Rabbi Larry's Corner
The Lord is My Shepherd Do you have a hard time believing God really loves you?
Let me assure you, He does!In the Word of God it says He loves you but people really can't grasp that.
Now I realize there are some people who have grown up in a home where their father or mother showed them little or no love. Such people wonder how anyone could love them, let alone God who they can't touch or see.
Friends, one reason people doubt God's love is guilt and self doubt. They feel so guilty they just can’t believe that God in all His awesome grandeur could possibly love them. Instead they think, "how could He take the time to think about someone as insignificant as I am?" Oh beloved do you think like that? Or maybe you reason that God is too busy to care about you or to be concerned about "someone like you?"
People give these sorts of answers because they believe they are beyond loving, beyond God's love.
But you know, one thing they cannot give is any biblical reasons why God might not love them just as they are!
Dear friends, I have heard these kinds of doubts over the years in my walk with the Lord. People who think this way go through their lives missing out on the awesome experience available to them through an intimate personal relationship with God. Its sad. Ones relationship with God is the most important thing in our lives! Yet so many people miss out because of guilt and doubt. They go through their lives missing out on a joyous life filled with confidence and security, not realizing they could have such a relationship with Him.
Friends listen, to believe with all of your heart that God loves you no matter what is absolutely an awesome attitude to develop! It is a great gift from God and it is available to you. You too can know that He truly loves you. Yet as long as people come up with specific reasons why they don't believe it they will go through their whole life having missed the most awesome experience in life. They never realize that there is a wonderful, intimate relationship that they could have had with God himself.
Friends this awesome relationship with God is only available through His son, the Lord Yeshua Baruch HaSHem (Praise God)!
Oh dear friends, its such a joy to know that He loves you unconditionally, no matter what! Knowing that His love never changes.
When you accept the Lord Yeshua into your life and walk in obedience to Him the blessings flow.
But understand too my friends that when we walk away from Him, when we stray, it's not that His love ceases, that never happens. However when we turn away from Him our capacity to receive His love and to enjoy His blessings and His presence in our lives is missing and we feel His absence.
You see, we determine how blessed we want to be. Its up to us. We decide how willingly obedient to Him we will be. And we can always return to Him in repentance.
Now, I want to deal with a passage of scripture that most of you have probably heard many times. Many of you have probably memorized it. Indeed, this may be the most quoted passage in the entire Bible! I'm speaking of the 23rd Psalm.
Friends, everything rests on the very first verse: "The LORD is my Shepherd."
As we read on verse two tells us that "He makes me lie down in green pastures." These are not weeds! These are fertile fields, pastures of His blessings.
Next we read: "He leads me beside still waters." Again, these waters are not a raging tsunami but calm, still waters of peace and joy.
Now we understand, back in verse one we read, "I shall not want." In other words I will not lack anything because He is my Shepherd and He is leading me! What a glorious promise that is!
Then in verse three we are assured that "He restores my inner person." This means a sound mind without confusion and doubts. Oh how we need this today! Then in verse four he continues, assuring us that "Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil for you are with me."
What an awesome feeling to know that the creator of everything is protecting us as we go through our lives! Even in the valley of the shadow of death. Praise God!
The Psalm goes on to tell us that in with faith in Him "I will fear no evil for you are with me." Again dear friends, what an awesome promise that is!
The Psalmist goes on to praise God that "My cup runeth over." This will happen for you when you become of one mind with Him: you will suffer no lack, you will have no fear, no doubts. Why? Because you will know that GOD is with you!
And then in verse six we read that equipped with this assurance "Goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life." Just try and imagine this friends, goodness and mercy that we do not deserve is our in Yeshua if we will accept it!
All this will be yours!
But only when you accept Yeshua into your heart and develop that intimate personal relationship with God that He is offering to you. When you do this "you will dwell in the house of the Lord forever." What a glorious promise!
Now listen, there are 55 Hebrew words in the 23rd Psalm and 115 English words. When David states that the "Lord is my Shepherd" this verse represents the Hebrew name of God consisting of the four letters: Yud-Heh-Vav-Heh! This most holy of names is sometimes rendered in English as Jehovah or Yahweh but usually its written as LORD or God.
So in the 23rd Psalm we start out affirming that God Jehovah is my Shepherd. If you start with that you have to ask yourself this question: Who is this Jehovah God who is my Shepherd?
This God is the all sufficient, the eternal-everlasting-omnipresent-omnificent God who is loving kindness and graciousness and who is always good to us! So when we say "the LORD is my Shepherd" just look who we are talking about!
And yet there are some people who think, "How can He be all of that?" Remember friends, He is God! There is none like Him! Who can truly understand such a Being!
Thank God we have the Torah and the rest of the holy scriptures to shine the light of truth on our paths. The scriptures help us in so many ways.
