Welcome to Torah Today Ministries. My name is Grant Luton and joining Robin and me today are two voices that many of you are very, very familiar with. You probably hear them in the morning and then at night when you go to bed. And I am referring to our dear friends Gary and Lynn Preston from England. So, welcome to this special episode of Be Our Guest.
Hello everybody. This is Robin and we are here with our friends Lynn and Gary. And what Grant’s referring to, of course, is the project that we did I don’t know how many years ago now, Grant, what was it? It’s been about three years, two years. We did a version of the daily prayers and called the Siddur (סִדּוּר) Project. It was a very, very special thing. And if you’re not familiar, we can provide that for you. And everybody’s saying, “Well, when are we going to hear your guests’ lovely voice if we want to hear their British accent?” So, Gary, would you introduce yourself? Tell us a little bit about yourself and get going.
Well, hello everybody. I’m Gary Preston and it’s a real pleasure to be part of this opportunity to talk to you all and to just enjoy the time that we’ve had with Grant and Robin as we’ve been over here in Ohio. And we live in Ramsgate in Kent, which is right on the southeast coast. We’ve known Grant and Robin face to face since 2014. I was trying to figure out what year it was. We were teenagers. Absolutely. And that’s actually when I think you made the suggestion that we do the recording. Yes. For the siddur (סִדּוּר) which took a little while for us to build up courage to say yes, we would do. But we are so pleased that we did do that and so is everyone else. Yes. It’s been a blessing to so many thousands of people.
And by the way, as we record this, this is October 2025. We still have a number of copies of the CDs of the Siddur (סִדּוּר) Project where you can hear Gary and Lynn’s lovely voices doing the morning and evening prayers. So if you send a request, go to our website torahtodayministries.org and just drop us an email, include your address and we can ship one out to you provided you live in the United States.
Now Lynn, I know you’re a shy person. We don’t like to take the limelight, but can you just say a few words of greeting to the folks?
Sure. Oh yeah, this is just so lovely to have this opportunity, so exciting. And really we were so honored to be asked to do the recordings for the Siddur (סִדּוּר). It was wonderful. So yeah, it’s been a wonderful time here with you both in Ohio for these past few weeks. And yeah, delighted to have this opportunity.
Well, it’s kind of funny. You came over for Sukkot (סֻכּוֹת) which just finished yesterday and you’ve been here for a little over two weeks and I kept thinking we were talking about we have to do a Be Our Guest episode with you two and I kept thinking we got plenty of time to do it. You’re getting on an airplane in a few hours. That just hit me. We haven’t said yes, we’ve had lots of conversations but actually yeah, this is the first time we’ve been able to put it down in a formal manner so to speak.
So that’s really. Well, you know, it’s funny thinking back when I first asked you if you two with your lovely accents and your voice, you just have great voices and sensitivity to the prayers. Absolutely. And asked you if you’d think about recording them and you said, “Yeah, we’ll do that.” And then I just kind of forgot about it. And I don’t know how many weeks went by and suddenly these files show up in my inbox and there they are. They’re done.
And so if you get the CDs, one CD has Gary and Lynn doing the morning and evening prayers for the weekday. And there’s a background music composed by our dear friend, board member, Kamel Sara who lives up in Nova Scotia. And the second CD is just the music, Kamel’s music by itself. So one of these days we’ll get Kamel here and record his story.
But I’m going to go back to when we first met you back in 2014. You were fairly new to the Torah movement. I don’t like to call it movement, the Torah awakening. And Torah has been an extremely important part, the foundation of your life in so many ways. How did that come about?
I think it would be fair to say that over time, Lynn and I have both grown up in Christian homes in one form or another. I grew up as a Catholic initially and then moved into the Baptist church and then sort of more evangelical circles through what we call over in the UK Christian Union. Mainly based in colleges and universities. And in fact that’s really where I met Lynn while she was at college. So that’s how we got to know each other.
But what I think a lot of people find today and what we were finding was that there was a gap in understanding that we were opening the Bibles but we were really just sort of sitting in the last quarter of the book and not really making any connection to the other three quarters that were there. And so we had both been on a search to try and discover more about the history. Not so much the history but the foundation of what we were coming from.
