Then Moses said, “I will now turn aside and see this great sight, why the bush does not burn.” — Exodus 3:3

God revealed Himself to Abraham as God Almighty and said, “Walk before Me and be blameless” (Genesis 17:1). In the Hebrew, El-Shaddai means the “All-sufficient One.” When Abraham had this Divine revelation, there came with it an enabling to walk before God and be blameless.

But to Moses, God revealed Himself as Jehovah. Jehovah means the “Self-existent One who reveals Himself.” It is the covenant-keeping and redemptive name of God. This name was so sacred to the Hebrews that they never spoke it. It is translated into our English as Lord.

At the time God revealed Himself to Moses as Jehovah, Moses was in real need of this revelation. Israel was in Egyptian bondage, and Moses was chosen of God to lead them out. God reminded him of His covenant to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—to give them the land of Canaan for an inheritance. This was too much for Moses. God had to intervene, and Moses had to see the God of ability and covenant-keeping.

When God was able to get Moses’ vision off the natural and centered upon Himself, He could intervene to do the seemingly impossible. Because of this revelation, through the rest of Moses’ life God was able to give him this marvelous supernatural ministry in bringing redemption to Israel.

PR

“…one of the early 20th Century’s prophetic voices still speaks today…” — Jack W. Hayford

Reprinted with permission from Daily Seedings: A Devotional Classic for the Spirit-Filled Life by Ivan Q. Spencer (selected and edited by Edie Mourey), Furrow Press, 2008.

For more about Ivan Spencer, see “Following in His Steps” by Edie Mourey.

There are some that would say private faith has no place in the public sphere. Historian Eddie L. Hyatt shows this was not what America’s Founders believed, and urges all Americans to recapture their vision that linked faith and freedom together.

In a meeting with Delaware Indian chiefs in 1779, George Washington commended them for their request that their youth be trained in American schools. He assured the chiefs that America would look upon them “as their own children” and then said,

You do well to wish to learn our arts and our ways of life and above all, the religion of Jesus Christ. These will make you a greater and happier people than you are. Congress will do everything they can to assist you in this wise intention.

Washington’s freedom in sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ with this Indian tribe was normal for the founding generation for such freedom was rooted in the original American vision. This original vision was brought here by the Jamestown settlers of Virginia, the Pilgrims and Puritans of New England, the Baptists of Rhode Island, the Quakers of Pennsylvania and other Christian reform groups who were drawn to this land with a proactive vision burning in their hearts.

The Original American Vision

Indeed, the original American vision was for a land of individual liberty and a place from which the Gospel would be spread to the ends of the earth. America’s Founders were not shy in expressing this vision for they believed, that in this world, real freedom could only be realized in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

John Adams, circa 1815, portrait by Gilbert Stuart.
Image: Wikimedia Commons

This link between freedom and the Gospel was expressed by America’s second president, John Adams, just two weeks before the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. In a letter to his cousin, Zabdiel, a minister of the Gospel, Adams wrote, “Statesmen, my dear sir, may plan and speculate for Liberty, but it is Religion [Christianity] and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles, upon which Freedom can securely stand” (Hyatt, Pilgrims and Patriots, 174).

Adams was not expressing anything new or novel for the idea of freedom rooted in the Gospel of Christ was a common American belief brought here by the very first European immigrants to this land. Consider the following quotes.

“From these very shores the Gospel shall go forth, not only to this New World, but to all the world.”
Rev. Robert Hunt, April 29, 1607, as he and the Jamestown settlers, who had just landed at Cape Henry, gathered in prayer around a large oak cross they had brought from England.

This is a three part series that Dr. Eddie Hyatt presented at a “Revive America” weekend at Christian Life Assembly of God in Picayune, Mississippi. In this series, he documents the radical Christian character of the first immigrants to this land and shows how the nation was formed out of prayer and a great Spiritual awakening.

For the rest of the series:

• Reclaiming America’s Godly Christian Heritage (Part 2) “A Nation Birthed Out of Great Spiritual Awakening“
• Reclaiming America’s Godly Christian Heritage (Part 3) “A Nation Birthed in Prayer“

Chris A. Miller, “Did Peter’s Vision in Acts 10 Pertain to Men or the Menu?” Bibliotheca Sacra 159 (July-Sept 2002), pages 302-17.

Over the years I have been interested in the various interpretations of Peter’s dream in the 10th chapter of the Book of the Acts of the Apostles. It is interesting to take a glimpse at the range of theories and the support for those theories.

Admittedly as a Messianic believer, my opinions already lean in support of a “whole Bible” approach to shaping my theological beliefs. So it was with great delight that I encountered Chris Miller’s article as he allows the text to interpret itself, dispelling some of the popular but inaccurate applications of this pivotal passage in Peter’s life, and in the life of the community of the redeemed.

Chris A. Miller is Assistant Dean at Cedarville University in Cedarville, Ohio.

Miller insightfully points out what we know about Peter and what we know about his hosts Simon the tanner and Cornelius the centurion. Each character study demonstrates that all appear to have been living a biblical lifestyle in every way, right down to what they ate. Verse 2 tells us that Cornelius was “a devout man, and one who feared God with all his household, and gave many alms to the Jewish people, and prayed to God continually” (NASB). God-fearers were Gentiles that had attached themselves to the God of Israel and His people. Even in verse 3 we find him in prayer at the ninth hour, the hour of the afternoon sacrifices in the temple, and the time for corporate prayer.

As Miller points out, “It is hard to imagine that one so sympathetic toward the Jewish nation would be so insensitive as to offer unclean food to his guest, for whose arrival he had four days to prepare and at whose feet he fell at their first meetings” (p. 310).

It is this type of logic that flows throughout Miller’s well-documented and footnoted article. In his final analysis, “Luke’s formidable skills as a writer drew out the lesson of Peter’s vision to people. As the angel and Peter entered Cornelius’s house, so also Cornelius entered God’s ‘house.’ God has now granted the Gentiles not only repentance unto life, but also the fullness of the Holy Spirit and full acceptance into His house-hold as first-class citizens” (p. 316).

Regretfully, Miller (as well as many other commentators) does not address one of the issues at hand. As he writes, “Simply eating with Gentiles was a significant charge in itself . . .” (p. 309). This thought is based on Peter’s own words, “And he said to them, ‘You yourselves know how unlawful it is for a man who is a Jew to associate with a foreigner or to visit him’” (Acts 10:28 NASB). Yet never does God’s Torah stipulate that a Hebrew and a Gentile may not associate nor share a meal! This is not the Torah the Law of the God of Israel. It is however, a part of the torah (small “t”) otherwise known as the oral tradition of the religious community. This torah created many rules and regulations prohibiting the interaction of Hebrews and Gentiles and became the middle wall of partition evident in synagogues and kosher restaurants today. The message to Peter may have been the same message Paul wrote for us in Ephesians 2:14, “For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one, and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall” (NASB).