Be A Witness

0:01 The Lord said to Abraham, get going out from your land and from your relatives and from your father's house to the land that I will show you. My heart's desire is to make you into a great nation, to bless you, to make your name great so that you may be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, but whoever curses you, I will curse. And in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed. Those words are from Genesis 12 verses one through three, and are reiterated throughout the Torah concerning Abraham, the children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

0:46 There remain over 130 hostages held in captivity for now five months and three weeks. Next week will be the will mark, the sixth month, six weeks perhaps, where they have not even seen the light of day. We don't know. Why don't we know? Because even the Red Cross hasn't been permitted to, uh, to come and check on the, on the hostages. The hostages have not been given any medication that was, uh, given to Hamas to administer. How do we know that? Because it ended up torn in on the roads of Gaza and on the roads leading out from Gaza

1:32 and in the ocean or sea. I guess technically it's a sea. Why do I get up every week? Because it seems to me that the world has forgotten. Why can I say that? Because the United Nations passed a resolution this, this past weekend, uh, nearly a week ago. Uh, actually, I guess maybe it was Monday morning, demanding the cessation or the ceasefire of Israel in Gaza without any mention of Kamas or what was happened, or any condemnation thereof. This was a security, uh, un security resolution

2:19 that was drafted and proposed, uh, was submitted by Russia and China and America failed to veto it. I don't know. Maybe I have high expectations of our government. Maybe I have high expectations of America to continue to do the right thing if nothing else. I have high expectations of America to at least not come into alliance with our enemies.

3:07 I mean, that's a, that's kind of my baseline. But rather than veto America made the choice to abstain in the resolution passed the said, I will bless those who bless you and I will curse those who curse you. I hope for the sake of our country that we're not drifting to the sa to the latter part of that verse. But I am here to remind you that there are more than 130 hostages

3:57 that we presume to be alive. We actually don't know that, by the way. In fact, we know that Hamas is holding more than 30 dead bodies hostage. I'm sorry, but that's weird. I, I think at a, at a minimum, that's weird. No. Like, no offense, but like when there's a dead body, let's, let's get into the ground as quick as possible. That's, that's my opinion. But, uh, it, it, that's not what has happened.

4:45 So that's your weekly reminder, lest we forget what happened on October 7th and what is continuing to happen every day since we are continuing our series today in Acts chapter five, acts chapter five, starting in verse 27, when they had brought them, they placed them before the Sanhedrin, the Koul questioned them saying,

5:30 we gave you strict orders not to teach in this name. And look, you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and you intend to bring on us the blood of this man. Peter in the emissaries replied, we must obey God rather than man or rather than men, excuse me, the God of our fathers raised up Yeshua, whom you seized and had crucified. This one God exalted at his right hand as leader and savior to give repentance to Israel and removal of sins. And we are witnesses of these events, as is the Kodesh or the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him. I know. All of a sudden we just jumped right into the action.

6:16 So like I always do, let's, let's just remember where we are. The emissaries or, or perhaps you are, are better known to the, or they're better known to you as the apostles. Uh, but I'll call them the emissaries. The emissaries were put into the jail by the koen or the high priest and his associates. Why? Because the high priest and his associates were filled with jealousy because of the signs and the wonders that were happening. So that's what has just happened. Then in the night, an angel of the Lord comes, opens the doors of the prison and lets them out. Let's Peter and the emissaries out, and then the, the, the angel says to Peter, and the rest of the emissaries go stand in the temple court

7:01 and keep telling the people about this new life. Which by the way, that's what got them put in. So I just want you to think about that. The door, the, the doors of the cell were opened. They're coming out and they're like, oh, yes, we're getting released. We're gonna, we're gonna hightail it outta here so we don't have to stay in jail. And the angel says, I want you to go back to the temple. You know that place where you just were probably like eight hours ago? I want you to go back to the temple courts and then continue to share about this new life. And they're thinking to themselves, well, I'm gonna go ahead and call cell number one. 'cause that one looks the most comfortable. Why?

7:48 Because they're gonna get thrown in jail again. They're doing the same thing. And why would you expect a different result? So what do they do? They, they do, as they're told, they go back to the temple area and around Don. So we're given a time period now it's just after Don around Don, they're there sharing in the, in the temple, uh, courts in the Sanhedrin, the, the ole and his, his, uh, party, the Sadducees in the Sanhedrin. They're beginning to assemble. And they, they asked the, the, the, the guards of the prison to go and check on, go bring them before them because they want to have an account. The guards go back to the jail, they open up the doors, and they're like, uhoh, something's missing.