And I think particularly from the Catholic point of view to open a Bible in church was so rare. You know, it sat there but it was like a lucky talisman rather than something that you actually referred to. And that was why I was so surprised when we came into the Baptist church because actually people did open the book, right? But then there was very little connection with what was going on in the first part and sort of seeing that history.
And so Lynn and I, once we were married and spending time together, we were really just confounded, I think, and desiring to get a deeper understanding. And then we came across a chap called Chuck Missler who was a great Bible teacher because he was willing to get stuck into the Old Testament, Hebrew scriptures, which provides such a context for even our Savior.
Yeah. Well, the what we call the Old Testament, that’s the Bible that Yeshua (יֵשׁוּעַ) and the apostles all studied and lived by. And everything in the New Testament scriptures is founded upon the Hebrew Bible because that is their standard and always was and still is.
Otherwise, didn’t you get the feeling that it contradicted itself? Like you knew bits and pieces from those older books in the beginning of the book. But what I was presented with from the New Testament letters and scriptures, it felt like it was a contradiction to what I had been told was true. So that caused a lot of confusion for me. I don’t know if you found that as well, but man, it really is nice to know it’s one story.
Absolutely. We sort of arrived at this image that our knowledge of the word was a bit like a helium balloon floating above, but bringing in Torah and that was really grounding and it starts to become one piece.
Now was your background similar to Gary? Gary was raised Catholic to Baptist. How about you?
Methodist church. Yes. Right from when we were very young all the way through. But then for me I really felt like I had wings and things took off when I went to college and going to the Christian society there. And suddenly there was a bigger group of people also looking to grow in this, different thoughts, different vantage points, new books.
So you both kind of discovered Chuck Missler at the same time then. You were already married. Yeah, and took adventure. So pick it up from there. What happened?
2005, we went across to Israel with a teacher called Yaakov Prasch who was a Jewish, he was a Messianic Jew, and he was running a tour that we decided that we would go on. And in fact as a result of that we met some friends who we’re still in touch with, who are part of our Bible study group even today. And all of a sudden the Bible became 3D.
Yeah, Israel has a way of doing that. That’s what happened to me. 3D and full color.
Yes, absolutely. And now we were seeing these places and these accounts and we were actually standing in those places. And so again, it was a sort of next step along the way because we’d still been involved with evangelical churches and at that time we were involved in the sort of UK division of the Vineyard movement.
And for me that was a bit strange because my understanding from the past of what Vineyard had been was that it was quite Bible based. But in the UK that seemed to be again very similar to me like it was in the Catholic Church. It was like if we’re going to open the Bible today it’s because I don’t know, we need to wedge a door open kind of thing. Like there was very little reference to the things that scripture was saying. It was much more orientated towards authors who’d written books and much more feelings and experientially based rather than being grounded in the word.
And so that for us was a turning point again to move away from that form of worship and fellowship. And we wanted to really get to a place where we were starting to be exposed to proper Bible teaching. And that’s when we started going to a fellowship down in London in the Westminster area which was Calvary Chapel based. And that was definitely more biblically sound, orientated in terms of the teaching that was going on there.
But then we hit this other problem which was that pretty much every church movement has its own eschatology, its own way of viewing the scriptures which although it will claim to speak in terms of “this is the Old Testament” or “these,” it wouldn’t really talk in terms of the Hebrew scriptures. This is the Old Testament, that’s the way it was framed. And yet it was still really being framed from a New Testament pre-tribulation eschatology viewpoint.
And that was problematic for us, or for me, because it didn’t make sense because now I was reading stuff in the Hebrew scriptures and Leviticus 23 being the typical example of here is a piece of a passage which is setting things out in a very clear way. And here is a church that is saying, you know, we go through the Bible verse by verse, chapter by chapter, follow these scriptures. And it’s like, okay, but we don’t do it.
And when we read things like Adonai (אֲדֹנָי) has given his people this gift of Sabbath rest and it’s very, very close to God’s heart and then we’re taught that it’s not really something that we need to think about now. Absolutely. That’s very confusing.
