How is it that just when we reach the high points of
our walk with the Holy One, that we suddenly have to turn and jump into a pit?
Even as the Sh'khinah of God still burned at the top of Mt. Sinai, Israel
forgot His commands, fell back into the ways they had learned in Egypt, and
tried to build an idol to Him, and in so doing were nearly cast away and
destroyed by His wrath. Fifteen centuries later, Israel received another
visitation, this time of the Immanu'El, the Sh'khinah-made-flesh, but her
leaders again rejected the commands of God in order to protect their own
positions and curry favor with the pagan Romans (cf. John 11:48)!
Yet the Father did not abandon His children, for in
both places He set up a mediator, one who had not shared in their sin, to
intercede for them and restore the broken covenant: First Moshe, then
Yeshua, the prophet like Moshe (Deu. 18:15). And just as Moshe came with
signs and wonders and brought down two new tablets to symbolize a renewed
covenant, and just as Elijah came with the fire of God to defeat the prophets of
Ba'al and restore true worship to Israel, so Yeshua will return with "wonders in
the heavens and in the earth: blood, fire, and pillars of smoke" (Joel 2:30) and
cast down all false prophets and false messiahs, bringing with Him the sign that
the Father has forgiven His children, and given them another B'rit Chadashah
(Renewed Covenant, cf. Jer. 31:31-34 and Heb. 8:8-12).