8:34 And they go back and they, they come and they say, well, I have good news and I have bad news. The good news is the jails are clean. The bad news is because there's nobody in them. I don't know where they went. So they're starting to the, the, the Kool and his and his and and his, uh, the counselor is starting to go, where are they? And then all of a sudden they begin to hear reports coming from the temple court, uh, the court, the the temple area about these people who were supposed to be in jail and are back at it sharing about the, about Yeshua and this new life.

9:23 So they send the guards back down to go get 'em. And here we are. They've been brought back before the court, and the court will now try or attempt to hold them accountable for disobeying the court orders. They say, we gave you strict orders not to teach in this name. You have continued to fill Jerusalem with your teaching. You intend to bring on us the blood of this man. By the way, when the, when the guards go down to, to fetch the emissaries and bring them back, there is a notation that says

10:08 they escorted them back, but didn't bring them back by force because they were afraid the people would stone the guards, which means that whatever the emissaries are sharing, they're gathering great favor with all of the crowds of peoples. Think about the numbers that would be in Jerusalem. We don't know if this is a festival or not, uh, but if we go back six months, is that when we started? Wow, we've been getting acts six months now. Something about six months. We talked about the, the population of Jerusalem and somewhere in the 50,000 range, but it would swell on holidays, on festivals to somewhere between 200,000 and a million people.

10:54 I just want you to think about that 2000 years ago. But in that, in that conversation, I said, that would be like if you're here from the area, that would be like Sanger, Texas, which is, uh, you know, about 45 minutes north of here, absorbing the population of Dallas for a weekend. Now, I'm just gonna tell you, knowing some people in Sanger, they would not be happy if the population of Dallas decided to come all in mass and just relocate for the weekend. Why? Because it's difficult to absorb that many people in an area. So you have to think, there's, there's lots of people in,

11:40 lots of crowds coming. They're coming for prayer. Why are they coming for prayer? Because it's morning, you come for morning prayers, morning sacrifices, and, and they're coming together in the, in the, uh, the emissaries and Peter are out there, uh, speaking and teaching and, and talking about Yeshua, talking about really probably they're also talking about this man who's, who is now able to jump for joy, but has been lame at the gates for 40 years. I mean, that this is, we're still within that context here. The people are excited. They're seeing these signs and wonders, and they're excited. And the temple guards are a little bit petrified because they don't want to get stoned, I mean, with rocks.

12:32 So they escort the emissaries back instead of dragging them back to the, to the, to the Sanhedrin. And here they are, the Sanhedrin is chastising them. And, and they say, you continue to fill Jerusalem with your teaching. You're teaching in the na in this name. They don't even say what the name is, by the way, you're continuing to teach in this name, but also you intend to bring on us the blood of this man. So what are they saying here? You're intending to bring before all of the people and lay the blame, the the blood guilt, if you will, of his death on us? Why? Why does that matter? Because if it's laid on them, then the people will revolt

13:18 and they'll, they, they'll, they'll go away from following them as their leaders. There is so much support for them that it seems the commoners would've risked their lives or even their livelihoods for the sake of stopping the arrest of the emissaries. And so the em, the, the temple authorities are talking about this blood guilt. In other words, the culpability or who's responsible for the death of Yeshua.

14:10 And they say, your intent is to make us responsible. Now, I do just want to refer back to Luke chapter 23, verse 23, which says this, but they, the ruling kho the leaders and the people were insistent, demanding with loud shouts that he be executed. He, he being Yeshua and their voices prevailed. It doesn't seem like this is too many years post that. So it, there does seem to be a little bit of legitimacy to who bears the blood guilt concerning the death of Yeshua. But I also wanna say, it may or may not be the intention. We, we don't know from the text of the emissaries to lay blame.

