Author: Steven R. Bruck

Saved by Faith, but Faith in What?

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The saying “Saved by faith” has been around since Shaul made it popular way back when, and even today people keep saying, “We are saved by faith!”

But faith in what?

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

The answer is really simple, but there is more than just one thing to be faithful to.

First of all, you have to understand that faith means choosing to believe in something that you can never really prove. Proof is the antithesis of faith because if something can be proven, then you have it as a fact and there is no need for faith. I can tell you that there is plenty of proof that God exists, but it is all just as easily dismissed as coincidence or science.

People who want to disprove God’s existence explain things scientifically, but what they fail to catch on to is that God created science and is not restrained by it.

So, to start with, when it comes to being saved by faith you must first faithfully believe in God. DUH! Without faith in God, you have nowhere else to go except to live your life knowing that there is no one behind you, no one caring about you, and no one you can truly, absolutely have faith in except another human being.

And given how human beings are, that is one in the loss column before you even start to play the game.

Next you have to have faith that what God says he will do will be done. Period.

The next thing is to faithfully believe that Yeshua IS the Messiah God said he would send. The reason this is essential for salvation is because there is no temple, and without the temple we cannot bring a sacrifice to be forgiven, and without forgiveness of sin there can be no salvation.

No one stained with sin will ever be allowed into God’s presence, so the way we are saved is through being forgiven. The shedding of innocent blood is the means by which we receive forgiveness, but it is forgiveness alone that saves us.

To receive forgiveness under God’s Torah, we had to shed innocent blood (Hebrews 9:22), and that had to be at the place God put his name (Deuteronomy 12:11), which was the temple in Jerusalem (Deuteronomy 12:5).

No temple, no forgiveness, no salvation no matter how faithfully you try to obey Torah (and I say “try to obey” because no one can be 100% Torah obedient 100% of the time).

This is where Yeshua comes into the salvation picture- his sacrifice, as the Messiah, replaced the need to bring an animal to the temple in Jerusalem, so through faith that God does what he says, faith that Yeshua is the Messiah and faithfully believing that as the Messiah, Yeshua’s sacrifice is a once-and-for-all sacrifice for everyone, you can receive the forgiveness that will save you.

And lets’ set the record straight right now: the once-and-for-all sacrifice doesn’t mean that all sins are automatically forgiven… NO! It means that every time we sin, we can find forgiveness when asking God to forgive us by means Yeshua’s shed blood. And you DO need to ask forgiveness for every single solitary sin you commit for the rest of your life.

And don’t think for a second that all you need to do is to ask. Without real t’shuvah (repentance), without feeling guilty and ashamed for having sinned, God will not forgive you.

God is not stupid or ever fooled- he knows your heart and what you are thinking, so without true repentance, you are no better off than a faithless person.

Oh, I almost forgot- faith in God is demonstrated by obedience to God, and not some religion. Don’t take my word for it: that’s what the brother of Yeshua said in James 2.

And, just in case you missed it the first time, the only place in the entire Bible where God, himself, tells us what he wants us to do is in those first five books, called the Torah. If your religion tells you, in any way, that you don’t need to follow the Torah, then you can never prove your faith by works, so your faith will be dead.

You can be the nicest person on the earth, give to the poor, go to church or synagogue every Shabbat, love everyone, and be as good a person as any human being can be BUT… if you reject anything in the Torah, such as reject celebrating the Holy Days God said to celebrate, reject God’s laws of Kashrut (Kosher) by eating whatever you want to, have intimate relations when you are not supposed to, or with someone you shouldn’t, or violate any of the other rules in the Torah, all that “good’ stuff you do will not help you.

Oh, yeah, and here’s the biggie!- according to the Messiah, as he tells us in Matthew 6:14-15, if you do not forgive those who sin against you, God will not forgive your sins against him, and (here’s another kick in the pants)… every sin you commit is against God.

So, there you have it, saved by faith means:

  1. Faithfully believing (that means without needing proof) that God exists and is 1,000% trustworthy to do as he says he will.
  2. Faithfully accepting that Yeshua is the Messiah.
  3. Faithfully believing his sacrifice was an acceptable sacrifice.
  4. Faithfully believing that because of his shed blood you can receive forgiveness of sin.

Salvation is what we are able to receive only when we are totally cleansed of sin, which is why it is so imperative that each and every day you ask God to forgive you, even if you don’t think you sinned.

Better to be covered than cursed.

Thank you for being here and please remember to 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 this week, so l’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!

What I’ve Learned

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It’s been nearly three decades since I first chose to accept that Yeshua is the Messiah God promised to send, and was happy to find that I could continue to live a Jewish lifestyle, even though I “believed in Jesus”.

And since then, I have learned a lot, and if I may, I would like to share some of that with you.

Warning: This is one of the longest messages I have given, but please stay around till the end because I really believe this is also one of the most important messages I have shared.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

Many of the spiritual lessons I have learned have a real-life, physical element of truth that, whether you are a “believer” or not, and even if you are an atheist, these lessons are valuable and can improve your life.

Let’s start with a touchy topic- forgiveness.

