REPENT AND ABSTAIN FROM SEXUAL IMMORALITY
REPENT AND ABSTAIN FROM SEXUAL IMMORALITY
Blessings are on the head of the righteous, but the mouth of the wicked conceals violence.
Proverbs 10:6
The righteous don't need to hide their actions. Everything they do, they can do in the open without fear, assuming the wicked don't occupy the majority of positions of power. The wicked, on the other hand, hide everything they do instinctively. They lie, conspire, sneak, censor, accuse, and threaten to hide their activities.
Now Jacob heard that the sons of Laban were saying, “Jacob has taken all that was our father's, and from what was our father's he has gained all this wealth.”
#genesis 31:1 #vayetzei
The world always claims that "Jacob has taken" when in truth, God has given. Antisemites are liars and cheats driven by jealousy and a hatred of God himself. All their rhetoric to the contrary is self-delusion.
Shalom, friends,
We invite you to join us live on Zoom and YouTube at 4pm Central Standard Time on this Sabbath afternoon, 12/07/2024, for scripture study and prayers.
The lesson for the day is titled: "No Torah, No Salvation?"
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The original article this week's lesson is based upon, as well as many others, can be found in the Library page of our website at: https://sabbathkeepersfellowship.org/library
Jacob's sheep were all spotted. Laban took the spotted sheep that he promised to Jacob, but God supernaturally gave them back to Jacob anyway. This is a picture of God's people. Our lineage is confused and cloudy. We aren't perfect, just chosen and forgiven. God gave Jacob marked sheep from unmarked parents. Like children of Abraham from stones. Satan tries to divide God's kingdom against itself, but God preserves a remnant that becomes even greater.
God knows His people. What are the signs by which He marks them? The Sabbath and the Law.
#genesis 30:39-40 #vayetsei
“IN EACH AND EVERY GENERATION THEY RISE UP AGAINST US TO DESTROY US. AND THE HOLY ONE, BLESSED BE HE, RESCUES US FROM THEIR HANDS.”
Have the nations really tried to destroy us in every generation? The following is just a sample of the atrocities committed over the centuries. Consider:
1430 BCE - Slavery in Egypt. (Passover)
356 BCE - Haman attempts genocide of the Jews. (Purim)
138 BCE - Greek government outlaws the practice of Judaism in Israel. (Chanukah)
27 BCE-330 CE - Roman persecution throughout their empire.
486 CE - Monks and mobs burn synagogue, dig up a Jewish cemetery, and burn bones.
624 - Mohammed watches as 600 Jews are decapitated in Medina in one day.
640 - Jews expelled from Arabia.
1096 - First crusade: Thousands of Jews tortured and massacred.
1146 - Second crusade: Thousands of Jews, including women and babies, are butchered across Europe.
1200's - Jews blamed for causing the Black Plague are murdered across Europe.
1290 - Jews expelled from England.
1306 - Jews expelled from France.
1349 - Jews expelled from Hungary.
1391 - Spain: Tens of thousands killed.
1394 - Second expulsion from France.
1400's - Jews accused of murdering Christian children and baking matzah with the blood are killed.
1421 - Jews expelled from Austria.
1492 - Jews expelled from Spain in the Inquisition.
1496 - Jews expelled from Portugal
1500's - Marranos are burned in Mexico, Portugal, Peru, and Spain.
1553 - The Talmud is burned in Italy.
1648-66 - Cossacks, Poles, Russians, and Swedes massacre Jews.
1744 - Jews expelled from Bohemia and Moravia.
1818 - Pogroms in Yemen.
1840 - Blood libel in Damascus.
1862 - General Ulysses S. Grant expels Jews from Tennessee.
1882 - Pogroms in Russia.
1930's-40's - Official Canadian reply to most Jewish pleas for refuge: "Unfortunately, though we greatly sympathize with your circumstance, at present you cannot be admitted. Please try some other country." Hundreds die as ships sink in harbors.
1939-45 - Six million Jews are annihilated across Europe. Babies serve as target practice, women are human guinea pigs for doctors and scientists, beards are torn from men's faces.
1948-67 - Arab nations launch attacks to annihilate the State of Israel. Fearing for their lives, Jews flee to Algeria, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Egypt.
2005-22 - Iran declares that it will annihilate the Jewish people and the state of Israel.
It is beginning to happen again now across the entire globe.
My wife, a dietitian, tells me that the three trees Jacob used to encourage breeding among his sheep have anti-inflammatory properties, which can have a significant impact on fertility. Could this have been common knowledge at one time? Did the sticks or the stripes have any effect on the breeding of the sheep or is there some hidden message in this story? I lean in the direction of the sticks being metaphor rather than medicine, but not strongly. I'm not convinced of either explanation.
#genesis 30 #vayetzei
Song for the afflicted - 6 | #friend paul