Yes. But I remember how it seemed that you, Gary, when you started to discover Torah, it was via the moadim (מוֹעֲדִים). Yes. Wasn’t it? That stepping, you were listening to Mark Biltz and the feasts were opening up. And of course Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) has become so precious. Yeah. And it’s top of the list. You know, Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) is the first one in the list.
And people seem to disregard it because it’s kind of like, well, it’s not one of the feasts. It’s like, no, if you’re writing a list of the things that are most important, the thing that you do is at the top of the list, you put the thing that’s at the forefront. In the same way that when you look at the commandments, what’s the first commandment? Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your soul. That’s top of the list. And so, the top of the list of the moadim (מוֹעֲדִים) is Shabbat (שַׁבָּת). And it’s no surprise that it comes around on a weekly cycle because we can’t go any further in our life without needing to be reminded.
Well, you know, there’s so many people I’ve asked this question. I’ve asked you how did you begin to engage with Torah and make it your lifestyle. And so many say it was Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) or was the moadim (מוֹעֲדִים)? And moadim (מוֹעֲדִים) for those of you who are unaware of it means the appointed times. And I mean, think about these appointed times aren’t just things where God says, “This is what you do on these days.” What he’s saying is, “These are the times I want to meet with you.” They’re engagements that we keep with God.
Yeah. So, it’s not like we just get together and go through some rituals. We realize God is showing up in a very special and tangible, almost a tangible way. And when we set aside these times, put everything else aside, say I want to meet with God in these times that he’s appointed, he really shows up. Yeah. It’s a life-changing experience.
Yeah. And I think it’s funny because today as we were traveling, we were talking about journaling and schedulers and stuff like that. And you know, I was saying that I print off a monthly calendar just to keep track of what’s going on in terms of my working week and the things that are happening. But at the forefront of that, every, the first thing that I write into it is Shabbat, erev Shabbat (עֶרֶב שַׁבָּת). This is the priority because I know that everything else that I’m doing is either coming out of that or leading up to it.
And I think that when we first started to discover Shabbat (שַׁבָּת), it was much easier for me because I basically land on a couch or a chair somewhere and get the books out and I’m like, “Okay, here we are, mandated rest, like what you’re talking about.”
Whereas Lynn would be kind of like, always something to do. There’s still stuff to do. I had to learn. Yeah. But I’m so glad that I had the opportunity to do. It’s a beautiful day. It becomes the rhythm of your life.
Oh, yeah. I mean, can you imagine if your boss at work, your employer says, “Next Thursday afternoon at 2:00, I want to see you in my office. I have something very important to talk to you about.” And 2:00 comes and goes on Thursday and you don’t show up. And he finally says, “Why didn’t you come to my office at 2 p.m.?” “Oh, well, there’s a ball game on. I didn’t want to miss that. And there was a sale down at the store. I wanted to hit that sale.” And the boss says, “Well, that’s too bad. I was going to give you a raise, but I’ve rethought that.”
Absolutely. God wants to meet with us because he has good things to share with us there. And that particular Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) will never come again. So, Shabbats are…
Should I tell the little story about the Bible study group I attend on Friday mornings? Sure. Yeah. We were… It’s a group of… I can officially, I’m an official old man. So, it’s a group of old men and we just get together up here at the corner church every Friday morning at 6:30 a.m. and we’ll take a book of the Bible and just read a chapter each week and just talk about it. And Gary got to join you which was amazing. Yes.
So anyways, we were going through the book of Exodus. We came to chapter 20 and the ten commandments. We were talking about the ten commandments and I just played the devil’s… maybe I should say God’s advocate. I said, which of the 10 do you think is the biggest threat to Satan? In other words, if you were the devil and you were allowed to remove one commandment from the 10, which one would you take out?
And they really started thinking. Some said it would be blasphemy or adultery or murder or theft. And then they looked at me and said, “Well, which one would you take out?” I said, “Well, which one did Satan take out?” They said, “The Sabbath.” Said, “Exactly.”