14:58 They're, we don't know that they're out there saying, these guys killed Yeshua revolt against them. Actually, I would say that it's probably not that, but that's what they're fearing. And as is often the case when someone in authority speaks, perhaps there's another layer of meaning. Now, we have seen it before in Luke, uh, in Luke, in the Luke account, uh, I think it's in the Luke account where the high priest says it's better for one man to die than for all of the people to suffer on, on behalf. What he was saying is, it's better to let Yeshua die,

15:44 be crucified than to have a rebellion. And all of the people gets, get stomped by the Roman authorities, get squashed. But what he unintentionally said was that it's better for one man to die so that all may live. You see, there's, there's another layer of meaning that's that's there within, and this is the high priest who is the highest spiritual authority in Israel who says this. Now here we say, uh, not we say, but we read the high priest says this. He says, um, you intend to bring on us the blood of this man.

16:30 Let me, if I can phrase this just slightly different, you intend for the blood of this man to be put on us. You see, there could be an alternative understanding or meaning here that we miss certainly, I will say the, the speakers and the, the high priest and the, the Sadducees intended it in terms of their alleged guilt regarding the death of Yeshua. But they might have missed the double entendre that is in here, that is embedded within the text, which is this, that the emissaries want to place the blood of Yeshua upon them. In a spiritual realm, I would say this is true. Why? Because when we allow the blood of Yeshua to come upon us,

17:19 it actually makes our sins turn white as snow. In other words, whatever we have done, when we take that blood and we put it upon us in the eyes of God, he's doesn't see anything other than the sacrificial blood. And that's a positive thing. So in a positive, in a, in a kind of nuanced sort of way, it could be that the emissaries are doing this because they do want their leaders to have the blood of Yeshua upon them, but not in a condemnatory way, but in a way for them to receive forgiveness and then come and partake in the kingdom. If that's the accusation, then I think the accusation might be correct,

18:07 but again, it's, It's, the text is not explicit. We come on and we, and, and so what we have here is now the council has put forward some questions, and Peter and the emissaries are replying. And so this is what the reply is starting in verse 29, Peter and the emissaries reply, we must obey God rather than men. Okay? I know that there's, the verse continues, but we're gonna stop there and we're gonna spend a little bit of time in this, in this text, when there comes a conflict in whom to obey, what we see here is the emissaries indicate that they must obey the Lord and not man. In other words, they're not obeying the council's requests because they, the, the request of the council contradict

18:55 what the Lord has told them to do. Do you see, I, I know I'm parsing out plain things, but I just wanna make sure you understand that there's a difference between what the council has said to do and what the angel of the Lord overnight told them to do. And those two things stand in disagreement. And so they say, we can't choose what the council wants us to do. We have to do what the Lord tells us to do. One of them is more important than the other. What the question should be. Now, an application for all of us is how do I know that it's the Lord who's speaking to me? And this is the question we can, we can apply or we can u utilize here in the text. Awesome. How do I know that it's the Lord speaking to me?

19:42 It could be someone else. It could be a figment of your imagination. So how do we know that? I'm, I'm gonna give you a few reasons here how to know, and you should apply these in your life all the time. First of all, the how to know is the first thing you do is you check what he's already said. You check the word of God and you confirm that what it is to be His word confirms and not contradicts what you believe to be what he has told you. So if God has told you to do something or be some way, you then go and you check the word of God. If the word of God says something different,

20:28 then I'm gonna tell you whatever voice you're hearing is not God because he doesn't contradict himself. So then you have to step back and be like, okay, wait a second. Lemme try this again. Lord, what did I hear again? Now if it, if, if there's no, maybe it's, maybe you hear something like the Lord of God, the Lord told me to go cut my grass this morning. And you're like, let me read through the Bible and see if the Lord says anything about mowing the lawn. And you can't find anything. So you start, have to start asking other questions. So let me, let me, let me say, let me make this application here in this verse. It says, Peter and the emissaries,

21:16 they're the ones who reply. In other words, it's not a singular person hearing from the Lord. It's actually a group of people who are accountable to one another so they have heard from the Lord. So when you have a group that has heard from the Lord, or when you've heard from the Lord, you verify with your group. Does that make sense? You ask wise counselors, people that you trust, people that you know the Lord has been working in their lives. I would, I would tend to, I would, I'm not saying this is a hard, fast rule, but I would tend to go with people who are far more mature in the faith than you. Now, that doesn't mean that they're older than you, it just means that they've been in the faith longer than you

22:02 go ask and say, listen, I feel like this is what the Lord is saying. I don't know. Am I supposed to mow my lawn on Sunday, Sunday morning Again, I'm, I'm, I'm being, I'm slightly trivializing the question, but well, then they say, well, let us pray about it. Let's see what the Lord says. Let's see if we can find anything. You, we don't find anything that contradicts that. Maybe you should try it and see if, if you do it once and see what the Lord says. So how do you know? Because they're accountable to one another. It's not necessarily one person who says, I heard from God and everybody else goes. Now, let me tell you a story about that.

