one.” Do you see the motherly reference in Messiah’s cry of pain to the Pharisees?
O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!
Matthew 23:37 and nearly word for word Luke 13:34 KJV
I say to you that knowledge of the Word alone is not His plan for us. I say that dealing with maturity and character issues alone is not His plan for us. His call to us is for relationship with Him and with one another in Torah community.
It is all well and good to be a living stone, but it is not His entire plan. It is all well and good to be a living stone in proximity to other stones, but it is not His entire plan. A primary failing throughout the generations of those who follow the Elohim of Israel has been to teach knowledge alone without the undergirding of character, maturity and relational connections.
In American society, we can see the fallacies that erupt through failing to lead with the Word at all, the father’s teaching and the mother’s relational teaching. Concentrating only on self-esteem and character, where that even happens, is still without moorings to hold steady. In the church today, and in the American Messianic or Hebrew Roots movement, we can see the division and strife that occurs when only one leading “rein” has been emphasized, the father’s teaching.
As the two types of teaching are brought together in collaboration, we will begin to see His restoration, the two becoming one in yet another sense and witness.
Through the balanced teaching of both father and mother, we are to be built together in relationship with one another and through Him so that we are strong, efficient and effective in standing as a wall for His Truth in a fallen broken world that is constantly contesting Truth.
End of Part 2
Today, there is encouragement among Bible believers to stand up and fight the wickedness that has come so boldly knocking at our doors. While I do not disagree with this, I also ask if those who are “fighting” in the physical realm, whether it is with words or their presence at political rallies, understand that our battle is not really with the people, the flesh and blood? Many can probably quote the following, but do they know what it really means and act accordingly?
Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. 11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the [b]wiles of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of [c]the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.
Ephesians 6:10-12 NKJV
Before we ever take physical action, our strength and safety comes in yielding ourselves in humility before our God first. We need to come TO Him, not just know OF Him, be fully united in Him! The battle is first won in our own soul and spirit, behind our eyes and between our ears.
A largely unaddressed part of the battle as I see it are the two primary remaining divisions between YHWH’s people:
- the enmity between the Houses of Joseph/Israel and of Judah….Christianity and Rabbinic Judaism
- the division that sin brought in between men and women
There is not room to go into this more fully here, but more will be found on our website, and Yeshua willing, in future editions. While we are still divided in these ways, we lack the full “echad” or being in unity with Messiah, His Father and one another as we need to be to stand firmly against the schemes of darkness.
Truthfully, it is not US going out to fight FOR Him…it is He Who goes before us and fights for us! As someone I know once said, he quickly “runs back behind the rock of Jesus when the battle gets tough.” I remember laughing and saying, “I’ve learned never to come OUT from behind the Rock!”
Having been in the battle “up close and personally” now for 30 years, with those who have been subjected to great wickedness their entire lives, particularly those who come from generational Luciferian families, I would say that strategic awareness of its schemes is a big part of knowing how to stand…when to exercise our authority through the shed blood of Messiah Yeshua, and when we need to acknowledge the higher level unholy powers, and address them accordingly.
May we find the unity we need and not fall to presumptuous sin, taking too much on ourselves in this spiritual battle, but be fully equipped, spiritually first!
Check our website for more information on Preparing Messiah’s Bride! Www.set-apart-ministries.org
[1] Blue Letter Bible. "Peter's First Epistle - 1 Peter 2 - (NKJV - New King James Version)." Blue Letter Bible. 1996-2014. 14 Jun 2014. < http://www.blbclassic.org/Bible.cfm?b=1Pe&c=2&t=NKJV >
[2] Blue Letter Bible. "Dictionary and Word Search for towrah (Strong's 8451)". Blue Letter Bible. 1996-2014. 14 Jun 2014. < http:// www.blbclassic.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?Strongs=H8451&
amp;t=KJV >
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