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Caption transcript for Faith for the Future: “Sacrifice and Loss” (4/10)

• 00:00 ♪♪♪
• 00:03 David Hart: Welcome to "Our Jewish Roots."
• 00:06 ♪♪♪
• 00:12 David: "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for,
• 00:15 the conviction of things not seen.
• 00:18 For by it the men of old received divine approval."
• 00:22 For whatever was written in former days was written
• 00:25 for our instruction that through endurance
• 00:28 and through the encouragement of the Scriptures,
• 00:31 we might have hope.
• 00:32 ♪♪♪
• 00:36 David: "Faith for the Future:
• 00:38 Our Journey with the Patriarchs."
• 00:40 ♪♪♪
• 00:43 David: Thank you for joining us today.
• 00:45 I'm David Hart.
• 00:46 Kirsten Hart: I'm Kirsten Hart.
• 00:47 Dr. Jeffrey Seif: I am Jeffrey Seif,
• 00:49 and I'd like to remind you what Jesus said.
• 00:51 Sometimes we have to pick up our cross and follow him.
• 00:54 We see that not just in the newer testament
• 00:56 but the Old Testament, correct?
• 00:58 Kirsten: And we've been through Abraham
• 01:00 and Sarah's journey.
• 01:02 We can say those names now, their extended new names.
• 01:05 And today is kind of the biggie, isn't it?
• 01:08 It's the Moriah experience that we kind of know Abraham for.
• 01:12 Jeffrey: It's a tough story: "Go sacrifice your kid,"
• 01:14 you know?
• 01:16 I mean, "Say what?"
• 01:17 That's a tough assignment.
• 01:19 Then he buries his wife too.
• 01:20 That's another toughie.
• 01:21 Kirsten: I know.
• 01:23 It's a hard one today, but it's part of his journey of faith,
• 01:26 and it's necessary to see what he had to walk through like
• 01:28 so many of us have walked through in our--
• 01:30 Jeffrey: As we journey through life, I think we all get
• 01:33 bounced around a little bit, you know?
• 01:35 It just happens.
• 01:36 David: In our drama today, Abraham is ready to encounter
• 01:39 his ultimate test of faith, followed by Barri's
• 01:42 insight regarding our obedience to the Lord.
• 01:45 Let's go there now.
• 01:47 ♪♪♪
• 01:49 narrator: And it came to pass, after these things,
• 01:53 that God tested Abraham.
• 01:57 Abraham: [speaking in Hebrew]
• 01:59 Isaac: [speaking in Hebrew]
• 02:01 ♪♪♪
• 02:07 Abraham: [speaking in Hebrew]
• 02:13 ♪♪♪
• 02:16 narrator: "And God said, 'Take now thy son,
• 02:20 thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest,
• 02:23 and get thee unto the land of Moriah,
• 02:26 and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one
• 02:30 of the mountains which I will tell thee of.'"
• 02:33 "Then on the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes,
• 02:38 and saw the place afar off."
• 02:41 ♪♪♪
• 02:52 Abraham: [speaking in Hebrew]
• 03:01 ♪♪♪
• 03:04 Isaac: [speaking in Hebrew]
• 03:11 ♪♪♪
• 03:14 Dr. Barri Seif: The most difficult assignment,
• 03:17 the most difficult call of obedience to follow,
• 03:22 as Abraham is prepared to carry out
• 03:27 what God has called him to do with his son Isaac.
• 03:31 What a challenge that any parent has regarding their own child.
• 03:37 A dear friend of mine recently had to bury her daughter
• 03:42 who died of natural causes.
• 03:45 That's outside the proper order of things.
• 03:48 The children should bury the parents,
• 03:50 not the parents bury the child.
• 03:52 But here we see Abraham's obedience.
• 03:55 Hebrews 12, exhort us to "Keep our eyes on Jesus,
• 04:02 Yeshua, the author and perfecter of our faith,
• 04:05 who for the joy set before him, endured the cross."
