Baldness of the Head and Heart

“Now  Korach [baldness] the son of K’hat [Kohath, allied or to ally oneself], the son of Levi [attached], along with Datan [strong] and Aviram [exalt my Father], the sons of Eli’av [El is my Father], and On, the son of Pelet [escape, deliverance, swiftness] descendants of Re’uven [Behold a son ] took men and rebelled against Moshe [drawn out , rescued].  Siding with them were 250 men of Isra’el, leaders of the community, key members of the council, men of reputation [but not Levites].” ~ Numbers16:1,2

The Punishment of Korah (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

[Is there a hidden message in the names of these verses? If you read the names from latter to first it could read: [You will be] rescued or drawn out of the [flood] waters, [if you] behold the Son, [who will bring] escape, deliverance swiftly! O El is Father, exalt El, [be] strong and attached  [to Him] like an ally, or mourn, shaving the hair of your head~]

“When Moshe heard this he fell on his face.”~ v. 4

“Then he said to Korach [baldness]…”…ADONAI will show who are His and who is the holy person… near to Himself…”.~v.5

“…Take censers…put fire …incense in them …”. ~v.6

Korach  and the Kohathites, sons of Levi, were servants in the Tabernacle, assigned to assist Aharon the cohen [priest] and his sons: “They are to carry out his duties and the duties of the whole community before the Tent of Meeting …in charge of all the furnishings…their one responsibility in regard to the people of Isra’el is to serve him [Numbers 3:7-9]”:

• “The K’hat [Kohath] clans were to camp next to the tabernacle, toward the south [Numbers 3:29].”
• “They were responsible for the ark, the table [of Bread of Presence], the Menorah, the altars [sacrificial & incense], the utensils the cohanim use when they serve in the Holy Place, the curtain, and everything involved with the maintenance of these things [Numbers 3:31].”

Moshe said to Korach [baldness], ” Listen…is it for you [sons of Levi] a mere trifle that the Elohim of Isra’el has separated you…to bring you close to Himself…do the work…of ADONAI and stand before the community serving them? [Numbers 16:8-9]”

• Moshe accused Korach [baldness] :”Now you want the office of cohen too? [v.10-11]”
• When Moshe sends for Datan [strong] and Aviram [exalt my Father], also Levites, they refuse [v.12-14]!
• Korach [baldness] assembles all the 250 with fire in their censers; he is still  angry  against Moshe the next morning. No mourning, no repentance, nor grief  in his heart noted in the morning!

“But I tell you that anyone who nurses anger against his brother will be subject to judgement; that whoever calls his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing!” will be brought before the Sanhedrin; that whoever says, ‘Fool!’ incurs the penalty of burning in the fire of Gei-Hinnom [Matthew/ Mattityahu 5:22]!”

English: The Fire of Atonement, as in Numbers 16:41-50, watercolor by James Tissot (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

• The glory of ADONAI appears to all  in the morning and ADONAI commands the earth to open and swallow Korach, Datan and Aviram and all their households. “So they and everything they owned went down alive into Sh’ol. …Then fire came out…and destroyed the 250 men who had offered the incense [v.31-35]”.

The brass fire pans became holy and were hammered into plates to cover the  incense altar: “…to remind the people of Isra’el that an ordinary person not descended from Aharon is not to approach and burn incense before ADONAI [16:39-40]”.

• Baldness [qorha or qarah, Korach] is “mourning” baldness, when the head hair of an Isra’elite is shaved to grieve, and clothes are torn, as a mark of mourning for the dead.
• The culture of mourning today includes entering the house, lamenting and grieving, sitting “shiva”, 7 days, with mirrors covered, bringing food, preparing a meal, bringing comfort and consolation [see Jeremiah 16:5-9].
• Otherwise, Isra’elites were FORBIDDEN to shave their heads, lest they be like the peoples around them.
• In the Tanakh [Holy Scriptures] hair has a increasing importance and is called the crown of glory when gray [Proverbs  16:31].
• Fallen hair or natural baldness is considered “clean” while a red and /or white spot on the scalp is “unclean” and under Levitical law as in Leviticus 13:40-45.