I have learned a very important fact, which is that forgiving someone does NOT make them right with God, but it does make YOU right with God.

In my experience, most people think that when they forgive someone for doing something bad to them it lets that person “off the hook”. What they don’t know is what King David did, and said so in Psalm 51, where he said his sin was against God, and God, alone.

Now, if you’re not familiar with which sin that was (Davey committed more than just one sin during his lifetime), it was a triple-play: he committed adultery, he committed murder, and he made his commander-in-chief, Yoav, an accomplice to murder.

You see, any time anyone sins, it is always against God. Yes, that sin is also against a person, but sinning is a rejection of God’s commandments, and (like it or not) God always comes first. So, if you forgive someone (which doesn’t mean you have to trust them), they still have to deal with God.

Here is the other side of that coin- if you do not forgive them, then you will also have to deal with God! Yeshua tells us that if we do not forgive on the earth, we will not be forgiven in heaven (Matthew 6:14-15), so you really must forgive those who sin against you: not for their sake, but for you own.

One other, and maybe the most important thing I learned about forgiveness, is this:

Until you truly forgive someone, the hurt will never go away.

If you have trouble forgiving someone, do what I do when I hit that roadblock: imagine what they will have to suffer if they never repent. If you have any level of compassion, you will feel so bad for them that it will make it easier to forgive them.

And this brings us to another lesson I have learned: how to love people better. By remembering all the ways we have constantly rejected God, especially my own people, the Jews, over the past 5 millennia yet he constantly is not just willing to forgive us, but he desires to forgive us (Ezekiel 18:23), it motivates me to be better, to be more compassionate (and that is not who I was before), and to be more humble.

Another really good lesson I have learned is that being humble is not being weak. In truth, it takes a lot of inner strength to be humble, and without humility you have little chance of every being saved.

Humility allows us to love better, to be more compassionate, and to accept that God is in charge. Being humble makes you a better friend, spouse, parent, and just an all-around better person.

True humility brings us closer to God, and improves our life tremendously.

I know I am much more humble since accepting God’s will over my own because before I knew the Lord as I do now, if someone was hurt of upset by something I did or said, I wouldn’t care. What I would do is to turn it around, and make it seem it was their fault that they felt that way.

Now you have to understand this was wrong because I DID do something wrong, I DID say something inappropriate or cruel, and it was MY fault. But not having humility, I was a coward and tried to avoid my responsibility for having done that.

Now when someone tells me that I did something to hurt them, my immediate response is to apologize. Even if I know that I did nothing wrong, it is more important to me that I deal with their feelings before my own.

Now there are times when someone will over-react and they need to be told that, but I will do it after I apologize. Yes, you may think I am eating crow that I shouldn’t have to eat, but that is what humility is- the strength to put someone else’s feelings ahead of your own.

Here is something else I have learned from knowing the Bible and observing the world:

The faithful are fearless and the faithless are fearful.

Without faith in God, it will never be any better than me against the world. Faith in humans is always going to be disappointing because we are, well…human! But faith in God is what strengthens you to be able to face anything, because even if you are to die, faithful people get to be with God forever, which is much better than anything we can have here on earth.

And, for the record, faithful to God does not mean following any religion, it means doing as God said to do, and that is found only in the Torah.

Something that is important to know is faith resulting from a miracle is having weak faith, at best, and that isn’t going to last because Satan can make miracles happen, as well.

You must choose to believe, and not be influenced by an event in your life because if one miracle turns you to God, another may just as easily turn you to Satan, and you won’t even know.

God will never provide absolute proof that he exists because if his existence can be proven, you don’t really need faith, but faith is the only way we can be saved.

I have also learned that there is a difference between what is important to know and what is just “nice to know” information. The “Acid Test” question I ask myself to determine which is which is this:

How does this affect my salvation?

If it doesn’t directly save me, then it isn’t important to know.

I now also know the answer to those two, age-old questions: “Why are we here?” and “What is life all about?” Would you like to know? Okay, I’ll tell you:

We are here to choose where we will spend eternity.

I’ve learned you can’t tell anyone what to believe, but you can tell them what you believe and why. Before anyone will accept what you believe, they have to first doubt what they believe, and you get them to do that by asking questions they can’t answer, but you can using the Bible to justify what you believe.

Finally, and I think what is probably the most important thing I have learned, is this:

We all have Free Will to choose what we will believe,
and we all will be held accountable for that choice.

So let me leave you with this thought: if you choose to reject the Torah (which, sadly, traditional Christianity teaches you to do) and you come before God at Judgement Day, which we all will have to do, and God asks you why you didn’t obey him you’ll have to say, “But Lord- I did what they told me I should do”.

Well, you know, I can’t speak for the Big Guy but I am pretty sure he will respond with something to the effect of….

“I understand, my child, that you only did what they told you to do,
but it is what I say that counts!“

Thank you for being here and please remember to 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!

Just Because He Can Doesn’t Mean He Will

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Have you ever had to work under a micro-manager? You know the kind- always watching everything you do, checking every little detail, making you feel like you don’t know what you are doing?