• 04:09 And then also in Romans 4, Paul reminds us about Abraham,
• 04:17 yet with respect to the promise of God,
• 04:20 "Abraham, he did not waver in unbelief,
• 04:24 but he grew strong in faith, giving glory to God,
• 04:30 and being fully assured that what he had promised
• 04:33 he was able also to perform."
• 04:38 Nothing is complete without the cross, and,
• 04:40 yet the cross is at the end of the story, is it?
• 04:43 This journey, this call of obedience
• 04:46 was not the end of the story.
• 04:48 The Resurrection, the empty tomb is the fulfillment
• 04:52 of the promise that we have in Messiah, Yeshua, Jesus.
• 04:59 We know that, through our trials,
• 05:01 always the best is yet to come.
• 05:04 That's the kind of Savior that we love, that we can put
• 05:08 our hope in when it seems as though all hope is lost.
• 05:14 He's the "Yes" and the "Amen," and we can trust him even with
• 05:19 a difficult call of obedience that we saw with Abraham.
• 05:24 ♪♪♪
• 05:27 Kirsten: Barri just mentioned this call to obedience,
• 05:30 and I've gotta be honest.
• 05:33 I don't think, if God told me "Sacrifice that beautiful son,"
• 05:38 or our firstborn, Tyler, I don't think I would've said yes.
• 05:42 David: You?
• 05:44 Jeffrey: Well, I don't know, you know?
• 05:46 If he's a teenager, I thought-- I threatened to kill my kids
• 05:49 every now and then.
• 05:50 I was joking, of course, and I'm joking now.
• 05:52 No, that's a tough one.
• 05:53 That's a tough order to fill.
• 05:55 Kirsten: But you--don't you believe--and the Scripture tells
• 05:58 us--right?--that Abraham had enough faith for the future
• 06:01 that God would raise his son up if he had to kill them.
• 06:05 That's a lot of faith.
• 06:06 Jeffrey: Yeah, and that's an incredible statement.
• 06:08 We find it in the newer testament,
• 06:10 and kudos to him for that.
• 06:12 David: Right now, let's go to our drama
• 06:14 as Abraham takes Isaac to the altar.
• 06:16 ♪♪♪
• 06:18 Isaac: [speaking in Hebrew]
• 06:21 Abraham: [speaking in Hebrew]
• 06:27 ♪♪♪
• 06:37 ♪♪♪
• 06:47 ♪♪♪
• 06:57 ♪♪♪
• 07:07 ♪♪♪
• 07:17 ♪♪♪
• 07:21 Abraham: [speaking in Hebrew]
• 07:51 ♪♪♪
• 07:58 Jeffrey: This series is about "Faith for the Future,"
• 08:02 and the 22nd chapter of Genesis, "Bereishit," is important
• 08:08 in that regard for both Jews and Christians.
• 08:13 Jews refer to it as the story of the "akedah,"
• 08:17 "the binding of Isaac."
• 08:20 Christians refer to the story as a typological picture
• 08:24 of the father, Abraham, taking his miracle-born son Isaac,
• 08:29 taking him to Mount Moriah and sacrificing him--
• 08:33 well, prevented from doing so with the Word,
• 08:37 according to chapter 22, verse 7:
• 08:40 "Vayomer Avraham Elohim yare, and Abraham said,
• 08:46 "God will provide."
• 08:49 And the argument is the ultimate provision was when God did,
• 08:54 himself, provide a sacrifice when Mount Moriah, years later,
• 08:58 in the person of his Son Yeshua.
• 09:01 It's a fascinating story and it's judged to be a picture,
• 09:07 a snapshot in Old Testament prophecy that takes us
• 09:10 to the story of Yeshua.
• 09:15 Here I am, you've heard of the beginnings of the Jesus story.
• 09:17 In the gospel of Matthew, the gospel of Luke,
• 09:23 we learn about the young Jesus.
• 09:25 Two different stories.
• 09:27 Actually it's the Lukan story that gets us here in the manger.
• 09:31 When the wise men show up in the Matthew story,
• 09:35 they don't come to a cave.
• 09:38 They come to a home.
• 09:40 They don't engage a child, a newborn, but rather a young lad
• 09:46 who's around two years of age, according to the Matthew story.
