Dear Friends,
Shalom!
Shabbat Shalom!
I wanted to send you last week’s teaching, a few thoughts on today, Lag B’Omer, plus a new piece of music I have uploaded. I hope you enjoy them!
We, some friends and I, were supposed to go to Israel last week but our flights got cancelled and we couldn’t go. Then I got sick. Out of those two circumstances the LORD was able to move Himself into some intimate places in my heart. I got stuck in bed for two days, which is always a great thing in the LORD! Such a blessing to “need” to spend “all” my time with Him alone, and not be interested or very capable to doing anything else. How He blesses me when that happens (rarely!) And how much better I feel afterwards! Truly refreshed.
The music comes from that.
I pray you will enjoy all!
Much love from me to you, ba Shem Yeshua!
WD
Last Week’s Teaching
Musical Offering
Lag B’Omer
Today is a minor Jewish festival called “Lag B’Omer.”
It is NOT a Biblical festival, nor does it commemorate a victory, so why are we celebrating it???
Let’s start with the name:
Lag is made up of two Hebrew letters:
Lamed and Gimel.
Lamed has the numerical equivalent of 30.
Gimel has the numerical equivalent of 3.
Together they equal 33.
Lag b’Omer is the 33rd day of counting the Omer.
We are more than half-way through this beautiful Biblical holiday of Counting the Omer (Lev 23:15-16). What a wonderful moment to stop and “smell the roses,” to celebrate God! Realizing how far we have come in thinking about His Glorious Self and how many days we have ahead to glorify Him! What a wonderful breath of time, just imagining how it culminates, year after year, on Pentecost/Shavuot. As we surrender our attempt to know Him we experience Him both revealing Himself and giving us His Spirit at PENTECOST/SHAVUOT. What an experience of bliss we have in this sweet, sweet surrender!!!
BUT … that is not what Israel experiences. No! Why? Let me give a bit of the backstory, starting with the glorious number 33 and making my way down to the corrupt.
Lamed (30) means to teach or to learn (depending upon the form of the verb used)
Gimel (3) means to run after somebody to bless them, to help them (merciful love).
Lamed is also 3×10, Gimel x Yud.
Yud is the spark of God’s eternity touching earth.
Gimel x Yud describes God running after us to give us a spark of His eternity.
YUD or TEN IS ALSO the number of people required for a “minyan,” the smallest number of men required for a congregation. Why? Because if Sodom and Gomorah had had ten righteous men it would have been spared.
And 33 is also the love of love. (3 of 3, Gimel of Gimel).
Yeshua was probably 33 when He was crucified and resurrected.
He was the Love of Love personified.
So … let’s put LAG together, with its full meaning.
Through Christ’s love of love, we chase after people, lovingly teaching them about eternity with God so they can function righteously in God’s Spirit with collective governmental spiritual authority.
And that’s today! Praise God.
But in Israel …. ooooooo …
Why is this day so pagan?
People have various beliefs about how this holiday began:
•It started with a temporary victory Bar Kochba had in his revolt against Rome.
•It is the day his revolt began.
•It is the day, in Rabbi Akiva’s Yeshiva, or school, when a plague that had overtaken the student body stopped, and the students got well. Rabbi Akiva was a student of Bar Kochba.
What’s so important about Bar Kochba?
Many, many people considered Bar Kochba to be the Messiah. When Yeshua didn’t defeat the Romans militarily, people looked elsewhere. They knew through various prophecies that it was the time for him to come. (I do not know much about those prophecies. Sorry.) And Bar Kochba was a violent and powerful military leader, who defeated Rome for a season, so they chose him. But after four years Rome completely and utterly defeated Israel, killing or expelling almost all the Jewish people, and renaming Jerusalem Syrian Palestina, which was its name until 1948. (The war was between 132 and 136 AD.)
The Jewish people still consider Bar Kochba to be a hero. In spite of his failure, they look to him as a type of the Messiah … not the Messiah, but an encouragement along the journey.
So what are they celebrating on Lag b’Omer?
A false messiah.
A false victory.
Tragedy.
The expulsion of the Jews from Israel for almost 2000 years.
The end of the Temple, Temple worship, and the creation of the state of Palestine.
Thus, we have so many horrible pagan rites that are performed on Lag b’Omer.
Do most Jews realize what they are celebrating?
Of course not!
So this is a great day to pray for the salvation of the Jewish people and the creation of God’s Israel.
Dear LORD, may this season be the season when the correct meaning of Lag b’Omer comes true! May all other forms of worship and all other interpretations become silent as people come to know Who You Are, who they are, and what our relationship with You is supposed to be … a blessing of a blessing, a love of a love, mercy of mercy, as you come running after us to give us Your Eternal Goodness and Peace, so we can walk AND RUN with you around the world learning and teaching the world about the beauty of their Creator. Shalom! Shalom! Amen to all.
WD
FREEDOM 
Leave a comment