Walking in the Dust of Rabbi Jesus: How the Jewish Words of Jesus Can Change Your Life

by Lois Tverberg

are we shallow, distracted by wealth or daily living?

Biblical Hebrew includes only about 8,000 words, far fewer than the 400,000 or more we have in English.

Hebrew verbs stress action and effect rather than just mental activity.

but simply don’t exist in indigenous languages where thought is tied to its expected outcome.8

It’s not about the thrill of romance, but the security of faithfulness.

They didn’t denounce the world around them and

brother what is good for him, and

“The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt.” More plainly this means, “You shall show love to foreigners, because they are like yourselves—because you were once foreigners in Egypt.”

All people, including ourselves, are flawed and sinful, but we need to love them because we ourselves commit the same sins. We’re alike in our weaknesses and frailties. We are to love those who do not seem worthy because we ourselves are unworthy and need God’s mercy.

answer Jesus, the neighbor was the Samaritan!

fed them and gave them drink, anointed them with oil, led all their feeble ones on donkeys, and brought them to Jericho, the city of palm trees, to their brothers; then they returned to Samaria.

Hebrew verb ties a mental activity to its expected physical outcome.

Advertising helps to keep the masses dissatisfied with their mode of life, discontented with the ugly things around them. Satisfied customers are not as profitable as discontented ones.”13

problem isn’t our income, it’s our major purchases.

“When a poor man asks you for aid, do not use his faults as an excuse for not helping him. For then God will look at your offenses, and he is sure to find many.”

The power of the name of Jesus is not about uttering a certain word, but in the supreme authority of the One who is named.

And teachers shouldn’t ask a student a question in class if they don’t think the student can answer.

give others the benefit of the doubt.2

A man prone to suspect evil is mostly looking in his neighbor for what he sees in himself.

“Everything is under God’s control, yet man has free will.”

“If you are not going to be better tomorrow than you were today, then what need have you for tomorrow?”13 In the late first century AD, Rabbi Tarfon summed this up in a delightfully two-handed way: The task is not yours to complete, but neither are you free to desist from it.14

Salvation is a free gift, but discipleship is a lifelong journey of dedicating ourselves to becoming more like Christ.

just the same way, as we imitate Christ as his disciples, we carry his image to those around us and cause them to become like him too.

“All of humanity is precious to God, not just me.”