• 09:50 It's in Luke we hear about Yeshua born and placed
• 09:53 in a manger.
• 09:55 Of course, this looks a little different.
• 09:57 We're used to wood stock for the manger.
• 10:00 The manger, however, in antiquity,
• 10:04 you go back to the Jewish world, they had better things to do
• 10:07 with wood than chop it up all the time.
• 10:09 In fact, we probably need to rethink the story of Jesus
• 10:11 and his father Joseph being carpenters.
• 10:15 Better to speak of stone masons.
• 10:17 Certainly, they're in the construction business,
• 10:20 but there wasn't a lot of cuttin' up wood.
• 10:22 Here we have an example of a feeding trough.
• 10:25 You'll see it right here, and, of course, there's hay on top,
• 10:29 and arguably the Christ child was put on something like this.
• 10:33 This is a softer place to begin, and he ended
• 10:36 on harder boards now, didn't he?
• 10:38 And that's the Gospel story.
• 10:40 That's the Gospel truth.
• 10:42 And we see a snapshot of that, as I've said, in the story
• 10:46 of Genesis chapter 22.
• 10:50 Just to repeat it, because it is so worth hearing,
• 10:53 especially for someone like me, it's really important
• 10:57 for someone like my wife and myself of Jewish extract to see
• 11:01 the Jesus story in the Jewish story.
• 11:03 That's really important.
• 11:05 There's the father, Avraham.
• 11:09 There's a woman who cannot bear.
• 11:12 She's barren.
• 11:14 There's a miracle that takes angelic visitation.
• 11:18 It takes divine impartation.
• 11:20 She gives birth to this son, miracle-born son from a womb
• 11:24 that couldn't produce.
• 11:26 And then this child is told by his father to go take a walk up
• 11:29 Moriah, and the father Abraham takes that son, Yitzchak,
• 11:36 and they go up the mountain.
• 11:39 I wanna talk about, "Faith for the Future."
• 11:43 And when I think of that, I wonder about Abram's state
• 11:47 of mind at the time for he is about to plunge a dagger
• 11:53 into the breast of the future or so it seems.
• 11:59 This is a man who's thoroughly committed to the belief that God
• 12:03 holds the key to the future, not the circumstances
• 12:08 as he sees them at the moment.
• 12:11 Now, to be sure, he loves his son.
• 12:14 This was a hard assignment, to be sure,
• 12:17 a test as it's noted elsewhere in Scripture.
• 12:20 He passed it.
• 12:22 And what enabled him to pass it and to get past the moment was
• 12:25 a belief in a God who can get him past the difficult moments
• 12:31 on into the future.
• 12:34 Some of you may be living in proximity to dying dreams.
• 12:38 Maybe you killed them, and a lot of people wonder,
• 12:42 "Is there hope even now? Is there hope?"
• 12:45 Is the conversation about faith for the future just something
• 12:49 that TV personalities talk about with open Bibles,
• 12:52 or is it something that you can think about in the life
• 12:55 that you live right now?
• 12:57 Well, listen, this story in Genesis 22
• 13:00 wasn't on the big screen.
• 13:01 This story was just a man making his journey through life,
• 13:04 a man who walked by faith, a man who believed
• 13:08 that God had the key,
• 13:10 and he walked by faith and believed God for a future.
• 13:14 ♪♪♪
• 13:23 announcer: Do you wonder about your future
• 13:25 as a believer in the Messiah?
• 13:28 Our founder, Zola Levitt, wrote a booklet that tells us
• 13:30 what lies ahead, "Glory: The Future of the Believers."
• 13:35 Inside, Zola explains the coming Rapture, our time in heaven,
• 13:39 the kingdom on earth, and then eternity.
• 13:43 Find out what God has prepared for those that love him.
• 13:47 Call 1-800-WONDERS or go to levitt.com.
• 13:51 ♪♪♪
• 13:58 ♪ Sha'alu Shalom Yerushalayim ♪
• 14:02 ♪ Sha'alu, Sha'alu, Shalom ♪
• 14:06 ♪ For the holy city of Jerusalem ♪
• 14:13 ♪ we will pray for peace, Sha'alu ♪
• 14:17 ♪ Shalom ♪
• 14:25 ♪ Shalom ♪
• 14:30 David: I was talking to some friends the other day,
• 14:33 who were making plans for their vacation.
