Author: Bp. Justin Elwell

Sharing snippets of life with those who happen by. Husband, father, bishop, scholar, hiker, and homesteader. Attempting to build a natural bridge between today and ancient faith-style living. If you didn’t enjoy today’s post, stop back, there’s always something new tomorrow.

But How?

On By Bp. Justin ElwellIn InspirationLeave a comment
The Jordan River.

In I Peter 2:11 the apostle writes, “Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul.”

But how?

How can we be strangers and pilgrims among the people, places, and things we know? Can we really displace ourselves within our own lives? Be semi-present?

No.

Aa the book of Genesis comes to a close, Jacob, before his death, insists that Joseph make a pledge. Joseph, of course, is viceroy of Egypt, second only to Pharaoh himself; and of Jacob’s sons, only Joseph can fulfill Jacobs last request.

Having lived in Egypt for seventeen years, Jacob realizes that his family has no reason to ever leave Egypt. What was meant to be temporary, seemed to have become permanent. After all, it is well with the Israelites in their exile; they are fed, protected, and seem to have a secure future.

Jacob makes Joseph pledge to take him back to the promised land, to be buried with his fathers. Worried that his descendants would mistake the Nile for the Jordan, he sends a message: do not set your heart in a land I would not allow myself to be buried.

With His resurrection Yeshua/Jesus sent us the same message: do not set your heart where He does not rest.

We are to be strangers, but deeply connected to life around us. We are to be pilgrims, yet cultivating the vineyard of people’s lives for heaven. How to reconcile?

Don’t mistake the Nile for the Jordan; don’t mistake the temporary for the eternal. Set your heart on the place of the promise, on the place where a river of living water flows, the place where the King is enthroned.

When life gets uncomfortable, it is a reminder that this is not our inheritance. When life becomes too comfortable, Jacob and Yeshua remind us that the place of rest is in His promise.

Remember, you are just passing through, doing the work prepared for this leg of the journey (Eph. 2:8–10), until you to enter the rest of the Lord, beside a river greater than the Nile and the Jordan: the river of life (Rev. 22:1).

Be well. Shalom.

Passover Meditation #1

On By Bp. Justin ElwellIn InspirationLeave a comment

Plagues. The idea of plague is no longer distant, unfamiliar, the memory of older relatives or neighbors. It is familiar. The fear. The uncertainty. The affliction. The anxiety. Death. It’s all too real.

While the plagues of Exodus were judgments upon the nation of Egypt due to pharaoh’s hardness, the words translated plague(s), meaning “to push” or “to touch” by the hand or power of God, however, also prepared hearts to open, and ears to hear.

Few of us have escaped the experience of personal or community tribulation. During distress our ears are open. Our senses are on alert. We want to know. We want news, information, or warning. We are listening for rescue, even when anticipating the unexpected.

As in Egypt 3000 years ago, in the midst of this global pandemic, with the uncertainty facing so many, we are learning to look to heaven in a more expectant way, and depend on the faithfulness of the One who is the same “yesterday, today, and forever” (Heb. 13:8).

Messiah said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear (Matt. 11:15; cf. Deut. 29:4). To have ears to hear, biblically, was to have a heart ready to act on the word received. Yeshua is saying there is a difference between having ears, and having ears ready to hear.

As we deepen faith in Messiah, He opens our hearts and ears to hear Him, trust Him, and follow Him, out from the plague, to freedom (Gal. 5:1).

Be well. Shalom.

One Word

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Amen. אמן. One word can mean so much. Too often we say it with little regard for what we are “amen-ing”: “preacher said, “amen,” so, “amen.”

Amen is a prayer in itself. When you look to heaven, at times, all we can say is: “Amen.” And that’s ok.

It is also an affirmation that opens our attitude. Perhaps we are down, upset, uninspired; amen opens the door of release, allowing entry into a new soul space: faith, awe, worship.

By saying it, amen, even when we are not there yet, adjusts our direction, our intention, to that which we desire: Him.

Amen is not simply the end of a prayer, it is a word of joining in, of joining together. Jewish tradition asks that “amen” be the response to every blessing we hear, and every blessing we say.

Amen, אמן, is derived from a verb root meaning to be firm, stable and trustworthy. Amen conveys: let this be so, or let it be solid.

Amen is a spiritual discipline in itself, as it is a single word that can refresh the physical, spiritual, and emotional download of the day. Refresh.

As Yeshua so often said, “Amen, amen, I say to you…” as He rebooted our crashed systems, thereby refreshing our hope.

Say it: Amen. Sing it: Amen. Live it: Amen. Pray it: Amen.

Be well. Shalom.