Shabbat shalom kol beit Yisra'el and Mishpachah. May the grace of our Master Yah'shua the Messiah (Jesus Christ) be upon us all on yet another swealteringly hot day!

For many of you our outdoor temperatures in the shade of 35°C may seem mild (though a friend in Thailand says it is only 30°C there!) but you have to remember that this kind of heat is not usual for us, we don't have air conditioning and very few people have electric fans. Sometimes it is necessary to take to the cellar to get a little cooler! So this has been quite challenging for us here in the sub-arctic though I have to admit that as a son of the tropical Far East - of Singapore and Malaysia, to be exact - I am actually starting to get used to this weather. And one good thing that is coming out of this heatwave is that heating bills are zero and fuel bills for mowing our extensive lawns are are virtually zero too! Whether we have a lawn next year or not remains to be seen, though, as everything around us is crispy brown. I guess my point is that there is always a positive side to difficult or challenging times: the family economy has had a reprieve.

At the last Rosh Chodesh assembly I quoted that famous and best loved promise of Yahweh in the Book of Isaiah that gives reassurance to those who are tired and worn out:

"They that wait on (gavah) Yahweh shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint" (Is.40:31, KJV).

I'd like to begin today by looking into Yahweh's condition for renewal, namely, to "wait on Yahweh". And whilst the Hebrew word gavah doesn't mean serve - or run around keeping as busy as possible, as some are inclinded to view it - neither does it mean to be idle. The sense of gavah is to 'actively look for' as we can see from an early Bible passage in Genesis where it used in the context of the patriarchal blessing of Dan, the son of Jacob:

"Dan will provide justice for his people as one of the tribes of Israel. Dan will be a serpent by the roadside, a viper along the path, that bites the horse's heels so that its rider tumbles backward. I look for (gavah) your deliverance, O Yahweh" (Gen.49:16-18, NIV).

The NIV here correctly translates gavah as "look for". Those of you familiar with the KJV will know that this blessing concludes this way:

"I have waited (gavah) for Thy salvation, O Yahweh" (Gen.49:18, KJV).

Both of these translations are correct for we are to wait on Yahweh but that waiting is not just to be passive but active - to wait, in this sense, means to actively look or seek at the same time.

To make the point, we find the same verb used with the third day of the creation, when Elohim (God) said:

"Let the mayim (waters) under the heaven be gathered together (gavah) in one place" (Gen.1:9, KJV).

That's to say, the all-pervasive waters of the original creation, divided on the second day of creation, are now told to wait patiently, as it were, while Yahweh formed the geosphere, the biosphere, and the astrosphere, before dealing again with the waters.

But perhaps the clearest insight into this 'active waiting' is to be found in its use in the picture of Messiah foreshadowed in the 40th Psalm:

"I waited (gavah) patiently for Yahweh; He turned to me and heard my cry" (Ps.40:1, NIV).

This 'waiting' on Yahweh is not only 'waiting' in the conventional sense - it's not only actively looking for Yahweh in prayer, meditation, Scripture study and in our personal circumstances - but there is also the sense of "gathering together" as Yahweh gathered together the waters on the third day of creation preparatory to releasing them. What kind of 'gathering together', do you suppose, we should be doing prior to Yahweh's 'release'?

Every single one of us who is a true believer is "waiting on Yahweh" for something, from the little to the large, from healing, to restoration of broken relationships, to new directions in life generally. Some will wait, some will not. In waiting, we are engaging in an incredible spiritual operation! We are participating in something far greater or larger than ourselves! When we are waiting on Yahweh, we are readying ourselves for extraordinary things. For it is written:

"Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
Yahweh is the everlasting (olam) Elohim (God),
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and His understanding no one can fathom" (Isa.40:28, NIV).

We don't know how this all works, and never will, because the finite cannot understsnd the infinite. It doesn't matter how clever we are, or think we are, this is simply beyond our ken. It is good to try to understand what we can but foolishness to go beyond our bounds.

Cleverness is not, in any case, the main thing, but emunah (faith), and we must ever be on the alert for that 'cleverness' which is presumptuous or wicked, for "there is a cleverness that is detestable...there is a cleverness that is exact but unjust" (Sirach 19:23a, 25a, NRSV).