Pending judgement of ADONAI  and possible death, should have brought a change in Korach the Levite. As in Isaiah 3:24, there should have been :

“…instead of perfume, a stench; instead of a belt, a rope; instead of a well-set hair, a shaved scalp; instead of a rich robe, a sackcloth skirt; and a slave-brand instead of beauty.”

It may be said of Korach and the sons of Levi:

“That day Adonai Elohim-Tzva’ot [LORD of Hosts] called on you to weep and mourn, to shave your heads and wear sackcloth; but instead one sees joy and celebrating, killing of oxen, slaughtering of sheep, eating of meat, drinking of wine–‘Let’s eat and drink now, because tomorrow we’ll be dead!’ [Isaiah 22:12-13]”.

Was the “mark of mourning”, the shaved head on Elisha when he was taunted by boys , misunderstanding him, in Kings 2:23? Was he grieving the death of  prophet Eliyahu  the Tishbite [ Tishbe ~recourse ] of Gilead, [~heap of testimony east of the Yarden ] and so shaved his head? Natural baldness or mourning?

• As the fiery chariot with horses of fire separated Eliyahu [Elijah] from Elisha. Elisha grieved and  cried out, “My father! My father! The chariots and horsemen of Isra’el [2 Kings 2:12]”. Then he lost sight of Eliyahu , seized his clothes, tearing them in half! Picking up Eliyahu’s prayer shawl, he struck the Yarden [Jordan], saying, ” Where is ADONAI, the G-d of Eliyahu?” And the Yarden divided! [v. 11-14]

“Elisha left to go up to Beit-El [House of El]. As he was on his way up the road, some boys came out of the town [not recognizing him for healing the waters of Yericho with salt to halt death & miscarriage,{v.19-22}?] and began making fun of him [ Lev. 21:5 Priests shall not make baldness on their heads for the dead ?]. ‘Go on up, baldy! Go on up, baldy!’ He looked behind him, saw them, and put a curse on them in the name of ADONAI, whereupon 2 female bears came out of the woods and mauled 42 of the boys [v. 23-24]”!

The cohen [priest] of  the sons of Aaron could not make himself unclean except for close blood relatives, “…because he is a leader among his people… [Leviticus 21 v.4]

“Rather they [cohanim] are to be holy for their God…they are the ones who present ADONAI with offerings made by fire, the BREAD of their God…[v.6].

Korach [baldness] was a K’hat son of Levi  but not a cohen. Also, Korach was not Aharon’s descenant, and so, was not forbidden to shave his head? Yet he certainly had “baldness” of the heart and neither mourned nor shaved his head . His “baldness  of the heart” was his sin and so he was judged by the Holy One.

Elisha a follower of Eliyahu the prophet mourned and grieved his death,  shaved his head as his mark of mourning for the dead.

Conclusion: Baldness

1. While from natural causes, it  was not uncommon to shave heads as signs of mourning (2 Kings 2:23; Isa. 3:24). With the  Isra’elites  artificial baldness was a sign of mourning (Isa. 22:12; Jer. 7:29; 16:6); it also marked the conclusion of a Nazarite’s vow (Acts 18:18; 21:24; Num. 6:9).

1. a. The cohanim were forbidden to shave heads ; they were disqualified for the priesthood if they had any defect (Lev. 21:20). One had to be perfect to present the BREAD of ADONAI.
2. The people of the land such as the Egyptians shaved their heads, only allowing the hair to grow as a sign of mourning!
3. Baldness is often alluded to (Micah 1:16; Amos 8:10; Jer. 47:5)
4. The Isra’elites were forbidden to follow the customs of surrounding nations in making themselves bald (Deut. 14:1) except for mourning the dead.

Baldness references

Lev. 21:5 Priests shall not make baldness on their heads.

Deut. 14:1 God’s children are not to disfigure themselves in mourning.

2 Ki. 2:23-24 Bears destroy the children that mocked Elisha.

Isa. 3:24 The judgments which shall be for the pride of the women.

15:2 The lamentable state of Moab.

Jer. 16:6 Do not make yourself bald for the dead that are punished.

47:5 The destruction of the Philistines.

48:37 Moabites shall be bald with beards clipped.