When we think about our lives today, about how to live for God fully and joyously, we naturally turn to the Tanakh (or "Old Testament") and to the books of the B'rit Hadashah or New Testament. The B'rit Hadashah often helps us to better understand the things written in the Tanakh.
Continuing our discussion of the Lord as our Shepherd, I'd would like us to now consider the 10th chapter of the Gospel of John.
In this chapter Yeshua is clarifying some things for his listeners at that time. He uses this example of the Shepherd and the sheep.
At John 10:1-3 Yeshua talks about a person who doesn't enter the sheep pen through the door but climbs in some other way. Yeshua says such a person is a thief and a robber because "...he who goes through the gate is the sheep's own Shepherd" but this person goes in some other way.
This is important to understand! Y'shua is the one the gate-keeper admits, the sheep will hear his voice. Why? Because "He calls His own sheep each one by name and leads them out." In verse seven of John 10 Yeshua said to his students, "Yes indeed! I tell you that I am the gate for the sheep." In verse eight he explains that "All those who have come before me have been thieves and robbers" but the sheep didn't listen to them. "I am the door if some one enters through me he will be safe and will go in and out and find pasture." This is pasture David talked about! Yeshua will guide us there!
In verse 10 Yeshua continues, saying "The thief comes only in order to steal, kill and destroy." But not Yeshua! He assures us that "I have come so that they may have life, life in abundance."
You understand? The thief is the devil.
Then in verse 11 he assures us that "I am the good Sheppard, the good Sheppard lays down his life for the Sheep." As he did for us on the stake.
Then in verse 12 Yeshua goes on to explain that when the hired hand, since he isn't the Shepherd and the sheep aren't his own, sees the wolf coming he abandons them and runs away! Without a shepherd the wolf drags the sheep off and they scatter.
Who we have as our shepherd matters! So in verse 13 Yeshua continues his analogy saying "The hired worker behaves like this because that's all he is, is a hired worker." It doesn’t matter to him what happens to the sheep!
But it matters to Yeshua! Yeshua promises us in verse 14 that "I am the good Sheppard" and "I know my own and my own know me."
This is the connection with the 23rd Psalm. Yeshua is our good Shepherd who leads us beside the still waters and into those green pastures. Friends listen to me, when we think about this we can't help but consider what an awesome love God has for you and for me! Just consider how He protects us and watches over us during the day and as we sleep at night, just like a loving Shepherd does with his sheep. This is what we mean when we talk about our relationship with the Almighty God!
With this great love in mind when we look back in the 23rd Psalm we see Yeshua as our personal Shepherd. As my Shepherd. As your Shepherd. Oh how he loves you and wants to be such a relationship you with all the time!
I'm so glad David didn't say "the Lord is a Shepherd." No, David said "the Lord is my Shepherd!" "I shall not want!" That makes him very, very personal as we just read in John 10:4. "My sheep hear my voice. I know them and they follow me," He says. "I'm known by my sheep and I know my sheep!" Friends every single child of God is one of His "sheep." We are each known by the Father personally, individually.
I have to say this to you and you may take it the wrong way, but you cannot say "the Lord is my Shepherd" and deny that Yeshua is the son of God. There are those who don't believe in Yeshua the son but only believe in the Father God. But friends, the true faith comes only in the belief of both the Father and the Son.
Yeshua tells us that every single child of God is a "sheep" and that each "sheep" is known by the Father and known by the Son, the Good Shepherd, our Lord Yeshua. As Christians we have that personal relationship the Good Shepherd and certainly he wants his sheep to know Him. His responsibility as Shepherd is to lead the "sheep" to the right place at the right time. This is why King David says "The Lord is my Shepherd" and why in the Gospel of John Yeshua makes it clear who he is.
As Yeshua was talking to his listeners He went on to say (in John 10:27-30) "My sheep hear my voice, I recognize them, they follow me." We must follow where he leads.
And here's another wonderful promise from the Lord in verse 28 where Yeshua says "I give them eternal life, they will absolutely never be destroyed, and no one will snatch them from my hands." Do you trust that promise friends? You should.
Back in verse 25 Yeshua says "I have already told you, and you don't trust me." Is that you my friend? Are you like the person Lord Yeshua describes in verse 26? "The reason you do not trust is that you are not included among my sheep." Is this you? Are you one of his "sheep?" Really think about this friends! Are you a "sheep" or a "goat"? Yeshua warns in His word that "You are either with me or against me."
Now, in verse 29 the scripture reads "My Father, who gave them to me is greater than all; and no one can snatch them from the Fathers hand." But we have to be in this Father's hand! Are you?
