Revisit: “And just like that, he is no longer alive . . .”

Image from quotesideas.com

[First posted January 23, 2016. Written by Sinaite NSB, a commemorative repost paying tribute to a co-founder of Sinai 6000.—Admin1]

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It has taken time for me to write a farewell tribute to Sinaite VAN. On January 23, 2016, at age 87, he left our Sinai 6000 original core community to . . .(or so we imagine) . . . finally meet YHWH our Creator, Source of Life, proclaimed ‘One True God’ by the Hebrew Scriptures which is our chosen source of Divine Revelation.

Sinaite LSS had wanted to write her own homage and a sufficient one it is: Mourning Significant Others

So what is this follow-up about?

An occasion to address lingering questions about ‘end of life’ and specific concerns of Christian colleagues regarding—

the eternal destiny of any individual born into life
who does not avail of the saving grace offered by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ
by getting under the wide-covering salvation umbrella of Christianity
to avoid eternal damnation in a place called hell,
where the doomed company of the rebellious/fallen angels, the devil (Satan!) and his cohorts,
are condemned to burn together in eternal fire.

Alas, for ex-Christians such as we Sinaites who have left the fold, what is our lot?

Well, according to the author of the NT book of Hebrews 10:26:

[ASV] For if we sin wilfully

after that we have received the knowledge of the truth,

there remaineth no more a sacrifice for sins.

Add to that the expanded dire warnings in the concise commentary of Matthew Henry:

10:26-31 The exhortations against apostacy and to perseverance, are urged by many strong reasons. The sin here mentioned is a total and final falling away, when men, with a full and fixed will and resolution, despise and reject Christ, the only Saviour; despise and resist the Spirit, the only Sanctifier; and despise and renounce the gospel, the only way of salvation, and the words of eternal life. Of this destruction God gives some notorious sinners, while on earth, a fearful foreboding in their consciences, with despair of being able to endure or to escape it. But what punishment can be sorer than to die without mercy? We answer, to die by mercy, by the mercy and grace which they have despised. How dreadful is the case, when not only the justice of God, but his abused grace and mercy call for vengeance! All this does not in the least mean that any souls who sorrow for sin will be shut out from mercy, or that any will be refused the benefit of Christ’s sacrifice, who are willing to accept these blessings. Him that cometh unto Christ, he will in no wise cast out.

(Shiver). Now before reflecting on a Sinaite’s reaction to threats quoted in no less than NT scripture which is accepted by its adherents as “the very words of God,” let us first get back to our dearly departed Sinaites and ponder their exit from our midst, as well as imagine the reaction of our Christian colleagues to these so-called “deaths.” Because in the case of those among us who have ‘moved on’, supposedly it is ‘too late’ . . . so where might they be now? In our case, we still can ‘repent’ and do the 180-degree-turnabout back to our Christian roots . . . that is, get off the pathway to Sinai and get back to the fork on the road and take the one leading to Calvary.

Will we . . . after reaching the point of no return? Speaking only for myself, I say “hell no!”

Seven years ago, Sinai 6000 unofficially entered the constantly growing number of ‘alternative faith communities’ which do not necessarily fall under the three major world religions that trace their roots to Abraham; namely, Judaism, Christianity, Islam. Within a month of our organizing efforts as a recognizable core community with a specific creed different from all others in existence, our oldest but newest recruit ‘Ciso’ joyfully danced his last hours celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles on to his Eternal Rest (“And He Called” 2 – Ciso’s Season of Joy). There was insinuation from our former messianic teacher/leader that Ciso’s ‘death’ might have been a result of Divine Judgment.

