31 October 2010 (Rishon/Pesach) Day #229, 5934 AM
Present Yourselves
The Way to Be Seen by the Bridegroom
"So Joseph made ready his chariot and went up to Goshen to meet his father Israel; and he presented himself to him, and fell on his neck and wept on his neck a good while" (Gen 46:29, NKJV).
"So be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself to Me there on the top of the mountain" (Ex.34:2, NKJV).
"Then Yahweh said to Moses, 'Behold, the days approach when you must die; call Joshua, and present yourselves in the tabernacle of meeting, that I may inaugurate him.' So Moses and Joshua went and presented themselves in the tabernacle of meeting. Now Yahweh appeared at the tabernacle in a pillar of cloud, and the pillar of cloud stood above the door of the tabernacle" (Deut 31:14-15, NKJV).
"Present yourselves before Yahweh by your tribes and by your clans" (1 Sam.10:19, NKJV).
"Do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to Elohim (God) as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to Elohim (God). For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under [the] law [of sin - Rom.7:23,25 - this is not the Torah being spoken of here] but under grace (undeserved loving-kindness). What then? Shall we sin because we are not under [the] law [of sin] but under grace? Certainly not! Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one's slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness? But Elohim (God) be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness" (Rom.6:13-18, NKJV).
"Be diligent to present yourself approved to Elohim (God), a worker who does not need to be ashamed" (2 Tim 2:15, NKJV).
Modern translations of the Bible frequently render the Hebrew word ra'ah as "appear" (e.g. NIV, ISRV) and this is certainly once sense to the verb. However, it is a much deeper word than that. To ra'ah yourself in Hebrew is much more than simply appearing before someone - it means to humbly present yourself as a servant ready to receive instructions from your Master. In the New Covenant the Bride (us) presents herself before the Bridegroom (Yah'shua/Jesus) as one who is approved by Elohim (God), unashamed because she has been washed or cleansed in the blood of the Lamb, unashamed because she has not presented herself as an instrument of lawlessness or sin but as one who stands under the grace (unmerited favour) of her Bridegroom.
But there is more to ra'ah than meets the eye because its root literally means 'to see' and 'be seen'. In a world where people are desperate to be seen and acknowledged by the Creator, it is important for them to be known by first presenting themselves, humbly, as servants. But since their pride holds them back, then instead make a public display of themselves, hoping to be 'seen' by being demonstrative and assertive by being rude and vulgar; and whilst indeed they are 'seen' in such a garish display, it is not in the way the Bridegroom 'sees' (and therefore 'knows') the Bride - rather, they are viewed with contempt for they are defiled. If, then, you truly want to be seen and known by Elohim (God), ra'ah yourself to Him with the proper attitude of mind, spirit, heart and body in tavnith in Yah'shua our Master.
21st century man, raised in a Marxist-leaning Western world, has all but eliminated ra'ah from his conscious-awareness. He has been told that he is an equal in everything, not just in birth (for we are all equal by birth) but equal in everything else also irrespective of the choices he has made in life. Thus we find in our neo-Marxist society the incongruous situation where a criminal has the same rights as the law-abiding citzen and who aggressively goes out of his way to claim those 'rights', where people who refuse to work have the rights to be taken care of nfinancially, where children now have the same 'rights' and privileges as parents, and where male-female rôles ordained by the Creator have been 'equalised' so that everyone and everything has been homogenised into a kind of grey 'sameness'. When children no longer present themselves to parents, or wives to their husbands, or mankind to Elohim (God), the result is chaos, as it has been in the past:
"As for My people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O My people! Those who lead you cause you to err, and destroy the way of your paths" (Isa 3:12, NKJV).
The way of "our paths" is the tavnith (pattern) of the mitzvot (commandments) of the Torah (Law) in Yah'shua our Messiah. Ignore this tavnith and refuse to present yourself to the authorities Yahweh has established, and the result is always Isaiah 3:12 with everything upside down and what comes pretty close to a madhouse. The truth is we all submit to authorities by default because that is the way we are made but unfortunately it's usually to the wrong ones, so we leave divine tavnith and end up oppressed by those who are our inferior (in terms of maturity, levels of submission and obedience to emet-truth, etc.) and are ruled by those who were not created to rule and are therefore unequipped to do so righteously. This takes us off the path of righteousness into grave error and into destruction. Everywhere we are surrounded my wimpish men, aggressive women and rebellious children.
Today the world of Isaiah 3:12 presents itself to the gods of Halloween and Samhain and so honours Satan, including those who call themselves 'Christians', because they refuse to honour Yahweh's moedim and so end up filling the vacuum with man-made, demonically-inspired ones. Those who participate in this devilish festival are submitting to darkness and to further spiritual chaos. It is appropriate, I think, that the prophetic month of October should end with this festival of death.
Everything has changed. I have changed. This ministry has changed. If you have failed to present yourselves to Yahweh up to now, it will require far more personal humbling to do so. Satan's kingdom is not going to wait for you to catch up but will ever press on making more demands on the unsaved and rebellious. Yahweh's conditions, though, remain the same, however harder it will not be for rebellious man to meet them. And those conditions are unconditional surrender. If you will ra'ah or present yourself before Him in that way, His grace will flow to you abundantly. If not, the spiral into darkness will relentlessly continue as you are dragged into its destructive depths.
It's your choice.
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