The Wonder of the Next Two Words of the Shema - (The Lord Our God) - Yahwheh Elihanou

Did you ever wonder? Did you ever wonder?

I do. Did you ever wonder? Why the sun always rises, but the stars never fall?

Why dry land is never satisfied by water? And why fire never says enough? Enough. The wonder of the Lord our God.

Okay? It's a challenge because, you know, you hear that a lot, and Moses is the first person to coin that particular phrase that way in Exodus. And, of course, it is here as we are speaking of the Shema. Today we talked about Shema Yisrael, and today we are into the next two words.

We're doing them two words at a time, apparently. And the two words that we're at today in Hebrew would be Yahweh, which is the Yud-Heh-Vav-Heh, infallible name of God. And, of course, it in itself is a study that will go on until eternity. I am that I am, so to speak, and the idea of this infinite God, right? A God that's above and beyond. And I think very much has to do with what we talked about in the idea of the Shema, that when you look up, there's more than we can really take in, right?

If you look up at the sky, it's way bigger than you are. And this idea of this God that is very infinite and way big, like bigger than all the stars and somehow or another above the universe. All amazing stuff that He has this unbelievable power to be not only every place, but everywhere at the same time, in time, you know, at the same time. I don't know, again, above my pay grade, but obviously, He's a big enough God to worship. And so that idea of Yahweh, which you may know the Jews don't know exactly how it was originally pronounced, and they won't say. So when you hear a Jew that would be praying the Shema prayer, they would say, you know, Shema Israel, either Adonai or Hashem. They either say Adonai or most of them actually say Hashem, which means the name. And that's the idea of that Yahweh, which is translated in the King James Version, the Lord.

And it's very often translated the Lord. And again, we've talked about in different episodes how there are two Heys in there. And the first Hey is the idea of Leah, this internal expression of God.

And the second Hey is the idea of Rachel, or Rachel, it depends on how you want to say it. And the idea of the external, in other words, kind of a connection to your, you know, faith and your works. Because everything that Leah did was in secret, her marriage was hidden, her burial was hidden, her life to some extent was hidden. And in the case of Rachel, everything was external, everything was on the outside.

And even her grave again there in Bethlehem is on the outside versus the inside. And so it's a beautiful understanding that God is all those things, especially the Yahweh name of God. But then there's this next thing that says, and you know, you can't help but wonder why you always have the Elohim, which is normally the way that people would translate God. But in this one, it's Eliyenu, which is a really neat thing because it's the Lord our God, with the emphasis on the our God, which makes him the finite God. So when you look at the two ideas that are translated here, essentially the idea of this infinite God, but now we have this very finite God, something we can grab hold of. And again, the Jews teach this has to do with his perfection because if you leave out the part that he's finite, you know, obviously he had to be finite in order to create a finite universe. But by the same extent, he's infinite.

In other words, he's bigger than the universe. And so it all fits together that you have this infinite and you have this finite and this idea of our God is so amazing because you have this idea of El, which is an Aleph and a Lamed, which is normally translated God. And when you put the him on the end of it, then there's a Yud and a Mem, and that's the way you'll find God usually in Genesis.

But here, when Moses started to say it, he would say our God, like the Lord, our God, like we let us go and serve the Lord, our God out in the wilderness is what he told Pharaoh the first time that he used those words. And so you take the L and the and the and the hay and then the Yud, but then you end with a nun and above. And that nun has to do with, again, to a great extent, comfort, but it has to do with your faith. And in fact, in my opinion, of course, every letter is Jesus. But this is a particularly beautiful version of Jesus, because you may know the first verse in the new in the section of the hundred nineteen Psalm is that word is a lamp unto my feet.

In other words, this has to do with our faith and what we truly believe. And again, Jesus is the word kind of all comes together. But when you look at the word comfort, because you can think that we've talked about this many times, that Noah, you can hear the end sound of the beginning of Noah is the word for comfort.

Right. And so this idea of the God of all comfort is kind of where I go with this particular Elianu. In other words, this is so comforting because he's our God. And this is what the covenant was about that Abraham said, I'm going to make this to where you know, I am your God and I'm going to do this for your seed after you. You know, if you look in the I believe it's Genesis seventeen seven in that particular covenant, that here is the thing that is the promise of promises that he's going to be our God. And not only that, he's going to be our children's God and how much weight, how much comfort does that give you? And so this idea of, yes, he's all infinite and way more than I can understand and see.

But by the same time, he is our God. And it is what I believe. Right. It has to do with that nun that gives me total comfort.

The God of all comfort is that way because I believe he is my God. And so once Jesus comes in there and then shed his blood, because if you think about in the Last Supper. Right. What he said, this is a new covenant in my blood shed for you.

Right. And so this covenant is that, in other words, we are brought into God's family through Jesus's blood, which is such a covenant. Again, this idea of him being our God because we're literally related by the blood of Jesus and we become his son. You know, it's it's so spectacular.

