Discovering The Jewish Jesus

Rabbi K.A. Schneider: I just wanted to lay a biblical foundation for all of us in hopes that we'll get more and more in tune with the fact that our God is a living, speaking God.

Shalom uv'rachah beloved ones. Peace and blessings to you. Baruch Hashem. Bless the name of the Lord. I wanted to share with you an experience that I recently had just to illustrate that we always need to be paying attention to what the Lord may be saying to us.

Before I actually share my personal experience, I wanted to lay a biblical foundation for all of us in hopes that we'll get more and more in tune with the fact that our God is a living, speaking God. Now, let's consider the Book of Acts chapter number two where we find the episode of the spirit of the Lord first given to the church.

Many of us know the story. 120 first believers in Yeshua were gathered together celebrating the day of Shavuot or Pentecost. They were recalling how about 1500 years earlier, the Lord had revealed himself to them on top of Mount Sinai by appearing in fire on top of the mountain and then writing his law on the tablets of stone.

As they were thinking about this, and the reason they were thinking about it is because they were celebrating Shavuot, which is the Hebrew way of saying Pentecost, and according to the tradition of the ancient sages, it was on this day of Shavuot or Pentecost that the Lord appeared on top of Mount Sinai in fire during the Mosaic Covenant. He wrote his law for the children of Israel on the tablets of stone, and Moses was on top of the mountain for 40 days receiving all the laws and commandments that Yahweh the God of Israel was bringing his covenant people into a relationship with him through.

So as they were sitting in the upper room in Acts chapter two, celebrating Shavuot or Pentecost, they were recalling once again how Yahweh, the God of Israel, had appeared to them on top of Mount Sinai in fire, how it thundered on top of the mountain representing his voice and his power, and how he communicated to them by writing his law on the tablets of stone.

As they were recalling that, sitting there in the upper room, because again it was Shavuot and that's what they would have thought of on Shavuot, suddenly as they're sitting there recalling what God had done in their history in the ancient past, now the same father that they had been contemplating about in terms of his working through Israel's history in the ancient times, suddenly the living Yahweh, the living God, now appears to them afresh, anew, and again right there in the upper room, except this time he appears as a tongue of fire.

Not just one tongue of fire, but the scripture says that over each one, over everyone of the 120 individuals that were sitting there, an individual tongue of fire appeared above their heads. Then this living tongue filled with esh, filled with fire, came through them and filled each one of the individuals. They had received the Ruach HaKodesh.

When they had received the spirit, they began to prophesy the good news of Jesus in languages that they had never heard because there were people that were gathered there for Pentecost witnessing what was going on that spoke many different languages. In order that the gospel could be proclaimed in such a way that everybody could understand in their native tongue, a supernatural unction, a supernatural utterance was given to each one of those 120 that had received the tongue of fire to be able to supernaturally proclaim the good news of Messiah Yeshua in the languages of all the people that were gathered there so everybody could hear it.

To give you an example, if I did not speak Chinese, God would give me a supernatural ability to speak Chinese just for a moment when I was witnessing to a Chinese person so that the Chinese person would be able to hear the gospel. That conceptually is what happened. But that's not the main point I'm wanting to make with you. I'm just describing historically what happened.

What I'm really driving for is for us to consider in a more profound and in a deeper way the fact that the Holy Spirit appeared to the church in Acts two. When he was given to us as a living tongue. Now, many of us know this, we've heard this, but I don't know if we've given it enough consideration in the sense that have we ever really pondered why the spirit chose to manifest himself to the church as a tongue?

He had appeared over Yeshua when Jesus came out of the Jordan River. He appeared as a dove. He appeared in other times as a rainbow. For example, Ezekiel saw the son of man in his vision surrounded by a rainbow of light. The spirit of the Lord had appeared in different forms throughout history. But now when he was given to the church, he chose to manifest himself as a tongue.

What is a tongue? A tongue is a speaking oracle. If someone does not have a tongue, they cannot speak. The ability that we have to speak in terms of that which is able to create the noise comes through our tongue. So what was being communicated beloved ones to us when God gave us his spirit in Acts chapter two, what he was communicating to us is that he will speak to us. He is a speaking God.

