The Shema

 

In 1945, Rabbi Eliezer Silver headed up the search for thousands of displaced Jewish children across Europe. They had been hidden from the Nazis on farms, in convents, and monasteries.

He had a promising lead, a monastery in southern France had reportedly taken in Jewish children. The priest in charge, insisted that to his knowledge, all of their children were Christians. Rabbi Silver had no records.

He asked if he could visit the wards. In front of the children, he began singing in Hebrew, “Shema Israel, Adonai Elohenu, Adonai Echad.” A handful of faces lit up, and tiny voices joined in. They recognized these words from their bedtime prayers, and from their earliest memories of their mothers and fathers reciting them, during their own prayers.

These six words begin the Shema (pronounced “shmah”), which is one of two prayers specifically commanded in Torah (the other is grace after meals). It’s the oldest fixed daily prayer in Judaism, recited each evening and morning since antiquity. It consists of three biblical passages, two of which specifically say to speak these things "when you lie down and when you rise up." The English translation of the prayer reads as follows:

Hear O’ Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.

Blessed is the name of His glorious kingdom for ever and ever. (This line is usually recited in an undertone.)

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. Take to heart these instructions with which I charge you this day. Impress them upon your children. Recite them when you stay at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you get up. Bind them as a sign on your hand and let them serve as a symbol on your forehead, inscribe them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

If, then, you obey the commandments that I enjoin upon you this day, loving the LORD your God and serving Him with all your heart and soul, I will grant the rain for your land in season, the early rain and the late. You shall gather in your new grain and wine and oil— I will also provide grass in the fields for your cattle—and thus you shall eat your fill. Take care not to be lured away to serve other gods and bow to them. For the LORD’s anger will flare up against you, and He will shut up the skies so that there will be no rain and the ground will not yield its produce; and you will soon perish from the good land that the LORD is assigning to you. Therefore impress these My words upon your very heart: bind them as a sign on your hand and let them serve as a symbol on your forehead, and teach them to your children—reciting them when you stay at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you get up; and inscribe them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates— to the end that you and your children may endure, in the land that the LORD swore to your fathers to assign to them, as long as there is a heaven over the earth.

The LORD said to Moses as follows: Speak to the Israelite people and instruct them to make for themselves fringes on the corners of their garments throughout the ages; let them attach a cord of blue to the fringe at each corner. That shall be your fringe; look at it and recall all the commandments of the LORD and observe them, so that you do not follow your heart and eyes in your lustful urge. Thus you shall be reminded to observe all My commandments and to be holy to your God. I the LORD am your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God: I, the LORD your God.

 

Pharos Publishing News (UPDATED September 2022)

Several of our free Titles are being retired and new Titles will be coming soon. Hopefully, this list will be a helpful guide.

Richard L. Foland Jr.:

Time Out of Joint -- Retired (June 3rd, 2021)

Highland Blades Quartet -- Retired (September 13, 2022)

At What Price? -- Smashwords Edition Retired (September 13, 2022)

Light in the Dark – Expanded Edition (Coming Soon)

Elmo Leopold:

Freak Show and Other Oddities -- Retired (Oct 9th, 2021)

Twelve Shades of Crazy(+) – 13 short stories in a Charity Anthology to benefit a Domestic Violence Charity

Kayleigh Foland:

Chaotica: Poetic Chaos(*) – Poetry Anthology on the theme of Chaos

Note: The Charity Anthology is looking for authors who are willing to donate short stories dealing with Domestic Violence, especially ones based on true events.

* = Tentative Title

+ = Editor 

Knot Tying 101

My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment. For we all stumble in many things. If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body. Indeed, we put bits in horses’ mouths that they may obey us, and we turn their whole body. Look also at ships: although they are so large and are driven by fierce winds, they are turned by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires. Even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things.

See how great a forest a little fire kindles! And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire by hell. For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and creature of the sea, is tamed and has been tamed by mankind. But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so. Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Thus no spring yields both salt water and fresh.