And they said, “Why is that so important?” I said, “Well, Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) is one day out of seven. So that’s one seventh of your life. Can you imagine what your life would be like if you took one seventh of your life, one 24-hour period a week, and you stepped away from the world and devoted it completely to family, to your marriage, to prayer, fellowship with other believers, to studying the word, spending time with your kids, and just devoted completely to God’s stuff.”
I said, “The other nine would be pretty easy to keep, wouldn’t it?” They all agreed. And I think we really underestimate the power of the Sabbath day of devoting your life to keeping that. So anyways, that’s my little… That has been so much of our conversation together. Yes.
The ways in which we’ve grown more aware and grateful that we are aware. And Lynn, one of the things, the many things I admire about your life, is that you care about the essence of things, not just the way things look from the outside. And you and I have chatted a bit about how important it is to guard this sacred time, but not in a way that’s militant or off-putting to people. Do you mind just sharing some of the secrets that you’ve learned along the way of how this can work into your rhythm of life without becoming awkward for you or for others?
I think there’s a wonderful way in which you work up through the week, you work up to Shabbat (שַׁבָּת). And so the planning that comes in for, you know, how you’re going to do the food so that you’re not doing too much on yourself to have everything ready beforehand. It really is, we talked about it before in terms of patrolling the borders of Shabbat (שַׁבָּת).
And one dear little example, but it’s really effective. So in the kitchen we have a blackboard and when I use the last of something, I scribble it on the board so that I know when we’re shopping next that’s something we need to pick up. I never write on that board on Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) because on Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) I have everything that I need. We have everything that we need.
So that’s one. There’s nothing lacking. Absolutely not. And we’ll also make sure to go out for a walk together, which doesn’t necessarily always happen during the week, and we’ll do that early before there are many people out. Because that starts to change when you’re out amongst those who aren’t keeping Shabbat (שַׁבָּת). It changes the tone. Yes, it does.
So that’s another key piece. And the little rituals that you have within Shabbat (שַׁבָּת). So, candle lighting, Friday evening. The people you gather with. Yes. On Shabbat (שַׁבָּת). And I know for us, because it will be the two of us during the day and then we study together with the group in the evening, but during the day the conversations that we’re able to have from the parashah (פָּרָשָׁה) usually, but other things also, but also connecting the things from our work week to try and understand that for the week we’re going into the things that you learn from the parashah (פָּרָשָׁה) and how they impact on daily life.
Those conversations are way deeper than they tend to be in the week. And it is this idea of that additional soul that comes to be with you. We feel that so definitely and it’s precious.
Yeah. And I think one of the other things practically has been how it’s not that we isolate ourselves but we… So I guess the analogy for us is we got rid of our TV back in 2002 and that came off the back of unfortunately a bereavement. But when we had taken time out from having the TV on, we then got to this place of we arrived back home and the first thing that happened was the television went on and I think within 10 minutes the television went off again because all of a sudden it felt like this invasion of space.
And the analogy that I used at the time was if any of the people that we see on TV actually came and knocked on our front door, would we allow them into our house? So, and the answer of course was no. So, why would you then allow them into your house freely without any sense of asking them questions about why are you here? What are you here to do? You know, they just bring all of their issues, all of their problems.
And I think that that has increased today exponentially because of the devices that we have. You know, and so we make sure pretty much that our phones are turned off, that our computers are zero access. You know, we might need to use them because I’ve got to send out a Zoom link to the group or something along those lines. But as a general rule, the space that we occupy is not invaded by the outside world.
That’s great. And that’s also been very much part of our mindset towards how Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) should be because we want to gather with people and with friends and our friends are actually the books that we have in front of us. There you go. And to not be disturbed by interruptions that are unnecessary because unless it’s an ox in the ditch type scenario, that stuff can all wait.
And it’s different, I think, for us because we don’t have a family, so therefore we don’t have small children and all of that. But I think even then, it’s easy to make an excuse. And in fact, you know, train up a child in the way they should go, right?