Eze. 7:18 The mournful repentance of them that escape.

27:31 And they shall make themselves utterly bald for thee.

Amos 8:10 I will bring baldness upon every head.

Mic. 1:16 Micah exhorts to mourning.

Baldness [from Wikipedia]

The religious meaning of hair dates back before the Bible as a symbol of faith, truth and higher mind.  Jesus, Sampson & the prophets, never cut their hair because they believed it further connected them to God. Sampson’s story is that of a judge or religious leader with long hair and super-natural powers that become weak when his head was shaved. Conversely, the shaving of the head can be an act of grieving. The symbolic nature of hair depends on the religious tradition of each culture.

Jewish men are often seen with long, flowing beards that they never cut. The older they get, the longer the beard and the greater the wisdom. This symbolizes their connection to the divine element. Ancient Israelites considered baldness a sign of calamity and grief.

Need More Victory in Your Life? Dig a Ditch!

  If I washed myself with snow water, and cleansed my hands with soap,  then You would plunge me into a ditch,  and my garments shall abhor me! [Job 9:30-31]

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Yahweh‘s soap opera: we can’t wash ourselves; only He can!  Many a king of Israel and Judah lost their way , not following Yahweh nor keeping His commands nor having a personal relationship with Him, like David. And they were dirty!

King Yahoram [~Yahweh-raised]  of Israel was dirty:   although removed the statue of Ba’al [v.2] :

1. He worshiped Ba’al and clung to the sins of Yarob’am [2K 3:3].
2. As Yarob’am,  Yahoram did not exalt HaShem [substitute title for YHWH], never became His servant, nor kept His Torah & commands like David [1K 14:7-9]!
3. Yarob’am was the first king to have Israel worship calves of gold, similar to the bull of Wall Street [1K 12:28],
4. Yarob’am had Israel worship not in Jerusalem as commanded,  but in Beth El and Dan, as high places and sites of idol worship, &
5. Yarob’am appointed his own priests, not Levitical, and  performed sacrifice rituals at altars!

And you dug a ditch between the two walls for the water of the old pool. But you have not looked to its Maker, nor have you seen Him who fashioned it long ago. [Isaiah 22:11]

This king gets a threat from the king of Moab .  King Meysha was a sheep breeder and had paid off Yahoram’s father not to revolt. Since Ahab was now dead, Meysha revolts and is on the attack! Meysha ironically means in Hebrew ” safety” !  [The name Meysha  similarly derives from “yasha” to be open, free, or deliver , as Yeshua, the Great Shepherd!]

King Yahoram does not seek the face of HaShem. Rather, he first counts or musters up Israel men to fight. Then he messages the king of Judah to fight with him, & they pick up the king of Edom on the 7 day journey …and find themselves in the desert, with no water  for their army & livestock! Then Yahoram says, “What! Has YHWH called these 3 kings…?” when HaShem  was never consulted!

“Who do we call?”

Yahoshaphat, the king of Judah asked, “Is there no prophet of YHWH here [v.11]?”.  They go to inquire of Elisha, ” who poured water out on the hands of Eliyahu [ ~ Elijah ]”.

Psalms 7: 14-15 says to note “he who is bound with wickedness, conceived trouble and brought forth falsehood”, that ” he has made a pit and dug it out, and falls into the ditch he made”!

Elisha looked at Yahoram and said to all 3 kings, ” What have I to do with you?”  But Elisha  respected the king of Judah so he requested a harpist, entered into worship of Yahweh. “And it came to be…that the Yad-YHWH, the hand of Yahweh, came upon Elisha [v. 15]! Only then did he receive a word from HaShem:

And he said, “Thus said YHWH, ‘Make this wadi [dry river bed] ditches-ditches.'” [v.16]

For thus said YHWH, ‘You are not going to see wind nor rain. Yet that wadi is to be filled with water…

And this shall be but a light matter in the eyes of YHWH. And He shall give Moab into your hand.

Ditches were dug ! The grain offering was offered in the morning ! [According to Leviticus 6:15, frankincense was applied to the grain, and it was burnt for a sweet fragrance, as a remembrance portion to YHWH…eaten with unleavened bread , the priests were to eat it ….a Law forever in the generations [v.18]!]

