Rabbi Schneider - A Multidimensional God
I want to continue today, reading from the book of Isaiah 7:14, focusing on the fact that in the Hebrew Bible, as the Hebrew Bible predicted for us what the ministry of the Messiah would do, we read that the ministry of Messiah would bring God near to us. That when Messiah came, we'd be able to say, "Listen, God is here". So, listen to the book of Isaiah 7:14. "Therefore the LORD Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin will be with a child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel," which means God is with us. Now, we find the scripture repeated. In the Brit Chadasha, in the New Testament, Matthew said in chapter 1, verse 23, when Yeshua was born, "Behold the virgin shall be with child, and she'll bear a son". And then he went on to quote there this 14th verse of Isaiah chapter 7.
And so, what we find then is, in the Hebrew Bible, a promise that a child would be born and his birth into the earth would bring God here. And again, when Messiah was born, Matthew quoted that Scripture, Isaiah 7:14, and said it had now been fulfilled. This is important for us to understand in a spiritual dimension because many of us are still looking for God someplace out there. We look up hoping that somehow maybe if we can see far enough into space, maybe we can connect to God. But the truth is, beloved friends, God is already here. And the problem is not that God is so far away that we can't get to Him. The real challenge for many of us is that He's so close that we're afraid to let Him in. "You shall call his name Immanuel," meaning God is now with us. He's here. Yeshua ascended to heaven, then He sent the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, the Ruach HaKodesh, the breath of Elohim is here with us on the earth. Jesus said, "I am with you always, even to the end. I'll never leave you or forsake you".
Right now, many of you are feeling anxiety, you're feeling nervous, you're feeling stressed. There's all these things in your life that are pressing in. You're feeling the anxiety of all these relationships and circumstances that you find yourself surrounded by. But I want to say to you, beloved one, God is already here. He's here. He wants us to get grounded in this reality. This is why David said, "Lo, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for thou art with me". When Messiah was born to the world, Matthew quoted Isaiah and said, "Immanuel has been born". God is now here. He's already here. Sometimes we're like groping in the darkness, and the problem is, is that we don't have faith to just affirm the simple truth. Because God is here, it doesn't mean that life's going to be easy. What it means is as we practice the presence, as we affirm the truth that God is here, the roots of our soul grow deep into the divine nature.
As we walk through life, and press in against the darkness, clinging to God, affirming that He's here, what happens is our soul is expanded in the realm of eternal life, and we get strong. And as we get strong, we get happy. As we get strong, we're able to conquer all types of darkness and the spiritual forces of wickedness that are all around us in this earth. But in order to be strong, in order to conquer wickedness, we need to know God is here. I want you to say it with me. Just put your hand over your heart, and just say out loud with me to the Lord: "God is here". Let's say it another way. "God is already here". And one more time, "God, Father, Yeshua, Holy Spirit, you are already here". This is what Messiah brought us, the Holy Spirit's here. And now Father wants to build us up in this truth so that we can live, beloved ones, in this reality. Again, we're talking about messianic prophecy. And we look first of all at Isaiah 7:14, where the prophet told us that when Messiah came, when the son was born, when the child was born, it would bring God here to planet earth available for all of us. He's knocking at the door of our hearts. And if we open up the door and let Him in, we can experience the reality that God is with us.
Let's continue on now in this theme of Messianic prophecy as we try and contemplate the mystery of the fact that Messiah is God's Son, that Messiah is the Son of God. Now, this may sound like a simple statement to many that are listening to me right now. That Messiah is the Son of God, that Jesus is God's Son. As John 3:16 tells us, "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him will not perish, but have everlasting life". It sounds simple to many. But I want you to know as a Jewish person, and to those that are Jewish that may be watching right now, we want to acknowledge that this statement that God has a Son is very difficult for us to comprehend and conceive. Because as a Jew, we were raised with this declaration: "Sh'ma Yisrael Adonai Eloheinu Adonai Echad. Hear, O Israel! The LORD our God, the LORD is one".
