Shabbat Thought :: Parasha Tazria

Each week in the Synagogue, a different portion of scripture is studied.  The Torah (Old Testament) is broken into portions which are read over the course of a year.  At the end of the year, it starts over again so the Bible is read annually. 

This week's Parasha is Tazria from Leviticus 12:1-13:59.

In a world without doctors, it seems the priests got to play the part in determining what was clean or unclean. As I read this Parasha, I keep noticing how yucky (yes. that's the technical term) it must have been those 5000 years ago. Blood to sacrifice, splattered everywhere, blood after childbirth, leprosy, disease, killing animals for dinner...the world then was full of lots of ick. Or perhaps our world now is just concerned about being clean.

I can get away without touching blood in the course of my daily life, and so can most of us, most days. But when you read this scripture, I think that it must have really been a bloody mess!

No matter how you look at it, the rules of Torah were, and pretty much are, a good thing. Caring about what was clean or unclean was likely a gift that God gave the Jewish people for their survival. In a world where disease was often attributed to evil spirits of one sort or another, this text seems to point to disease as something more along the lines of what we consider it to be in this day and age. 

Separating out contagious diseases, aside from protecting the people, allowed Yeshua to show His might. Why would someone touch a leper? Someone with the power of God would not need to worry, because God can overcome all and make all clean.

Also, sometimes verses just make me laugh. Leviticus 13:40-41, "Now if a man loses the hair of his head, he is bald; he is clean. If his head becomes bald at the front and sides, he is bald on the forehead; he is clean." The passage then talks about types of balding that are unclean. But for some reason, I found that bit funny!

Leviticus is full of lists of rules that are easy to skim through. I guess I can connect to this type of passage more than I thought I could. 

What are your Shabbat Thoughts?

Five Minute Friday :: Mighty

I'm joining Lisa-Jo Baker for her Five Minute Friday.  Her rules:

1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking. 2. Link back here and invite others to join in. 3. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is, like, the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.

The word today is mighty. GO.

Word association activities come to mind today. Mighty Mouse. Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. A Mighty Fortress is our God. God is Almighty.

Then I look at the word, "mighty" and think I just wrote that so many times that it looks wrong, but there's no squiggly red line underneath, so it must be fine. Might looks like it's part of mighty. It is. In one definition. Might, power, strength. With all her might, she held back tears as the boys in her classroom teased her. But then I might or might not. Now my love of words and their meanings comes to the surface. How is the word mighty related to the word might? How is a word that means strength and power connected to a word that means pretty much the opposite? 

And STOP.

Egads. My five minutes is up. I'm going to have to go look in my dictionary, because now I'm curious.

Ok. According to my Concise Oxford Dictionary of Engish Etymology (which I got in High School, and is falling apart), Might means, "quality of being able, power, strength....hence Mighty." It then refers us back to "may" as in "Mother may I? Yes you may." or "Might I have a bit of earth?"

Flipping to "may" reveals that, although the use is obsolete, the conjugation of "may" is indeed related to "mighty."  "may (past tense) might - be strong; be able; be allowed....The primary sense was 'have power'...hence maybe". 

When we say I might, then, we use the word that does indeed mean power. When you look at the history of the word, you essentially are saying that you have the power or ability to do something. "I might write a blog post" should be more certain that we intend that statement to be. Modern English has transformed a word that implies power into a word that implies weakness!

Fascinating.  What do you think?

Thanks for stopping by! I appreciate you reading, and I appreciate loving comments. Oh! And if you have a chance, will you swing by this week's Shabbat devotional?

Path to Passover :: Pantry Challenge

One of my favorite blogs is Life as Mom. She helps me understand ways to successfully manage a kitchen with many kids. She has more kids than I do! I love her pantry challenges. See how much you can eat out of  your pantry without buying much new foods. Every time she runs one, I think, "Wow, if only that challenge happened the month before Passover, now THAT would be something for my kitchen!"

So that's what I'm doing. This week for me, I start to think about what needs to be done to eliminate chametz (foods with leaven in them) from my kitchen. Sounds perfect for a pantry challenge.

The scripture says, "Seven days there shall be no leaven found in your houses; for whoever eats what is leavened, that person shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he is an alien or a native of the land. You shall not eat anything leavened; in all your dwellings you shall eat unleavened bread.’” (Ex. 12:19-20)

This week I'm going to go through my pantry and make plans for the bread, flour, grains, pasta, etc that's in there. I'll also clean out the freezer and fridge and use up things in there, too.