• 14:34 I believe they were going to Hawaii or somewhere.
• 14:37 I can't remember exactly where it was.
• 14:40 Kirsten: Tropical.
• 14:41 David: Yes, and I said,
• 14:43 "Why don't you plan a trip to Israel with us?"
• 14:45 And they hadn't even thought about that, but they perked up
• 14:48 when we told them how amazing our trips to Israel are.
• 14:52 We would love for you to join us.
• 14:54 Maybe you haven't thought about it before.
• 14:56 It's life-changing.
• 14:57 We would love for you to join us on a tour.
• 14:59 You can find all the information on levitt.com.
• 15:02 Kirsten: We tell people, "Save up your pennies.
• 15:04 Save up your dollars, and they'll add up,
• 15:07 they'll stack up, and you can go to Israel with us."
• 15:09 Speaking of dollars--
• 15:11 Jeffrey: It's true as well, when people invest in the Lord's
• 15:14 work, they're laying up their dollars in the bank of heaven.
• 15:17 With that said, begging your indulgence, let me inquire
• 15:22 of you whether you'd be willing to support and help
• 15:26 not this program but this witness.
• 15:29 Your dollars translate into a testimony in the world.
• 15:34 It's a Gospel testimony, but we look at the good news
• 15:37 through the eyes of the Jews, and we have to rely on yous
• 15:41 to do it, please.
• 15:42 We're looking at a program, sacrifices at play
• 15:45 in the literature.
• 15:46 It's been like that from Genesis all the way to Revelation.
• 15:49 We're all participating in the drama
• 15:52 of expanding his kingdom on earth.
• 15:54 Let me encourage you to be sacrificial,
• 15:56 and help us do it through this ministry.
• 16:00 Kirsten: Our ministry is known for the wonderful,
• 16:03 dramatic reenactments.
• 16:04 You help make that possible.
• 16:06 Now let's go back to our story as our beloved Sarah passes on.
• 16:11 ♪♪♪
• 16:15 narrator: Sarah died in Hebron, in the land of Canaan,
• 16:19 and Abraham paid 400 shekels of silver for the Cave of Machpelah
• 16:24 for a burying place.
• 16:26 Abraham bought the field of Machpelah and the cave therein
• 16:31 and all the trees that were in the field.
• 16:33 ♪♪♪
• 16:35 [vocalizing]
• 16:46 [vocalizing]
• 16:56 [vocalizing]
• 17:03 ♪♪♪
• 17:12 Abraham: Sarah-- [speaking in Hebrew]
• 17:28 ♪♪♪
• 17:34 ♪♪♪
• 17:44 ♪♪♪
• 17:52 Jeffrey: In so many ways, Sarah was the lamp,
• 17:56 the light of Abraham's life.
• 18:01 We come to a place in the literature today, however,
• 18:05 in the 23rd chapter of Genesis, when the light went out.
• 18:12 Abraham finds himself in a tough place.
• 18:16 We're looking at the literature at some tough space.
• 18:20 In the Jewish world, this portion of the text is called
• 18:23 "Chayei Sarah," which translates as "The Life of Sarah,"
• 18:28 but truth be known, the literature speaks more
• 18:32 to her death and shows something about Abraham as he looks
• 18:37 to the future as he remembers his past.
• 18:41 And I think, by the way, that those that are faith-filled
• 18:45 and looking to the future, one of the ways
• 18:47 that we articulate that, one of the ways that we attest
• 18:51 to that is how we remember the past.
• 18:54 And what's particularly striking, for my money
• 18:58 in literature, is the dignity, the solemnity
• 19:03 with which Abraham deals with the loss of his beloved.
• 19:08 We're told in chapter 23, verse 2, when we're told that
• 19:13 "Abraham came to mourn for Sarah and that he wept over her,"
• 19:20 it's a tender moment.
• 19:23 It's time to say good-bye.