Finally in verse 30 he says "I and the Father are one" (Baruch HaSHem: Praise God). The Father gave us to the Son and the scripture states that we will never be destroyed and that no one can take us from Him. HaSHem our God gave us to Yeshua His Son and as the scripture says, HaSHem is greater than all!
So when where talking about the love of the Good Shepherd we are talking about the love of HaSHem our God and that of our Lord Yeshua. Remember friends, verse 30 quotes Yeshua as saying "I and the Father are one."
As I mentioned earlier, there are those who believe in God but don't believe in the Lord Yeshua but you just can't say I believe in God but not in His Son! Again as Yeshua clearly says in John 10:30 "I and the Father are one." To say you believe in the Father but not in the Son you would have to deny God's Word! You would have to say God's Word is not true. If you did that, the only thing you would have left would be your word against the Word of the eternal Son of God who laid down His life and shed His precious blood for your sins and for mine.
I want to make this point very clear. You really need to understand this if nothing else. Only those who have trusted and put there faith in the Lord Yeshua and who have accepted him as their personal savior can truly say "The LORD is my Shepherd." Why? Because the scripture says that the Shepherd gives his life for his sheep and that's exactly what Yeshua has done for you and for me. He went to the cross/stake and laid down his life for us to have eternal life and to receive the blessing of Abraham while still on the earth. Oh my friend, you simply must accept Yeshua as Lord and savior of your life.
We are living in the End Times my friends. The Lord is coming back for his "sheep" real soon so if you have not accepted him into your life please don't wait a moment longer. You don't want to face what's coming with God in your life! Believe me on this. I'll get into that subject in another sermon, but friends, I tell you that sheep are dumb by nature! To understand what it means to know God personally through His Son Yeshua, the true gate-keeper, you are going to have to get in His Word the Bible. You are going to have to spiritually educate yourself and renew your mind in Him so that you can tear down the strongholds that are holding you back. Maybe you need freedom from all your wrong education, maybe you've dabbled in too many other religions, strongholds come in so many different ways and a lot of you probably don't even realize you've got them! I'll be sharing a sermon soon called "The casting down of strongholds" that you wont want to miss.
Friends you have to get a hold of this truth and understand it by reading your Bible daily so you can truly come to know that the Lord is the one true Shepherd. He's the one who opens the door, and he's the one your going to find in the scriptures of the Tanakh as well as the B'rit Hadashah. Lord Yeshua was first foretold in Genesis 3:15. He is talked about in the book of Colossians, specifically at Col 1:17 where it say "He existed before all things" and "He holds all things together." Yeshua has something to teach us in every single verse in the Bible.
What an awesome God we serve! If you are saying "I just can't accept this Yeshua" well friend, you just can't have it that way because you can't have the Father without the Son. Think about this, you're coming to the Holy Righteous God who loves you and you say to Him "I love you, but I can't accept that Yeshua is your Son. You are telling Almighty God "I cannot accept your Son who was sacrificed for my sins, I just can't accept Him." Dear friend that way of thinking just doesn't make sense! It's spiritual ignorance on the part of people who think that they could deny the one and only begotten Son of God, Yeshua who is the Good Sheppard. Read John 10:30 again, "If you've seen me you've seen the Father, I and the Father are one." To deny this you would have to deny so much scripture.
Can you now see that Lord Yeshua is the Good Shepherd of every single person who allows him to be? Understand that Yeshua is the Good Shepherd of all those who accept him as the one true Son of the living God. Yeshua is there for each and ever person who accepts the reality of his death at Cavalry and for everyone who places faith in him as the holy lamb of God who abolished all our sins so that we can have a personal relationship with the Almighty God! Lord Yeshua did it all! We have only to accept it.
I’ve talked with many people who deny the Lord Yeshua. They try to tell me about God but it is clear that they are in spiritual ignorance. Many of these people have discovered some spiritual crumbs, yes they know of God however they do not have a personal relationship with Him! Friends to really know God we must have an intimate relationship with Him! Then the Ruach Hakodesh (or Holy Spirit) can bring us the wisdom of HaSHem we crave.
As we come to the end to this sermon just remember that it is Yeshua alone who is offering you the possibility you to develop a personal intimate relationship with HaSHem. Through Yeshua you will be able to walk in a loving wonderful relationship with the Father and Son and the Holy Spirit. Yeshua, the Good Shepherd, only wants what's best for His "sheep" -- for You!
As we close friends, just remember what Philippians 4:19 says "Moreover my God will fill every need of yours according to His glorious wealth, in union with the Messiah Yeshua." Remember friends to renew your mind on a daily basis with the Lord's Word so that your heart might become enriched through the love of Yeshua, God, and the Ruach Hakodesh.
If you have any comments or questions about these topics you are sincerely invited to contact Rabbi Larry by e-mail or through his blog.
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More to Come!
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