Are we serving with the right motives?
3 Tammuz 5776
Most of us who live in our western society believe that democracy where majority rules, is the best of all systems. In my experience I have never found this to be true. Majority imposes itself upon others even when it is wrong. Our Creator has a different type of government which is never mentioned today — Theocracy. In His system, our Creator chooses the people for their roles. Today we laugh at this idea as we ask for proof that someone was “called” to their position. At the time of Moses it was obvious. The people had witnessed firsthand Moses parting the Red Sea, interceding on their behalf time and again and bringing water from the rock. There was no doubt about the relationship that Moses had with the Creator… but what about today? Is the Torah just an historical novel or can its principles be applied to us? The Torah teaches us that we are responsible for our own actions and they in turn permeate throughout the community. Those of us who are called by the Creator do not have the luxury of feigning innocence. Whatever we do affects everyone. Our Creator calls us as individuals to serve the community, not vice versa. When we expect the community to serve us, we destroy what our Creator has done. Strength lies within community.
In this last Torah portion, the actions of Korach, Datan and Abiram in seeking their own positions held grave consequences for many. Like the scouts in the last portion, what they were complaining about held validity however it was their manner of presenting it to the rest that caused widespread rebellion as they cast doubt upon everyone about the Creator. This is called lashon harah – the evil tongue and there were grave consequences. They had left no room for our Creator to do what He does best — His miracles.
When God calls you, be ready and available to serve Him. Do not do it because you are seeking fame or satisfying your own ego. Instead be humble as you serve. Our Messiah Yeshua was the greatest example of this. He was a simple man, living to serve right up to the end. He was my rabbi, a wonderful prophet and the anointed one. When we remove his humanity, we remove his true identity. He never intended to be like Korach; to take the position of our Creator. He told us to humble ourselves before Him and he never said that he replaced God. Sadly the two major religions today have a totally wrong idea about who Yeshua really was. His role was to bring his people back to the basics of the Torah — the Ten Commandments. He summed them up by saying that the most important commandment is “to Love the LORD with all our heart, soul and might and to love our neighbor as ourselves”. Everything else is pure commentary. If you simply follow these Ten Commandments using them as the rule by which you measure everything you do, I can assure you that you will be above everyone else. That is what it means to be Shomer Torah, keepers of the Torah and our calling is to share them with the rest of humanity. Imagine the peace that will ensue when everyone has this understanding!