And so as Jewish people, we're raised in an environment in which we have come to believe that there's only one God. And so when we now try to start to assimilate this revelation that God has a Son, it becomes very difficult because we say, "But we only believe in one God. Now it sounds like we're talking about two Gods. It sounds like we're talking about God the Father, and now you're talking about God the Son, and now you're talking about God the Holy Spirit. I mean, which one are you worshiping? Is God divided"? This has been a huge theological source of tension between the traditional Jewish community and the Christian community. With the traditional Jewish community focusing solely on the oneness of God, and then the traditional Christian community talking about the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. So how do we merge these together? And what does the Hebrew Bible teach us about God having a son?
Well, let's begin by looking at Psalm 2:7. Here we have the psalmist inspired by the Holy Spirit, declaring this: "I will surely tell of the decree of the LORD. He-speaking of the Father, speaking of God-he said to me, 'You are My Son, I have begotten you.'" Let's read it again. Psalm 2:7. "I will surely tell of the decree of the LORD. He said to me, 'You are My Son, today, I have begotten you.'" This reminds me of Yeshua on the Mount of Transfiguration with his apostles and how the voice came from heaven, that said to him, "You are My beloved Son, and in you I'm well pleased". The disciples heard the voice saying, "This is My beloved Son, and in Him I'm well pleased". And so we get this concept of the Sonness of this element of the Godhead in Psalm 2:7. We're going to look at another Psalm a little bit later. But remember David said, "The Lord said to my Lord". And Yeshua said to the Pharisees, "Who was David speaking of when he said, 'The Lord said to my Lord'"?
Of course, what was going on here is this mystery of the relationship between Messiah who's the Son, and the Father, both equally God. How do we understand then that God is one, and yet one God exists in Father, Son, and Spirit? Well, first of all, let me say this. Some may accuse me of copping out by answering this way, but I personally feel that it's very genuine, authentic, and true. How can we expect to understand the fullness of God's nature when we cannot understand how God has always been? Can you understand how it's possible that God has always been? I mean, the only thing that our mind can comprehend is, but where did He come from? Well, how did He get here? I mean, how could he have come from nothing? He had to come from somewhere. How can a God be self-existent? How is it possible that there's a God that has always been? It makes no sense to us. It's beyond anything that we can even come close to grasping.
And since we can recognize that we cannot even come close to grasping the wonderful, supernatural, it's just incredible reality that there's a loving God who's self-existent, that's always been, that didn't come from anywhere, even as we cannot understand that rationally or logically because we can only think in terms of cause and effect. We always think of where'd that come from? Or what caused that? The big bang. What caused the big bang? What caused that thing that caused the big bang? The questioning will go on like that forever because the only thing that we understand is cause and effect. But God is the first cause, who Himself had no cause. Nothing caused Him. He's always been. Since our human minds cannot think in that realm, a realm of a self-existent God that came from nowhere but has always been, how should we expect to be able to say that it's impossible for God to be one, and yet within Himself have a multiplicity of natures that He can display?
When we say that God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we're not saying that He's three gods. But we're rather saying-hear me now-that God is multidimensional. There's one God, one essence, and He is multidimensional. He could manifest Himself as Father. He could manifest Himself in the form of His Spirit. He could manifest Himself as Son. This is what the Brit Chadasha, the New Testament teaches: that there's one God. And that within the Father's bosom is a Son. It's His own Son. And this is what Psalm 2:7 is saying. The Lord is speaking, "I will surely tell the decree of the LORD". Jesus is speaking, "He said to me, 'You are My Son, today I have begotten you.'" Matthew 17:5 says, "While he was still speaking, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and behold, a voice out of the cloud said, 'This is My beloved Son, with whom I'm well-pleased; listen to Him!'". Luke 22:70, they were saying to Yeshua, "And they all said, 'Are you the Son of God then?' And Jesus, Yeshua said to them, 'Yes, I am.'"