And that leads you to ask yourself, “Doesn’t he have anything else to do?”

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video


God knows every, little thing we do. He knows what is in our hearts, and he knows our thoughts before we do.

That sounds to me like the ultimate micro-manager.

But God doesn’t micro-manage us, even though he can. Yes, he controls our lives (if we ask him to) and he also can make anything happen, but does he really get that involved?
I mean, I know he has plenty of other things to do than to watch me 24/7/365.

And we read in the Bible how God has made things happen in people’s lives, both to help them and to punish them. We also know that if we reject him, he will reject us.

I believe when we read about the curses we will have to suffer for disobedience (Deuteronomy 28), that God doesn’t actively do bad things to us, he just removes his protection and leaves us alone to suffer what the world will do to us.

God is not a micro-manager or a helicopter parent, but he is always available to us when and if we need him, but only if we ask him. That’s why I say even though God can control every aspect of our lives, he doesn’t.

It’s all part of that Free Will thing.

Of course, if he has a specific plan for us, he will intercede and even interfere as he deems necessary, but still, if we reject the call, he will simply find somebody else.
Do you recall from the Bible all the stories about all those people who rejected God’s call? No? Not one? You might say Jonah, but he came around and did as God wanted him to do.

Everyone else who chose to reject God’s calling never got mentioned the Bible, and probably won’t make it into his presence after Judgement Day, either.

I was in management for most of my career, working in different jobs for different companies, and I learned that you need to let people make their own mistakes. I have always felt a good manager can correct what little things go wrong, and prevent the really big ones from happening by interfering at the right time. But watching what people do doesn’t have to mean standing over their shoulders.

God is always watching us, he is always concerned, and I believe he feels really bad when we reject his help, which is more easily done than you might think: you don’t need to ask him to stay out of it, you simply need to not include him from the start.

One of the biggest lies from the pit of Sheol is: “God helps those who help themselves.”
The truth is when I try to do it on my own, I am telling God to mind his own business, and I am left at that point to face the entire world, on my own.
The result is always a foregone conclusion: if it is me against the world, I will lose.

And God will allow me to lose, but what is really great about him is that if I repent of my prideful and stubborn attitude, humbly come before God and ask that he help me get out of the mess I created, he will.

So, remember this: in every endeavor you need to first ask God to work with you. Even when I just go for a bike ride, and even though I stay on the sidewalks as much as possible, I try to remember to ask God to watch out for me before I even get on the bicycle.

Nothing- absolutely nothing- is so unimportant that we shouldn’t ask God to help us.

There is an old saying that it is better to ask forgiveness than to ask permission, and in the human world, I believe that is best.

But when it comes to God, always ask first.

Thank you for being here and please remember to 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 this week, so l’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!

Do Your Actions and Your Words Match?

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When I was in Sales, I learned a very important lesson: people don’t mean what they say, they mean what they do. Yeshua also taught this lesson when he said to let your “Yes” be “Yes” and your “No” be “No” (Matthew 5:37).

So, do your words match your actions?

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

Going back to my Sales experience, I was what is called a “Tinman”; not the kind that was with Dorothy, Scarecrow, and the Cowardly Lion. “Tinman” is an old term used for someone who sells aluminum siding for your house. I also sold window replacements and kitchen refacing, and these sales came off tele marketed leads and were a one-call close.

That means the day I see you is the day I sell you; either I leave with a signed contract or I leave empty-handed, but there was no going back. And those who bought had three business days to cancel their sale and get their deposit back.

Okay, so where is this related, at all, to a spiritual message?

I’m glad you asked.

Of all the sales I made, the ones I could almost be certain would cancel before I even got the paperwork into the office were the ones I made with so-called “Believers”.

That’s right, and yes, it is sad. And to a one, when I would call to try to save the sale (which you do, even though you know 99.9% of the time it’s not going to work) they would use this excuse…

“We prayed on it and now believe this isn’t the time to do this.“

If that was their excuse, I would remind them of what Yeshua said about no being no, etc., and that they gave me a yes.

You know what?- that didn’t make any difference. What they really should have said, to be honest, was that they changed their minds and are reneging on their word.

And yes, just because there is an option to cancel, that doesn’t mean if you take it you haven’t lied.

And when they say they prayed on it and need to change their minds, that is even worse because now they are blaming God!

Oh, yeah- like it or not, when you say you “prayed on it” and now feel differently, that is no different from saying God told you not to do it.

That brings us back to today’s spiritual question: do your words match your actions?

If you say you feel this way, but act that way, then you are a liar!

Now, even though every lie is a sin, that doesn’t mean every lie is unjustified. There are times, and we see this happening in the Bible over and over, when lying is the only way to continue to live. Or sometimes a “little white lie” is the more compassionate thing to do. I would still ask God to forgive me for doing it, but what is wrong in all cases is making a contract and then reneging on it. The exception to this is if you know you were being lied to by the salesperson.

Other than that, the cancellation period is not some “Get out of jail free” card you can pull just because the next morning, when you look at your checkbook, you say, “What the heck did I do?” That’s called “Buyer’s Remorse”, and is normal even when you are positive you did the right thing.