-- James 3:1-12

Previously on a WCTL Blog…

In Matthew 15 Jesus says, “Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. These are the things which defile a man, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man.” In other words, what is in the heart is what comes out of the mouth. If you want good things to come out of the mouth, you have to have good things in your heart. If your heart is lashed to the Lord then so will be your tongue and you will be unable to talk out of both sides of your mouth. Your tongue will not produce salt water, only fresh. Have you lashed your tongue to Christ?

We absolutely need to tie our tongues to Christ so that when we speak what comes out of our mouth will glorify God. So, how do we go about that? Well, if we want to tie something securely we need to learn knot tying. We can’t tie anything if we don’t know how to make any knots. The same can be said for our metaphorical knots, we need to learn how to tie a few or we won’t be able to securely lash our tongue to the Lord. With that in mind welcome to Knot Tying 101. Now, let’s take a look at how to make a handful of the knots we’ll need for our purpose.

Study – Paul tells Timothy that, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” Immersing ourselves in scripture is one method of lashing our Tongue.

Prayer – In his letter to the Philippians, Paul writes, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” In fact it’s not the only time he exhorts believers to pray. When we pray, properly, we grow closer to Christ and tie our hearts more closely to His.

Meditation – In the next couple verses of Philippians chapter 4 Paul says, “Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things. The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you. Meditation has become somehow tied to the eastern religions but meditating on the things of God is another good way of binding ourselves to the Lord.

Fellowship – Fellowship with each other and with God are important. Fellowship binds us to each other and to God. If we want to tie our hearts to Christ we need to be in fellowship. The most beautiful description of fellowship I’ve ever read is in Acts 2 where Luke, talking about the early church wrote, “And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers. Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need.

So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.”

We’ve briefly looked at a few knots for use in lashing our tongues to Christ, but there are many more. Service is another good one. I urge you to look for others and to go out into the world and give them heaven.

Look at this Wall

So, the government is shutdown because of a fight between Trump and the Democrats over a wall. The mainstream media and Fox News have taken their usual sides. Social Media is replete with memes from people supporting one side or another. Have you taken sides?

You have? Really, why? Didn’t you think, before choosing sides, that it might be a smokescreen. Politicians are sneaky. They’ve got everyone looking at the wall rather than at what the are doing. They don’t care about the wall and they certainly don't care about us. Most of them only care about themselves, money, power and or status. What are they doing behind our back to help themselves while we’re all looking at the wall?

I will admit that there are a few people claiming that Trump is trying to distract us from something with the wall, but they don’t seem to realize that both sides are dragging this out. What is each side doing that we aren’t seeing? How is whatever it is going to effect those of us who live paycheck to paycheck? I’ll tell you this for nothing, it probably won’t be good for us or they wouldn’t need the distraction!

So, when we finally wake up, look away from their fracas over the wall and realize what they were distracting us from and how much worse off we are just remember one thing. If everybody had voted for third party candidates in the last two elections we wouldn’t still be in this mess.

Proof

The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen, to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.

-- Acts 1:1-3

“I’ll believe, in God, when I see some proof that there actually is one.” Have you ever heard someone say that, or something similar? Much like Thomas, the doubting disciple, many people want to see proof. Unlike Thomas, however, we don’t usually get any.  In John 20:29 we are given comfort about our lack of proof, “Jesus said to him, “Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”” We are blessed who believe with little to no proof. But that isn’t something that will satisfy an unbeliever’s demand for proof. So, how do we answer them? I’m not sure we can, at least not without the Lord’s guidance, but let’s take a look.

I once was engaged in a debate on a Star Trek fan sight about religion in Star Trek which quickly devolved into a handful of us trying to “prove” that God and Jesus existed. I gave up when someone posted that he would die, turn to dust and would still be dust when the “real Zefram Cochrane makes First Contact.” What I learned from that conversation has steered me toward a different type of witnessing. But first, here’s my biggest take away from my Star Trek experience.