Yeah. I have a question for you while I listen to you talk. Did you find Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) at the beginning a difficult thing to enter into? Was it kind of like, just what was your experience when you first decided let’s keep the Shabbat (שַׁבָּת), let’s just try this? What was it, easy? Was it hard? Was it…
I remember that first Shabbat (שַׁבָּת). And as you said, Gary, you find it very easy. So there you are stretched out on the couch reading, happy as Larry. And I’m thinking, I’m not doing anything. I’m… and I’m uncomfortable. So I take myself for a walk. And it was a beautiful walk around the countryside where we lived. I remember coming back around, passing houses. One of the houses had outside the front, apples, fallen apples that they just offer to. And I picked a couple of apples because I thought well maybe bake those another day.
But for me it was that thing and needing to be active, like productive. Yes. But that was the last time that happened and then gradually often away into it.
Well, yeah. And I think so for me, I think it is just maintaining the discipline. So on the one hand, I can immerse myself in a book as an example. And that sounds idyllic in a Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) sense, but actually that’s not really what it’s about. And I think that as we’ve grown in this together, we’ve realized that in fact it’s us, it’s Lynn and I joining together in this process and therefore not seeking to isolate ourselves but actually to come together.
And I think that’s the essence of then you see within fellowships this idea of having fellowship. But as you’ll be aware that when you come together for fellowship, that can create its own sense of busyness. And you know, you’re thinking about, and you’re not actually thinking about Shabbat (שַׁבָּת). You’re thinking about have we got all the things that we need for the service, plates. Exactly. All of that stuff.
And so it’s very easy to get trapped into something that you feel is justifiable because it’s part of what we do for service and for fellowship. But in fact in its own right it’s a kind of… it’s almost like sort of Screwtape Letters. You can imagine Screwtape receiving this letter saying and make sure that the people who are actually thinking that they’re practicing a Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) are in fact not practicing Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) because they’re being so busy about preparing for Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) and doing Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) and it’s kind of like in the way that they think that they should be doing but in fact is no different from anything that they would be doing and so you come away from it exhausted.
Yeah, it takes practice to realize, like we mentioned productivity and we mentioned feeling like we need to do something, Lynn, because I tend to be the same. But we are being productive but in a different way. And it took me years to understand. I’m still working on it.
It isn’t that we’re not accomplishing something or even building something, but it’s in the invisible kingdom, not in the visible kingdom because we work so hard in our physical world, which we need to do. We’re required and called to do that. But he says, “Here’s a day to delight in where you can have a taste of the world to come and begin to be productive, but in an unseen world.” And I love that.
Well, keeping Shabbat (שַׁבָּת) for me really showed me in a real practical way how out of control my life is because I couldn’t make myself stop. And I realized the busyness and the things to do and the schedule that was controlling me. I was not controlling it. And even if you do it outwardly, it’s hard to do it in your head. It is. To make yourself stop.
And it’s a discipline like you said, but what a rewarding one. But I know the first time, first few weeks we tried to keep Shabbat (שַׁבָּת), I was, it was miserable for me because I mean I can’t do this, I can’t do that. My body is just vibrating with nervous energy to do stuff and it’s like stop it. Be still. And begin to really take control of your life. And then we can hear it, that being still and knowing.
Yes. And there’s a very strong connection there, right?
Gary, you mentioned the word isolation and you mentioned the word fellowship and coming together as a concept on Sabbath. You know what? I think it’s harder for people who may be single or in a marriage relationship or in a family where they seem to feel like the lone ranger in desiring these things. And they think, well, if all of my family or my husband and I could be on the same page and get in the car and drive to a place where we could be with other people who agree that this is important, then this could be a special day. And I feel that. But it’s not.
So, can you speak to that?
I think that, I think certainly if you are a single person on your own, it’s definitely harder. And I think that maybe that’s where the responsibility almost comes in for us to be able to as couples to then identify who those people are and be able to welcome them into a wider circle.
So Shabbat (שַׁבָּת), you know, having a meal together around a table. I think that we all get into our own world and I think that even with, you know, finding a fellowship that you feel that you can settle in and be part of and not be too focused on yourself. It’s this, it’s the ability to move out of yourself.
So if six days of the week you’re on your own and you’re just in yourself. That’s why people will spend so much time at work. They will get into this place where work becomes the main focus. Well, you feel competent. Exactly. And now what do I do? What do I do with this?