Water came from the east….the land was filled with water! Mayim! Mayim! [~waters]!

Moab arose early in that morning too! The enemy saw the waters as red as blood! Blood is symbolic of the blood covering of Yeshua.

And they thought, ” This is blood. The kings have …killed one another!” Yet, when they came to the camp of the king Yahoram, Yisra’el ambushed them! HaShem indeed had given them the victory! The enemy was smitten and spoiled! They did as instructed by HaShem: Yisra’el broke their cities, made the land stony so  they could not plow nor grow food, stopped up all the wells and fountains of waters and cut down all the good trees!

• Miracle: ditches full of water without seeing rain nor wind, usually from the south, in a dry place! The rain came from the East, symbolic of the Eternal One, sending His Spirit for cleansing and filling! The waters were as the blood of Yeshua, cleansing us and covering us, for life eternal!
• The Israelites had to do something: dig the ditches [~geb: Hebrew; a well or cistern or pit! ] , chase the enemy, beat down cities, cast stones, stop all wells, chop down good trees !
• Ditch ~ also miqvah, SC #4724: collection reservoir, pool used for purification or baptismal cleansing

I open rivers on bare hills, and fountains in the midst of valleys; I make a wilderness become a pool of water, and a dry land springs of water! [Isaiah 41:18]

Wash me completely from my guilt, and cleanse me from my sin. [Psalms 51:2]

Cleanse me with hyssop ( dipped in the blood of the Lamb ~ Exodus 12) , and I am clean; wash me and I am whiter than snow. [v. 7]

Go wash in the pool of Shiloah (~ Shiloh, the Messiah sent)…so he went and washed and came seeing! [John 9:7]

He saved us, not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to His compassion, through the washing of rebirth, and renewal by the Holy Spirit, which He poured  out on us richly through Yeshua Je’sus Christ our Savior…[Titus 3:5-6]!

The One who went to the pit of Hell Himself for us after shedding His Blood on the cross…the One who loves us so much and washes us from from our sins…the One who makes us kings and priests…look, He is coming with the clouds, and every eye shall see Him, even they who pierced Him. [Revelation 1:5-7; Zechariah 12:10]

May we dig a ditch, empty out ourselves, so He could fill us to the overflow!

But whoever drinks of the water I give him shall certainly never thirst. And the water that I give him shall become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life! [John 4:14]

Ditch digging is hard work!

But Yeshua says…, ‘No one, having put his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the reign of the LORD’ [Luke 9:62]!

Like the Shunammite woman gathering all the empty vessels to be filled with oil, or the Israelites digging the wadi ditches, the deeper you dig the more you receive. You will get as much as you can receive! HaShem wants to bless us and lead us into victory. So…let us not be as  2 blind men leading each other, for both shall fall into the ditch! [Matthew 15:14]

“Gird Up Your Loins…”: Girdle, don’t leave home without it!

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Let your loins be girded and your lamps burning [Luke 12:35]!

Loins or motnayim in Hebrew, can be the waist, the back or two sides of the back, from an unused root, mothen, to be slender. Usually though, loins refer to the lower part of the abdomen and groin considered as the seat of physical strength or generative power.

“To gird up one’s loins” means to prepare for strenuous activity. “To gird” is ‘azar to belt or bind; shanas, to compress with a belt; chagar, put on or fasten.

Men wore and still wear a girdle or belt for support! Eliyah the Tishbite was described in 2 Kings 1:8 as “…a hairy man” who “…wore a leather girdle around his waist.” So also Yohanan John the Immerser who wore camel’s hair and a leather girdle around his waist [Matthew 3:4]!

PARABLE OF THE GIRDLE

Jeremiah was told by Yahweh to get a linen girdle, put it on his loins but not wash it! Then Yahweh told him to take it, arise & go to Perath to hide it in a hole in the rock. [Perath means to break forth , rushing, for example, the Euphrates, a river of the East.]  After so many days, he was commanded to arise, go back to Perath, dig and take the girdle , which was completely useless. The girdle became symbolic of Yahweh’s people , as in verses 9-11 of chapter 13:

Thus said Yahweh, ‘Thus I ruin the pride of Yahudah and the great pride of Yerushalayim…refuse to hear My Words, who walk in the stubbornness of their heart, and walk after other mighty ones to serve them and to bow, is like this girdle which is completely useless.

