Prayer of Manasseh from the Apocrypha

Get a Bible – turn to John 3:  John 3:1 There was one of the Pharisees called Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews, 2. who came to Jesus by night and said, "Rabbi, we know that you have come from God as a teacher; for no one could perform the signs that you do unless God were with him." 3. Jesus answered: In all truth I tell you, no one can see the Kingdom without being born from above.

  4. Nicodemus said, "How can anyone who is already old be born? Is it possible to go back into the womb again and be born?" 5. Jesus replied: In all truth I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born through water and spirit; 6. what is born of flesh is flesh; what is born of the spirit is spirit. 7. Do not be surprised when I say: You must be born from above. (NJB with corrections) 

 

Psalm 85:8. I am listening. What is Elohim's message? Yahweh's message is peace for his people, for his faithful, if only they renounce their folly. 9. His saving help is near for those who fear him, his glory will dwell in our land. 10. Faithful Love and Loyalty join together, Saving Justice and Peace embrace. 11. Loyalty will spring up from the earth, and Justice will lean down from heaven. 12. Yahweh will himself give prosperity, and our soil will yield its harvest. 13. Justice will walk before him, treading out a path.

 

Galatians 5:16. Walk by the Spirit, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh.  17.  For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh; for these are opposed to each other.  … 19.  Now the works of the flesh are plain: fornication, impurity, licentiousness (license–shuss-nuss),  20.  idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit,  21.  envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like.  I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the Kingdom. 

   22.  But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,  23.  gentleness, self-control; against such there is no law.  24.  And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.  25.  If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.  (NJB excerpts)

 

Yahshua Is the Kingdom

   Yahshua is in Jerusalem for the Passover, that special day given in remembrance of how Israel was SAVED from the wrath of the Almighty by the blood of lambs (Exodus 12).  The Passover from the distant past sets the stage for today’s good news – that the human soul may likewise be rescued when the angel of death – passes by.  Herein is the key to the door of the unseen Kingdom and the solution to the crisis of death.  Herein is the means by which Yahweh saves from the wrath to come; and how one might enter into so great a salvation!  I’m speaking of the NEW BIRTH!  O, if we could but understand it!  Better, if we could but experience it.

   One of the truths of Salvation History is found within the name Joseph gave his son – Yahshua.  He, like his name, never changes (Hebrews 13:8).  The reason His is such an important name is because it’s the only name by which we may be saved (Psalms 106:8, Acts 4:21, Romans 10:13). Yahshua, in the language of Heaven, means “Yahweh’s Salvation.”  When we hear that name, we shouldn’t be crazed, but calmed.  Calmed and glad it belongs to us.

 

Intruders! 

    Yahweh’s Salvation, the man, is camped on Mt. Olive outside Jerusalem.  It’s dark as pitch – the gloom is only overcome by the brightness of his fire.  Night’s silence is broken when the disciples hear men approaching, then see them step out of the din into the campfire’s flicker.  These intruders are very dangerous – bodyguards of an important potentate who stands behind them.  {pause}

   Simon Zealotes, one of the disciples, draws his sword to protect the Master, but he’s too late, for the armed party is upon them, and the sword is quickly pressed upon Simon’s throat.  From the midst of angry faces, the uniformed “leader of the Jews,” Nicodemus, steps out.

   Nicodemus is well-known and feared.  He’s an enforcer for the Pharisee political party (the PPP), a fanatic for inflicting religious law, prepared to strike down any variance.  Now, the disciples see Nicodemus close-up for the first time – in the stylishly luxurious white linen gown of the affluent – with the long, gray beard and the high, wound turban of the mighty, with plenty of the golden ornaments of the rich: gold braid, chain and coin cascading about the blue-trimmed toga.  Nicodemus looks far more heavenly than the whitewashed tomb-full of devils that he is.  (For it’s as the Master said of his kind, Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do - John 8:44.)

 

The Meaning in Names

   Names are so important in the Bible; they drop clues as to the inner identities of their namesakes.  A study of Bible names reveals a great deal about the souls of Bible people.  Just as Yahshua means Yahweh’s Salvation, Nicodemus means, “people-beater.”  And Nicodemus wears the name well, so long as his henchmen stay close by.  The disciples know that People-beater would gladly beat them all i with one word of command, so they listen closely.

 

The Kingdom in a Man

    Nicodemus slides unctuously into his interrogation – with a veiled compliment. “We know,” he says (without ever saying who we are), “that you are a godly teacher because of the signs you perform.”  There’s silence.  The disciples cower in fear as they observe their master’s failure to thank this malevolent dictator for his verbal tidbit.  Yahshua doesn’t even offer him a little cookie in return – only an immediate challenge.  “How would you know from which Kingdom I AM?  Unless you’ve been born from above, you can’t even see my Kingdom.”