I think that that’s why things like Torah Today and various other study groups that you can access online are so important because now you can take yourself out of your normal six day a week world and enter into something that’s more special. It’s not perfect, but it’s certainly a step in the right direction.
But I think that at the very heart of it, I love the scene in The Chosen in the first series where you see Mary doing her first erev Shabbat (עֶרֶב שַׁבָּת), inviting these people and not knowing who’s going to turn up and then all of a sudden a couple of the disciples turn up and then Yeshua (יֵשׁוּעַ) turns up and it’s kind of like, and she doesn’t quite know what she’s doing.
I think it’s difficult for single people to feel completely comfortable, but maybe what they can do is link in with other single people and also not be afraid to say, well, rather than me feeling that I have to be invited somewhere, maybe I can do the inviting. There you go. Right. And breaking that isolation. It’s tough. I’m sure.
You know, well-meaning people will always ask me, “I don’t know how to do it right. I’m afraid I’m not going to do it right.” And it’s like, “The only way to do it wrong is to not do it.” Yeah. But it’s like learning how to play the piano. You’re going to hit a lot of wrong notes, but at least you’re learning. And you know, if you’re taking piano lessons, a little kid, your parents are delighted. He’s playing the piano. He’s making mistakes, but he’s… And God’s the same way with us. Oh, they’re doing Shabbat (שַׁבָּת). He doesn’t care if you’re not doing it right. What is the right way?
Right. I love what Dennis Prager said when someone asked him what is the consequence or the punishment so to speak for not keeping the Sabbath and he said you miss the Sabbath. Absolutely. That’s the punishment.
Yeah. But I want to back up just a titch and we didn’t even intend to go down this road of just talking about Sabbath but it must be the important subject. One more thing for this conversation. But let’s say you are a single person and you are alone so to speak. I know people that do manage to put a guard around that sacred time and create little rituals that they can become more aware of the fact that they have a father. Yeah. And a beloved who is bending closer and more available than at any other point in time during the week and they can experience a sweet connection with him.
That’s for sure. And I know people that can do it and I want to encourage people to try to. Yes. Do you agree, Lynn?
I do. We spoke about this earlier in the week, didn’t we? And how, yes, we acknowledge it’s difficult for people on their own, but it’s those little rituals that make so much difference. Key in what you said, this thing about, you know, leaning into him in that way, hearing his voice. And gradually, gradually finding different ways of doing that. For the beauty.
That’s so good. Our time has flown by. Look at that. But there’s one other thing I’d like to finish with this. As I mentioned at the beginning, Beth Tun put together an English version of the morning weekday prayers and the evening weekday prayers. And you did so graciously record those for us. Gary, you did the morning prayers and Lynn, you did the evening prayers.
And I know that praying through the liturgy and embracing the traditional prayers of Israel and the first century believers, it’s a very important part of your life. So, starting with you, Gary, since you did the morning prayers, could you just give a word of encouragement or a story of how this has impacted you and to encourage other people to really incorporate these into their daily lives.
So, like I said earlier, I kind of grew up in Catholic church and so liturgy was really, really important there. But it got to the point of being meaningless. I actually, you know, left the church and then six, seven years later went into a service and I could straight off the bat recite everything that was going on and it was as if it had just been like a parrot. Yeah. It was like there but there was no real meaning to what I was doing.
Now when I take time to actually meditate on the siddur (סִדּוּר), when I take time to meditate on the words, there are two things that happen. First and foremost I have this recognition of the fact that I am now communicating with the Creator but I’m also standing in the presence of all of those other people in the world who are doing this as well. And that’s even more present when we come to doing the liturgy, when we gather together and do Rosh Chodesh (רֹאשׁ חֹדֶשׁ), when we do a little stripped down version, but you just recognize that God is hearing this collective voice. He’s not just hearing your voice. He’s hearing a collective voice.
And you’re part of something so much bigger than yourself. Absolutely. And it reminds me of the time of the Exodus where God says, you know, I’ve heard the cries of the people, not the cries of a person, but the cries of the people because there is an expression of desire, need, just even desperation almost. Where are you? Where are you in all of this? Why, when is the rescue coming?
