A few days ago I was reviewing the ‘About’ page trying to ‘see’ what others ‘see.’ You know, a sort of self assessment.
I noticed on the page that I had written that my goal for this blog is to ‘share the journey’ and ‘explain what I am learning.’ Well, it is pretty clear that I love sharing the fire in my soul that burns daily with new ways to challenge the reader to action and growth, but I realized that I have missed widely on the other ‘goal’ for the blog. Sharing my journey.
While I don’t have a particular story or encounter to share, I thought I’d take a post to give some general thoughts and experiences over the last two years as this transformation in my understanding of Scripture has happened. Certainly, my post on Antisemitism was heart wrenching, and the early RT series more personal as I related the early parts of this ‘walk’ but I have missed that area a bit lately.
Overall, I, and my family, are incredibly blessed and fulfilled in our journey, but it has not been without bumps and heartache.
Perhaps the hardest part has been the seeming difficult relationship with members of my large family. By way of background, I am a third culture kid, the eldest of six. I come from a solid Bible believing family with multiple familial connections in ministry… so, when I, an ordained minister, turned and began to swim against the accepted tide of dogma, you can imagine how that went over. Lead balloon?
The most challenging part, the most hurtful part of the whole journey is that not once, not a single time has any member of my family asked to sit down with me and open a Bible to discuss where I am and why my family and I have made this change in direction. Not once.
Yes, several have attended a Seder dinner we hosted, but no meaningful exchange or wrestling with the Word. We are talking solid, grounded, believers. Nothing.
There are a couple who talk about me… They even go to the trouble of ‘warning others away from me,’ but they haven’t a CLUE what I actually believe, because they have never had a single conversation with me about what I believe!! Astonishing.
It hasn’t been for lack of trying on my part. I’ve really tried to open that door, but thus far, they prefer to avoid the topic or change the subject.
Not unlike my own family, the elders at two churches I served in have severely disappointed me for exactly the same reason. Men that claimed to love me… nothing… save one elder who has kept in touch, but we haven’t had a theological discussion. (I worked with one elder for a while and we had a few conversations, but generally, he would quickly disengage and seemed very uncomfortable wrestling with hard verses.) The only in-depth conversation I had with that pastor was because I pursued him. According to a later email from that pastor, the most loving thing he said they could do for me was to ostracize me. Seriously.
I’m just glad they didn’t have the authority to burn me at the stake!
I could go on, but you get the point.
The most perplexing part of the whole thing is the unwillingness to have honest rational discussion about Scripture.
I mean, I went to a planned lunch meeting with two pastors from my denomination to discuss the things I was seeing in Scripture and I was the only one to bring a Bible to the meeting! Seriously?? These are pastors! Conservative pastors that would disavow mainstream ‘churchianity!’
Maybe the best way to encapsulate this is to say that the most perplexing part of this journey is the revelation that the professed ‘love of truth’ by the conservative Christian community I was in, was NOT matched by a willingness to actually wrestle with Scripture. At least from my perspective, all parties prefer avoidance and their precious doctrinal statements they KNOW are fallible.
I’ve gotten over much of the initial anger at the ‘system’ that I had when I first began to find holes in mainstream Christendom. But, the hurt lingers. I pray for my brothers and sisters, both physical and spiritual, because I long for them to know the Messiah as I do now. I would love to have midrash sessions with them the way I enjoy with my family and congregation.
We are blessed to homeschool and, at least for the time being, I am not employed. It is such a joy to join my family for their daily Bible reading, now directed by the Torah Portions schedule we got from First Fruits of Zion. It is a HUGE blessing to have my teen sons put pieces of Scripture together now seeing things that two years ago would have been lost on my Masters of Divinity. I want to see my nephews’ eyes light up in the same way…
In this time of year we are focused on Rosh Hashana and the return of THE King. We say, ‘May He come soon, and in our generation.’ Yet, I genuinely fear for those I love who are not being obedient to His commandments.
It was one thing when I/they walked in ignorance. Neither of us is ignorant any more. My family and I have chosen obedience, they have chosen willful disobedience. That scares me. Really!!