By nature, God is a communicator and he speaks. So knowing that God is a speaking God, and in fact when he gave us his spirit, the first thing that we realize is that he has come as a tongue that we are going to hear him speak, knowing this should cause our senses to be very attuned and very aware that God is speaking so that we're always in our life looking around and wondering what may he be saying to me because God is always communicating.

In fact, in this same episode in Acts chapter two, when these first believers were filled with this living tongue of fire and it was so powerful it appeared they couldn't keep their balance because it was so overwhelming for them even physically, the power of it, Peter stood up. Many of us know the story and he said, "These men are not drunk." He said, "What you are witnessing is what was prophesied by the ancient Hebrew prophet Joel in Joel chapter two when Joel declared:"

Dustin Roberts: The Old Testament is more than a collection of traditions. Rather, it paints a rich and colorful picture of Jesus, proving that he is indeed the Messiah. Drawing from Hebrew tradition, where prophecy is multi-dimensional, in Messianic Prophecy Revealed, Rabbi Kurt Schneider unpacks scripture that not only declares the future, but he reveals how the whole of scripture points to Christ. Call 800-777-7835 or visit discoveringthejewishjesus.com and be absolutely confident that Jesus is the Messiah. Messianic Prophecy Revealed.

This book really does build absolute confidence that the Hebrew Bible points to Jesus as Messiah. So make sure to get your copy of Messianic Prophecy Revealed. And now, back to Rabbi with the second half of today's lesson.

Rabbi K.A. Schneider: So what happened was I have a friend who was sitting in a prayer room. He was reading from the Book of Isaiah, and as he was reading, suddenly a scripture popped out at him from the Book of Isaiah. The scripture is: those that wait upon the Lord shall rise up like an eagle with wings, and they will run like youth and not grow weary.

When he read that scripture, suddenly it was like it popped out to him, and he felt like the Lord was saying to him, "I want you to call and share that scripture with Rabbi." He wasn't quite sure whether that was the Lord or not. He's thinking about should he call me about this or not. Suddenly while he's sitting there thinking as to whether this was really the Lord telling him to call Rabbi about this scripture, they that wait upon the Lord shall rise up like an eagle with wings.

Suddenly as he's thinking about whether he should step out in faith and call me, because he's never done that before, given me a prophetic word, a woman walks in the prayer room. Her name is Diane Schneider, same last name as mine, and she's wearing a t-shirt with an eagle on it. So when he saw this woman walking in with an eagle on her t-shirt with my last name, he knew. So he reached out to me and told me about the scripture.

I was encouraged by it, and I was thankful for it, but it was general. Many of us have heard that scripture before. Some of you may have gotten a card with that scripture on it. Some of you may have even gotten a plaque with that scripture on it or a picture that you're hanging on the wall. It's a pretty well-known scripture. So I was encouraged by it, but it was general, so it didn't put me over the moon so to speak.

But get what happened next. A few days after he calls me and gives me this scripture, and I write it down in my journal, so-and-so called me up and they said the Lord had encouraged them to share this scripture with me and Diane Schneider walked in the prayer room right at that time with an eagle on her shirt, and so I wrote it down.

A few days later, I look out my back window at home and lo and behold, the first time I've ever seen this in my life, a literal bald eagle was sitting on a tree stump right in my backyard as clear as day. I saw the eagle's head, I saw the eagle's tail, the white head, the white tail. I saw the eagle fly away. I was blown away.

I just wanted to share that with you today because our God beloved ones is a living God. He's at work in your life as you're seeking him and he will continue to work in our lives even into eternity. Let's be paying attention. So Father God, we ask you to wake us up today. You said he that has ears to hear, let him hear what the spirit is saying to the churches. Father, open our ears to hear, we pray. We don't want to miss a word that you're saying to us in Jesus' name. Amen and amen.

Today beloved ones as we get back into the word of God, we are continuing our study on Messianic Prophecy. Last time I was talking about from the Book of Malachi that the Lord told us that before Messiah came, he would send a messenger to prepare the way. When Yeshua came to Earth, some came up to him and said, "You can't be the Messiah because the Book of Malachi said that before Messiah comes, Elijah the messenger would come first." And Yeshua said, "You missed it. Elijah did come. Elijah did come in the person of John the Baptist." So Yeshua said John is Elijah if you can receive it.