Never engage in an argument about historical evidence. In this case, the definition of argument would be “a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition.” However, what argument usually becomes is contradiction, which is “just the automatic gainsaying of anything the other person says.” It is never fruitful. You can bring up Josephus but his references to Jesus will be dismissed as interpolations by Christian scribes at a later date. You might mention Simon Greenleaf’s conclusion that the evidence for the existence of Christ would stand up in court and have it dismissed because lawyers can’t be trusted. You cannot win. It doesn’t matter if you bring up Pliny the Younger, Lucian or Tacitus they will be dismissed. I know. I’ve tried. People may say they want proof but they don’t. It reminds me of the Babel Fish from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

The Babel fish is small, yellow, leechlike, and probably the oddest thing in the Universe. It feeds on brainwave energy received not from its own carrier but from those around it. It absorbs all unconscious mental frequencies from this brainwave energy to nourish itself with. It then excretes into the mind of its carrier a telepathic matrix formed by combining the conscious thought frequencies with nerve signals picked up from the speech centers of the brain which has supplied them. The practical upshot of all this is that if you stick a Babel fish in your ear you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language. The speech patterns you actually hear decode the brainwave matrix which has been fed into your mind by your Babel fish.

Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mind-bogglingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as a final and clinching proof of the NON-existence of God.

The argument goes like this:

`I refuse to prove that I exist,' says God, `for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.'

`But,' says Man, `The Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED.'

`Oh dear,' says God, `I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly disappears in a puff of logic.

`Oh, that was easy,' says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossing.

-- The Hitchhiker's Guide of the Galaxy, Douglas Adams

You can’t argue someone to Christ. So, what do you do? The older I get the more I believe that the only way to witness to the world is to love people. Love and live. Love all and live for Christ. Be a reflection of Him so that others may see Him and believe. It sounds easy, but you’ll need the Lord’s guidance to do it.

Each person is different and therefore they each experience love differently; you’ll need to be constantly in prayer so that you may love each person effectively. That being said, the Golden Rule is a good starting point. “Treat others in the way you would like to be treated.” I believe that this is truly the best way to witness. Forget about finding or providing proof and just be the proof.

Free Book in Exchange for Honest Review

I am giving away free copies of my eBook Light in the Dark in the hope of generating honest reviews. You may enter for a chance to win one of fifteen copies at LibraryThing or you can use coupon code UA92C at Smashwords. Both the contest and the coupon end August 31, 2016.

You are welcome to review the book on your personal blog or at your favorite eBook seller or social networking site. Just remember to be honest; I am not looking to have my ego inflated.

Note: This is a Christian title, if you are someone who is offended by that you are probably not going to be able to write an honest review. However, you are more than welcome to try.

Dead and Damaged Blog Tour: Day Two

Dead and Damaged, the sequel to The Endangered, will be published on July 14th and the publishers are having a blog tour all this week to spread the word. The book, Dead and Damaged, picks up with, main character, Lori attempting to track down the source of stealth technology rogue vampires are using to hunt humans. Her pursuit leads her into the arms of a government agency with similar objectives. A temporary alliance is formed in an effort to stop the corporation responsible for putting the technology in malignant hands. Their mission goes awry, however, and leaves Lori with more enemies than friends.

Her situation worsens when, vampire leader, Marcus learns that the corporation has also been working with vampires to develop daylight suits and synthetic blood. He convinces his clan that this organization and its infinite resources will be a valuable asset in the evolution of their kind. They begin questioning Lori’s motives and Marcus takes the opportunity to capitalize on their distrust. Consequently, Lori soon finds herself on the run from her former clan and turns to Vega for help exposing the truth behind Marcus and his new deceitful allies.

We, of course, will be reviewing the book as soon as we can so stay tuned. If you want to check out our review of the first book it can be found here. You can also fin our interview with the author, S L Eaves, here. The publishers are giving away copies of the book; you can enter to win under Dead and Damaged Giveaway to the right.