For as the girdle clings to the loins of a man, so I have caused all the house of Yisra’el…and Yahudah to cling to Me…to become Mine-for a people, and for a name, and for a praise, and for an adoring. But they did not listen!

The girdle was worn figuratively in Isaiah 11: 5 describing the Rod of Jesse/  Netzer of Yishai , our Messiah Y’shua: “…righteousness shall be the girdle of His loins, and trustworthiness the girdle of His waist“!

In Daniel’s vision , chapter 10, he saw “…a certain man dressed in linen, whose loins were girded with gold of Uphaz…his body was like beryl …his face like the appearance of lightning…his eyes like torches of fire…arms and feet like polished bronze…the sound of his words like the sound of a crowd [v. 5-6]”!

As in Ephesians 6: 10-18, we are to be strong in the Master and in the mightiest of His strength. However, we are to put on the complete armor of Elohim, so that we have the power to stand against the schemes of the devil:

Stand, then, having girded your waist with truth , and having put on the breastplate of righteousness…taken up the shield of belief…the helmet of deliverance, and the sword of the Ruach/ Spirit…!

As Nehemiah built the Jerusalem wall, the enemy arose, conspiring together to come to fight! “But we prayed to our Elohim, and stood a watch against them day and night, because of them [4:6-9]”! Nehemiah appointed people with bows, shields, spears, and swords to stand guard while the builders worked with one hand, the other hand holding a weapon [v.13, 17-18]! The sword as a weapon is the Word at our side, in our hearts and minds:

As for the builders, each one had his sword girded at his side as he built. And the one who sounded the ram’s horn/ shofar  was beside me!

“Girding up the loins” means we must make “ready for action”! Eliyah/ Elijah ran ahead of the foretold rains and Ahab, who rode:

And the hand of Yahweh was on Eliyah. And he girded up his loins and ran ahead of Ahab to the entrance of Yizre’el [1 Kings 18:46]!

• Elisha, in 2 Kings 4:29, sends his servant on ahead of him : “Gird up your loins, and take my staff in your hand, and go…and you shall lay my staff on the face of the child”!
• “And Elisha the navi/ prophet called one of the sons of the nevi’im/prophets, and said to him, ‘Gird your loins and take this flask of oil in your hand, and go to Ramoth-Gil’ad‘ [2Kings 9:1]”!
• Yahweh instructed Moshe and Aharon , in Exodus 12, about the Passover: “And this is how you eat it: your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand…[v.11]”!
• Yahweh also instructed Jeremiah/Yirmeyahu: “Now gird up your loins and arise, and speak to them all that I command you. Do not break down before their faces, lest I break you before them. For look, I have made you this day…and they shall fight against you, but not prevail…for I AM with you…to deliver you [1: 17-19]”!
  

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The loins also are “the seat of strength” and generative power!  Deuteronomy 33: 11, Moshe prays, ‘ O Yahweh, bless his strength [ the tribe of Lewi, the Levites], and accept the work of his hands. Strike through the loins of those who rise against him…”.

The “capable wife” of Proverbs 31 girds her loins with strength and strengthens her arms [v.17]!

She shall make fine linen and sell them, and shall give girdles for the merchants [v.24]!

The loins also are the “seat of keen pain, due to grief or dread” ! Yahweh declared to Amos , chapter 8:9-10, how He would darken the sun at noon, turn their festivals into mourning and bring sackcloth on all loins.

Therefore my loins are filled with anguish; pangs have seized me, like the pangs of a woman in labor. I was distressed when I heart it; I was troubled when I saw it [Isaiah/ Yeshayahu 21:3].

Kepha/ Peter speaks to us who receive the Good News, of Salvation through the Messiah Y’shua,  by the Ruach ha’Qodesh/ the Holy Spirit:

Therefore, having girded up the loins of your mind, being sober, put your expectation perfectly upon the favor that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Y’shua ha’Mashiah, as obedient children…as the One who called you is qodesh/holy…[1 Peter/ Kepha 1: 12-16]”.