All that comfort. If you believe those things right, if you believe he's the son of God, if if you believe he died for your sake. In other words, all those things, that that's your belief, which is that nun at the end of that, our God Ella L.A. No, that that new that no sound. It's no you the way it would be in English, that that is that idea of what you believe about God. OK. And so if you believe that, then oh, my goodness, what the promises that you have and the comfort that you have as a result of just that. Now, when you put it all together and you say Shema Israel.

Right. And then Yahweh Elianu, then, OK, Shana, meaning to Shema, meaning this idea of to hear or obey or to understand. But also, as we talked about yesterday, that it is a acronym for this idea of to look up. So when you Israel look up, when you if you look up and you think, wow, what am I worried about right this minute? Well, what's God worried about? I mean, if you look up and you realize what is what does God really think about all that you're thinking about right this minute? It takes a tremendous load off because you're going to see that God's not all that worried about all that finite stuff that's going on right this minute.

He he has bigger plans for you, bigger plans for your family, bigger plans than we can possibly imagine. And so if we if we will just look up like the Shema says, you God wrestlers, right, Israel, that idea of of not the heel, but again, lifting ourselves up into that position of Israel. Right. And then Yahweh, in other words, he's bigger than anything that we could possibly think or imagine or whatever. But at the same time, he is completely our God because we are his sons. And as we walk into that idea of being his sons.

Like, oh, my goodness, it's just unbelievable. So here's the idea that God showed me this morning. And this is my story, so to speak. It means a lot to me. I hope it will mean something to you as well. But essentially, you know, I love to do my devotions and one of the things I've really enjoyed here recently since I went to New York. And I had this relative that was showing me all about essential oils and incense and these kind of things and how things vibrate at different frequencies. And one of the more beautiful items that vibrates at a wonderful frequency is frankincense. And so I've had some frankincense for some time. And she also gave me some frankincense. But this is no, you know, just stick of frankincense incense.

It's actually the resin itself. And so you have to have charcoal to put the frankincense on in order to burn it. And so, you know, I have my whole little incense kit with my charcoal and my frankincense. And I start the charcoal every morning.

I put my frankincense on it. And what happens is a result of that is a great deal of smoke rises. OK. And and when you think about and I and I can't help but think about this when I look at my incense, when I'm praying in the morning, when I'm spending time with him in the word and that smoke is rising, that if you were to come to the temple during the day, they had this huge barbecue in the outer court, right?

The altar was there, not the altar of incense, which, by the way, is another one of those. But this particular altar, like if you were just like a regular Jew and you came into that court, you know, what you're going to see is this giant fire, which there's going to be smoke. And that smoke is going to be going up into the infinite. Right. And so as I look at that and I can smell that incense and think about God, that I see, oh, it's going up.

And look what's happening. If I go up, my thoughts go up. Then, then, then I'm getting to the Shema.

Right. I look up. I mean, think about what's going on up there. You know, think about what's going on from that perspective. I realize it's all in my heart because that's where the kingdom of heaven is.

But by the same token, it's up. It's not what I'm looking down at the ground. It's not what I'm necessarily thinking about. So as I was doing that and I was closing my eyes, praying, I noticed because I like to actually see what I'm looking at while I'm praying. I see this really bright reflection. Like, you know, you got your eyes closed. You know, what is that shimmering?

What is that shimmering? Well, I was holding on to my cup of coffee, which again, if you know me, is mixed up with all sorts of wonderful things. And that cup of coffee was catching the light. And as it was kind of like water in there, it would reflect this light. And the closer I got it to my face, right, because that's where the coffee was, the more this would shimmer in my eyes. And so as I was seeing this light, I realized that, oh, my goodness, look here. The closer that I get this to my face, the brighter the shine.

Okay. And we've talked about many, many, many times that the idea of of what I was told this year to begin with is to be gathered in great faith. And that ideal of the letter cuff, which is this has to do with the with the statutes and things we've talked about many times. His closeness or getting this hug from God. In other words, the closer I get, the more this light shimmers. And you think about how close Moses got in his light, became his face, became this bright light. Well, it's the same is true for us that that yes, God is infinite and all that stuff. But as we draw near because he is our God and our father, then oh, my goodness, we begin to get our shine on. We get that halo I've talked about before.

And I was thinking about that coffee, how how it just shimmers. Right. And when you see somebody that is is just in the Lord and and and sharing something like actually our pastor did in church this week, he was actually talking about Moses and and talking about Moses as he worked through.

God worked through him for obviously one hundred and twenty years. In other words, God was not in a hurry when it came to Moses and he's not in a hurry when it comes to you. But as you draw closer to you, to him. Right. You get this shine and that light that we're talking about in that none as it becomes our God. Right.

Well, then you get to reflect that which draws others to the light. It's it's a beautiful, amazing thing. And so when you think about these two words we're talking about today, Yahweh. Right. That idea of this infinite, unbelievable God.

And Elieheinu, which is this idea of our God. Thanks for listening.