What's in your pantry?

Path to Passover :: Not Perfect

This is about the time of year where I'm simultaneously planning and freaking out. Keeping Passover isn't something I grew up with, so my traditions have been developed over the last 15 years or so. So I'm not an expert.

And there's lots of resources, recipes, and directions out there on how to get ready for Passover from people who know what they're talking about.

Despite this, Passover is probably my favorite Jewish holiday. The center of celebration is in the home. It's in the searching for leaven, and cleaning it out. The mundane becomes holy. Our daily chores become a work of sanctification. Spring cleaning becomes more than just spring cleaning. It becomes a spiritual discipline.

Having said that, my work is always far from perfect. The first thing I do, even before I make lists of things to clean is to modify my current routines. Once the spring hits, I start thinking of the things I can start to do to make things easier on myself when it gets to the final push. I'm working to keep things clean and not let it get too dirty. So that when I go to wipe down the counters the week of Passover, I don't have to scrape down the counters. I'll just wipe and go.

Oh, and my first favorite resource for how to get ready is here, Kosher on a Budget. Her lists and how-tos for getting ready for Passover helped me a ton last year!

Let's get ready for Passover!

Five Minute Friday :: Joy

I'm joining Lisa-Jo Baker for her Five Minute Friday.  Her rules:

1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking. 2. Link back here and invite others to join in. 3. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is, like, the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.

The word today is joy. GO.

I sit in the pizza place listening to a daddy on a lunch date with his young daughter. She's maybe three or four by the way it sounds. What joy to hear the conversations a daddy can have with his little one.  I, on the other hand, have a lunchdate with myself. Isn't that a nice treat now and again?

I went to Woolesy Hall today with my fifth grader's band. They played on the stage with New Haven school music departments with T. S. Monk. What a joy it was to hear these children play in such an amazing music hall? I felt honor that that I could tag along as a chaperone!

I find it easy to discover joy in the little things, in the amazing acoustics in an old hall to the friendly service at the pizza place. I remember last time I was here, eating pizza with all my kids, keeping them quiet while they waited for their dinner. That was a different type of joy. This is the quiet , being alone among people type of joy I have today. And I appreciate both types.


And STOP.

Thanks for stopping by. I love these Five Minute Fridays, they give me a groove for my writing. Any suggestions on how to get a groove for writing?

Path to Passover: Take stock

I was excited when I looked at my calendar this morning, and up popped my Passover reminder that I wrote to myself as Passover ended last year. 

As soon as Purim ends, I like to start thinking about getting ready for Passover. In these weeks leading up to it, I'll be writing about some of the things I've done to get ready for the season.

What do you do to get ready for Passover? Please share in the comments!

Five Minute Friday :: Crowd

I'm joining Lisa-Jo Baker for her Five Minute Friday.  Her rules:

1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking. 2. Link back here and invite others to join in. 3. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is, like, the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.

GO.  The word today is crowd.

I'm odd in a crowd. It's not that I dislike people, at all, or even crowded areas. I'm just not always ready to be in the midst of a large group of people all the time. There are many times when I gather myself to the edges of the crowd, to watch from a different perspective. Sometimes you can see different things when you're looking from the outside of a crowd, in than from the inside looking out. You can get a perspective change, I think.

In the end, I'm the girl who appreciates her solitude. Don't get me wrong - love being with people. I think my favorite crowd is my family. Family is the smallest of communities, the bedrock of other communities. Living in family Fivemakes me happy. In college, I yearned for my own family. I loved the freedom of living on my own, but I lived on my own. I love being with my husband and my children, and I love my times of quiet when I can think and be a little balanced.

And STOP.

Thanks for stopping by! I appreciate you reading, and I appreciate loving comments!

Modern day parable

For my husband's 50th birthday, we've been surrounded by balloons! We blew up a bunch by ourselves, then we had some mylar and regular balloons inflated by helium.

I watched my kids keep the balloons we blew up in the air. Fine. I started the game, but I got tired, and watched. It takes a lot of effort to keep the balloon up in the air. Gravity does its job, and what goes up, comes back down.

The helium-inflated balloons stay up on their own. There's a difference between the mylar balloons and regular ones. After a couple of days, the regular balloons have started to sag to the ground, while the mylar ones, with thick skin, will probably stay in the air until August. Or until I pop them...

