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Dear Friends,


Myles & Katharine Weiss

Messianic Jews have consistently experienced a presence of peace with Arab, Egyptian, and Persian Believers. The continued failure of political peace efforts is underwhelming and completely predictable. Any of us who are involved with world ministry, especially those in Israel, can recount mountaintop experiences of supernatural fellowship that supersedes human failure and historical precedent.

This is based on the power of blessing that comes directly from the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It is not merely a New Testament phenomenon. Blessing is a characteristic that winds throughout His-story including the Tanach (Old Testament). From the very time it was instituted in the Word, we see that Abraham could bless whomever he wanted. One of the most famous rabbis in Jewish history observes that if Abraham could bless whomever he wanted, doing so becomes a privilege that God gave to us as the children of Abraham. In fact, it is commanded. In Numbers chapter six, God told Moses to have Aaron and his sons stand before the people and “You will bless the Sons of Israel in this way….”

If you have been grafted-in by faith to the House of Israel, any blessing that is in the Word for the Sons of Israel includes you. To refute Replacement Theology: Christians may borrow and apply God’s promises to themselves … we just cannot steal them!

Here, then, is the Aaronic benediction (Numbers 6:24–26):

The Lord bless you and keep you;
The Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up His countenance on you and give you peace.

This blessing is the role of the high priest. In the natural sphere, it was Aaron. In our lives, it is the great high Priest, Yeshua/Jesus, who blesses us with this Word. As Believers, when we hear this verse, He is blessing us with divine grace. His face shines upon us.

There are two New Testament references to the shining of Yeshua’s face. The first occurs on the Mount of Transfiguration, where Jesus is revealed in light.

Matthew 17:1 After six days Jesus took with him Peter, James, and John the brother of James, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. 2 There he was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light. 3 Just then there appeared before them Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus.

The disciple’s reaction?
6 When the disciples heard this, they fell facedown to the ground, terrified.

In Revelation we learn that no sun will be needed because of the Son! When John sees the Son of God from the island of Patmos—his reaction?

Rev 1:16 In his right hand he held seven stars, and coming out of his mouth was a sharp, double-edged sword. His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance. 17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead.

There is something about the revelation of who He is that increases light in our lives. In fact, when He was up there on the Mount of Transfiguration with the disciples, He was shining in such a way that they were compelled to see into eternity, as was John in his revelation.

How is this possible? Because He is 100% God and 100% man, He can silence and flatten us with His majesty, and simultaneously call us to be blessed in the most intimate familial way.

It was Yeshua revealing Himself in the Old Testament, in this benediction. Jesus later revealed to John that it was He who appeared as the Angel of the Lord to the patriarchs. The many instances when He appears before His incarnation refer to Him as the Angel of the Lord, as Light, as the One with the meaningful Word for whomever is seeking it.

Daniel 10:5, Daniel 7:13, Ezekiel 1:26, and Exodus 24:1 all illustrate instances of these “theophanies,” or pre-incarnate appearances of Jesus. Israeli Messianic leader Asher Intrater is releasing a new book, Who Ate Lunch with Abraham?, which is a wry but pithy way of opening the subject.

God does not want us to die when we encounter His glory! In Exodus 33, God limited Himself so that overexposure would not overwhelm Moses. In their exchange, Moses pleads: 18 And he said, “Please, show me Your glory.” 19 Then He said, “I will make all My goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim the name of the LORD before you. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” 20 But He said, “You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live.” 21 And the LORD said, “Here is a place by Me, and you shall stand on the rock. 22 So it shall be, while My glory passes by, that I will put you in the cleft of the rock, and will cover you with My hand while I pass by. 23 Then I will take away My hand, and you shall see My back; but My face shall not be seen.”

Again in Exodus 34, when Moses came down from the mountain after fellowshipping with the Lord, the light and glory of God that was on him was so intense that he covered his own face so that the Israelites wouldn’t plotz (Yiddish for fall down dead).

29 Now it was so, when Moses came down from Mount Sinai (and the two tablets of the Testimony were in Moses’ hand when he came down from the mountain), that Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone while he talked with Him. 30 So when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him.

In the Brit Hadashah (New Testament), God in His mercy put scales over Rav Shaul’s (Paul’s) eyes so that he wouldn’t fry from seeing the glorious face of the Lord. God covered him and healed him, because that is how God is—full of grace and mercy.

The Talmud (oral history) refers to the blessing that Aaron gave as the “lifting of the hands.” (Does this sound familiar? Lift up holy hands in the sanctuary? Psalm 28:2, 1 Timothy 2:8)

When we pronounce this blessing, we lift our hands with the sign of the Hebrew letter shin. The high priest would hold his hands that way because “shin” is the first letter of Shaddai. It is El Shaddai—the mighty God; it is the big word for God in His majesty.

The priests make this sign because at the end of the Aaronic blessing, the Scripture says, “They shall invoke My name on the sons of Israel and I then will bless them.” The expectation is that God will actually DO what He says when the benediction is proclaimed.