Look, if you profess to believe in God and want to do as God says, then do not do or say something that you aren’t absolutely certain you will feel the same way about in the morning.

And, even if you feel you made a mistake, live with it! Unless you have good reason to think you were bamboozled (that’s a great word, isn’t it?), you must make sure your words match your actions.

Yeshua is the ultimate example of “I am what I say” and if you want to follow in his footsteps, you must also make sure that your words and your actions are the same thing.

In everything you do, let your “Yes” be “Yes”, and your “No” be “No” because how you keep your word reflects on you, but as a Believer it also reflects on God.

Be thou holy as I am holy is not a suggestion.

Thank you for being here and please remember to 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!

What the Bible Doesn’t Say

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Did you ever hear the saying, “Money is the root of all evil”? Think it is from the Bible?

Well… it isn’t. And there are a number of “biblical” sayings that are not from the Bible.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

Most people do not know one thing from the Bible, but they think they do because they have heard people say, “The Bible says…”.

And those people don’t know what they are talking about because they are just repeating what someone else told them is in the Bible, who heard it from someone else who also doesn’t know what the Bible really says.

They just heard it from somewhere.

People easily believe what they like to hear, and adamantly refuse to believe what they don’t want to hear, and the sad thing about that is most of the time what they don’t want to hear is the truth.

Are you familiar with these sayings, supposedly from the Bible?

“God helps those who help themselves.”;
“Cleanliness is next to godliness.”;
“The Lord works in mysterious ways.”

Sorry to burst anyone’s bubble, but none of these are from the Bible.

The one about money being the root of all evil is close- what the Bible does say is that the love of money is the root of all evil (1 Timothy 6:10). When you know what the Bible really says, it makes a whole lotta difference, doesn’t it?

There is nothing wrong with money, or having money, or even wanting to earn more money. Where things go wrong is when the money becomes more important to you than God or family. Many of the holiest people in the Bible were rich- Abraham, Job, and Joseph were very rich, just to name a few.

And as for the lie that God helps those who help themselves, well, this is one of my favorite ones to hate. Not only is it NOT from the Bible, but it leads people to reject God!

In Joel 2:32, which is repeated in Acts and Romans, we are told that all who call on the name of the Lord will be saved: it doesn’t say all who try on their own will be helped. We are not told anywhere in the Bible to depend on our own power or strength, but rather the opposite- we are to depend on God!

God doesn’t want us to leave him out of it, but rather to include him from the start. Yeah, sure, God will help us as we go through life, but only when we go through life the way he says we should. If we want to do it on our own, God will let us; but doing it on our own is rejecting God, and when we reject him, he rejects us. Now, because he is a forgiving and compassionate God, after failing miserably on our own, if we humble ourselves, repent of our sin (of rejecting him), and ask him to forgive us and help us, he will be all-in for that.

But if you want to do it on your own, don’t expect him to help.

The “biblical” wisdom about cleanliness and God working in mysterious ways is not found anywhere in the Bible. It is true that we are told God is so far above us we can never understand him (Isaiah 55:8-9), and there are laws God gave us to obey that are called Chukim, meaning laws that we cannot understand why God gave them to us, such as the showbread. So, okay, yes- there are mysterious things about God, but he doesn’t work mysteriously. In fact, Moses said it best in Deuteronomy 30:11, when he told the people that the Torah is not difficult to do or to understand.

So, nu? …what’s my point?

It is this: if you don’t read the Bible for yourself, so you know what is in there and what isn’t, like Isaiah said (Isaiah53:6), you will be easily led astray.

When a cop stops you and tells you that you broke a traffic law, and you say you weren’t aware of that law, you know what their reply will be, right?

Ignorance of the law is no excuse.

When you find yourself facing God on Judgement Day (and we all will) and he asks you, “Why didn’t you do what I said to do?”, your only answer will be “But I did what they said I should do- how was I to know I was rejecting you?”

Expect to hear this:

Ignorance of the law is no excuse.

You can be ignorant, or you can be saved, but you can’t be saved from your ignorance.

Thank you for being here and please remember to 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 this week, so l’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!

Yeshua and God Must Be Separate Beings for Salvation to Work

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One of the main religious issues that causes disruption, as well as distraction, is the idea of the Trinity: is God separate from Yeshua or are they the same entity, in different forms.

As far as salvation is concerned, the question of Trinity or Unity is irrelevant because Yeshua MUST be the Messiah, and not God, for the plan of salvation to work.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

The plan from the start was that God would send a Messiah to make it possible for us to overcome our sins and be able to commune with God, which is only possible after we have been cleansed of sin. Now, with the destruction of the temple in 73 AD, because the Torah required a sin sacrifice at that temple, and no where else, without a Messiah we could never be forgiven.

When Yeshua sacrificed himself, it was the means for us to be forgiven in that his sacrifice- as the Messiah- replaced the need to bring an animal to the temple in Jerusalem. That is why he said the only way to the father is through him ( John 14:6) because the temple was no longer available.