• 19:26 There's beauty here.
• 19:28 There's dignity there.
• 19:30 And sometimes, the way that we deal with death
• 19:34 is an attestation of the way that we deal with life.
• 19:39 It shows value.
• 19:41 It shows virtue.
• 19:43 And I might say, by the way, that I think Christians
• 19:46 have a lot of trouble dying.
• 19:49 In the Jewish world, there's a set trajectory
• 19:53 of how we deal with death.
• 19:56 Let me explain that to you and talk to you about how this is
• 19:59 understood within the context of "Faith for the Future."
• 20:05 In the Jewish world, when someone dies,
• 20:10 they're interred immediately, and the family members
• 20:15 will throw the dirt into the grave.
• 20:19 There's a kind of finality there that's telegraphed
• 20:22 to the principal parties who are mourning.
• 20:26 Subsequent to that, in the Jewish world,
• 20:28 there's a period of mourning.
• 20:29 It's called "Shivah."
• 20:31 It's a week, and in a Jewish home,
• 20:33 all the mirrors are covered.
• 20:37 The family doesn't sit on couches.
• 20:39 They sit on wooden stools.
• 20:42 It's a time to grieve.
• 20:44 Men don't shave.
• 20:46 Women aren't putting on makeup and cologne.
• 20:48 People are coming over to the home to bring food
• 20:51 and to comfort those that are grieving.
• 20:55 But the way that we comfort in the Jewish world is,
• 20:58 when you visit someone who's grieving,
• 21:00 you say nothing because, you know,
• 21:03 when people show up, they wanna encourage or "God bless,"
• 21:06 "Johnny was a great guy,"
• 21:07 and "Yeah, I remember this and that."
• 21:09 In the Jewish world, you say nothing.
• 21:11 You sit next to the person who's mourning
• 21:14 and wait for them to speak.
• 21:17 If they wanna cry, you cry with them.
• 21:20 If they wanna reminisce, you reminisce with them.
• 21:23 If they wanna be angry at God for the loss, you let them vent.
• 21:27 It's all about accompanying the mourner.
• 21:31 It's all about accompanying the person whose grief
• 21:33 on the journey--it's not about trying to bottle up grief.
• 21:38 It's to let it--you know, energies run their course,
• 21:45 and I think we see this in play in the literature.
• 21:47 In the Jewish world, there are seven days of mourning.
• 21:50 It notes here that Abram mourns.
• 21:52 Subsequent to which then there's a 30-day period called
• 21:55 "Shloshim."
• 21:57 Not everyone can be in the state of shock and awe, you know,
• 22:02 not shaving, colognes, sitting on benches and just sitting in
• 22:06 the house, and--but through the 30-day period and the aftermath,
• 22:11 you know, people are still in a state of shock.
• 22:14 In the Jewish world, on the 30th day, the rabbi will come to
• 22:18 the home and take the mourners for a walk around the block.
• 22:22 It's a symbolic gesture.
• 22:24 You don't need to say anything.
• 22:26 It's a way of telegraphing, you know, that death has happened,
• 22:29 and we gotta get out there again and live again and dream again
• 22:35 and love again.
• 22:38 Jews toast with the expression "L'Chaim," which means
• 22:43 "to life."
• 22:45 We celebrate the lives of those who live with us, but subsequent
• 22:49 to that, then we have to go on and reach for the future.
• 22:54 In the Jewish world, if someone's engaged to be married,
• 23:00 and the wedding is set for one day, and the father or mother
• 23:04 or significant person in the family dies two days beforehand,
• 23:08 you don't cancel the wedding.
• 23:10 Now, in other cultures, it would be deemed an insult
• 23:12 to the departed, but in the Jewish world,
• 23:15 the engines of life have to outperform the engines
• 23:19 of death, decay, despair, disorientation, and death.
• 23:23 I mention that here.
• 23:24 There's something beautiful.
• 23:26 When you look at Abraham, it's time to say good-bye,
• 23:29 and he does, and he does so gently.
• 23:33 He does so tenderly.
• 23:34 And then, in his own time, he lifts himself up
• 23:38 and reaches into the future himself.