And I think particularly now we are aware of that in the world where people are feeling so desperate. They’re crying out and they’re saying, “God, where are you in all of this?” And he’s saying, “I’m right here.” But I’m the one who covers you.
The liturgical prayers are a covering. They’re not just parroting words. And I think a lot of people get really bogged down by the thing of what it says in the New Testament about, you know, this sort of repetition. And it’s like, the meaning comes from the heart that you go into this with. If you just think that this is a religious process then you are going to miss the point of it. However, even if you start at that point of it being, “I’m doing this because it’s a religious process,” okay, that’s fine. Meditate on the words.
Meditate on Adon Olam (אֲדוֹן עוֹלָם), lord of the world. That alone can carry you through a whole day. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.
And we do the Hareini Mekasher (הֲרֵינִי מְקַשֵּׁר). But we’ve actually changed the words slightly. So rather than “I hereby join myself to the master” or “I hereby bind myself to the master,” we’ve changed the words slightly and we’ve made it a collective. We’ve said “we hereby join ourselves.” Join ourselves. Bind ourselves.
So it’s, and I’m just really conscious of the fact that the Father wants us to bind ourselves to him. Yes. To join, to not just join. I can join in with something because I’m present but actually to bind myself to this thing. Identify. Absolutely.
So we make it a plural. It’s us together. We hareini (הֲרֵינִי). We do this together. And I think that, and for me coming into the liturgy of the siddur (סִדּוּר), straight away as soon as I first heard it, as soon as you gave us a copy of the Beth Tun siddur (סִדּוּר), there was just this rising up in my spirit and in my soul and it was like, Father, these words, they’re true as well as being an expression of fellowship together.
And I think it goes back to your question earlier, Robin, about people may feel that they’re on their own but when they join together in the liturgy, if they can imagine themselves standing in the room with many others because it is true, exactly, in that invisible room. And it’s like being able to take their spiritual eyes rather than their physical eyes and seeing themselves standing on their own but to imagine themselves standing with others, then that isolation disappears. Absolutely.
Yeah. Lynn, I’m going to go to you next and we’ll give you the final word on this, but one of the things that comes to mind when I think of the evening prayers, which are pretty short compared to the morning, a number of times over the years, I’ve had people say they have so much trouble sleeping or they’re troubled by nightmares. And just, they… it’s like nighttime they dread because they go to bed, it’s like their brains fill up with stuff that just keeps them awake.
And I say do the evening prayers. I said listen to the evening prayers while you go to sleep and it transforms their sleep. What has been your experience especially with the evening prayers?
Well, even as you say that, while I was listening to Gary and I was thinking about what’s, you know, what is there for me in the evening prayers that’s similar, and it was just this thing. It was, it’s such a safe, secure place to be held after a busy day. And how that can help you to lead into sleep. It sort of sets the tone.
And you know, maybe you’re not straight to sleep immediately after you’ve finished praying that prayer. But that’s the, from that place you might start to think of all the things you’re thankful for from the day and from your life as a whole. And that’s such a good way to drift into sleep rather than letting your wild thoughts, just the thoughts of the day take you in all sorts of places where you’re then working again.
But I find an additionally wonderful part of the evening prayers is dealing with forgiveness. Yes. So keeping things really short, accounts clean, those things are dealt with.
That’s so good. That’s good. Well, I know that when I listen and I hear you praying these evening prayers and the recording, you can really tell this is a person to whom these are not just words, that this is someone who’s experienced the power of these prayers in their life. So, I just want to thank you for that, both of you, because your sincerity comes across in your voices as you lead us in these prayers.
Thank you. And I’m sorry, I’m going to go ahead. As is my usual. You said you were gonna give Lynn the last word and it’s not that I want to steal that from her, but it was just to follow on from what Lynn’s saying.
I think that, and again it comes from the conversations that we’ve had during the last couple of weeks, you know, we all have this, we all have this trouble with the videotape that we replay in our minds. Oh yes. You mean that’s not just me? No, no, no. You are not alone. Absolutely.
And I think that that is something that really comes across through the bedtime prayers, that there is this ability to actually think about those words. And first and foremost, if you have troubled thoughts, you know, there’s Psalm 91 and it’s telling you very clearly how God is protecting you.