The balloons are like us, trying to stay in the air, trying to keep our spiritual life close to God. When we fill up with our own spirit, we can get in the air, but we come right back down. We get tired trying and trying to stay in the air. We watch mylar balloons stay and wonder what they do to stay afloat in the air.

What is the difference? A different kind of air. We need a different kind of Spirit to keep us going. That's what Yeshua means when he tells us that His burden is light and He will give us rest. I can't keep myself going without burning out. But when I allow the Spirit of God to fill my life, I won't get burned out.

So be the balloon filled with helium.

Shabbat Thought :: Parasha Vayikra

Each week in the Synagogue, a different portion of scripture is studied.  The Torah (Old Testament) is broken into portions which are read over the course of a year.  At the end of the year, it starts over again so the Bible is read annually. 

This week's Parasha is Vayikra from Leviticus 1:1-5:26.

He shall sprinkle some of the blood of the sin offering on the side of the altar, and what remains of the blood shall be drained out at the base of the altar; it is a sin offering. Leviticus 5:9 (JPS)

Offerings and sin offerings and guilt offerings, oh my! It's a great deal to wrap your mind around, isn't it? Do you ever have those weeks where you just can't get into a text? Your house is finally recovering from crumbs on the floor, and the piles of laundry and dishes aren't so tall, but your brain is a little fuzzy? No? Just me?

Well. In my reading of this week's parasha, It occurs to me that worship before Yeshua was really really messy. Blood was everywhere! Imagine being there, being then, the noise of animals roaming the temple. There must have been lots of people noise, talking, shouting. You hear the chanting of prayers, the confession of sins. You hear the screams of the dying animals. And the blood everywhere - on the alter, on the base of the altar. Everyone's hands  must have been covered in blood.

We don't touch blood much in our American culture. Surgeons do. Butchers do. But not communally, the way the world used to on a daily basis. Even to eat meat, the everyday person doesn't usually touch blood like they used to when you had to slaughter your own chickens for a chicken dinner.

The book of Hebrews tells us how things have changed since Yeshua came:

The Torah has a shadow of the good things to come—not the form itself of the realities. For this reason it can never, by means of the same sacrifices they offer constantly year after year, make perfect those who draw near.  Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the worshipers—cleansed once and for all—would no longer have consciousness of sins?  But in these sacrifices is a reminder of sins year after year—  for it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. ( Hebrews 10:1-4 TLV)

Therefore, brethren, we have boldness to enter into the Holies by the blood of Yeshua .  He inaugurated a new and living way for us through the curtain—that is, His flesh.  We also have a Kohen  Gadol over God’s household. So let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and body washed with pure water.( Hebrews 10:19-22 TLV)

I'm really thankful our worship isn't as messy as it used to be. I'm thankful that I don't have to deal with blood in order to have my sins forgiven. I'm glad that Yeshua died for our sins, as the offering, and that the way we worship forever changed.

Aren't you?

Shabbat Shalom!

Five Minute Friday :: Willing

I'm joining Lisa-Jo Baker for her Five Minute Friday.  Her rules:

1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking. 2. Link back here and invite others to join in. 3. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is, like, the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.

The word today is willing. GO.

Okay. Five minutes, focused writing. (When I free write, I always need to talk to myself!) I've been thinking recently about what I haven't been willing to do to say yes to other things. One thing about being a mother I treasured even before I had my own kids is that time early morning when your kids jump into bed with you and snuggle. Oh! It's the sweetest thing in the world with little ones! To just have time to be with them and to hold them. "They" always say to treasure your babies while they're babies. So I have been.

I am not necessarily a morning person. (Or a night owl, for that matter...) So getting up at five (or six...) in the morning is hard for me. When mothers say that they get out of bed before their kids get up, I always say, but my kids get me out of bed. I have not been willing to give up that sweet time with my children just to have moments to myself. My moments come, or will come.

Something happened recently, though. My kids haven't come in to wake me up before I'm awake so much anymore. Some mornings, I'm even up before all three of them are. At the ages of 10, 8, and 5, snuggling Mom in the morning may not happen much anymore. And that's okay with me. It's just a season of time. I did my part to treasure the babies, and I don't really have them anymore. Now, I need to treasure my young school-aged kids. And that means taking advantage of them not needing to snuggle in the morning, and getting up and using those early(ish) hours for focusing on myself.

And STOP.

Thanks for stopping by! I appreciate you reading, and I appreciate loving comments. While you're here, will you drop by and read my devotional on this week's Torah Portion?