The Messiah serves as a substitution for the sacrificial animal, and only God can forgive sins. Oh, yeah, I know what you’re going to say, “Yeshua said he can forgive sins”, and you’re right, he did say that. BUT… that was only while on the earth (look it up in Matthew 9:6). Once his role as the substitutionary sacrifice was completed, and he was raised into heaven to sit at the right hand of God, sin forgiveness reverted back to God, and God, alone.

Yeshua, as Messiah, is an intercessor, not an interceptor. We worship God, we pray to God, and we thank God for forgiving us because only God can forgive sins.

Yeshua provides the way to come before God so we can ask for forgiveness, by means of the blood sacrifice performed on our behalf by God’s Messiah.

If Yeshua is God, then why refer to him? Why pray in his name? Why have anything at all to do with him? If he is God, what sense is there in going to God to ask God to refer to himself when we ask God for forgiveness?

Yeshua always referred to God as his father, and never made the literal claim stating that he is God in the flesh (that was what some guy wrote in the beginning of the Gospel of John, and Yeshua never said that about himself).

Here’s something else to consider… how do we know Yeshua is the Messiah? The answer is that he fulfilled nearly every prophecy about him, all of which are in the Tanakh (the Old Covenant, aka the “Jewish” Bible). Some of those prophecies are still to be fulfilled, and that will happen when he returns- not as God, but as the Messiah. So, if Yeshua is God, then the prophecies about the Messiah would indicate that he will be God, but here’s the kicker- not one prophecy about the Messiah in the entire Tanakh indicates that he will be God.

Aright, here we go again: I know, I know, you are going to say, “What about Yeshayahu (Isaiah) 9:6, where it says he will be called “Mighty God”? That verse doesn’t say he IS God, only that he will be called “Mighty God”. That is more of a warning about the creation of the Trinity than it is about confirming the Messiah is God.

(In the description is a link to a message I just did about this misleading verse).

The fact is that there is not one, single reference to the Messiah in the Tanakh, which is the definitive source for knowing how to identify the Messiah, that indicates he is actually God.

Not one.

A man whose name was Tertullian, sometime around the middle of the second century, is the first one to use the term “trinity” when referring to Yeshua, and that is where this whole idea came from. The Gospel of John is the most often quoted source for any validation of Yeshua’s divinity, and that gospel is recognized to be so very different from the other three that it is suspect.

Personally, I totally reject the entire gospel of John, and even more than that, not only do I believe it is not a valid gospel, but I don’t even think it was written by a Jew! But, I digress…

God’s plan of salvation is simple: if you are stained with sin, you cannot enter into God’s presence. The way to be “saved”, i.e., to be in God’s presence, is to be cleansed of sin. This was done through the sacrificial system, with the blood of an innocent thing (lamb or goat) being spilled to atone for the sin of a person; the animal’s life served as a substitution for the person’s life (the life of a thing is in its blood-Leviticus 17:11) .

In Deuteronomy 12:11, God states that the only place a sacrifice can be made is where he places his name. Initially, this was at the Tent of Meeting (where the Ark was kept), and later at the temple in Jerusalem. That place has never changed.

With the destruction of the temple in 73 AD, there was no way that, in accordance with the Torah, anyone could be saved. Ah, but, that is where the plan for a Messiah now comes into play. The Messiah is a human being born from the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit), making him the Son of God (literally, not just spiritually), who would be the only human being able to live in complete accord with the Torah, 100% of the time, and as such be an acceptable sacrifice for sin.

This is essential! The Messiah has to be human to be an acceptable sin sacrifice! He has to be able to sin, otherwise his sinless life is just a cheat. There is no value in being sinless if you can’t sin, to begin with, which would be true if Yeshua was God. That is why Isaiah, in Isaiah 53, tells us that the Messiah was 100% human, that he knew illnesses and was as susceptible to sin as anyone else.

You’ve got to understand this: lambs are born sinless, but not humans, so for a human being to be sinless takes self-discipline, humility, and faithful obedience to God. An animal can’t be faithful but a human can, so for a human being, i.e., the Messiah, to be an acceptable sacrifice, he must have the ability to sin.

God can’t sin. That’s right, Folks- if you believe Yeshua is God, then your salvation can’t be real because God can’t sin, he can’t die, he can’t be a sacrifice, and God can’t forgive himself because he can’t sin, in the first place.

If Yeshua is God, that turns the entire sacrificial system upside down, and renders it impotent!

Faithful acceptance of Yeshua as the Messiah is the only way we can be saved- we are not saved by believing Yeshua is God, but by believing he is the Messiah God created and sent to the earth to provide a means for us to receive forgiveness of sin.

Like it or not, Yeshua HAS to be the 100% human Messiah, created by God through Miryam and not God in the flesh, in order to fulfill the prophecies about the Messiah and to be an acceptable sacrifice; otherwise, God’s plan of salvation can’t work.

Thank you for being here and please remember to 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!

Yeshua and the Snake

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In John’s Gospel, Yeshua says that he will be lifted up like the snake in the desert. Many consider this to be a prophetic statement about how he will die, but I believe it means more than that.