In Isaiah Yahweh promises us renewal. He says that He will "renew our strength" but what you may not be aware of that is that this 'renewal' is actually an exchange - we have to yield something in order for us to be in a position to receive. We are literally told that He will "exchange our strength", meaning, He will exchange our weakness for His strength, and this comes about by 'waiting on Him', 'looking for Him' and, like those primeval waters, 'gathering together' to Him together. Implied in this 'waiting' is a communal action - a togetherness or two or more people. And as we wait paintly for Him, we gather together to Him, we look for Him, we cry to Him, we trust Him, and He renews our strength!

This alters the dimension of waiting somewhat, does it not? The Hebrews didn't 'wait' as we think of 'waiting' today. There is both the passive trusting and the active seeking rolled together into one. The Hebrews rolled lots of things together like that. Thinking is never something done separately from feeling - the mind is never separated from the heart as in the classical Greek sense. The Hebrew word lev or 'heart' includes the mind. Thus the idea of 'science and religion' as two totally separate entities would make no sense to the ancient Hebrew - they were all echad or one. They were not reductionists as we moderns tend to be but regarded the body, spirit, mind, heart, and psyche to be all one entity. And I suspect one of the reasons the West has lost its way so spectacularly is because it has hermetically sealed one discipline off from the other.

Our 'waiting', then, involves both our minds, hearts, spirit and physicalness. And since none of us sits around in an armchair doing nothing as we 'wait' for things to happen in Yahweh's will, so also, while waiting for Yahweh, we are to be busy in all spheres of life. The only 'resting', aside from the mandatory physical resting on the Sabbath and after work - making sure we get adequate sleep - is to be IN Yah'shua (Jesus). We wait on Yahweh rested and in shalom (peace) whilst carrying on with our daily labours. But the regular labours aside, Yahweh does expect action on our part in respect of those things we are waiting for Him on when action is required which it always is at a certain point.

Nothing that is worthwhile is accomplished, moreover, without a certain element of risk. To achieve anything of lasting quality you have to take risks, especially in relationships. And sometimes you mess up and get hurt. Indeed, I will go so far as to say that anything that's worth doing is risky. We are told that "Barnabas and Paul ... risked their lives for the name of our Master Yah'shua the Messiah (Jesus Christ)" (Acts 15:26, NIV). "Priscilla and Aquila ... risked their lives" for Paul (Rom.16:3-4, NIV). And "Epaphroditus ... almost died for the work of Christ, risking his life to make up for the help you could not give me (Paul)" (Phil.2:25,20, NIV).

Now, of course, we have to make the distinction between different kinds of risk though it's not always easy to tell the two apart at first. At first we must simply exercise common sense, learn by trial and error, and finally enjoy the benfit of experience. Of course, when your life is at stake, you need to exercise a lot more caution. But for now, let's focus on those risks which do not entail life-threatening situations, even if at some point most believers must inevitably face these too. Indeed, it may turn out that we have been risking our life more than we realise.

I think it would be true to say that most people don't like being challenged or taking risks. For one thing, risk is often stressful. This work to which we have been called and been engaged in now for over 30 years has entailed a lot of risks and plenty of stress! Every new work of Yahweh does. Just the planting and administration of new congregations is a very risky and stressful business as any evangelist and pastor will tell you. Moving country, town or house is a risky business, though some people like the adventure of a constant change of environment. In my parents' day you stuck with your job for your whole life and moved infrequently. Mobility seems to be what people like to do a lot of in this restless society today. I myself have moved country four times and home nine times during the course of my life. Had not the latter moves clearly been the will of Yahweh, I probably would have stayed put, as I am not one of those restless people who likes to keep moving. And it would be true to say, the older you get, the less one feels inclined to move and take risks but I think this is a function of age and health more than anything else.

As believers, we are commanded to put the Kingdom of Elohim (God) ahead of everything else. Yah'shua (Jesus) taught:

"Seek first [Yahweh's] Kingdom and His righteousness ... do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself" (Matt.6:33-34, NIV).