Oh that the Father would open their eyes to the fullness of His eternal unchanging Word!!
So I will keep Your TORAH continually,
Forever and ever.
45 And I will walk at liberty,
For I seek Your precepts.
46 I will also speak of Your testimonies before kings
And shall not be ashamed. Psalm 119:44-46
And, the words of Messiah Yeshua,
Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11 “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
If you’ve been through or are going through some rough waters as a result of understanding Scripture the way it was written (from a Hebrew perspective), then know you are not alone. In spite of the bumps and hurts, there are many blessings and the depth of Scripture begins to open glorious views and understanding.
Stand firm!!
Yahweh bless you, and keep you;
Yahweh make His face shine on you,
And be gracious to you;Yahweh lift up His countenance on you,
And give you peace.
B’shem Yeshua Hamashiach, Sar Shalom!
Pete
11:3 Restoration 
AMEIN!! It happens to all of us. We just keep on going. Hoping /praying their eyes will be open, their ears unstopped, their hearts softened. Till then we will Love the One who loves us, keep praying and enjoy the fellowship we have.
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This really touched my heart as I also come from a large family and I have only one family member, my brother, that is now in the Hebraic. While my husband and children don’t understand why I left the Lutheran Church, they are respectful of my decision, but are not asking any questions either. That amazed me until I understood that they don’t want to hear why I left because it is going to cost them as well. People don’t like change in their lives because they love the idea that all their friends and the rest of the family see things as they see them. They are seeking that positive reinforcement more than they are seeking truth…thus we continue praying for them.
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I feel your pain. It is an avoidance that occurs, and no questions..just avoidance tactics. I know if we could just talk then things would open up. But, now I just look odd, and they presume to know things of the whys without asking. You would think if they had such firm ground they would want to midrash, but the quick changingof the subject to avoid it all is so sad. The light exposes the darkness is simply it. Comfortable with where they are. It breaks my heart. I am sure it broke His when He was here going through it with His people. Sigh…
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I love the blind man’s true story [and mine] Yeshua sought him out after he was cast out of the temple [and by his family] to comfort him! John 9: 33-38 “If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.” 34 They answered him, o“You were born in utter sin, and would you teach us?” And they pcast him out.
35 Jesus heard that they had cast him out, and having found him he said, “Do you believe in qthe Son of Man?”3 36 He answered, r“And who is he, sir, that I may believe in him?” 37 Jesus said to him, “You have seen him, and sit is he who is speaking to you.” 38 He said, “Lord, I believe,” and he worshiped him…” “The God of all comfort”! [11 Cor. 1: 3-5]
This was very helpful:
http://datamanos2.com/theology/thesis.html
Also, our loved ones don’t ask because they don’t want to encourage us in our “error”! Hoping we will come back around to their way of thinking…
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“our loved ones don’t ask because they don’t want to encourage us in our “error”!”
Lotta truth to that one… What they don’t understand is that once you ‘see’ this picture with great clarity, there is no way to ‘unsee’ it. It makes too much sense and brings unity to the whole of Scripture like no other paradigm. From the passage you quote, ‘I once was blind, but now I see!’ (v.25)
Welcome to the blog, I look forward to more comments.
Shabbat Shalom.
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Thanks for the post Pete! I can identify with some of what you write. I too, have scratched my head as to why they won’t even enter into dialogue or discuss what I believe and why. I’ve realized that they don’t really want to know – they are comfortable in their life and they don’t want anything to upset it.
I can speak with passion and certainty about what I believe, because I’ve been where they are, but they haven’t been where I am, thus is scares them.
Shalom
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Sorry for the late post but I am new to this site – Today! I have been on here for about 4 hours now and man…. WOW! I too was touched by your family’s reaction and lack of faith. I can only hope and pray that I don’t run into such resistance but I don’t see that happening. Like when Iost my “friends” after accepting Christ. I love you brother and there is freedom in TRUTH. Truth doesn’t lie. It’s always the truth weather you accept it or not, believe it or not, or deny it. I hope and I pray that i will finally begin to understand and make sense of scripture. But without seeking, searching, testing…. one will never find.