In 2013 at the turn of the year, Sinaite ‘Lorna’ texted her new year message to all her female friends, a day after celebrating her 40th wedding anniversary . . . then succumbed to a stroke. Because she was only in her 60’s, again Christian eyebrows raised in wonder why a vibrant, very fruitful Sinaite who not only contributed many articles to this website but also taught Christian seminarians to reread and restudy their “Old Testament,” would be untimely plucked from her service dedicated to HASHEM [THE NAME, Jewish circumlocution for] YHWH, her so-recently-rediscovered God. She even wrote a short post correcting the use of “hallelujah” which should be “hallelu YAH.” (God is near, do not fear . . . Friend, Sinaite, goodnight)

Now two years hence, Sinaite VAN inhaled and exhaled his last breath. He had been announcing for six years his desire to exit from this life exactly like his dear friend ‘Ciso’, on the 7th of “My (YHWH’s) feasts” commanded in Leviticus 23. Rather than granting VAN’s oft-expressed wish, the LORD OF THE SABBATH not surprisingly chose a more appropriate day—His declared Day of Rest as early as Creation Week, a weekly occurrence rather than a once-a-year celebration. Indeed, what grand finale could better signify the LORD of LIFE’s approval of a loyal servant’s finished work than a quiet private departure from this side of eternity to his well deserved Sabbath Rest ?

Ecclesiastes 12:7

Thus the dust returns to the ground,

as it was,

and the spirit returns to God

Who gave it.

To their credit—concerned friends who are leaders/founders of a huge successful evangelical church with ever multiplying membership—attempted a well-intentioned last ditch effort to ‘rescue’ VAN and BAN from their ‘unbelief’:

From the time of our breakaway from Christ-centered faith, there have been unspoken speculations (we’re merely guessing, knowing how we used to think as former Christians) that the deaths among our very small core community are indicators of Divine Judgment upon the ‘already-saved’ who turn their backs on the Savior.

Now think about it:

would the God of Righteousness, Justice and Mercy
really ‘punish by death’
those whom He did not choose (like the Israelites),
but who chose Him as LORD (like Sinaites),
no matter how late they showed their recognition of YHWH as the One True God
in their non-stop quest to ‘Know God’,
a pilgrimage that has taken a lifetime,
holding on to Divine declarations in—-
- [EF] Deuteronomy 4:29

But when you seek YHWH your God

from there you will find (him),

if you search for him with all your heart

and all your being.

and [AS] Jeremiah 29:14:

“You will seek Me and you will find [Me],

if you search for Me with all your hearts;

I will make Myself available to you,

the word of HASHEM [YHWH].

The character of the God of Israel whom Sinaites have come to know is defined through His actions as well as His Self-declarations recorded in the Torah, His Book of Life:

6 And YHWH passed before his face

and called out:

YHWH YHWH

God,

showing-mercy, showing-favor,

long-suffering in anger,

abundant in loyalty and faithfulness,

7 keeping loyalty to the thousandth (generation),

bearing iniquity, rebellion and sin,

yet not clearing, clearing (the guilty),

calling-to-account the iniquity of the fathers

upon the sons and upon sons’ sons,

to the third and fourth (generation)!

So what has YHWH (“his Lord” as our former messianic pastor referred to VAN’s God ) declared about the destiny of the likes of us or, for that matter, the life of all?

Here is the developing Sinaite’s view of ‘end of life’ lingering questions. The reason for bringing this up now is because we have been constantly asked: “What do Sinaites believe happens after death?” Specifically, where does one go if he does not embrace the Christian Savior?

Sinaites can only go by what is on record as “the very words of God” and we do not speculate beyond what is written. We have explained in many posts what we consider “Divine Revelation” and that is limited to the Torah which is not word-for-word attributed to the God of Israel, but a book that contains or records the words of the God of Israel. . . and His instructions for living, for Jew and Gentile.

Image from quotesgram.com

That oft-repeated question of “what next” after “this life”? Death is the inevitable destiny everyone alive faces, ready or not. Some religions are quite preoccupied with the subject, particularly those that claim specific revelation about what lies beyond. Myths and legends abound regarding ghosts and spirits that linger; some advocate that the dead believer is ‘instantly’ with their ‘Lord’ and that non-believers are condemned for eternal suffering in the fires of hell.

Sinaites have struggled with explaining our view of what happens in the “afterlife.” If we don’t believe in the devil and a place called hell where non-believers in the Christian Savior are supposedly destined to go, then where is the non-Christian’s ‘eternal destination’?

