Tear the Roof Off

 Do you have have enough faith to tear the roof off?

As I frequently do on the Sabbath, a few weeks ago I had some praise and worship music playing when a song came on that I had not heard before. The song is titled, “Tear the Roof Off.” While the song was not necessarily catchy, or soon to become my favorite, I quickly understood the reference in the title.

And see, men brought on a bed a man who was paralysed. And they were seeking to bring him in and lay him before Him. But having found no way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the house-top and let him down with his bed through the tiles into the midst before יהושע. And having seen their belief, He said to him, “Man, your sins are forgiven you.” And the scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, “Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who is able to forgive sins except Elohim alone?” And יהושע, knowing their thoughts, answering, said to them, “Why are you reasoning in your hearts? “Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Rise up and walk’? “But in order for you to know that the Son of Aḏam possesses authority on earth to forgive sins...” He said to the man who was paralysed, “I say to you, rise, take up your bed, and go to your house.” And at once, having risen up before them, he took up what he had been lying on, and went away to his house, praising Elohim.  And astonishment seized them all, and they praised Elohim and were filled with fear, saying, “We have seen extra-ordinary feats today!” 

Luke 5:18-26 (Scriptures version)

Note verse 20 in which it says of Yeshua, “And having seen their belief, He said him, “Man, your sins are forgiven you.” The word translated here as “belief” is more commonly translated as “faith.” So, I ask again, do you have enough faith to tear the roof off? Do I have enough faith to tear the roof off?

There was a crowd blocking their path to bring this man to Yeshua yet they didn’t give up and go home. How often does the going get tough and we use it as an excuse to simply give up? “It was too hard,” we might say or, perhaps, “It wasn’t really that important anyway.”

The man’s friends knew that Yeshua could heal him and believed that He would. Their faith led them to take the action of lowering the man into the house from the roof. It’s important to recognize that they didn’t just wait outside in the crowd and expect healing to take place.

Faith requires action. We see this very clearly in the book of James.

My brothers, what use is it for anyone to say he has belief but does not have works? This belief is unable to save him. And if a brother or sister is naked and in need of daily food, but one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,” but you do not give them the bodily needs, what use is it? So also belief, if it does not have works, is in itself dead. But someone might say, “You have belief, and I have works.” Show me your belief without your works, and I shall show you my belief by my works. 

James 2:14-18 (Scriptures version)

Again, replace “belief” with “faith.” Faith without works is dead.

We see this as a theme throughout Hebrews chapter 11, often referred to as the faith chapter. We see the actions that the “heroes of faith” took because of their faith.

Abel offered a greater sacrifice than Cain. v4

Noah prepared an ark. v7

Abraham went out to the place of his inheritance and offered up Isaac. v8 and v17

The parents of Moses hid him despite the commands of Pharoah. v23

Of course, there are more examples in that chapter, not to mention various others allude to, but not included, for the sake of brevity.

What is also telling is the form the faith takes in the armor or God.

above all, having taken up the shield of belief [faith] with which you shall have power to quench all the burning arrows of the wicked one. 

Ephesians 6:16 (Scriptures version)

Why is faith represented as a shield? I’m certain that it’s no coincidence that a shield is one part of armor that is dynamic, that is, it requires action to use properly. To effectively block arrows, a shield must be turned toward the direction from which they are coming. When the enemy comes in from the right, we need to move our shield to the right and when he comes from the left, we move the shield to the left. If you simply leave your shield in front of you at all times, it can only be effective part of the time.

To often, it seems, people think that if they just wait around for God to save them, that means that they have faith. They allow this understanding to support their inaction. Perhaps they get this idea from the story of the Exodus.

And Mosheh said to the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand still, and see the deliverance of יהוה, which He does for you today. For the Mitsrites whom you see today, you are never, never to see again. 

Exodus 14:13 (Scriptures version)

We can read this verse and think that we just need to “stand still”, that we don’t need to take any action of our own. If we read a little bit further in the story, we see what the real lesson is for this passage.

And יהוה said to Mosheh, “Why do you cry to Me? Speak to the children of Yisra’ěl, and let them go forward. “And you, lift up your rod, and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it, and let the children of Yisra’ěl go on dry ground through the midst of the sea.

Exodus 14:15-16 (Scriptures version)

Instead of Moses telling the Israelites to “stand still”, he needed to be telling them to “go forward,” to take action. Moses himself had to take the action of lifting up his rod and stretching his hand over the sea and all of Israel needed to go. 