   When Yahshua says, “my Kingdom[1],” he’s not meaning that place to which religious folks think they’ll be raptured.  No.  He’s talking about himself.  Yahshua himself is the Kingdom in the flesh.  Nicodemus stands right before the Kingdom, looking right at it, yet Nicodemus can’t see the Kingdom, because he hasn’t eyes to behold Yahshua for who and what he is.  No matter how religious he looks, no matter how loudly he boasts, People-beater is blind to the Truth who stands before him. 

   However, those disciples – just getting started in religious studies – have their eyes open to the Kingdom.  They can see the Kingdom in their Master just fine; for only those born from above can see a Kingdom in a man.  The disciples exercise new spiritual eyes; new spiritual realities and truths break in upon their visual cortices.  But People-beater has no such eyes.  His religion shows him only violence, suspicion, submission and criticism. 

   Christian friend, our religious trappings and pious righteousness mean little or nothing without our first experiencing the New Birth; that is, being born from above.  Before that, religious presumptions, cackling in the choir, $3 in the offering plate – all are plug-nickel worthless – like the gold goodies hanging off the devil’s turban – just presumptuous abominations – designed to impress other religious hobbyists like ourselves .  Learn what this means instead: You must be born from above!

 

Born New

   Ol’ People-beater kinda wanted to learn. “What do you mean by ‘born from above’?” he demands.  Even a bad windbag can blow out a good question on occasion.  The original words behind ‘born from above’ are ambiguous.  The Bible language has gennēthē anōthen (gennhqh anwqen).  Gennhqh means born.  But anwqen means three different things.  It means anew, above and again.  Nicodemus wonders which of these adverbs are meant – must a man be born again, born anew or born above?  Of course, Nicodemus knows this term already – he’d used it himself when baptizing converts into his cult – he knows what he means when he says it.[2]  But what did this heretic, Yahshua the Nazarean, mean by gennhqh anwqen? 

   And even more puzzling is how such a rebirthing experience could possibly come to pass.  “Oy vay, Rabbi: and just how is it a man can climb in and out of the womb a second time? Ha Ha! {cough}”  His goons laugh.  Simon Peter also snickers.  Yahshua glares at Peter, and he stops.  Of course, the wise Believer knows that the New Birth refers to all three possibilities at once: You must be born anew, born again, born from above.  Three in one.

 

What Does He Mean by Gennhqh Anwqen?

   But HOW does one become reborn in such a flamboyant manner?  That’s a mighty fine question.  The answer consists in the only hope you and I have of gaining the fullness of the Kingdom that our Master represents.  For nothing has changed; like the Master himself, the Kingdom Way is from everlasting to everlasting, the same yesterday, today and forever.  ¿Friends, are we not part of forever?   We too must be born again, anew, from above. 

   But how???  Yahshua takes the question of the “great teacher of Israel” seriously, and gives him a little hint of an answer.  He says, “You have to be reborn two ways to see and enter the Kingdom.  (1) By water and (2) by spirit.”  The people-beater Nicodemus had been born a million times of water, for it was the practice of the adherents of his cult to baptize themselves just about every day in cold water.  Yet his baptism never led to anything beyond drip dry self-righteousness and cusséd meanness.

 

Born of Water

   So - many - church groups deny a plain reading of the Good News and put their own spin on births of “water” and “spirit.”  Let’s set our understanding aright.

   Some say that born of water means baptism.  Our founder John Wesley taught this; yet Wesley also said that baptism could never suffice if one desired in her heart to see the Kingdom.  There are a lot of baptized believers that show no spiritual fruit at all; and many baptized believers are meaner than Tasmanian devils. 

   Both “Jesus” and Wesley concur that you may know the ones who see the Kingdom – by their fruits.  “Bear fruits meet for repentance!” we’re commanded.  Road apples don’t grow on pear trees.  Pears don’t grow on a poison oak.  Us non-technical people know the name of the tree because we know the name of the fruit. 

   Names are important, my friend!  Did you know that you may have a new name written down in glory?  That new name will most certainly have a new meaning, based on the fruit you bear out of love.  Is your new name more likely People-beater or People-healer?  This type of honest introspection would be worthwhile for our soul’s health.

 

Born of Spirit
   Yahshua also said you must be born of spirit to enter into the Kingdom.  Some say when a person is born of spirit, the Holy Spirit comes in and takes up residence in the human spirit.  I know you’ve heard that – but let me suggest that such a notion is impossible.  Here’s why: The Holy Spirit is, like his title, qadosh #dq[3] – holy – set-apart.  Holy means “set apart.”