In Yahweh's Kingdom, taking risks lies at the very heart of what He does. To risk is to dare. Witnessing requires you take risks because you never know what sort of a reception you are going to get when you approach and talk to people. When I was younger I used to do door-to-door evangelism - you never know what sort of a reception you're going to get at someone's house. Street evangelism is even more risky because it doesn't take long for a crowd to gather together to potentially cause mob trouble. When Yah'shua (Jesus) read out Isaiah's prophecy in the synagogue and declared He had just fulfilled it, He was mobbed and almost killed. Paul and the other apostles knew what it was like to face mobs, beatings and death. They risked their lives daily. But risk-taking bears incredible fruit sometimes - when you take risks for the Kingdom of Elohim (God), things are changed for the better. People are changed. And if there is revival, whole communities can be changed for the good!

Being a believer in a hostile world is risky. Being a witness, as we're all commanded to be, is riskier still, for as you know Yah'shua (Jesus) guaranteed opposition:

"Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of Me. At that time many will turn away from the emunah (faith) and will betray and hate each other, and many false nevi'im (prophets) will appear and deceive many people. Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved. And this Besorah (Gospel) of the Kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come" (Matt.24:9-14, NIV).

Now you'd have thought that such a promise of opposition leading to persecution and sometimes death would be enough to drive most people away. Of course, Yah'shua (Jesus) wasn't preaching to the unsaved but to those who were "being saved" (1 Cor.1:18, NIV). Notice, if you would, that those who were at that time saved needed to continue in their salvation as a matter of choice, for "he who stands firm to the end will be saved". We are saved, and are being saved, all the time, beginning with the time we made our first decision for Messiah, whether unconsciously or consciously. No predestined salvation, no 'once saved, always saved'. So here is another risk in life - we risk our salvation too if we ever walk away and refuse to come back to salvation. There is a dynamic at work here. Life itself is a risk for you never know what it will deal out to you.

I have never tried to sugar-coat the Besorah (Gospel) as so many do these days. Life is a bit like two buckets, with one in each hand. One contains simcha (joy) and the other sorrow, and they are dished out to us in this life in equal measure. Why do we continue? Because of the future hope promised to those who continue trusting in Yah'shua (Jesus). I am fiercely opposed to any and every kind of so-called 'prosperity' gospel, as you know, because it's not only a lie but it creates unrealistic expectations in people which, if they aren't realised, can cause them to fall away from the emet (truth). There are both secular and religious versions of this. Those who work hard don't always succeed. Those who trust in Messiah don't automatically get an easier life. Job understood this when, in the midst of his own suffering, he observed:

"Why do the wicked live, reach old age, and grow mighty in power? ... They spend their days in prosperity, and in peace they go down to Sheol" (Job 21:7,13, RSV).

Of course, when they get to Sheol, that 'peace' soon evapourates, but that's another matter. And equally, those who take risks for their Elohim (God) and suffer in this life, sometimes go to their graves heavy-hearted and in great sorrow because of the wickedness of the world and their own losses, are quickly filled with simcha (joy) as they enter into the presence of their Master in the Paradise part of Sheol! The tables frequently get turned at death, at least as far as prosperity is concerned. No, prosperity is not a sign of Yahweh's favour necessarily, and though there are exceptions, more often than not the people of Elohim (God) must do without such things.

So why is it that we are motivated to take risks for the Kingdom? Because we know the King! We know of His ahavah (love), we know of the inner shalom (peace) He gives us even when we are surrounded by turmoil, and we know that His promises are reliable. It would be a strange thing were life to be smooth and filled with plenty from beginning to end for Yahweh's people because that is not how it is life. So I want to give you some counsel today, based on over 60 years' of experience and what I have learned from others.

Firstly, things rarely go the way you expect. But don't let that discourage you, because if you don't take risks, and if you aren't prepared to accept the possibility of failure, you'll never do anything and always be a failure by simply never starting. Besides, some of the things we may view as failures can very often turn out to be the opposite of what we thought. So, my first piece of advice is this: when things don't go the way you expect, as they often (but not always) will, you must never give up, but rebuild and restore, and go for something new. Keep starting again.

It's easy to believe that everything will eventually be wonderful, easy and right, but this is not true - things will often get worse, and worse, and worse. And yet we must still keep going, and going, and going. I am making the assumption, of course, that the direction you are taking is right, and you can only know that if Yahweh confirms it to you. But what if Yahweh led you down a certain path, and you took risks, and it didn't work out? Does that means it wasn't Yahweh inspiring? Not necessarily. Yahweh can have purposeful reasons for things apparently 'failing'. I don't know how many times I have had to re-start this work but I know what my calling is and I am determined to keep at it until the very end until I receive directions telling me otherwise. I have the faith that I am laying a foundation that a 'Solomon' one day will pick up and complete and that I will be able to pass the baton on further.