So, when we talk about faith, it’s important that we talk about it in terms of action. Do we have the faith to take the action of tearing the roof off? Or, do we have such a lack of faith that all we do is stand still. Let us go forward, let us tear the roof off, and let us move mountains.

Remember, in the passage in Luke, it’s stated that Yeshua saw their belief [faith]. He saw the action that they took to take their friend to the roof and lower him down into the house. An important question that we must ask ourselves is does He see our belief today?.

To Vote or Not To Vote! | According2Craig

Confession time. As a man in his forties, living in these United States, I have never voted before.

I grew up with the belief that Christians should not vote. You know, the whole thing about being Ambassadors for Christ and our citizenship not being of this world, and so on.

2 Corinthians 5:20 Therefore we are envoys on behalf of Messiah, as though Elohim were pleading through us. We beg, on behalf of Messiah: Be restored to favour with Elohim.

Philippians 3:20 For our citizenship is in the heavens, from which we also eagerly wait for the Saviour, the Master יהושע Messiah,

Of course, we also knew that ultimately it was our heavenly Father that put leaders into place. We wouldn’t want to presume to know his will, would we?

Romans 13:1-2 Let every being be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from Elohim, and the authorities that exist are appointed by Elohim.

2 So he who opposes the authority withstands the institution of Elohim, and those who withstand shall bring judgment on themselves.

In recent times, I’ve come to the opinion that just perhaps that anti-voting belief was incorrect. Of course, I need to be able to support any belief with the Bible, and not just my personal opinion. I can have opinions all day long, but they are worthless if they don’t have a firm foundation.

Remember, our citizenship is in the heavens. Messiah even said that we are not of this world.

John 17:16 “They are not of the world, as I am not of the world.

But does that mean that we are not to take part in the world? I think that it we look at the verse just before, we get an idea of the answer to that question.

John 17:15 “I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You keep them from the wicked one.

He (Messiah) did not pray that we would be taken out of the world. If therefore we are still “in” the world, should we not then participate where appropriate? In this world we are subject to the laws and regulations of this world, and have no choice but to be a part to many things.

Mark 12:17 So יהושע said to them, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to Elohim what is Elohim’s.” And they marvelled at Him.

“Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s.” Doesn’t sound like we are supposed avoid participating in the world that we are in. A bit like the saying, “No man is an island.” We can’t take ourselves out of the world, why should we not be a participating member of society.

So, at this point, I’m sure that someone is thinking that we just need to have faith that our Father will appoint the authorities (Romans 13 again). Does it take more faith to sit back and do nothing or to take some action.

James 2:17 So also belief, if it does not have works, is in itself dead.

So, faith (or belief) is dead without works. What are these works? Put simply, these works are our actions. Without action, our faith is dead. In the Bible we read of many that had great faith, and we read of their works. In Hebrews 11, often referred to as the faith chapter, we see repeatedly the works of those that are deemed to be examples of faith.

• Noah – prepared an ark (action)

• Abraham – moved to a strange land (action)

• Abraham – offered up his son (action)

• The parents of Moses – hid their baby for 3 months (action)

You can read more on your own, those are just a few quick examples.

Another quick thought about faith being of action.

Ephesian 6:16 above all, having taken up the shield of belief with which you shall have power to quench all the burning arrows of the wicked one.

It’s the shield of faith (belief). How does one use a shield? Think of soldiers or knights on the battlefield. They wouldn’t just set it in one place and leave it there. For the shield to be truly effective, they needed to turn it to put between them and the attack. If the “arrows of the wicked one” are coming from our left, we better be putting that shield on our left side. If they are coming from the right, guess what. Yes, the shield goes on our right. If we don’t actively position our shield, it is not going to be effective.

Perhaps a little more light could be shed on this subject by thinking of something else that our Messiah said:

Matthew 5:13-16 “You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt becomes tasteless, how shall it be seasoned? For it is no longer of any use but to be thrown out and to be trodden down by men. 14 “You are the light of the world. It is impossible for a city to be hidden on a mountain. 15 “Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it shines to all those in the house. 16 “Let your light so shine before men, so that they see your good works and praise your Father who is in the heavens.

So, we’re the “salt of the earth.” I don’t know about you, but the salt in my kitchen doesn’t seem to do anything if I just let it sit in the container. I actually have to shake out a little salt, or grind some salt, for it to be effective. If, then, I’m going to be the salt of the earth, sitting at home and doing nothing is not going to be very effective. I want to be of use.

