Rabbi Schneider — Yahweh Nissi
We are in the midst of a beautiful series called The Covenant Names of God. And what we're doing is we're looking at those places in the Hebrew Bible, in the Old Testament, where Yahweh, which is the Father's personal name, reveals himself to his people through one of the saving functions of his grace.
In other words, we find in the Hebrew Bible the Lord saying to Moses, your forefathers knew me as God Almighty. They knew me as El Shaddai. But Moses, by my name, Yahweh, they did not know me. This is my memorial name forever. And then throughout the rest of the Old Testament Yahweh, Father's personal name, is revealed progressively to the children of Israel through what he does to him in the acts of his saving grace.
And so we began looking at Yahweh Yireh, the Lord that provides. And we were looking last week at Yahweh as our healer. In Exodus, chapter 15:26, we find the Lord revealing himself to Moses and the children of Israel as Yahweh Ropheka or Yahweh Rophe, the Lord our healer.
I'm not going to repeat everything that I said last week, but I do want to pick up with making a few statements and then pressing on a little deeper. What we read in Exodus, 15:26 is that the Lord said to Israel, if you'll walk in my ways, give heed to my voice, walk by my statutes and commandments, you're going to experience me as the Lord that healeth thee.
And I ended last week's broadcast by sharing with you the fact that if we want to live in the reality of knowing God as our healer, we have to be rightly aligned with him. This is why the Lord said to Israel, if you'll walk in my ways, you're gonna know me as God your healer. Often times I find that in the church people want the health benefits of knowing God as their healer, but yet they continue to walk in unhealthy habits.
Either they don't exercise, or they eat too much, or they don't watch their cholesterol, or they don't watch their sugar, or maybe they're living in some other belligerent sin. But the Lord said, you're gonna know me in fullness.
You'll know me as the Lord your healer when you're walking in my ways, when you're following my Spirit, when you're yielding to me. Because when we position ourselves to receive Father in fullness, then his fullness is manifest in our lives, including his fullness revealed through us as the provision to keep our flesh healthy.
Now I realize that some of you have questions. Well why am I not healed? Or why do some people get healed and not other people? And let me say to you in humility, I don't have all the answers. What I do know is that it is clear in the Word of God that our God is a God that healeth thee.
Let me make a few other comments, though. The Lord said that we have to live, listen now, in his ways in order to experience him as God our healer. And again, I don't want you to feel bad. Maybe someone's watching right now, you're struggling with some type of sickness, and you're, you've done your best to live for God, and yet you're still struggling with this thing.
I want you to know, I, I make no judgement at all. I don't know why some get healed instantly. Some get healed over a period of time. Some don't experience their complete healing until they meet God face to face. I don't know the answer to that. What I know is that God is your healer and that you're gonna know perfect healing in your life. And I want to encourage you to believe in your healing now.
Let's not let what we don't understand keep us from taking ahold of and believing what we do understand. I want to make another observation now, church, beloved ones, from Exodus, 15:26. Notice here that the Lord says that if you'll walk in my ways, he said, listen now, I will put none of the diseases on you that I put on the Egyptians.
Many people teach that the Lord is never responsible for, for someone getting sick. People teach that sickness is never of God. But look at Exodus, 15:26, with me. Let's read it together: He said, if you will give earnest heed to the voice of the LORD your God, and do what is right in His sight, and give ear to His commandments, and keep all His statutes, now everyone listen up, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have put on the Egyptians.
Who put the diseases on the Egyptians? God is saying here concerning himself, I did. You see, we see other places in Scripture as well where God himself takes responsibility for putting sickness on someone.
For example, when Aaron and Miriam began to, to blasphemy Moses, what did God do? He struck them with leprosy. Who did that? God did that. When the children of Israel were in the wilderness grumbling against God, what did God do? He sent serpents to bite them and many died.
We read in the Book of Revelation that the Lord said concerning Jezebel, I gave her time to repent. God wanted her to repent. God said, I gave her time to repent and she would not. Therefore, I will cast her and those that practice immorality with her onto a bed of sickness.
Who was casting her and those that commit immorality with her onto a bed of sickness? God did. And so those that deny that God never puts sickness on someone are really putting blinders on their eyes because they can't handle the portion of the Word of God that teaches that sometimes he does because it doesn't fit with their theology.
But the truth of the matter is we do see examples in the Bible where God does use sickness to accomplish his own objectives. Now don't misunderstand. There's a difference between the temporal will of God and the eternal will of God.
You see, sometimes God will allow or cause sickness to come upon his people because it's a way of making them dependent on him. Sometimes it's because of sin. Sometimes it's because he's doing something in someone's life because through our weakness his power is perfected. But God is never interested in keeping somebody permanently sick. That is completely outside of his nature.
But to say that he never uses sickness or puts sickness on someone is to deny, beloved, the Word of God because it's clear that at times he does. Now I don't want you to get confused here. Is God a God that wants me to be healed or is God a God that wants me to be sick? God is a God that wants you healed. But sometimes God uses evil to accomplish a higher good.
