Jesus’ words are often difficult to understand. This is because of many reasons including the culture, context, and our lack of knowledge concerning the common conversations of the day in which Jesus spoke the words which are recorded in the Bible.

When we have a better understanding of Jesus’ first century world, the words of Jesus take on a whole new life and bring great excitement to our hearing and teaching of his words. For example, are you aware that Jesus was born in a bakery? Bethlehem means “house of bread.” Now when I tell others that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, I can confidently understand and teach that Jesus, the Bread of Life, was born in the “House of Bread.” How is that for a picture? Incredible!

In my latest podcast, “Malchut Shamayim,” I speak a little about the statement that Jesus made, which is recorded in Matthew 19:24, “…it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.” Why a camel through the eye of a needle? Couldn’t he have said it’s easier for a pig to fly or a spider to eat a horse?

The reason that Jesus used the particular saying of a camel going through the eye of a needle has to do with a common teaching about repentance, as well as a first century rabbinic style of teaching.

First we should know that first century rabbis often used whatever was in view of their audience as an object lesson. More than likely, a camel was very near Jesus as he taught. Second, repentance was very important for Jews of the first century. The ten days of fasting and reconciliation leading up to the Day of Atonement or Yom Kippur is a testament to this fact.

In order to understand Jesus’ words in Matthew 19:24, we must know that the eye of a needle was a symbol used to represent a persons willingness to seek forgiveness and turn back to God. As Rabbi Yose would say, “God has declared, ‘Make for me an opening as an eye of a needle, and I will open it for you so wide, that armies of soldiers with heavy equipment can enter through it’” (Brad Young, Meet the Rabbis, 23).

Jesus’ words in Matthew 19:24 can only be fully understood with this information. Jesus is not teaching us that people with lots of money will have a hard time getting into heaven when they die (as is often taught). Jesus is saying that the rich (those who have good health, comfortable living standards, a strong family, good education, plenty of food and water, et cetera) as apposed to the poor (those who are unhealthy, uneducated, lack basic provisions, have struggling family relationships, et cetera) will have a difficult time seeing their need of turning their lives over to God.

To “follow Jesus” was to learn how to correctly live out the commands of God and live life to the fullest. Jesus’ sarcasm is clear as he says, “A camel will make a tiny turn toward following God before a self-sufficient human will.”

Many blessings,
Johnny

© 2007 Jonathan P. Gainey and Flock’s Diner.
All Rights Reserved

Many Christian denominations hold as a doctrine that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are the only divinely inspired teachings that constitute the rule and faith of a Christian life.

In Jesus’ day, commentary on the Written Torah, which was only translated verbally through memorization until 200 A.D., was also considered authoritative and divinely inspired. The Oral Torah, like today’s printed commentaries, was used to offer direction for obeying God’s written Word where the instructions were not completely clear.

For instance, not working on the Sabbath is an instruction of God, but the definition of work is left for interpretation. That is where the Oral Torah is given by teachers with the anointing to interpret the Scriptures for God’s people. These oral teachings are still known today in written form as the Mishnah.

Here is a rabbinic parable that was taught by Jewish sages during Jesus’ time and used to emphasize the importance of both the Written and Oral Torahs: 

“The King’s Wise and Foolish Servants”

“My son, were not both Bible and mishnah spoken by the mouth of the Almighty? If so, what is the relationship between them? The distinction between them may be illustrated by a parable. To what may the matter be compared? To a mortal king who had two servants whom he loved with utter love. To one he gave a measure of wheat and to the other he gave a measure of wheat, to one a bundle of flax and to the other a bundle of flax. What did the wise one of the two do? He took the flax and wove it into a tablecloth. He took the wheat and made into fine flour by sifting the grain first and grinding it. Then he kneaded the dough and baked it, set the loaf upon the table, spread the tablecloth over it and kept it to await the coming of the king. But the foolish one of the two did not do anything to it.

“After many days the king came into the house and said to the two servants: My sons, bring me what I gave you. One brought out the table with the loaf baked of fine flour on it, and the tablecloth spread over it. The other brought out his wheat in a basket with the bundle of flax over the wheat grains. What a shame! What a disgrace! Need it be said which of the two servants was the more beloved? He of course who laid out the table with the loaf baked of fine flour upon it.”

When the Jewish listeners were hearing this parable, they would recognize the hard work that goes into making bread and cloth, which would “…remind the audience of the way the Mishnah refines the deeper meaning of the Bible”(Dr. Brad H. Young, The Parables: Jewish Tradition and Christian Interpretation, page 91).

Both the written and oral Torahs were considered to be the authoritative and inspired Word of God.