22:49 12 years ago, 12 years and four months ago, I was here as beknownst to the rest of the congregation. I was single. However, I was about three weeks away. Brittany and I, when we were dating, we didn't tell anybody. In fact, we didn't even tell our parents. Now teenagers, I'm not recommending you do this. But first of all, we weren't teenagers. We were in our twenties so that we were a little bit more mature, but we didn't tell anybody. Why didn't we tell any, either any of our parents? Well, because our mothers were like best friends, and we didn't want any, wouldn't want any, any familial, uh, bad blood if it didn't work out between the two of us.

23:37 So, uh, we kept it to about two people who knew about our relationship until our parents discovered it a few months in, in, and then after that, it, it slowly grew, but we didn't tell people. So at around six months we've been dating and, and I'm about a month out from proposing, I come in here one Shabbat morning and my mom, my mother, she goes, you go that way. And I was like, okay, yes ma'am. And I turned and walked the other way. And afterward, I, I came back to her and I was like, why did you like send me in a particular direction very quickly? And she said, well, there was this young lady here who said that she just heard from God last night

24:23 that she's gonna marry you. By the way, the young lady's name was not Brittany. And I looked at her and I started laughing. I said, well, God didn't tell her I'm already dating and I'm about to be engaged. I was like, 'cause you think that would be important information for to share if God's speaking to you. I'm telling you all of that because it sounds comical, but sometimes you can really believe it's God and it's not. You just need to confirm. In this case, I am safe to say that was not God who spoke to her, and I haven't seen her since. Um, anyways, how else in this text do we know that they, that,

25:09 that it's a word from the Lord and not from someone else? It's confirmed by signs and wonders. Now, that can be a, uh, a controversial thing, but signs here serve to verify the veracity of the teaching and the actions that is coming from the Lord. However, just because something is accompanied by a sign doesn't mean it's from God. You should be sitting here in your, in your chair going, Ari, you are confusing me. Do I need a sign or do I not need a sign? Yes, that's right. If it's accompanied by signs, what you then have to do,

25:54 and this we find in the Torah, it's in Deuteronomy, if it's accompanied by signs, and then the person says, stands up and says, these are the signs. Now follow. Now come with me. We're gonna go serve this God that's a, a, a God different than the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Then it's not signs that confirm that it's the word of the Lord. It's signs that actually confirm. It's not the word of the Lord. Why? Because you have to see who the signs point in service to. So if the signs point in service to some other God other than ours, then the signs actually don't mean anything other than probably don't do that.

26:40 So these are, these are some primary ones. I'm gonna give you one more, more, which is not straight from the text, but I, I would say as you delve into scripture, becomes clear in many cases, and that sign is what role is humility playing in your decision making process or in your I heard from God? Because if your I heard from God is for the purpose of lifting you up to drive others, then I, I think I would question it. But if it is I heard from God, I don't really want to do this. I don't even really wanna say I heard from God,

27:26 I feel like I should just say the Lord. I not even, maybe I, maybe I don't even use the Lord. I feel like we should go this direction. Humility has to be in your decision making process. Why? Because pride drives you the other way. Pride makes everything about me, makes everything, not me, Ari, Waldman, but me, the person, the decision maker makes, it makes all the decisions about me. When our decisions aren't about us, our decisions are about whether or not we're gonna choose to follow him. So if the decision requires us to be humble and submit ourselves, which is difficult, by the way, humbling and submitting is hard work, not easy work.

28:12 It's easy to say, but it's hard to do. If it's that, then I would say, you probably have heard from the Lord. Now we can go back to, oh, here's, here's, here's my clarifying question. This is how you know, one way or another, does your choice to obey God's direction in your life, elevate you or elevate God? Because if it elevates you, it might not be from him. If it elevates him, then that's, that's how you can confirm going to last week's message. Can you recognize what God is doing in someone else's life? That requires humility? Can you? Now, on the other hand, can you recognize

28:59 what God is doing in your life? That also requires humility. It's a different exercise in the same way. And finally, is God truly in charge of your plans? That's a hard one to answer. And I would say probably you need some, uh, outside of yourself input if, if it, if God is truly in charge of your plans. So we come on here to the next verse. Verse 30, the God of our fathers raised up Yeshua. So let me, let me just, sorry, lemme go back. Just one more. Peter and the emissaries reply, we must obey God rather than men. The God of our fathers raised up Yeshua whom you seized and had crucified.