Where do we think that intangible immaterial part of us —

we might call “soul” or “spirit”
that leaves our physical body
. . . goes . . .
when the inevitable separation
of our essence from the body it inhabits
happens at the crucial ‘end of life’?

Our simple and candid answer? We do not know.

We do not ‘worry’ about that particular ‘unknown’. Why not?

If the Revelator on Sinai emphasized LIFE in all of His declarations, then who is man to speculate and imagine what happens beyond the boundaries of what is divinely revealed to venture into the unknown? YHWH the Creator of Life is Life-focused, emphasizing what each human can do during his life span which is about the only time he can exercise his God-given free will, to choose–

how to live his life,
to do or not to do . . .
his will or God’s Will . . .
to be the ‘I’ in the Idol
or the ‘I’ in God’s Image.

The Revelator’s mouthpiece, Moses, urges “choose life” to the second generation issuing from the original mixed multitude who were freed from bondage to Egypt 40 years before; born in the wilderness, children of freemen, who were all still alive and breathing as they were about to enter the Land of promise.

What does “choose life” mean to generations who are still alive? We have articles explaining “choose life” so we won’t go into that here, please scroll through our SITEMAP for those posts.

Not so strangely, the Torah is silent about what happens beyond life on this earth. Except for some phrases about how each of Israel’s patriarchs “went the way of his fathers” the generational narratives move on.

Why so?

We can only know the Mind and Will of God according to what He chooses to reveal, right?

So we figure that YHWH,

the Revelator on Sinai,
Creator of humanity,
Source of life and breath,
the God Who revealed Himself and His Way to Israel,
chooses to emphasize in His Manual for Living, His TORAH—
- what each individual can do
- while he has breath
- for each moment-by-moment
- constantly time-passing ‘present’—-the PRESENT —- which is the only real-time one has or actually possesses; which is ever fleeting second per second,

to choose to do or not to do, to act or not act,
in accordance with one’s own inclination
- whether knowingly
- or ignorantly (uneducated by Divine Revelation)

or in accordance with God’s revealed and known Will, all contained in the Torah.

In short, if God doesn’t say so, neither do we. Leave that part to the Lord of Life!

We do know the consequence of ‘choose life’ and that is ‘blessing’. Can we leave it at that?

The title of this post is the opening line of a quote from a Jewess author Aviya Kushner in the last chapter titled “Memory” of THE GRAMMAR OF GOD:

“And just like that, my grandfather is no longer alive.

I write no longer alive,

not dead,

not gone,

because neither of those has really been true.”

NSB@S6K

P.S. Please click the link below and read through the liturgy that reflects the faith of a Sinaite; then make your own conclusions about ‘life’ and ‘end of life’ and the Lord of Life:

A Sinaite’s 5th Anniversary Celebration – 4th Sabbath of September

Source: Exodus/Shemoth 24 – "the sight of the Glory of YHVH (was) like a consuming fire" -- We gentiles living in this 21st century are able to experience that climactic moment [God appearing on Sinai] by reading and studying this portion of the TORAH. Indeed, we see YHWH not quite as dramatically as the mixed multitude did, but perhaps even better through these accounts recorded in Exodus. There is a saying that hindsight is 20/20 vision, i.e., we begin to see and understand the question marks in our past only later in our lives, as we mature and hopefully become wiser and more introspective about the meaning or seeming meaninglessness of happenings in history, whether personal, national, or universal. Søren Kierkegaard adds a twist to this: “Only 20:20 vision is hindsight. Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” As we endeavor to understand each portion in the TORAH of YHWH, much of it will seem irrelevant to our current situation but if we see beyond the time-bound cultural and religious situations and begin to understand what truly has not change—human nature and the Great Revelator who designed the perfect blueprint for living in peace, happily and contentedly with family, community, country and the nations, the unquestionable conclusion is: TORAH is relevant to ALL humankind, not just to Israel, to this very day.

Revisit: “And just like that, he is no longer alive . . .”

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