I know this is hard to understand, but think about Paul. Paul was very explicit about this. Paul says this. Paul said this: Because of the abundance of the revelation that was given to me to keep me from exalting myself, Paul said, there was a messenger of Satan, Paul said, to buffet me to keep me from exalting myself.
And Paul said, I prayed to the Lord three times that God would remove this thorn in the flesh. But, Paul said, then the Lord spoke to me and said, no, Paul, my grace is sufficient for you. For in your weakness my power will be perfected. Therefore, Paul said, I would therefore glory in my weakness than in my strength, for in my weakness his power is perfected; for when I am weak, Paul said, then I'm strong.
So Paul was very specific when he says that because of the abundance of the revelation that was given him, to keep him from becoming prideful, God himself, it was by God's design, God sent a messenger of Satan to torment him to keep Paul dependent, to keep Paul clinging to Jesus so that Paul wouldn't get puffed up in the flesh.
It was actually a gift to Paul. It was the method that God used to keep Paul on his knees. And Paul said, and not only was it a method given to keep my on my knees, but it made me weak. And Paul said, and the Lord revealed himself that in my weakness his power will be built in my life. So people that want to deny that God can never use evil or that he never can use Satan for his own purposes, or that he never can use sickness, these people, beloved, are burying their head in the sand because they can't deal with the truth.
I want to state again, God is a good God. In him there is light and there is no darkness at all. But God, as we say in Hebrew, listen church, Adon Olam, he is the Master of the universe. And God uses all things to accomplish his own purpose. Even think about the fall of Adam. Think about this with me for a second.
Does God ever use evil to accomplish a higher good? And I'm here to say to you, church, yes. Think about Adam. Adam was in the garden with Eve, right. He was walking in the garden. He knew God, right. But what happened? Satan came into the garden, deceived Eve. Adam and Eve both fell. And the question we have to ask ourselves is did God want Adam to fall?
Was it God's purpose for, for Satan to deceive Adam so that Adam and Eve would fall and suffer spiritual death? What's the answer to that question? I believe the answer to that question is yes, it was God's purpose for Adam to fall. And here is the reason why. If Adam would have never fallen, Jesus would have never been glorified as the Savior of the world. Think about it.
When we meet Jesus, we're gonna throw our crowns at his feet and we're gonna say, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive glory, honor and dominion forever and ever. And we're gonna bow down and worship Jesus forever for being our Redeemer and our Savior. This is God's purpose.
If Adam and Eve would have never fallen, Jesus would not have been honored and glorified through human beings the same way. Secondly I want you to consider this. The Bible tells us that the first Adam, the Adam that was in the Garden of Eden, he was a living soul. But the second Adam, the Bible says that the second Adam is the Lord Jesus; that the second Adam is a life-giving Spirit.
Now stay with me, church. The first Adam lived in God's presence, but the second Adam, Jesus, listen now, has given us his own Spirit so that the church, now listen, is actually born of his Spirit. This is why Jesus said, Truly, truly I say to you, that which is born of flesh is flesh; that which is born of Spirit is spirit.
You must be born again, speaking of the new birth of the Spirit. You see, Adam, the first Adam in the Garden of Eden, he wasn't born again. He lived in God's presence but he wasn't born internally of God's Spirit. But now that Adam fell and you and I are redeemed through Jesus, we actually have God's Spirit, listen now church, living inside us.
We're born again. We actually are at a much higher place in the, in terms of the realm of redemption than the first Adam ever was because God's own nature now is part of our own nature. We've been made partakers of the divine nature. He lives in us and through us. And so you see, God used the fall of Adam to glorify Jesus and to elevate those of us that are redeemed into a place of literally being born by a spirit.
So we are now, get it church, the children of God. So there's a great mystery. This is how big God is. This is why Paul says in the Book of Romans, who has known the mind of the Lord. His ways are past finding out. God said, my ways are not your ways, and my thoughts are not your thoughts. Even as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.
God works all things after the counsel of his own will and causes all things to work together for good for those that love him and are called according to his purposes. And so as we conclude this section on the Lord as our healer, I want you to encourage you to trust him. I want to encourage you to know that he loves you, that he has your healing secured through Jesus.
Sometimes people are healed in an instant, sometimes they're healed progressively as they're going. Some are healed when they see him face to face. But I want you to know, God's banner over you is healing. I want you to believe him for healing. I want you to ask him to come inside you and infuse you with healing. I want to encourage you to ask him to touch your mortal body to bring life to your mortal body.
Father, right now in Jesus's name, I come right now and I shock, Father God, the electrical system, the nervous system of your people; Father, that you would bring each one of us into divine alignment; Father, that you would bring these physical bodies into divine health. I know that there's somebody that's out there, you just got healed of a neurological disease as I prayed just now. And Father, I speak Shalom over your people now.
Father, thank you for revealing yourself to us as Yahweh Ropheka, as the Lord our healer. Daddy, we trust you. King Jesus, we love you. Thank you for dying on the Cross, shedding your blood, being pierced through for our transgressions, wounded for us for our iniquities, and that by your chastening, we could be made whole. Thank you, Jesus, that in you we're complete, and that in you we're healed; Jesus, that by your stripes we are healed. You are Yahweh Ropheka. You are the Lord our Healer. Praise God. Amen and Amen.