   The Holy Spirit is Yahweh, the Almighty One, the Heavenly Father; the same to whom the great elders and saints bow and cry, “Qadosh, qadosh, qadosh: Holy, holy, holy – his esteem fills the whole earth” (Isaiah 6:3). 

   We overestimate the free grace of the Holy Spirit if we think that He who is set-apart #dq can mix it up in the foul foment found within an unrepentant sinner’s heart.  No; the heart must first be cleansed and circumcised.  (“You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit,” so preached the first martyr, Stephen.  His text? Deuteronomy 10:16, 30:6, Jeremiah 4:4.) They say, “Home is where the heart is,” but what seems to be more realistic is “the heart is where the home is.”  If we live where the Heavenly Father is excluded, what must we say of our hearts?

   Some won’t allow a man of G-d into the house, much less the Holy Spirit into the heart.  And the Spirit doesn’t want to dwell in a cramped, smelly place anyway.  Let’s allow Yahshua to express his own ideas about what he means when he says, “You must be born from above of spirit.”

   We have to go back to the original language again: the word for “spirit” isn’t capitalized, as it is in your Bible.  Yahshua isn’t talking about the Holy Spirit when he says “you must be born of spirit to enter.”  He’s talking about something much more fundamental to human existence than the Holy Spirit. 

   John Wesley takes us clear back to Adam to help us understand the New Birth of the spirit.  Here’s what he says in his famous sermon, “The New Birth”): 

In Adam all died, all human kind, all the children of men who were then in Adam's loins. The natural consequence of this is that every one descended from him comes into the world spiritually dead, dead to G-d, wholly dead in sin; entirely void of the life of G-d; void of the image of G-d, [without] all that righteousness and holiness wherein Adam was created. Instead of this, every man born into the world now bears (a much less dignified image): that of the devil in pride and self-will; the image of the beast [speaking of an animal], in sensual appetites and desires.[4]  So [Adam] lost both the knowledge and the love of God, without which the image of God could not subsist. Of this, therefore, [Adam] was deprived [of the image of God] … and became unholy as well as unhappy.[5]

 

The New Birth / The New Man

   So what your founding father’s saying is this: When a person relents against and renounces the devil, and pleads with the Savior for forgiveness with the promise of obedience thenceforth, and then is diligent in all that’s given him to do by true apostles – he then becomes a candidate for the birth from above by and of spirit. 

  Then, when a person is granted the New Birth, his heart is cut open by the two-edged scalpel of the Word (Hebrews 4:12), and a new and right spirit is embedded in that beating flesh (Psalms 51:10), the incision is sealed with the covenant (Isaiah 8:16), and the image of G-d begins to enlighten (2 Corinthians 4:4) and cleanse every silly little millimeter of his body through the nourishing of Blood (1 John 1:7).  That which was ripped so violently away from Adam and Eve when they rebelled – that Divine Image and Name – is replaced through the New Birth from Above.  A new child of Jesus grows forth from that newborn-spirit/heart-seed in due time. 

   Nourish that seedling with compost, and the NEW MAN arises from the organic soup. 

And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

   Have you ever been concerned because your children are wayward?  They need to be born anew.  And how about those who harass you on account of your faith?  They must be born again, for

Those wicked are … like chaff which the wind drives away.  (Psalms 1:3,4 KJV)

 

The Spiritually Dead

   As for this chaff: Yahshua taught that spiritually dead men and women can never be complete without being Born Anew of the Spirit from Above.  Yet millions here and about are walking zombies – beasts enfleshed as humans, spiritless, dead inside, spiritually dead. 

   Listen: There’s a grave danger in remaining spiritually dead.  Yahshua warns us that when an evil spirit (a devil), wandering this earth, finds an opening, “he goes in and brings with him seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they enter and live there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first" (Matthew 12:45).  There’s always some foul spirit available to fill the void, like anger or hatred, like perversity or murder, like witchcraft or control, or the spirit of Antichrist.

   You don’t believe in that?  No such thing as demons or personal evil?  I wonder, my friend, what world you’re living in!  You’d better look around.  “As Cardinal Newman observed, all you need to do is look around and see that something is dreadfully wrong with the human race.”[6]

   Can you now understand why Yahshua is so assertive with the people-beater Nicodemus about this concept?  Can you see how evil appropriates the minds of the spiritually dead to bring forth chaos and destruction on the planet?  And can you see that the New Birth is the only hope that humankind has for peace, preservation and prosperity?  Of course you can. 