Then, in verse 14, Messiah says, “You are the light of the world.” Just like a flashlight does nothing in a dark room if you don’t turn it on, I cannot be the light, or a light, of the world if I don’t take some action. As believers, we are told “Let your light shine before men.” We have to be among men for them to see our light.

In either case, we are called to action. We aren’t called to be simply bystanders of what this world is doing. We need to take are part, and we need to take it seriously.

1 Corinthians 10:31 Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the esteem of Elohim.

His esteem, not our own, is the goal. Whatever action we take, “whatever you do,” must be with that in mind, but action must be taken.

So, yes, 2020 became the year that I voted for the first time. It’s about time that I make my voice known in one way or another. I know that ultimately, regardless of the outcome, our Father, Yahweh, is in charge.

One last thing that I feel is very important, regardless of what action you have personally chosen to take or not to take, follow this advice:

1 Timothy 2:1-3 First of all, then, I urge that petitions, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgiving be made for all men, 2 for sovereigns and all those who are in authority, in order that we lead a calm and peaceable life in all reverence and seriousness. 3 For this is good and acceptable before Elohim our Saviour,

All scriptures quoted are from The Scriptures version by the Institute of Scripture Research

The image at the top of this post is © 2020 by Craig Pifer, All rights reserved. Unrelated to the post, but it looks happier with an image.

I Ain't Afraid Of No Ghosts

Recently, one of my former places of employment has been in the news, and on national TV. Sure, this isn't the first time, but it's for a little different reason than usual.

Over the course of three summers I worked at the Enchanted Forest Theme Park just south of Salem, Oregon. I loved working there and had a great time. It's a great place for families, and it was also enjoyable seeing the look of joy and excitement on the faces of so many children.

This weekend, The Land of Enchantment was featured on a show called Ghost Adventures. I have not seen the show, and don't necessarily plan to. I simply don't have the desire to learn what they think they've found.

One of my current co-workers asked me whether I thought the place was haunted. My answer was simple, "no." To put it more plainly, I do not believe in ghosts, therefore it cannot be haunted by ghosts.

"For the living know they will die; but the dead do not know anything, nor have they any longer a reward, for their memory is forgotten." - Ecclesiastes 9:5

That's right, if the dead don't know anything, it eliminates the possibility of ghosts. I do believe, thought, in a spirit world. The Bible, while not supporting the existence of ghosts, does indeed support the existence of angles and demons.

I told my co-worker that I never experienced anything of a "haunting" nature at Enchanted Forest. Continuing on, I explained that there has only been one time that I've truly felt an overwhelmingly evil presence.

During the summer of 1993, I spent six week in Israel with a group from college. We spent five weeks digging at Tel Hazor, and the final week was spent in and around Jerusalem. On August 4th, we went to Bethlehem and visited the Church of the Nativity.

The Church of the Nativity was established in 327 CE, but was formerly a site dedicated to a Greek god. While there, I entered the site with other members of our group, but after only a short time, I was compelled to get outside, and stay outside. I had a feeling that this was NOT a place that honored God in any manner. Although this site is heralded as the birth place of Christ, I am absolutely convinced that it definitely is NOT.

Of course, it doesn't matter where Christ was born. I believe that the evil one, Satan, uses such things to draw focus away from what really matters. The more you focus on a site, the less you focus on the significance of the event that is being claimed to have taken place there.

Two days later, we visited the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. This site is also quite old, and has some similarities to the Church of the Nativity. It is said to be the location of Christ's crucifixion and entombment. Whether or not it is, I really have no way of knowing, and neither does anyone else. What I do know is that it did not elicit the same feelings in me, or the same response to flee.

In 1998 I also was fortunate to make another visit to the Middle East. Again, the group that I was with visited both of these sites. When we visited the Church of the Nativity, I chose to wait on the bus. After my previous experience I wanted nothing to do with the place.

As for Enchanted Forest being haunted, I'm sure that like every other place on Earth, it is NOT haunted. Probably about the creepiest things I saw while working there are in the photos below.

The Maximum Minimum - Part 2

Today Oregon governor, Kate Brown, has signed the new minimum wage bill into law. That means that it's time for the sequel to The Maximum Minimum. I received positive feedback on my last post, despite having a relatively low view count. I attribute the latter part of that partly to the lateness of posting. As I had mentioned, I did have a few more things to discuss with regards to minimum wage.