I'm continuing on today with another huge prophecy that was given to the Hebrew people for the whole world in the Tanakh or in the Old Testament. I'm reading now from the Book of Isaiah chapter number 61 verse number one speaking of the Messiah and what he would do. Hear the word of God. The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of God abides forever.

The spirit of the Lord is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the afflicted. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners. So here we find the actual nuts and bolts of the type of heart and ministry that Messiah would have.

Now what is important about this? And what am I asking you to consider? I'm asking you to first of all consider the fact that many people when they think about God, they think of him as so omnipotent, all-powerful, omniscient, all-knowing, the beginning and the end, the eternal one, the limitless one. They think of him as so big and so cosmic and so holy and so other than that they lose fact of the point that God is also the most tender, humble, caring, loving person in all of his creation.

God cares. Yes, he is all-powerful. He is all-knowing. He does judge sin. He is going to exterminate evil. But beyond that beloved, he's loving and the reason he came into the world in the person of Yeshua was to heal us. So listen what Isaiah said again. He's speaking on behalf of the Lord. He's speaking in the first person of Messiah.

The spirit of the Lord is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the afflicted. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted and to proclaim liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners. Where do we see this fulfilled in the B'rit Chadashah, in the New Testament, word for word almost? We see it in the Book of Luke chapter four beginning in verse number 14.

Yeshua, Jesus, returned to Galilee in the power of the spirit. News about him spread throughout the entire surrounding district. He began teaching in their synagogues and was praised by all. He came to Nazareth where he had been brought up, and as was his custom, he entered the synagogue on the Sabbath and stood up to read. The book of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him, and he opened the book and found the place where it was written. Now I'm going to quote from where I just read, Isaiah 61:1.

Jesus gets in the synagogue, as was his custom. He opens up the portion of the haftarah, the Torah reading, and what does he do? He opens it up to Isaiah 61:1 and he ascribes it to himself. He opened the book and found the place where it was written: the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord.

Then he closed the book and gave it back to the attendant, sat down, and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed upon him and he began to say to them, "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing." I want you to know beloved ones, the study of scripture and the readings of scriptures about the Messiah or Yeshua, it's not just an academic thing.

He's a living person that wants to set you and I free. He came to deliver those that were oppressed. He came to bring supernatural recovery to us. I speak over you right now beloved one, supernatural recovery over your soul. Whatever in your heart has been broken, maybe it's a relationship that broke your soul, maybe it was being raised by parents that weren't whole, maybe something else happened to you along life's journey that just stole your confidence and you're walking around now broken and depressed. I declare over you right now in the name of Yeshua the Messiah supernatural recovery and deliverance from oppression. Jesus is here for you today. He's alive now and as we open our hearts we will recover in him.

I want to read for you the Book of Deuteronomy. We call it in Hebrew Devarim. I'm going to the 14th chapter. I'm going to be reading from the 22nd and the 23rd verse. Hear the word of God. The Lord is speaking here and he says, "You shall surely tithe all the produce from what you sow, which comes out of the field every year." Then he continues at the last part of the next verse he says, "So that you might learn to fear the Lord your God always."

Do you know that fearing the Lord is related to tithing? When we tithe, we're giving God the respect he deserves by declaring that we believe that everything that we have comes from him. Beyond that, the Lord said the tithe is his. So we're just really giving back to God what's already his to begin with. We're just cooperating with him. Beloved, if you want to put today's teaching into practice in your life, if you're not tithing, do so, and God promised he would bless you for it.

Dustin Roberts: Amen. And to take a step of faith right now, go online and give at discoveringthejewishjesus.com. You can also support this ministry by calling us. Our number is 800-777-7835. And you can send a gift of any amount in the mail. Our address is Discovering the Jewish Jesus, PO Box 777, Blissfield, Michigan 49228.

If you've been blessed by this study on Messianic Prophecy, I want you to know that we have more resources available. Rabbi has written a book and it complements this study. It is called Messianic Prophecy Revealed, and it's available on our website right now. I believe this book can really impact your life. Rabbi takes us through God's word and he shows us how the New Testament writers proved that Jesus was the Messiah going through Messianic Prophecies. It's a great book that's designed to help you dig deeper into God's word and strengthen your faith. So pick up your copy of Messianic Prophecy Revealed today at discoveringthejewishjesus.com. I'm Dustin Roberts, and I'll see you next time on Discovering The Jewish Jesus.