I believe he is saying he will become an idol, replacing his father as God.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

I suppose we should start by reviewing the snake incident.

In Numbers 21, after the people kvetched (again!) about something, God sent poisonous snakes to bite and kill them as punishment. The people repented, and asked to be saved, so God had Moses make a brass serpent and place it high on a pole. When someone was bitten, they only had to look towards the snake and they would not die.

(You know, there is an entire message in that one sentence, how people sinned and would not die but still suffered the consequences of their sin, i.e., they still got bitten! But that is for another time; actually, I just recalled I already did a message on that one, and I’ll put a link to it in the Description.)

Now, what happened to that snake is not mentioned again until centuries later, in 2 Kings 18, when we learn that this snake, which originally was designed to represent God’s salvation from death (by snakebite) was now being worshipped as an idol, a god in and of itself, and it was being called Nehushtan (“Nachash” is Hebrew for snake). King Hezekiah had it destroyed.

Now let’s see why Yeshua chose that event to tell us what will happen to him.

Yeshua was placed on a stake for all to see, and he tells us that those who see him there and believe in him will be saved. Just like those who saw the bronze serpent on a pole and believed in God would be saved.

Prophecy fulfilled, right? Not quite.

The snake was later turned into a god, and what the “Church” has done is the same thing with Yeshua, changing what he is (the Messiah FROM God) into God, himself!

Christians constantly pray to Yeshua instead of to God, they ask Yeshua for forgiveness, when God is the only one who can forgive, and they thank Yeshua for blessings in their life when those blessings come from God!

Let’s get something straight: While Yeshua did say he had authority to forgive sins (Matthew 9:6), he specifies that he has this authority on the earth. This is also in two other gospels, and the reason he says that is to prove he is coming from God, NOT that he is God, and since he is no longer on the earth, the sin forgiveness thing has reverted back to Daddy.

The prophecy Yeshua made was a dual-prophecy: first, a soon-to-occur prophecy that Yeshua would be raised on a stake and secondly, as a future prophecy that he would be worshipped and replace God.

Exactly what happened with the snake.

So, if you find yourself praying to Yeshua, stop it- pray to God.

If something wonderful happens in your life, don’t thank Jesus- thank God.

And next time someone tells you that it is all about Yeshua, remind them (as you are being reminded, now) that for Yeshua, it was ALWAYS only and totally about his father in heaven.

Hey, look- if Yeshua said it is all about his father, and that his father forgives, and that his father blesses, and that he only did and said what his father told him to do and say (that’s in John), then who are you or I to say anything different?

Yeshua always referred to himself as separate from God, identifying as the Son of God, and he always considered himself subservient to God, so how do you think he feels when people worship him instead of his Father?

Thank you for being here and please remember to 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!

Does Isaiah 9:5-6 Really Say The Messiah Will Be Almighty God?

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One of the most well-known prophecies in the Tanakh (everything in the Bible before Matthew) regarding the Messiah to come is Isaiah 9:5-6, where we are told that the Messiah will be called (among other things) the Almighty God.

But does that mean the Messiah will be God, or just that he will be called God?

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

There are many, MANY versions of the Bible, and most of them are interpreted by Christians. There are a number of Jewish interpretations, of course, so let’s see where some are the same, and some are different when we look at Isaiah 9:5-6 (remember that not all Bible interpretations have the exact same numbering.)

The JPS Hebrew-English Tanakh (1999) says: “He has been named ‘The Mighty God is planning grace*; The Eternal Father, a peaceful ruler...”

( * It references Isaiah 25:1, where another prophecy
mentions how God has planned graciousness of old.)

The Sefaria (a non-profit digital library of Hebrew texts) interprets it this way: “He has been named ‘The Mighty God is planning grace; The Eternal Father, a peaceable ruler'”.

The KJV says: “~ and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.”

The NIV says: “And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

The Complete Jewish Bible says: “Pele-Yo‘etz El Gibbor
Avi-‘Ad Sar-Shalom [Wonder of a Counselor, Mighty God, Father of Eternity, Prince of Peace]”

And let’s look at one more Jewish version, Chabad’s Complete Jewish Tanakh: “~ the wondrous adviser, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, called his name, ‘the prince of peace’.”

(This one seems to be describing God, and that God will call the Messiah the “Prince of Peace”.)

So… who is correct?

Every Christian version I looked at (and I looked at more than just the ones here) said he would be called some version of “Almighty God”, and I even saw that in some of the Jewish versions.

But as you see, some other Jewish versions do not call him mighty God, but show that the mighty God calls him the Prince of Peace.

Interesting, isn’t it? The more Orthodox Jewish interpretations do not indicate Messiah will be God, while most every other version, some Jewish and all the Christian ones, indicate that Messiah will be God.

But wait a minute! Does it say he will be God, or does it say he will be called God?

You know, there’s quite a difference between what one is called, and what one is. Think of all the things you have been called throughout your lifetime, and ask yourself if what you have been called is always really what you are.

During my lifetime the things people have called me isn’t really what I am…. well, maybe some of the things, but not all of them!