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Take your time and dig deep! There is much we know, but maybe haven’t understood it the way our Creator intended it in the beginning!
Some family may come.. some may not. Either way, just follow the narrow path to fullness of truth and our Father will bless!
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I am so happy to have found this blog site- it is tremendous. My husband and one of his sisters have been on this incredible journed for going on 6 years now and as wonderful as it is, it can be lonely. We too were a very close knit family in christianity. My husband has 2 other sisters who are very strong christians. The older sister- seminary graduate- was open at first, but her husband and other sister put a stop to it. This older sister just couldn’t understand why we left “the larger body of believers”. We have tried to explain, but not sure if it sinks in. She does converse with me through email- she and her husband are in Kenya teaching at a Baptist School there and call themselves “missionaries”. I tread very carefully in email- letting her know that it is just my journey- I am telling her she has to understand any of it, that it is my story. It seems to work. And she seems to be interested in my understanding of scriptures- especially the First Century Writings. It didn’t seem to matter how many times we told them that we hadn’t walked away from Yeshua (Jesus to them) they would not believe us. But in my last email to her and explaining some of my understanding of first century writings from a Hebrew mindset- she understood something- and seemed to understand that we have not walked away from the Messiah. We used to be a large family that would sit around the Christmas dinner and Thanksgiving dinner discussing scriptpures for hours on end. But… not anymore. We couldn’t do christmas any longer, but were still open to thanksgiving- but they said no to that. So we are a very divided family now. It deeply hurts, and they for the most part don’t ask questions- and some one said recently that it is because christianity believes they have all the answers and we are so far off base- I find that somewhat arrogant, but that is just me- I used to be there in christianity and used to believe the same way they do- so I understand. Thankyou so much for this incredible blog site.
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Shalom and welcome!!
It is interesting that so many of us have such similar stories! Maybe one day we can tell the details and rejoice in the final victory of our King as He opens the eyes pf those closest to us!!
Hope you’ll hang around and participate in the discussion!!
Blessings!
Pete
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Dear Pete,
I just read your latest post, new insights to the good Samaritan, another perspective you called it. I enjoyed reading it and appreciate you sharing your thoughts. It caused me to spend a couple of hours this morning in Luke looking at chapters 10 and 11 for some context of Y’shua’s words. (I read primarily now from an Aramaic based NT, a translation of the Peshitta, which makes me even more of an odd-duck!:-)
That is why I am posting here – in your old post about how well, ‘not’, your Greek thinking Western Christian friends and family took to your new journey in Torah. Two thoughts come to mind for me at this point in my journey: I need new friends, and, ‘how perplexed Y’shua was at their unbelief!’
Isn’t it interesting in the proceeding chapter to the good Samaritan Y’shua sent out 70, told them NOT to stop along the way and initiate conversation with those along the road rather seek out a friendly household of faith at their destination and preach “The Kingdom of Elohim is drawing near to you” (Luke 10:9)
I think though, these words really sum up, at least to me, the crux of what He speaks about: “And whoever listen to you listens to me, and whoever rejects you, he rejects me. And whoever rejects me rejects Him who sent me.” (Luke 10:16) We are seeking to follow, to listen to, the message of the 70, who were sent by Y’shua himself, preaching the ‘Kingdom of Elohim’, running back to Him, obeying Him, listening for His voice, obeying His commands.
As I am humbled in Y’shua, the one who was willing himself to equate himself to being thought of as ‘a Samaritan’ if necessary to illustrate what it really means to love one’s neighbor to all of us who have gone astray, who have gone our own way, yet he has bandaged up our wounds, provided his garment as cover, placed us in his Father’s care, paid for our lodging – “Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this that demons are subject to you, rather be glad that your names are written in heaven.” Amen and Amen!
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It is indeed very difficult, dealing with family members and people we used to fellowship with; but I have been able to accept it as part of the process of humbling us and honing us as intercessors for those who are blind. We will see our reward.
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