29:44 This God exalted at his right hand as, uh, this, excuse me, this one, God exalted at his right hand as leader in Savior to give repentance to Israel and removal of sins immediately, as soon as he creates a distinction, God, Peter says, we can choose to follow God or we can choose to follow you. That's essentially what Peter says. He says, we choose to follow God, not man. But then the very next verse, he says, the God of our fathers. So what Peter is doing is he's now putting himself in the same grouping with those who are investigating him, with those who are the, if you will, the counsel.

30:29 As they're asking questions, he says, the God of our fathers raised up Yeshua. He's not manipulating language to draw them in. He's actually connecting himself to the God of our fathers. The God of our fathers has interjected himself into society, into history numerous times to ensure that his will is done throughout history. And now what he's saying is that God, the one who, who continues to interject himself into history, the God of our fathers is now here currently interjecting himself into history. Again, you see, Peter is not separating himself from them,

31:14 but rather he's including them in saying, this is what our God does. He comes and, and, and inserts himself into society or into history for his purposes. And he's doing it again right now. Don't miss it. That's what Peter's saying. Now, Peter gets a little strong with language. I just want you to remember this is a, um, a, uh, in, in, in a larger sense, a within the tribe discussion or within the family, if that makes sense. You see, if I go to someone else's family and I say, you crucified Yeshua,

32:08 those become very strong words. However, if I'm within the family and I say, listen, you messed up, you crucified Yeshua. That's not a, it is not necessarily condemnatory. It's this is what happened. But you feel way more judged if you're not a part of the group and being accused than if you are a part of the group. I don't know how many I, I could, I guess I could say other examples, but we probably don't need them. I would just want you to understand that this is within the, the family. This is a, within the family turmoil discussion. When I talk to my sisters and I say, you screwed up. We get, we get into some arguments. Now, if any one of you were to come to me and,

32:55 and have my sister next to me and, and, and point your finger at my sister and say, you screwed up, guess all of a sudden where my fight goes, not toward my sister, it goes toward you because you're coming from the outside saying, judging whatever the action is within our family, it may or may not be right, but I want you to know that it's as soon as you come in, in full attack mode from the outside, the whole, I mean, this is what our family does. Our family, instead of all circling around and pointing at each other, we turn around and it becomes a solid unit facing outward, which you don't want to necessarily pick on,

33:41 but this is, so he's within the family unit. He says, you messed up this, this Yeshua. By the way, our God who, who inserts himself into history raised this, this Yeshua from the dead whom you crucified. Maybe we can just inverse the language here. You crucified Yeshua. And our God who inserts himself into history raised him up because that's what he wanted to do. He wanted to raise up Yeshua for the purpose of bringing salvation to all of our people. It's not that far of a a of, of a, of a, a stretch to get to that.

34:26 Why was Yeshua exalted, Yeshua's raised up and then exalted to the right hand of the Father, uh, as the leader and savior? Why is he exalted? It's given here in the, in the sentence, in the verse, to give repentance to Israel and removal of sins. In other words, repentance precedes removal of sins. So this Yeshua, whom you crucified, our God, has now lifted up the God of our fathers, has now raised up and exalted him for the purpose of repentance and the removal of all of our sins. Do you see the conversation that is now being had between Peter and the emissaries and the council?

35:19 The repentance and the removal of sins are connected. And here we go, continue to the next verse. And we are witnesses of all, uh, uh, of these events as is the Kodesh, the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey. In other words, Peter says, we witnessed it, we saw it back then just as is now. Priority or preference was given to eyewitnesses. People who saw the event, Peter says, and actually Peter witnessed all, I saw you condemn him. I saw him die.