Jesus often advocated the use of oral Torah, which can be seen when reading of his miracles. When He healed on the Sabbath in most cases he never touched the person and only healed with words, which was allowed by the Jewish religious authorities long before Jesus was born. In other cases Jesus used touch on the Sabbath to heal despite the written Torah and the instructions of the Jewish religious authorities. In these cases Jesus appears to be breaking the Sabbath until we are familiar with the teachings of the Oral Torah.

The Sadducees did not recognize the authority of the Oral Torah, but they did recognize the Judean (Jewish religious authorities in Judea) decision to break the Sabbath in order to keep the instruction to circumcise on the eighth day due to the obvious need for compromise.

In John 9:14 we read that Jesus healed a blind man using touch on the Sabbath which brings us to Jesus’ use of the oral Torah.

In the Bible God says a person can not work on the Sabbath (Exodus 20:9-10, 23:12, 31:14-15, 34:21, 35:2: Leviticus 23:3; Deuteronomy 5:12-14). God also says that a child “must” be circumcised on the eighth day (Genesis 17:12, Leviticus 12:3). The Judeans had already settled the matter and stated that the keeping of the Sabbath will be broken in order to keep the mitzvah (commandment) to circumcise on the eighth day.

There is also a teaching of the Oral Torah which says that a person can break the Written Torah in order to keep the Spirit of the Written Torah, which is to give life. With that portion of the Oral Torah, along with the instructions that a person could break the Sabbath to circumcise, an Oral Torah observant Jew could surmise that a healing could take place, even with touch. Jesus could heal in the presence of Sadducees as long as He didn’t touch. In the presence of Pharisees He could draw from the above commandments both oral and written.

Because of the Pharisaical flexibility of the Oral Torah, a Rabbi with “authority,” like Jesus, meaning that He was able to interpret the Torah and give commands for “binding and loosing” or “forbidding and permitting,” he could draw from the command that a person could circumcise on the Sabbath and conclude that it is also allowable to heal a person of a childhood illness or physical defect such as blindness.

Jesus used what is called a Kal v’ chomer (‘light and heavy’) argument to defend his actions. This is when a sage would remind an accuser that the mitzvah (commandments) must be weighed in order to keep the “spirit of the law,” which is to give life (not necessarily meaning the opposite of death, but a life that is more whole).” By reminding the Pharisees of their own oral traditions, Jesus was able to justify a healing on the Sabbath as he was also an advocate of the Oral Torah.

If Jesus were being questioned by Sadducees this would not have been as easy to defend because Jesus used touch in the healing miracle. The Sadducees did not believe in the Oral Torah. They were very strict and rigid in following the Written Text.

Think of it this way: If you were living in the place and time of Jesus and you wanted to fish with your kids on the Sabbath some Pharisees would say, “No problem. Have fun.” Other Pharisaic sages would say, “You can fish, as long as you don’t clean the fish and prepare them for cooking.” This is known as “binding and loosing.”All Sadducees would say, “Absolutely not! You are not allowed to fish, because it is a form of work. No exceptions.”

The Pharisees, like Jesus, would “bind and loose” differently according to their own interpretation of what it meant to work. They would “bind (forbid)” what they believed to be unacceptable and “loose (permit)” that which they deemed acceptable such as fishing for fun on the Sabbath. The Sadducees were strict literalists. No work meant “No Work!”Jesus was being confronted by the more flexible Pharisees in John 9.

Today we will often hear or even say that the preacher or teacher is going to bring to us a “message from God.” By saying this, we are advocating an ancient belief that it is not only the written Word which is divinely inspired and given authority by God, but the oral teachings are believed to have the same inspiration and authority.

Should this not be the case, it would be difficult to expect a “message from God,” unless the teacher was to read strictly from the Bible. In that case the teacher would be following the custom of the Sadducees who would only use the Written Word and did not believe in Oral Torah like the Pharisees and Jesus.

In His dust,
Johnny

© 2007 Jonathan P. Gainey and Flock’s Diner.
All Rights Reserved

I have always wondered why we have collective worship on Sunday, and when I ask those I think will know, I always get the same response: “It’s the day that Jesus rose from the grave.” Based on the studies of ancient Jewish customs, we can confidently challenge that answer.

First, according to the Jewish day, which begins about 7 PM, Jesus rose on Saturday night. Secondly, the reason we worship on Sunday is due to an ancient spat between the surviving Pharisaic Jews and the surviving Nazarenes after the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D.When the Temple was destroyed, the Pharisees escaped to Yavneh and the Jewish followers of Jesus ran to the mountains of Pella as they were told to do in Matthew 24:16. Since that time the Jews and the Church have created obstacles to keep one another from being unified.