When I pray for our congregation at Beth Shalom, I always say that this is intended to be substantive. In other words, this is intended to put the name of God in the hearer so that each person leaves the service with an impartation. Throughout Scripture, God declares that His blessing flows from generation to generation. He never limited His love to the first generation. Over and over, Scripture reminds the reader that His love carries over a thousand generations.

  • Exodus 20:6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love Me and keep My commandments.
  • Deuteronomy 5:10 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love Me and keep My commandments.
  • Deuteronomy 7:9 Know therefore that the LORD your God is God; He is the faithful God, keeping His covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love Him and keep His commandments.
  • 1 Chronicles 16:15 He remembers His covenant forever, the promise He made, for a thousand generations.
  • Psalm 105:8 He remembers His covenant forever, the promise He made, for a thousand generations.

In 1979, in a burial tomb near Jerusalem, archaeologist Gabriel Barkay discovered two tiny silver scrolls from the 7th century B.C. That is Isaiah’s time in history. When the artifacts were opened, archaeologists found the texts of the Aaronic blessing inside. That makes them one of the oldest known portions of Scripture in existence, and they pre-date the destruction of the Temple. These verses will bless you and your family as you mix them with faith.

“The Lord bless you …”
One of the most respected rabbis in our history says that this specifically touches material blessings: May your possessions increase. In other words, may God make you successful in your endeavors. Unlike the superficial “Prosperity Gospel” that presumes upon God, this is a clear edict from the throne of God that His desire is for His people to do well in this world—in concert with the totality of biblical teaching.

Moses ordains Aaron to priesthood

“… and keep you.”
To keep you is really to protect. “Behold, He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep” (Psalm 121:4). He is shomer Israel, the protector of Israel. He wants to protect you, He wants to keep you; He wants to let you know that His protection is part of the blessing.

“The Lord make His face shine upon you …”
Sometimes, Believers can’t tell how they are doing until someone else remarks an increase in the Believer’s life. A friend of mine—Ed Silvoso, a powerful teacher of marketplace paradigms—said, “The anointing is like bad breath, everyone knows you have it but you.” We can see it in each other, but sometimes we don’t see it in ourselves. Perhaps our inability to see the anointing we walk in is His way of helping us to remain humble.

“… and be gracious to you”
If we can be aware of this and do it, how much greater is the grace of God when He is smiling, especially upon those who have come into the life of Yeshua? It is expressed as “to be gracious to you.” The Hebrew word here, chanan, also translates as “favor.” The same concept appears in the New Testament as “grace.” So we receive this grace, this shining, this connection with the smiling face of the Lord, especially because of the finished work of Jesus on the cross.

“The Lord lift up His countenance on you …”
The rabbis explain that this is a way of saying that God is not mad at you. It is scriptural; the “good mood” of God is actually in the Old Testament—for example, Jeremiah 29:11. He is not angry at you; that is what this shining countenance is about: a reminder of His acceptance and positive plans for you.

The Hebrew language here indicates that, by “lifting” His face, God is not hiding His face from the hearer. He is not turned away, He is not angry; He is lifting His face to look the one He is blessing in the face, as the smiling and shining being that He is. The priestly benediction asks God to smile at us. Because of God’s unconditional love (chesed) for us, we can rest assured that God does lift His countenance toward us.

“… and give you peace.”
Peace, shalom, really is accomplished through the acceptance—the receiving—of the presence of the Lord.

Shalom is more than just the absence of conflict. It implies wholeness, complete ness, and a general sense of well-being. It is such a big, meaningful word that the only way to understand it is to look to Sar Shalom, the Prince of Peace. It is in the face of Jesus—in the face of who He is—that we can really understand and see what peace means. He is Sar Shalom, the Peace that surpasses all understanding (Philippians 4:7).

We all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory.—2 Corinthians 3:18

We behold the face of the Lord not with physical eyes, but with the eyes of the heart (Ephesians 1:18). As we behold the glory of the Lord by faith, we are transformed, little by little, in increasing stages, into His own image. And where is that glory? In the shining face of Yeshua!

The LORD said that when the priests bestow this blessing upon the Children of Israel, “they shall invoke My name on the sons of Israel, and I then will bless them” (Numbers 6:27).

When Jews and Arabs join together in the pursuit of Yeshua, peace reigns—that which cannot be achieved through political negotiations is imparted from Heaven to Earth. In a living example of the power of reconciliation, Jewish and Arab teens found the power of love in the arid deserts of the Middle East. This anecdote was posted on the Internet by the 10/40 Window Project Shalom/Salaam at http://www.joshuaproject.net/assets/booklets/AD2000-Shalom-Salam.pdf

Forty teenagers crowded the bus as it sped through the rolling hills toward the Middle Eastern desert. In the center, several Palestinian young people gathered around a durbeke (drum), some standing in the aisle, others in their seats, all enthusiastically singing choruses. Scattered around the bus, some Jewish young people and a few other Palestinians tried to join in. Others talked with friends, and a few listened to their own private music.

Few of the kids knew anyone except those from their own youth group, and those who did know each other stuck closely together. All shared a sense of anticipation, with apprehension at the many new faces and sounds. Would the experiment really work? Could they really overcome their many adolescent fears, cultural barriers, and language differences?