36:05 I saw him raised again, and then I saw him exalted to the right hand of the Father. I'm a witness of it. And then Peter says, all of us are witnesses of it all. 12. If you remember, if you go back to the beginning of Acts when they were replacing, uh, Judah or Judas, as, as is commonly called when they're replacing him, the, the stipulation was that this person had to witness, had to have witnessed everything that Yeshua did from the beginning of his ministry to his exaltation into the heavens. So Peter now has no problem saying, we are all witnesses. It's not just one or two of us, but there's 12 of us who are witnesses. And actually there's probably even more.

36:53 But he says there's 12 of us. We are witnesses about, uh, of the events that God is now inserting himself into history for the purpose of the repentance and the removal of sin for Israel. The order to not teach in the name of Yeshua was in direct contradiction to all of this. Why? Because you can't teach about Yeshua and talk about his, his life, his death and his resurrection and his ascension to, into the, into the heavenlies,

37:40 to sit at the right hand of the Father without talking about Yeshua. It seems like I, I know, I'm just, I literally am saying the exact same thing, but you can't talk about with Yeshua without, you can't talk about Yeshua without talking about Yeshua or using his name. It's impossible. So what they're asking him to do is don't do what you're like. Don't use the name Yeshua. Whatever you do. What? Just don't use Yeshua's name. But that doesn't work. You either want us to do what we're doing or you don't want us to do what we're doing. And we'll come, I think it's in next week's passage, we'll come to a place where there's a sage on the council

38:26 who says, you know what? It's better to not make a judgment right now because if it's from God, it will continue. And if it's not, it'll die. But what's happening here is they're making swift decisions saying, don't talk about Yeshua. We feel condemned. I'm sorry, I can't help how you feel. All I know is that our God, the God of our fathers inserted himself into history so that he could raise Yeshua from the dead so that Israel could repent and have removal of our sins permanently.

39:11 And if repentance happens, then you have to acknowledge the person of Yeshua because it's all because of him. It's not because of anyone else. And not only are us 12, by the way, I'm just still Peter in this, in my terminology here, not only are US 12 witnesses, but also the spirit of God, the Ko, the Holy Spirit, is a witness. Now, this is now becomes a little bit more inflamed of a discussion. By the way, when you're having heated discussions, understand that you can either choose to cool the discussion or inflame it by, by Peter saying here also the ruakaka Kodesh is a witness man.

39:58 He just like rolls in God into the equation. He's like the Holy Spirit is a witness of everything, which now indicates that the high priest and his associates are in, are acting in opposition to the spirit of God. We're gonna stop there because next week we'll talk about the, the, the council judgment. But we'll stop there and we'll say, we'll have a couple applications. So what does this mean for you and me here at Brook Hashem? So the first thing, the first question I have for you is how do you know if you have heard from God?

40:44 Because you have to walk away from here today because I believe, and I sure hope you believe that God continues to speak to us. And if that is true, then we have to be able to discern whether or not it is God speaking to us. So how do you know if you've heard from the Lord, if God has called you to do something, what are you doing about it? In other words, are you walking in that call? Now? I have a few minutes 'cause I am drawing to an end early. So I'll share a story with you. Some of you may know, some of you may not.

41:32 But in 2020, pastors, religious leaders, community, faith leaders, whatever you, whatever verbiage you wanna put to them, but especially congregational leaders, uh, experienced one of the highest turnovers ever of any job including both deaths and resignations. And I guess firings would be included. Why is that 2020, if I can just put it this way, was a very difficult year. And I know that I just am, I'm kind of explaining to everyone what everyone already knows.

42:20 It's a, it's a difficult year. And this is, this is what I said to a pastor friend of mine. I said, it doesn't matter what decision I make, 60% of the people are gonna disagree with me. Now, I want you to think about that. If I say we're gonna do it this way, 60% disagree, well then wait, wait, lemme do this way. I still have 60% who disagree. That doesn't mathematically make sense. Why? Because 2020 doesn't make sense, but it's all true. It didn't matter what decision was made. It didn't matter if it was em or some church in California or some church and somewhere else. The church attrition rate churches dropped by a minimum of 40% in attendance, and that 40% never returned.

43:08 Now, they didn't go to other churches because if it dropped 40%, let's just tape em. If it dropped 40% here and it rose somewhere else, it would've marked as an even, even back and forth. But it fell 40% everywhere, which means they just stopped going to church or synagogue or wherever the place of worship is. And the reality is, no place has recovered yet. It has been. We're in 24, right? Yeah, it's been, it's been four years. I've got way more gray hair than I did in 19 20 19. But here's the thing. I was in a conference. I wasn't in a conference.