Which brings me to another point. Sometimes the things we are called to do are a part of a larger project than we could never dream of, involving lots of other people and sometimes spanning several generations. Modern Chinese Christians will acknowledge that the Messianic Community (Church) in China was wholly dependent on those early 19th century Western missionaries even though in terms of converts their effors produced very little result. But they sowed a seed which sprouted only after they had gone.

This is not about our personal glory but Yahweh's. We cannot measure our labour in finite terms because the things we do for the King and the Kingdom, and the risks we take on behalf of them, span beyond our short lives and into the eternities. One day I will be able to look back and see that the work in the little patch of the Master's Vineyard that I have been given has depended upon thousands - if not tens of thousands - of those who went before. We are a part of something infinitely greater than ourselves. As we have received, so we shall give, and are giving. Moves of Yahweh have come and gone but their legacy remains.

The Enemy will seek to trip us up all the day, strewing our path with many temptations. And the more successful we become, the stronger will the oppposition sent by him grow. It always does. Each time I have put my head into a hornets' nest of wickedness to seek out the lost, those hornets have swarmed and viciously gone for me and my family. There have been a lot of casualties and enough sorrows to last several lifestimes. So why do I continue? For the reasons already given: I know in whom I am trusting!

Accordingly, we must never allow ourselves to go down the path of compromise in dealing with corrupt, wicked or deluded people for the sake of achievement, remembering that 'achievement' in Yahweh's eyes is very different to 'achievement' in the world's. For Yahweh's people, there is no glory in the world, only in the world to come. I would be really scared if the world started praising me. And it doesn't. You need to get used to that.

Don't seek to be liked or applauded by anyone. Just do what's right and trust and take the required risks as Abraham, Noah, and David did. Abraham quit a prosperous mercantile life in one of the great Chaldean metropolis' of his day, Ur, leaving behind everything, and headed off into the desert not knowing where he was going! That was a huge risk, staking everything on Yahweh's call. Noah was riddiculed all his life, building a ship far inland, and preaching repentance or death by drowning. It must have been hard waiting, and waiting, and waiting, and having to endure the mockery. It's been like that for me too, building a work that has been trampled on by those who decided to no longer believe and leave. Yahweh doesn't always deliver early - Abraham got his son Isaac right at the end when all seemed lost, and Noah likewise got his flood in his old age. David took the risk of fighting a giant because he couldn't stand Yahweh'e name being mocked by a heathen descendant of the nephilim. He risked standing up to Saul's wickedness. He risked all his wealth to acquire the goods to build Yahweh's Temple but wasn't allowed to see the glory that Solomon did. These are but three of many. Abraham never saw the Promised Land become an Israelite nation. All three were preparers for others who would come after them. We are but tools in a greater work and that should be adequate for us.

Now the navi (prophet) Jonah - oh boy, he did not like taking risks. Indeed, he only took risks when Yahweh made him take a risk, and that is never the best way to take risks. How did that work out for Jonah?

"But Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry..." (Jonah 4:1, NIV).

The silly man. Don't rebel and force Yahweh to drag you into risk-taking which you are not first joyful and at peace about beforehand. You will mess up your relationship with Yahweh if you do. Remember, we are covenanted servants by baptism and by our Torah covenants so He has rights - He can demand you serve Him. After all, don't you refer to Him as 'Lord' or 'Master'? You'd better mean what you say. So, volunteer - don't wait to be booted or you will start making feeble excuses and complain like Jonah who said:

"I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate Elohim (God), slow to anger and abounding in ahavah (love), an Elohim (God) who relents from sending calamity" (Jonah 4:2, NIV).

He was complaining. He was very unhappy that his preaching had saved an enemy city - Nineveh - from destruction because of what that city's people had done to his own nation. He would not forgive. He ended up a most miserable man:

"Now, O Yahweh, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live" (Jonah 4:3, NIV).