You see, the Son is in the bosom of the Father. God is one, but within Himself, there is relationship. This is why we read in the book of Genesis. From the very beginning, the Scripture says, "Let us", when God was creating the world. The Scripture says in Genesis, "Let us", the Lord said, "make man in our image. Let us make man in our image". Why? Because within the Godhead there is a multidimensional aspect. In the bosom of the Father is the Son. The Son has always been. He's always been. He's been forever in the Father, with the Father. And the Father's love is focused on his Son who's in His bosom. And it's the Son who has always been in the bosom of the Father that was made manifest in the world and who came and died, beloved ones, for our sin. It's beautiful. We worship you and bless you, King Jesus, Messiah, Yeshua. And so we see the concept then of the Son of God, this aspect of the Godhead revealed, even in, beloved ones, the Torah.
Let's continue on today in our journey down the road of Messianic prophecy by focusing on the fact that in the Hebrew Bible, we're looking at predictive prophecy. Because remember, I've been sharing with you, in Season 1 and 2, that not all prophecy, not all messianic prophecy is predictive. Some of it is in type. Some of it is in shadows. Some of it is just Yeshua repeating Israel's history because Yeshua is Israel's divine head. But now we're focusing on predictive prophecy. And one of the things that we read about in the Hebrew Bible is that the Messiah would be born into the world through a woman. In other words, He wouldn't just materialize out of the sky, but He literally would be born into the earth through a woman.
Now, again, myself being Jewish, I'm very cognizant of the fact that traditional Jewish people feel that this concept of an eternal God being born into the world through a woman is blasphemous. And that's one of the things that they accuse Jesus of over and over was blasphemy because He made Himself out to be the Son of God, or made Himself out to be equal with God. But the reality is, is that God coming to the earth through a woman was done because He wanted to fully unite Himself with humanity who He wanted to save. And the only way He could really unite Himself with you and I, that had been created in His image in order to be in relationship with Him, the only way He could fully unite Himself to us so that we could enter in to the intimacy with Him that He's after, is that He became one of us. And in order for that to happen, beloved, He had to come into the world, just Like you and I, through a woman.
And so we read in the book of Bereshit, the book of beginnings, the book of Genesis in chapter 3, verse 15, these words: "And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel". Many people feel this is the first messianic prophecy. After Adam and Eve sinned, they needed to be redeemed. They were separated from God. We know what happened. They sinned. Why did they sin? They sinned because they had desire. The serpent came and said, "Look at this tree. If you eat of it, it's going to make you wise". And when Eve saw that it looked good to the eyes, that it would be pleasant to the taste and it would make her wise, it aroused her desire. But she chose to fulfill her desire in the wrong way. God said, "You can eat from any tree except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil".
So she chose to fulfill her desire-we all have desire-but she chose to fulfill her desire outside of God's path for her life. So she ate of the tree. And when she ate of the tree and Adam ate of the tree, immediately, they realized they were naked, shame sat in. And then when they realized they were naked because they sinned, and shame set in, they began to run to hide from God, and eventually became isolated and alone. Because shame causes us to run, and we run into a place of darkness or isolation. But Jesus, born into the world through a woman, came to redeem us and save us from what Satan had been able to do when Eve fell for his lie.
I want you to know, beloved, your salvation is rooted in the Word of God. It goes all the way back to Genesis 3:15, immediately after Adam and Eve sinned, when God promised humanity He would send us a redeemer, that His redeemer would come into the world through a woman, that He would crush Satan under His feet, and He would save God's people. I want you to know today, God has a wonderful plan for your life. It's bigger than anything you can even imagine right now. But in order to enter into our destiny, beloved, we need to fully return to our creator by giving our lives to Him through Messiah Jesus. I love you today. God bless you. We'll see you next week, and shalom.