Y’shua had warned Kepha, saying ” Truly…when you were younger you girded yourself…when you are old…another shall gird you and bring where you do not want [Yohanan/ John 21:18]”, speaking of his death as a martyr.

And in the perfect words of the greatest rabbi/ teacher, Y’shua Je’sus the Messiah and our LORD,

Let your loins be girded and your lamps burning [Luke 12:35]!

Blessed are those servants who the Master, when He comes, shall find watching [praying]. Truly, I say to you that He shall gird Himself and make them sit down to eat, and shall come and serve them [v.37]!

May we let the Master gird us with His Righteousness and Truth and keep our lamps lit and burning bright! HalleluYah! Glory! Ahmein….shalom!

 

 

 

Lest I Be a Castaway by the Moth

“And the earth was corrupt before Elohim, Almighty God, and the earth was filled with violence… for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth…” [Genesis 6:11-12]

•  Corrupt [shaw-kath in Hebrew] :  to decay, cause ruin, cast off, perish, spoil or waste .

“Therefore, diligently guard yourselves…lest you should do corruptly & shall make for yourselves a carved image…[Deuteronomy 4:15, 16, 25]”.

Moses said to Levites, elders & officers of the 12 tribes : “For I know that after my death you shall do very corruptly & turn aside from the Way which I have commanded you…[31:29]”.

The fool who says in his heart, ” There is no Yahweh”, has done corruptly an abominable deed! [Psalm 14:1]

Job 13:28 “So man wastes away like something rotten, like a garment eaten by moths.”

Yahweh says in Jeremiah 8:12, ” Were they ashamed when they had done  abomination? No!…nor did they know how to blush. So they shall fall among those who fall. They shall stumble in the time of their visitation, ” said Yahweh”.

Abomination done? “The time of their visitation” ? Waste away as clothes eaten by moths?

• Abominations: do not obey or incline the ear to Yahweh; walk in the counsels, in the stubbornness of their evil heart & go backward & not forward [Jeremiah 7:24]!

1. Abominations :adultery, gossip, falsehoods, deception!

“Their tongue is a slaying arrow. It speaks deceit-speaks peaceably to his neighbor with his mouth, but in his heart he makes his ambush [9:8]”.

• The time of their visitation: As Moshe [Moses]says in Numbers 16: 29, all men are visited as all men are reckoned with or charged or appointed by Yahweh! Peq-u-dah means  in the Hebrew, an official account, charge,  custody, office, order, reckoning or visitation! It comes from paw-qad, to visit, with either friendly or hostile intent; appoint, avenge, bestow, commit, deliver to keep, be empty, enjoin, go see, hurt, do judgment…and punish.

1. Visitation of Yahweh can either preserve our spirit [Job 10:12], or cause us to perish [Jeremiah 8:12, 10:15, 51:18]. The days of punishment did come already for Israel, as in Hosea 9:1- 7, and would come for Judah!

And as He [Yeshua Jesus] came near, He saw the city & wept over it, saying, ” If you only knew…because the days shall come upon you when your enemies shall build a rampart around you & surround you & press you on all sides, and dash you to the ground & your children with you…you did not know the time of your visitation  [Luke 19:41-44].”

This prophecy of Yeshua was fulfilled in 70 AD in Jerusalem and soon after at Masada: all there committed suicide rather than be taken by the Romans, who  set up ramparts around them!

“Listen to Me, you who know righteousness…in whose heart is My Torah: do not fear…nor be afraid…

For a moth eats them like a garment, and a worm eats them like wool; but My righteousness is forever, and My deliverance to all generations  [Isaiah 51:7-8]”.

The Servant [Messiah]  said , in Isaiah 50:9, ” See, the Master Yahweh helps Me. Who would declare Me wicked?

See, all of them wear out like a garment, a moth eats them.”

• Moths waste, spoil,  & ruin clothes by eating holes in them. A wool coat or jacket will eventually show holes if not kept in a cedar closet with cedar oil ”moth balls”!