 

You Must Be Born Again

   My friend, you must be born again!  You must.  And if you have even a skin of a doubt about it, you’d best turn your mind around and get back on the narrow way that leads to rescue.

   Does anybody feel convicted?  Does anyone feel wickedness stirring up their insides?  Or how about a need to come to Jesus?  Do I need to drag you to the altar again this morning?  Well, I’m not going to any such thing.  If you want to come up here and be gossiped for the next three months, that’s your business.  In my opinion, an altar call is insufficient for your desperate need.  If I’m talking to you now, you need to go home and make space for Jesus to do heart surgery in your own event-filled house. 

  

Yahshua a Schneider (A Cutter)

   This kind of preaching cut the people-beater Nicodemus to the heart:  “You’re the Teacher of Israel and you don’t even know what it means to be born again?”  It’s one thing not to sport with the name of your heavenly Father or to make that holy name a matter of reproach – but it’s quite another to reject the Holy Spirit and his wonderful transforming power. 

   Every person has a choice of what to believe ~then~ what to do with that belief.  Even a person as far gone as Nicodemus had a choice to believe, to make time for, and to seek out the New Birth, or – to reject it along with its Master.  If you know the rest of the story about the people-beater, then you know that he made his choice.

   But I’m not so concerned about his choice, except as it illustrates that nobody’s too far gone to make a new start – not even you, parishioner, who’s missed the mark a million times.  But your new start begins with your new choice- nobody can choose for you – you’re on your own.  If you choose rightly, your new Roadway to New Life begins with New Birth. 

   Yes, I’m concerned about YOU!  This Assembly.  The future of this town.  Why in the world would I be here if I wasn’t?  So, if we’re going to succeed in New Life together, then YOU MUST BE BORN ANEW and thus cast off the works of the flesh – strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy and the rest; and grow to be seen sprouting instead charity, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control.  Listen to me.  Your heart and your home needs to be opened up – you must be born anew.  Have you any room?

Have you any room for Yahshua, He who bore your load of sin?
As He knocks and asks admission, Sinners, will you let Him in?
Room for pleasure, room for business, but for Him, the Crucified,
Not a place that He can enter in the heart for which He died?

{Have you any room for Yahshua, as in grace He calls again?
O today is time accepted, tomorrow you may call in vain.}

Room and time now give to Yahshua; soon will pass his grace and peace;
Soon thy heart left cold and silent, and thy Savior’s pleading cease.

Room for Yesu, King of Glory! Hasten now His Word obey;
Swing the heart’s door widely open; bid Him enter while you may.
                        - anonymous, 1878 

---

PRAYER OF MANASSEH

    1 O Yahweh Almighty, El of our ancestors, of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and of their righteous offspring; 2 you who made heaven and earth with all their order; 3 who shackled the sea by your word of command, who confined the deep and sealed it with your terrible and glorious name; 4 at whom all things shudder, and tremble before your power, 5 for your glorious splendor cannot be borne, and the wrath of your threat to sinners is unendurable; 6 yet immeasurable and unsearchable is your promised mercy, 7 for you are Yahweh Most High, of great compassion, long-suffering, and very merciful, and you relent at human suffering. 

   O Yahweh, according to your great goodness you have promised repentance and forgiveness to those who have sinned against you, and in the multitude of your mercies you have appointed repentance for sinners, so that they may be saved.  8 Therefore you, O Yahweh, El of the righteous, have not appointed repentance for the righteous, for Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, who did not sin against you, but you have appointed repentance for me, who am a sinner.

    9 For the sins I have committed are more in number than the sand of the sea; my transgressions are multiplied, O Yahweh, they are multiplied! I am not worthy to look up and see the height of heaven because of the multitude of my iniquities.  10 I am weighted down with many an iron fetter, so that I am rejected because of my sins, and I have no relief; for I have provoked your wrath and have done what is evil in your sight, setting up abominations and multiplying offenses.

   11 And now I bend the knee of my heart, imploring you for your kindness.  12 I have sinned, O Yahweh, I have sinned, and I acknowledge my transgressions. 13 I earnestly implore you, forgive me, O Yahweh, forgive me! Do not destroy me with my transgressions! Do not be angry with me forever or store up evil for me; do not condemn me to the depths of the earth.  For you, O Yahweh, are the El of those who repent, 14 and in me you will manifest your goodness; for, unworthy as I am, you will save me according to your great mercy, 15 and I will praise you continually all the days of my life. For all the host of heaven sings your praise, and yours is the glory forever. Amen.

 

 

Excellent Believers' Historic DVDs Gifts Sets  

Word Studies in the Greek New Testament

New Jerusalem Messianic Resources