American Torah Shorts

Honor your parents for a longer, happier, healthier life. You won't just be honoring your parents, but yourself as well.

Whatever you're doing, if it's complex, it's going to be messy.

God's justice doesn't punish one innocent person in order to "level the playing field" for another innocent person. That only creates guilt in the beneficiary and resentment in the punished. Restitution is to be extracted from the guilty.

The more shocking a claim on social media is, the more likely it is to be false. Do your own fact-checking. Don't share clickbait.

We all tend to judge ourselves and our friends by a different standard than we use for other people, but God says we need to use the same standard for everyone.

A slack hand causes poverty, but the hand of the diligent makes rich. He who gathers in summer is a prudent son, but he who sleeps in harvest is a son who brings shame. Proverbs 10:4-5 ESV

Taking the easy way out today creates a harder road tomorrow, and it will only be your own fault.

It's tempting to take the path of least resistance, but don't do it. You'll be happier, healthier, and live longer if you consistently challenge yourself to take the harder road.

For the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. 1 Corinthians 12:14-18 ESV

Wisdom has sent out her young women to call from the highest places in the town, 4 “Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!” To him who lacks sense she says, 5 “Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed. 6 Leave your simple ways, and live, and walk in the way of insight.” Proverbs 9:3-6

For even when we were with you, we would give you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. 2 Thessalonians 3:10 ESV

Moses didn't think he was up to the task of confronting Pharaoh and leading the people of Israel out of Egypt, but God knew better. After all, it's not the man so much as the God behind the man.

Trump might be an arrogant jerk. He might be mean and crass. He might rub people the wrong way. But he also has a way of getting people to expose themselves as corrupt, evil people who will do anything and lie about anything to win.

Every language has idioms, frequently involving the passage of time. Jesus said he would be in the grave for "three days and three nights" and "rise on the third day", but those statements are mutually exclusive if taken literally. One or both are idioms.

Every language is full of idioms, even in the most formal contexts. Hebrew and Greek are no exceptions, so when you read the Bible, keep in mind that many phrases were never meant to be interpreted in a strictly literal sense.

Not all journalists are bad people, of course, but most of them seem to be pathological liars.

When your family is going through a major transition, you can avoid a lot of potential problems by keeping your family's needs ahead of your own and even ahead of your community and ministry.

Sometimes you just have to tell grandma and grandpa no.

Brian Serrano talks about how Christians sometimes behave worse toward each other than they do to unbelievers.

Jay Carper and Brian Serrano talk about how kids who have grown up in the Torah movement look at Christmas trees.

Make choices today that will add value and joy to your life in the future.

God gave you passions for a reason. Use them wisely to benefit your family, community, and the Kingdom of God.

Don't worry so much about who the antichrist might be or what the mark of the beast looks like. Focus on God and what he wants from you in your every day life. Study the Scriptures and learn God's patterns, then trust him.

The two biggest events in Israel's history happened at Passover, and throughout the Bible, revivals were marked by a subsequent Passover celebration.