43:54 I was in my bedroom watching a conference online because we couldn't do anything. And it was in November-ish. It could have been late October, November, something like that, of 2020. And I'm watching this pastor, and some of you may know him, you may, I, I'm not gonna use his name just in case you don't like him. But I'm sitting here and I'm watching this conference and, and he's having a conversation and he looks at the camera, wait, let me look at the camera. I can see which one he looks at the camera and he goes, some of you are sitting at home right now saying, I quit. And like, I'm like, literally, I had sat there just moments before and I was like, I'm done, Lord, I I can't do this anymore. And and he goes, you're sitting at home in your chair, in your office or in your bedroom,

44:41 and you're saying, I quit. And I'm thinking to myself, Brittany, who are you on the phone with? Like, literally he was taking the words out of my head and I was like, okay, maybe I should listen. He says, this is what I want you to do, take a blank piece of paper. He said, I want you to write down what God originally called you to do. I wrote it down. Now, for some of you, you may not know this, you may not have never heard this story, but mine was very specific. I, in, in, in all of this rewind 13 years, I went to my parents and I said, God called me. Well, lemme rephrase. I said, I feel like God called me.

45:27 Can you pray with me and confirm or deny? I feel like God called me to be the senior leader of RK Hashem. Like it was like, it was very specific. It was not, you know, I'm gonna be in ministry. I'm gonna go lead some congregate. It was very specific to Bru Hashem. And, um, so I write this down, he says, now pray for a few minutes. So I'm sitting there praying. I'm like, okay, God, what a mess. I'm in. Like, I have like a six month old son who like literally is crying all the time. Kids everywhere. Congregation, why are you wearing masks? Why are you not wearing masks? Why you have this many people? Why you not have this many people? Why don't you do this? Why don't you do that? Like, I like so many conversations, my brain is about to explode and, uh, and,

46:14 and I'm, so he says, okay, now I want you to look at that statement and see if you accomplished what God called you to do. I looked at it in, in one way, yes, I'd already been senior leader Brook Hashem for two and a half years. So if you wanna call two and a half years accomplishing, then I had accomplished what God had called me to do. But I'm sitting there, I go, okay, okay, jokes on me, I get it. And I, okay God. And he says, if God, if you have, if you've already accomplished it, ask God if there's something else. He goes, if you haven't accomplished it, now you have to ask God, did you change my call or am I just need to suck it up buttercup and keep going?

47:01 And, uh, and so I was like, okay, okay, Lord. All right. So I, I came outta that. And I'll tell you what my honest, my honest opinion, not that I don't give you my honest opinion all the time, my honest opinion, 2020 would've dished me out just like everybody else. If I hadn't have had the exact words that God called me to do. And then someone challenged me and said, did you do it? It would've chewed me up and spit me out just like so many others. And the reality is, there's people who got chewed up and spit out unnecessarily. And unfortunately, some of those people have even left the faith.

47:47 Why? I don't know why, other than they needed to have someone say, turn to God and say, did I accomplish what I'm doing? And have other people around them saying, listen, I know it's crazy right now, but don't get crazy. I can't tell you how many times I had discussions with different people here who said, okay, just take a breath. This is one of my wife's favorite devices. If you're freaking out, just take a breath now take another one.

48:34 Now take one more. Do you feel what? Just whatever. If you did those three breaths, do you just feel what just changed within you? All of the anxiety and the emotions, they just kind of went by the wayside for a moment. So you need to know if God has called you to do something, and if you know it, what are you doing about it? And if you're doing nothing about it, I would challenge you just like our, our elder Dave does. If you're not hearing from God, go back and, and say, what was the last thing I heard from God? Did I finish doing that? Because why would God take time to tell you to do something else if you haven't finished what he told you to do?

49:20 Last, secondly, and finally, we are called to be a witness as Peter and the emissaries were witnesses concerning the death, resurrection, and ascension of Yeshua. So also, we are called to be witnesses to what the Lord is doing in our lifetime. By the way, we wi we are witnesses from, from the chain of events, the chain of transmission concerning the death, resurrection, and ascension of Yeshua from one follower of Yeshua to another. We become witnesses to that. But we're not just witnesses to that. We are now witnesses to what God is doing in our life.

