Eschatology, Tetragrammaton pronunciation, Calendar dates, 666… all of these things have had people wondering what the heck they mean for millennia.
But you know what? None of it really makes any difference when it comes down to being saved or not.
If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.
So many questions, and so many different answers, none of which are going to make any more “saved” than anyone else.
Now, am I saying not to study these topics? No, not at all: studying the Bible is good. There is nothing wrong, at all, with wanting to know as much about God and what is in the Bible as we can.
What I want to say is that there is a difference between wanting to understand God and wanting to know what God knows.
The writer of Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) spent so much of his life and time trying to know the “why” of everything; what he really wanted was to know what God knows, and he found out the hard way he can’t. As he said, it was like chasing the wind, and he finally came to the conclusion that the best you can do is to eat, drink, and appreciate whatever God has given you.
I believe that people who say they know when the Acharit haYamim (End Days) will begin are just trying to get attention and feel validated, being given praise and told how smart they are to have figured it out.
I say if God won’t let his own son in on when that day will come (Matthew 24:36 and Mark 13:32), what makes anyone think he will let them know it?
And for the proper pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton, those 4 letters (Y-H-V-H) that God tells Moses are his name, well… there are many, MANY names and titles we are told refer to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and I believe that God knows each and every one of them, and maybe some others we don’t even know of!
But we are saved by faith, not pronunciation, so why bother knowing what doesn’t matter? God sees our heart and he knows our mind, so if we use a title or name for him that we know to be the one, true God, the father of the Messiah Yeshua, then that is all he cares about.
Now, I don’t pretend to speak for God, but I am pretty sure he cares more about what is in our heart than what name or title we use when we pray to him.
In Psalm 51, when King David prays for forgiveness, he says God won’t turn away a broken spirit or spurn a broken, chastened heart. He doesn’t say that we need to pronounce God’s name correctly in order for our prayers to be heard.
And with regard to the Apocalypse, we aren’t told that we need to know when it starts, but rather that we should live each day prepared for it because it will come upon us “like a thief in the night”.
And which day is the absolute correct day for celebrating any of the festivals is impossible to know, unless (of course) you know someone today who was with Moses when they left Egypt and has kept an accurate count of every new moon since then.
In truth, even that won’t be accurate. The new moon is invisible to the naked eye, so the first visible confirmation of a new moon is actually the Waxing Crescent Moon which, using the naked eye, can only be observed for at least some 15.5 hours after the New Moon. And if that night is cloudy or raining, it may be a day or more after that time before someone can actually eye-witness the moon.
So, my point today is this: stop wondering about what you don’t really need to know and concentrate on that which will help you to be, and to remain, saved.
Here is what is important and will affect your salvation: knowing what is a sin and what is not, and deciding if I follow what a religion tells me to do or what God tells me to do.
Pretty much everything else is isn’t as important, and you shouldn’t sweat the small stuff.
Study, learn, and know what is in the Bible so that you can recognize false teachings and understand what God wants from you: that is good-to-know stuff.
But as for the questions that do not directly affect your salvation, like the arguments about Trinity or whether or not celebrating Christmas is wrong, most of which have done nothing more than to cause strife and dissension within the body of the Messiah, well… leave them alone.
Study God’s word so you can know the difference between what God says and what men say, such as you find in letters written by men or Halacha created by Rabbis.
Thank you for being here and please comment and share these messages with everyone you know, even non-believers. Hey, after all, you never know how fertile the soil is until you plant a seed in it.
That’s it for today, so l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!