They were headed to a desert encounter sponsored by a Christian ministry called Musalaha (Arabic for “reconciliation”), which seeks to bring Jews and Arabs to a higher loyalty beyond ethnic and political loyalties. By taking the teenagers into the desert, away from the distractions of a turbulent society, Musalaha tries to build bridges across the many obstacles that divide the people of the Middle East. Through the shared hardships of the journey, Musalaha hopes that the young people will open their lives to the Holy Spirit, who will lead them to encounter one another in peace and unity in Jesus despite their different backgrounds and experiences.

“At first I was worried,” admitted one participant later. “So I kind of stayed in my group with my friends. It was hard to talk to the Arabs because not all of them spoke Hebrew or English. But I decided to reach out to those guys, and it worked! We gave each other funny nicknames, and pretty soon we really became friends. At the end of the trip, I was sad to see them go.”

Traveling by camel across the desert was a new experience for most of the kids, and they were not quite sure what to make of the growls and grunts the beasts emitted. “I was struck that the moments when the group was most united was when we were moving,” a counselor commented later. “Most of the kids started out with a partner or in groups of three: one leading the camel, one riding, and the other walking alongside. At each rest stop, they changed places, and before long the partnerships were well mixed.” At the end of each day the exhausted teenagers shared a meal of lentil stew, then molded themselves places on the desert floor and slept ’til daybreak.

It was good for us to be together like this—Arabs and Jews,” one girl observed later. A young man agreed: “We are joined by faith in Jesus our Messiah.”

“People who spend time in the desert are changed,” the group’s guide, Yoav, told them one morning. He listed biblical examples: Moses, Abraham, and Jesus. “In the future,” he told the teenagers, “if the seeds of anger and bitterness begin to grow in you, they’ll be choked by the seeds God has planted during our days together out here in the desert. The memories of this time will serve all of you—Palestinians and Jews—reminding you of friendships formed, faith shared, and that God binds His followers together in His love.”

The Musalaha ministry that sponsors the desert excursions was founded by Salim Munayer, an Israeli-Arab who grew up in the mixed Arab-Jewish community in Lod (biblical Lydda). Shortly after he became a Believer in Jesus in 1977, Salim realized that the conflict between Jews and Arabs was rooted in sin and separation from God. Through the desert encounters, he seeks to bring Jewish and Arab youth together in the true peace that they can find only in their shared faith in Jesus/Yeshua/Yasua/Isa.


A Jew (your messenger), an Egyptian, an Iranian, and an Arab illustrate the fruit of Sar Shalom, the Prince of Peace—the only REAL answer to the Middle East conflict. As we do this, the Lord’s face shines upon us all.

Sar Shalom the Prince of Peace can, and is, doing what no ideology or political process can do. It is a high calling that this ministry of ours shares with you. We continue to reach for salvation among the Jewish people and our Arab relatives. The miracle of Yeshua’s sacrifice makes it possible for peace to replace war in the soul of man—thus making it possible on Earth.

Only Jesus could make the photo (right) a reality—and ZLM is spreading the Word around the world.

During November, Zola Levitt Presents will broadcast Ruth: Your People Shall Be My People, proclaiming that gentiles and Jews can rise up together and call upon the Name above all names. We begin with an interview with Zola’s widow, Sandra. Then, the Ruth series includes awesome verse-by-verse teachings. Please tune in to watch:

A New Season of Ministry
Sandra interviews Myles and Katharine Weiss who provide on-location teaching for the upcoming series on Ruth. Senior Theologian Dr. Tom McCall reviews the history of Zola Levitt Ministries. Our travel manager, Tracie Robbins, talks about 2012’s March 11, June 3, and October 14 tours to Israel. Find more information at www.levitt.com/tours. Or contact Tracie at or (214) 696-9760.
Ruth—“The Covering”
Myles and Katharine Weiss guide us on Naomi and Ruth’s journey from Moab to Israel. God is bringing Jews and Christians together as never before. Israeli tour guide Arie Bar David shows the map of Judah and Moab.
Ruth—“Road to Bethlehem”
After suffering through ten years of famine, Naomi returns to Israel. Her faithful daughter-in-law declares, “Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God” (Ruth 1:16). Arie Bar David shows the route to Bethlehem.
Ruth—“Finding the Redeemer”
From Kibbutz Nan during the feast of Shavuot/Pentecost, Myles and Katharine tell of Naomi and Ruth’s arrival in Bethlehem at harvest time. The romance between Boaz and Ruth begins to blossom. We enjoy music from our friends Sasha and Anya.
Ruth—“Breaking of Bread”
Boaz asks Ruth to break bread with him. Our heavenly Father invites us into relationship with Him through His Son, Jesus (the Bread of Life). The story of Ruth and Boaz bears a similarity to the relationship of Myles and Katharine—Jew and gentile in the harvest field with the Lord.

Your messenger,
Myles
Myles


Aaronic Blessing

P.S. Please keep standing with us; Keep loving what God loves. May you receive His impartation today and always. And … Sha’alu Shalom Yerushalayim—Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem.

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