Remember how Yeshua said that he would be like the snake in the desert (John 3:14)? And remember that the snake set up by Moses in Numbers 21:9, to represent God’s salvation from the snake bites, was later worshipped as a god and called Nehushtan (2 Kings 18)?

Well, I believe Yeshua’s prophecy wasn’t just about how he would die (being raised on a stake), but also how he would later be worshipped as a god; actually, as the one and only God. He knew that people would replace worship of the one, true God, his father, with him: praying to him, asking him for forgiveness, and basically replacing his father with him, something Yeshua would never have even thought of doing.

I believe this passage from Isaiah has been misunderstood, and now is being used as a justification for the Trinitarian belief that God (the father) and Yeshua (the Messiah) are the same entity.

As I said earlier, there is a BIG difference between what someone is called, and what they are. I am inclined to go along with the more Orthodox Jewish interpretation that indicates the Messiah will be called, BY GOD, the “Prince of Peace.” That the authority placed on his shoulders will be from God, and not self-generated (which, if Messiah is God, would have to be the case).

In Matthew 22:45, Yeshua disarms the Pharisees trying to trick him by asking them why, in Psalm 110:1, does David call his son (meaning the Messiah) “Lord”? Yeshua points out that if the Messiah is David’s son, how can he be David’s Lord? Similarly, if Yeshua is the almighty God, how can he be a prince?

I wonder how, after all these centuries, no one has noticed this obvious disparity? If the Messiah is the almighty God, then how can he be a prince of anything? Wouldn’t he, as God, have to be the Lord of Peace? Or the King of Peace? Whatever, if he was the almighty God, he certainly wouldn’t be just a Prince of Peace, would he?

This is why I go along with the Orthodox Jewish interpretation that indicates when the Messiah is born, he will be a counsellor, he will be a prince of peace, and his authority and rulership will come from God, but he will not be God.

I also believe that the interpretations saying the Messiah will be called almighty God are based on Christian Trinitarianism, and the Jewish Bible versions that also say “almighty God” are wrong, as well.

To finalize, it is imperative to accept that what someone is called is not what they are. Yeshua said we can tell who people are by their fruits, so, nu … what fruits did Yeshua demonstrate? Well, when I read the Gospels, it appears to me that his fruits were always giving his father, God, the credit for everything, and he never called himself the almighty God.

Thank you for being here and please remember to 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 this week, so l’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!

How Do You Free Something That Doesn’t Exist?

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I generally try to keep away from politics, but with so many young people who are totally ignorant of the truth screaming “FREE PALESTINE!”, I need to set the record straight. This is more than just politics- it is Satan acting against God’s people.

So, to all those young, misled people, my question is this: since there is no country called Palestine, how do you free it?

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

To begin with, let’s review the actual history:

  1. Sometime around 1407 BC, Joshua and the Israelites (named at that time after their ancestor, not the country) entered what was then called Canaan, and under orders from God took over the land. They were supposed to have eliminated all the sinful and paganistic people throughout the entire territory God promised them, but they failed to do that. Subsequently, since that time to today there are people all around what is now called the state of Israel who want to kill the Jews living there, and who wouldn’t be there if what Joshua was supposed to do had been done.
  2. After the split of the kingdom under Rehoboam (Solomon’s son) circa 930 BC, the Northern Kingdom was called Israel, and later Shomron. The Southern Kingdom (composed mainly of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin) was called Judea.
  3. The Northern Kingdom was overthrown by the Assyrians (722 BC), Judea was overthrown by Babylon (586 BC), and Cyrus the great allowed the exiles to return to Judea and rebuild the temple (circa 538 BC). Later, around 63 BC, Rome conquered and ruled Judea.
  4. In 135 AD, after the Bar Kochba revolution, Rome renamed the province of Judea to Syria Palaestina. This renaming was a deliberate act aimed at severing the Jewish connection to the land, and to add insult to injury since Palaestina was the Latin name for the Philistines, the ancient enemies of the Jews. 
  5. Fast forward to 1920, when Britain gained control of Palestine after the League of Nations granted them a mandate to administer the territory following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. It remained as Palestine until 1948, when Britain gave the land to the Jews, who established the state of Israel, effectively removing “Palestine” from existence.

That’s the history, so there is no “Palestine” anywhere, any more- it is Israel, and it is a Jewish land, legally owned by the Jews, not to mention granted to us by God nearly 5,000 years ago.

What is now being called the “Palestinian people” are really (mostly) Syrians and Jordanians who were going in and out of the land (now) called Israel, tending their flocks but NEVER establishing any permanent dwellings or settlements in the land. They were nomads, and the idea of a Palestinian people is the result of a propaganda campaign created by Yassa Arafat sometime in 1964 when he created the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO).

The expulsion of the Arabs from Israel after the 1967 War was done to rid the land of potential enemies, and that land (which included Gaza at that time) was officially and legally owned by the Jewish population of Israel.

Now that you have the historically validated facts, if you run into some of those people screaming to free Palestine, maybe you can set them straight?

But I doubt they would listen. The world is full of people who don’t care about facts or truth, but just want to make noise, act like they are fighting for the underdog, and have no real justification for what they are protesting for or against… they just like to protest.