• 23:40 In short order, he'll go meet his maker as well.
• 23:44 We're all on a journey from the womb to the tomb,
• 23:46 as I like to say, and there are road bumps
• 23:49 on the highway of life.
• 23:50 Sometimes it's time to say good-bye, but what's over
• 23:54 for us, when we run our earthly track, it's not over for God.
• 23:59 We are beckoned to be torchbearers.
• 24:02 We are beckoned to be a light in this world to dispel
• 24:07 the darkness, but there comes a point in time when the lamp runs
• 24:13 out of oil, and those of us who make our earthly trek go
• 24:17 unto our reward, and it's a reward in heaven.
• 24:21 It's a reward for walking by faith, and it's what we get,
• 24:25 those of us who walk with God and live with him and have faith
• 24:30 in him for the future.
• 24:34 David: Join us right now for additional content
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• 24:43 Visit our website, levitt.com, for the current
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• 24:59 Also on our website is the online store.
• 25:02 There you can order this week's resource,
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• 25:09 Your donations to Our Jewish Roots help us to support
• 25:12 these organizations as they bless Israel.
• 25:14 ♪♪♪
• 25:16 David: Please remember, we depend on tax-deductible
• 25:18 donations from viewers like you.
• 25:22 Kirsten: We believe in lifetime learning.
• 25:24 We love learning things.
• 25:26 We love learning things from you,
• 25:27 especially with the Jewish perspective,
• 25:29 and you brought the Jewish perspective on grieving,
• 25:31 and it's a longer process time that, kind of,
• 25:34 we go through now.
• 25:36 Jeffrey: Yes, we do, and to your first point,
• 25:38 it's great to learn, and it's insightful to learn
• 25:41 about the grieving process as well
• 25:43 'cause that's part of life for all of us.
• 25:45 David: I would say, you're still learning yourself, yes?
• 25:48 Jeffrey: Yes, I'm a student at Cambridge University.
• 25:50 In fact, I go back and forth across the pond in England.
• 25:53 And I wanna continue to grow, and I'm 65.
• 25:56 When they accepted me, I thought,
• 25:58 "Wait a minute, do they know how old I am?"
• 25:59 And I inquired, by the way.
• 26:00 I wanted to know if I was the oldest student
• 26:02 that ever went there.
• 26:03 The oldest took a PhD at 92.
• 26:07 Kirsten: You're close, you're close.
• 26:08 Jeffrey: I should've waited a few years before I applied.
• 26:11 But it's great to learn, and learning to deal with loss,
• 26:15 oh, it's a toughie.
• 26:17 I've walked in the valley of the shadow of death, and you have,
• 26:20 and it's, just, it's part of the living experience,
• 26:22 learning to do it gracefully with faith.
• 26:25 These biblical characters had to do it.
• 26:27 We all do.
• 26:29 Kirsten: And it was part of Abraham and Isaac's journey
• 26:31 and Sarah, but everyone walks through that,
• 26:34 so it's wonderful to see the examples of what
• 26:36 the Bible shows us of how people did survive that.
• 26:40 Jeffrey: Yes, you know, cartons of milk, when you get
• 26:42 'em, there's an expiration date punched onto the surface.
• 26:45 We don't have an expiration date written on our foreheads,
• 26:48 but we all do have one.
• 26:50 May we learn to commend those we love to the future.
• 26:53 We'll see them again.
• 26:55 David: Thank you for your insight today.
• 26:56 We end our program with this--
• 26:58 Jeffrey: We wanna see you again, but until then,
• 27:00 Sha'alu Shalom Yerushalayim.
• 27:02 David: Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.
• 27:04 ♪♪♪
• 27:07 ♪ So I'll cherish the old rugged cross ♪
• 27:16 ♪ till my trophies at last I lay down ♪
• 27:27 ♪ I will cling to the old rugged cross ♪
• 27:37 ♪ and exchange it someday for a crown ♪
• 27:53 ♪ Ooh-ooh, oooh, ooh-ooh ♪
• 27:59 ♪ oooh, oooh, oooh ♪
• 28:04 ♪♪♪