It's hard at first to wrap your mind around Jonah's behaviour. He knew Yahweh was loving and forgiving and yet he wanted to die. Why? Because he chose to see his situation through the lens of the flesh instead of the Ruach (Spirit). He let old resentments eat him up. He loathed the pagan Assyrians because of their cruelty and murderousness and he was determined to hate them even after Yahweh had saved them at his hand! I'm afraid people can be like that. And unfortunately we all have the potential to be like that. Don't let Satan stir up old hates and resentments. Let them die at the cross once and for all, never more to rear their ugly heads to poison and kill your soul. Mean it when you declare that you are "crucified with Messiah", that it is no longer you who lives, but Messiah lives in you (Gal.2:20). There's no skirting around that for an authentic talmid (disciple).

Now, please, consider this - chew over this if you will. This I learned from Anglican Canon Andrew White, the vicar of St.George's Church, Baghdad, who risked his life every day for years and did the impossible, bringing peace and reconcilliation between Moslems and Christians even after he had been told, because he suffered from multiple sclerosis, that he was too ill to serve at home, let alone abroad in a war-ravaged country like Iraq. He will go down in history as the only Christian who ever wrote a Moslem fatwah calling for the protection of Christians and other minorities which was accepted, adopted and issued by both the Sunni and Shia Moslem clerics of Iraq! The day after the fatwah was published, the killing of Christians stopped. It's an incredible story and if you get the chance to read his books, I highly recommend them [1].

Now this was Andrew White's testimony: Every situation is wonderful, no matter how bad, provided Yahweh is there with His Ruach (Spirit). But if you are going to take risks, you absolutely need to have Elohim (God) with you. If we're going to take risks for the Kingdom of Elohim (God) we have to be prepared to enter into Yah'shua's (Jesus') suffering, His brokenness, and His pain. Abraham did, Noah did, David did, and Job did, and because they did, they got answers. Yah'shua (Jesus) didn't have it easy either and neither will we. But that doesn't mean we won't, or can't, have a wonderful life in Messiah! If Elohim (God) was willing to both take risks in creating man with free agency as well as risk the whole Universe through the incarnation and death of Yah'shua (Jesus), then who are we to shy away from taking risks when called upon to do so?

We return, as we always do, and always must, to the major theodic crisis in the history of the world - to the cross. We will always be brought back there whenever we are confronted with such big questions as to why a good, all-knowing, all-powerful and omnibenevolent (all-good) Elohim (God) permits the manifestation of evil with all the suffering and brokenness that entails. You young ones are going to have to struggle with this question as you are confronted by evil face-to-face in your lives. The philosophers and theologians of theodicy, like Gottfried Leibniz and John Hick, have struggled with this question. I wrestle with this periodically, most recently last year [2], each time coming to the inescapable realisation that the only credible answer to the suffering of humanity lies in the cross and what made it necessary. I certainly know where answers cannot be found, the foremost contenders of which are reincarnation and atheism. And we can only ever approach the answers we seek by walking the way of the Messiah, taking the risks that inevitably bring us closer to Him, because taking risks implies exercising emunah (faith).

If in your search for answers you can't get a 'yes' or 'no' from Yahweh, then you're either asking the wrong question, you need to wait until both you and Yahweh are ready to receive and give the answer, or the answer is something inbetween a 'yes' and a 'no'. As with Yahweh's sovereignty and man's agency, the answers can often lie somewhere in the middle. But you will have to learn to wait on Yahweh for answers and in the meantime get on with what you know needs to be done.

I was not sure that I would manage to prepare, let alone deliver, today's sermon, but Yahweh rallied me yesterday evening and reminded me, as I am reminding you today, that He remains in control in all our circumstances and is calling us to step out and take risks in response to His calling no matter how we may feel. There is no time like the present. Time and tide wait for no man and Yahweh will change neither for us - He will not stop them or slow them down while we catch up. If you miss one tide, you'll have to wait for the next. So it is with moves of the Ruach (Spirit) and the march of the Kingdom. Yahweh is moving, will you get on board? A time has come such as Yahweh has often spoken of in times past:

"I am Yahweh, in its time I will accomplish it quickly" (Is.60:22b, NRSV).

May the Master of the New Covenant endow you and cause you to rise to your feet and be counted for Kingdom work, in whatever condition you may find yourself. I don't care if you are strong or falling apart at the seams, just step forward and sign on. May you have a blessed week until next time. Amen.

Endnotes