50:05 You may say, what is God doing in our life? God founded the state of Israel, the modern state of Israel in our lifetime. That is a modern day miracle. God continues to preserve the Jewish people, the state of Israel through all sorts of problems, whether of others, uh, the doing of others or the doing of our owns our own problems. He's preserved us. That's God inserting himself into history and making sure that we continue to exist to be a witness concerning him. Yeshua died and rose again for the repentance of, of, of Israel and for the removal of sins

50:52 that atonement has been extended to all, who placed their trust in Yeshua, repent and turn to him for the removal of their own sins. And by doing that, you now have been grafted in to the promises and the covenants of our fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And so now you can say God has been faithful to me and because of our fathers. Why? Because you have been brought in to the commonwealth of Israel. It doesn't make you Jewish. It doesn't mean you have to be Jewish. It just makes you a, a worshiper of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

51:38 And you recognize that he hasn't stopped being the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And you wanna be a part of that. And so you continue to, to, to bless Israel and you continue to try to figure out how to provoke Israel to jealousy. Why? Because that's part of the role in the call of the nations. We are in a time period is so bizarre. Someone, I was talking to someone the other day and they said to me, do you think it's the like, like the, like, like, do you think we're in revelation? Do you think we're in the last days? I mean, I could just list off like 20 things right now as to, you know, there's wars, there's rumors of wars,

52:24 there's earthquakes, there's pestilence, there's disease, there's plagues. Um, there's all these nations rising up against Israel. Uh, hold on, let me get let me just, you ready? You ready? There's red heifers. I mean, all of these things are like beginning to come into place and you're like, oh my gosh, what do we do? Take a breath. It's all in God's time. Our job is to continue to be a witness concerning the light of Yeshua and to an ever-growing dark planet,

53:11 society, people, group, whatever terminology you want to use, that's our job. Our job's not to freak out about the signs of the times, though I'm not telling you, don't be aware of them. When Brittany was pregnant with, pregnant with, with all three of our babies, the closer we got to birth, the more I knew birth was coming. One of our children, she had contractions every night for 10 nights and it would start at 10:00 PM which by the way is when we go to bed. And like, we'd lay down to bed and then she'd be like, and we'd be up for like an hour and a half and then everything would go away by about midnight.

53:56 And I, and finally after on the last day, she looks at me, she goes, I can't do another day of this. She says, this baby has to come. And I, and I looked at her and I said, sweetie, the baby's not gonna live in you forever. The baby's gonna come out at some point. And if that's not mansplaining it, I don't know what is, but the, but that night, the baby came out. What I re like, there are certain signs that come with the birth of a baby. Likewise, there are certain signs that are coming or associated with the birth of the kingdom of God here on earth as it already is in existence in heaven and the like. Who knows where on those? If I were to take my wife's 10 day of false labor, who knows

54:44 where we are in that 10 day spectrum? But lemme tell you, all of the conditions exist for us to even be in the spectrum. For the first time ever, these nations are aligned. There's all sorts of things. You know what, you know what it, you know what it's supposed to inspire us to do. It's inspiring us to pray and to be continuing lights of Yeshua. It's not to, to, oh my goodness, there's gonna be so many people who die because there are revelation talks about it. The, the, the percentage of the po world's population that die through these plagues and pestilence. You know what? If you worry about it to the point

55:29 where you don't sleep, do you know how much you just prevented it? None. You know what all of that worrying did made your life shorter. That's it. Made you miss a good night's sleep. Get a good night's sleep and wake up the next morning and be like, Lord, who you got in my path today? I want to, I want to be Yeshua. I wanna show Yeshua to them. Like that's what you do. Why? Because that's what we're called to do, to be witnesses to what Yeshua and what our God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is continuing to do by inserting himself into history today, a Venus Shaima, our father in heaven. Lord, I thank you for this, uh, this text. I thank you for the emissaries and for Peter

56:16 and for their lives and their, their, uh, witnesses, the way they were to bear witness to you. Lord, I just thank you for these examples that we can look to, that we can inspire us. Lord, I pray that you would continue to, uh, work within each of us, that you would continue to cause us to grow and to mature in our faith in you. Lord, we bless you and praise you in Yeshua name. Amen. There's already in existence to hear on earth. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.

57:04 Give in the name of our Messiah, Yeshua Shabbat Shalom.