Va'Eira (and I appeared)

Exodus 6:2-9:35

Today's Torah portion begins with God reassuring Moses that He is the Lord. Moses needs this reassurance because Pharaoh was refused to allow the Jewish people to go out into the wilderness. The Lord tells Moses to inform the Jewish People that He is going to take them out of Egypt . However, the Jewish People do not listen because now Pharaoh has made their work more difficult. The Lord then commands Moses to go to Pharaoh and ask him to free the Jewish People
 

We want to focus our attention on Ex. 6:12 which says "Behold, the sons of Israel have not listened to me; how then will Pharaoh listen to me?" In this context we must ask the question what does it mean to "listen"? Obviously, the Israelites physically heard the voice of Moses. Also they obviously understood what he was saying. So then how is it that they did not listen? The answer is that as a result of the increased hardship on the Israelites because of Moses visit to Pharaoh, the Jewish people did not believe what Moses told them. The word for "listen" in Hebrew is the word "Shema", as in "Shema Yisrael Adonai Elohaynu Adonai Echad". In English, "Hear O Israel, the Lord our God the Lord is one". The word Shema implies listening and obeying. It means to "internalize" or "receive" the words.
 

Consequently, in our passage today, Moses is saying, if the sons of Israel do not act on my words how will the king of our oppressors act on my words? The words that Moses spoke to the Israelites was "I am the Lord your God". In what sense did the Israelites not obey this statement? The answer is in Ezek. 20 where we read that the children of Israel were told to remove foreign idols and they rebelled. So we see that implied in the words, "I am the Lord Your God" is "be obedient and put away foreign gods".

The lesson for us is that when we say that God is Lord of our lives or that we believe in the god of the bible, it must be accompanied with obedience. It is not enough to say simply that I believe, but according to the bible, both Old and New Testaments) faith must be accompanied by actions. As James said, "faith without works is dead". How shall the world know that Yeshua is truly the Messiah if we do not live out the words "I believe that Yeshua is the Lord". I truly believe that more people would consider Yeshua as the Messiah if they saw more of the reality of the faith in our lives.

Something to think about. Shabbat Shalom!