If they really believe that what they are doing is ethically correct and morally justified, why are they always wearing masks to hide their identity?

Sadly, they may never really realize how they have been misled and how horrible their actions have been: not just by supporting antisemitic terrorism, but by actually commending unethical and illegal actions against other human beings.

If it was being done to their friends and family, they would be twice as loud against it.

Thank you for being here and please share these messages- especially this one- 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!

Salvation: Same in Old, Same in New

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I believe if you ask most Believers what is the main difference between the Tanakh (the “Jewish” Bible) and the New Covenant regarding salvation, they will say the old way was through works, and the new way is only through faith.

Well, they would be right, but for the wrong reasons.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

In the entire Bible, Genesis through Revelation, the only thing that saves us is faith. But faith in what?

Christians will say faith in Jesus, but what the heck does that mean? Faith that he existed? Faith that he was immaculately conceived? Faith that he is the Messiah God promised to send? Faith that he was resurrected? Faith that he did what the Gospels tell us he did?

My answer is faithfully believing that he was the son of God through divine conception, that he was (and still is) the Messiah God promised to send, that his death was accepted as a once-and-for-all sin sacrifice (proven by his resurrection), and that through his sacrifice we can ask God to forgive our sins any time, any where, because his sacrifice replaced the need to bring an animal to the temple in Jerusalem.

Which has proven to be really convenient since the temple was destroyed nearly 2000 years ago.

My answer also includes that the way we demonstrate that faith is to obey the Torah, which is what Yeshua did throughout his lifetime, and what we must do if we truly want to follow in his footsteps and live as he did.

And doesn’t Christianity state that is an essential part of being Christian? Yet, sadly, they say “Do as Jesus did” while teaching to do everything except what Jesus did!

TIME OUT: When I said Yeshua’s sacrifice was a once-and-for-all event, I did not mean that all sins are automatically forgiven, which some Christian religions teach. No! I mean that when he sacrificed himself, it replaced the need to bring an animal to the temple in Jerusalem, which the Torah required for any sacrifice. We still have to fulfill every step of the sacrificial system for sin: we have to be accountable (confession), we have to be remorseful (repentance), we have to have the shedding of innocent blood as our substitution (that’s the part Yeshua took care of), and we have to do T’shuvah (turn from sin) as we go forward.

Throughout the Tanakh the means of salvation was obedience to the Torah, mainly because the Messiah hadn’t come yet. But the requirement for salvation was still faith-based.

God said that sacrifices and offerings mean nothing without obedience; read 1 Samuel 15:22, or Isaiah 1:11-14 or Jeremiah 7:21-23, or Psalm 51:16-17… they all say that obedience is more important than sacrifices or offerings, meaning that just going through the motions is useless without obedience, meaning faithfulness!

Going through the motions is obeying, isn’t it? So how can God say obeying means nothing without obedience? It’s because when he says “obedience”, he means faithful obedience, i.e., obeying from faith that what God says is righteous and correct.

Truth be told, Yeshua proved that someone CAN be saved by obedience to the Torah because he was 100% obedient, and after he died he was resurrected to eternal life in God’s presence. The “fly in the ointment” is that we humans are born sinful and not filled with the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit) as Yeshua was. As such, we don’t have a chance of being 100% Torah observant, 100% of the time as he was.

That’s why God planned for a Messiah right from the get-go.

The New Covenant is all about faith in Yeshua, but the problem is that most Christian faith is misplaced. Some believe Yeshua is God, some believe he is the son of God but that he forgives sin, and some even pray to dead people. Most Christian religions, whether Trinitarian or not, have gotten to the point where they pray to Yeshua instead of to God, effectively replacing God with Yeshua.

That is changing Yeshua from an obedient son (like Isaac was) into a rebellious, throne-stealing son (like Absalom was.)

How can we find salvation through a Messiah who teaches to ignore God? If Yeshua taught to ignore the Torah, he committed treason against the King (God) and was a sinner. And we know sinners don’t get to be in God’s presence.

And those who follow sinners are the blind being led by the blind, and both will fall into a hole. That hole goes all the way down to Sheol.

So, both the Old and New Covenants teach we are saved by faith:

  • Non-believing Jews faithfully obey the Torah (well, at least as best as they can) while faithfully waiting for the Messiah
  • Messianic Jews (like me) faithfully accept Yeshua IS the Messiah God promised to send, and we also faithfully obey God’s Torah (again, as best as we can)
  • Most every Christian religion teaches that they need to only have faith in Jesus (again, whatever the heck that is supposed to mean) and to love each other. The BIG mistake they make it that they totally ignore doing as God said to do, as Yeshua did throughout his lifetime, and which is the only acceptable proof that their faith is genuine.

Bottom line? Faith is not just one or the other, Jesus or Torah, law or lawlessness, but it is both sides of the same coin: one side is faithfully believing Yeshua is the Messiah and the other side is proving that faith through obeying God’s instructions (in the Torah).

Thank you for being here and please remember to 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 this week, so l’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!