• Moth is #6211 SC: awsh, from aw-shesh, to be consumed, to shrink or fail! The moth consumes as a larvae worm and adult and is itself consumed and dies , too! We have all seen the moth attracted to the light, in the darkness, only to get burned!
•  Yeshua said not only man  but his possessions waste away like something rotten, like a garment eaten by moths. So store up treasures in heaven , not to be eaten  by moths!

 Matthew 6:19-20  : “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in the heavens, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.”

1. This moth is to lay waste, oppress, crush in judgement, “…because he walked after the command when it pleased him [Hosea 5: 11]”.

“So I AM to Ephrayim like a moth, and to the house of Yahudah like rottenness  [v. 12]”.

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” How silently the moth makes its way into the best wardrobe, and what dreadful destruction it makes of the wool clothing! Its deadly work is always on the best garments.

It is even so with sin. To so many people Adam’s sin was so small that it did not amount to anything, and yet see how it has affected the whole human race. It has made the earth to heave and groan. It has robbed heaven of millions  and has also built our great state prisons, which are in a sense our hells on earth.

For our state prisons are places of banishment and punishment, and sin has filled them with precious human souls, and has kindled its fires of sin and vice and degradation, and has finally populated hell with precious souls, where “the smoke of their torment ascends upward for ever and ever.”
The enemy has tried to make you believe, no doubt, that the thing you have committed is so small
it doesn’t amount to anything, or will never harm you; but just stop and think a moment of that one
sin of Adam. Think of the wrecked homes, broken hearts, ruined lives, blighted prospects; think of
the wails, moans, and groans of the offspring of Adam; and all of this misery and wretchedness was
brought about by only one sin. “

“How much more those that dwell in houses of clay , whose foundation is in the dust, who are crushed before the moth?” [ Job 4:19]

Yahweh is our Maker, the Righteous one. If we as mortal man, put our trust in Him, we build on the Rock, a solid foundation!  He shall charge His heavenly malachim or angels over us to protect us, morning to evening. We shall not perish unlike the moth attracted to the light! We become His Beloved and live, with wisdom , knowledge, and understanding of the Eternal Holy One!

     “When You [Yahweh] correct man for iniquity with rebukes, You make his  beauty to consume away like a moth: surely every man is vanity. Selah. [Psalms 39:11]”.

Our hope [tikvah] is in Yahweh who through Yeshua Jesus Messiah will deliver us from all  our transgressions, and hears our prayers!

“O spare me so that I may recover strength, before I go away, and am no more! [v.13]

See, behold, Yahweh Elohim, has made a Way to raise from decay and the pit of destruction  [shaw-kath] through Yeshua Jesus Christ!

“For the creation was subjected to futility…because of Him who subjected it, in anticipation, that the creation itself also shall be delivered from the bondage to corruption INTO the esteemed freedom of the children of Elohim GOD [Romans 8: 20-21]”!

“…So also is the resurrection of the dead: it is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption…sown in disrespect;, it is raised in esteem; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body; there is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.  [ 1 Corinthians 15:41-43]

“And this I say, brothers, that flesh and blood is unable to inherit the reign of Elohim, neither does corruption inherit incorruption.[v.50]”

See, I speak a secret to you: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the …dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.[51-52]

“O Death, where is your sting? O grave, where is your overcoming [v.55]?”

But thanks to Yahweh who gives us the overcoming through our Master Yeshua ha Mashiach. [v.57]

“Do not be led astray: Elohim is not mocked….he who sows to his own flesh shall reap corruption...he who sows to the Spirit shall reap everlasting life…[Galatians 6:8]”!

As Peter, servant of Yeshua said, we have been given exceedingly great & precious promises! So, through Yahweh’s Mighty power, we escape from the corruption in the earth, caused by lust! [2 Peter 1:4] Let us not again get entangled in the defilement of the world, but be over comers through Yeshua Jesus Christ our Savior. [2:20] Ahmein!

“Your riches have rotted, and your garments have become moth-eaten. [James 5:2]!”

“Your gold & silver have become rusty…a witness against you…shall eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days [v.3]!”

“You have lived on the earth in pleasure & luxury, you have fattened your hearts, as in a day of slaughter [v.5].”

“Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Master has drawn near [v. 8b]!”