Category: Weekly Torah Portion Reading

Wee the People.

Did you have to memorize the preamble to the Constitution in school?

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution…”

I never had a problem memorizing things for school. It was getting up in front of people that was terrifying. Eighth grade was a veritable shark tank of hormones, cliques, and mean girls and guys. A public mistake likely meant a nickname you didn’t want. Not much tranquility among “we the people” in junior high.

We the people. The politicians did get a few things right back then. A sense of common identity, community, mutual respect, and all those things that define a people group were at the top of their agenda. Not a bad start for a government defining and agreeing on what “constitutes” a nation.

But the signers of the Declaration of Independence and Constitution didn’t want a king, even a good one.

Israel in the wilderness was a miracle, a people group preserved in Egypt over hundreds of years without losing their identity. They had a king, a pharaoh, yet they kept their own language. They kept their tribal identity. These things became even more defined in the wilderness when they received their covenant in Hebrew, affirming their collective mission.

Each tribe’s blessings were clarified, territory defined in the encampment, leaders chosen and instructed. A central place of worship nestled in their center, reminding them that they should provide for the common defense of the Ark, maintain their boundaries in tranquility, and look to the welfare of their families so that their posterity would be able to enter and inhabit the Land of Promise.

Their King was YHVH, Who betrothed them to Himself at Mount Sinai. Everyone signed on with “We will do, and we will hear.” Unlike the Tower of Bavel, where human beings united to build a name for themselves, Israel united to build the Name of the Holy One of Israel. There is ultimate power in unity, which is reflected in our proclamation of the greatest commandment: “Hear O Israel, the LORD your God, the LORD is One.”

What happens, though, when our “we” becomes my “I”? Oh, my.

The stutter-steps in the wilderness occurred when the I’s developed an independent agenda or envied others. There were rebellions against the authority of Moses and Aaron, rebellions against the mitzvot, even passive-aggressive disobedience. In the wilderness, that means just not showing up when you know you should.

Each problem emerged when “I” outweighed “we the people.” Even rebel groups were not truly a “we.” They had different agendas, so they were bound as “we” only in dissatisfaction, which would not be enough to hold them together had they been successful, such as Korach and the Reuvenites. Truth is, they were a collection of “I’s”.

The secret to a successful “we”, as in “We will do, and we will hear,” or “We the people,” is that we have to become wee people. Smaller than our egos tell us we should or ought to be. Or, in some cases, bigger than our fears will allow us to be. In that case, doing more is actually an act of humility. If we obey the fear, we will not be fruitful in the congregation. We have to make the fear smaller and our Divine spiritual calling greater. Great faith means wee fear.

WE are not alone as we battle our egos or our fears:

“Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us…” (He 12:1)

The clouds surrounded the Israelites in the wilderness. Within the cloud were many witnesses to the exodus from Egypt, the miracles along the way, and the national purpose to build the Kingdom of the only true King of Kings. “I” could never forget what “we” experienced because there were so many witnesses in the surrounding cloud. What I experienced was what we experienced.

This is a race we run together. The only time there is one runner is called a “walk-over” in horse racing. It means that there is an entry in the race that is so formidable that no one else dares even enter another horse in the race. That horse has only to walk over the finish line. In other sports, a walkover occurs when the opposing team forfeits because of the overwhelming skill of the opponent.

The race is not against other believers! The race is against the enemy within, the sin that so easily bogs us down, entangles us. Did you know that every horse race is designed to be a theoretical dead heat? The track experts rate each horse, and then the faster ones with more stamina carry extra weight in their saddles to slow them. Less proven horses carry less weight so they can run faster.

Although there is rarely a true dead heat, that is the goal. Within the Bride of Messiah, however, that is the ONLY way we finish the race, together. We might look around and point the finger at others for interfering with us, blocking us, bumping us, discouraging us. With our race, however, Paul tells the Corinthians that WE are our own obstacles.

Our own sin, whether rebellious and aggressive, or rebellious and passive, is a burden, or “encumbrance” in the NASB. It’s not extra weight that someone else slips into our saddle, but extra weight we choose to carry. And we don’t have to. And we shouldn’t. Because we want to finish the race at the same time as everyone else. This is not a speed race, but a finishing race. To finish with everyone in the cloud is the win. That’s why Paul says it’s an endurance race. There are no walkovers in the cloud in the wilderness.