“The Church forbade believers from keeping the Jewish feasts and began to meet on Sundays, while, in reaction to the Christians kneeling for prayer, the Jews adopted the standing position while praying the Amidah” (Ron Moseley, Yeshua: A Guide to the Real Jesus and the Original Church). Why do I believe that Jesus rose on Saturday night? The answer comes from research done by David Bivin and the Jerusalem School of Synoptic Research.To the Jews, the day always begins with night. That is because of Genesis 1:5, which reads, “And there was evening , and there was morning-the first day.” First century Jews, using Nehemiah 4:21 as their guide, defined Nightfall as the moment when the stars were visible, which was around 7:00 PM during the season of the Passover.

In Matthew 28:1 we read, “After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb.” In Greek the Scripture reads, “Opse de sabbaton te epiphoskouse eis mian sabbaton…” (Late [of] sabbath, in the lightening to one of Sabbath). This doesn’t make a whole lot of sense in Greek, but in Hebrew it makes perfect sense.

“Late of Sabbath” is a Greek form of the Hebrew phrase, “be-motsa’e shabat” (at the exiting of Sabbath), which means the hours that follow immediately after the Sabbath. “In the lightening to one of sabbath” comes from the Hebrew idiom, “‘or le-’ehad ba-shabat” (light to [day] one of the week). Used in this way, “light” is a synonym for “night,” referring to the night before the next day. In Hebrew, “light” can be used as an antonym for its literal meaning to speak of the dark hours that exist before a new day.

An example of this usage is found in ancient Jewish writings that give instructions for carrying out the search for leaven as directed in Exodus 12:15. The ancient writing says, “Light to the fourteenth [of Nisan] one must carry out a search for leaven by the light of a lamp.” The use of the lamp gives us a clue that the search was done in the dark hours.

“With this understanding, the Galilean women returned to the tomb to anoint Jesus’ body shortly after dark on Saturday evening. It was then that they found the tomb already empty. Jesus, therefore, may have remained entombed only slightly more than twenty-four hours, being raised from the dead on Saturday evening rather than on Sunday morning. By the method of reckoning time in Jesus society, such a short period, scarcely more than a day-a part of Friday, all of Saturday, and a part of Sunday-would have fulfilled his prophecy that he would be raised from the dead on the third day after his death” (David Bivin, Jerusalem School of Synoptic Research).

Based on this historical information, it seems that the reason we worship on Sunday has more to do with a 2000 year-old grudge than a God-honoring recognition of the Messiah’s defeat over death and the grave.

Forever learning,

Johnny

© 2007 Jonathan P. Gainey and Flock’s Diner.
All Rights Reserved

WARNING: This may be disturbing to some readers. This article includes news of sexual brutality toward a child.

Monday evening I turned on the television in a hotel room in Gatlinburg, TN to hear something that made my blood boil…toward God. I was so disturbed by what I had heard that I found myself having difficulty sleeping. There were even moments when I wanted to scream out and cry for the misery that had been given to an innocent toddler who had no one to turn to…not even God.

You may have heard the news that someone video taped the rape of a three-year-old girl. I have a three-year-old girl, a fact that caused this horrific news to hit so close to my heart that I have not been the same since the moment I turned on that television. I struggled with anger and frustration over my own helplessness. My mind was so troubled by this story that I woke up to the sound of a screaming girl crying “Mama!” in my sleep Monday night.

Because I am a visual person, it was difficult for me not to hear the screams, picture the begging, the crying, the helplessness that this baby must have experienced. And it made me so angry that I wanted to stand outside and scream, “Where are you, God?!!!!!”

I hear so many stories about God’s powerful presence during times of prayer, when entire cities are transformed by revival. Why is the powerful presence of God always so evident when people are worshiping, but not when an innocent child is being mutilated and destroyed by those who she believes are the protectors of her world?

The absence of God in these kinds of situations is beyond frustration for me and millions of others. I am so sorry for that little girl.

Although the questions that surround God’s absence in times of desperation may never be fully reconciled on this side of heaven, there is an answer.

God is not our baby sitter.

Too often we spiritualize our own responsibilities as protectors of the children in our communities, and hand those responsibilities to God. In such a busy, out-of-control world it is easy to forget that God gave us instructions to take care of our world and all that is in it. We cannot expect to raise our children in an irresponsible, hateful, brutal society, and expect God to intervene every time we neglect our own jobs as stewards of the children in our world. And this is not a statement towards parents alone, but towards all adults. We all have a call to look out for the little ones, whether they our our own children or the children of others.

It is time that we stop pretending that God will bring down fire from heaven every time one of his children is in trouble. The simple truth is, we have a responsibility to be God’s eyes, ears, hands, and even fists in the world.

Keep our children safe. Stop trying to give God our jobs. God is not a baby sitter!

Blessings,

Johnny

© 2007 Jonathan P. Gainey and Flock’s Diner.
All Rights Reserved