Wages vs. Welfare
I work daily in the world of public assistance in the form of Medicaid. Eligibility for this program and many others such as SNAP (food stamps), TANF, etc. are based on federal guidelines, not state. Currently Oregon already has one of the highest minimum wages in the country, $2 above national. A single person working a full time job (40 hours a week) at minimum wage in Oregon does NOT qualify for Medicaid. Same job at the national minimum wage would be within the qualifying income range.

So, the higher the wage, the fewer people getting public assistance. That's great, right? In terms of health insurance, it can be the difference between getting free healthcare via Medicaid, or having to pay for private insurance. It's not just the premiums, which could be as low as a few dollars a month, to a few hundred depending on certain factors. What about deductibles and co-pays? If a person actually has to use the insurance, they could end up spending more total than the increase in pay that disqualified them from Medicaid.

What about someone receiving SNAP benefits? Again, this is a federal program, based on federal guidelines. The more money someone earns, the less they can receive in benefits. Now, more of the wage increase goes to the food budget therefore nullifying the increase.

The Maximum Minimum

Those of us in Oregon are more than aware that as of today both the Senate and House of Representatives have passed a bill to increase Oregon's minimum wage. It also comes as no surprise that the governor is expected to sign it, after all, wasn't it her idea anyway? While the overall increase proposed in this bill will take a matter of years to be fully implemented, it will make Oregon's the highest state minimum wage in the United States (assuming that other states don't pass similar increases before then).

What follows here is my opinion, achieved by using logic a common sense, things that are sadly lacking in this world. If you disagree, that is fine. If you are offended or upset, you were warned. Continue at your own risk.

The Windows 10 Experience | Part 3

So, I've been running Windows 10 for a few months now. A wise old lady asked me for another post, and I've put it off until she bugged me about it again. Sorry mom.

Back when my mom asked me to write another post, I really didn't think I had all that much more to say. There were a couple of things that I thought deserved to be mentioned, so here it all comes.

I'm pretty sure that it was the same day that I was asked to do another post, that I turned on the computer and found this.

That little "Sign out now" button was completely useless. It let me log back in, but came up with the same error. I had to power the computer off, by holding the power button for a few seconds, and restart it to get it to start up properly. It has not happened again, but I don't have any idea what prompted it that one time.

The Windows 10 Experience | Part 2

After a few days of having Windows 10 on the new laptop, I thought I would go ahead and post part 2 of this experience. I'm not going to pretend to share any great insight, but rather to just share some thoughts and opinions.

Travels to the Edge.
I said before that I found Microsoft's new browser, Edge, to be just as useful as Internet Explorer in that I used it to download Firefox. I decided that in all fairness I should actually go ahead and give it a try.

From what I can tell, it's a fairly straight forward web browser. The interface is clean and simple, yet seems a little blockier than what I am used to. There are no "curves" to it, as there are with many other programs. This almost seems to be the way with Windows 10 in general. Nothing inherently wrong with squared edges and such, but it definitely doesn't look pretty.

I started this post in Edge, but I just had to switch to Firefox instead. I'm used to the Blogger interface giving me a WYSIWYG interface, but instead in Edge it was HTML only. I'm not brushed up on my HTML enough to be comfortable working with it. In Firefox I have the option to switch between WYSIWYG and HTML. Perhaps there is a plug-in that Edge needs for it to work, but it did not request to add anything, and it Firefox it just works.

Speed. I really don't know how to measure a browser's speed to be able to compare Edge to Firefox. There are times that it seemed a little slow, but that could just be the computer. At other times it did seem to be moving at adequate speed.

Conclusion: It won't be my every day browser. I'll still stick with Firefox. Maybe it's the familiarity, but why fix what's not broken.

Start Menu.
I decided that it was only fair that I revisit the start menu. After my friend Marty left a comment on my earlier post about how the "tiles" could work, I decided that I would take a look at it. I understand it somewhat now, but I'm not convinced that it's a better interface than what was in previous versions of Windows. For now I plan to continue using the Classic Shell interface, but I still have the option to use the W10 start menu at any time.

If you spend the time getting your commonly used programs setup as tiles, then it could be beneficial. Aside from doing that, it seems that a lot of extra time and effort is expended in actually locating the program that you want. Sadly there are some things that do not show up in the Classic Shell menu, but can be found with the W10 menu. All newly installed programs will show up in both locations. I do not know why there is a disparity, but it seems to be mainly with Microsoft applications.


That's it's for this installment. Futures posts on the Windows 10 experience will be dependent on my deciding that there is actually something worth me saying about it.

Thanks for reading, I'd love to  know your thoughts.