We are not alone in our walking race. The cloud of the Presence of Adonai with us includes the inspirational souls of Israel who have gone before in their royal priesthood bridal garments. Like all who would take the yoke of the Torah upon them were standing at Mt. Sinai, so we are part of that great cloud of witnesses…

As the Israelites neared the Promised Land at the end of their journey, Moses reminded them, “You are witnesses today…”

The goal is to finish the testing in the wilderness, which is a race of endurance, not speed. We are in the wilderness of the peoples. In the wilderness of the peoples, we also are surrounded by that great cloud of witnesses and the Presence of Adonai:

“Now not with you alone am I making this covenant and this oath, but both with those who stand here with us today in the presence of the LORD our God and with those who are not with us here today (for you know how we lived in the land of Egypt, and how we came through the midst of the nations through which you passed; moreover, you have seen their abominations and their idols of wood, stone, silver, and gold, which they had with them)…” (Dt 29:14–17).

Like the Israelites had to see the gods of Egypt and of the nations in their exodus, so the great cloud of witnesses are “with” us as we also journey, exiting Egypt, being tested for any shred of idolatry left within us from the “midst of the nations” where our wilderness of the peoples occurs.

Endurance is the race strategy, not speed. In this race, all finish at the same time, the resurrection of the dead. In the warning to Sardis in Revelation, Yeshua cautioned that not all who were called will be fully clothed in the supernatural garments that allow them to pass into and out of the “cloud” of New Jerusalem as they minister to the nations and kingdoms of the millennium. Although all were educated by Moses and the Ruach in the cloud in the wilderness, not all obeyed His compassionate mitzvot with joy, and they died in the wilderness. The Cloud expels rebels and practicing sinners. It re-assigns them to less holy spaces.

Nehemiah explains Israel’s royal priestly semi-Edenic journey, reiterating the special garments in a cloud dwelling where the Lamp was the Lamb, the Word of God, and they ruled the peoples from this portable Jerusalem/Temple. (Re 21)

“You, in Your great compassion did not forsake them in the wilderness; the pillar of cloud did not leave them by day, to guide them on their way, nor the pillar of fire by night, to light for them the way in which they were to go. You gave Your good Spirit to instruct them, Your manna You did not withhold from their mouth, and You gave them water for their thirst. Indeed, forty years You provided for them in the wilderness, and they were not in want; their clothes did not wear out, nor did their feet swell. You also gave them kingdoms and peoples…” (Ne 9:19-22)

From the wilderness the Israelites were educated how to rule kingdoms and peoples on behalf of the King of Kings. They had to see the abominations and idols in their journey in order to know how to minister to those peoples with the Light of the Torah. Although Hebrews, they understood the language of the Egyptians. They were to see what NOT to do; they weren’t supposed to absorb it and do it.

Although we are Israelites in the wilderness of the peoples, we speak the languages of our exile. We see their abominations and idols. And in spite of all we see in our many Egypts, we retain our identity and the Scripture, the Hebrew “language” of righteousness. We, like every other witness at Mount Sinai, are being educated by Moses and trained in righteousness by the Ruach HaKodesh. The Divine constitution of our nation rests in our midst, the Presence of our King among us, abiding among us through His Word.

We are no longer I.

For now, our temporary tribal territory has been defined so that we may observe the nations and their abominations and idols, so that we may intercede for them now, lead them to repentance, and demonstrate to them that even though we are many Hebrews, we are one in Messiah. We eat the same spiritual food and drink the same spiritual drink in this wilderness.

Where, you ask, is this manna and water in our wilderness?

It’s on your end table. Your nightstand. Your desk. Your laptop. Even your phone.

The Israelites had to walk out each morning together to gather the manna and draw water from the rock’s streams in the desert. We, however, have the Scriptures at our fingertips without ever leaving our homes, our chairs, or even our beds. Never has a wilderness generation had such easy access to manna and spiritual water of the Word.

Therein is a great blessing, and therein is a great danger.

When we don’t have to gather together to gather the Bread of Heaven, we can remain isolated in our feeding upon the Word. I read. I study. I post. It appeals to both the inflated ego and the passive one who remains aloof, hiding from brothers and sisters in the cloud. The cloud is not a place to hide our faces from one another. It is not the cloud that makes us invisible to one another. It is the encumbrance of sin and rebellion we still lug around.

Although it seems like a great blessing for the Word to be so easily gathered and ingested, it is also a test in our wilderness of the peoples. Moses was the most humble man on the face of the earth. He humbled both aspirations and fears. He decreased so Adonai could increase in the faith of the Israelites. He decreased so the King’s witnesses could increase to fulfill their mission and finish the journey. He decreased so kingdoms and peoples could be joined to Israel. Moses became a wee person who could draw near the Divine Presence and draw others near as well.

In Yeshua’s temptations, neither aspirations nor fears clouded his understanding of the Word and his mission. Our Messiah Yeshua put off the Divine glory to become a wee person, to draw many into the cloud of witnesses.

Shouldn’t wee?