But then also there’s this other part which is, you know, may my soul be as dust to those who I’ve hurt, who I’ve received hurt from. You know, just to kind of draw a line under that. And I think that for again, for many people in isolation but in marriages as well, that they spend so much time replaying the video of the day or of past events or worrying about how things are and where we’re going.
And it’s kind of like, without trying to sound condemnatory, that’s not faith, you know? That’s not trust, which we’ve talked about. Trusting in Hashem (הַשֵּׁם) means that we actually set these things down and we don’t let our troubled thoughts…
You know, I think you chose well to choose Lynn to be the voice of the evening. You know, Lynn will rest you into sleep. I’ll be the clarion call to get you up.
And so yeah, and I think that’s one of the things that’s really key. Oh, and Lynn, I’m with you in terms of the importance of just allowing yourself to fall into that safe place. And it’s always a place that’s there and it never changes. No matter where I am physically or spiritually or emotionally, that place is always there for us.
It is. And we return and we go, “Oh, there’s that familiar hug and I know all is well.” Yeah. What in the world could be better? Well put.
Oh, we… No, we thought, how are we going to fill up 30 minutes? 45 have gone by and it seems like it’s been 60 seconds. But, this has been wonderful. I know you have a plane to catch in a few hours, which means we’ll have to be saying our goodbyes soon. But, thank you so much for sitting down and just sharing your lives with Torah Today.
I have an idea. Can I be impulsive here? Absolutely. I know that you’ve committed the Hareini (הֲרֵינִי) to memory. No, I haven’t. No.
I was going to have that spoken, but… Well, maybe, I mean between us. Yeah. Yes, we can do it. Let’s do it. Yeah. We or the I. I think. However you want.
Okay. So we hereby bind ourselves to the Master Yeshua (יֵשׁוּעַ) the Messiah, the righteous one, who is the bread of life and the true light, the source of eternal salvation for all those who hear him. Like a branch that remains in the vine, so may we remain in him, just as he also remains in us and the Father in him in order that they may remain in us.
Yes. And we hereby receive upon ourselves his yoke to love Adonai (אֲדֹנָי) our God with all of our heart, with all of our soul, and with all of our strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves.
And may the grace of the Messiah, Yeshua (יֵשׁוּעַ) the Messiah, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit abound to us. Amen.
Amen. Well done. Oh, it’s beautiful.
And there’s strength in numbers. Yeah. And you know, we want to thank you also for the time, not just that we’ve had over this last couple of weeks. You know, we’ve been desperately trying to get out here for the last seven years to actually spend time together. But also, you know, Grant, Robin, the times when we hear your voices, right from the get-go when we were first listening to the teachings of Beth Tun, it has filled our hearts with such encouragement and joy and just a desire to walk even more closely with Hashem (הַשֵּׁם) and with his Messiah, Yeshua (יֵשׁוּעַ).
And you have opened the door to so many beautiful things. And so we want to thank you for that as well because, and I think I would echo that for all of those who listen to Torah Today and for all of those who listen to the teachings of Beth Tun over the past and for everything that’s going to happen in the future because you have created a pathway for us to walk in which wouldn’t exist unless you had desired the things that you’ve desired from the Father and been obedient to him. And so we want to thank you for bringing us to this point as well.
And for living it, for living it. And we’re so thankful to have friends like you all that we can walk this pathway with because we get just as much encouragement from you. But it’d be so much easier to walk this path with you if you’d moved to the United States. We’re trying to talk them into this folks. There are a lot of places for sale around there.
So wonderful. Well, just to everyone who’s listening, if you would like to get a copy of the prayers and print them out, again, go to our website torahtodayministries.org. Go to the resources page and you can print out the siddur (סִדּוּר) there for your own use and there are links there to where you can listen to the prayers online or you can, as I said earlier, drop us a line with your name and address. We’ll be happy to send you a copy of the CDs.
So, any last words, Robin?
Oh, it’s just been a joy. It is. And, shalom (שָׁלוֹם) to all of you. Yes. Shalom (שָׁלוֹם) and may God bless. And bye-bye now. Bye.
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